The Pink Sofa meets Bodicia

The PINK SOFA is delighted to welcome Bodicia. She describes herself as a mother, and grandmother whose interests include geoscience, planetary science, ancient history and civilizations and chocolate. A woman very definitely after the PINK SOFA'S heart in every respect. Bodicia also reviews books on her site A Woman's Wisdom: http://awomanswisdom.wordpress.com/  and is an all round supporter of writers. The Pink Sofa has lost count of the number of times she has kindly retweeted links to its new book: All You Need To Know About Upholstery.

In honour of Bodicia's visit to Hedges Towers, there is fresh coffee and a humongous box of Belgian handmade chocs on the coffee table. So lovely lady ...over to you:

BFinding The Perfect Moment by Bodicia

I was a lucky child; I had the most wonderful grandmother. She would read Enid Blyton’s books to me as I sat on her lap, snuggled and surrounded by her love and transported to faraway lands of adventure and mystery as the Famous Five went on adventures I could only dream of. And dream of them I did.

I found adventures of my own in my grandparent’s garden. I hunted for broken pieces of decorative pottery left over from another era in the sandy soil. I followed butterflies as they danced over purple buddleias and I tried to capture their essence on to mere paper with my ever present colouring pencils. I wrote of elves in the garden and fairies on toadstools. I lay on my back in the grass and watched the birds flying overhead and I wondered what it would be like to glide so freely, held by the invisible power of the wind.

One day I went outside to collect the hen’s eggs and as I rounded the bushes I saw something which, to my childish eye, resembled a pirate’s chest. It was made of slated wood and metal and was big enough for me to fit inside. It was surrounded by bushes and roots and looked as if it had burst from the very soil itself but I reached out to touch it and with mounting excitement I slipped the catch and opened the lid wide, letting loose a musky wooden smell.  As I peeked inside it appeared to be devastatingly empty but a closer inspection revealed a tiny piece of exquisitely embroidered cloth, about three inches square, in the bottom corner.

 I lent right inside and took it back out into the sunlight, running my finger over the faded silks and imagined it a map of places untold of for centuries. I took it to my grandmother who told me her mother had embroidered it and that the chest had belonged to her great uncle who had gone to sea. She gave me the cloth and the chest was taken to my bedroom at home where in times of trouble I would lift the lid, breathe in the perceived memories it held and feel my grandmother’s comforting presence. And I would paint those emotions with words in my stories and colour them in until I was gliding free again.

What I enjoy about the written word is the emotions and memories it invokes. I like to touch a story with all my senses, to taste the emotions and feel them in my core. Life goes by at such a fast pace we sometimes forget to make the time to just ‘be’ and exist in that perfect moment where imagination has no limits and the only thing which exists is the slow beating of a butterfly’s wings.

Thank you, Bodicia for sharing your story.  And while the PINK SOFA absorbs these words of truth and prepares to copy them into its next book, a quick reminder of Bodicia's review site: http://awomanswisdom.wordpress.com/ where you can read lovely reviews like this. 

Meanwhile, Bodicia will be here for a while to chat and hand out chocolates - if she hasn't scoffed them all.....

ccc