Vada Bobada

Owls, maps, and a really good cry…

---

Thank you to each and every one of you for reading along this year. I love this little space on the internet and I’m so happy that you are here with me. Thank you xxx

---

Merry week-in-between Robin Robins,

I quite like this dead week, this liminal space between the end and the beginning. It contains all the satisfaction of completion and the excitement of the possible, without the actual embarkation. It’s s safe space for me. Whilst usually a huge fan of the beginning of things - new projects, new notebooks, new terms - the conjunction with the turn of the year spooks me more than thrills me. In fact, I think the only year-turning I’ve dived headfirst into was 1999/2000 - when a somewhat nihilistic 18 year old me and my friends sat on a hilltop in Wales waiting for the world to end, as the sun rose over the valley.

I get the feeling however, that most people dislike this week, or at best feel indifferent about it. So here to get you through is a list of links to keep you entertained/distracted/thinking:

1. You know by now that I love really old books and manuscripts - so it’s no surprise that I also love really old maps.

2. This substack by

   Claire Zulkey
   of Evil Witches made me laugh out loud - I mean, we have a room in our house affectionally called ‘the poo room’ which isn’t even the bathroom.

3. I’m on the second round of roughs for the book cover I’m currently illustrating, so this article about versions of covers that could have been feels pretty close to home at the moment.

4. We do a book advent every year - I basically hide our festive/wintery books away and then one reappears each day of advent. This year I added a new book, Jon Klassen’s How Does Santa Go Down the Chimney - Library Mice have written an excellent article about his masterful page layouts.

5. I might love owls more than books. Maybe. Whilst researching for my latest Literature Brief with Pathways Into I stumbled upon this magnificent Who’s Who of owls - I love it.

6. Watch: imposter syndrome and nobody is normal.

7. Don’t hate on me for linking this - crying is good for you - although I got Vada Sultenfuss sobbing “He can’t see without his glasses” on my second click and needed a cup of tea to recover*

8. I don’t usually mind the shorter days and darkness of Winter, I look forward to filling our home with fairy lights and candles - but this year the darkness of the world has been ever oppressive.

   Naomi Krueger
   finds solace in the words of the 1962 children’s book ‘ A Wrinkle In Time’ by Madeleine L’Engle.

9. Dun dun dun duuun! - how rockstar composer Ludwig van Beethoven takes us through a dark world and delivers us into the light.

   

   10.

I’m not going to ask you to consider becoming a paid subscriber this month. Instead I’m going to ask you to please donate, just the price of a coffee, to Doctors Without Borders - and if you are already a paid subscriber, I will donate your December payment.

Wishing you everything you need this week, and I will see you on the other side.

Love,

*from 1991 film, My Girl - which made me bawl as a 10 year old and still does today.