Currently sat watching some nonsense (thing about the making of Merlin that might make more sense if I actually watched Merlin). This after watching a baffling teenage programme called ‘The Cut’, that only served to make me really very pleased I’m not a teenager anymore. I am struggling to find enough distracting material on iPlayer*.
Continue Reading…
This first bit is by way of an introduction.
About twelve years ago I asked my grandfather( my mum’s dad) to talk to me about his life. Unlike my mum who had grown up with all of his gruesome war stories I had heard none of them. Nor indeed did I know much about his life prior to my mother’s existence. My grandmother was in mid-stage dementia at the time, so by and large convinced that Richard Whitely lived in her sitting room, and thus I didn’t get to repeat the exercise with her.
I have been thinking lately that I wanted to do something with what I learned, especially given that I have spent a good deal of time lately reading about what was probably the most significant experience in his life (and many of his peers I imagine), the second world war.
I did consider just typing up everything, but I’m not sure that would do it justice. His writing style is un-fluid (it’s genetic!) and I think would be hard to follow, and I don’t want to mess with his words too much. That would be inappropriate.
So instead I decided to draw. There are words too. It’d be baffling without. My drawing style isn’t perfect and is idiosyncratic, but it’s mine and I kinda like it.
This is the first of five parts:
After my very wordy last post I thought I’d share some old rehersal photos I found a few days ago. I don’t do well with flash, I wasn’t drunk. Truly. Oddly I think I prefer me now to 19/20 year old me. Although I wouldn’t mind the waistline back.
This is Sutton Scarsdale Hall. Or rather this is what’s left of it.
Number of photos on this page reduced because my server was crying… So these are on Flickr as are the rest of the set, all 79 of ‘em, here in my Flickr set.
So we’ve done, what I wear. Now it’s your turn. All two of you so far, but anyone can join in this one at anytime….
The two joinees so far are both male, which does seem to make a difference, in that there isn’t a great deal of difference. I don’t think this is because men are less interested in what they wear per se, just that the choice of men’s clothing is frankly limited. Especially in the West. Yes you can have a wardrobe of forty odd different t-shirt designs, ten completely dissimilar shirts and trousers in every fabric going. Basically though it’s the same three items of clothing. I imagine that a large part of this is down to socially acceptable, it being the case that even on avant garde catwalks the sight of men in a frock is still considered daring. And not just in the Daily Mail.
A while ago I was half watching something on television and someone commented that the human world is different to animals and birds, as in the animal kingdom it is the males that make the effort, whereas for humans it is opposite. It hasn’t always been the case, and certainly in some non-Western cultures male dress continues to be highly impressive. In Western Europe male extravagance in dress was common and regarded a symbol of status. Continue Reading…
