Author: bella

memories riding me west

Posted on by bella
Pointing to the West

I’m sick at home with the flu. It’s been trying to catch up with me for weeks but i’ve been dodging it like an son of a bitch. But i could only run for so long. And so here we are. I’m investing some well earned time into my blog today and i’ve been digging into my dark pit of old photographs. Boy, it sure is easy to lose yourself in the past.

When i was little i didn’t play all that much with other children. I was busy playing cowboys and Indians at Mormor & Morfars house. Morfar, as long as i can remember, has always been John Wayne to me. I also thought Mormor was secretly a witch because she had a very questionable broom stick in the garage, but Morfar was Big John Wayne with the personality of an angry buffalo. He was the Duke because he folded the ends of his jeans the same way. My jeans were always too long for me because i was so small — so he’d fold mine too because theres no need to ruin the end of your cowboy jeans if it can be avoided. In Denmark thats what we called Jeans “Cowboy trousers.” Morfar is taller than the mast on a rigger — he also has a burly step to his walk.
He still has/does all these things. It’s one of the many things that early on in my life pointed to something bringing me west. I used to have a small belt buckle with three rope rings on it and in the rope rings was a conestoga wagon, a team of 8 horses and two people riding to a new homestead in the west. Jack and i probably. All this time i carried us on my belt. Until it didn’t fit and i grew woman hips. In England i would make bows and arrows out of sticks and string. And that i could fire a crossbow better than the man who owned it.  Even in nursery i remember sitting in a random tube in a hole in the ground wearing big black cowboy boots that didn’t fit (sorry mor — i lied so you’d buy them for me). But i wanted them and i wore them, they must have made a difference considering i live my everyday in cowboy boots. There are many little things in my life that seemed to nudge me towards what was going to happen.

Morfar and his folded Jeans, with me on his shoulders and Steph hiding behind him.

I wanted to share some of my photographs from that life on this blog. I don’t know why i didn’t blog back then. I tried a couple of times but life was getting pretty complicated and i could barely keep up. Surprisingly i also don’t have that many photographs from Texas, but that was because i was so busy living. I’d found life so god damn hard up until that point — but now there was a reason to try harder. To be better. To be a new person and a greater version of me — the me i recognise. And i look at her every day in the mirror now. Though somedays i might not like her face i so appreciate her for what she’s done for me and got me through. I can look at her in the eye and tell her she did the work of a woman who could fly. A person who believed she could so she did.

I’m sure some of you question whether i had anything that stopped me wanting to move to Texas. Yes, i had a few small things in the back of my mind that concerned me but i’ve never been one to listen that well. And i went anyway. Before i met Jack i never wanted to go to America, and i felt terrible for everything the First nations were put through. I wanted no part of that which is why i never wanted to step foot on that land. I didn’t want to move further away from my family either and i so wanted to grow old in Denmark. Sometimes i still do. But i know i’m not meant for that life. I’ve lived so long away from home — that home is anywhere now. If i returned home i would never belong again and it would feel like everything was a dream. The absolute hardest part of moving was giving up my sailing life and it’s still a wound that i scratch at once in a while, but i’m also aware enough to know that that part of my life was supposed to bring me to something better than where i’d been. Sailing was the last beautiful gift England gave me after the harsh years i had where i was. And i got my best friend for life, but i had to leave and move on to find where i was supposed to be. So yes these things can still get on my mind and i still have to work to figure them out but for now I bring to you — Texas as seen through my eyes.

The brazos river. One of my favourite places in Texas so far and in almost every western you’ll ever read. Ain’t she pretty?
The sunset in Texas is out of this world. Its where the earth meets the stars. And the mule smiles. So — that tells you how damn rare it is to see a sky like this anywhere else.
You wont find a town in Texas that doesn’t have old secrets of whores, railroads or just beautiful architecture.
The most handsome man any which way from the Mississippi.
A backend rail road haunted by the corpse of a dead’n gone dog the size of a car. You think i’m lying, but it’s true. I thought about sharing the picture but it still breaks my heart to see. As i’ve said before — Texas isn’t always pretty. It’s harsh living and you see a little of it every day. Folk from Texas are made of something different.
Home-decor inspiration.
Barrel racin’ !
Huntsville Rodeo.
I’ll always remember the Alamo. I remember her like an old friend. When i saw her from behind the trees i wept. I’d heard about her from Morfars stories and the old westerns on Tv. Right in front of me she was, and she was perfect.
A friend gave me an old hat — you don’t give a hat to a man you dislike.
Farm country.
An old abandon town with an old abandoned buck board.
An old gas station.
I never had the issue of snakes coming into my living room when i lived in England, funny that. But this garter was a cutie.
I want one. A Texas longhorn.
Lizards, lizards everywhere! I even showered with one. Im still not entirely sure which one of us was more traumatised.
Fields of a hundred prison ponies, and they’re all the sweetest and easiest going horses i’ve met in my life. And i met a lot of horses and a lot of horse people.
Strong and beautiful culture with dances that sing like the wind.
The old buckboard is open to homesteaders wanting to go back on the Oregon Trail.
My first shot was barely a cm from the bullseye. When we get our own land — i’ll be the next Annie Oakley, just not quiet as sophisticated.
Praying mantis — i’d only ever seen these creatures on tv. Now this guy was living on my porch.
The most beautiful butterfly i’ve seen in my entire life. Again — on my porch.
A Texan worth moving 4000miles for.
Probably the strangest visitor we’ve had… but still. I dont mind letting these guys sleep outside the door.
When he knew i was leaving. And i didn’t see him for 8 months. When we all already belonged to eachother, and the harder times were still to come.
Wide open spaces and beauty at every roadside. Even if its just another gate to another field, in another town.
In the dying sunlight the babies will piss off their mothers and start to play.
Out in the middle of bum fuck Egypt nowhere Texas, where the wind was high but sun was higher. We stopped the car for a few minutes just to take it in. The view. The air. The sky.
The longest and most incredible road i ever saw.
A folk festival and Jacks big hat.
Our boy on our first walk in a park as the three musketeers.
The herd at the farm we worked at a while.
I’ve never met a horse or a donkey that didn’t love Jack.
Angel had a lot of opinions that day, but it was a fantastic ride with great company.
Probably one of my favourite pictures i’ve ever taken, because this is a picture of utter happiness. Of a dream lived and realised. Of hard work. Breaking barriers. Living. And you know what else? Folded jean bottoms.
Texas was hard and circumstances arose so we tried something new, but to me — this is what Texas was to me. Everything right in this picture. So, im glad we tried leaving but i’ll be a lot happier to get back to an old porch where my boots can clomp on the boards. Where the hot sun is dying and Jack is grilling something. And Basil, though he’s not here anymore — he’s in every damn plan i’ll ever make.

[I’d like to clarify that Jack would not be grilling Basil, i just noticed how that last quote sounded.]
♡

the coming of spring

Posted on by bella

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Hello everyone! ♡
I’m still alive — this week has been a little lazy for me regarding the blog. I meant to write a few times but ended up falling asleep or doing something else. I’ve been in the woods a lot recently and its good for my soul. Its not really a “wood” more like a random little nature area buried between big roads and housing communities; but i can hide in there and there’s nature living amongst the stones. So i will take it for its worth. It’s all i have until i get back to the rolling deserts and piney woods of the South. The birds have started to sing in choirs at the coming of spring and its so incredible to listen to them whispering between the tree tops. Blue jays, woodpeckers and “mormor fugle” as i call them. In the distance you can hear the hawk, sometimes even the bald eagles of fairytales, and thats when the singing stops and the birds start to scream, alerting each other of the danger lingering in the clouds.

spring is in the air and all the birds are singing about it.

 

my sad old thoughts

Posted on by bella

Hello!
Its one of those nights where i find myself reminiscing and looking back at where i’ve been. If i were given the chance i would still be an avid sailor, but sadly thats not how my life is panning out — at least right now. And it sure as hell wont if i live in the panhandle of Texas one day. But i made it happen at one point in my life because it was something i desperately wanted for myself — i needed it. I got my certificates and i can read a chart like a boss. Through sailing i found freedom and a best friend. So, even though it maybe now be years ago… i never shall forget, how precious those moments will forever be to me. When Pat is long gone — how precious he is and will always be to me.
Realistically, i don’t know when i will ever get back to England. The prices go up and up for plane tickets.
And i’ll be honest. My heart aches at the thought that i may never see my old shipmate again. It would be a blow that will wound me for the rest of my life, but i also know it’s very likely. If it happens, which given the distance and how years roll on without us, it probably will. Just as my family will slowly disappear from my mind as quickly as they will from my life.
There is a truth they never tell you about moving away from home to an entirely different world. 4000miles may as well be a million miles. A skype call can’t fix loneliness — it can only cover the wound for a few minutes.

I just put a favourite old clip to a song we really loved to sing to. It was a beautiful sun down and we were in the middle of the islands in the Bristol Channel. Over the waters where we raced, danced to sea shanties and laughed. Just me, Pat and the boat that sailed us anywhere. There have been many nights, many trips but i’ll always wish for at least one more. Many stories about pirates and treasure, Nelson and the Victory. So many stories since that go somewhat unshared.
I like to make little clips of my life to remind myself that i HAVE lived. I HAVE been there and i HAVE done that. And its ok to be where i am now, even if its hard to see whats in store for me. I know a lot of us probably worry about where we should be and what needs to be done by certain ages. I battle with it often, and its hard having moved from country to country and feeling REALLY “behind.” Where we are now, is where we need to be. No matter how challenging or painful. How beautiful and magic. The important thing is we are living and we can change anything and everything — we just have to dream it, and make it happen.

After all, as Walt Disney said, “if you can dream it, you can do it.”
And we can most definitely do it. Can’t we?

⚓