One Small Thing: Rachel Hore
Whether we are enjoying it or not, life has slowed right
down and there is plenty of time to pay attention to small things: delicate
seedlings that we’re nurturing in a window box, a delicious snack we’ve been
looking forward to or a phone call with a friend.
I find it hard to write creatively at this time because of a
low thrum of anxiety, but I have found it possible to edit the novel that I’d
been working on. This has now been
despatched to my editor and whilst I wait for her response I wander aimlessly
about the house, starting minor tasks, such as painting a skirting board, and
forgetting to finish them before I turn to something else. And there is always housework. My husband does a fair bit, but is dismayed
to realise the terrible truth that as soon as he’s cleaned the house it gets
dirty again. I smile to think that women
throughout history have always known this.
Whilst doing a little dusting I regularly come upon this
carving and wonder at it anew. It’s a
young nanny goat, so dainty that she fits onto the edge of a shallow bookshelf
where I keep my poetry collection. I
found her a few years ago in an art gallery in Cley on the North Norfolk coast
and loved her at once. Shortly before, I
had read Edmund de Waal’s memoir The Hare
with Amber Eyes, in which he uses his collection of
netsuke – tiny carved Japanese figures – as a way of delving into the history
of his family. This wild caprine
creature would be my very own netsuke and I snapped her up!
There is something wild about her, as though the artist
alighted on her sleeping in a forest glade.
Every detail of the carving is perfect and she herself is lovely; look
at the curve of her spine, the sweetness of her pointed face, her tender horns
and her tiny tucked-up tail. I can’t
make my mind up what she’s made of, horn or resin, but she feels so smooth and
it’s comforting to hold her in the safety of my palm, to stroke her with my
finger and to be reminded of what matters in life.
RH
25 May 20
You can find out more about Rachel's work here. Her latest novel, The Love Child was a Sunday Times bestseller and is available at Amazon, Hive and Waterstones.
Stay well, stay safe, stay home.
