THE YEAR THAT WASN’T

What did I learn in the past year? Don't make too many plans as life can change when you least expect it. After working on a solo exhibition and my involvement in the Grampians Arts Trail, I had planned to take the rest of the year off to downsize my garden. But that did not happen and I became involved in a project that ate up a very large chunk of mine and many others lives, along with most of the year I should add. What did become clear to me is that although we are aware of the fact that we should be looking after our precious environment, bad projects and the argument that it is 'good for the economy' seems to rule. Climate change being the hottest topic, and the one that governments seem to not want to address. Although I am not a Catholic, Pope Francis is winning my admiration in his stand on climate change and our need to act now. Mid year I purchased a new camera and planned to walk in the forest armed with a field guide to our wildflowers in an attempt to be able to identify and get a better idea of when their short season is in relation to being able to go back at the same time each year. As we had no spring rains here the flowers were very disappointing. I volunteered in an orchid watch program. Each year the spider orchids are tagged, documented and comparisons are made to the previous 10 years that they have been surveying the same area. The results were terribly disappointing this year and highlighted the dry season. I did get the chance to photograph some of our unique flowers and uploaded them onto a new blog. Everyone lives in a part of the world that is unique in its own way so the new blog is just a photo essay of my local region. This year I hope to not miss out on our short wildflower season.
In some quiet time this morning I re watched this talk given by Alice Waters at the Sydney Opera House late last year. Incredibly inspiring and it cements the way that I would like to see the future evolve.