Belinda Hollyer

At the end of last year a lovely woman from Seattle – a friend of my American sister – came to tea with me in London, and brought me my very own crystal ball. It says so, as you can see from the photo.

I’ve never been much of a collector of things. I don’t mean that I lead an admirably minimalist life because, alas, I do not; I mean that although I’ve faffed around from time to time, thinking that I might collect pottery cats, or Victorian samplers with rhyming religious verses on them, or even silver apostle spoons (don’t ask, that one didn’t go anywhere) I have never followed through on any of them for long. I still have a few little cats and one beautiful sampler but the apostle spoons are long gone.

An old friend of ours used to have the most astounding range of collections imaginable. He had salt & pepper sets, he had Niagara Falls snow globes, he had obscure medical equipment – the list would be too long. If I saw something I thought he’d like (the Tropical Trash Dept in Fastbuck Freddy’s shop in Key West was always a treasure trove of kitsch) I’d phone and ask if he needed it, ‘need’ being an elastic concept in this context. I’d say something like, “Larry! I just saw a salt and pepper set with an utterly vulgar cat and dog on it, might you like that?” and there’d be a pause, and then he’d say “Is the cat wearing plaid overalls and simpering?” It was. “And does the dog look really gross and does it wear a cap?” It did. “Got that one,” Larry would say, before adding, “and what’s more, I love it dearly.” Go figure.

Anyway. I’ve never consciously saved or collected globes but to my surprise I see I now have three (do three make a collection?). There’s my new crystal ball, there’s a heavy globe maybe made of glass and covered in gold leaf that someone once airmailed me at mortgage-level cost from the other side of the world, and there’s a pretty papier maché apple, probably given to me because I like apples so much. So perhaps this is indeed the start of a new collection, I could add a snow globe, for which I have a none-too-secret affection. Or maybe a small world map globe? And in the meantime I thank Joanne for her kind generosity, and continue to peer into my crystal ball from time to time, to see what’s cooking in my future.

I’ve just joined a new web resource called THE AUTHOR HOTLINE, which is a new website that will be launching to UK schools on 4th March, World Book Day. It’s intended to be a nifty children-friendly resource that schools will be able to use whenever they want, and it’s also a welcome new way for authors, illustrators and poets to publicize their work.
 
Anthony Lishak - the writer whose good idea this is - has had a great response from children’s writers and illustrators and so far there are about 200 profiles in place. The site
has teamed up with World Book Day (which will feature the site on their website) and they’ll jointly organize a quiz/competition to all schools from 4th - 31st March, which will run on the site.

I was delighted to be asked to join and I really enjoyed answering the questions that are posed as part of the authors’ profiles. Do have a look at the site - I’d love you to check out my profile, or just browse around from the home page. This is a very encouraging new development for us all, and I’m very happy to support it.

I went mad this January. Usually the most I attempt in the marmalade field is half a case of organic Seville oranges, which is about 5kg or so. In the recent past I’ve shared a case with a friend who also makes it, but Mary was away this year, and anyway she’s still got some Sevilles in her freezer, so I slightly lost the do-able plot and decided to get what I thought was three quarters of a case all to myself.

But then I really stopped paying attention to reality and managed to order and buy FIFTEEN KILOS of Seville oranges slightly by mistake, and suddenly it all became a rather more serious enterprise than I had bargained for. Fifteen kilos of oranges takes up a lot of room, which we do not have, and our flat is not only small but also very warm (incredible insulation, thank you properly-fitting windows) so I had to use the oranges quickly before they went off. (That’s the downside of organic ones: they don’t last long.)

I’d collected lots of jars during the year, but even so I didn’t have enough of them – not even enough for 10kg of marmalade. What was I thinking? And once I’d decided to grit my teeth and go for it, I also had to trudge off on very many sugar-buying trips. I use as little sugar as possible when I make marmalade because I like it tart and tangy, but even so, to get the stuff to set I’ve found that you have to use at least 750 - 800g of sugar for every 500g of oranges: 900g is safer, but not quite so delicious.

Anyway. I made two helpful decisions to start with: I immediately washed 3kg of oranges and put them in the freezer, and then we drove to Lakeland and bought 24 extra one pound jars. Then Bruce offered to help with all the chopping, which was great because after three batches I started getting bored with that part – or maybe just anxious about how many more times I’d have to do it. And now we’ve finished! All the jars are done and dusted: filled, set to perfection, admired, labelled, and stored away. I don’t think I’ll ever make so much again at one time, but then again, I still have those frozen ones waiting for me…

Most of the batches are straightforward plain marmalade (see the recipe below which is twice as easy as, and much faster than, most of the other recipes I’ve seen around). I also made one batch of ginger marmalade (love or hate – it’s like Marmite) and tried twice to make cardamom-flavoured batches as well. Neither of these turned out as well as the one that had inspired me – Arabica’s ‘Orange and Cardamom marmalade’, which is simply sensational. I couldn’t find a recipe for that, so first of all I tried just adding cardamom pods to the water – a handful of pods when I cooked the oranges, and then a fresh handful of pods at the chopped oranges-and-sugar stage. (I also added a fresh pod to each jar, because there’s at least one in each Arabica jar.) But there’s almost no cardamom flavour at all in my finished product: great marmalade taste, but no spiciness.

So I went back online, and talked to a marmalade-making friend, and with the next batch I crushed up the seeds of about 15 cardamom pods and added those with the sugar (I make 1.5 kg of oranges at a time, which is all that fits comfortable into my preserving pan.). Result: a faint trace of cardamom, but still nothing like the rich but subtle flavour of Arabica’s product.

If anyone has any good suggestions to offer please let me know: those frozen oranges are just longing to be turned into something wonderful. And in the meantime here’s my marmalade recipe, found years ago in the ‘Melbourne Age’ and never bettered. Just don’t go as crazy as I did with the quantities!

GEORGINA WILSON’S MELBOURNE AGE MARMALADE

450g Seville oranges
1120 ml water
900g sugar
(And I always add a lemon to help the pectin along)

Wash the oranges and put them in a preserving pan with the water. Simmer slowly for about an hour and a half, or until a skewer easily pierces the skin. Keep the remaining water and cool the oranges enough to handle them. (I do this part of the recipe last thing so the oranges cool overnight in the pan, and then make the marmalade the next day.)

Cut the oranges into small thick strips (I used to do this by hand: not any more, I confess, although Bruce still does this bit by hand when he’s the co-cook) retaining all the pulp and juice, but extracting the pips. Put the pips in a little saucepan, cover them with water, and boil steadily for at least 10 minutes to extract the pectin, which forms a sticky scum on top. Add the pectin water to the preserving pan and repeat if necessary. (I never throw the pips away until the marmalade has set, just in case…)

Add the chopped peel, pulp and juice to the preserving pan, and bring the mixture to a boil. Then tip in the sugar (you’re supposed to warm the sugar but I never bother) reduce the heat and stir until the sugar has dissolved, then bring back up to a brisk boil.

Boil rapidly until the marmalade reached setting point (I assume you know how to test for that). It can take only 15 minutes but usually it takes mine about 40 minutes.

Leave it to settle for 5-10 minutes and then pour/spoon into sterilised jars and cool before sealing.

You’ll need to refrigerate it after you open it because it’s got such a small quantity of sugar. I usually reduce it further to 800g, rather than the 900g the original recipe specifies.

Happy marmalade making!

I’ve done two interviews for young readers in the last couple of weeks. Here’s a link to the latest one, a well-conceived blog called the mile long bookshelf, which is run by an enterprising 11-year-old called Amber Kirk. Amber’s also involved in contributing to at least two other blogs, as well as acting in drama club productions in her spare time. Quite a girl!

Anyway, I liked doing the interview a lot - the questions were thought-provoking and spurred me into a good writing schedule for the new year. So thanks again, Amber.

I have found a number of things to be true in the past few weeks that I didn’t know before. Here are three of them.

• I can’t take a good photo of Minnie Mouser, the lovely cat I share in Key West. The only result that’s anywhere near OK has her looking cross, which is completely untypical and relates to her not liking the flash on my camera. But trying to take her photo reminds me of trying to photograph warthogs in Namibia, some years ago. There they are, rootling away at the side of the road in typical piggy fashion, and apparently unconcerned by passing traffic – but the second you slow your car down even slightly to try to photograph them they’re up and off, running at a remarkable speed. I got a lot of blurred photos of warthog bottoms in the middle distance, but none of warthogs rootling. And Minnie photos are rather similar, because she spends most of her time at ground level, and as soon as I kneel down to photograph her she’s up too close and in my lap wanting to be stroked, or winding herself around my legs: she has no concept of staying still and posing. I’d say I need a faster shutter speed, and a better zoom lens – or else I need to find her asleep, preferably on a raised site, and sneak up on her. But anyway, here’s a photo of the peerless Minnie Mouser, even if it doesn’t apparently catch her best mood. I realised on this trip that she must be at least 12 years old although she still looks and behaves like a young cat. And oh! Those whiskers! Those eyes!

• I have never felt confident about driving a rental car alone from Key West to Miami airport. Driving down would be easier but I’m too tired after the long flight to risk the journey; driving up is a better option but fraught with sudden and unexpected choices and lane-changes. But this time I drove up with Bruce in the passenger seat making notes about the hard bits and I now have perfect crib notes for a solo trip. So – hurrah! Yes I can!

• Who knew this: there’s actually an organisation that produces poems for doctors’ waiting rooms? It’s called, unsurprisingly, Poems in the Waiting Room, and indeed there they were in my doctor’s waiting room, just above the tattered pile of last year’s HELLO! magazines – leaflets of poems that you could read on the spot or take away with you. They’re a registered charity, and their website is www.poemsinthewaitingroom.org. Here’s one of the poems from their latest leaflet: NOT EVEN, by Ben Ziman-Bright.

NOT EVEN
the wet rustle of rain
can dampen today. Your letter
buoys me above oil-rainbow puddles
like a paper boat, so that even
soaked to the skin,
I am grinning.

This photo, which is one of the ones I used on the latest blog intro page and promised to talk about, is of the flowering vine outside the front door in Key West, where I’ll be for ten days from the end of this week. The flowers look as ravishingly beautiful in real life as they do in this photo; their only fault is that they don’t have a scent: none at all. And somehow I can never feel complete respect or affection for a flower – however beautiful it may be – if it doesn’t also have scent. (Well, maybe I can – anemones are the exception, now I think of it. But the only one.)

I haven’t been in Key West for about a year and I’m looking forward to this visit. I hope to do some writing, and catch up with friends, and bike over to the beach path in the very early morning to walk into the rising run, and eat lots of fresh local fish. And high on the list of anticipated pleasures is seeing Ms Minnie Mouser, the cat I share with a friend and neighbour. Minnie is actually and totally Doreen’s cat these days, but both Doreen and Minnie are gracious enough to go along with my continuing part-ownership fantasy. So when I’m in town Minnie visits me regularly during the day, lies in the shade on our front porch, and asks me to supply breakfast and supper. But as soon as I leave town again she stops looking for me or for my food offerings, and reverts to her usual duties.

I should explain that her name – the Mouser part – is an honorary title rather than a descriptive one. There are no mice on the property as far as I know: I’ve certainly never seen any and I don’t believe Minnie’s ever caught one. There are certainly cockroaches (known locally as palmetto bugs, as if a cute tropical name makes them any less disgusting), plus the occasional scorpion and probably worse things, too – but not mice. So Minnie’s no mouser. Her duties, as she sees them, are to patrol the territory’s perimeter against intruders, and to meet-‘n’-greet guests in the property’s rental units, and she does both in a notable fashion.

I’ve never managed to take a good photo of Minnie but I’ll try again this visit. She’s worth it.

I’ve been thinking about Judith Scott’s fibre art sculptures since I saw some in a new exhibition space that’s opened in London, called ‘The Museum of Everything’. (The Museum space is an intriguing mixture of large and small semi-derelict rooms hidden behind the Chalk Farm library. You have to hope that the Camden’s health and safety officers aren’t going to visit any time soon.)

The Museum shows the work of artists who live outside the conventions of modern society as well as outside the art business, and you might think that the idea of a gallery dedicated to ‘outsider art’ is ironic: this category is defined by its segregation from the mainstream art world. Its works were never intended for public display, and its practitioners haven’t often thought what they made to be art at all. But James Brett, whose invention the Museum is, says he wants “to assert the sheer beauty of the best outsider art, to reclaim it as a distinct aesthetic category – one in which you have a whole world being conjured up by the artist.”

I found that the exhibition had a curiously liberating effect on my own imagination, and the film about the work of key artists – and especially of Judith Scott – was enthralling. I feel deeply moved by the metaphors her fibre art suggests; the wrapping and weaving, the twisting and tying of fabric around objects: tying and untying a life story of confinement and freedom, of concealment and revelation. It’s made me think a lot about the things we try to mask or display about our lives, and the things we reveal by attempting that.

In Judith Scott’s work the things she wrapped are mysteriously transformed and yet still somehow visible (or able to be imagined) beneath the fabrics and fibres – just as our hidden selves are sometimes made visible by our very attempts to conceal them. The sculptures are beautiful and compelling, and her work has taken up a permanent place in my mind. And somehow, it makes me feel very happy.

This is the view from our back balcony, where we sit every evening to watch the sun go down – and we have breakfast on the front balcony, shading the sun with a big beach umbrella. But from all the windows of our apartment on this little farm, everything you look at is beautiful: the curve of a ploughed field rising to an impeccably spaced line of trees; the distant view of hills and mountains; the gray-green lace of the olive trees; the curling fingers of mist around the valley in the very early morning.

It’s very hard to leave so much simple delight. Sometime, maybe, we’ll stay to help with the olive harvest… but tomorrow we start the drive back to London - me with lots of writing done, and both of us with the prospect of excitement and entertainment ahead. Really, I have no good reason to feel so wistful! Well, except for leaving these olive trees.

Oh! And the swallows which today are wheeling and diving in increasing numbers, which probably means they’re getting ready to leave as well. Last time we were here we left later in the month and the swallows were gathering on the power lines by then.

And the sense of being close to the seasons and the way in which the land is used: that’s hard to leave too, if only because those of us who mostly live in cities don’t often witness the pace and rhythm of the country. It’s a blessing to treasure and remember.

I haven’t blogged much recently although I have every good intention about keeping it up – I like having a blog and I enjoy writing it when I actually get to it. But life and work got in the way quite a bit after I returned from New Zealand, and in any case I tend to find London life both hectic and stressful. So when I’m in London I get to a stage where I only think about what I want to say in a blog when I can’t sleep, and then when I’m awake the next day picks me up again and throws me into a new set of demands and I forget about it all again, until the next time I can’t sleep…

But right now I’m sleeping like a baby: indeed sleeping better than most of the babies I’ve ever known. I’m also dreaming a lot –elaborate story dreams that perplex me for hours after I wake, wondering what on earth that one was about (a very detailed dream about being in prison in Zimbabwe is just one example).

One good reason for presently sleeping well is that I’m on holiday in my favourite place in the world: Italy. We’re in an apartment on a little organic farm in the Umbrian hills, north of Orvieto, where we first came two years ago and had such a glorious time that we’re back again. It’s just as wonderful this time. The air is clear and scented with thyme and rosemary, the sun is shining, the swallows are swooping, the olive and fig trees are burgeoning, the pool is beckoning: happy happy days. It’s so easy to have delicious meals: tomatoes and basil warm from the garden, good bread baked in a wood oven, local cheese, and melons, figs and peaches out of a foodie’s dream…

I’m writing every morning, and in the afternoons we think about going to look at something wonderful. We don’t always go, though. Sometimes we just read, or pick more figs, or swim, or walk to an abandoned house nearby that we fantasize about buying.

Just look at these figs and you’ll probably understand why they are worth a journey all on their own.

I came across a lovely quote about writing - on Graham Beattie’s blog, see my blogroll for a connection to it, it’s great - and for some reason it resonated with a very sweet quote I heard the other day about throwing things away.

E. L. Doctorow said this about writing: “It’s like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights. But you can make the whole trip that way.”

I particularly like that because it’s reassuring about the journey that writing presents. The quote makes me feel less anxious about not knowing where I’m going with something, when I don’t know (and I often don’t). All too often I just feel my way along, and the quote suggests to me that it’ll be absolutely fine to go ahead like that. So thanks, E.L., and also thanks Graham.

And the other quote, about throwing things away? I’m told there’s a sign up in the kitchen at the Medical Foundation in north London that says: “Don’t throw anything away. There isn’t an away.”

And I suppose the reason why that gives me such pleasure is (a) it’s satisfyingly as well as surprisingly true, and (b) it kind of fits in with my writing philosophy, which is that nothing is wasted. And I do mean nothing.