a big dose of beauty

It started on Friday when I went to the Launceston Art Society's Eskleigh Tasmanian Art Award exhibition. There were so many beautiful paintings and so much skill on display I could only whip out my mobile and take a few sneaky shots to share later with Frank... although thinking about it now, perhaps I could have bought one and taken it home for Frank to see in real life! Budgets and tight schedules being what they are, I could not linger and I could not buy. Miniscule, poor quality photos on my phone were all I could manage, and since I can't work out how to get them off my phone, that is where they will stay.

Thankfully my memories of the exhibition are better quality, and I walked out of Eskleigh feeling rich with amazement at what people can do with pencil, paintbrush, ink or oil. All the way back to town I chuckled, and shook my head in wonder and murmured with delight.

Saturday morning, and Frank and I were up with Hector for an early trip to Hobart. If you've never seen the sun rise over Ben Lomond and Stacks Bluff, then I highly recommend an early morning drive down that way. Quite stunning, and then once the sun is up, that autumn goldenness steals over the hills and trees and sheep and it is wondrous.

Soon Frank was watching people climb trees at the Tasmanian Tree Climbing Championships while I hit Salamanca with my aunt, uncle and cousins.

Saturday in Hobart without visiting the market would be a dead loss if you ask me. I don't buy much, the stalls barely change, but I love to go and mooch around. You'll find three-packs of winter socks, vintage clothes, sheep cheese, wooden paraphernalia, soap... and craftsmanship of the highest order. One lady makes necklace pendants from broken china, a man had handmade snakeskin sandles and wallets. There were beads and scarves and felted hats, and a strange woman paraded around her stall caressing her knitted wares with a $50 note in a strange form of money dance, all the while with a knitted possum perched atop her head. Nearby was the elderflower cordial and raspberry chilli chocolate sauce, of which I required only a taste to be convinced to part with my money. I left Salamanca marvelling at the creativity and ingenuity of the human spirit.

Frank was still assisting at the climbing championships, and while he soaked up the sun at the base of a tree, I sat on the beach and read a book. There's a reason why Sandy Bay is called Sandy Bay, and I wasn't the only one enjoying the incredibly warm autumn weather. Families, and dogs, and couples and grandmas and grandpas were everywhere. We were onto a good thing and did our darnedest to make the most it!

After a night in some rather lovely accommodation (in which we were upgraded to the King Suite... nice!) we headed back to the park for a serious day of competition. Well Frank did... I headed back to the beach and finished the book.

All the while I kept thinking how beautiful the world was, and how spoiled I was to be able to just sit and enjoy it. The whole thing kept getting better and better. I drove to Kingston to meet my newest first-cousin-once-removed and enjoyed being with family then came back the scenic route, and somehow stayed on the road despite trying to geek at the view around every bend.

And then it was all over. We got in the car and drove home, and the autumn dappled light shone through yellow leaves and the goldenness kissed the hills and trees and sheep and it was wondrous.

Home now and I feel over stuffed with beauty. There's an Italian saying, or so my pen friend told me when I ate too much at that amazing restaurant her family took me to in Ravenna: 'sto sca piando'. I have no idea how to spell it, or what the Italian words even are, but that's it phonetically.

The literal translation is "I'm about to explode". Which about sums it up. I have seen so many wonderful things this weekend, and enjoyed nature and human creativity at their absolute best. I could not possibly fit any more goodness in... or I just might explode with rapture.