Infinity Pool

A couple of years ago we bought a boat we meant to use for sailing and painting. It seemed right for us to paint surrounded by the sea.We stayed on the coast, in a house which was decorated in too many shades of blue - navy curtains, faded sky blue walls, dull blue carpet which matched the sea in shade but not luminosity. From the living room we could look through the large square window to the sea and sand dunes. The sun set late and rose at 4am, the light moved slowly but evenly across the day, like a photocopier lamp. The length of the day contributed to our feeling of listlessness, definitely not unpleasant but more part of being on holiday. But more seriously, this lead to an uncomfortable intensity in our participation in everyday events - visiting the chemist, looking at a bird in the garden, isn’t peeling potatoes strange. This intensity seemed to suggest something like a worrying lack of concreteness in the physical world behind these events. It felt as if risks would wash off. There was lots of stuff around to paint, but we didn’t really sail much because it was impractical to get the boat past the estuary.