December 2025
Report from Greco on a cold day in Corfu. It’s raining, the lemons are ripening, a palm is dying, the two cats who seem to have adopted me this year (grr) are confusing the no pets rules around here and they’re softening me. Sometimes I miss everyday doing life with friends and guests, other days I protect the solitude like a mf. Over these quieter days I read, light the fire, get all the paints out at the kitchen table. I’m tired, yet grateful for the divine plan, living on the edge of a beautiful island. Though the woodpile is dwindling, yesterday was brilliantly sunny and I went up the road on the walk to the monastery, grateful for the stunning views.
In our last soul journalling of the year with Ayelet, in a meditation on the year past, we laid out the gifts and challenges of the year. All around me were pink pebbles representing all the friends and folx who showed up in support. If I ever feel I’m alone in this, that’s profoundly untrue. I had over 50 guests at Mandala last year and more than half of them were friends. I mean, how cool is that? I feel the love for this place, for me, for this dream. For the connections that form and grow and for the winter community here.
Yet it’s still not without financial challenges and anxiety shows through the image as a blue thread which accompanies my existence. Alongside a couple of guests who didn’t keep agreements, which in my wheel of consent world, where freeloading isn’t an option, the house needed a new bathroom. So I find myself again in January wondering how to cover the basic bills which are significantly higher in winter. After paying for all the bodywork on my car to be restored from the many Corfu kisses and scratches, my neighbours car rolled into it and crunched it. Buggeration. More obstacles, these will pass too.
Year’s end and new beginnings merge, soon the house will have guests again. Denis is arriving again to find fixable affordable faults and fall in love with Corfu. The sun will shine after the rain. I like this part of the year of thinking ahead. After taking part in Anne Scott’s Imagination Factory my hearts desire of an artists residence, offering hope and possibility for artists, friends and me is coming into being. Now I’m out of the survival mood of the last couple of years, it’s heartening and exciting seeing who wants to come and offer workshops wrapped in a holiday.
Perhaps that’s as much as I know or need to know for January and it’ll be alright. Probably.
I wish you all an easier 2026, with joy, pleasure, sunshine and steadiness.
