Day 3 1 November 2019
All Hallows’ Eve and I take a broom and sweep; the old Station Master’s cabin needs cleaning. I’m mindful that today is Halloween and also of the task of cleaning Shinto Temples carried out by Mitko maidens. I see cleaning as a means of honouring Place.
The old Station Master’s cabin has a magnificent dresser and a sink
The cabin is a microcosm of a house; it has a large cast iron stove, a ceramic sink which drains outside, wire drawers to store cheese placed over the window, a wooden plate-drainer, a chair and table. The dresser is the imposing centre piece with glazed doors and is placed centrally as you enter; it reminds me of a Butsudan (Buddhist Shrine). The hut sits on a vein of deep underground water.
It also has a drawer of very scary black spiders
This afternoon I wander around the woodland. It is quite steep inside and about 2.4 metres tall; overgrown with saplings and brambles and feels quite disconcerting. I’m curious, but don’t want to spend much time in there. I’m not sure if I want to tend it or ignore it. It feels disturbed.
The woodland mound
I collect fallen red ‘Virginia Creeper’ leaves from the garden and place them on the roof of the Wendy House. I’m intending to write some ‘winter-water’ haiku in the exercise-book. It’s waiting.
A red roof and a yellow floor for the water shrine
Using the divining rods I ask the Consenting Objects which of them is willing to be placed in the cabin. The eco-prints say “yes” as does the dyed off-cuts of twine that were used to bind the paper in the dye-vat. I place them in the dresser with the doors open.
A stack of prints made from plants in my Chelva garden and string used to bind them in the dye-bucket.
In the pitch-dark I return with my Portuguese studio-mates to read them the story of Vasilisa; the Russian folk story of a girl’s journey to collect light from Babayaga the terrible witch who lives in the middle of a dark forest in a hut that sits on chicken’s legs; it all looks very different on Halloween night.
