I’ve missed week 6 on purpose and will release that at a later date. In this newsletter, I do lots of cooking and gardening to remedy my poor mental health then get terrible heatstroke in a boatyard.
Mon 18 July
nothing happens until the afternoon. kevin and christina are going out on a rowing boat to capture some footage and sounds recordings and i get wind there’s a two-person canoe as well. i convince sille to stay for an extra night by suggesting we take it up the canal. it’s sunny but cool as we slip on neon-orange life jackets with tiny zips and many straps. we have a quick tutorial from christina about where not to put feet / bags, and set it next to a low jetty. when we set off i realise this is something i’ve been thinking about trying for a long time. i love the idea of having a little kayak and just dropping into some canals in the midlands. i get the hang of rowing, steering and emergency stop very quickly considering I haven’t been in a person-powered boat since being in the scouts.
in afternoon i declutter and rearrange the store room so i could work in it as a theatre group needs the
stage for their activities. i brought down most of my stuff –tools, paper, wood offcuts– and left the windows from the dump leaning against the wall at the top of the stairs overnight.
michaela, the next kreenholm plants residents, is arriving this eve. sille suggests making a lentil curry then i instantly get carried away and make loads of fancy sides with christina: pickled green toms (sliced ever so thin and left to marinate in last weekends pickle juice) yoghurt w fresh herbs and lemon juice, toasted and boiled buckwheat. i dig some cranberry jam out of the fridge too.
then alexander turns up and we light a fight in the pit we used for the hot tub a few weeks ago, and i turn the sauna on to get it heated. suddenly a small meal becomes kevin’s leaving do.
wine beer vodka
ice cream, cherry ginger compote, spruce honey and crushed peanuts. i pulled this dessert out of thin air and it was unaminously one of the best dishes ive made all summer
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tues 19 july
great therapy session then read my book in the sun and spent some time cleaning out my fridge and eating leftovers
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Wed 20 July
depressed no exercise
two cheese twists, yoghurt pesto dip, fruit salad
reading 20 mins then pop to garden for solutions
weed beds, thin radishes
show ukranian kids garden
rest, go to maxima and babushka
dinner with staff and residents on the balcony is nice
pain in my groin
this better not be another hernia
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Thurs 21 July
I wake up in a funk immediately remediated by pancakes, fruit and yoghurt with Christina. She is leaving this morning and we have so often spoke around the table with food so a nice way to end. I really admire her candidness and generosity, and how she jumped into cooking with me at the barbecue without any persuasion.
The past few days have been bad so I need a different flavour in my mouth. I’m going to try and do some of my favourite things that are also functional, as the residency ends soon and I still have lots to do. I decide to try slow yoga on the balcony to see if I can ease up the pain in the crease at the top of my leg. It’s either an internal bruise that I can help heal with my daisy and comfrey balm, or something a little more serious that I need to keep an eye on. Stretching it out is tricky but a success, I lay in shavasana and breathe into the pain for about 20mins afterwards and watch the birds drawing on blue.
Then i shower and do a full skincare and hair routine, recalling sonia’s tips and taking time to massage my face. I take a small lunch of leftover pelmeni with cream cheese and pesto dip, and leftover fruit salad from the fridge. All the glassware from last night’s dinner is just sitting on the counter with flies, so that goes in the dishwasher along with my plates and i wipe the sides with a cloth.
The high sun and lack of clouds say gardening would be better in the evening but i’m feeling itchy to get my hands dirty. Some jobs:
Plug lettuces into north side of star bed for partial shade
More lettuces in the concrete dish
Split up dill sprout and plant clumps in the star bed
Water everything heavily from full butt with a big glug of kitchen grey water mixed in
Chop up hay with secateurs
Mulch everything
pretty hot and bothered after this, get accosted for a polaroid headshot then head back to nart. still q energised so i set up a workstation on the grass outside the store room im using as a studio. Regarding the woodwork plans, I am a novice so it will take as long as it takes. If i wasn’t so stubborn i would watch some youtube videos on the correct techniques or even general power tool use, but that would be nowhere near as fun. I insist that i will work it out through my mistakes and should absolutely indulge in the deep time i’ve found. Some jobs:
Chop only halfway through some lengths of timber with a handheld circular saw
Finish off with my pruning saw
Drill pilot holes and attach short batons to old windows
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Fri 22 July
Massive fruit salad
No electricity
Cycle to kulgu
Swim (thrash), read and cord plastic bags at the port
Cycle to dacha zone
Find a tiny shop and buy a twister and two beers
Explore dachas for longer
Stop by canal to cord and read
Theatre opening for beer with residents
Slight heat exhaustion so home to bed
Cottage cheese, bilberries, lilac honey and fresh mint on toast
Rose, dead nettle, mugwort, corn silk tea
A few sopranos episodes
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Sat 23 July
Body is mashed
Kasina meditation (learnt in the Buddhist Sanctuary), long easy yoga, rose and cranberry tea, NTS Slow focus infinite playlist
Managed to make omelette with leftovers and shared it with Michaela and new resident Liina. Been craving some discussion beyond small talk, and we got stuck into food politics
Nervous system been totally disregualtory this week. Feel constantly on the cusp of becoming ill with a range of symptoms that could mean multiple things: from a common cold to rectal cancer. This is exactly why I used to tell my friend Rachael not to self-diagnose using google. I’m not sure how it will pan out for now, I’m relying on moving slowly and listening to what my body tells me it needs –corn silk for kidneys, rose for courage, dead nettle for mood.
Best snack I ever had was viennese whirls and fridge-cold plums at 2am.
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Sun 24 July
Wake up feeling less dead despite again getting very little sleep with fever and porridge brain past few days. My diet of intentional herbal teas, intermittent fasting and Sopranos is repairing me. Also im wearing a crystal Sonia accidentally left at the sauna, for strength.
Head to Vitatiim, local youth group organising alternative educational courses to talk about plans for their 2023 permaculture garden. I’m going to make them some drawings on how to use what is already on site to achieve a low-maintenance space with growing beds, seating areas and on-site compost. They already have some good beds and plan to build some more so I will design their planting patterns for next five years and rehome some nuisance members into a herbs spiral and tree guilds. I’m thinking about low-energy high-impact actions for an already over-stretched and under-resourced organisation. Letting areas that are not used much go totally wild just requires requesting / demanding the council refrain from cutting it regularly. This will certainly improve biodiversity, opportunities for pollinators and fix the soil with nitrogen. The infrastructure is already here, it just needs some rearrangement to make areas more welcoming or playful or private. There is an abundance of free materials in Narva, I’ve been adding everything to my imaginary inventory since I arrived. It’s a dream job, if only a really short one, and a shame I won’t be here to implement it in the spring.
I walk back to NART with Alina and instantly go back to bed. This is so unlike me, my body feels in painful flux ever since I overheated. I have the most meagre amount of energy to get me to the bathroom or kitchen but it’s not in like a sickly way, just disoriented and slow. I cannot focus on doing more than one thing at once – something I wish I knew how to do when my body is not in disease.
Did manage tea and a quick critical chat about food with Michaela and Liina. It’s so good, i think to myself, to have this now and again, before suddenly I realise I might have been feeling a bit sad and uninspired because overall there’s have not been many opportunities during my stay. Fun, discovery, intrigue and challenges – yes– but little integration with intellectual research.