An Attic for a New Life by Anna Kingston

Climbing the pull-down ladder into the attic again and again, dragging up with me a table top, its legs, a rug, lamps, a chair, and more with each trip.

 

        (How I’ve longed for such a chance, time and again spaces I’ve had           were overtaken by family demands)

 

The floor is now swept, Velux wide open, the sounds of an early summer morning deliciously wafting into the space.

 

        (I don’t even mind the sneezes the sweeping created, each tickle is            worth it)

 

Dust motes spiral in the faint breeze, highlighted by rays of sunlight.

 

        (I wish I could capture the dust in a painting - it feels like MY dust up         here in the silence)

 

Artists’ sketchbooks, paints, pencils, masking tape…the trappings of a developing artist, desperate for a tiny corner in which to create.

 

        (Hope is beginning to grow that I can be a ‘real’ artist at last)

 

This little space, crammed though it is amongst boxes and bags, Christmas decorations and my beloved mum’s precious crockery, old school books and baby toys, is MINE and mine alone.

 

        (I think I’ll be painting some of these forgotten treasures to share with       the world)

 

A little corner, not enough but a start, the tiniest of triumphs hard won.

 

        (The heartache and disappointment at losing previous spaces is real,          but so is the growing hope that my time is here now)

 

Now an old telephone cabinet, the menfolk press-ganged into moving up the ladder, another small win for artistic endeavour, takes its place proudly in my art attic.

 

        (My fingers are itching to strip and paint it in MY favourite colours, to         begin putting my stamp on this space)

 

I’m sitting at my table, summer sounds floating through the window, the warm sun releasing the fragrance of the candle I chose, closing my eyes and feeling the space expand.

 

        (In the silence, with closed eyes, I feel finally ‘enough’, whatever that        will look like from now on)

 

This space is such a little thing, but it’s also huge…my creative soul breathes a tiny sigh of relief and finally has hope for the future.

 

        (My first creative ‘job’ is to name my haven, to take possession of it           with a title…)