January 2021: Lemon flowers in winter

Attending the online 47th Annual New Year’s Day Marathon by The Poetry Project based in New York, felt like a fitting celebration to mark reaching the end of my 365-day ‘2020: Less Social Media / More Social Distancing’ poetry project. I love writing so much, and I’m really proud of having spontaneously written these poems (which I’m going to resist editing too much). This month I also wrote and recorded audio descriptions to go with pieces by performance artists; another new skill that helped me see art from different perspectives.

I found that taking the time to slow down each morning as I focused on my dreams was a good way of making them manifest.

Via Nora Bateson on LinkedIn, I met Mark McKergow, founder of Village In The City, and began my ‘lockdown’ project of becoming a micro-local village builder in my street. The online ‘Reimagine Leadership’ conference gave me much food for thought in this regard: maybe all of us are yearning for the same elephant, and each person speaking their truth can bring on the unimaginable?

My ’Frustration’ composition went sort of viral on YouTube, which was rewarding.

Finally some of my mixed media artwork is for sale at: gemmaboyd.artweb.com

Rather than setting goals and making plans, I listened to my whole body and relied on subtle signs to uncover next small steps.

Lemon flowers appeared for the first time (inside and in the middle of winter) on one of the five-year-old lemon trees I grew from seed: pure hope!

My double bass has been my ‘happiness vehicle’ throughout the years.

Grønt nabofellesskap vegan ecovillage in Norway sent me their prospectus, which looks really excitng, and I wrote my first poems and emails in Norwegian!

I’m going to continue to try to not be afraid of honouring my soul’s calling when life feels as if it’s falling apart at the seams.