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Oh for a fine plum wool pelisse, for careless muddying in the November storms!
Rainstorm over the Sea
John Constable
ca. 1824-1828
Royal Academy of Arts
Braemar. The damp, midgy August of 1881. Robert Louis Stevenson, exhausted, spitting blood, was housebound, but, sparked by the detailed vision of a map, he began to write a new book –Treasure Island. Read my essay on this & other piratical matters. #botd https://t.co/2Cg32FLs1Q
Black Cat at Night
Shoda Koho
ca.1920s
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
The Girl by the Window
Edvard Munch
1893
Art Institute of Chicago
Pine Marten had woken in the night shaking with fear again over the Great Sickness. The enormity of it, the encroaching lockdowns across Dorset. I'm so scared, Babcia, he cried, everything feels so strange & so different. We're safe here, said Babcia, we're safe with Old Fox.
Pine Marten & Babcia had gone to gather mushrooms. When Pine Marten was a kit, they used to spend golden autumn days in the Wolski Forest - baskets filling with yellow fox mushrooms & parasols & penny buns or boroviki, which Babcia would fry with eggs & sour cream for tea.
All was peaceful in Old Fox's cottage. The mobile library was coming the next morning, so everyone was trying to finish their books. Old Fox had one of his mysteries, Babcia an historical novel set in Denmark & Wolf, The Old Curiosity Shop, which was making him very, very cross.