Saucy

I am standing on one leg waiting to step forward and say something motivational to nearly 100 people who have turned up at the Cardiff School of Optometry and Vision for the opening of the 'Sight of Emotion' photographic exhibition when I have a realisation. You see, for a couple of weeks I have been trying to figure out what it is that my new perfume really smells of. I have got the ylang ylang and the hint of sandlewood,I have noted the musky vanilla but there is something ..else…and I’ve been wracking my brains trying to think what it is.
A second before I have to step out into the dazzle of other people’s eye lines I realise. Its soy sauce. A very expensive, organic Japanese sweet soy sauce to be sure but soy sauce none the less.
It makes sense. Ever since I started wearing it I have been cooking every meal in a wok (including breakfast) and when I have been out in company its takes only 10 minutes before someone orders sushi.
I am about to speak for 5 minutes about photography, art and disability and I smell like noodles.

(As it turns out no one seems to notice but afterwards the teriyaki chicken sticks fly off the buffet table. )

The exhibition is called ‘Sight of Emotion’; photographs by visually impaired or blind artists. I have four pieces in this travelling exhibition and am ‘representing’ the other photographers that I worked with last year. I talk from the heart (assisted by a sneaky nerve steadying glass of Cava) and two women in the audience start crying. I am slightly distracted by this as my intention was to inspire not cause distress but turns out the tears were cathartic. I could have had the whole audience sobbing if I’d been given another twenty minutes. Perhaps I should change my presentation style…..

Well..its been emotional. I’m off for some miso soup and bean curd.

Canada very dry

‘Can we help you…?’

I am standing glumly unsure about whether to wait for assistance from the BA ground staff (will they make me sit in a bloody wheelchair again) or just take pot luck and stride off in the general direction of customs when I hear this question from the couple in front.
It is apparent they are not going to move or let anyone else off the plane unless I capitulate so I fall in line behind them and grab the woman’s elbow as we hit the terminal.

By one of those marvellously strange twists of coincidence it turns out that they are filmmakers screening a documentary at the Hot Docs festival and that the first film the chap made back in the mid ‘90’s was about an English man with…guess what…. Retinitis Pigmentosa!! In the short walk through to baggage we discussed methods of exposing film to simulate sight loss, colour vision and the red spectrum and the problems of guiding and being guided.

My beautiful friend A met me at the airport and we drove around to her new little gallery on Roncesvalle St. Having not slept for over 30 hours I was beginning to hallucinate so the art on the walls seemed to be 3D and wobbling and I made some complementary noises about the ‘installation’ only to realise it was the storage area. The gallery itself was lovely with sunlight streaming in through the windows and everything painted and primed. The opening do is on Friday and A is a tiny powerhouse of energy, holding down a fulltime job and pulling this business venture together in her ‘spare’ time!

Toronto by the way is blazing hot. I however packed for sleet and snow and am feeling a bit foolish and in need of some sandals. I have yet to see a Mountie and have not had a chance to eat anything with maple syrup in it.