Pride

The National Galleries of Scotland have been running a project inviting folks to make a contribution to an exhibition trying to capture some experiences of lockdown through stories or photographs or portraits.  I submitted an extract from a piece of writing based on a lockdown queueing experience.  The exhibition can be seen online at

https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/features/2020-stories-portraits-visions

My piece was selected for display as part of the rolling exhibition at the Portrait Gallery.  It will be up for three days before being replaced by other submissions so we went to see it today.  I felt good about it.  Even proud.  Judging by the extra, I think Ellen did too.

You can have a read ...

Queueing


Passing strangers
Looking and not looking
Masked and not masked
To the empty waiting place.
To the first cross I have to bear
And start my stammering walk.

Two metres in four gentle strides.
Maybe if I stretch a bit, I could do it in three.
Maybe it would be quicker that way.
Or maybe I should take five or six
That would be the mindful way
And it would pass the time.
Or I could do a quickstep
Or a slow fox trot
From cross to cross
With an imaginary partner.
But I don’t know how to dance. Pity.