Sometimes nature takes a hand and ‘consumes the shot’.
With the above grouping of blossom on the shrubs, the old outbuilding (see below) and a one of the surviving ash trees, I was feeling distinctly poetic.
My mind mused ‘from blossom to birds to bold blue sky; and the idea of one’s attention being hijacked by beauty was compelling.
For several minutes I simply gazed. Then comcluded the experience needed no more poetry than the photo.
The first such day of the season (here). I hope we all get many more.
American politics aside, it’s a beautiful world…
(Our outbuilding is a small bit of local history. It was the storage place for gunpowder (saltpetre, as was) in the 1820s. The lower half of the garden was the old canal basin.
We have many unshiftable weeds that seem to date from the same period…
©️ Copyright Stephen Tanham 2026.
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A very dark day in January.
I’m injured … nasty groin sprain. Haven’t played my favourite Pickleball for nearly two months.
Click the link above if you’ve no idea what Pickleball is. Beware, though. It may ensnare you, as it has both of us.
Being unable to play for so long is driving me nuts…But I digress. Me moaning is not the self-indulgent purpose of this post.
My wife, Bernie, suggested a trip to the local garden centre might help with the limping blues; and it would get us out of the house. We set off into the gloom of a January late-afternoon.
Bernadette seems to know the name of every plant in the place, courtesy of her BTech, but at least I have my trusty Google Lens (below) to help with my lack of training…. just open Google and snap an image within the app.
Voila!
Xanthosoma lindenii, also known by its botanical synonyms Caladium lindenii or Phyllotaenium lindenii. … apparently.
I don’t fancy an exam with that one in. But Bernie has the certificates for hers.
The local garden centre is at Beetham, on the A6 just south of Kendal. It’s a big one, and has both cafe and restaurant alongside three halls of plants and assorted gardening accessories.
Beetham Garden Centre is not afraid of being quirky, and I enjoy the humour of the frequent eccentric exhibits… The last one of these Citröen vans I saw was serving pancakes on Preston Docks. For looks and historical style, you’ve got to admit they’ve never been bettered.
Where was I? Oh yes, the cafe…
Coffee and cake, and a leisurely stroll around the various wares brought us close to the exit…
Where my eyes were treated to the sight of a section dedicated to orchids. Bernadette is not overly fond of them … temperamental, she says. But I love them. The depth of their colours and the intricacy of the patterns get me every time… so I just gaze, in an uneducated way, of course.
She found me staring into this one, lost in contemplation.
“Penny for them?” she asked, coming up quietly behind me.
“I was trying to find the right words to describe the colours of this beauty…”
She put her hand on my shoulder, and we gazed together.
“How about unbearable soft?”
It was perfect. So here it is; with a complete absence of Latin. As they used to say on The Good Old Days: , for your delectation…
———-
I hope you’re enjoying your January … or at least finding ways to make the darkness bearable! Let me know…
©️😎Stephen Tanham, 2026.
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Sometimes, especially on very cold days, the afternoon sun in winter gives us a brief blaze of colour that warms, emotionally, if not physically.
One of my favourite subjects is the low sun on bare hedges. There’s something almost ‘crop-like’ about the uniform nature of the vertical ‘fingers’, each catching its own slice of the provider in the sky.
©️Stephen Tanham 2026
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The Sizergh estate is the ancestral home of the Strickland family, whose name is threaded through the history of the Kendal area.
They’ve recently begun to decorate the whole estate for Christmas. Here’s a sample of what it’s like.
The interiors are from another age – and respond perfectly to the Christmas spirit!
And the famous gardens are lighted beautifully.
Most of the work is done by an army of volunteers.
Happy Christmas!
©️Stephen Tanham, 2025
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If time proves to be not just malleable, but revisitable, we can close our eyes and be back in a tiny Lancashire hamlet called Tockholes; graced by a pub, a few stone cottages and a car park/bus turnaround of the farthest route from Bolton’s bus station, on Moor Lane, in the town centre.
Had my share of nightmares, didn’t think there could be much more
Then in walked Rodrick Usher with the Lady Eleanor…
The car park’s sole occupant is a Ducati 250cc single-cylinder motorbike. It’s not new, but it’s a lovely, metallic mid-blue and silver, and this is the first outing of its new life with a sixteen-year old who has just passed his bike test.
The boy and bike are on an inaugural celebration run to mark their pairing – provided by the lad’s father to mark success at the GCE exams, at which he’s just done quite well.
She tied my eyes with ribbon of a silken ghostly thread
I gazed with trouble vision on an old four poster bed
He’s not with the bike, though it brought him here and sits in the pub car park, polished and gleaming as much as a six-year old machine can.
He’s here – in Tockholes – because, on a previous occasion, it was on the way here in the family car that he first heard a piece of music so powerful that he feels it changed his young life … and he had dreamed that, if he passed his exams and his bike test, he would come here and celebrate with a flask of hot tea and a Turkish Delight chocolate bar … at his favourite ‘me-spot’ by the lakeside, below.
The place where he first sang to The Lady Eleanor.
It’s a ten-minute descent from the pub’s car park to the lake. He’s been singing to himself the whole way. The volume of his singing increases as the water comes into view – calm and beautiful… and receptive; as though the lake is listening.
And the Lady of this lake is Lady Eleanor … and she listens to the boy singing and accepts his tribute. The valley resonates with the exchange.
Life is good. Very, very good.
Last Saturday, the creators of the Lady Eleanor song – the still-performing group Lindisfarne – came to The Platform concert venue in Morecambe.
The sixteen year old young man was there …
and so was his Lady Eleanor …
Here’s a YouTube video if you’d like to warm those memories…
©️Stephen Tanham, 2025.
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The lovely Park Road Gardens, in Grange-over-Sands is one of the jewels of the Cumbrian coast of Morecambe Bay.
I like to photograph it through the seasons.
Through November, it completes its departure as a summer haven and takes on a beautifully melancholy palette of fading golds.
One other transformation is unexpected. A hidden path from a former iteration of the park’s design opens up to reveal a clear view down to the promenade and shore.
Although only a short distance to the sea, the old path would now cross the main Barrow-in-Furness railway line … so you can see why it was horticulturally concealed- to discourage children from trying!
There is though that lovely feeling of having uncovered a phase of local history.
©️Stephen Tanham, 2025
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The small seaside village of Arnside seldom disappoints in providing us photographers with scenes animated by extraordinary light.
Facing west out into the northern end of Morecambe Bay the estuary features complex tides, the outflowing confluence of three local rivers, and some of the most spectacular skies in Britain.
We even have our own ‘bore’, much like the River Severn, but considerably smaller in amplitude.
The sky is the constantly-changing star. There is always so much energy up there that no visual moment can be guaranteed to last. If you see it, take it has to be the sentiment.
This shot was taken mid-afternoon, when the light was dropping like a stone. In the resulting gloom – which had painted the village a seeming coal-black – there emerged a fluffy tunnel of golden light.
As taken. No filters or effects.
©️Stephen Tanham. All work by the author.
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Time-travelled fragments
of mittened fingers
Held in firm parental hand
Exploding neighbours’ gardens
Ripe with bangs and secretly given
toffee-apples
Eyes that glistened with a million smiles
And a few deep breaths as
Imagination proved secondary
To ruptured air obeying gunpowder’s plot
So long ago, now
Yet
In these simpler flames
Where logs surrender to stealthy heat
And memory is escorted, glowing
It remains in vibrant view
A glorious recollection
Of children’s delight.
~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~
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A dear friend sent this to me a few days ago. In a year that’s been very emotional, it touched me deeply, and I thought I’d share it here:
‘The Taker of the Photos
‘I am the taker of the photos. I am the receiver of the groans, the eye-rolls and the “hurry ups”.
I am the one who disrupts the moments – to capture them. But I am also the holder of the memories, I am the keeper of the stories. I am the one with the precious proof.
And if you are too, please know you are capturing this life as it happens. Capturing stages, ages, twists, turns and final moments no one could have forseen. The eye-rolls will be replaced one day with absolute all-consuming gratitude for the image of a smiling face so missed and a memory returned home to stay.
Keep disrupting life to capture it, my friends. When it’s all that’s left, someone, somewhere, will be so very glad you did.’
Donna Ashworth
Joy Chose You
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The crunch-crackle…
I’ll bet you can hear it in your head!
Image by the author.
©️Stephen Tanham
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Part one: eternal stone
A canvas on which the far future writes.
Part two: life abundant, free divergence.
Part three: Fragment of a moment in which intelligence passed this way, a quarter-second behind reality.
©️Stephen Tanham, 2025
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There’s always one day in October that epitomises that golden sense of the final goodbye to the summer for another year.
A visit to Grange always entails a short collie-walk in the Park Road Gardens, which are beautifully kept and a treat for any season. Tess is nearly eleven, and such strolls are ideal for her ageing joints…
Today was it, and we were lucky enough to be doing the weekly shop in Grange-over-Sands when the sun burst through with all its October mellowness, lighting not only the pale greens of the departing leaves, but also the seemingly endless carpet of gold beneath.
The winter is just around the corner, of course. But this immersion in glorious gold is very welcome!
Photos by the author. ©️Copyright Stephen Tanham, 2025.
Sun in Gemini 
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