Inn of the Wandering Dragon

You can now find Classy Cat Henna to keep you entertained with my various henna adventures!

There is still more to be done, more pages to add and possibly a gallery or slideshow of images once I work out how I would like it all to go. In the meantime, enjoy!

The popular term for it now is Zentangle. The aim is not to create something recognizable, but to engage in a deliberate act of mark making that is essentially a visual meditative process. I find it a pleasant way to relax and bring me back to the here and now (handy, since my brain is usually going several strange directions at once). It requires my brain to focus and shove the other chatter to the back burner for a while. This zentangling is also a handy puzzle to play with. Yes I can fill the spaces with random repeating patterns but I still want the overall result to work in a visual way. I am looking for a sort of balance and flow if you will.

And of course, I am thinking this will make a fun incubator for henna patterns as well!

I haven't typically been one to fuss over it much. There has always been too much expectation, even back as kids when the teachers would politely send home the class list to all the parents. We knew that everyone was supposed to receive valentines from everyone else in the class, so we could all feel that we were friends equally. And we all knew it wasn't so.

Years ago in university I remember one boyfriend grumbling about the day - and what was the point of having a day where he was "supposed to be romantic"? Every girl in the room shot back that if there wasn't this one day we would never see any romance at all. He wisely changed topic after that.

I suppose guys have reason to sweat, we have been raised on movies and stories of true love and romance all our lives which makes for fun fiction but does not seam to pan out as well in real life. They are faced with the looming shadow of "letting us down" while we dread the prospect of "being let down". I can almost hear the chorus in the background: but it's just one day - can we not have one day a year where we can revel in the beauty and the romance? Let's be honest here - romance takes work.

In my previous relationship, we tended to keep it simple. We gave each other valentine cards and had a nice dinner together. For the first while anyway. That faded off as he lost interest in putting in the effort and I lost interest in having my efforts go unappreciated. So even with a not so huge investment of effort, it can still seem like too much if you are just not in that space together.

This year, for the first time in a long while, I am single for Valentine's Day. Thankfully I am not one of those people who seems to view being single on this day as some sort of doom or failure. In fact I can honestly say that I tend to have the most fun on Valentine's Day when I am single. I've been out dancing with friends at free concerts. I've been traveling in exotic places. I have had wonderfully pleasant conversations with good friends over good food. I have enjoyed quiet evenings with a good book. So in light of this, what's not to love?

Really, Valentine's Day is like any other day. It is all what you make of it.

There are thoughts, that will not part,

that will not leave us in peace,

And there are visions, dark and sinister

that never will cease,

A darkened tide of endless pride,

of mystery and a dream,

A dream so fraught, of wild thought,

the same somnambulant theme,

All that we see, all that we seem,

is but a dream within a dream.