This time last year ...

70th Birthday party.  Johnny and beloved granddaughter Chloe

Surprised and delighted to have reached seventy in 2010,   Johnny declared,  'I am now officially old,' and began to contemplate a retrospective exhibition.



By December 2011, those thoughts had become a commitment, but 2012 did not get off to a good start.  Full of enthusiasm, J was dogged by feeling unwell ...

The gassing of Johnny

I am a Yorkshire artist, from near Rotherham in fact.

I live to paint; it’s all I do – I can be quite abstract.

I have a lot of paintings stacked up in my studio,

Which is down to my reluctance in permitting them to go.

My friends don’t understand me: they think I’m daft and rash,

When I pass up opportunities to flog a few for cash.

But my reason for reluctance to disperse this vast collection

Is to keep it all together, for my future exhibition.

Last year I sensed the time for this event was drawing near:

I felt that paintings yet to paint would take just one more year.

The omens boded well, you see, for peak creative state

Since Neptune, now in Pisces, for Pisceans should be great.

The planets thus were perfect for my fishy disposition;

So too, the signs were positive from old Chinese tradition. 

This New Year’s Eve, the Orient would welcome in the Dragon,

The year of which, for Smaugs like me, should be a fucking good ‘un.

Instead

I was gassed!

I damn nearly died!

Because the air that I was breathing in was carbon monoxide.

I couldn’t figure out you see, where all my oomph had gone;

My head felt thick; my stomach sick; the weariness dragged on.

I blamed it all on alcohol and allergies to food

And no amount of sleep or rest could lift my dismal mood.

The problem

Was gas!

That’s why nothing I tried

Could counteract the dire effects of carbon monoxide.

‘There’s gas!’ said Emilie one day, determined on detection

And through intensive sniffing, found the source of fume infection.

The boiler was the culprit: a cantankerous contraption;

And so the odd job man was called, to put it out of action.

So

I was being gassed!

My mind had not lied!

My off-colour state a consequence of carbon monoxide.

What joy to know my poorly plight was not psychosomatic!

There was a reason after all for symptoms problematic.

Once more I dreamed of working bliss, aloft in studio

And letting fly with paint and brush and passionate gusto.

But!

I was still being gassed!

The cowboy denied,

But the boiler yet was seeping lethal carbon monoxide.

At last an engineer arrived to sort my situation.

He found the source of leakage; gave a thorough explanation.

He informed me I was lucky; I could very well have died

Because the wonky boiler was not proper certified.

So, I opened all my windows to assist with ventilation

And tanked up quick on oxygen through rapid inhalation.

At last I’m free from poison and the source of inhibition;

And back, with oomph, to studio to sort my exhibition!

Gillian Tarn

Feb 2012

I am pleased to report that 2013 is off to a cracking start, with much gusto and oomph in studio - and it is still the year of the Dragon, if only just.