Blip Birthday - of a sort.

This is a sort of blip birthday for me.  

Not one of the round numbers that gets an official recognition, but a personal number.

On Hogmanay 2010 I finished the year with a blip - my 106th since I started blipping on the 18th of November the year before .  

During those 408 days I had posted 105 photographs but I decided as my new year resolution for 2011 that I was going to try and do one every day in that year.   I don’t think I could make it, but I did - and again, and again until today which marks 7 days of blipping every day (though with just a few day after back blips of course).

I started out hoping to record a year.  Then I thought I might record a complete Parliament.   Now I am thinking I could make that two ! 

So this is my 2552nd  consecutive blip and tomorrow I start my eighth year of the daily determination to post at least one image that says something to other people or about how I see the world.

And as this year has also marked 25 years of us being at Feorlean (which as most people know is the name of our house , which i use for this journal and for my twitter handle) I thought I would try and find something today that also indicates the passing of the years.

The house in the picture does just that.    It is Ian Paterson's former farmhouse at Craigendive.   When we came to Glendaruel  Iain was very much still farming the land from here all the way to the Glen as his family had done for a long time.    .  He was  a formidable individual , session clerk at the local kirk , a repository of vast amounts of agricultural knowledge and also, alas, someone who eventually lost a sadly dramatic  long term battle with alcohol .  

 He had been at school with my then neighbour, Archie McNaugton (from whom we bought Feorlean , though he is long dead too) ) and I remember several Hogmanay’s in the McNaughton’s kitchen when Iain Pat arrived absolutely unfit to drive but determined to do whatever he wanted  on , as he put it, “the roads on my land ” (which were in fact the adopted roads on which he eventually lost his licence). 

The house was already old fashioned when we first saw it.   Then as he declined so did the building.   Once he died it lay empty for a long time .    The route  from Dunoon to Glendaruel runs right behind it and as we passed over the years we watched as it slowly  lose slates and the windows fogging up with dust and stoor.

However this year the estate undertook a massive and imaginative  renovation and now it is up for rent.   It sits at the top of Loch Striven with a fabulous view across the water.   

So in the 25 years year it has gone from being the traditional heart of a thriving farm to being an empty shell to this attractive re-incarnation which I am sure someone will love as a modern home.   I have blipped across the loch on several occasions though I don’t think I have ever featured the house before.

Time passes.   Things change.   I will however go on blipping I hope for a while yet.   It is always a challenge, and usually a pleasure.  I have found that  by looking at other people’s pictures and taking your own every day you become a better photographer as well as more observant of the world around you.

Thanks for the experience are undoubtedly due  to the blip community which has itself changed too over the past 7 years.   I will always be grateful to Joe for starting  Blipfoto  (and I was glad to see him recently in Edinburgh) and to Graham who was always encouraging.   I am sorry the Polaroid deal didn’t work out but  communal ownership seems to have brought some much needed stability.   

The thing I miss most is the photo books you used to be able to order to keep a printed copy of your entries so my personal pleas after seven consecutive years is for their return.  I have my  first 105 blips  in one slim volume, and then  complete sets for 2011, 2012 and 2013.   I would dearly like to heave the rest on the shelves of my new study at Feorlean - something else that has changed , though that has happened very recently and is still underway.

And finally a little more light hearted teaser.   I wonder if people can work out what my extra photo is.  It is about a couple of miles away from this house and I loved the pattern when I saw it this morning.