Observations, Vashti Bunyan - From Here To Before.

I watched the Vashti Bunyan documentary, From here to before on YouTube last week, Despite it being wonderful, there was something that she said that has stuck with me since. Vashti is stood outside the cottage in the Lake District that she had revisited as part of the film. It was here she found out that her mother had passed away.

She said that now she is older than when her mother died, she feels she has a whole extra bit that she must make the most of.

I was 30 when my sister Alison passed away. She was just 38 and I remember feeling that I had to get past that age. I had to reach 38. I am now 44 and I have had six extra years that she hasn’t. People say ‘Oh, that is silly!’ but as Vashti says, it is something that she has to do.

Since dad died last November, I am feeling it even more now. I haven’t been up to much these past seven months but I have been reassessing and just sitting. Slowing down and doing gentle things. I am kind of back to the beginning stages of nearly 14 years ago.

Anyway, thankyou Vashti for reminding me. If you don’t know Vashti Bunyan then you may have first heard her song Another Diamond Day on the T-Mobile advert in 2007. I have loved her ever since and annoyed that I never found her before.

Go HERE to read about her book, and HERE to see a small clip of her journey with former partner Robert Lewis, with whom she began a trek on horse and wagon in 1968 from London to Donovan’s commune on Skye.