Encouragement Files
(24-2025) Field Notes for Curious Minds
This is the 24th Edition of ‘The Encouragement Files’, a weekly celebration of others.
This magazine-style digest is our chance to showcase words and creativity that has inspired us. Perhaps, it will encourage you to celebrate the inspirational folk who lift your spirits, who offer a counterbalance to the fractious edginess of an out-of-kilter world.
Parenting is a weighty business, interwoven with complexities, pressures and huge commitments. It is challenging, unrelenting - rewarding, of course - but tough work. If you come to it unexpectedly, way too young, you are barely more than a kid yourself so there’s the whole growing up as you do it part.
Grandparenting, on the other hand! It’s cleaning the pool, building a giant beach/sandpit, washing off the inflatable flamingo and testing the water pistols; it is checking out the local playparks … trying the cakes in local cafés … it is dusting off recipes for homemade fish fingers and chicken goujons … we’re sourcing drawing paper, pens and stickers, planning cycle rides and walks in the woods … we’ll be getting the bedroom ready and dusting off the tent for ‘garden camping’. Grandparenting is mostly playing with stuff and being silly!
Beyond Substack
A R T
Artists like Joris Hoefnagel (1542-1600) advanced the collective understanding of the natural world with his detailed studies of insects.
I know most people try hard to do good and find out too late they should have tried softer. Commit to loving yourself completely. It’s the most radical thing you will do in your lifetime.
― Andrea Gibson
Thank you for this quote
Emma is recommitting to self care as she takes gentle steps towards her authentic self.
A R C H I T E C T U R E
Regular readers know we obsess about cabins in woods, the flights of fancy that lead us to day dreams where we hide then emerge with our novel written. This example in Ontario seeks to disappear into the dark atmospheric forest shadows.
“Sometimes a fella just needs to wade in fast water and toss flies to willing fish with a fly rod he's loved for nearly twenty years, or hike up grassy mountainsides, nap in the shade of a sandpaper leafed tree and listen to fiddle music and cricket song while cooking supper on a camp stove in fading light. We are not meant to work constantly, or rob ourselves of the joy of simple pleasures just because we know several someones who constantly talk about how very, very busy they are and how they just don't have time to do the silly sorts of time wasting things that we revel in.”
―
Feasts
We love the energy, enthusiasm and passion for cooking, baking and cookbooks that
shares with us all. This week, a lovely round up of life, recipes and renovations.Talking of feasts, we discovered
seeking inspiration and ingredients at a farmer’s market just behind the Antica Tettoia dell’Orologio (Turin). We stayed for delicious-sounding recipes and fabulous photography.Our plan for an Autumn rail adventure in Europe starts with Denmark, Norway - including Narvik, way up in the Arctic Circle - and Sweden. Fika is a Swedish institution, something way more than just a coffee break … coffee, of course, company, without a doubt, and a hefty cinnamon bun too. The generosity of this recipe shared by
is very much in the spirit.
Fables
Someone must have replaced the ink in a few pens and opened some notebooks at the perfect prompts because some of our favourite fiction writers have quietly slipped out some crackers from their writing desks.
inspires many of us with his ‘Fifties by the Fire’ but he has a deft touch in longer form. ‘Adults and Their Secrets’ is a beautifully observed piece. I even managed to pen a short tale myself after a few fiction-less months; hopefully it is not a ‘Flash in the Pan’. kindly offered an encouraging comment; that’s the perfect excuse for me to share this perfect example of Jim’s work. He is a writer whose dialogue is out of the top drawer - just check out ‘Everything About You’.Nature
Beautiful, lyrical observations by
as she prepares to leave her beloved hill for a holiday in Porto with Rosie, the daughter who gifted it to her.On another day, this time evening heat glows, radiating from my glistening skin. Across distant hills, the sun, a streak of tangerine light beyond is beginning to seep into the indigo of dusk, the landscape shimmering in acceptance, is silent, only the hoppers sing their summer songs. An owl swoops past, disinterested in the day almost passed, its languid wings seek only night. Just beyond the kitchen window is a commotion, the lingering hush of late evening erupts into a different sound, sharp and shrill, it shatters the deep silence.
That Was The Week That Was
(A snapshot of life in our corner of rural France)
Bite Size
While many photographers play around with techniques and create images that stretch the medium, Riya Panwar goes even further by changing the canvas, shadowy images on leaves and fruits creating a living art.
Perhaps, like us, you had no idea that Slovakia has a rich history of spa holidays, replete with mud baths and thermal springs.
Creative Boom is championing the finalists in the World Illustration Awards. Check out the shortlist here.
© Spike Chien | © Liberty Opal | © Bailey Crouch
PS
The busier Substack gets, the harder it can be to find the folk whose quality posts lured you in the first place. It was a joy to see this Note by
, proof that Mikey’s levels of curiosity and curation are still amongst the best.Back next week, same time, same place.
Barrie and JoJo
I appreciate your mention of Justin Deming, a fine writer and uncommonly supportive of and generous to his peers. ( As are you, my friend.) And, Jim Cummings? A humble writer who does not yet believe how brilliant his short stories are. To me, they are magic. More people need to discover his work. Thank you Barrie.
Something for everyone here. Really enjoyed your comments on grandparenting! And thank you so much for the shout out.