LISTS

I came across an interesting list today in an old notebook:

Velvet horn
Thong weed
Maidens hair
Toothed Wrack
Beanweed
Spiral Wrack
Land Ladys Wig
Glasswort
Gooseberry sea-squirt etc...

In fact there were several lists in the notebook but this was by far the most interesting (it was longer!) and in case you didn't know it is a list of sea plants. The funny thing is I have no recolletion of when or why I wrote it - and it is definitely in my handwriting.

List making is a weirdly compulsive habit, I make quite a few but I have friends who make lists for absolutely everything. Mine tend to be shopping, things I need to do or lists in exercises from self help books like the Artists Way http://www.theartistsway.com/.

List making seems to be intrinsic to our society and I often wonder did people in more primitive cultures make lists somehow. Were those paintings of animals and hunting on cave walls just a shopping or to do list? Nick Hornby has immortalised the fine art of list making in his book High Fidelity (also a great film!), part of the joy of his main character's compulsion to document his life through lists is the fact that we can all relate to it. How many of us haven't made those lists, top five singles, top five albums etc etc.

If you are interested in lists a great web site is http://www.5ives.com/ a site devoted to top fives!

Other lists in my old notebook were: women I most admire, CDs I want, cards in a tarot reading, eclectic albums....