I go to my local probably about once a week if not more. I was brought up next to a library, in Bradford and in Newburn. They were places I could go to for some sense of freedom and adventure.
The librarians knew me and would recommend books to me and events. They wouldn’t rush me, I was welcome to stay as long as I wanted.
Today, I love to pop in to see the book sales at my local libraries. As I have a few on my doorstep now. I flit between them, collecting worn and torn books that I repurpose.
I was brought up to know it was ‘wrong’ to write in books. They were sacred in our home. Probably because we were poor and if we bought books, usually from the indoor market in town, we knew it was money we couldn’t afford to spend on books. But my parents spent it anyway, as they valued books, learning and education. It was our way out of poverty.
I wonder what they would say now, if they saw what I did to books?
10p is all I pay for big, colourful children’s books, withdrawn from library stock. I have to feel the paper first though before I buy them. Even if only 10p, too shiny the page and the paint won’t grip it as well. The paint just swirls around and doesn’t stick.
I like my pages rough and matt finished. Ready to absorb whatever I put down on it.
This sketchbook was my side hustle for the last month. Side hustle to my main creative sketchbook. Here I just lay down colour and see what happens.
I like when what’s underneath the paint bleeds through. I like when the different layers of paint and pencil and pen bleeds through to the surface too.
It’s like a palimpsest. The marks beneath is the feeling I’m after. The haunting, the trace, the evidence of time and the passage of time. The archive is present now.
Reading Bone Rooms by Samuel J Redman, which starts off documenting the beginning of the frenzy to collect bones in the 1800s, especially Native American bones, as a means of establishing pseudoscientific ‘evidence’ to support the racial hierarchy, I am hit by the continued disregard/ disrespect/ lack of recognition of the humanity of black and brown bodies. History is littered by these practices one example being the transatlantic slave trade.But it would seem that history continues to repeat itself and we as a civilisation have failed to put in place safe guards against these atrocities happening again and again.
Has there no just been Holocaust Remembrance Day and the rally call always that we will not let this happen again, and yet we stand by and allow it to happen again and again within our lifetimes because we, and the establishment, pick and choose who’s life is more valuable and recognised and willing to fight/ stand up for. Usually black and brown bodies are not protected and usually there is no up roar in our blatant and deliberate destruction .
I come here today enraged and saddened as hear about the case of the USA funded , Danish scientists medical study on Guinea-Bissau newborns around the hepatitis B vaccination.
Within the UK, newborns are given the hepatitis B vaccination within 24 hours of birth as it is proven to lower the paediatric contraction of the disease. There is no cure for this disease which is life threatening. But does not pose a threat here or any of the western countries because of this preventative medicine as birth.
In December 2025, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) made the announcement that they were stopping their country’s hepatitis b vaccination programme for newborns as there was worry about the effectiveness and safety of such vaccinations. Bearing in mind that the programme has reduced new infections, with up to 90% effectiveness in preventing perinatal transmission when administered at birth and 98% immunity for infants, resulting in decreased liver cancer and mortality.
Why this change of policy? Robert F Kennedy, and the Trump administration.
Then just two weeks later, there is the announcement that the USA will fund Danish scientists in Guinea-Bissau to carry out the medical study on newborns around the effectiveness of the hepatitis B vaccination.
Over 14,000 babies involved where half would be given the vaccine within 24 hours of birth and the other half had the vaccine withheld until 6 weeks old.
1 in 5 people in Guinea-Bissau are infected with hepatitis B far more than USA, Denmark etc. This country is one of the poorest in the world. Why run tests on a vaccine that they know works in reduced the contamination of the disease. And why if there’s concerns about the vaccination why not carry on this study on American babies or Danish babies?
Guinea-Bissau has not asked for this study to take place. This is ‘medical’ colonialism.
The effectiveness of the vaccine has been proven so why carry out further tests that they know will endanger the lives of newborn babies? Will probably plunge the country into further poverty and disease, suffering and deaths related to hepatitis B.
This is just another example happening now of a foreign ( white) state/ power/ institution acting as if they have a god given right to exploit, extract, experiment on black/ African/ brown bodies? As if our lives do not matter as we are just disposals.
That our only value upon this earth is to further the will/ need/ wants/ lives of white people.
This sickens me. This is a policy, funded by fascists, to deliberately murder African babies. Why? Because they think they can. Because they have done so before. Because we live in a system where whiteness reigns supreme.
History does continue to repeat itself and whiteness finds new ways to justify the same harm. Or is the harm getting worse?
I’ll tell you the truth, I heard about Keith Porter Jr. 1 day ago.
Keith Porter Jr., a 43 year old father of two girls. He loves fishing and spending time with his family. Laughing.
Keith fundraised for battered women’s shelters, supported street artists, advocated for health services. With real family and friends, real daughters and a real presence in his community, Keith Porter Jr. is no longer with us.
Rest in Power Keith.
On New Year’s Eve, in Northridge, Los Angeles, Keith was seeing in the new year with family and friends in his neighbourhood. Tradition was to fire a gun into the air in celebration.
An off duty ICE agent, heard the shots, and inserted himself into the situation. A situation he shouldn’t have been in as an ICE agent is supposedly trained in compliance, transportation, custody paperwork. Immigration.
ICE is not designed or trained in community engagement responses. community law enforcement.
It is argued that after a short verbal exchange, the ICE agent shot and killed Keith.
Official reports from federal agencies say the ICE agent was responding to an ‘active shooter situation’. The department of homeland security says Porter fired at the agent before he was killed (in cold blood).
Watch how they change the narrative. Remember Keith Porter Jr. the man laughing with his family, caring and empathetic will become the monster who deserves to be dead.
Family and community advocates dispute this claim, stating that there is no independent released video evidence showing Keith Porter Jr. posed an imminent threat or fired at the agent.
Rather than lethal force, this off duty ICE agent should have done his citizen’s duty and called local Police as this was not an immigration issue. This was not his jurisdiction, his authority.
Keith Porter Jr. became an imminent threat only when this ICE agent turned up.
ICE has no community engagement training. They might have authority but not in the community, they don’t have the judgement and empathy to be on the streets. But obviously this ICE agent, off duty, thought otherwise.
Nearly two weeks ago Keith Porter Jr. was shot and killed. And people, the average person, even those online are just starting to find out about this murder. Only after Renee Good’s cold bloodied murder.
There is selective outrage in America. As I wrote last week, I have no issue with the response to Renee Good – that’s how we should be respond in this situation.
But
#SayHisName
Keith Porter Jr.
His family had been struggling to get his story, his unlawful killing into the current media cycle. This just compounds what I’ve been saying about the lack of visibility in mainstream media of black people being unlawfully killed by law enforcement.
Be honest have you heard of Keith Porter Jr? But you’ve heard of Renee Good?
There are arguments we can put in place here . You might not have heard his name, Keith Porter Jr. because he was killed by an off duty ICE agent not on duty with a large crowd there. Might be because there’s little video evidence circulating around. But the main reason is because Keith Porter Jr. was a black man.
This is part of the reason for not using #SayHerName for Renee Good.
No one’s even heard of Keith Porter Jr. No national attention for his murder but within 24 hours everybody knew Renee Good’s name.
This is the very reason #SayHerName was created for the invisible black women and black men who are causalities of the state, of state terror.
And it’s only now that white people are waking up to this terror when black people have been enduring if for centuries. This is why I argue to consider the language used and to give credit and recognition for where it originated, why it was created in the first place.
And yet the same stories are being used to justify the unlawful killings of Renee Good and Keith Porter Jr. They were both pointing weapons at ICE agents, posed a threat and had to be eliminated.
I say
2 different people
2 different cities
but the same structural problem.
Later down the line this might get read as the one bad apple or one bad moment. But this is clearly a system which once hidden no longer neededs to remain hidden.
A system that is built without limits or accountability.
De facto special powers bestowed by the Trump administration on ICE that seem to supersede police powers. ICE is now inserting itself into everyday life and every day neighbourhoods. And as we are witnessing this very presence is killing people. Killing more and more people who weren’t even their targets.
But that no longer seems to matter.
As I’ve said before and I’ll say again, I don’t have an issue with the response to Renee Good – that’s how we should be responding in a situation like this. I just argue that the others, and there’s a long list that is growing of people who have been killed by ICE during this administration, deserve the same energy that is surrounding the murder of Renee Good.
As last time I checked, these are not animals, criminals or just talking points but human beings. Real human beings with grieving families. And this is something that gets forgotten in the media.
We need to continue to have these conversations and we need to keep fighting, on the small and large scale, against fascism near and far.
This was quickly followed with the writings and (re)drafts of Darkling, my poetry/hybrid collection published in October 2024.
After this 2025 has been a period of extended rest and refusal.
But something has been niggling me. The desire to create with paint again. the desire to play without expectations and outcomes/ products.
I’ve just scratched the itch through scrolling through Pinterest. Adding another abstract or landscape painting to a board that I’ll probably not look at again.
But it satisfied this niggling feeling. Until it didn’t.
It was going back into the classroom. Completing a few days of supply that pushed me over the edge.
The time I gave away for money. The time I’d lost pursuing my own pursuits. And realising that I wasn’t pursuing all the pursuits I wanted to pursue in the time I had/have.
So out came a creative sketchbook, inspired by the 30 days sketchbook challenge created by Cheryl Taves over at Insight Creative.
This is as much as I’m willing to share for now about the challenge, my creative sketchbook, processes and insights.
One of my rules is that it’s just for my eyes only. I want to see how this rule changes my practice. I want to create without fear but with curiosity. I want to give myself all the freedom without worrying about what others will think or say or comment on.
It’s not like I’m hanging on other people’s responses and reactions but I have gotten into a habit of just sharing anything and everything on my blog and I’m curious to see what happens when I keep things to myself.
Just for my eyes, heart, and soul only.
So far I’m enjoying the process of the challenge and I’m reflecting and paying attention to what makes my heart sing, what’s my creative vocabulary, what pushes my energies.
Do doubt whatever I explore within my creative sketchbook will be showing up in everything that I create. In everything who I {BE}. For sure.
I’ve not been into the sea since the beginning of July. I’ve been staying away, allowing my tooth extraction wound to heal. I didn’t want to get it infected, further or again.
I have missed her, no doubt. I woke early and didn’t give it a second thought. I had the time, the energy and means to get on down there and get in.
It was like starting all over again. The pain of the cold was something I’d forgotten but soon remembered as I inched my way in, allowing the water to seep further and further up my body.
It was worth the pain. It’s always worth the pain.
I feel at peace now as I warm up and give thanks to myself and nature for allowing me this time and space to just {BE}.
Woman got herself dry socket. Exposed bone and nerves after a tooth extraction happens when the blood clot for Porte took doesn’t form properly or get dislodged.
It’s painful and can lead to infection. Guess I’m one of the lucky ones. As mine is infected.
I thought the pain and bad taste and breath were part of the healing process. No pain no gain right?! Seems this level of pain and the foulness is a sign of dry socket and infection. Go figure.
Thank goodness for saltwater washes, walking and self-care. Looking out for myself has become a priority in a world that just doesn’t care.
‘This year is gonna be about me. Never will I ever have a reason to doubt me.’ – Emily King
This year is gonna be about me, I’m gonna turn the tables, feeling all the feelings. Or maybe numb it out?
Car horns honking through the open window, sirens cutting through the heat haze, YouTube chatting while they play Mario Party, with the aim to lose. The only time when coming last makes you a winner.
I don’t wanna leave but this year is gonna be my year. I’m gonna love the music I love and I’m gonna love the words I love, words that open up worlds, one word at a time, each word moving further away from you and your crippling crap.
This year is gonna be all about me. Never am I gonna waste my time again trying to get your attention. I’m giving me all the attention. Chicken salad and all that stuff. Mayo too. Because nothing is off the agenda, for me, this year.
This year is gonna be me travelling and enjoying the experiences, alone and whoever comes along for the ride. You better have a ticket to ride as we’ll be crossing hostile borders and encountering enemies within. So you better be down for some deep shit, some deep emotional shit.
This year is gonna be all about me and no never again am I gonna doubt me and what I’m capable of. I’m allowing the cool breeze to caress the hairs on my arms and just breathe into the moment, budding into bloom.
This year you’re not gonna be able to handle this honesty, this raw heart of love and pain, again and again.
Weathering to shine through.
This year is gonna be all about me. And never again am I gonna double me. I’ll have no reason to, as I’m gonna shine through.
Letting my brain catch up with the happening, I allow my heart to stop for an instant. Feeling unmoored to make sense, far too soon.
If only I had saw it coming. If only someone had thought to talk to me before this. Maybe things would be different, maybe the wound wouldn’t cut so deep.
Needing to rewind the clocks, to go back to that ignorant bliss, that season of love and acceptance, is a fool’s wish.
Under the avalanche of words, I move silent into the dark night, to piece myself back together following a different schema, charting an undiscovered course.
Living Wild Studios 