hollyhocks and heights

Years ago, I had a friend who, for reasons unknown to me, used to call hollyhocks “‘olly’ocks” and this is how we now refer them (just as we call fuchsia “foosha” because Simon’s Mum did).

It’s a good year for the ‘olly'ocks, though we’ve not yet come across psychedelic levels of them like the Beatles did on their Mad Day Out photoshoot with Don McCullin and others in July 1968.

It’s almost like the flowers are themselves on acid. (Great recollection of the day by someone who was six at the time here.)

Some of this year’s are also pretty high (pun intended).

Still on the big flower theme, no sooner had I said I was tired of huge floral quilts, than I went and made one.

Old habits die hard, especially when they involve joyful fabrics. This is the top,

and I have used up leftover pieces from other quilts for the back. Tall hollyhocks growing all the way up would have been good,

[flowers in Yellow Submarine (1968)]

but who am I to complain about the Yellow Submarine-style acid trip blue-leafed poppies and plate-sized roses?

Life is still on hold, and we are still in distraction mode, but now that the Olympics are here, I don’t have to look too far. I don’t love the ridiculous cost, disruption, opening ceremonies, lack of tangible legacy, abandoned sporting facilities, but I do love seeing what humans can do with their bodies. It would appear that I particularly enjoy the events involving heights and getting over things.

So I shall be taking up my starting position on the settee to watch Femke Bol make running round a track and leaping over hurdles look so effortless,

gasp as Armand Duplantis uses a long bendy pole to launch himself six metres and more (the height of a double-decker bus) above the ground in order to clear a bar,

[1992 Olympics, Barcelona]

hold my breath while Tom Daley does a handstand on the edge of a 10m high concrete platform before twizzling and twirling into a pool below (and enjoy our favourite diving commentator, Leon '“get your surfboards out” Taylor),

and cheer on the fabulously sporting Gianmarco Tamberi, who agreed to share a gold medal rather than compete in a jump-off with his friend and rival, slither over the high jump. I also have a settee-date for the pole-vault final with Olympics super-fan Phoebe who has an event spreadsheet, cookie dough and home-made chuckleberry ice cream in the freezer, and a serious attitude to all the daftness.

I may be tall, but I’m not keen on actual heights; I get sweaty palms watching roof-top chases in films,

and this is the stuff of nightmares (my stomach churns just looking at the photo). But hitting the heights of the Olympics from the safety of a settee will do nicely.

Happy Sunday!