Mid Wales: Mist and Mourning at Clywedog

Christmas 2024 will remain etched in my memory as the most painful to date. In the days leading up to it, one of my beloved cats fell ill. What initially seemed manageable quickly turned devastating when, on Christmas Eve, I was forced to say goodbye after the very unexpected discovery of multiple tumours in CT scans. Her decline had been swift, her quality of life deteriorated to the point that I was left with no choice but to make that agonising decision that all pet owners dread. Holding her as she slipped away was utterly shattering.

We had planned to spend Christmas in Keswick, but with her hospitalisation, everything was abandoned at the last moment. Grieving and disoriented by the abruptness of her loss, I sought solitude in a remote corner of Powys, Wales, a place where I could be alone with my thoughts. When I arrived, the landscape seemed to reflect my inner world; thick fog draped the hills, and as I launched my kayak onto the water, it felt as though I were drifting into some liminal space between reality and grief.

There is something profoundly meditative about being on the water. The rhythmic movement of paddling, the quiet embrace of the elements; it creates a space where emotions can settle and take shape. I drifted aimlessly for hours, allowing my thoughts to unravel. Filming the eerie, dreamlike conditions became both a distraction and a means of expression, a way to externalise something that words could not fully contain.

The result was a video that, in its own quiet way, serves as a tribute to Freyja. There are visual metaphors woven throughout; subtle, perhaps, but deeply intentional.