The Ragged Optimist 77

Hope and joy to start the week the right way

Being an artist and a writer is a job of work. I’m not supported by any other income or a trust fund: I’m supported by myself bringing in enough paid work to pay the rent on home and studio, the bills, my tax. I work to a-n pay rates, where possible, although not everyone funded by Arts Council England and commissioning artists with their funding sticks to that.

Writer-in-Residence on Sittingbourne's Steam Railway. An Ideas Test commission.

It fits in a strange place, this artist and writer job, somewhere between manual labour (it is me, being present and making things, that people pay for) and a professional career (it is also my ideas, my thinking, that people pay for - some days I have to gaze out of the window). It is all possible because I have done this for thirty and some years, have experience and understanding, and have built a network of like-minded people and connections that enable the work. Thank you, too, to the people who subscribe to this newsletter, and the paid subscribers who support my thinking about seaside towns.

And because it’s a job, and even though I obviously love it, I try to set boundaries - I don’t work evenings, and anything that can’t fit into a sensible working day gets left to one side. Generally, I try not to work weekends, but in September I was at Sittingbourne’s Steam Railway pretty much every weekend (I am not complaining: I got to drive a steam train), and this weekend I had Open Studios.

So it’s been a very busy couple of months, and I need a break. Next week, I’m going home to Worthing, where I fully intend to act like a tourist for a few days. So if you’re between Brighton and Littlehampton and fancy a cuppa (22nd-26th October, roughly), drop me a line. But let’s not talk about work.

1. A worldwide network of metal detectorists are finding lost wedding rings.

2. The green turtle has been rescued from the brink of extinction in a major conservation victory. Thanks to decades of global conservation efforts - from protecting eggs and releasing hatchlings on beaches to reducing accidental capture in fishing nets - new data shows green turtle populations are rebounding. Thanks to the lovely Ant for spotting this.

3. In the 1940s, Avocets were so endangered that the UK’s few breeding birds were guarded around the clock. Now, they thrive on many RSPB nature reserves. We can do this stuff, if we try.

4. A wildlife survey in Himachal (Northern India, near Tibet) seems to suggest Snow Leopards are doing well, and it also found the first official sighting of Pallas’s cat in Kinnaur and the rediscovery of the woolly flying squirrel in Lahaul.

5. ‘Prompting Nowhere’ is an attempt to develop an AI ethically compliant to William Morris’s socialist and utopian ideals and values both in its use and creation.

6. The Anthony Timberlands Center for Design and Materials Innovation integrates innovative mass timber construction while using Arkansas’s forest resources. Read the design report here.

7. I think Stewart Brand would approve of this conversion of a 1900s building in Birmingham, Alabama.

8. Remember Nature: A Day Of Action on Tuesday 4th November will see 16 arts organisations across England, including Tate, Serpentine, Kettle’s Yard, and Turner Contemporary come together to stand up for nature. It’s described as artist-led, but it seems to be led by organisations not artists, who’ve commissioned work from Hamish Fulton, Cornelia Parker, Anya Gallaccio and others.

9. Kent Wildlife Trust explain why it’s good to grow perennial fruit & vegetables and shares some species you can start growing in your garden or allotment.

10. From the archive. Back in 2011, I tried to apply Agile methodology from software to the arts. I’m planning something new for 2026, and this is a good reminder that sometimes you have to stop planning and try it out loud.