Mirror, Mirror

Peter and Bonnie and some of our closest friends gave me cash for my sixtieth birthday. I wanted to buy a mirror, something unusual. While on holiday we found a shop in Wales that sells hand made mirrors to your own specification. We picked it up yesterday. Peter and Bonnie came along for the ride, a good lunch and afternoon tea and scones. Bonnie got Peter to buy her an Amber necklace in the shop.

The shop is a cave of delights. The windows are full of mirrors and stained glass. Outside boxes over spill with embroidered cloths and cushion covers. Inside is lined with shelves of healing crystals and stones, jingling wind chimes, amber jewellery, Buddhist statues, scented candles, and tie-dyed dresses and t-shirts. Mrs. Gruffydd, the mirror maker’s wife, is a crystal healer and Reiki master. She told us that Rhys would be back shortly. “He’s gone wandering somewhere,” she said. He arrived looking like a Welsh Priteni with his bald head, round face and straggly, grey goat-like beard that moves up and down as he talks, but he doesn't have a Welsh accent. Whether the name is false we didn’t like to ask, but he is definitely a scouser, from Liverpool, with a chequered history, only lately becoming an artisan.

It stood upstairs ready, waiting, in his workshop, my 3 foot x 2 foot mirror mounted on a black board to fit flush with the wall. Two vertical rows of 2 inch x 2 inch randomly coloured glass squares inserted four inches from the edge on either side, the only decoration.

As Rhys is a Buddhist, I felt it would bring good karma, but the difficulty Dan had putting it up (he’s not into DIY) started me doubting. Not his fault, Rhys had given him the wrong size brackets.

But once fitted, and the focal point of the room, the coloured glass squares of burgundy, pink, blue, yellow, orange and green cheered up the mellow shades of our living room.

Copyright © 2007 Barbara Attwood