I apologise in advance for this weeks rambling affair……….lots of things happening. My diary is looking like one that doesn’t actually belong to me as it has some very unusual and diverse entries in it. Lots of scribbles and crossings out and alterations mainly due to the fact that I have a three-week slot of mayhem. In no particular order a volunteer fair, taking down an exhibition, putting up an exhibition, putting up a different exhibition, a funding fair, talking to training GP’s about the benefits of social prescribing, presenting to the Integrated Care Community, taking part in a local radio discussion panel on community, an exhibition preview night, another exhibition preview night and of course the usual day-to-day S2C stuff.

I have probably forgotten an odd thing in there too, I am finding that increasingly, with my own medical ongoing issues and also caring for my wife after her stroke sometimes things I say I will do just vanish from memory. Apologies if I have forgotten anything I said I would do to any reading this, just give me a nudge and try again. I am haunted by the thought that there is some poor person sat in a coffee shop somewhere in Kendal waiting for me to turn up for a meeting.

So, you are wondering, what is the 39, 40 all about. Well I mentioned exhibitions. I have been thinking and looking back to 2012. When we started S2C which was five years ago in December gone (so we are well on the way to six now) and started adding up all the shows, exhibitions, displays we have done. And I came to the figures that the next two exhibitions we do will be the 39th and 40th in five years! That is a lot of artwork by service users and local artists that might otherwise not have been seen. We have put art in our gallery, in shops, in the Town Hall, in Doctors Surgeries, in Hospitals, in tents in muddy fields, in the Leisure Centre and more.

In many cases we have given people their first experience of exhibiting and introduced people to new artists, raised people awareness of art as a tool for recovery. We work with people at their very worst and lowest points through to the point where they are back fully taking part in the local community and the artwork we show tells those stories. Every Service User artwork that goes on show has more in it than just its creative value. Every piece has the story of an individuals journey from the lowest moment to recovery, a snapshot along the way. This is why we are determined that our sessions are always ongoing rather than in short bursts and why we are ken for people to express and explore art rather than force them to do a particular style or method.

So this week we put a new selection of Service User Artwork in Helme Chase part of the James Cochrane Practise throughout the waiting rooms and building. The week after we have a major exhibition of artwork on an abstract theme from just about every creative group that come to S2C exploring how being abstract distracts from problems and the benefits to recovery.

I run S2C but at the same time I am one of its Service Users too because being involved and being able to lead and run creative sessions making artwork with and alongside some amazingly brave people is helping me as well as them.