The Centre of Ratho in Snow – Watercolour, Acrylic and Structure Gel in a Watercolour Moleskine

Our village is under about 24″ of snow at the moment, hence the proliferation of these winter scenes – my “Brrrr Pictures”. This is the corner building where Main Street joins Dalmahoy Road. Its been like this for over 120 years, in fact I have an old photo of this view which looks almost exactly the same as this. The original building was a dwelling house, then it doubled up as a shop as well. The old photo has a sign which says “Robert Young – Grocer and Wine Merchant”. It was fixed to the wall between the two windows on the gable end. When we moved to this place, in 1977, it was still a shop but sold more general goods. Then it became the village Post Office for many years. These days it is privately owned and has been converted back into a dwelling house. Such a history of change yet one thing has stayed the same, namely the tree in the background. It has been pruned severely, of late, to allow the increase in traffic to pass but it is instantly recognisable. Today it was clothed in snow perhaps defiantly demonstrating that it will take more than a wee amount of bad weather to undo its presence.