The vacuum of time strikes again.
It sucked us through its straw last January, and we felt the slow pull of irresistible traction. As we passed the year's centre, there was a floating sensation as we were suspended in its vortex. Now we are being lifted and pushed out the other side, to land with a 'pop'...right here. Some of us on our feet and some on our asses.
Today, the final day of the year, is usually one of reflection. This morning I have pondered the year that was, how it played out for me and those around me. For many, it was a tough year, one that seemed to stop and start, to happen in parts rather than as a smooth, uninterrupted length of time. It was adjunct and haphazard, cyclic and challenging.
One wise owl (often perched on my shoulder) informed me that in August, several planets cosmically aligned for the first and last time in our lifetime. The period leading up to and subsequent to that alignment was unsettling and uncertain for everyone as the universe anticipated and then consolidated this astronomical anomaly. For me, this made some sense of what has seemed to be an unusual period of upheaval.
Each year is extraordinary in its own way. On New Year's Eve, my husband and I often get together with one particular friend, look back over and dub the year with a theme that captures its essence in a nutshell. There was one year (2006?), where absolutely nothing seemed to happen and it was therefore dubbed, "The Year Where Absolutely Nothing Happened". As you can see, we place an emphasis on integrity.
For 2010, I submit the theme, "The Year of Parts & Pieces", for consideration by my comrades. It was a year that gave a whole new meaning to the term, going with the flow.
There has been one constant for me throughout this year. The commitment I made back in January (New Year? Really?); that I would consistently post and maintain this blog. In 2010, an average of 70 and sometimes over 100 people have visited this site to catch the latest post. Since I started collecting stats mid year, there have been 983 visits to Mindfield.
So next year, if you want to keep reading, I will keep writing. Thanks to those of you who have visited once and a special thanks to those of you who keep coming back.
Reading over the posts from 2010, it seems there has been one other constant that I forgot to mention. The only other thing that ever stays the same.
Change.
Wishing you all a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Trojan horse
The year is almost at a close and it hardly seems the time to start something new. But that is what I've done. Timing is everything or so they say, yet time itself is more a mock structure for our lives that sets our expectations of what should be happening right now, and what comes next.
It's a new job. That's what I've started. The gates opened unexpectedly, and at first I was cynical. Not a trait I'm proud of but it's part and parcel of my long-suffering survival instinct. I rode in slowly on my Trojan horse. As the wheels creaked to a halt, I sat inside, huddled, listening for explosions, gun fire, yelling. I wait for it, confused and suspicious. I have long prepared myself for this moment. I am armed and I am dangerous. But where I find myself now, this is not the same war zone... I am met by a resounding silence.
Over a decade of siege, I have constructed this wooden horse. It has been my protection. My get-out-of-jail-free, hide-when-you're-scared, armoured shell. The tough 'n' stuff I carry on my back, so that nothing sticks and there is no cut too deep to heal from. Though made from hard, resilient timber, the horse is always hungry. He feeds on fear and indignation.
And in many ways, he has been feeding on me.
Now, I pop the peephole and look out to survey my new surroundings. The sun is shining. The air seems clear. I emerge, surprised to find I am no longer at war. People are amused and pleased to see me as I dust myself off and shut the horse's gut behind me.
I am not their foe, nor have I tricked them to let me inside their secure space. I am invited. I am welcome. Low and behold, the horse that got me into Troy time and time again, was not at all the stratagem to end the conflict. All it took was me.
Needless to say, I do not intend to ride out on the horse I rode in on. But I will stable it, for now. I don't quite have the energy to push it to the outer yet.
From where I sit at my new desk, I can see the back of a sign, advertising the company to those that pass by. A bird is nesting there, inside the letter 'r', and occasionally I look up to see him bringing small twigs and leaves to build his urban hideaway. He tweets and flutters, scampering in and out from behind the metal scaffold. Every so often, he appears to look me in the eye. Head tilted to the side, he regards me with feint interest.
Mr Bird has things in perspective. He reminds me that everything we do feeds back to our home, our family, and is part of something much, much bigger.
It's a new job. That's what I've started. The gates opened unexpectedly, and at first I was cynical. Not a trait I'm proud of but it's part and parcel of my long-suffering survival instinct. I rode in slowly on my Trojan horse. As the wheels creaked to a halt, I sat inside, huddled, listening for explosions, gun fire, yelling. I wait for it, confused and suspicious. I have long prepared myself for this moment. I am armed and I am dangerous. But where I find myself now, this is not the same war zone... I am met by a resounding silence.
Over a decade of siege, I have constructed this wooden horse. It has been my protection. My get-out-of-jail-free, hide-when-you're-scared, armoured shell. The tough 'n' stuff I carry on my back, so that nothing sticks and there is no cut too deep to heal from. Though made from hard, resilient timber, the horse is always hungry. He feeds on fear and indignation.
And in many ways, he has been feeding on me.
Now, I pop the peephole and look out to survey my new surroundings. The sun is shining. The air seems clear. I emerge, surprised to find I am no longer at war. People are amused and pleased to see me as I dust myself off and shut the horse's gut behind me.
I am not their foe, nor have I tricked them to let me inside their secure space. I am invited. I am welcome. Low and behold, the horse that got me into Troy time and time again, was not at all the stratagem to end the conflict. All it took was me.
Needless to say, I do not intend to ride out on the horse I rode in on. But I will stable it, for now. I don't quite have the energy to push it to the outer yet.
From where I sit at my new desk, I can see the back of a sign, advertising the company to those that pass by. A bird is nesting there, inside the letter 'r', and occasionally I look up to see him bringing small twigs and leaves to build his urban hideaway. He tweets and flutters, scampering in and out from behind the metal scaffold. Every so often, he appears to look me in the eye. Head tilted to the side, he regards me with feint interest.
Mr Bird has things in perspective. He reminds me that everything we do feeds back to our home, our family, and is part of something much, much bigger.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Inside the jar
The other night we went out, as you do, to catch up with some friends for a meal at a popular spot, one that didn't require a lot of um-ing and ah-ing. We'd been there before... we knew we'd get a good feed for a fair price. And it was true. What we didn't count on was the colorful and entertaining service.
One waiter in particular captured my attention. It was partly because he walked so very fast. The doors from the kitchen swung open and he launched like a whippet, out of the gates. His movements were sudden and frantic. His face was as thin and drawn as the weasel from "The Wind In The Willows", but he was neither dark nor deceptive. He was friendly, openly helpful in fact, delivering extra cutlery and menu advice without request.
When it came to dessert, we stood, eyes glazed at the glass wall of cakes, reading the little signposts that named the streets on the road to gluttony. While the waiter-whippet assisted by differentiating between three decadent and equally enticing chocolate towers called Mars, Mousse and Death By, I noticed his tattoo.
If you have instantly conjured an ink-laden image in your mind, you would be incorrect. The tattoo in question was not an image at all. It was in fact, a sentence complete with full-stop. Down the inside left of his forearm this man made a bold statement about himself to the world.
It said simply, I am pure will.
For the remainder of the evening, stories ran rampant through my head as to what would motivate a person to brand themselves with those particular words, and in a bodily space that was so deliberately public. I was bemused and fascinated.
I considered that perhaps he was fighting an addiction. Each time he looked down at his arm and the veins that itched and ached, it would speak to him about his strength and his courage. A fire would rise within him, almighty. You have come this far. It was like a permanent post-it to re-assert his self-belief, an affirmation of hope in order to stick with the program. Then, in a blur he whirred past me... if I am right, it may not be working, I thought.
I wondered did he suffer depression? Did he wake with a groan and lie in until late, staring past his TV to the beige of his wall as 'The Circle' made over yet another weight-loss achiever? Blinds down, but flipped upward, so the light could never touch the pasty skin of his toothpick arms. I am fragile, he would think, and wrap himself tighter in the layers of his doona, cocooned, a parcel for the postman to pick up and take anywhere. Anywhere but here. At three, he would wake instinctively, knowing the time had come, and only by reading his arm would he make it to the shower.
Maybe he just wanted to tell people about who he is and he found the regular labels dull. He was not just a father, a brother, a son. He was not just a waiter-whippet. He was will. And not just any will. Blatant. Uncompromising. Indomitable, Pure Will. Or at least, that's the label he puts on his jar. Inside he could be crunchy or smooth. Or both.
His label keeps me guessing. Whether he is an addict or an egotist, I will never know. None of us are one dimensional and none of us are singularly anything. After a few days' reflection, I think the man's tattoo says: Don't tell me who I am, let me tell you who I am.
It's just one example of the attempts we make as humans to define ourselves, to piece together our identities before others do it for us. To assert some control over our own story and how it is interpreted when transmuted through the social spectrum to strangers in restaurants.
Reading people is fun, especially when they have sentences on their limbs. But you can only perceive so much from the jar. You find out more from the list of ingredients.
One waiter in particular captured my attention. It was partly because he walked so very fast. The doors from the kitchen swung open and he launched like a whippet, out of the gates. His movements were sudden and frantic. His face was as thin and drawn as the weasel from "The Wind In The Willows", but he was neither dark nor deceptive. He was friendly, openly helpful in fact, delivering extra cutlery and menu advice without request.
When it came to dessert, we stood, eyes glazed at the glass wall of cakes, reading the little signposts that named the streets on the road to gluttony. While the waiter-whippet assisted by differentiating between three decadent and equally enticing chocolate towers called Mars, Mousse and Death By, I noticed his tattoo.
If you have instantly conjured an ink-laden image in your mind, you would be incorrect. The tattoo in question was not an image at all. It was in fact, a sentence complete with full-stop. Down the inside left of his forearm this man made a bold statement about himself to the world.
It said simply, I am pure will.
For the remainder of the evening, stories ran rampant through my head as to what would motivate a person to brand themselves with those particular words, and in a bodily space that was so deliberately public. I was bemused and fascinated.
I considered that perhaps he was fighting an addiction. Each time he looked down at his arm and the veins that itched and ached, it would speak to him about his strength and his courage. A fire would rise within him, almighty. You have come this far. It was like a permanent post-it to re-assert his self-belief, an affirmation of hope in order to stick with the program. Then, in a blur he whirred past me... if I am right, it may not be working, I thought.
I wondered did he suffer depression? Did he wake with a groan and lie in until late, staring past his TV to the beige of his wall as 'The Circle' made over yet another weight-loss achiever? Blinds down, but flipped upward, so the light could never touch the pasty skin of his toothpick arms. I am fragile, he would think, and wrap himself tighter in the layers of his doona, cocooned, a parcel for the postman to pick up and take anywhere. Anywhere but here. At three, he would wake instinctively, knowing the time had come, and only by reading his arm would he make it to the shower.
Maybe he just wanted to tell people about who he is and he found the regular labels dull. He was not just a father, a brother, a son. He was not just a waiter-whippet. He was will. And not just any will. Blatant. Uncompromising. Indomitable, Pure Will. Or at least, that's the label he puts on his jar. Inside he could be crunchy or smooth. Or both.
His label keeps me guessing. Whether he is an addict or an egotist, I will never know. None of us are one dimensional and none of us are singularly anything. After a few days' reflection, I think the man's tattoo says: Don't tell me who I am, let me tell you who I am.
It's just one example of the attempts we make as humans to define ourselves, to piece together our identities before others do it for us. To assert some control over our own story and how it is interpreted when transmuted through the social spectrum to strangers in restaurants.
Reading people is fun, especially when they have sentences on their limbs. But you can only perceive so much from the jar. You find out more from the list of ingredients.
Sunday, October 24, 2010
I summon the Genie
Rome was built from the ruins, I thought, as I climbed out of my pit of despair. Phew, that was exhausting. I sat, perched on the edge of the hole I had dug for myself, legs dangling, perspiration pouring, dirt smeared across my cheeks. I looked down and then up. I looked for a sign.
Instead, this week, I received a series of revelations. So, in no particular order I am going to share them with (lucky) you.
No one turned up on a government-sanctioned mission to rescue me with a half dozen engineers and a special, rocket-like chute... but many hands reached down from the light and offered to extract me from my hole. I gratefully took these hands. To be alone is sometimes a physical reality, but to feel alone is a choice. The truth is, there are people everywhere, friends, and if you are willing to wave a flag from inside the cavity you have fallen into, your brave signal will lure fellow cave dwellers from their own pits in droves. Invite someone over coffee. Phone a friend. Listen while someone else tells you about their much, much worse situation. Relay and relate. Talk to a stranger at a bar or at the library. There are at least 100 ways not to be alone. So, I picked more than one.
Lesson number two: When you set demanding goals, be they financial, professional, creative or otherwise it is worthwhile to first find out what tools, collateral or energy might be required to meet said goals; as opposed to projecting a deep, dark road littered with difficult obstacles between yourself and where you ultimately want to be. This imagined clutter is difficult to clear up once projected. Start with facts, rather than assumptions and the way to the finish line will look a little less like Jurassic Park during Cyclone Tracy and a little more like the yellow brick road to OZ.
I have been reminded once again that my life's purpose is my property. I own it and I shape it. This idea takes some getting used to. Some days, it feels like I stole it and so I hide it behind the couch until I find someone worthy to give it back to. Then I remember that there is no one more qualified to handle it than me. It's "if you build it they will come" versus "they have built it so let's go visit and do what we're told while we're there". Start small, somebody told me. You might feel like an ant wading in a puddle of almost insurmountable expectation, but keep your head up, swim and soon you will grow.
Getting back to the idea of life purpose made me do a lot of thinking about creativity, both my own and as a general concept. I was referred to a TED Talk by writer, Elizabeth Gilbert on nurturing creativity. She talks about artists being held accountable and how the creative 'genie' once considered to be a divine enigma, visited upon unsuspecting artists is now considered to inhabit the self. We are on the look out for a (human) creative genius rather than the concept of 'creative genius'. With works pending critical judgment even prior to creation, you can see how one's capacity for inspiration or transcendence could be severely incapacitated by society's jury, waiting with baited breath, tapping fingers and feet, as the artist of today tries to "bring it home".
Whether this judgment is real or imagined, there is a certain truth in an artist's journey being less valued and respected today, than it may have been historically. Artistry was once revered as a dignified and envied vocation. Capitalism sure has a lot to answer for. We shake in our boots at any career that does not play a hearty role in meeting the household budget. There is no creative venture where anguish is not anticipated in advance, where fear for what the future holds is not felt. A sense lingers that there is a danger to our wellbeing, psychologically, socially, financially, if we continue to pursue such fanciful prospects.
And here comes my next revelation...I hereby conclude that this festering attitude in our collective subconscious can go and fuck itself. Artists in all forms should be treated like a protected species, in a societal construct that enables, encourages and fosters creativity to thrive. Let's tear down the emotional firewall that stands between what we think we should be doing and what we were put on this earth to do. Our personal security settings are good and keeping bad things out, but they can also block good things from coming in. If you put up a fence, you always have to climb up to see over. It's protection at a price; quite literally, the cost of living.
Humans are just that. Human. We can be vessels for something greater if we are open and ready. So, show up, be present. Nothing can be achieved by you if you aren't actually there. A transition is just the first step in a revolution. Releasing the genie requires time and space. You have to be willing to claw your way back out of the hole.
Sit on the side with you legs dangling and look around for a sign.
This week, I opened my eyes and an opportunity presented itself. For the first time in a long time I am genuinely motivated, propelled towards something that could feed my soul, for which the entire point is fulfillment of a greater purpose. No money will change hands.
If it is meant to be, I will have another good reason to get out of bed each morning. If it is not, I will dust myself off, keep my head up and swim in my puddle until I outgrow it. And I will not swim alone...all creatures great and small are welcome.
Instead, this week, I received a series of revelations. So, in no particular order I am going to share them with (lucky) you.
No one turned up on a government-sanctioned mission to rescue me with a half dozen engineers and a special, rocket-like chute... but many hands reached down from the light and offered to extract me from my hole. I gratefully took these hands. To be alone is sometimes a physical reality, but to feel alone is a choice. The truth is, there are people everywhere, friends, and if you are willing to wave a flag from inside the cavity you have fallen into, your brave signal will lure fellow cave dwellers from their own pits in droves. Invite someone over coffee. Phone a friend. Listen while someone else tells you about their much, much worse situation. Relay and relate. Talk to a stranger at a bar or at the library. There are at least 100 ways not to be alone. So, I picked more than one.
Lesson number two: When you set demanding goals, be they financial, professional, creative or otherwise it is worthwhile to first find out what tools, collateral or energy might be required to meet said goals; as opposed to projecting a deep, dark road littered with difficult obstacles between yourself and where you ultimately want to be. This imagined clutter is difficult to clear up once projected. Start with facts, rather than assumptions and the way to the finish line will look a little less like Jurassic Park during Cyclone Tracy and a little more like the yellow brick road to OZ.
I have been reminded once again that my life's purpose is my property. I own it and I shape it. This idea takes some getting used to. Some days, it feels like I stole it and so I hide it behind the couch until I find someone worthy to give it back to. Then I remember that there is no one more qualified to handle it than me. It's "if you build it they will come" versus "they have built it so let's go visit and do what we're told while we're there". Start small, somebody told me. You might feel like an ant wading in a puddle of almost insurmountable expectation, but keep your head up, swim and soon you will grow.
Getting back to the idea of life purpose made me do a lot of thinking about creativity, both my own and as a general concept. I was referred to a TED Talk by writer, Elizabeth Gilbert on nurturing creativity. She talks about artists being held accountable and how the creative 'genie' once considered to be a divine enigma, visited upon unsuspecting artists is now considered to inhabit the self. We are on the look out for a (human) creative genius rather than the concept of 'creative genius'. With works pending critical judgment even prior to creation, you can see how one's capacity for inspiration or transcendence could be severely incapacitated by society's jury, waiting with baited breath, tapping fingers and feet, as the artist of today tries to "bring it home".
Whether this judgment is real or imagined, there is a certain truth in an artist's journey being less valued and respected today, than it may have been historically. Artistry was once revered as a dignified and envied vocation. Capitalism sure has a lot to answer for. We shake in our boots at any career that does not play a hearty role in meeting the household budget. There is no creative venture where anguish is not anticipated in advance, where fear for what the future holds is not felt. A sense lingers that there is a danger to our wellbeing, psychologically, socially, financially, if we continue to pursue such fanciful prospects.
And here comes my next revelation...I hereby conclude that this festering attitude in our collective subconscious can go and fuck itself. Artists in all forms should be treated like a protected species, in a societal construct that enables, encourages and fosters creativity to thrive. Let's tear down the emotional firewall that stands between what we think we should be doing and what we were put on this earth to do. Our personal security settings are good and keeping bad things out, but they can also block good things from coming in. If you put up a fence, you always have to climb up to see over. It's protection at a price; quite literally, the cost of living.
Humans are just that. Human. We can be vessels for something greater if we are open and ready. So, show up, be present. Nothing can be achieved by you if you aren't actually there. A transition is just the first step in a revolution. Releasing the genie requires time and space. You have to be willing to claw your way back out of the hole.
Sit on the side with you legs dangling and look around for a sign.
This week, I opened my eyes and an opportunity presented itself. For the first time in a long time I am genuinely motivated, propelled towards something that could feed my soul, for which the entire point is fulfillment of a greater purpose. No money will change hands.
If it is meant to be, I will have another good reason to get out of bed each morning. If it is not, I will dust myself off, keep my head up and swim in my puddle until I outgrow it. And I will not swim alone...all creatures great and small are welcome.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Bend it like Bender
I am sitting outside in the sun, writing what is my first post this month. Since you last heard from me, I have become one of “those people” you see in cafes tapping at their laptop. Today, the sun has drawn me out, crab from shell, and encouraged to send some unsolicited words out into cyberspace. Have I been lazy? Possibly. Distracted? Definitely. Perhaps I was hibernating, like a brown bear. It was the end of a long Winter after all.
No matter the reason, it's a fact that not a lot has sprouted in the usually fertile ground of Mindfield recently. To those of you who rely on me for amusement, thought provocation or the raise of a furry brow, I submit a formal apology.
My silence may have been best for readership. I have not been an easy person to be around this past month, uncharacteristically introverted and moody. Husband can vouch for my lack of social compatibility. Each time we have left the house to confront the world at large I imagine him phoning ahead to warn them; “We’ll need to keep her separate, you know that she doesn't play well with others.” I arrive at places expecting to see a little signpost at my table.
As yet, I have no resolution for my onset of this self-diagnosed inertia. It seems I am momentarily frozen in time. Prophets of common sense would suggest that action could cure me, but there is a sense that the cons of committing on both sides outweigh the pros of making a move in either direction. After years of doggedly pursuing every lead life had to offer, walking through all doors, open and shut, it seems that I have stopped dead, mid-cycle, and not even mid-life.
Was it wisdom that I paused to ask myself where I was running to and why the hurry? Or was it self-destructive? When I stopped to smell the roses, a question mark somehow got sucked up my nose. Now it is zipping around in my head and I feel like until I answer it correctly, I won’t see anything but an endless quandary of questions. I will be literally missing the point. Period.
There are days when I watch myself spin like Alice down the rabbit hole. I have even considered the possibility that I have accidentally wandered into the Bermuda triangle of life. I would describe it as limbo, but limbo could imply there is a sort of goal. A bar that keeps resetting the challenge, that requires you to stretch yourself, even if it’s just for fun.
For now I accept that I have lost my rhythm or at least misplaced it. The familiar tune I was dancing to inexplicably changed from pop to jazz in the bridge. Now, there isn’t even a chorus. It’s unpredictable and disorderly. The symbols clash and I cringe, not sure what to expect next, my beat in complete disarray. Needless to say, I never cared much for jazz.
I will keep walking down this road that only reveals itself in front of me a few metres at a time. I will take my chances. I need the time to gather the bricks and mortar so I can pave my own road... it is a slow process. I walk past other avenues and alleyways, perfectly constructed and inviting. People I know beckon me to walk their way. I wave politely and ignore them.
I figure, if you have to spend time in limbo, you might as well join in. Sing your own tune regardless of what's playing, and bend it (like Bender) for as long as you can. Only time will tell if you will break your back trying.
No matter the reason, it's a fact that not a lot has sprouted in the usually fertile ground of Mindfield recently. To those of you who rely on me for amusement, thought provocation or the raise of a furry brow, I submit a formal apology.
My silence may have been best for readership. I have not been an easy person to be around this past month, uncharacteristically introverted and moody. Husband can vouch for my lack of social compatibility. Each time we have left the house to confront the world at large I imagine him phoning ahead to warn them; “We’ll need to keep her separate, you know that she doesn't play well with others.” I arrive at places expecting to see a little signpost at my table.
As yet, I have no resolution for my onset of this self-diagnosed inertia. It seems I am momentarily frozen in time. Prophets of common sense would suggest that action could cure me, but there is a sense that the cons of committing on both sides outweigh the pros of making a move in either direction. After years of doggedly pursuing every lead life had to offer, walking through all doors, open and shut, it seems that I have stopped dead, mid-cycle, and not even mid-life.
Was it wisdom that I paused to ask myself where I was running to and why the hurry? Or was it self-destructive? When I stopped to smell the roses, a question mark somehow got sucked up my nose. Now it is zipping around in my head and I feel like until I answer it correctly, I won’t see anything but an endless quandary of questions. I will be literally missing the point. Period.
There are days when I watch myself spin like Alice down the rabbit hole. I have even considered the possibility that I have accidentally wandered into the Bermuda triangle of life. I would describe it as limbo, but limbo could imply there is a sort of goal. A bar that keeps resetting the challenge, that requires you to stretch yourself, even if it’s just for fun.
For now I accept that I have lost my rhythm or at least misplaced it. The familiar tune I was dancing to inexplicably changed from pop to jazz in the bridge. Now, there isn’t even a chorus. It’s unpredictable and disorderly. The symbols clash and I cringe, not sure what to expect next, my beat in complete disarray. Needless to say, I never cared much for jazz.
I will keep walking down this road that only reveals itself in front of me a few metres at a time. I will take my chances. I need the time to gather the bricks and mortar so I can pave my own road... it is a slow process. I walk past other avenues and alleyways, perfectly constructed and inviting. People I know beckon me to walk their way. I wave politely and ignore them.
I figure, if you have to spend time in limbo, you might as well join in. Sing your own tune regardless of what's playing, and bend it (like Bender) for as long as you can. Only time will tell if you will break your back trying.
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
An Ode to My Gut
For when I am doubled in doubt
Fighting on the fear frontier
With reason lost or unfounded
I will read this again, to remind myself.
I will place my hands atop my belly
And close my eyes to see
If I can reach into the dark
To pluck with precision,
The Answer.
The Way,
and the Truth.
It will be there, alright.
Buzzing around others, from a land Before
That have served their purpose
And have since lay down to rest,
Content. Exhausted.
If I could place an ear to my soft rise,
I would surely hear it coming.
A locomotive from a tunnel
With its lights on.
Surrender my head that belies logic
Forgo the Queen of Hearts,
and her endless negotiations.
And tune only the channel of instinct.
Pure. Resounding.
Infallible navigator,
Primitive animal.
Sensory genius,
Selfless companion.
May I tread the path that leads me first to your door
So that my when I am mirrored
I can avoid the reflection of my eyes
that speaks,"I told you so..."
Fighting on the fear frontier
With reason lost or unfounded
I will read this again, to remind myself.
I will place my hands atop my belly
And close my eyes to see
If I can reach into the dark
To pluck with precision,
The Answer.
The Way,
and the Truth.
It will be there, alright.
Buzzing around others, from a land Before
That have served their purpose
And have since lay down to rest,
Content. Exhausted.
If I could place an ear to my soft rise,
I would surely hear it coming.
A locomotive from a tunnel
With its lights on.
Surrender my head that belies logic
Forgo the Queen of Hearts,
and her endless negotiations.
And tune only the channel of instinct.
Pure. Resounding.
Infallible navigator,
Primitive animal.
Sensory genius,
Selfless companion.
May I tread the path that leads me first to your door
So that my when I am mirrored
I can avoid the reflection of my eyes
that speaks,"I told you so..."
Monday, August 30, 2010
My coffee shop, the Oracle
I recently set out to challenge myself, to write something other than a post for this blog, a communication strategy or a copywriting job. Set a goal, people encouraged me. Writer folk espouse that competitions can provide the necessary impetus, setting a deadline for you without compromise, a looming date whereby a piece of work must be polished, printed, proofed and posted.
I am used to crafting careful messages, sharply defining the complex, crystallising a blur of technicality into a stark transparency. Sure, I sometimes weave in a witty repartee and experience the odd flash of (dare I say) brilliance during my personal indulgence in developing prose; but generally, I have made my living by making the confusing, clear and the indifferent, meaningful.
So, when faced with the task of drawing outside the lines, dancing with the shadows of subtlety that deliberately push a reader into the dark, I was more perplexed than I expected to be. Skills I learned long ago seemed to elude me. I had put them down somewhere and could no longer locate them. What I had deemed a minor professional transition was suddenly exacerbated to overwhelming. The elephant I had planned to eat in small bites multiplied into a herd, and I began to lose my appetite.
Extracting the required story from my creative being proved similar to the intricate game we played as children called Operation, where you lay on your stomach wielding tweezers to remove tiny plastic bones from an inanimate, two-dimensional man.
My procrastination was excruciating and the blame splashed everywhere but on me. I couldn’t write in an unclean house. I was hungry, thirsty, tired, could not resist watching endless repeat episodes of Californication. I struggled to be creative at the same desk where I conjured up the corporate devil. Fed up and in a flabbergasted effort to refresh and re-boot, I took myself out and down the street to put pen to paper, the good old fashioned way.
Our strip of ‘urbia offers a plethora of options for caffeination. I select the most eclectic of places, the one that vibrates pure, haphazard, hippie randomness in order to enhance the flow of my so called artistic juices. To the right side of the front door, there is a stout blackboard and on it I read a message. Had it been delivered in a bottle, I would have sworn it had been (pre)scribed, just for me:
If you will it, it will no longer be a dream.
How encouraging. After my third latte, it is not only encouraging, but occurring. Ink and paper finally connect and there is more evidence to speak of than when man made contact with the moon. Scribbles return home to be relayed to trusty Daddy Mac. Words front up to numerous iterations and renunciations on screen. Cobbled together, it’s parchment by patchwork and along with some inherent failings, a conclusive draft comes to exist. A story strewn from beginning to end, which in itself seems to be an act of protest against nature. My own nature, that is.
Mould of a masterpiece now etched, I pro-actively seek perspective from a deliberately diminutive number of supposedly like-minded commentators. This serves as a stinging reminder that it is always better to rip the band-aid off yourself. Getting someone else to do it... it is not designed to hurt them. My small band of merry people inflicted many wounds and they used a range of weapons. Some of them technical, some credible, some subjective and some intuitive. I see a bad moon rising and I am remiss to wear my armour. Resilience, I had forgotten, is the formal wear of the artist.
(And despair is the lonely friend, who always wears black and lives in a cold stone cottage, just out of town; close enough to visit occasionally.)
My recovery is week-long until a fresh day when I wake up clean and pick up an empty basket to start cherry picking the wreckage. The story I gave birth to is never the same and I accept that perhaps it shouldn’t be. I polish my beaten resolve and try chanting a more upbeat, mantra. Opinions are like bums and everybody has one, or so I am told.
I meet the competition d-day and after I mail the yellow envelope, I am still rumbling with mild dissatisfaction at the final product but I am relieved to let it go. I decide on a coffee, so it is back to 'caffeine ecelectica' for another dose. I pass the blackboard standing guard and today the message is even more fitting and profound;
Use what talent you possess. The woods would be very silent if no birds sang except those that sang best. [Henry Van Dyke]
Well. How about that.
I am used to crafting careful messages, sharply defining the complex, crystallising a blur of technicality into a stark transparency. Sure, I sometimes weave in a witty repartee and experience the odd flash of (dare I say) brilliance during my personal indulgence in developing prose; but generally, I have made my living by making the confusing, clear and the indifferent, meaningful.
So, when faced with the task of drawing outside the lines, dancing with the shadows of subtlety that deliberately push a reader into the dark, I was more perplexed than I expected to be. Skills I learned long ago seemed to elude me. I had put them down somewhere and could no longer locate them. What I had deemed a minor professional transition was suddenly exacerbated to overwhelming. The elephant I had planned to eat in small bites multiplied into a herd, and I began to lose my appetite.
Extracting the required story from my creative being proved similar to the intricate game we played as children called Operation, where you lay on your stomach wielding tweezers to remove tiny plastic bones from an inanimate, two-dimensional man.
My procrastination was excruciating and the blame splashed everywhere but on me. I couldn’t write in an unclean house. I was hungry, thirsty, tired, could not resist watching endless repeat episodes of Californication. I struggled to be creative at the same desk where I conjured up the corporate devil. Fed up and in a flabbergasted effort to refresh and re-boot, I took myself out and down the street to put pen to paper, the good old fashioned way.
Our strip of ‘urbia offers a plethora of options for caffeination. I select the most eclectic of places, the one that vibrates pure, haphazard, hippie randomness in order to enhance the flow of my so called artistic juices. To the right side of the front door, there is a stout blackboard and on it I read a message. Had it been delivered in a bottle, I would have sworn it had been (pre)scribed, just for me:
If you will it, it will no longer be a dream.
How encouraging. After my third latte, it is not only encouraging, but occurring. Ink and paper finally connect and there is more evidence to speak of than when man made contact with the moon. Scribbles return home to be relayed to trusty Daddy Mac. Words front up to numerous iterations and renunciations on screen. Cobbled together, it’s parchment by patchwork and along with some inherent failings, a conclusive draft comes to exist. A story strewn from beginning to end, which in itself seems to be an act of protest against nature. My own nature, that is.
Mould of a masterpiece now etched, I pro-actively seek perspective from a deliberately diminutive number of supposedly like-minded commentators. This serves as a stinging reminder that it is always better to rip the band-aid off yourself. Getting someone else to do it... it is not designed to hurt them. My small band of merry people inflicted many wounds and they used a range of weapons. Some of them technical, some credible, some subjective and some intuitive. I see a bad moon rising and I am remiss to wear my armour. Resilience, I had forgotten, is the formal wear of the artist.
(And despair is the lonely friend, who always wears black and lives in a cold stone cottage, just out of town; close enough to visit occasionally.)
My recovery is week-long until a fresh day when I wake up clean and pick up an empty basket to start cherry picking the wreckage. The story I gave birth to is never the same and I accept that perhaps it shouldn’t be. I polish my beaten resolve and try chanting a more upbeat, mantra. Opinions are like bums and everybody has one, or so I am told.
I meet the competition d-day and after I mail the yellow envelope, I am still rumbling with mild dissatisfaction at the final product but I am relieved to let it go. I decide on a coffee, so it is back to 'caffeine ecelectica' for another dose. I pass the blackboard standing guard and today the message is even more fitting and profound;
Use what talent you possess. The woods would be very silent if no birds sang except those that sang best. [Henry Van Dyke]
Well. How about that.
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Freedom is everywhere
Melbourne is such an outstanding place to live for so many reasons. Coffee is the unequivocal, first and foremost reason. I am not sure why people in other states don’t know how to make it, but they just don’t. It’s like all of the baristas that were any good at distilling and frothing a decent brew have somehow found their way here.
Food, and I refer to both the standard and the variety, comes in a close second. You can find almost any type, fresh and fast, on any budget, at any time. Cook it yourself or have someone much more qualified do it for you. The choice is yours, quite literally. From spicy dumplings, to a juicy steak, hearty Italian cuisine, burritos and churros. All awaiting our visit to the inviting ambience of one of thousands of eateries, all over town.
And the list goes on; from the shopping, to parks and gardens, the galleries, the markets, and the book nooks, it’s an artisan’s vision. But one of the true highlights also has to be how, in less than just two hours, you can be outside of the city, enjoying the enchanting and peaceful paradise that is regional Victoria.
Over the weekend, we made a getaway. We packed the car with a change of clothes and a few bath items, grabbed a magazine, a book, turned off the power at all the sockets, shut the blinds and hit the open road.
In Winter, as you escape the hustle and bustle at the core of Melbourne, and crossover its outer fringes, you can feel the air around you crystalise. All of a sudden, there is space to breathe again. The clarity is stark and visceral.
The road stretches out ahead, as if to show you the way, and the land rises in mounds for a time and then falls flat and lies low, a dewy blanket spread out from the edge of the road to the edge of the earth.
A smattering of homesteads and holiday villas dot the rise at Daylesford, ranging from quaint to colourful, with the ghostly and profound Convent building at its peak, and the main street like a valley of gift shops and day spas. There is an uncompromising chill and a thin ice that coats the morning and melts away as the day delivers a divine and pure sun. Melbourne’s passion for all things edible extends well passed its bounds into its sister townships, where someone who lives down the road grows the produce and you pay good tourist dollars for a plate (or glass) of local pride.
The green is vibrant and the trees out-populate the people, random and rampant. There is a lake of still mud glass. White and spotted ducks are chased by dogs that relish in time spent off their leads. We stay with an old friend, and the welcome mat lays out long after we have shared and laughed over homemade pizza and eggs, sunny-side up. On Sunday afternoon, we take the scenic route, stopping to buy a sourdough Vienna from a baker down an alley in Trentham. Traffic hums and the road home seems somehow narrower.
As we drive back over the Bolte bridge, I catch a sweeping view of our mecca. It glows a hearth as the sun sets, light dancing off the glass windows of sky scrapers.
The weekend is an affair to remember. But my city beckons me home with a love that is as push and pull as a high school romance. Commitment coincides with wonder. The wind rushes in the front window and out the back. Freedom is really everywhere.
Food, and I refer to both the standard and the variety, comes in a close second. You can find almost any type, fresh and fast, on any budget, at any time. Cook it yourself or have someone much more qualified do it for you. The choice is yours, quite literally. From spicy dumplings, to a juicy steak, hearty Italian cuisine, burritos and churros. All awaiting our visit to the inviting ambience of one of thousands of eateries, all over town.
And the list goes on; from the shopping, to parks and gardens, the galleries, the markets, and the book nooks, it’s an artisan’s vision. But one of the true highlights also has to be how, in less than just two hours, you can be outside of the city, enjoying the enchanting and peaceful paradise that is regional Victoria.
Over the weekend, we made a getaway. We packed the car with a change of clothes and a few bath items, grabbed a magazine, a book, turned off the power at all the sockets, shut the blinds and hit the open road.
In Winter, as you escape the hustle and bustle at the core of Melbourne, and crossover its outer fringes, you can feel the air around you crystalise. All of a sudden, there is space to breathe again. The clarity is stark and visceral.
The road stretches out ahead, as if to show you the way, and the land rises in mounds for a time and then falls flat and lies low, a dewy blanket spread out from the edge of the road to the edge of the earth.
A smattering of homesteads and holiday villas dot the rise at Daylesford, ranging from quaint to colourful, with the ghostly and profound Convent building at its peak, and the main street like a valley of gift shops and day spas. There is an uncompromising chill and a thin ice that coats the morning and melts away as the day delivers a divine and pure sun. Melbourne’s passion for all things edible extends well passed its bounds into its sister townships, where someone who lives down the road grows the produce and you pay good tourist dollars for a plate (or glass) of local pride.
The green is vibrant and the trees out-populate the people, random and rampant. There is a lake of still mud glass. White and spotted ducks are chased by dogs that relish in time spent off their leads. We stay with an old friend, and the welcome mat lays out long after we have shared and laughed over homemade pizza and eggs, sunny-side up. On Sunday afternoon, we take the scenic route, stopping to buy a sourdough Vienna from a baker down an alley in Trentham. Traffic hums and the road home seems somehow narrower.
As we drive back over the Bolte bridge, I catch a sweeping view of our mecca. It glows a hearth as the sun sets, light dancing off the glass windows of sky scrapers.
The weekend is an affair to remember. But my city beckons me home with a love that is as push and pull as a high school romance. Commitment coincides with wonder. The wind rushes in the front window and out the back. Freedom is really everywhere.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
The Earthquake inside
Recently, I made a change. A decision. In fact, 'made' might be a little bit strong. But according to one of my closest friends, who applauded my choices or fate, as it were, I can be proud because "I really owned it". Other people would have just stayed put, treading water, walking in circles, she said.
So, I am now the proud owner of 'it', whatever 'it' is. Well done, me. I think.
It involved a change in job. A change in purpose. A change of mind? Yes, I concur, although not a deliberately articulated one. It was a core shift that might go unnoticed to those who don't know me well. It was one of those underlying, deep, internal movements that seemed to be completely out of my control, yet was somehow both conscious and unconscious at the same time. An earthquake inside.
These core-shakers can be hard to manoeuvre.
It stands to reason, that if you're used to working within a clear structure and you're tossed out on your heiney, you won't know what the rules are anymore. The boundaries dissolve. You lose your bearings. Give me a pre-determined framework to climb and I'm in there, navigating the scaffolding like a pro. On the flipside, working within the constructs of others, requires a bending and re-shaping of both your will and your terms. You're always trading-off something.
The concepts of structure (our external influences and environment) and agency (our freewill and capacity to think for ourselves) are considered polar opposites in the social sciences. They wrestle for power in a classic debate about which has the greatest influence on our behaviour. Can one exist without the other? I think it's a bit like the chicken and the egg. Freewill, left to its own devices must ultimately develop its own set of rules, a baseline to build from, or else it will surely lose its way. Without freewill, structure is never questioned or challenged. They are and they have to be, as interdependent and as balanced as yin and yang.
But freewill can be hard to pin down. It lacks direction, as unpredictable as nature, as the wave I rode in on to find myself here. It rises up like a fire with an undetermined point of origin and shrinks only in the presence of fear and loathing (and not only in Las Vegas). This is a fire I can no longer suppress but cannot yet control. I am both my strength and my weakness and within this contradiction I seek a compromise, a settlement with myself.
It remains to be seen if the change has made me. Whatever 'it' is or will be, there is only one way to find out. I stand now, on one side of a cliff, armed with all of the materials to build a bridge to the other side, but not quite knowing where to start. There are no instructions. No guidelines. The valley in between is an abyss of potential, a projection of possibility.
Struck by a paralysis that is too much time and space, I pause before I venture out to cross the distance, between where I am and where I could be.
I breathe.
And gulp.
So, I am now the proud owner of 'it', whatever 'it' is. Well done, me. I think.
It involved a change in job. A change in purpose. A change of mind? Yes, I concur, although not a deliberately articulated one. It was a core shift that might go unnoticed to those who don't know me well. It was one of those underlying, deep, internal movements that seemed to be completely out of my control, yet was somehow both conscious and unconscious at the same time. An earthquake inside.
These core-shakers can be hard to manoeuvre.
It stands to reason, that if you're used to working within a clear structure and you're tossed out on your heiney, you won't know what the rules are anymore. The boundaries dissolve. You lose your bearings. Give me a pre-determined framework to climb and I'm in there, navigating the scaffolding like a pro. On the flipside, working within the constructs of others, requires a bending and re-shaping of both your will and your terms. You're always trading-off something.
The concepts of structure (our external influences and environment) and agency (our freewill and capacity to think for ourselves) are considered polar opposites in the social sciences. They wrestle for power in a classic debate about which has the greatest influence on our behaviour. Can one exist without the other? I think it's a bit like the chicken and the egg. Freewill, left to its own devices must ultimately develop its own set of rules, a baseline to build from, or else it will surely lose its way. Without freewill, structure is never questioned or challenged. They are and they have to be, as interdependent and as balanced as yin and yang.
But freewill can be hard to pin down. It lacks direction, as unpredictable as nature, as the wave I rode in on to find myself here. It rises up like a fire with an undetermined point of origin and shrinks only in the presence of fear and loathing (and not only in Las Vegas). This is a fire I can no longer suppress but cannot yet control. I am both my strength and my weakness and within this contradiction I seek a compromise, a settlement with myself.
It remains to be seen if the change has made me. Whatever 'it' is or will be, there is only one way to find out. I stand now, on one side of a cliff, armed with all of the materials to build a bridge to the other side, but not quite knowing where to start. There are no instructions. No guidelines. The valley in between is an abyss of potential, a projection of possibility.
Struck by a paralysis that is too much time and space, I pause before I venture out to cross the distance, between where I am and where I could be.
I breathe.
And gulp.
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Separate your whites
Last weekend, I went to the laundromat. We don't have a dryer, you see. So, I took my damp towels and bed sheets, I put them in the boot of my car and drove them about ten minutes from my house to the nearby laundromat with the best parking.
I never had cause to visit a laundromat until I left home, at the ripe age of seventeen. After my initial move "out" to board with a friend, I moved again, this time "in", with a boy who was all wrong for what were at the time, all the right reasons.
It was then that I found myself down the road with my baskets of wet laundry for the first time.
Perhaps strangely, the laundromat is a place that I find grounding. There is something about the activity of washing and drying your clothing and manchester in a communal setting...it is humble and simple. It's necessary. It takes me back to basics.
You see people from all walks of life at the laundromat. They are careful to separate their whites from their darks and their brights, but in the process of the sorting and cleaning they reveal a range of colours, and I'm not just referring to their underwear.
I saw a girl take a chair and post herself right in front of the dryer she was using, as if to stand guard of her socks. If someone intended to perform daylight sock robbery she was ready to take them down. She sat right on the edge of her chair. No-one was getting past her. Of course, there was no-one so daring or perverse, at least not while I was there. But it was clear that she felt the need to protect what was hers.
There are those who are polite, even helpful; like the man I saw opening the door for people and warning them that the dryer on the end was swallowing coins in exchange for naught but a few spins of cold air.
And there is always at least one noisy, attention-seeking person. The one who has to take a phone call while stuffing their washer to announce their most recent personal problem over the hum of the machines. All the while, their children run riot around patient others who are mid-chapter of a novel they have been dying to get to all week.
Their laundry speaks volumes about who they are, what they do. From flamboyant frills to baby jumpsuits and Calvin Klein y-fronts, doilies and stained sheets, the innards of life spill out over the tops of cane and plastic baskets.
Like no other time, except perhaps when you need a toilet stop at Picadilly station, is it as important to have the right change. If you don't, you will have to take a walk, purchase something from the milk bar and make a polite request for dollar coins. You will need to pretend that the man selling the milk does not really know why you have asked for the coins and then casually disregard the sign that says, "we do not provide change for the laundromat", smoothing the awkward moment with your nicest manners and a dazzling flash of white teeth.
How much time you get for a dollar is anybody's guess, a secret known only to whomever hides in the booth behind the wall of industrial machines, under lock and key.
Somehow, watching my towels turn around and around in the dryer is soothing to me. The sound and the motion is repetitive, like being on a train. The dryer exudes a comforting heat. You are forced to stop still and stare while it cycles. It's a mesmerizing fabric evolution.
Over the years I have changed laundromats, sure. I have moved house about a dozen times. Being laundro-loyal is simply not pragmatic. But taking this basic, in-house event down the street reminds me that the inner workings of our day-to-day lives are very common. We are not alone. Each week, at some point we will all stand by a basket, sorting and folding, shaking our heads at the occasional white sock gone pink or an accidentally shrunken garment.
These basic threads, they weave us together.
I never had cause to visit a laundromat until I left home, at the ripe age of seventeen. After my initial move "out" to board with a friend, I moved again, this time "in", with a boy who was all wrong for what were at the time, all the right reasons.
It was then that I found myself down the road with my baskets of wet laundry for the first time.
Perhaps strangely, the laundromat is a place that I find grounding. There is something about the activity of washing and drying your clothing and manchester in a communal setting...it is humble and simple. It's necessary. It takes me back to basics.
You see people from all walks of life at the laundromat. They are careful to separate their whites from their darks and their brights, but in the process of the sorting and cleaning they reveal a range of colours, and I'm not just referring to their underwear.
I saw a girl take a chair and post herself right in front of the dryer she was using, as if to stand guard of her socks. If someone intended to perform daylight sock robbery she was ready to take them down. She sat right on the edge of her chair. No-one was getting past her. Of course, there was no-one so daring or perverse, at least not while I was there. But it was clear that she felt the need to protect what was hers.
There are those who are polite, even helpful; like the man I saw opening the door for people and warning them that the dryer on the end was swallowing coins in exchange for naught but a few spins of cold air.
And there is always at least one noisy, attention-seeking person. The one who has to take a phone call while stuffing their washer to announce their most recent personal problem over the hum of the machines. All the while, their children run riot around patient others who are mid-chapter of a novel they have been dying to get to all week.
Their laundry speaks volumes about who they are, what they do. From flamboyant frills to baby jumpsuits and Calvin Klein y-fronts, doilies and stained sheets, the innards of life spill out over the tops of cane and plastic baskets.
Like no other time, except perhaps when you need a toilet stop at Picadilly station, is it as important to have the right change. If you don't, you will have to take a walk, purchase something from the milk bar and make a polite request for dollar coins. You will need to pretend that the man selling the milk does not really know why you have asked for the coins and then casually disregard the sign that says, "we do not provide change for the laundromat", smoothing the awkward moment with your nicest manners and a dazzling flash of white teeth.
How much time you get for a dollar is anybody's guess, a secret known only to whomever hides in the booth behind the wall of industrial machines, under lock and key.
Somehow, watching my towels turn around and around in the dryer is soothing to me. The sound and the motion is repetitive, like being on a train. The dryer exudes a comforting heat. You are forced to stop still and stare while it cycles. It's a mesmerizing fabric evolution.
Over the years I have changed laundromats, sure. I have moved house about a dozen times. Being laundro-loyal is simply not pragmatic. But taking this basic, in-house event down the street reminds me that the inner workings of our day-to-day lives are very common. We are not alone. Each week, at some point we will all stand by a basket, sorting and folding, shaking our heads at the occasional white sock gone pink or an accidentally shrunken garment.
These basic threads, they weave us together.
Monday, June 21, 2010
The Winter Soul-stice
On the shortest day of the year I deliver what might be my shortest blog.
The solstice occurs when the sun is the greatest distance from the equator. Twice a year, this is the case. The other time, the day is much longer.
My soul hibernates now. It has crawled deep inside its shell, my body, to hide away from this harsh and bitter cold.
Today, marks the central point on the annum's road between brisk and unforgiving days to days that glow and draw us out of our caves, warm and inviting. It is not a matter of being half way to anywhere in particular, more like being perched atop a ferris wheel, mid-cycle. What goes up, must come down. We will be back again, one day soon.
Inside, I seek comfort, protection from the insolent chill. I create a cocoon of heated air and mohair throw rugs. I look out at the world from my coddle. Consolation of steaming coffee and hearty soup. My body is suspended somehow, weighted by skies that are the color of indifference.
I struggle against time's moment whenever the outside world beckons, and coat myself in an armor, unnecessary when the days are more reasonable, more relenting. Leather gloves, woolen socks, knee high boots. Scarf and jacket. Turtleneck. Grey and black. Black and grey. I walk to meet what feels like a wall of ice and the air cracks around me.
For now, I am frozen.
I trust that Spring will come eventually; to renew the barren and melt this season's punishment.
To bring about the green sprouts of fresh resolve.
The solstice occurs when the sun is the greatest distance from the equator. Twice a year, this is the case. The other time, the day is much longer.
My soul hibernates now. It has crawled deep inside its shell, my body, to hide away from this harsh and bitter cold.
Today, marks the central point on the annum's road between brisk and unforgiving days to days that glow and draw us out of our caves, warm and inviting. It is not a matter of being half way to anywhere in particular, more like being perched atop a ferris wheel, mid-cycle. What goes up, must come down. We will be back again, one day soon.
Inside, I seek comfort, protection from the insolent chill. I create a cocoon of heated air and mohair throw rugs. I look out at the world from my coddle. Consolation of steaming coffee and hearty soup. My body is suspended somehow, weighted by skies that are the color of indifference.
I struggle against time's moment whenever the outside world beckons, and coat myself in an armor, unnecessary when the days are more reasonable, more relenting. Leather gloves, woolen socks, knee high boots. Scarf and jacket. Turtleneck. Grey and black. Black and grey. I walk to meet what feels like a wall of ice and the air cracks around me.
For now, I am frozen.
I trust that Spring will come eventually; to renew the barren and melt this season's punishment.
To bring about the green sprouts of fresh resolve.
Monday, June 7, 2010
The Red of Hearts
Life is choc full of choices. At every turn, there is something new to decide. What to eat for breakfast. What to wear to work. Shall we eat out? Is it time to for a career break? When will we have children? Where to invest? The list goes on. Making life's choices, small and large, can feel like a gamble. A game.
Black or red, first choice. Then there are choices within and beneath that choice - will it be an ace, spades, clubs or hearts? Every color has its own shade of grey. By choosing red, does the option to choose black just disappear? If we go with hearts, does it mean that we can never try clubs? Sometimes, we get lucky and choose an ace; and sometimes, no matter what we choose, it feels like a losing hand.
We compare our own cards to the cards of others, which can tend to appear more positive or fortuitous. To the person holding the cards, it may not seem that way at all. It's hard to tell, especially if they can keep a poker face. The cards will always look better to the person who isn't holding them. They're designed that way.
Emile Durkheim studied the social factors contributing to suicide and classified the phenomena into types. One type, he dubbed Anomic, inflicts those who are unable to find their place in society, those who never really feel they belong anywhere. Durkheim believed that the progressive society (of the late 1800's!) offered up far too many options; that people struggled to fit in and understand their true purpose, resulting in internal revolt. I suspect that Durkheim would balk at the vast array of choice we face today, and the sea of opportunity we can drown in.
We set out deliberately to ensure our access to what could be restricted or inaccessible to us in the future. Recently while touring Fiji, I learned that its native children are granted the gift of free education by their government, yet they have a substantially lower literacy level than the high contingent of students whose families have emigrated to Fiji from India.
And, why is this? Because Indian children do not share the land entitlements of their Fijian counterparts. They know they have to work hard at school to ultimately be employed, buy land, and make homes of their own. The children of Fiji, however, will continue to occupy land that has been owned and occupied by their families for generations. No matter what they do or don't do at school they will have somewhere to live, and their essential needs will be met. They are not as motivated, because they don't associate the benefits of education as being fundamental to their existence.
Uncertainty breeds motivation. We are all driven in different ways and have a range of levers that pull us from one end of life to the other. There are occasions when our usual buttons seem unresponsive. When our most basic instincts are not enough to push us forward.
It's those times, when "they" say that "timing is everything". It shouldn't be "everything", but it does bear weight. It can feel like the wrong time to make a call, when your chips are down or you're on a losing streak. Someone once told me that if you're struggling between two options, then neither of your options can be that bad. When the pros and the cons do not tip the scales to present a clear winner, you can't really go wrong. Just choose something.
While I quietly insist to myself that it must be more clever and courageous to make a decision based on your innermost motives, rather than external and sometimes imagined influences, I also question; does it actually matter? Perhaps it's just better to choose (period) than to sit and stare at the cards, hoping, praying, perhaps in vein, for something to change by itself.
No matter what you choose, another hand will always be dealt, and while our choices are not finite, our moments here on earth most certainly are.
The important thing is that we decide. We choose something. We be right, we be wrong. Whatever. We exercise our agency, our freewill and remember that our right to choose will still exist afterward.
Black or red, first choice. Then there are choices within and beneath that choice - will it be an ace, spades, clubs or hearts? Every color has its own shade of grey. By choosing red, does the option to choose black just disappear? If we go with hearts, does it mean that we can never try clubs? Sometimes, we get lucky and choose an ace; and sometimes, no matter what we choose, it feels like a losing hand.
We compare our own cards to the cards of others, which can tend to appear more positive or fortuitous. To the person holding the cards, it may not seem that way at all. It's hard to tell, especially if they can keep a poker face. The cards will always look better to the person who isn't holding them. They're designed that way.
Emile Durkheim studied the social factors contributing to suicide and classified the phenomena into types. One type, he dubbed Anomic, inflicts those who are unable to find their place in society, those who never really feel they belong anywhere. Durkheim believed that the progressive society (of the late 1800's!) offered up far too many options; that people struggled to fit in and understand their true purpose, resulting in internal revolt. I suspect that Durkheim would balk at the vast array of choice we face today, and the sea of opportunity we can drown in.
We set out deliberately to ensure our access to what could be restricted or inaccessible to us in the future. Recently while touring Fiji, I learned that its native children are granted the gift of free education by their government, yet they have a substantially lower literacy level than the high contingent of students whose families have emigrated to Fiji from India.
And, why is this? Because Indian children do not share the land entitlements of their Fijian counterparts. They know they have to work hard at school to ultimately be employed, buy land, and make homes of their own. The children of Fiji, however, will continue to occupy land that has been owned and occupied by their families for generations. No matter what they do or don't do at school they will have somewhere to live, and their essential needs will be met. They are not as motivated, because they don't associate the benefits of education as being fundamental to their existence.
Uncertainty breeds motivation. We are all driven in different ways and have a range of levers that pull us from one end of life to the other. There are occasions when our usual buttons seem unresponsive. When our most basic instincts are not enough to push us forward.
It's those times, when "they" say that "timing is everything". It shouldn't be "everything", but it does bear weight. It can feel like the wrong time to make a call, when your chips are down or you're on a losing streak. Someone once told me that if you're struggling between two options, then neither of your options can be that bad. When the pros and the cons do not tip the scales to present a clear winner, you can't really go wrong. Just choose something.
While I quietly insist to myself that it must be more clever and courageous to make a decision based on your innermost motives, rather than external and sometimes imagined influences, I also question; does it actually matter? Perhaps it's just better to choose (period) than to sit and stare at the cards, hoping, praying, perhaps in vein, for something to change by itself.
No matter what you choose, another hand will always be dealt, and while our choices are not finite, our moments here on earth most certainly are.
The important thing is that we decide. We choose something. We be right, we be wrong. Whatever. We exercise our agency, our freewill and remember that our right to choose will still exist afterward.
Sunday, May 23, 2010
Paradise Lost and Found
The word 'honeymoon' is a funny one and I wonder where it originates, so I hunt around. Apparently, a long time ago in a land far, far away (called Scandinavia), when it was still okay to kidnap a wife of your liking, newlyweds would drink a daily cup of honey flavored wine called mead. 'Moon' referred to the cyclic nature of our skies and therefore, the first full month of marriage when this wine consumption would occur. Some have since said that the term, 'honeymoon' implies that the first 30 days of marriage will potentially be sweeter than the times that lie ahead. That remains to be seen, of course. What I can vouch for is that 'honeymoon' is a word defined as; "brief yet meaningful sabbatical in order to celebrate extraordinary relationship milestone and add to already exorbitant wedding spend". It also provides the breathing space that two people need to get used to calling each other "husband and wife" when they have well embedded the colloquial references "boyfriend and girlfriend".
On ones honeymoon, there are many things to opt in and opt out of. Lounging is high on the list of priorities, preferably by a pool and with spouse. Cocktails certainly made the top five on our hitlist, as did sleep-ins and sunsets. Most couples are on the lookout for that golden opportunity to make their honeymoon that little bit more something. Every destination has an array of bells and whistles to bolt-on and enjoy. Upon our arrival at Tokoriki, Fiji, we went straight for that list of exclusions, pointing to the most suitable extra to further enhance an already exceptional set of circumstances.
We select the delectable "honeymoon picnic", booking it for Friday, precisely one week post the best day of our lives. Advertised as a romantic day of seclusion on a private beach, the lucky couple is dropped off at a deserted island with naught but a radio for emergency contact, a picnic lunch and all the towels and snorkeling gear that four hands can carry.
When Friday morning rolls around we are enthused. Another couple are on the boat when we arrive and we watch our driver load a red and a blue eski on to the motorised tinnie. After the initial surprise of seeing another pair of honeymooners on board, we manage to extract enough information from the reserved Fijian sailor to understand that there will be two drop off points that day - one island for each couple.
We set out, salted sea spray in our faces and upon arriving at the first island, it is left up to us to decide amongst ourselves whose picnic destination this will be. I can tell that Chris is not as impressed as he could be by this beachfront and we graciously insist that the other pair should disembark at stop one.
The driver proceeds to the next island, which appears to be the back half of the beach we just visited. Calling it Liku, he helps us dump our eski and beach mats, a bag of supplies and then motors away. We are left, as advertised, completely alone.
We reach prompt agreement that our first adventure will be to enjoy the snorkeling. Our agreement is followed in quick succession by the discovery that the rip is too strong for anyone to snorkel. Sand from the ocean floor is churning so violently that I almost swim face first into a seaweed bush because it is so well camouflaged by gusts of sand. Trying to pull on flippers in the current is also challenging. It is hard enough to stand on two feet, let alone perched on one in a rubber shoe when the swell is plotting to drag you 50 metres off the beach. A romantic walk is also out of the question. The sand is so clean and loose we sink deeper with every step, and are soon marooned up to our knees as if wading through thick mud.
So, with walking, swimming and snorkeling all now listed as life endangering activities, we choose to read.
We spread our towels under the shade shanty (pictured) and proceed to lie like brocoli on the lumpy sand. Half an hour later, we are fed up with the unique combination of sand flies, aching joints and sweltering heat. We're becoming agitated, not at each other, but much like bees become agitated, in unity. We check the time via our only source of real world information - Chris's mobile phone. It is a mere 11.30am. Chris turns off his phone to save battery power and we continue reading a little while longer.
Hot and restless, Chris goes in search of other life forms. He finds two crabs and makes a circle in the sand using a large stick. We hold a crab race. Spiky shell and Shiny shell fight it out under a brazen sun. Spiky shell is ultimately victorious and makes his way across the line of the outer circle with somewhat measured glee, for a winning crustacean.
Chris and I look up at the sun and make an uneducated judgment that it must be lunchtime, eagerly breaking open the picnic eski to a putrid smell. We're relieved when we realise that it's not the food, but the container itself that's in need of a good airing. Regardless of the odour, we investigate each foil covered plate. Leftover chicken. Okay. Soggy bread - also leftover? Possibly. We put that aside. Fruit, half mandarins, fresh pineapple and watermelon. Some cut oranges. Good for scurvy. Another plate with some melted looking cheese, maybe Camembert, more watermelon, more bread. Bread and watermelon are not good on the same plate (in case you are wondering) but we rescue a couple of pieces. The saving grace of lunch is a container of Just Juice pineapple and two beaten plastic wine glasses. We munch the chicken, some bread and cheese, some of the fruit. Then we carefully place the food with the least nutritional value on the bottom of the eski where ice has become a swimming pool for food, in case we are stranded like Tom Hanks on Castaway.
Half an hour later we are even more hot, more sunburned, more bored and annoyed than before lunch and we begin to develop a mild understanding of how Tom became such good friends with a netball. We exchange verbal extremities about how it is [f&%k$n&] crazy that we paid good money for this experience. I accidentally rub insect repellant in my eyes and have to pour drinking water all over my face. It takes awhile for the stinging to stop and for my blurred vision to return to normal.
We make up songs. "We're all stuck in the middle of Fiji", works quite well to the basic tune of the epic Beatles classic, "Yellow Submarine" and helps to sustain an amicable mood. We try to check the time again and find the phone battery flat. We try to tell the time by looking at the sun but we're guessing at best. I am distressed because Chris thinks the man who dropped us off in his boat said he was coming at "four o'clock" rather than "in four hours". We agree optimistically that Chris must be mistaken. I am forced to finally concede a point that my husband has maintained for a good part of nine years; that I would not last long if I was ever on Survivor. The evidence for the prosecution is simply too overwhelming.
At what we estimate to be about two pm, I reach and exceed my tolerance threshold for general discomfort. The sun has moved around the beach to a point where the shade in our so-called hut is about a metre square and we are standing atop of one another trying to occupy it. I bark in a tantrum like fashion that Chris is the husband and that he should radio home base to find out how much longer we are going to be stuck on this god forsaken beach. He tells me to be patient. I tell him I am completely out of patience and that there is nowhere to buy any around here. He says I am being a princess (a little bit true). I instruct him to man up and radio in and to look after me, his wife (which of course he is already doing for the most part). He gives in to my whining, picks up the radio, tunes it in and phones home like E.T.
There is no answer. Nobody responds to our distress call. He tries again. Good thing it isn't a real emergency, he says. Isn't it? I prepare to stamp my feet but remember we are on an island of quick sand. Surely being covered from head to toe in bites with a full body suit of sunburn, and sand particles located dangerously close to one of my more intimate orifices must be classified as some kind of emergency.
And then the boat comes, like an mirage crystallising in a desert.
Crisis averted. Relief pours over us (or at least me). We high five and cheer. We do a little dance with our hands on our hips and pack up our stuff like the island is on fire. I could have kissed that little boat man on his brown, freckled nose.
Standing under a cold shower, back in the 5-star luxury of our beach bure, I had a quiet chuckle to myself. I have to admit that the cumulative panic I experienced over a whole four hours of what was (on reflection) relatively mild discomfort, was a bit of a shameful display. How accustomed we become to our creature comforts and how lucky we are to have them. I openly apologise to the people of the world who live through ordeals with much worse implications everyday, and I promise to check myself and my over-reactions in any future potentially uncomfortable situations. It's a good thing that my relationship is almost decade old and our trip did not serve as a personality expose.
I concede that I like my life just the way it is. But life, like honeymoons, and like marriage, can't always be a picnic.
Monday, May 10, 2010
I'm with him
Many people have expressed surprise that I will change my surname now that I'm married, although my pen name remains in tact. I suspect that the jaw-dropping is because most people perceive me to be an independent type of person, perhaps even defiantly so at times. To me, a surname is just a symbolic inference. It used to say, "I'm with them". Now it says, "I'm with him". The key to it is, I'm still Peta and that cannot be changed. My surname is just a family GPS. It tells people where to send me if I get lost.
Overwhelming would be an understated description of the emotional tsunami that was our recent wedding. A (married) friend had told me in the lead up that having such an expansive group of friends and family in the one place at the one time, all there to celebrate your partnership and future, was like being trapped in a wonderful love bubble. Even this astute summation left me unprepared for the outpouring of goodwill and generosity that was to come.
Our wedding was a warm, sparkling, happy celebration full of unforgettable moments with special people.
Afterward, a sea of faces and fun played like a b-roll, over and over in my mind. I lay, awash with feeling and exhausted in my crisp, white hotel bed, unable to sleep for the adrenalin still pumping through my veins. I could not shake the profound sensation that something extraordinary had just happened, something life-changing. This was a peak in my existence. A marker.
Even looking at the hundreds of beautiful photos taken on the day, there is simply no way to bottle or capture the cumulative moments, the pearls of time strung together, so precious and delicate, which had occurred. I thought, I must be satisfied just to savour them inside and to share them with my husband.
We left for Fiji two days after we were married. In Fijian culture there is a concept called kerekere. It means that time (and property) is communal and is shared amongst many. Continuing from person to person, it is given unconditionally.
Upon our return, so many of our friends and family have called or dropped by to share their experiences of our wedding. Their humorous anecdotes, enjoyment of the food and wine, excitement at making new friends or in catching up with old ones, and their genuine sense of appreciation for the ceremonious and monumental nature of the event in our lives has been humbling.
Fijian kerekere is indeed alive and well, here in our heartland. Memories shared will make the pearls of time from the beginning of our marriage into a dazzling necklace, to be kept forever in a sacred and collective vault.
Overwhelming would be an understated description of the emotional tsunami that was our recent wedding. A (married) friend had told me in the lead up that having such an expansive group of friends and family in the one place at the one time, all there to celebrate your partnership and future, was like being trapped in a wonderful love bubble. Even this astute summation left me unprepared for the outpouring of goodwill and generosity that was to come.
Our wedding was a warm, sparkling, happy celebration full of unforgettable moments with special people.
Afterward, a sea of faces and fun played like a b-roll, over and over in my mind. I lay, awash with feeling and exhausted in my crisp, white hotel bed, unable to sleep for the adrenalin still pumping through my veins. I could not shake the profound sensation that something extraordinary had just happened, something life-changing. This was a peak in my existence. A marker.
Even looking at the hundreds of beautiful photos taken on the day, there is simply no way to bottle or capture the cumulative moments, the pearls of time strung together, so precious and delicate, which had occurred. I thought, I must be satisfied just to savour them inside and to share them with my husband.
We left for Fiji two days after we were married. In Fijian culture there is a concept called kerekere. It means that time (and property) is communal and is shared amongst many. Continuing from person to person, it is given unconditionally.
Upon our return, so many of our friends and family have called or dropped by to share their experiences of our wedding. Their humorous anecdotes, enjoyment of the food and wine, excitement at making new friends or in catching up with old ones, and their genuine sense of appreciation for the ceremonious and monumental nature of the event in our lives has been humbling.
Fijian kerekere is indeed alive and well, here in our heartland. Memories shared will make the pearls of time from the beginning of our marriage into a dazzling necklace, to be kept forever in a sacred and collective vault.
Words to Wed By
I feel like I've been spun around twice (really fast) and now I find myself back in the chair, married and 'honeymooned' already, with lots to report. First and foremost, I will respond to numerous requests for my wedding speech to be posted. For those of you that I was unable to invite to the nuptials, my husband and I shared the thank you's at our reception, so those that appear to be missing from my speech were spoken by my handsome other half.
The posting of this speech will be followed by a post on marriage and of course the honeymoon, an indulgence of the highest order, wiled away in the tropical surrounds of Fiji.
For now, without further ado...the bride's speech...
Good evening, everyone.
I know that it’s a bit unusual to hear from the bride, but I think it would be fair to say in this case that it would be more unusual not to hear from me.
I know that table 9 in particular, which is filled with folks who have all at one time or another been my colleagues, would be very surprised if I stayed in my chair and let someone else have the last word.
My parents will be able confirm what Chris is about to find out, if he doesn’t already know – that the last word always belongs to me.
I am going to begin tonight with the remainder of the thank you’s that were not covered by my husband.
My first thank you goes to Alex [bridesmaid] for her kind words.
For those of you that don’t have the privilege of knowing Alex, she is very careful when she commits words to a page. She feels their weight and their meaning and treats every word as a thought delicately placed.
For this reason, and because we have been friends now for just on 20 years, I was confident when we assigned her the task of making a speech on one of the most important days of our lives.
My second thanks goes to Nataisha [bridesmaid], my supremely organised sister and friend.
I know many of you are quietly nodding and surmising that surely there is not a person more organised or more anal in the world, than I – but alas, I can assure you that there is!
Without Nataisha’s spreadsheets and google maps, her thesis on wedding cars, and her month-by-month checklist, we would most likely be at McDonald’s right now holding a party that involves cheeseburgers and paper hats.
A sincere thank you to both of my bridesmaids, affectionately know as B1 and B2, for your counsel, your friendship and your good humour.
Thanks also to our mums, dads, and our extended families, for everything you have done to support us and to get us here in one piece.
It’s been an extraordinary and special day that we’ll never forget. Everyone has pitched in to ensure it goes to plan.
For some people, a wedding involving a diverse or complex family coming together would be viewed as difficult or awkward. We prefer to see the glass as more than half full.
We might have more members than Oprah’s book club but we also have less turf wars than the Hells Angels.
Our family has multiple parts, or layers if you like – Chris says we are part of the onion family.
One thing is for sure - there is nothing like a wedding to make you appreciate diversity. We approached seating our guests a bit like the Event Manager at a banquet for the United Nations. In fact, if you have any feedback about your experience with us this evening you can email it directly to enquiries@un.org.
Thank you to my new in-laws, the clan of Bender on table 2. I have always been proud of my name, but I will be equally as proud to bear yours from now on.
Thank you to our sponsors, otherwise known as “the silent partners” of this event, you know who you are. All of your contributions are gratefully received and acknowledged.
Thanks to “MC Steve” who emerged as an early front runner in a race consisting of stage-shy parental types, then looked behind him to find out he was the only horse running.
You’ve done an outstanding job as our MC this evening and we really appreciate it – please put your hands together for Steve, folks.
It would be remiss of me not to thank all of our speakers and readers from today, I know some of your were quite nervous but you all did a fantastic job.
Fiona Hewish has been assisting in the role of long-distance wedding planner. She runs her own business called Weddings Actually, in Sydney and it turns out she actually does know quite a bit about them. Thank you Fi, for lending us your coordination skills for today.
Last but by no means least we would like to thank;
Sophie, Christy and Rebecca from Fenix and the Chef, for what has so far been a delightful meal.
Thank you to our celebrant Janet Hussey, photographer, Robyn Slavin and to our DJ, Bruce Harrison.
Thanks also to CMS Australasia and Office Choice Braeside for their assistance with our Bonbonierre – Chris calls them Bon-Bon-YEAH! So I hope you all find them as exciting…
I also echoe Chris’s thanks to our interstate guests and regional visitors. It means a lot for us to have you here tonight.
Phew.
I hope I didn’t wear you out with all those thank you’s because I’m about to get to the real business at hand.
The business of marriage.
You may not know this, but I have never really been an advocate of marriage, so to be standing here today in the frock that rocks is more surprising to me than to anyone.
For my 21st birthday my grandmother (who turns 93 on Sunday), gave me all of the money she had saved for my wedding to spend on my first car. I had her thoroughly convinced her that I would never be exchanging nuptials with any man.
Now, you hear all sorts of clichés about marriage – it’s an expensive way of getting your washing done for free.
It’s the ball and chain.
They even call it “tying the knot”.
Lots of harmless quips that imply being stuck, captured, tied up and tied down.
Those of you that know me best know that there is nothing I value more than my freedom.
So, why “tie the knot”, then?
There is a simple answer – because I was asked by the lovely Mr Christopher.
Until I met Chris, I didn’t realise that the best kind of freedom is the sort that you find within a relationship.
But after nine years of being a part of “us” I believe I have enough evidence to prove that this is, in fact, the case. During this time, we have travelled overseas twice, moved house three times (three blocks apart), and changed jobs eight times between us.
I don’t believe that love has anything to do with “becoming one” or a single soul inhabiting two bodies.
To me, marriage is about agreeing to move through life permanently alongside another person – always parallel but never merging.
Almost like two sides of the same freeway.
The partnership that we have gives both of us the space to be who we are, do what we do, and achieve what we want to for ourselves as well as each other.
As much as we are a couple we are also two individuals.
Chris never tries to change me or to make me do things for selfish reasons. He always tells me to do what makes me happy, even when the outcome doesn’t necessarily favour him.
Our life together has a built-in flexibility, with enough push to challenge and enough pull to compromise.
Personally, I think this could be because my brother-in-law Paul has been chanting his mantra of “Happy wife, Happy life”, in Chris’s vicinity.
We kept our vows simple and traditional at this afternoon’s ceremony. We thought this was safer, given start-of-day nerves and the fact that it was too early to justify too many stiff drinks.
But now that I have warmed up my vocal chords and consumed enough vodka to boost the Russian socialist regime for few more months, I will say a few words extra words, especially for my new husband.
To me, love is not about finding a perfect person but seeing an imperfect person perfectly.
I am imperfect but I know that you see me.
I want you to know that I see you too.
I love you because you are the rarest of human beings.
A man of honour and a man of your word.
Children are drawn to you because they see your energy. They also see you are a very big kid.
You have an extraordinary talent, but you are extremely humble.
You are kind to others and too hard on yourself.
You have an offbeat sense of humour and you are genuinely funny.
You make me laugh out loud every single day.
Every morning you sing me a different song.
You are beautiful to me.
Chris; I promise…
I will laugh with you,
and tell you when others are laughing at you!
I will tell you that you’re wrong if you need to hear it…
but I’ll agree to humour you most of the time.
I will stand by you, stand with you and stand up for you.
I will fight for what I, you and we, believe in.
We will have some more great adventures in amazing places
And great fun with amazing people.
And no matter where you are, you will never be alone.
To borrow some well-worn words from my friend Mr Shakespeare;
My heart will be your shelter, and
My arms will be your home.
Thank you, everyone.
In closing – our heartfelt thanks to each and every one of you for coming here to share our wedding day with us.
We are privileged to have such an exceptional group of family and friends. We have friends here who have known us since primary and high school, who have worked with us, travelled with us, and most importantly have laughed and/or danced with us – as we have said inside your gift today, your smiles have made it truly spectacular.
Have a great evening.
The posting of this speech will be followed by a post on marriage and of course the honeymoon, an indulgence of the highest order, wiled away in the tropical surrounds of Fiji.
For now, without further ado...the bride's speech...
Good evening, everyone.
I know that it’s a bit unusual to hear from the bride, but I think it would be fair to say in this case that it would be more unusual not to hear from me.
I know that table 9 in particular, which is filled with folks who have all at one time or another been my colleagues, would be very surprised if I stayed in my chair and let someone else have the last word.
My parents will be able confirm what Chris is about to find out, if he doesn’t already know – that the last word always belongs to me.
I am going to begin tonight with the remainder of the thank you’s that were not covered by my husband.
My first thank you goes to Alex [bridesmaid] for her kind words.
For those of you that don’t have the privilege of knowing Alex, she is very careful when she commits words to a page. She feels their weight and their meaning and treats every word as a thought delicately placed.
For this reason, and because we have been friends now for just on 20 years, I was confident when we assigned her the task of making a speech on one of the most important days of our lives.
My second thanks goes to Nataisha [bridesmaid], my supremely organised sister and friend.
I know many of you are quietly nodding and surmising that surely there is not a person more organised or more anal in the world, than I – but alas, I can assure you that there is!
Without Nataisha’s spreadsheets and google maps, her thesis on wedding cars, and her month-by-month checklist, we would most likely be at McDonald’s right now holding a party that involves cheeseburgers and paper hats.
A sincere thank you to both of my bridesmaids, affectionately know as B1 and B2, for your counsel, your friendship and your good humour.
Thanks also to our mums, dads, and our extended families, for everything you have done to support us and to get us here in one piece.
It’s been an extraordinary and special day that we’ll never forget. Everyone has pitched in to ensure it goes to plan.
For some people, a wedding involving a diverse or complex family coming together would be viewed as difficult or awkward. We prefer to see the glass as more than half full.
We might have more members than Oprah’s book club but we also have less turf wars than the Hells Angels.
Our family has multiple parts, or layers if you like – Chris says we are part of the onion family.
One thing is for sure - there is nothing like a wedding to make you appreciate diversity. We approached seating our guests a bit like the Event Manager at a banquet for the United Nations. In fact, if you have any feedback about your experience with us this evening you can email it directly to enquiries@un.org.
Thank you to my new in-laws, the clan of Bender on table 2. I have always been proud of my name, but I will be equally as proud to bear yours from now on.
Thank you to our sponsors, otherwise known as “the silent partners” of this event, you know who you are. All of your contributions are gratefully received and acknowledged.
Thanks to “MC Steve” who emerged as an early front runner in a race consisting of stage-shy parental types, then looked behind him to find out he was the only horse running.
You’ve done an outstanding job as our MC this evening and we really appreciate it – please put your hands together for Steve, folks.
It would be remiss of me not to thank all of our speakers and readers from today, I know some of your were quite nervous but you all did a fantastic job.
Fiona Hewish has been assisting in the role of long-distance wedding planner. She runs her own business called Weddings Actually, in Sydney and it turns out she actually does know quite a bit about them. Thank you Fi, for lending us your coordination skills for today.
Last but by no means least we would like to thank;
Sophie, Christy and Rebecca from Fenix and the Chef, for what has so far been a delightful meal.
Thank you to our celebrant Janet Hussey, photographer, Robyn Slavin and to our DJ, Bruce Harrison.
Thanks also to CMS Australasia and Office Choice Braeside for their assistance with our Bonbonierre – Chris calls them Bon-Bon-YEAH! So I hope you all find them as exciting…
I also echoe Chris’s thanks to our interstate guests and regional visitors. It means a lot for us to have you here tonight.
Phew.
I hope I didn’t wear you out with all those thank you’s because I’m about to get to the real business at hand.
The business of marriage.
You may not know this, but I have never really been an advocate of marriage, so to be standing here today in the frock that rocks is more surprising to me than to anyone.
For my 21st birthday my grandmother (who turns 93 on Sunday), gave me all of the money she had saved for my wedding to spend on my first car. I had her thoroughly convinced her that I would never be exchanging nuptials with any man.
Now, you hear all sorts of clichés about marriage – it’s an expensive way of getting your washing done for free.
It’s the ball and chain.
They even call it “tying the knot”.
Lots of harmless quips that imply being stuck, captured, tied up and tied down.
Those of you that know me best know that there is nothing I value more than my freedom.
So, why “tie the knot”, then?
There is a simple answer – because I was asked by the lovely Mr Christopher.
Until I met Chris, I didn’t realise that the best kind of freedom is the sort that you find within a relationship.
But after nine years of being a part of “us” I believe I have enough evidence to prove that this is, in fact, the case. During this time, we have travelled overseas twice, moved house three times (three blocks apart), and changed jobs eight times between us.
I don’t believe that love has anything to do with “becoming one” or a single soul inhabiting two bodies.
To me, marriage is about agreeing to move through life permanently alongside another person – always parallel but never merging.
Almost like two sides of the same freeway.
The partnership that we have gives both of us the space to be who we are, do what we do, and achieve what we want to for ourselves as well as each other.
As much as we are a couple we are also two individuals.
Chris never tries to change me or to make me do things for selfish reasons. He always tells me to do what makes me happy, even when the outcome doesn’t necessarily favour him.
Our life together has a built-in flexibility, with enough push to challenge and enough pull to compromise.
Personally, I think this could be because my brother-in-law Paul has been chanting his mantra of “Happy wife, Happy life”, in Chris’s vicinity.
We kept our vows simple and traditional at this afternoon’s ceremony. We thought this was safer, given start-of-day nerves and the fact that it was too early to justify too many stiff drinks.
But now that I have warmed up my vocal chords and consumed enough vodka to boost the Russian socialist regime for few more months, I will say a few words extra words, especially for my new husband.
To me, love is not about finding a perfect person but seeing an imperfect person perfectly.
I am imperfect but I know that you see me.
I want you to know that I see you too.
I love you because you are the rarest of human beings.
A man of honour and a man of your word.
Children are drawn to you because they see your energy. They also see you are a very big kid.
You have an extraordinary talent, but you are extremely humble.
You are kind to others and too hard on yourself.
You have an offbeat sense of humour and you are genuinely funny.
You make me laugh out loud every single day.
Every morning you sing me a different song.
You are beautiful to me.
Chris; I promise…
I will laugh with you,
and tell you when others are laughing at you!
I will tell you that you’re wrong if you need to hear it…
but I’ll agree to humour you most of the time.
I will stand by you, stand with you and stand up for you.
I will fight for what I, you and we, believe in.
We will have some more great adventures in amazing places
And great fun with amazing people.
And no matter where you are, you will never be alone.
To borrow some well-worn words from my friend Mr Shakespeare;
My heart will be your shelter, and
My arms will be your home.
Thank you, everyone.
In closing – our heartfelt thanks to each and every one of you for coming here to share our wedding day with us.
We are privileged to have such an exceptional group of family and friends. We have friends here who have known us since primary and high school, who have worked with us, travelled with us, and most importantly have laughed and/or danced with us – as we have said inside your gift today, your smiles have made it truly spectacular.
Have a great evening.
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Karma Chameleon
The world is ever-changing and the corporate world, as I was reminded this week, can be especially harsh and volatile. The chameleon called change is unavoidably everywhere.
It has the literal perpetuity of a merry-go-round. Each time you get on, you find yourself a horse. You might choose it because you like the colors or the fact that it bears its teeth. Maybe its seat looks newer than the other horsies.
Anyway, you choose your horse and away we go. The music starts and we move up, down, up and down, the lights are flashing. People get on and people get off. You get along with the people riding the other horses. You look out at surroundings occasionally and while the faces sometimes change, and the sun rises and falls, the landscape is relatively same-same. But there is a definitive order to how these things go.
First, something happens. Let's call it a holocaust. Okay, perhaps a little too dramatic and inconsiderate of those who have actually experienced a holocaust. Sorry. Let's expand on the initial metaphor and say that the carnival comes to town.
So, the carnival comes to town. Your merry-go-round has always been profitable, popular and mechanically sound. The carnival doesn't see it that way. Suddenly, your trusty ride doesn't seem to "fit" alongside the newer, more death-defying amusements. It needs to change. The horses must move faster, to a different song and in the opposite direction. All around you, people are falling off their horse. Maybe you dig your heels in and hang on tighter.
Maybe it is time to get off the ride.
This is just a small taste of the tumultuous adventure we call acquisition-based change. Amongst the amusements there is change for the sake of improvement, change for the sake of alignment and sometimes change just for change's sake. There is the "it's not your fault, we just do things better around here", type of change. And the "we don't really care how you do it, or whether it's better or worse, we just want to do it our way now", kind. Both can be equally hard to digest.
Objectivity is kind friend to have. Especially, when you feel like you are trapped in a padded and sound-proofed room, screaming at deaf onlookers who are nodding and smiling facetiously at your expense.
Enveloped by acronyms, company jargon and other miscellaneous word vomit (little pieces of words that come out looking and sounding like small chunks of their original selves), we wade together through a thick swamp of meaningless ambiguity in a quest to save any morsel of our previous purpose.
At different times in our lives we all find ourselves in a nook. A cosy, happy corner of life that is easy and comfortable. When you find yourself in the nook, you are unlikely to leave voluntarily. It is welcoming and warm. Until someone comes along and tears you out, completely against your will. You shiver. There is no going back, the air is cold, sharp and ferocious.
Perhaps life thought you got a bit too comfortable. Or perhaps you are experiencing an ambitious agenda of M&A*. Either way, stand up and brush yourself off. One way or another, we will all end up back on the horse.
*Mergers & Acquisitions
It has the literal perpetuity of a merry-go-round. Each time you get on, you find yourself a horse. You might choose it because you like the colors or the fact that it bears its teeth. Maybe its seat looks newer than the other horsies.
Anyway, you choose your horse and away we go. The music starts and we move up, down, up and down, the lights are flashing. People get on and people get off. You get along with the people riding the other horses. You look out at surroundings occasionally and while the faces sometimes change, and the sun rises and falls, the landscape is relatively same-same. But there is a definitive order to how these things go.
First, something happens. Let's call it a holocaust. Okay, perhaps a little too dramatic and inconsiderate of those who have actually experienced a holocaust. Sorry. Let's expand on the initial metaphor and say that the carnival comes to town.
So, the carnival comes to town. Your merry-go-round has always been profitable, popular and mechanically sound. The carnival doesn't see it that way. Suddenly, your trusty ride doesn't seem to "fit" alongside the newer, more death-defying amusements. It needs to change. The horses must move faster, to a different song and in the opposite direction. All around you, people are falling off their horse. Maybe you dig your heels in and hang on tighter.
Maybe it is time to get off the ride.
This is just a small taste of the tumultuous adventure we call acquisition-based change. Amongst the amusements there is change for the sake of improvement, change for the sake of alignment and sometimes change just for change's sake. There is the "it's not your fault, we just do things better around here", type of change. And the "we don't really care how you do it, or whether it's better or worse, we just want to do it our way now", kind. Both can be equally hard to digest.
Objectivity is kind friend to have. Especially, when you feel like you are trapped in a padded and sound-proofed room, screaming at deaf onlookers who are nodding and smiling facetiously at your expense.
Enveloped by acronyms, company jargon and other miscellaneous word vomit (little pieces of words that come out looking and sounding like small chunks of their original selves), we wade together through a thick swamp of meaningless ambiguity in a quest to save any morsel of our previous purpose.
At different times in our lives we all find ourselves in a nook. A cosy, happy corner of life that is easy and comfortable. When you find yourself in the nook, you are unlikely to leave voluntarily. It is welcoming and warm. Until someone comes along and tears you out, completely against your will. You shiver. There is no going back, the air is cold, sharp and ferocious.
Perhaps life thought you got a bit too comfortable. Or perhaps you are experiencing an ambitious agenda of M&A*. Either way, stand up and brush yourself off. One way or another, we will all end up back on the horse.
*Mergers & Acquisitions
Sunday, March 28, 2010
The Vented Spleen
One of my all-time favourite TV characters is Hank Moody, the writer from Californication. Hank says, "Being a writer is like having homework for the rest of your life." This my friends, is an unfortunate truth.
Today, my homework is almost day late. My dog didn't eat it. I don't even have a dog. My excuse is simple; I have a wedding in less than three weeks and I had to construct a polystyrene model of my seating chart.
In this unique approach, the model is constructed using the back of a child-sized, thermoplastic mobile phone courtesy of your local JB Hi-Fi store. Cue one black texta, a fiancé with the artistic capacity to juxtapose an A4 table plan onto a larger canvas, and 87 toothpicks with guests names sticky taped around them. I am now the proud owner of something that looks like a strategy plan for the 2010 AFL grand final.
Before you ask, it is a completely normal part of the wedding planning process to model your guests as toothpicks. More broadly, the wedding is also an excellent excuse for procrastinating other things and putting the rest of your life, "on hold". But, at a minimum, the blog must go on.
The thing is, I refuse to bore you or be repetitious. I was jotting in my journal yesterday, the launching place of most pieces, and while the content was pleasing, your shiny little heads kept popping into my mind, telling me it just wouldn't do.
Being conscious of my audience is a professional hazard. This awareness is not an act of deliberation, it is purely instinctual. The "known" audience, however, is a much more frightening phenomenon.
Australian author, Tim Winton believes that writing is a process of venting the spleen. While cathartic, it can also be excruciating. It has been a tumultuous fortnight and everything gleaned from my spleen seemed either too provocative or was tied by puppet strings to one of my previous topics.
I do my best to avoid the soap box here, although it often finds me as I pour my thoughts on to the page. It bursts from the ground like a jack-in-the-box and I have to force myself to step over it, tempting as it is. Unsolicited ramblings are one thing, unwarranted ramblings are another.
In a quest for inspiration, I serve only to intimidate myself with other people's highly developed, visually pleasing and amusing blogs.
I read about a writer who believes it should take no more than an hour to write a blog post. This was a startling and disturbing revelation to me, who spends anywhere from three to seven hours crafting my post until it no longer nips my fingers as they leave the keyboard. To this writer, the blog was a simply another tool in the toolshed. A no holds barred device for unzipping the soul.
From herein, I pledge to worry more about what I want to write and less about what you want to read. After all, my "homework" is not really work at all. There is a very fine line between the editor and the edited.
I want to be neither.
Today, my homework is almost day late. My dog didn't eat it. I don't even have a dog. My excuse is simple; I have a wedding in less than three weeks and I had to construct a polystyrene model of my seating chart.
In this unique approach, the model is constructed using the back of a child-sized, thermoplastic mobile phone courtesy of your local JB Hi-Fi store. Cue one black texta, a fiancé with the artistic capacity to juxtapose an A4 table plan onto a larger canvas, and 87 toothpicks with guests names sticky taped around them. I am now the proud owner of something that looks like a strategy plan for the 2010 AFL grand final.
Before you ask, it is a completely normal part of the wedding planning process to model your guests as toothpicks. More broadly, the wedding is also an excellent excuse for procrastinating other things and putting the rest of your life, "on hold". But, at a minimum, the blog must go on.
The thing is, I refuse to bore you or be repetitious. I was jotting in my journal yesterday, the launching place of most pieces, and while the content was pleasing, your shiny little heads kept popping into my mind, telling me it just wouldn't do.
Being conscious of my audience is a professional hazard. This awareness is not an act of deliberation, it is purely instinctual. The "known" audience, however, is a much more frightening phenomenon.
Australian author, Tim Winton believes that writing is a process of venting the spleen. While cathartic, it can also be excruciating. It has been a tumultuous fortnight and everything gleaned from my spleen seemed either too provocative or was tied by puppet strings to one of my previous topics.
I do my best to avoid the soap box here, although it often finds me as I pour my thoughts on to the page. It bursts from the ground like a jack-in-the-box and I have to force myself to step over it, tempting as it is. Unsolicited ramblings are one thing, unwarranted ramblings are another.
In a quest for inspiration, I serve only to intimidate myself with other people's highly developed, visually pleasing and amusing blogs.
I read about a writer who believes it should take no more than an hour to write a blog post. This was a startling and disturbing revelation to me, who spends anywhere from three to seven hours crafting my post until it no longer nips my fingers as they leave the keyboard. To this writer, the blog was a simply another tool in the toolshed. A no holds barred device for unzipping the soul.
From herein, I pledge to worry more about what I want to write and less about what you want to read. After all, my "homework" is not really work at all. There is a very fine line between the editor and the edited.
I want to be neither.
Monday, March 15, 2010
Veils off
Alright people, it's really late.
Not the blog, that's due today.
The time.
It's one am.
I'm still up and wired, and it's not because I like to stay up late. It's because I told you I would write a blog every fortnight, and so that's what I will do. It's a small matter of integrity, of credibility. I promised and I'm committed. At least, I'm about to be, in more ways than one.
In exactly four weeks and four days I will be walking down the aisle to meet my chosen life partner at the metaphorical bridge to our future. The fact that there is not actually an 'aisle' where the ceremony is being held is really not the point. The point is, it's a profound life moment. Whether it's a turning point or just a point in time, depends on who you talk to. Where will this metaphorical bridge lead us, once we cross over to the other side?
Truthfully, I doubt it will be anywhere that different than where we were already headed; before the aisle, the dress and the cake. I say this not to be cynical, but because I see my impending nuptials as a simple extension of the relationship we have, as it currently exists. Before saying "I do", I still would have. So, why 'take the plunge' at all? Well, why did the chicken cross the road? To get to the other side, of course. We all know that.
The chicken sets a fine example. You don't find out what's across the road unless you pop over and see for yourself. The chicken too, was quaking and clucking, praying it wouldn't get hit by a car and that there wouldn't be a Red Rooster on the corner. It held out hope that once across the road, it would find a nice hen house and finally lay that golden egg.
I don't expect my relationship or my life to magically transform after marriage. Perhaps to solidify. Sort of like baking a nice cake. When all of the ingredients are combined, they taste good enough to lick the spoon. But baked, the flavour is somehow more rounded, the texture is more...something.
Relationships change because people change. We evolve. Maybe for some, it's getting married that causes change. For some people, it's time. Circumstance. Other people. Careers and miscalculations. Anything can happen. People come and they go. They make new choices and they take opportunities. Sometimes they walk away. The triumph is inherent in the risk. All you need to know is what your gut tells you. Then, trust it.
You won't see me hiding behind a veil on my wedding day. I have nothing to hide and any fear I have of the future has nothing to do with who waits for me at the altar. If anything, by acknowledging my partner and celebrating our relationship, I expect to strike a sense of balance, to feel more grounded than before. What is across that bridge will no longer seem important. There is someone to push me forward and to pull me back. I am more equipped to cross it.
If you can find a person to stand still with, for however many moments, I highly recommend it.
Not the blog, that's due today.
The time.
It's one am.
I'm still up and wired, and it's not because I like to stay up late. It's because I told you I would write a blog every fortnight, and so that's what I will do. It's a small matter of integrity, of credibility. I promised and I'm committed. At least, I'm about to be, in more ways than one.
In exactly four weeks and four days I will be walking down the aisle to meet my chosen life partner at the metaphorical bridge to our future. The fact that there is not actually an 'aisle' where the ceremony is being held is really not the point. The point is, it's a profound life moment. Whether it's a turning point or just a point in time, depends on who you talk to. Where will this metaphorical bridge lead us, once we cross over to the other side?
Truthfully, I doubt it will be anywhere that different than where we were already headed; before the aisle, the dress and the cake. I say this not to be cynical, but because I see my impending nuptials as a simple extension of the relationship we have, as it currently exists. Before saying "I do", I still would have. So, why 'take the plunge' at all? Well, why did the chicken cross the road? To get to the other side, of course. We all know that.
The chicken sets a fine example. You don't find out what's across the road unless you pop over and see for yourself. The chicken too, was quaking and clucking, praying it wouldn't get hit by a car and that there wouldn't be a Red Rooster on the corner. It held out hope that once across the road, it would find a nice hen house and finally lay that golden egg.
I don't expect my relationship or my life to magically transform after marriage. Perhaps to solidify. Sort of like baking a nice cake. When all of the ingredients are combined, they taste good enough to lick the spoon. But baked, the flavour is somehow more rounded, the texture is more...something.
Relationships change because people change. We evolve. Maybe for some, it's getting married that causes change. For some people, it's time. Circumstance. Other people. Careers and miscalculations. Anything can happen. People come and they go. They make new choices and they take opportunities. Sometimes they walk away. The triumph is inherent in the risk. All you need to know is what your gut tells you. Then, trust it.
You won't see me hiding behind a veil on my wedding day. I have nothing to hide and any fear I have of the future has nothing to do with who waits for me at the altar. If anything, by acknowledging my partner and celebrating our relationship, I expect to strike a sense of balance, to feel more grounded than before. What is across that bridge will no longer seem important. There is someone to push me forward and to pull me back. I am more equipped to cross it.
If you can find a person to stand still with, for however many moments, I highly recommend it.
Monday, March 1, 2010
Gavin.
We have never met you.
But we know you by heart.
You are our son.
At first,
You took us by surprise.
You were shock
And delight.
We each had a path,
Ahead of us.
Plans and ideas
That you redirected.
We reconvened.
We gathered all that we had.
All that we knew.
Combined and intertwined it.
We looked forward to you.
Our home we built,
Around you.
We longed for you to come.
Now we stand, entangled.
Making choices for your life
That are Impossible
To choose.
Torn apart, yet
Forged together.
We want
Only the best for you.
We wait for you now.
Although you will not come.
You are part of our family.
You are our son.
For Ryan & Stacy.
But we know you by heart.
You are our son.
At first,
You took us by surprise.
You were shock
And delight.
We each had a path,
Ahead of us.
Plans and ideas
That you redirected.
We reconvened.
We gathered all that we had.
All that we knew.
Combined and intertwined it.
We looked forward to you.
Our home we built,
Around you.
We longed for you to come.
Now we stand, entangled.
Making choices for your life
That are Impossible
To choose.
Torn apart, yet
Forged together.
We want
Only the best for you.
We wait for you now.
Although you will not come.
You are part of our family.
You are our son.
For Ryan & Stacy.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
The calling
Yesterday, like many of us, I was hunting around a gift store trying to find that perfect little something for the man in my life. Although nothing jumped out at me and announced, "Happy Valentine's Day", I spotted something else. A sign. It was in fact, a silver ring. It was engraved with the words, It is never too late to be who you always were.
And so, the cogs began turning.
Why is it that some of us are compelled to commit to a singular path, with unrelenting tunnel vision, while others simply dither? Pulitzer Prize winning author, Cormac McCarthy, is said to have once sold his shoes because he was so resigned to the fact that he was and always would be a writer that he flatly refused to take any other job, even when stricken by poverty. He just kept on writing until there was food on the table. Amongst the dedicated, is an unwavering belief that their mission has been assigned specifically and no matter what, it will carry them through. Not a trace of doubt lingers.
We are who we are. Yet, we spend most of our high school years trying to decide what to do with the rest of our lives. Pondering what to "be" when we grow up. That tiny voice inside may beg to differ; "Am I not someone already?", but the question is out there to be answered and the seeking begins.
So, we pick a role and we play it. Sociologists refer to us as "actors" and I am not sure that the irony is intended. We make our selection by assessing external stimuli. Weighing up our interests, our grades, our personality, parental and peer inputs with a formulaic rationale, in order to align ourselves with an idea of the future. We begin to create (or re-create?) ourselves within a framework, so that soon we can be recognised by a set of standardised variables. A lawyer must be wealthy, diligent, perhaps a little pompous. A nurse is caring, flexible, good at multi-tasking. Tick, tick and tick.
These are identities are for sale... but who's buying? By the time you have bought in, you may have sold out. It's life by design. We become what we do, rather than being who we are.
If Mozart had a career counselor, would he have been a bio-chemist? Would Van Gogh's vision of 'a starry, starry night' seen him apply for NASA training? I would like to think not. Vocation stems from the heart of all of us. Not the head. It's built into our core.
Somewhere, deep inside us, there is a seed. It's there when we're born and it's the seed of who we are and who we will be - of our truest nature, our essence. From the time we are young it starts to grow. It feeds off all of the things that give us butterflies and bright, wide eyes. It flourishes throughout our beings, sprawls and fulfills our person. We grow into ourselves. And then, one day, somebody asks us what we will "be", and thinking that what we are is not enough, we take a guess, and pursue it doggedly.
In deciding what to be when I grew up all I did was make the the growing up harder. The formula of me didn't fit in the real world. You couldn't bottle it and you couldn't sell it. So I adjusted the formula, packaged and took it to market and in doing so, suppressed an important part of myself to enable that decision to take shape. Many years from now, I hope to look back and say that I have come full circle. That the distance I once wandered towards a distorted version of myself was not so far, not so exhaustive that I couldn't walk all of the way back.
It is never too late to be who you always were. Seriously.
And so, the cogs began turning.
Why is it that some of us are compelled to commit to a singular path, with unrelenting tunnel vision, while others simply dither? Pulitzer Prize winning author, Cormac McCarthy, is said to have once sold his shoes because he was so resigned to the fact that he was and always would be a writer that he flatly refused to take any other job, even when stricken by poverty. He just kept on writing until there was food on the table. Amongst the dedicated, is an unwavering belief that their mission has been assigned specifically and no matter what, it will carry them through. Not a trace of doubt lingers.
We are who we are. Yet, we spend most of our high school years trying to decide what to do with the rest of our lives. Pondering what to "be" when we grow up. That tiny voice inside may beg to differ; "Am I not someone already?", but the question is out there to be answered and the seeking begins.
So, we pick a role and we play it. Sociologists refer to us as "actors" and I am not sure that the irony is intended. We make our selection by assessing external stimuli. Weighing up our interests, our grades, our personality, parental and peer inputs with a formulaic rationale, in order to align ourselves with an idea of the future. We begin to create (or re-create?) ourselves within a framework, so that soon we can be recognised by a set of standardised variables. A lawyer must be wealthy, diligent, perhaps a little pompous. A nurse is caring, flexible, good at multi-tasking. Tick, tick and tick.
These are identities are for sale... but who's buying? By the time you have bought in, you may have sold out. It's life by design. We become what we do, rather than being who we are.
If Mozart had a career counselor, would he have been a bio-chemist? Would Van Gogh's vision of 'a starry, starry night' seen him apply for NASA training? I would like to think not. Vocation stems from the heart of all of us. Not the head. It's built into our core.
Somewhere, deep inside us, there is a seed. It's there when we're born and it's the seed of who we are and who we will be - of our truest nature, our essence. From the time we are young it starts to grow. It feeds off all of the things that give us butterflies and bright, wide eyes. It flourishes throughout our beings, sprawls and fulfills our person. We grow into ourselves. And then, one day, somebody asks us what we will "be", and thinking that what we are is not enough, we take a guess, and pursue it doggedly.
In deciding what to be when I grew up all I did was make the the growing up harder. The formula of me didn't fit in the real world. You couldn't bottle it and you couldn't sell it. So I adjusted the formula, packaged and took it to market and in doing so, suppressed an important part of myself to enable that decision to take shape. Many years from now, I hope to look back and say that I have come full circle. That the distance I once wandered towards a distorted version of myself was not so far, not so exhaustive that I couldn't walk all of the way back.
It is never too late to be who you always were. Seriously.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Reality loses its bite
Over the past few weeks we have watched in horror as the people of Haiti suffer through a terrible natural disaster. The catastrophic earthquake that killed one hundred and seventy thousand people (and counting); buried them alive, crushed, suffocated and drowned them. Entire families lost forever beneath the rubble. Followed closely by pain, grief, chaos and hunger.
In 2001, we looked on from our loungerooms, jaws ajar, as one and then another fanatical hijacker, drove a 767 passenger jet filled with domestic travellers into the South and then the North of the twin towers. We watched as they erupted into flame and proceeded to collapse like proverbial houses of cards. Both buildings, filled with everyday people performing everyday jobs. People like you and me. People with brothers, wives, friends, and daughters.
The spectacle of death of and disaster has become an art form. News stations thrive. Vision and story come together in an effortless fashion. The distinction between man made and created by the almighty unknown is irrelevant and we stand, mesmerised by representation.
Reality is now the cheaper form of fiction. It's like going to a movie. We have seen the world end over and over, aliens have invaded. We have survived great battles and witnessed horrific crimes. Fiction became so blase, that we introduced TV to expose the lives and personalities of other 'ordinary' people. From Paris and Nicole, to Big Brother and Biggest Loser. And You Tube. Nothing is shocking, anymore.
We have covered every angle, and are so steeped in our pre-emptive quasi-experience that there is literally, nothing new to see. Yet to 'see' is only one aspect of the human experience. An experience that also involves taste, smell, touch, auditory stimulation. Still, we persist to seek out fantasy. To drown in it, to entertain ourselves. Is it avoidance or preference? Or is what we see simply so powerful, that we can no longer set reality and fiction apart?
Every contact we make now is channeled through a medium of sorts, starved of actual human interaction. The irony of our 24-7 connectivity is that we are physically distant. We converse behind 24-inch monitors, limit speech to staccato via text and no longer need a pen or a stamp to mail a letter. Why reach out when you can just stay in?
This superimposed reality is dangerous. By bringing things closer to us, we are driving them away. It helps us sleep soundly knowing that we've acknowledged the experience of others. It's part of the human consciousness to do so. But empathy means to walk in another's shoes, not simply sigh and hit the red button on the remote. We prefer to look on from a distance and then walk on. To live the dream that it can never happen to us.
It's about time to wake up, folks.
In 2001, we looked on from our loungerooms, jaws ajar, as one and then another fanatical hijacker, drove a 767 passenger jet filled with domestic travellers into the South and then the North of the twin towers. We watched as they erupted into flame and proceeded to collapse like proverbial houses of cards. Both buildings, filled with everyday people performing everyday jobs. People like you and me. People with brothers, wives, friends, and daughters.
The spectacle of death of and disaster has become an art form. News stations thrive. Vision and story come together in an effortless fashion. The distinction between man made and created by the almighty unknown is irrelevant and we stand, mesmerised by representation.
Reality is now the cheaper form of fiction. It's like going to a movie. We have seen the world end over and over, aliens have invaded. We have survived great battles and witnessed horrific crimes. Fiction became so blase, that we introduced TV to expose the lives and personalities of other 'ordinary' people. From Paris and Nicole, to Big Brother and Biggest Loser. And You Tube. Nothing is shocking, anymore.
We have covered every angle, and are so steeped in our pre-emptive quasi-experience that there is literally, nothing new to see. Yet to 'see' is only one aspect of the human experience. An experience that also involves taste, smell, touch, auditory stimulation. Still, we persist to seek out fantasy. To drown in it, to entertain ourselves. Is it avoidance or preference? Or is what we see simply so powerful, that we can no longer set reality and fiction apart?
Every contact we make now is channeled through a medium of sorts, starved of actual human interaction. The irony of our 24-7 connectivity is that we are physically distant. We converse behind 24-inch monitors, limit speech to staccato via text and no longer need a pen or a stamp to mail a letter. Why reach out when you can just stay in?
This superimposed reality is dangerous. By bringing things closer to us, we are driving them away. It helps us sleep soundly knowing that we've acknowledged the experience of others. It's part of the human consciousness to do so. But empathy means to walk in another's shoes, not simply sigh and hit the red button on the remote. We prefer to look on from a distance and then walk on. To live the dream that it can never happen to us.
It's about time to wake up, folks.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
A Coming of Age
I had another birthday this week. I find birthdays to be a bit like a stalker. They seem to creep up behind you (although technically, they're in front of you) and you're never quite sure how you're going to feel when they inevitably make themselves known. Some seem harmless enough, but others are quite frightening indeed.
This one was more like your garden variety peeping tom. Our eyes met through the window and then it went away, acknowledged but left shrugging, achieving little bang for it's buck. It caught me with my pants well and truly up this year.
At this age, I know myself reasonably well. I'm not an old friend, but I'm familiar enough to anticipate my reactions, dislikes and sometime idiosyncrasies with highly attuned accuracy; to within a decimal point.
My flaws, which were once foe, are now more like friend, revealing an obstacle course for me to navigate around myself. Unlike Jennifer Hawkins' flaws, which even stark naked and sans photoshop you need a microscope to identify, mine are crystallising, the embryos of ice cubes.
Each year, I see myself more plainly than before. I'm empowered to surpass the boundaries of my character, many of them constructed by me, some with early foundations built by others. Now I choose to see the land clear, can deconstruct and re-construe. Or not.
As I stand at station thirty-three, watching my thirty-second year depart, I am grateful for the eleven thousand, six hundred and eighty-two days that have brought me to right here.
Me/I greet this new age with a raw and dewy calm.
This one was more like your garden variety peeping tom. Our eyes met through the window and then it went away, acknowledged but left shrugging, achieving little bang for it's buck. It caught me with my pants well and truly up this year.
At this age, I know myself reasonably well. I'm not an old friend, but I'm familiar enough to anticipate my reactions, dislikes and sometime idiosyncrasies with highly attuned accuracy; to within a decimal point.
My flaws, which were once foe, are now more like friend, revealing an obstacle course for me to navigate around myself. Unlike Jennifer Hawkins' flaws, which even stark naked and sans photoshop you need a microscope to identify, mine are crystallising, the embryos of ice cubes.
Each year, I see myself more plainly than before. I'm empowered to surpass the boundaries of my character, many of them constructed by me, some with early foundations built by others. Now I choose to see the land clear, can deconstruct and re-construe. Or not.
As I stand at station thirty-three, watching my thirty-second year depart, I am grateful for the eleven thousand, six hundred and eighty-two days that have brought me to right here.
Me/I greet this new age with a raw and dewy calm.
Friday, January 1, 2010
New Year? Really?
OK, so apparently it's 2010.
A lot of things happened last night to evidence this. For a start, there were fireworks. Lot's of them; and they were loud. There were also drinks, friends, crowds and other seeming celebrations. It was even on the news. It is now 2010 in many countries or so they say. Yet today, I sit spinning and I can't shake the feeling that I've lost something.
Ah, that's it.
2009.
New Year's Eve always brings both trepidation and anticipation. To welcome something new we must let go of something old. But, is it really new? Or is it just a convenient way of convincing ourselves we have yet another chance to get it right. To change something or do it differently.
Time is, after all, the way we measure and collect units of what is essentially the same thing, over and over. If we viewed all time as a single unit, one continuous and monotone vacuum, would we ever reinvent ourselves or start anything new? Time can be a crutch of sorts and one I am willing to lean on as I reflect on another year passed with no real or ordered recollection of how I spent it.
The new year ushers in fresh commitments with a healthy dash of resolve and amongst mine is to update this blog and pester you - my family, friends, colleagues, clients and fellow free thinkers - to read it. To share the goings-on from inside my noggin on a regular basis, and to create a record of the year so that I am not sitting, beer in hand next New Year's, trying to jumble together random brain matter from the year that was 2010.
Opt in or opt out at your discretion, but I intend to spend 2010 as an online space invader, adding to the fast accumulating mindfield of web-based outpourings.
Welcome to my new year's resolution.
A lot of things happened last night to evidence this. For a start, there were fireworks. Lot's of them; and they were loud. There were also drinks, friends, crowds and other seeming celebrations. It was even on the news. It is now 2010 in many countries or so they say. Yet today, I sit spinning and I can't shake the feeling that I've lost something.
Ah, that's it.
2009.
New Year's Eve always brings both trepidation and anticipation. To welcome something new we must let go of something old. But, is it really new? Or is it just a convenient way of convincing ourselves we have yet another chance to get it right. To change something or do it differently.
Time is, after all, the way we measure and collect units of what is essentially the same thing, over and over. If we viewed all time as a single unit, one continuous and monotone vacuum, would we ever reinvent ourselves or start anything new? Time can be a crutch of sorts and one I am willing to lean on as I reflect on another year passed with no real or ordered recollection of how I spent it.
The new year ushers in fresh commitments with a healthy dash of resolve and amongst mine is to update this blog and pester you - my family, friends, colleagues, clients and fellow free thinkers - to read it. To share the goings-on from inside my noggin on a regular basis, and to create a record of the year so that I am not sitting, beer in hand next New Year's, trying to jumble together random brain matter from the year that was 2010.
Opt in or opt out at your discretion, but I intend to spend 2010 as an online space invader, adding to the fast accumulating mindfield of web-based outpourings.
Welcome to my new year's resolution.
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