Heading Home

Walking Away

I have been surprised by this ‘blogging experiment’ I have been undertaking for quite some time now. As a tool it has proved to be a way to engage me in activities I would not have even entertained let alone participated in as far as technology and gizmo’s are concerned, it has helped me remember stuff, explore others stuff and discover even more stuff but frankly the stuff is stuffed and I am walking away.

I’m walking away as I have done throughout my life with no regard to packing up and taking everything with me, stuff can be acquired in this life almost at the speed of breath:0) If anyone trips over the pile of stuff here and in the other ajoining ‘rooms’ and finds some use for something, help yourself. Things will stay here till some time when they are not.

As I wrote the post below I felt as if I might have just posted my last post at the blog and I feel that more strongly today.

One of the striking, quite amazing things that has happened during this ‘blogging experiment’ is the people who didn’t just stop and stare – I’m used to that:0), but those few who said hello. Such a gift made all the more special by it being unexpected.

A woman could get used to people saying hello.

However, I have come to understand that the unfathomable multi layer, intricate weave of many of my posts made saying anything almost impossible for anyone who was daft enough to read to the end as they would be so stupefied and dumfounded by the sheer audacity of the woman who tried to understand through words that they just stepped back quietly hoping not be caught sight of.

Interesting this understanding, makes so much more sense of personal interactions that have always been a puzzle to me. The kind that illicit silence as major response along with nervous laughter, the ‘ oh my brain is too scrambled to give you response at the moment I’ll get back to you when I’m in better place’ response – which translated reads - ‘what are you on! where DO you get such unfathomable ideas from, can’t you just make me laugh if I just go silent we can pretend you never said that’.

Trouble is, making people laugh is party tricks and blowing up balloons, which comes as second nature BUT blogging has found me discovering for sure that I fundamentally and profoundly need to breath out expression of complicated, half cocked, unfathomably dense and layered thought and just wish I knew how to say it all with an ironic smile which made people feel safer. Then to do that I suspect one has to feel safe oneself and safe is never a word I’d use for my place in the world.

So thank you to those of you that stopped, stared and said hello. That didn’t make me laugh it made my heart smile in surprise at the recognition.

The camera will still be used and at the end of the year the Four on Friday project I set myself will possibly find its way on to the web somewhere. I’ll continue to scribble unfathomable posts to myself but maybe now I will use them for their best function, making spills for the stove in the sitting room.

Moment by moment, thought by thought, breath by breath; kind of special looking up and seeing stars and being reminded this spec is part of all that. The animation might make no sense generally but to this heart and mind that’s all I have that makes any sense as I watch another sun rise and know it continues. Love.

The L Word

So, why another long silence…. Maybe you’ll find out in this post but this is going to be one of my ‘real’ streams of consciousness I suspect, so, if you want to come along for the ride get a cup or glass of something you enjoy and sip slowly, breath gently and forget about meaning or sense and maybe we both may feel what I’m saying:0)

There is an old phrase ‘words come cheap’ and I understand it to be about actions promised with half a heart, very little engagement of brain and even less of intent.

I have difficulties with words, both those offered to me by others and those I try to find for myself.

Morning Moments 1,2,3

The three small clips held in the posts below were taken earlier this morning, just as the light was really making itself known in the valley, around 6am.

The camera work leaves something to be desired, the operator hasn’t a clue what she is doing:0). But the welcome to the light is fractionally caught and that seems rather fine to me.

It is such moments that reinforce the sense of delight and wonder I discover each new day, the utterly unbelievable gifts right there at my back door given freely and consistently. How fortunate I am has no need to be mentioned or underlined but here each morning I get an underlining full of joy and life and dare I say it love.

The birds chorus is one that rips through the valley like a star careering to Earth transformed into energy and encountered by a heart.

I live in a crowded busy valley in Wales but on a morning such as this I know I live on a bounteous, beautiful and breathtakingly generous place called Earth and I am not ashamed to say I give thanks each morning for life offered so freely and accepted too often with only a passing nod.

The mornings give me a moment to say thank you but more than that they give me a moment to remind my self that moments are precious and are all I may stand in. That anything I ‘achieve’ in a day is but a moment and will pass as quickly as it came but Earth Stars and Sun give signs and wonders beyond knowing or understanding but an open heart and mind may receive them standing on a small piece of the Earth on an Early Sunday morning.

Moment 1 – 6am looking from kitchen door up the valley
Moment 2 – 6.05am looking from kitchen door down valley
Moment 3 – 6.15am looking around part of the garden from wee summer house verandah
Do have your speakers turned on or you'll miss the stars of the show:0)

Always

Often when I catch glimpse of the wonders that the Earth places before my eyes so freely I am overcome in wonder and joy. This was so when I saw pussy willow buds waving in a stiff wind bringing promise of lighter days yet to come and new and perfect growth for the moment.

Looking at them closely is to realise their fragility and resilience and understand this is the dark and light in all life which will find meaning in its living especially when echoing the rhythm of the Earth where its life and impetus may be found and expressed in truth and the simplicity of being, which is the most complex realisation a human heart can engage with it seems to me.

Would

Would

Would I walk away. Yes
Would I feel annoyance. Yes
Would I express the annoyance clearly and calmly. Yes
Would I be angry. No
Would I express anger. Yes
Would I listen to another’s distress. Yes
Would another listen to my distress. No
Would I hear another’s confusion. Yes
Would another hear my confusion. No
Would I collude. No
Would I encourage another’s collusion. No
Would I be willing to pay the price . Yes
Would I hurt for standing firm. Yes
Would I regret my stand. No
Would I challenge, confront and create. Yes
Would I conform. No
Would I cry in pain. Yes
Would I sob in frustration and fear. Yes
Would I laugh at the dark. Yes
Would I smile through the fear and find light. Yes
Would I visit the temple of Rhinestone and Glitz. No
Would I tarry in the palace of If-Only-What-If. No
Would I feel bereft. Yes
Would I find gift and understanding in the loss. Yes
Would I share laughter with strangers. Yes
Would I receive happy moment from friends. Yes
Would I find the bottom of the clean washing pile. No
Would I route out all the dirty washing. Yes
Would I be able take off the crampons and belay line lately used to get to my bed. No
Would I discover the whole floor in workroom. No
Would I fall asleep lying on the bathroom floor. Yes
Would I be loved and tested to extreme by two dogs. Yes
Would I discover the kitchen sink really has a bottom. Yes
Would I hold up a white flag. NEVER
Would I find love. EVERYWHERE AND ALWAYS

That would be some of this last week then.

Shadow and Light

I took the series of snaps of this piece of stone because I loved the way the light was playing on it and how within a few moments its shape and colour changed.

It was a metaphor I needed today. It is a metaphor that will take some embracing and accepting and this rock of a life feels a bit more mis-shapened than the beautiful stone above but the promise of transformation through light playing on a life is one I needed to be reminded of today midst the sense of yet another 'defeat' which in truth was none of the sort just a momentary passing place I found myself in but whose geography squeezed the breath out of me and I'm still gasping a little knowing days ahead will need to be taken slowly but with open hands and accepting heart life is and will be sweet.

Looking Up

Even in the most supposedly mundane daily chores there is always a gift waiting to be found as long as I try to stay aware and alert to the messages to my heart.

The picture above is definitely a moment of finding a gift in the most unexpected place. Sunday found me busy catching up on the pile of bed linen and clothing that had accrued in the previous twenty-four hours or so. I was aware of course that it was a bright blue sky day why else would the washing machine have been whizzing and spinning since early morning. Having divested it of a third load I set off down the garden to check on the progress of an earlier load hoping to make room for the latest load.

I love the interaction with the weather moment by moment that using the solar dryer requires. Standing on my back step looking down the valley to gauge what sort of weather might be heading in from the sea, walking across the yard to look up the valley to see if the Beacons have not held back the latest onslaught from the north east and the calculating if I think I have enough time to hang things out and leave them for at least an hour before the rain arrives actually keeps me in touch with the nuances that is the weather here.

Embrace

"When all the rivers and valleys and forests and hills of the world have been priced, packaged, bar-coded and stacked in the local supermarket, when all the hay and coal and earth and wood and water has been turned to gold, what then shall we do with all the gold? Make nuclear bombs to obliterate what's left of the ravaged landscapes and the notional nations in our ruined world?" Arundhati Roy 'the algebra of infinite justice'

"If you see in any situation only what everyone else can see, you can be said to be so much a representative of your culture that you are a victim of it" S.I. Hayakawa 'Language in thought and Action'

These two thoughts followed me through my day and are still my companions as I begin to prepare for bed.

Today has been a mixed day of early morning waking to mists and chill morning air, to an all to brief walk in the brightening day midst gorse and tree then on to appointments and small daily tasks made large by circumstance.

Emergence

I came across these words today “provoke emergence” and it made me smile as I liked the rhythm they made but they seemed good words to herald the Spring Equinox which I endeavoured to mark today in small ways.

The Valley was bathed in sun and covered by blue sky early on, which was a gift in its self. The temperature was certainly chilly to say the least but the very strong north easterly wind that has been ripping through the valley in the past few days had died down and the noticeable breeze was from the south west again and though keen was not as merciless as its previous incarnation. The light was ice white in intensity which proved to be small problem for my eyes even beneath prescription dark glasses and wide brimmed hat but I was not going to retreat in to the shade of the cottage until Rhys, Banon and myself had taken huge gulps of Spring promise and enjoyed the bounty of a clear to the horizon morning.

The words I found earlier skipped around in my brain and I began to review the winter now marked as passed – and I cannot say with any great regret on my part:0) How much had my energies and intent been given over to provoking emergence I wondered and realised I won’t really be able to answer that question till Spring has turned in to Summer and Autumn has beckoned and I find myself walking in to Winter again.

That seems the great thing, emergence does not happen in an instant, it is a gradual and ongoing process but putting that word provoke before it really cheers me both in spirit and intent as it seems to encourage me not to just sit passively and wait for the right time, expect something to come to me but rather it’s about preparation, expectancy and questioning to make space for thought, prepare the foundation for action, take notice of the moment and understand it is promise for the living not the waiting.

A Way is Always there

I found myself wondering where what and how early this morning as I considered what seemed a very long journey to the basin and toilet in my bedroom which are housed in THE smallest ‘room’ less than three paces from my bed. I say ‘room’ as to say it’s a cupboard is expanding it somewhat:0) However, I count myself as most fortunate to have this facility within easy reach even if that reach is made as a crawl.

I remember the long years of a bucket and conundrum of getting it and me down the stairs, not one of my best memories really but even then I felt fortunate for I was able to empty said bucket into a flushing toilet – even if that was in another ‘room’, this time somewhat larger than the one now found in my bedroom.

This room was constructed with corrugated sheeting of dubious make up - think asbestos, and various other materials well past their prime creating sense that the toilet was seat in a ship caught in a storm as the moving and creaking was not about the body sat on the throne rather the roof, floorboards and walls dancing. The bath in this room actually was only half in the room as a hole had been cut in the floor boards so the bath could actually sit on the ground below because frankly the floorboards could not take the weight of a full bath of water let alone the addition of a human body.

This ‘room’ was constructed as a lean-too though it was rather more lean-away and when I first moved in involved filling a baby-burco to heat water and then fill the bath as there was only cold water tap. It was always an adventure using that bathroom and I know anyone who stayed here during the years it was in operation will almost certainly remember the experience:0)