I was reading a blog post here http://growandbegrown.blogspot.co.uk/ and it reminded me of this episode of the "popular US Sitcom" Friends. Monica has a cupboard (aka closet) which is always locked. Now being a fan of the show you will know that Monica is the Empress of Neat Freakiness and Goddess of Clean. Everything in her life is tidy. When the cupboard is finally opened it is chock full of crap, everything piled up in a heap. A whole mess of stuff.
It made me think about a tendency I have to "tidy". Not specifically in a real way (though it has been known). More in a "life" kind of way. I want to deal with stuff and move on. I want to line all the different perspectives and emotions up, work through them in a systematic way and then pack them neatly up in lines, or file them, alphabetically, or maybe in time and date order.
Of course "life", by it's very nature, resists that. "Life" is chaotic and crazy and unexpected and bonkers. It can be dangerous, risky, beautiful, wild, surprising. It doesn't want to be filed or labelled because the minute you do that it will smirk at you and change and defy the carefully shaped hole you have tried to squeeze it into.
I am getting better at just letting it happen. There are days when I slip into old habits, thinking I actually have some kind of control (much hysterical laughter). But when I stop thinking that it becomes much easier, more fun, gentler, exciting. When I let go of my categories, and they float up and around me like bubbles and pop in the sunlight, I feel a slow unclenching in my chest and I breathe differently. It scares me. But it feels more hopeful.
I am hoping to one day make peace with my own "cupboard", the messy, junky, broken, crappy bits of my life, to lay them out in the sunlight, because they are part of me, they make me who I am, even when they are ugly and jagged around the edges. And then eventually the grass will grow around them and blur the edges and soak them away.
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Saturday, March 24, 2012
Digging for gold
I have had a strange sensation this past week. It began when I was listening to the album "Watermark". This was something I used to listen to all the time about 20 years ago.
Coupled to the music was the memory of a work experience placement I had when I was 16 at Canterbury Archaeological Trust. It was a two week placement and I remember it quite vaguely apart from the smell of the finds room and the sensation of working, under a baking July sun, brushing away at ancient pieces of pottery embedded in the earth.
This new world I am living in is a place of discovery, like the dig. For a long time I wore certain roles like garments. The role of "wife" was one of them. Now that that role is set aside I find myself uncovering the person I used to be. It is a slow process and it is sensory stuff which helps with the brushing away of all the dirt. There are moments when the brushing gets kind of painful and I want to heap all the dirt back over myself and hide. But it's exciting (in a reserved, British way).
I like the feel of the idea of discovering that person, before she got all hidden by roles and expectations. I like the feel of how careful you have to be as you uncover something precious hidden in the earth, how gently you have to work, how it takes time and patience.
Coupled to the music was the memory of a work experience placement I had when I was 16 at Canterbury Archaeological Trust. It was a two week placement and I remember it quite vaguely apart from the smell of the finds room and the sensation of working, under a baking July sun, brushing away at ancient pieces of pottery embedded in the earth.
This new world I am living in is a place of discovery, like the dig. For a long time I wore certain roles like garments. The role of "wife" was one of them. Now that that role is set aside I find myself uncovering the person I used to be. It is a slow process and it is sensory stuff which helps with the brushing away of all the dirt. There are moments when the brushing gets kind of painful and I want to heap all the dirt back over myself and hide. But it's exciting (in a reserved, British way).
I like the feel of the idea of discovering that person, before she got all hidden by roles and expectations. I like the feel of how careful you have to be as you uncover something precious hidden in the earth, how gently you have to work, how it takes time and patience.
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Story of the day
| You can subscribe to these little story snippets daily by googling STORYPEOPLE. This is today's which I love... |
| Couch Explorer |
| When I was young I always wanted to go exploring in a cave and when I got older I finally did & it was dark everywhere & there were strange sounds like your stomach after a big meal & I couldn't wait to get out. I figured out later that I mainly liked to go exploring caves in my mind where I could be comfortable & not get dirty & cold. If you read too much National Geographic when you're young it's hard to adjust to the real world. |
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Carry On Regardless
There comes a time, in your travels (and specifically, today, in mine) where you need to re-evaluate the direction you're going in. For a while you were travelling in one direction, and it was good. You were hopeful. The horizon gleamed with new possibilities. Then your tornado happened. In my case I decided the tornado wasn't going to interfere with my life's direction. I was, in true Blitz spirit, going to keep calm and carry on. The world might have changed completely around me but I was going ahead.
That was good. I was being positive. I was being optimistic.
Until today when I realised I might have gone a bit beyond that and be being totally unrealistic. I don't know at what point I passed the marker between optimism and delusion but it reminded me of this clip from The Holy Grail http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RZ-hYPAMFQ.
It's all very well trying to carry on regardless but sometimes you need to look at the reality of your situation (note to self). This is actually, longer term, showing yourself kindness. Because if you keep on trying to do what is clearly not possible you will end up exhausted and discouraged.
Better to rest a while. To have a good look at your surroundings and take in the place you find yourself in. It is not where you thought you would be, it might not even be where you thought you were. But you can't find a way forward until you know your starting point, eh?
That was good. I was being positive. I was being optimistic.
Until today when I realised I might have gone a bit beyond that and be being totally unrealistic. I don't know at what point I passed the marker between optimism and delusion but it reminded me of this clip from The Holy Grail http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RZ-hYPAMFQ.
It's all very well trying to carry on regardless but sometimes you need to look at the reality of your situation (note to self). This is actually, longer term, showing yourself kindness. Because if you keep on trying to do what is clearly not possible you will end up exhausted and discouraged.
Better to rest a while. To have a good look at your surroundings and take in the place you find yourself in. It is not where you thought you would be, it might not even be where you thought you were. But you can't find a way forward until you know your starting point, eh?
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Tornado
Not a real one. Something metaphorical. Very little warning, unpredictable, taking apart the life you had in a matter of seconds and leaving you upside down in a tree looking at an unfamiliar landscape.
It's a sharp and twisted place, full of things you recognise, that was my kettle, that my favourite book from A level literature. But they are out of context, the kettle wedged behind a broken cistern, the book spread out among planks and rubble, drifting away, page by page across the neighbours lawn.
Right way up again you try and make sense of your surroundings and just how this happened. Yesterday the world was ordered, organised, everyone in the right places, relationships bumping along as they have for decades. You had a sense of the future, because you knew the past. You imagined life as a straight highway, that was where you were. You are here now. That direction is where you're headed. It's clear, you think, straightforward, obvious. There may be the odd unexpected diversion, maybe while they're filling in pot holes, but this is it. It's your road. You chose it. Sometimes, when you were younger, you wished it was different, that there were more trees, or rest stops. But for some time now you've been resigned to this way of travelling, it's not perfect, but it's known.
Standing on the debris strewn yard you begin to become aware that you are hurting, the bumps and knocks, the bruises, the cuts and scratches all waking up in a cacophony of searing sensations. This is not the awakening you were hoping for, if something dramatic happened you imagined it good, a promotion, a fabulous work opportunity abroad, success for your children.
At points you can barely stand. You have to stop your aimless wandering in the ruins, stick your head in your hands and howl. How could this happen? Why now? None of it makes any sense, you wail. It's so unfair.
Sometimes this will last for days, sometimes months.
Back in the day, when I used to watch Tony Hart on TV and Animal Magic, with Johnny Morris, I used to be fascinated by film played backwards (well I might still be, but they don't do it so much now, what with everything being so fancy and digital). One day you wake up and you realise that this particular event can't be played back, unwound until it's all back the "right" way again.
That hits you, just below your stomach, like a punch. It leaves an ache. But it also shakes you awake. There is no "way back". There is, now, no safe passage to Alderaan. That future is gone.
In your newly awakened state you begin to notice that the world is already different again, in between the rubbish weeds are growing. You have a good look at the junk of your life, you work out what you can keep, what is worth holding onto, what might be salvaged.
Creeping out from your tarpaulin-roofed shelter one morning you gather together your life, pick up your dusty coat. There is nothing here for you anymore. You are going to go and become a Jedi like your father. Or, more likely, set off from this place, because here there is only mess and pain and regrets. You start walking, away from the junked up neighbourhoods, already almost abandoned. You head out into the open spaces beyond the edge of town. You feel unsteady, this journey is different, because you aren't sure there's a destination, and that sense of future is gone, you just keep putting one foot in front of the other, breathing steadily, looking off to the horizon, blurry and blue.
This is how it begins.
It's a sharp and twisted place, full of things you recognise, that was my kettle, that my favourite book from A level literature. But they are out of context, the kettle wedged behind a broken cistern, the book spread out among planks and rubble, drifting away, page by page across the neighbours lawn.
Right way up again you try and make sense of your surroundings and just how this happened. Yesterday the world was ordered, organised, everyone in the right places, relationships bumping along as they have for decades. You had a sense of the future, because you knew the past. You imagined life as a straight highway, that was where you were. You are here now. That direction is where you're headed. It's clear, you think, straightforward, obvious. There may be the odd unexpected diversion, maybe while they're filling in pot holes, but this is it. It's your road. You chose it. Sometimes, when you were younger, you wished it was different, that there were more trees, or rest stops. But for some time now you've been resigned to this way of travelling, it's not perfect, but it's known.
Standing on the debris strewn yard you begin to become aware that you are hurting, the bumps and knocks, the bruises, the cuts and scratches all waking up in a cacophony of searing sensations. This is not the awakening you were hoping for, if something dramatic happened you imagined it good, a promotion, a fabulous work opportunity abroad, success for your children.
At points you can barely stand. You have to stop your aimless wandering in the ruins, stick your head in your hands and howl. How could this happen? Why now? None of it makes any sense, you wail. It's so unfair.
Sometimes this will last for days, sometimes months.
Back in the day, when I used to watch Tony Hart on TV and Animal Magic, with Johnny Morris, I used to be fascinated by film played backwards (well I might still be, but they don't do it so much now, what with everything being so fancy and digital). One day you wake up and you realise that this particular event can't be played back, unwound until it's all back the "right" way again.
That hits you, just below your stomach, like a punch. It leaves an ache. But it also shakes you awake. There is no "way back". There is, now, no safe passage to Alderaan. That future is gone.
In your newly awakened state you begin to notice that the world is already different again, in between the rubbish weeds are growing. You have a good look at the junk of your life, you work out what you can keep, what is worth holding onto, what might be salvaged.
Creeping out from your tarpaulin-roofed shelter one morning you gather together your life, pick up your dusty coat. There is nothing here for you anymore. You are going to go and become a Jedi like your father. Or, more likely, set off from this place, because here there is only mess and pain and regrets. You start walking, away from the junked up neighbourhoods, already almost abandoned. You head out into the open spaces beyond the edge of town. You feel unsteady, this journey is different, because you aren't sure there's a destination, and that sense of future is gone, you just keep putting one foot in front of the other, breathing steadily, looking off to the horizon, blurry and blue.
This is how it begins.
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