Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Tuesday afternoon walk


The more I try to say something the more my words play hide and seek with me. I wish instead of having to type I could just take you along on a long afternoon walk.


While we walk I could tell you that the job with Ekukhanyeni never really got off the ground. Liza just have too many crisises at present for us to sit together and plan. However, tomorrow I start doing volunteer work for community health group, headed by a psychologist whose approach to mental health I have long admired.


I'm very excited.

Today I also discovered that one gets a field of research called antropological psychology. I love thinking about the strange and wonderful findings this could lead me towards.

For a while we just walk while the dogs run ahead chasing after birds and the wind. Our attention follows the sun rustling through the leaves.


I suddenly remember to tell you about Sunday morning's walk. The world was filled with white butterflies and purple flowers. When Shanti rushed into a puple bush she was suddenly surrounded by a cloud of small white flutters.


Strange, only the next day it was cold and grey.


But it still had a beauty of its own.


Suddenly I notice that the dogs are standing still staring at something we can't see so we turn around and start walking back up the road.


We stop under a tree and for a while our spirits fly into the leaves shining in the sun and under the bright blue sky while every now and again the sun peeps out blinds us in the I.


I notice a cool deep space where water runs when it rains.


The sun and the wind dance around and through everything.


Our hearts are filled with happiness at the beauty found all around the wide horizon and tucked away in corners where flowers and grasses create moments of stillness and movement.


Florian and I have been fighting.

I feel like sometimes he never hears a word I am saying and I hate being the kind of woman who cares.



I hate the weakness that makes my joy turn to saddness when it is not acknowledged.

I resolve to keep breathing and listening to the songs we sing.


Between my own truth and reality a dance exists which I can not yet recognise.


It moves through my heart pulling me towards a me that can feel all without being afraid of not knowing.


Sigh, it is easy to stumble a bit while learning a new dance.


Next week Saturday I will start a new dancing class.


I have not danced the last two years and I miss it.

The joy of becoming one with the music, feeling the earth vibrating under my feet and my hair taking flight.


Will you tell me about the things that make you happy?


And strong.


Things that makes you catch your breath at the joy at being alive.


Things that hide in the corner of your hearts, suprising you when you least expect it.


Tell me how to remember that it is never as serious as it seems. Tell me where my sense of humour is running around sniffing flowers. I'll tell you that I had a coherent happy mail waiting to be written before I had a fight with Florian and you can tell me "I don't know what you are talking about, this post seems pretty coherent to me." And I'll say: "That is good because everytime I am in a good mood our internet connection is down and I go and soak up the sun while composing posts that are soon forgotten."


Or if your words are playing hide and seek with mine just say whatever pops into your mind even if it describes the wall paper in front of you.

Monday, November 19, 2007

Visitors


Yesterday I received a visit from depression. She slowed down time, made my books boring and my mood thick. My world became twice removed.


By suppertime I'm chopping vegetables and crying. I cry about the banality of having to prepare and eat supper and about the difficulties of communicating with Florian and life. The space around us dissolves meaning until it becomes ambiguous and dull.


After a while I give up searching for the moment in which reality took flight. Past experiences have become as exciting as sitcom re-runs.


I step outside to do qigong under the trees. I breathe deeply while raising my arms. Looking up between my fingers I deepen my breath. A glimpse of a cloud and a dancing leave stirs a forgotten memory.


I breathe out while bending down. My mind wonders back into the mist. I start walking away. I call myself back. I reach up and breathe in.


The wind remembers lightness. I close my eyes and allow the depression to settle into my body. To just be. My heart beats to a forgotten rhythm. I breathe in and blindly reach for a wish to be a small leave dancing against a blue sky and a white cloud. I breathe out the heaviness and the wish.


Once inside I curl up on my bed. Inside my heart a small warrior awakens. She wears a bright pink jersey covered in blue and orange flowers. She gently pushes against the grey static surrounding us. Sometimes her steps are as faint as a breeze on a sand dune. Sometimes she jumps of cliffs while singing to the unknown.


Today the world is back in colour. On my study wall I notice shadows dancing in a golden square. I step into a green field laughing at three dogs trying to fly after a guinea fowl.

Thursday, November 15, 2007

Escape from the whirlwind


Do you ever get the feeling that you have been thrown around and around and around by time chasing its own tail?


I feel like my hair is standing on end and filled with twigs, grass and leaves. My eyes are darting around and although I know that the whirlwind has stopped turning my senses are still poised in defense. Somehow, a part of me feels that listing things after the fact will help me regain my balance.


I wonder what really happened in all those moments. Moments blurred with the speed in which I swept past, holding on to the tail of time. What did I miss, what could I have done better, said better, how could I have listened more or what could I have allowed to be born by giving it the time to slowly and gently emerge?

I close my eyes and I let go of time's tail. I slow down and look around.

And suddenly small things emerge. A moment of clarity as my eyes follow the dance of shadows across wolf fur. A reply to a apology humorously reminding me to not take myself so seriously. A realisation that another way of achieving exists and that small baby steps and lots of courage has the power to transform my life.

A hope that if I stand still long enough the hundreds of opportunities around me will manage to gently land on my shoulder and lead my heart in a new direction.

Thursday, November 8, 2007

October Just Posts

justpostoct



Today I would like to invite you to join me, Jen Mad and Susanne at the Just Post table. In my mind the table stands in the middle of a field filled with tall grasses. The golden light of the sun slowly fades into a blue grey twilight. The sound of laughter and conversation fills the air.

We light a fire and its orange blue crackle shouts a welcome to the first curious stars. Children and dogs run around the fire or lie quietly, their eyes reflecting the flight of a white moth around the moon.

After a while we become silent. It is time to sing a new world into existence.

We close our eyes. Each of us reach deep into our hearts where a small golden flame sings to itself. Around it dances its pale blue shaddows. It sings of change. We open our hearts and allow its words to fill the air around us. Together our voices invite a new future to approach.

The evening holds her breath.....

and then the stars join the dance, the wolves run around the fire and children laugh with the joy of new possibilities.

Some songs heared around the fire:

Aliki with Affordable Guilt and on unreasonable expectations
Blog Antagonist with Not a drop to drink bon with Dear Margaret Trudeau
Chani with Restorative Justice ... and when community comes together
Crazymumma with Untitled and i just left my yoga class
Get in the car with Philanthropy Thursday

Glennia with why poverty matters
Her Bad Mother with No Shame
Jen with Respect Your Mother, 13 million reasons, little boy lost and my first mothering
Jennifer with potatoes for dinner
KC with A physician's perspective on universal health care

Susan Wagner with Wrinkle in Time, or Thoughts on Turning 40
Susanne with Art and creativity are pivotal
Suzanne Reisman on BlogHer with More Contraceptive Use, Fewer Abortions and with Combating The Stereotypes and Injustice Surrounding Male Rape
Thordora with Mentally ill lighter sentences
Maggie with Respect and Old Age and environment



Small Meadow Farm with Reduce Reuse Recycle
The coffee house with Positive Thinking/
The chickens have escaped! with No eggs, just rats
Beyond the fields we know with Mama says Om - Divided
Trailer Park Girl with what if


Beansprouts with I believe
Fortune and Glory with Oneness and Bomb, bomb Iran
Riversands Feeding and Gardening project with Mothers who volunteer
Princess Mouse with The Power of Community - How Cuba Survived Peak Oil
Permaculture in Brittany with Houston, we've had a problem

Roy with let's have a wake! chivalry is dead
Mrs. Chili with shouting it from the rooftops
Mary G. with ouch that hurt and letter to danier leather
Alejna with hungry
Ancors and Masts with how would you deal with it?

League of Maternal Justice with Mission #3
It's Not A Lecture with something good in facebook for a change
Mom's Speak Up with American People = Bush's ATM
been there with BlogDay for Mothers ACT
From the front lines with Philanthropy Thursday

Cecilieaux with what makes pedophiles look good
A Commonplace Book with nooses: why now?
Snoskred with please help do what you can to stop internet scammers NOW
Jenn with do you know me


Julia with what's in a number
Thordora with It's not so easy being hard
Julie with Imagine, tie a red ribbon round my daughter's wrist and take me to toxic town
Biodtl with no child insured, either and why I can never vote Republican Mimi with brave new boobs post
Jangari with another pseudo apology and more white exceptions to grog bans


Mary Alice with Philanthropy Thursday
Mother Woman with On the library strike
Painted Maypole with My Pink Ribbon and gratitude and giving
Slouching Mom with Smog
Sober Briquette with This pacifist gets all patriotic and Sunday dinner left-overs

Some of the song recorders:

Izzy De Jess Jen Bon Joanne Mother Woman Alejna Jen Mad Susanne Hel


Sunday, November 4, 2007

Four more days

...of exams and then four days in Capetown and freedom. Blessed freedom.

The past week was wild with work and studying and finishing my research project. I managed to leave two pages of my project at home in my hurry to leave. Sigh.

The wonderful thing is I'm beginning to realize that my worth does not equal the average I receive for my projects. It has to do with meeting each moment with curiosity, with taking risks and trusting unexpected opportunities, with light and shadows dancing behind screens of foliage, with leaves dancing with clouds and with Florian and I dancing in the kitchen to Burning spear.

Now I have to return to the books but I will be back as soon as I get to Capetown.


ps. While I have been studying summer has arrived. Green and purple and thunderstorms and late sunsets.