“So what do you call this?”, you rightly say. “Turning up without a “How do you do?” after months of silence!”
Suitably shamed, I find myself sliding down into the well of a café chair, reminded of school days where the Russian phrase I still remember so well translates as: “I’m sorry I’m late again”. I was consistently delayed to early morning classes. And sufficiently so to earn the scorn of my lovely Russian teacher. Though I was useless enough to barely scrape a pass grade, I loved Russian folk songs and considered THAT to be a good enough reason to learn the language.
The journey to the café today has been a mixed experience. There’s an abundance of snowdrops gathered in perfect bouquets along the riverside pathway; almost as an offering to the coming of Spring. I’m so glad not to have missed them this year. The enormous relief of being back in the saddle under an open sky leaves me feeling especially blessed. I mean that in the most divine sense and find it frustrating trying to explain this without sounding rather trite.
Oddly, it’s incredibly tempting to pursue this task with the help of an entirely different medium. Do I don a paintbrush? Perhaps a poet’s pen? Grab some sheets of music manuscript paper? Or perhaps start with a guitar underarm and wait for inspiration? I want to share that sense of utter wonder, now that the weather is improving, finding myself able to do something again that was never a ‘given’. On second thoughts, I think you’re more than capable of understanding, should you have ever been in love!
Apologies for digressing. The intention was not to abandon the journey here and for good reason. With the snow gone and industrial mowers having removed much of the undergrowth, the route is badly disfigured by copious amounts of rubbish. No doubt this is from many sources: walkers, park bench addicts (the main culprits), windblown contents from fallen bins and yet more deposited by flood waters that flow down the river from time to time.
Fortunately, I have a few like-minded neighbours and friends who feel a similar need to remedy this problem and we will soon acquire enough litter pickers and bags between us to make an impact. It needs clearing soon, before green shoots start pushing skyward and hiding the mess from view. OUR view, that is, but not that of the precious creatures that inhabit this space.
My attention, thank goodness, eventually turns to a small woodland overlooking the park. Tall mature deciduous trees with barely a leaf between them standing on a gently sloping hill. “Did you miss me?”, I find myself wondering, aiming my gaze towards 30 or 40 of them.
A love of ‘Lord of the Rings’ stories and characters (excluding the long rambling battle scenes and irrelevant historical detail) brings to mind a race of fictional beings sprouting branches and twigs. Tolkien chose to call them the Ents, ‘Treebeard’ being an aptly-named ‘person’ of note … I’m now curiously struck by how the woodland trees furthest away from the pathway, well, they appear to be peering from behind their less-conscious companions, as if desperate to hide their nakedness!
As soon as I find myself chuckling at the imaginary scene unfolding before me, I come to the rapid conclusion that Spring had better come soon, for all our sakes.
So, do I need to explain my absence? Like good friends, can we accept each other without judgement? Perhaps, there is no need for explanations, considering the ancient wisdom that friends can dip in and out of each other’s lives ‘as if’ we haven’t been apart at all? There again, this is a blog. What kind of blogger avoids their truth? Or have I got this all wrong?!
I ask that you pause for a heart-warming moment as a friend arrives to keep me company. His journey today has been a particularly difficult one, so all the more appreciated. After the usual niceties, banter, food and drink selections (“The Black Cherry Marzipan Cake is to die for!”) and a bit more sharing of this and that, we start discussing our concerns.
“You’ve been in a time warp” he points out, “and you ran out of inspiration because of having to deal with day to day realities.”
That’s one way of putting it!
Like a lot of people who find themselves grieving a loss of ‘normal life’ due to illness, I’ve also been privy to all that the system tries to throw at us. For some reason, I’m being made to jump through extra hoops by being assessed and challenged every 18 months or so, despite medically not being expected to get any better. It may be because I’m not doing the anticipated and ‘decent’ thing, which would be to lie in bed all day on a plethora of medication. Not anymore thank you. I’ve been there for long enough! I’m challenging these preconceptions by fighting to stay fit DESPITE feeling permanently awful. The horrible nature of it all means that I sometimes understand the temptation to give up on the human race.
Another friend adds “It’s about not being in the mood, with nothing to blog about and nothing inspiring to say”. Oh dear! I find myself agreeing with him and telling him so.
To keep mobile, I’ve been enjoying virtual rides down the Loire Valley and up into the French Alps, all fabulously displayed on an eye-level screen. Even so, it’s incredible how much more interesting life becomes, simply by spending time moving through nature. The gym is no compensation for ‘sharing the moment’ with tiny foraging creatures, almost too cute to comprehend. Nor for exchanging (strangely) knowing smiles with other cyclists. The whisper of fresh air that brushes your skin and fills your lungs just can’t be replicated on a static bike. To cap it all, the simple act of engaging with an exotic sky-scape, watching gently morphing clouds against an ever-changing pallet of colour and hue, becomes a form of meditation in itself.
Away from those beautiful green spaces, I’ve allowed myself to feel bad lately about so many unfairnesses of our time. Many vulnerable people around us are now suffering terribly. I understand a friend who believes that we, as a society, have chosen to behave differently with one another, having accepted the diet of disinformation fed to us. I SO need to believe that we also have it within us to reach out and make things right; as the truth comes to light.
Out of a sense of helplessness, despite loving my furry and unfurry friends alike, making daily gratitude lists, attending yoga classes and doing whatever I can, I’ve almost morphed into a bore. And that, dear reader, is one of my greatest fears.
“I know that feeling” replies another friend, in fits of laughter. He sounds more than a little relieved. It comes to something when having nothing interesting to contribute for months on end provides some kind of comfort for our companions!
I hope that what is important here is simply being ‘back on the page’. All thanks, I believe, to a shared experience of painting (badly) left-handed, inspired by ‘chakra’ music playing in the background. The idea of the workshop this morning was to help us all to access those stubborn ‘hard to reach’ bits of our brains, advertised with the question ‘Want to be more creative and connect with your deeper self?’
“Absolutely!”
Despite having the competence of a 5-year-old at play and not ‘getting’ this chakra stuff, it seems that mine (my chakras, in case it wasn’t obvious) have mysteriously ‘opened up’ again.
Glad to be back! ?
“Art is the only way to run away without leaving home” – Twyla Tharp
“Being an artist means forever healing your own wounds and at the same time, endlessly exposing them” – Annette Messager
“My therapist said ‘Time heals all wounds’, so I stabbed him. Now we wait ……” – Unknown
