The Offbeat

Life in the slow lane was an odd place for me to be found ever, I was energetically ignited, had some major fire in my belly and a mind full of adventurous wanderings. One day I woke up, was shoved quite rudely into a corner, pinned down and shackled to the wall by M.E. I was given a very finite and closed space within which to move, if I try to venture past I’m quite sharply reminded by my constraints, they inflict pain and severe unrelenting exhaustion. As I’m sure you can imagine it took a little while for me to become accustomed to my new situation, I cried, I screamed, I pleaded, I begged, I tried sweet talking, giving up and imagining my freedom yet nothing worked. Eventually one day I accepted where I was even if I didn’t understand why, it didn’t make my symptoms any better but calmness prevailed and life in the slow lane began for the first time in my life.

I’ve learnt to love this gentle pace, even enjoying the juxtaposition of my place within society, watching my peers have families, get MA’s, PHD’s, their careers burgeoning, deeply ingrained in modern life juggling so many perilously balanced balls. I could quite easily fold into myself and become desperate by my lack of “life.” I’m so grateful that I rarely feel that way, I always enjoy seeing my friends’ happiness, it in turn makes me smile, and I'll take as many smiles as I can get. I travel in your timeframe through your stories. The time in which I traverse now goes at a slow beat in comparison, gentle but still rhythmic. All that I do is accompanied by a rhythm, always has been, but now I meander to a different tempo. It’s a gently lilting cadence and my steps are taken on the offbeat.

There appears to be a lull in proceedings. 

Composing the Past

It's been many years since I wrote in French but this morning I had an urge and here's what came forth. Thankfully my dear friend Flo helped iron out some errors. I've translated it below. 

"Cours mon petit cours,” elle a crié. 

“Le vent t’emmènera, en volant tout deviendra clair,

La hauteur te séparera de toi même. 

Comme ça plus rien ne pourra te nuire.

N’aie pas peur d’être en morceau, 

La légèreté te remettras en entier.

Reste entortillé dans les nuages, 

Si douces ses paroles, n’est-ce pas?

Ta terre nourricière attendra infiniment

Le jour où tu lui rendra sa bonté 

En s'effrondrant doucement dans ses bras.“

“Run my darling run,” she cried.

"The wind will carry you, all will come clear in flight,

The height will separate you from yourself.

Then no more shall you be hurt.

Don’t fret of being in pieces,

The lightness will make you whole, once more.

Stay enveloped in the clouds,

Such sweet nothings, no?

Your earth mother will forever wait

The day you return her kindness

By collapsing gently into her arms.”

Growing Pains

Growth comes in fits and starts and there are a ton of clichés but what I want to consider is why some people are able to grow and mature as a person and some aren’t. I don’t think it’s linked to intelligence but linked more closely to those with a greater capacity for compassion and understanding. You see it from a young age in children, there are those who are capable of great empathy whilst others have no concept. Is it something that is taught or nurtured? I suppose it’s something that could be but there can be stark differences between siblings. We all know of brothers and sisters who are miles apart in the way they view the world. Some people grow with each hardship they face and the empathy they already possess flourishes. Do these people spend a lot of time analysing their behaviour and are therefore more cognisant? Or is it just a natural progression that comes with age and experience for some? I’m no psychologist so I don’t have the answers and unfortunately no longer the intellectual capacity nor mental energy to research it.

On the flip side are those who stagnate and some even seem to become more embedded, less-abled to see another person’s suffering, all they see is their own problems. No one suffers as much as they do, they seem to find it impossible to really take the time to listen and acknowledge what is in front of them. I see this as a lack of honesty perhaps, and it may stem from having difficulty in being honest with themselves. Or maybe it’s their way of getting through life’s hardships, if they deny the surrounding reality they can cocoon themselves from going through what is painful work. Taking that step back from ourselves and looking in from the outside, taking time and stock to look truthfully at our own behaviour and why we react as we do towards others is not only rough going but also frightening, however I believe to grow in any meaningful way it is necessary.

Where do I fit in? I’m certainly somewhere in between and have been at points in my life completely unaware of my behaviour and its affect on others. Looking back I feel ashamed. I do try now to always take that step back and take a long hard look at myself. I know I don’t always win through yet it will be something I strive for until my last breath.  

Ripples in the Sea

The slow click clack echoes around the half-empty room that has seen its fair share of nothingness. A room which is filled to the edges with unfulfilled dreams and aspirations, adorning the bare walls with the graffiti of one’s mind. The long, elegant fingers, the leanest part of the body, stretch and linger on the keys whilst the brain and extremities try to reconnect. There is a time delay, like the wobble of a bike after a few years of absence but it feels the same, the breeze through the hair, the flush of the face, the refound pleasure of the long forgotten. But just as after not having ridden for a while there’s no stamina and it’s quickly apparent that one cannot go on for long, especially one who is tainted by ill health.  One would think it’s been years rather than weeks that I haven’t managed to write but I suppose it amounts to the same thing. My small, sore red eyes are drooping, my fingers and brain slowing so for now I will call time but hope that this is the gentle beginning to a return to words. 

The Velveteen Habit

 

It’s a Velvet kind of day.

 When the lingering cadence,

 Wraps itself round my pale blue eyes,

 And slithers down soothingly,

 Occupying that grandiloquent void,

 In a Velvet kind of way. 

Untitled II

Couldn't be more out to lunch if I tried.