I’d say it’s what separates us, not from the beasts, but the bestial. Creating the future, renewing a learned past - these are reasons to strive. Writing for and with love, taking and framing an image, stretching new melodic skins onto old skeletons of song… it’s how we manage to fly. It’s how we stay you and me, not us and them.
Unlike Osk, who seemed to establish his own tactical task force wherever we lived, scooping up neighbourhood feline troublemakers as sidekicks (including the memorable ginger behemoth Watson, with whom he used to scope the street from the safety of the shed roof), Jelly has the intelligence gathering skills of a sponge cake.
Anyway, somewhere in between my 'and then you should've done this' and 'why didn't you say x and y, rather than z', and 'for the love of monkeys and the general public's eyesight, you didn't honestly wear that heinous shirt did you', something he was saying about the dating extravaganza we were picking to pieces finally penetrated my cloud of self-congratulatory cumulo-waffle.
"Most people don't talk about how dates are progressing as a tender process, do they?" he asked.
"What?"
"She said I was 'part way through the tender process' and that she was judging me on my submission. I'd like to think there was irony involved, and I think at the time I may have given an admittedly weak "haha, yesssss, quite". Looking back, I'd have to conclude, computer says no on the presence of Fabulon or other aids to achieving crisply pressed linen."
It was a little like my first meeting with that extremely difficult gentleman of Ephesus, the ‘dark’ philosopher himself, Heraclitus. Now, short of travelling back in time to c.500BCE, this was obviously a meeting of the minds, rather than a chat over a coffee and a scone or two. (I’m fairly certain sitting down for a quick macchiato wouldn’t have been high on Heraclitus’ to-do list at any stage in the proceedings anyway, unless he was attempting to be clever or prove a point, but that’s just my opinion.)
““Love the life you live. Live the life you love.””
— Bob Marley
I cheerfully confess to stealing the attached quote from Miss Fiona last night about 5 seconds after she posted it on Pinterest. Fi, I owe you one - or possibly two glasses - of champers for this one. Luckily we are now in the same state which makes this eminently more achievable!
Having just mowed through a mountain of moving boxes, and dealt with all the detritus attached with the process of plopping oneself into a new location, I can cheerfully say that I haven't had a lot of love to spare for anything - or anyone - in the last few weeks. Which is why, I think, that this particular little piece resonated with me when I saw it last night. That and the enormous technological frustrations I was having, which when one's work is based online does not make the heart grow fonder of - well, anything.
To quote Roxie Hart in Chicago, you can like the life you're living, you can live the life you like - but liking it? It's not enough. You need to embrace the craptacular and the mundane as well as the awesome, even if there doesn't seem to be much point at the time. I may have been grumbling and gnashing my teeth as I unpacked what felt like the seventy two-hundredth box last night; but then I looked around and saw something spectacular.
A home.
It had appeared while I was bitching away to myself about packing paper and interwebs and I hadn't even noticed. Which is a shame, because it looks really speccy, if I do say so myself, and I should have enjoyed the process more, rather than only seeing the hindrances.
Life is such an amazing gift, and we squander it. We waste so much time thinking about what we might be able to obtain, or who we might be with, that we don't love the here and now. We also think it should be all highs and something out of a romantic comedy, with the whole 'wow' factor occurring on a daily basis, when in fact it's just life. Crap happens, and we have to deal. That doesn't mean we can't find some way to love the process.
I think that if I can write this after a decidedly average week, and mean it, that a lot of other people can manage to keep going with a bit more amour for the daily chore. And you know what? If you honestly hate things so much, or if life is just 'meh' and you can't see any joy down the line - for the love of monkeys make some changes so that you can love life more.
And maybe - just maybe - you will love yourself more in the process too.
One may even find the inclination to purchase a new pair of shoes. Believe me, genuine joie de vivre is needed for that.
I am going through some significant life changes at the moment, and as a result feel as though I am chasing my own tail half the time. You know what I mean - that headlong half-panicked, half-excited sensation combined with an 'oh hell, I have so much to do and no time in which to do it' tic in the back of your brain.
Is it weird to be grateful for that squirmy 'what the hell am I doing?' sensation in my stomach?
As I sit here in the Dread Pirate's seaward looking lair - which unfortunately is sans said Dread, who is busy buccaneering - I can't help but think of David Bowie's 'Changes'. I am trying to turn and face the strange, but at moments... well, I feel like facing the familiar and the known, even with the realisation that they are not what I want or need moving forward.
I think everyone experiences this at some stage when facing the unknown. Whether you are in a new job, new personal circumstances, a new town even - it's sometimes tempting to want to turn back the clock if only so that the uncertainties are removed.
But then - if you remove the uncertain, and stick with the safe, aren't you basically saying 'I know I wasn't happy with my life before, but it was the way things were, so I will just keep on going'?
This is a time for a leap of faith. Whether it is faith in your own abilities, faith in another person - it doesn't matter. What does matter is being brave enough to say OK, it may not work out - but if I don't try, I will never know.
Turn to face the strange. Be grateful for the unknown and the possibly precarious. You never know - time may have a treat in store for you.
