Desiderata

Today is the first day of the new year. 2012.

Traditionally we make new year's resolutions to be a "new me" and then by tomorrow we are back to the "old me".

It is a beautiful morning, as I look down from our veranda overlooking the Lagoon, white yachts moored near the yacht club - and bird song from Pledge Park next door, shouting wildely to announce this new year. I was chatting to Michelle about our hopes and dreams for the year, and we are excited about 2012! We intend to embrace every good thing, be positive and to live with good expectations about every new day. As we talked we remembered the hippy posters of the 70's of the Desiderata, a 1927 poem by Max Ehrmann. And it still seems to have some very good messages for those of us who want to commit to a new way of thinking in 2012.

Go placidly amidst the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals; and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth. Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here.

And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be, and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul. With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful.

Strive to be happy.

Life is about choices. We can choose to live happy and fulfilled lives - or we can choose to bow our heads and take the cares of the world on our shoulders - why would we want this last choice - yet so many do. So many deny themselves the chance to soar like eagles. We surely all want to be free, to fly and to embrace the world.

I believe that one of the most debilitating loads man takes on is religion. That is "religion" the bondage. Faith can set us free - but religion will make us a prisoner. We are free in the joy of creation, we are created and creating all our lives. How can we deny that. But even more - how can we allow man to shackle us in irons and imprison us in laws and doctrines which suck out our life and living until we are bowed under structures which deny our freedom.

So lets break free in 2012 - celebrate creation around us and find joy in every day and every person who crosses our path.

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Michelle's new blog

At last! An entry in the blog!

It seems that living in Sedgefield has breathed new life into the writer. Michelle has started her own blog and it can be found here Michelle's new blog from Sedgefield

Enjoy!

Its all Greek to me

It was L's birthday. We like to celebrate birthdays if our finances allow. This year his birthday fell on a Monday, and so we chose the Sunday to celebrate instead, and took the long winding road, between the mountains - to the sea.

First stop was Seal Point, scene of much surfing in the past, and even with an onshore wind there was a gentle point break, and a few relaxed surfers, gliding by.

Next was Jeffreys, and, still in search of a sea view we ended up at The Greek, all blue and white decor, and a bone fide Greek in attendance. His daughter was seated at a table near ours, lace miniskirted, spoiling someones baby - they all were, that whole Greek family eating around the table, doing that family thing that Greeks do so well.

I should know, Greeks have been part of my life for a very long time. I chose Maria to be my very best friend when I was just thirteen. She was totally different to everyone else - ivory skinned, with black ringlets and black eyes. Her and her family were beloved to me for many years (and still are)....

I remember their dimly lit house, attached to their cafe (of cause) and the huge tins of olives always open in their kitchen, with slotted spoon with which to scoop up a large quantity of calamata olives when we passed by... Her father dispensing cokes from behind his counter, her mother making lemon soup.

I loved going with them to the Greek Orthodox Church in Port Elizabeth, for Easter. Maria and her sister dressed me for the occasion. They were both exceptionally beautiful and they made me up as best they could, blow dried my relentlessly straight hair, sprayed me with perfume.

Together we sat in the pews, after kissing mother of pearl icons, being showered with gold leaf petals and leered at by virile, swarthy men. We whispered and giggled under the condemning gaze of a flock of black crow woman who stood up front and chanted. We bowed left and right to the sound of unintelligible Ancient Greek and our eyes stung with the incense that rose from the priests' swinging lantern.
Oh how I loved it all!
The wedding crowns in their glass case beside her parents bed, the Parthenon hanging in the lounge, Zorba their dog, the smashed plates later at Evas wedding, the dancing, round and round...

But that wasn't the end of the 'Greek Thing' in my life. During my drop out years i.e. trying to write, trying to dodge the Security Police. trying to make sense of it all... I did my share of waitressing. And I did it in Greek.

Tropicana in Port Elizabeth was where I spent many a long day and many a long night. My free meal was souvlaki, my coffee was not complete without a diamond of baklava. My best tips came from Greek Seaman, whose parties were fuelled by Ozo and kept me working and dodging their hands till the early hours. I have carried laden plates of Greek lamb whilst kicking aside the debri of smashed plates, the powerful aroma of garlic clinging to my clothes for days afterwards. I never drink one of those coffees topped with beaten milk without thinking of Mimi's orders to put lots of 'vrot' on top!

My friends sometimes visited me there while I worked, drawn by the Moussaka, Dolmades, Calamari, Spanakopita and Galatiborika! I served L there a couple of times, when he was a 'seven years older than me man' and I was just a crazy girl, and we laughed over our coffees I'm sure, before he went his way and I went mine.

I ate at Maria's Restaurant in Cape Town when just a girl - L paid but he was still only a friend then, and someone my sister shared a house with. Nearly twenty years later he took me there again on our first official date, and I think I regaled him with Greek tales from my past. We drank wine that lovely Greek way, in kitchen tumblers that you can slam down hard on the table top, when making a point! I remember Greek lamb, falling off the bone soft from being cooked in a clay oven, and piles of olives and garlic.


And now we celebrated his fifty five years overlooking the blue sea of Jeffreys Bay. I ate souvlaki and he succulent lamb, we had plenty of olives, and wine , followed by coffee (with 'vrot') and baklava. We walked on a sand blasted beach before driving home.

Driving home I felt it might be time for me to watch 'Mama Mia' again. For the Abba adolescent memories, but also for the blue sea, the white buildings clinging to the hillside - for Greece.

Life in the Son

Here comes the sun (tum ti tum ti)

Here comes the sun

And I say

Its all right

(tum ti tum ti ..)

The feeling of Spring in the air always makes me sing.

The truth is.....

I love the sun

I love the Son

(a happy English coincidence)

In England I suffered from S.A.D. That's sun affected disorder. My African brain could not function properly without light. Up in the frozen north I saw very little light. The days were short, the nights very long. I felt like I was wading through a thick soupy fog.

I needed the sun

I needed the Son.

Without the sun I get sad.

I started making handmade patchwork quilts because of it. I sat under a daylight bulb and stitched away at patches of bright colour. The doctor told me that colour and light would kick start the serotonin in my brain, and make me happy again. It worked.

I need light to be happy.
I need the Light to be happy.

I made a point of using cotton fabric cut from friends' old clothes for my quilts. Now they serve as friendly reminders. They are also reminders to me at the moment of the importance to cut out the best bits from everyone and everything in life and stitch them all together. To toss away, as it were, the stained, torn, frayed and faded sections that bring with them no joy, no beauty.

I saw some wool recently, here in Joubertina. The balls of bright colour sat tightly together in a box behind the counter in the second hand clothing store.

I wanted some so badly, especially the bloeisel pink, the spring green, the summer sky blue...

Like a butterfly, spring was beating away inside me.

When money came I bought a bagful of balls. I am crocheting them out in stripes - making a startling blanket to keep me warm when winter comes again.

And anyway, God has been showing me rainbows lately. They seem to be everywhere. A combination of rain and sun. Thats a rainbow.

So I've been thinking that maybe...

Christ is the Rainbow.
The Promise, the Hope - the prism through which all colour breaks forth.

My blanket is a rainbow in the making. I am compulsively, obsessively addicted to it. As it grows under my hands I am excited by all the different colour combinations. Blue next to yellow, pink against green, purple beside orange.

Rain and Sunlight
Tears and Laughter
Winter and Spring
Death and Resurrection Life.

Black Beauty

Black like night.
Black velvet pierced with stars.
Black like jet.
Patent leather shoes with lacy white bobby socks!

Top hats and tails .
A little black dress on Oscar night.
Onyx rings

Black tyres with white walls.
Sleek limousines with black tinted windows.

My favourite wine-gum.
Liquorice
Caviar

I have always told my children they are beautiful. They are blessed because it is true.
Black is, of cause a political term. No one is really a colour.

In England a group of National Front skinheads once pelted me and my ex husband with snowballs, whilst snarling the word 'Nigger.' I was pregnant and slipping on the black ice on the sidewalk. I remember the white snow against their Doc Martens. White against Black.

On the street in Port Elizabeth in 1990 a man nearly shot my then husband because he assumed he was assaulting me. (His hand was on my arm.) He called him 'Kaffir' and ordered him to move away from me. I remember that his gun was large and his finger was on the trigger. A white finger against black steel.

I thought there were laws in place and these and other names would not be heard again. At least not in public life. I thought people would keep their mouths shut and let these words seethe inside their heads, only.

Not so. In hidden places, like here, there is a freedom I have found to allow inner venom to spill out. To allow hatred to curl from lips and teeth and tongues, to curl into the air. To spiral into my ears, my mind, my heart.

They hurt, these uncaring, unfeeling, cold, stone, dismissive, sword-like, dagger stabbing words.
And White Tiger like, being a mother also, my teeth and claws are showing.

White snow
White lace at weddings
And smooth icing on cakes
White linen on washing lines
Arum lilies growing in glades
Warm white bread
Milk frothing from cows

Oh God
Creator of All

Piano keys play harmony

Black print on a White page
Charlie Chaplin
Black and White movies
Black ties and frilly White shirts...

Having a ball in Joubertina

I think there is a lot of evidence to show that it is very likely that God is very fond of balls.

We all live on one, for a start - this pale blue dot spinning through space, surrounded by a whole lot of other balls. I remember that wonderful Giglio show all about space. It made me feel really small and God is, of cause, very big.

I have a lot of balls around me right now in the koshuis. Pool balls, ping pong balls, volleyballs and soccer balls. Never mind the rugby ball. I'm fed up with rugby right now, and anyway it's not a true ball...

Years ago I worked in Arcadia, in the days of Apartheid. I was young, with so much passion and vision. I wanted to reach the 'lost' and the 'poor' and the gangsters on the corners, smoking boom. I remember praying fervently for them as they sat there, under their gloomy cloud.
So I went out walking with a ball. I was pretty fearless then, armed with my ball. Those boys were covered in tattoos, not body art, you understand, but 'tjuppies' - the prison variety.

I sat with them there, under the vandalized street signs, and talked balls. That was the beginning of the football team. They, like God, also liked balls.

Balls!
I am 48 this years and too tired for it all anymore. I try not to regret things but today I do. I regret the walking out I've just done again, with balls. I regret the pool, table tennis and volleyball me and my family started for children here. I regret the fact that someone closed it down after only a couple of weeks because of some childrens' petty misdemeanour. I regret the fact that it seems as though no one really cares...

I regret the regret.

I took on a job to work with food and finances. The only balls in sight were supposed to be a meatball, brussels sprout,onion, beetroot, baby potato or tomato.

Some things should be left well alone, and either I've lost my touch (dropped the ball) or doing work with balls is not what it used to be.

In a place like Joubertina I'm an English, liberal misfit (strangely enough a bit like a rugby ball once was I guess).
I stood up here and shot my mouth off about a whole lot of things. Well, there are more cannonballs and gunshot still out there than I realized. Man made balls, the lot of them. More than my mouth has been shot off.

Balls are fun, except when they come at you. Hard.
I now know how those Goalies felt.
Devastated.

It's not Gods fault. I take most of the blame.
I don't think He ever intended me to do more right now than cook up a storm.

At the moment its all a right balls' up!