Flames

 A friend of mine, Morag Lobley has a book of "poems and wonderings" published.  It's called "Flames" and is available from Bridge Books or I can get a copy.

It's excellent - Morag writes from her heart as she says in her introduction - and she can certainly write!  There are reflections on bible characters, on current events, and on Jesus.  Most touchingly, there is a section on grief.  I don't have experience of loss like this, but for my own much smaller loss, I have found her poem "Steps" very, very resonant, as a friend has said to me, "Judith would have wanted you to enjoy life" - which she would, of course!

"Steps" Morag Lobley (Flames)

He died..

And I said,

I choose life,

Not knowing how big a step that was.

The next day

 I chose life again

and the next....

How

    many     

        steps?"

Poems drive deep into our hearts.  I used to write, but I find that I can't write that kind of thing so well, so will make do with blogs!  There will be a blog soon on my adventures in the South Hams, when I have a bit of headspace.

SAD - for beginners!

 SAD - seasonal affective disorder.  It's not "winter blues" even if I may tell you it is.  I have been doing some reading around as it is something I have experienced, as regularly as the seasons, for about 10 years.

It starts, usually for me, as the light wanes, early September and kicks in as the clocks change bringing dark mornings, dark evenings.  It starts to lift in February - as the light changes.

I read that if you have 2 or more episodes, it is diagnosed.  That would be two years of miserable winters!

The treatment varies - for me, the ususal "have you tried a light box" works not at all.  I take a bit more anti-depressant in the winter - my brilliant doctor and I have worked on a pattern that is effective although the weight gain makes me snarl in total utter frustration.  It is a very miserable side effect.

The best things are simple: SAD makes me want to sit on the sofa, go to bed early and hibernate and not see people.  It is like one of Harry Potters Dementors - it draws the life and energy out of you, leaving you no energy to do the good things that work.

So each Autumn I make a plan.  This usually involves me booking an early swim, and forcing myself to walk for 10 minutes outside even if it is just about light, before work.  Planning meals - otherwise I eat chocolate! And I start to plan a spring holiday - in this case it will be in March, two walking days in Cornwall. St Ives - beautiful in Spring, horribly crowded in Summer.

I'm planning on leaving my trainers by the door, so that I practically fall over them because I work 40 hours and that's a fairly long day.  I need to get out.  I'm preaching to myself here.

Being honest to friends is another good strategy.  And now I'm off to swim!

Shades of Autumn

 "Bereavement" (Ann Lewin"Waiting for the Kingfisher"

Dark place

Where, vulnerable, alone,

We lick the wounds of loss.

Wise friends say little,

But hold us in their love,

And listen.

There are no guarantees,

Only reports from those

Who've been there. 

That there is hope,

And life persists."

The words above say it far better for me than words of my own.  

I lit an early morning candle for Judith in the Cathedral, a place about which, working professionally for the diocese, she had very mixed feelings.  It helped me anyway.  

It's the little things I miss - teasing her that everything has to match - toilet rolls, towels, soap, washing up liquid - who on earth matches their washing up liquid to the colour of their kitchen?  Judith did.

Hearing her voice in my head, quietly and sanely responding.  Walking on Dartmoor - crossing a river on a sluice gate because "the map says there is a path" and me saying "but it isn't on the ground" The retort was a cross "well it should be" I couldn't argue but we ended up wringing out socks and tipping out boots after ploughing through sodden marshy ground the other (safely path strewn) side of the river.

Listening to the endless search for an impossible item of clothing - straight trousers in a year of flappy wide ones, white sandals (!) in a year of navy blue. And wondering who else cleans window frames on an evening when you could be sitting in the garden with a book?

I think it will be standing room only at her funeral.

September ups and downs

 What a September!  A little summary should follow I think.  We have had weeks working in a tiny training room and now we have been unleased on the remodelled new office.  Comments vary from "airport lounge" - blue carpet, white walls, gregory logo obscured glass breakout rooms, lots of space.  It's much nicer but at the moment, oh so noisy!  Myself and Stacey are in the cool, quiet corner but we face three noisy managers who shout at their laptop microphones when they should be using their headseats.

We are surrounded by piled up dismantled desks, emptied cardboard boxes, discarded ceiling light boxes. But it is clean, light and I like it!

Sandwiched in between was a holiday in Cornwall. Most of the week the skies were like this:

The usual mix of some lovely coastal waks, amazing smoked salmon and scrambled egg breakfasts, leisurely coffees and a bit of touristy shopping in Porthleven. And lazy evenings watching sunsets and Netflix.

It's hard to write a blog sometimes.  

This is one of the times, because for the last few months, my long time friend Judith has been slowly losing her fight with cancer.  To put it into perspective, I've literally known Judith half my life.  We walked together in the same walking group, worshipped together in St Leonards church, laughed and, in my case cried together, through my divorce.  And then as she had her first and second cancer diagnoses.  Through losing her parents, through losing my job - several times, redundancies are common these days.

I'd been to my aunty and uncles. A long day, a long drive.  I poured a tin of G&T.  The phone rang - Judith. "I have spine cancer" I remember saying to her "did you just say...." Hard to take it in. 

Cancer is such a bastard.  It takes the gentle, wise, stubborn friend.  Who hated floppy trousers - wide legs - such as I will wear to her funeral.  Whose warm smile and enthusiasm and cry of "mmm" when presented with anything she liked, I am sorely missing. Who had to have all film and TV references explained as she was too busy being kind to people.

September is a lovely month.  But I will remember Judith with love.

Playing with Fire

This week I have been for one of those box ticking exercises inflicted by the NHS - a health check.  I have a suitably bruised arm from a fairly novice blood taker, and an instruction to walk more - despite being in the "active" category which apparently very few are!! Madness.  Didn't need any encouragement - I swam at 8am and then went to Knightshayes to walk.  The kitchen garden is always the best bit - lovely shapes and the fragrances of herbs.  The weird and twisty shapes.  The bright dahlias and sunflowers lifted my heart.  Quiet trees and needle strewn paths and an avoidance of the honey pot of the tea shop!

Afterwards, I helped my friends in their project of a garden: I was their bonfire warden, after telling them last time that I wanted to be the one to light the fire:  I left too long between visits so the fire was a damped down, smouldering ash heap with blackened stumps but a heart of glow and embers.  My job to wake the dragon!

Fire. Warmth, light, danger, safety, flickers of orange dancing up around green mottled wood. Feeding it air and fuel to awaken it. 

The hissing and crackling as green leaves and fir branches went on.  Explosions of sparks from the giant fire cones - nature's fire lighters, resinous and eventually alight and blackening.  I couldn't stop staring into it's depths as the tiger flames hungrily curled into the green wood. White smoke curled and billowed up and out, drifting across the grass. Ashes swirl around the firepit.  

Standing and watching, feeling the warmth on shorts and bare legs, sign of the spirit, life and unpredictability, holiness and an edge of challenge.  And because I am overthinking as I write, what I actually thought was "other people invite you to a barbecue, here it's me being barbecued"  It was a shame we didn't have chocolate biscuits and marshmallows to toast - it was reminding me of being a guide, and building fires to cook on - going home reeking of woodsmoke and happiness.

Tarka Trailling

 

Yesterday I kicked myself out of a cosy-duveted bed to walk in North Devon.  I think I drove on auto-pilot, fuelled by Tesco chocolate milk from the meal deal I picked up as I had a couple of small glasses of red wine the previous night and that is more than enough to make me feel fairly seedy. Enough not to want to make a packed lunch at 6.30am.  

Parked up in the train station carpark at Barnstaple, the lure of a cup of tea and a bacon sandwich called to me.  It's been a tough week.  An old friend from St Leonards died from kidney and lung failure - I found out, by text, at work. And a long term friend is slowly losing a brave battle with cancer.  Steadfast friend that I am, I find it hard - it's the August that does it - the same month as I lost another friend 6 years ago.  Memories!

Fuelled, and fortified and very slightly more awake I walked up to Fremington Quay.  North Devon is like Cornwall - full of holiday folk ; Tarka shared his trail with a huge rush of bikes - families with little kids on bright bikes, elderly folks on electric bikes, and lycra clad men who thrashed past at speed.  

And the occasional walker. I passed one flagging couple as I walked back and we had a little banter about tea and cake - his knee looked dodgy but I hope he made it as the cake is very nice.

It set me up for an epic battle with the weeds, grasses, and most of all the brambles of Kathy/Peter/Morag's overgrown "secret garden"  A very warm battle, indeed but so mind altering in a good way.  Hard work digging out a border with good company and a very huggable labrador who likes to share her beautiful blonde fur with me.  All over my navy shorts!

It's the time of year that nature goes spectacularly to seed.  Weeds and wilds.  People are like grass - they don't last.  Not forever.  Not on this earth anyway.  Not for now.  But in nature I know nothing goes to waste.

Gay Lego and why we need other people

 

Back in June I bought my first set of lego for many many years.  Diverse, respectful of Trans and non white heritage, beautifully striped, neatly made, it has sat on my shelf with the figures all orderly and sat on their right coloured stripes.

It feels like a brave and happy thing.  I don't see being made in God's image as a problem to be solved, or something that I need to hide or cringe about anymore. If Exeter had had Pride this year, I  would have donned a purple "Christians at Pride" T shirt and joined in, or been a steward if allowed to volunteer.  What an incredible transformation those words are from the person who would have argued that God's will was singleness.  I still opt for singleness, but know that this is a happenstance, a chosen option, not a forced decision because of who God has made me.

Yesterday my lego got rearranged. First the figures waved - that was the total extent of my tranformation.  My spiritual director, delighted at seeing the completed set, which she had first seen as heap of little plastic shapes tipped out on her table, moved the black lady to the pink spot.  And vice versa.  I felt slightly uncomfortable. Change very rarely comes at my hand!

"Leave it on your shelf" she said "your visitors will play"  Not just the visitors but the homeowner. It occurred to me that transposing the colours and the wigs would be far more fun.  

And so it is.

At work, I make tiny modifications, ususally when prompted.  Today, doing church felt awkward, happy, strange and encouraging - singing - weird - talking over tea and excellent sticky pastries to celebrate our vicar going on maternity leave.  I'm still trying to work out where an overthinking, friendly person who would prefer to blog and to read fits in. But in all contexts of my life I am very slowly and hesitantly learning that as much as I need other people maybe they also need me.