When pool stands still and stagnant
Little thrives bar toxic stench
Life stifled in that moment
Apathy entrenched
And resistance festers silently
Motivation all abates
While hope that soon movement will come
With bated breath awaits
Yet over time if nothing happens
The clench of all that’s wrong
Suffocates with the grim reaper
Singing out his bidding song
And ruin wreaks a mockery
Runs naked through the air
As hope drips through the grates of death
Wrung out in sheer despair
This month’s task for my writer’s group was to write around the title “journey”. There were so many wonderful contributions. Here is mine.
They tell you now, or should that be nowadays, that’s it’s ‘all about the journey’. At least that’s what the ‘spout-forthers’ on the internet tell you. I think, they call themselves ‘influencers’, but I prefer ‘spout-forthers’ as with bombast, they photobomb their way into our virtual lives with their opinions, beliefs, and perspectives, manipulating, or trying to manipulate, each individual thought process and convince people of the need to subscribe to their viewpoint or product.
They monopolise the socials with memes that speak of the ‘journey’ and the importance of ‘living in the now’. The destination is somehow a fluid concept that, I guess, for many of us is obscure. But what of this journey? What is it all about? And can a journey be a course with no defined destination? The ‘spout-forthers’ don’t seem to talk about that. They just say it’s ‘all about the journey’ often laced in universal metaphor advocating the ontology of presentism. They say it with their sparkling, white-edited teeth, glistening coiffured locks, toned and tanned bodies, and perfect make-believe lifestyles from their polished, photoshopped worlds. In essence there’s an irony right there – the ostensible proof of a preparatory prelude to the video or photo opportunities that pervade any instantaneous ‘nowness’!
Meanwhile others talk about goals and targets. Tangible concepts that are destination orientated. They want us to make these goals SMART. Measurable outcomes calculated in the short, medium, and long term; the end points of mini and longer journeys, I suppose. Projections reaching into the future and less cemented in “the now” perhaps.
What these ‘spout-forthers’ fail to mention is how the two interrelate. Can you, I mean, have a journey without a destination or a destination without a journey? Where do we get to if or when we wander aimlessly without sense of purpose and is that more fulfilling and maybe less stressful than steadfastly walking to a planned future? And then again, what about the past? The place from whence we have come. That land of experience framing our understandings and our reckonings of what it means to be here in ‘the now’ and giving us a platform and a springboard. None are really mutually exclusive, but all allude to a direction of travel – a journey with the delicious dilemmas that we construe in life!
This was the predicament that confronted George that morning in March when he woke up with his mind a whir – wired to think, or overthink as he was sometimes very aware, yet incoherent in this moment. He stirred trying to work out whether this moment in time was part of his journey or whether he had arrived. With the sun illuminating particles of dust that danced in the arrowshot of light piercing its way through a gap in the curtains, he roused intent on answering a question. Yet he was still very much in that post-nocturnal postictal stupor from a dream of which he had no reckoning.
It wasn’t a question that he had been aware previously needed answering. And if he was honest, it was not a question that he could rightfully define. Yet the answer was, unsurprisingly, elusive or was that the question – he did not know for his consciousness presented as a vanishing illusion suspended between two worlds in his hypnopompic state. That morning, though, it, whatever ‘it’ was, was certainly wrestling with a fuzzy fervour in the depths of his furrowed brow synchronising with the creased sheets in which he lay.
“Am I here?” his mind mumbled. “Or am I going somewhere? And if I’m going somewhere, then where am I going? But if I’ve arrived, where have I come from? And then am I now in ‘the now’, or has that moment passed? And how do I know because if I’m here now, or at least I was in ‘the now’ then, but now this is now, can now even exist? Or do I need to go to ‘the now’ and if I do, or even if I do not, then what about where I’ve been if that was now, and now is now, and then, will be now too?”
Confusion descended in a miasma of thought as a cloud outside passed in front of the sun so that the dust particles ceased their dance.
“George?”
The words broke through his semiconsciousness.
“George! You getting up this morning? You’re going to be late!”
“Shit!” Suddenly, he was brought right back to “the now” however ‘nowish’ that was with the sledgehammer of reality which succinctly answered his unasked question. The blunt brutality struck in that familiar way that our stressed, everyday lives so often have the discourtesy of doing in an instant! And in that instant, he was awake – up and ready to continue on his journey into the then, the now, and the next, right now!
I’m a curtain hook thief
Though I’ll pretend I am not
Until caught all red handed
And in a tight spot!
Yet what is a cat
To do all day long
Bar create havoc and mischief
Take what doesn’t belong
Be it hooks or an item
And cause disarray
Under the guise of great fun
And all part of cat play!
I am a member of a Towcester Writer’s Group and every month we are challenged with a title or theme. This was the January challenge
Tell me about it” she said, “your recovery, that is”
“Wells, it’s a longs story so I ‘opes yous ‘as time” came back the answer from the man sitting in on the opposite seat in the rather old, dilapidated railway coach. “It’s a very longs story and if I’m ‘onest, I’s nots sure “recovery” even cuts it. But you asked so ‘eres we goes”.
With that he proceeded to rapidly recall the contents of his life over the past ten years in meandering sentences that seemed to lose a certain coherency over the next portion of time. Quite a long portion of time in all fairness and there was part of her that wished she had never asked.
He had seemed an interesting fellow and she had been intrigued by the prelude to his story but in hindsight, she had to admit that she wished she had just kept her nose firmly implanted in her paper and never looked up as he rambled on! Yet in another moment her consciousness pricked the lining of her soul, and she remonstrated her selfish lament and reconnected, at least cognitively, to the old man and his tale.
“And theres yous ‘as it” the chap wound up. “I tolds yous it was a long ‘un but it’s good of yous to listen. Most folks just gives me that quizzical look that says ‘oh god’ and ‘old fool’ and don’t gives mes the times of days. So good of yous to listen. When alls saids and dones though, I’m really not sure that recovery is the right word. I means do wes ever truly recover or do wes just reinvents us-selves” he mused.
“Reinvent ourselves! That was exactly it!” thought the girl silently. “That’s exactly what we do. Reinvent – reframe – repurpose!” She wondered some more.
“Does recovery suggest that we return to a previous state?” she thought. “But how was that ever possible. Life isn’t about re-doing anything. In reality, we may return to a previous address, or station or place but in ourselves, was recovery the healing balm it alluded to or was it just an illusion that we recovered by returning to better health or the same place or the same state. In the presence of the experience that one had lived through was recovery about improvement or adaptation or the ‘new normal’ that had become a buzz word through the recent pandemic”.
To the old chap opposite, she smiled and nodded. “I wonder then, why we call it recovery then?”
“We likes to kids us-selves” he said. His front tooth was missing, and the wages of time wore deep into his furrowed brow. His stubbled chin was dappled grey and unkempt and the hair on his head was lank with strands falling in grease ridden clumps out of the flat cap that must have been as old as he was!
“We kids us-selves” he repeated. “We likes to thinks that we’ve got it sussed. We likes out security – thats wes dos. We thinks that if we recover then it’s all gonna be dandy – fine and dandy likes it used to be. But it’s not, is it? It’s not really ever like that, it’s…..” His voice trailed off into the narrative that continued in his mind yet was denied any verbal definition that could be shared with his travelling companion.
“Yeah, wes kids us-selves – that wes dos” he said with a certain conviction as he returned from whence he had been to the present conversation looking to the girl for some validation.
“We certainly do” said the girl with the stamp of authority that the chap was beseeching from her. “We certainly do” she said recovering herself in that moment. The irony was not lost! “We certainly do!”
Christmas Eve arrived and a
Grumpy Santa set out sail
With reindeer up ahead of him
Lashed in face by Rudolph’s tail
The night was wet, not frosty
No Christmas snow in sight
Yet a hurricane blew a hooley
And lightning added fright
His sleigh skid-landed on a roof top
A tile dislodged and hit
The cat below right on the head
And knocked it out – “oh sh**!”
He scoured the roof for chimneys
But from them emitted smoke
“For god’s sake,” said Grumpy Santa
“I’ll burn! Is that a joke!”
He lost his footing briefly
And tripped and fell right down
Clinging to a gutter
Before slip-sliding to the ground
Now he really wasn’t happy!
Wet, bruised and lashed in face
He scoured the house for a way in
With little love and little grace
Finally, he found the cat flap
Squeezed through it with magic dust
As Rudolph watched quite gobsmacked and
A squashed mouse squealed “Ouch – I’m crushed!”
Then Santa stomped towards the living room
Quite frustrated to the core
Before getting caught up in some tinsel
That was draped across a door
“Stuff and bother! What a Christmas!”
He huffed and puffed annoyed
“Why can’t the elves do this instead?”
“I’m too old to post these toys”
And fed up, soaked, and frazzled
He chucked the presents neath the tree
Then stepped back and trod on the mince pies
That had been left there for his tea!
“Oh blast” he cried flopped in a chair
“I’m done doing as I’m told”
And with that he glugged a whiskey
To warm him from the cold!
“Just another little dram” he mused
Before glugging more and more
Until when he tried to get up again
He fell right on the floor
And there he lay in drunken state
Forgetting he should go
So in the morn he was still there
With quite a hungover glow!
The children came rushing downstairs
And screamed at what they saw!
With tinsel torn, trod-in mince pies
Greeted by Santa’s snore!
Alarms were raised and cops arrived
Arresting the old man
Handcuffing him, dragging him out
To be thrown in a nee-naw van
And that is how Santa was charged
With breaking in and disarray
So that now when you wake up
He won’t have been on Christmas Day
For he is serving time instead
His DBS has all expired
And Rudolph lives in London Zoo
Quite happy and retired!
And the mouse? Have you forgotten him
Well he took his chance that night
And now commands a brand-new sleigh
Drawn by cats for the Christmas flight
Merry Christmas to one and all!
This blog has always been dedicated to raising awareness of heart conditions, but this week we are raising the focus of Parkinson’s. Parkinson’s is a progressive neurological condition which means that it causes problems in the brain and worsens over time. There is no cure!
My father had a Parkinsonism condition called progressive supernuclear palsy. It was a beast of a condition which robbed him of his ability to speak, walk and swallow yet even more cruel in the sense that he retained capacity and was aware of everything that he was being subjected to. He died in 2017, 10 years after diagnosis. This year marks the fifth anniversary of his death. Therefore both cardiac conditions and Parkinson’s are close to heart.
As a result, I will be joining Parkinson’s UK in a sponsored “virtual arch to arc” alongside their chair of trustees, Gary Shaughnessy who will be completing a gruelling 83 mile run from London to Dover, a 21 mile row across the Channel and a 186 miles to Paris. Wow! Right?! Those completing the virtual arch to arc will together look to notch up the 300 miles of the triathlon at the same time with individuals contributing to the overall total in any way they can.
I have elected to attempt to cycle 50 miles (in the gym) as part of my mini challenge. However, as maybe ‘pathetic’ as that sounds in the light of the amazing efforts of others and in a world that pushes the bounds constantly in social media, for me it will be a major challenge. My fitness levels have crashed this year having struggled massively with my condition in recent months. Alongside the PoTS which I have written about in my bio, I suffer with atrial fibrillation, a surprisingly common condition whereby the heart ticks out of rhythm and at rates that can sometimes be eye wateringly high. It renders me fatigued and dizzy. However, for AF sufferers, there has been a lot of newsworthy attention on lifestyle modification in recent years encouraging people to maintain an exercise regime, very much the same as we encourage people with Parkinson’s to keep exercising. But when you have a chronic condition of any sort, it’s hard work and takes perseverance.
Walking distance is out for me but using the recumbent bike in the gym should be possible. Therefore the 50 miles in the gym will be carried out in small bite size chunks over a time that allows me to safely complete the challenge. The main outcome though will hopefully be to raise funds for Parkinson’s UK who support patients, like my Dad, to live well with their condition through a dedicated information and support service as well as championing research in a quest to find a cure.
A cure can’t wait! It didn’t come in time for Dad but we are getting closer all the time. However, can you help?
If you would like to sponsor me, please go to https://events.parkinsons.org.uk/fundraisers/ginidellow?fbclid=IwAR0d_H1eun93iyZfe5cVPF0rp0VsF882myLwRjLGa61d43UNRMYF0P0cnPc
Every penny makes a difference.
Thank you
One thing I have always been committed to is giving my children unconditional love. Loving them with all my heart absolutely without question through the good and bad times. I believe they each know that and I pray that they are uplifted by that because when that love is missing in a child’s life, or when love comes with conditions or is withheld or replaced with ostracism, or it’s benefaction is a consequence of a child fulfilling a parents request rather than being the bedrock of the relationship unconditionally, the fallout leaves an unfortunate legacy for a lifetime. For love is not a neatly packaged commodity that only comes out when everything goes well. True love weathers the storms and perseveres through thick and thin. It doesn’t barter. It doesn’t trick. It seeks truth and holds fast in sunshine and in rain.
You know when you get away and the creative juices flow? Well this weekend has been one of fresh air, beautiful scenery, opportunities to draw and an occasion to write about! Feeling very blessed.
I saw a sign at Sainsbury’s
Pointing to a new hotel
Abreast some stilts stuck in the ground
For somewhere safe to dwell
Where a million little windowpanes
In honey combed array
Said ‘welcome to our hotel
Please enjoy your stay.’
I thought I’ll do my shopping
Then book in there to rest
For a night of being spoilt
Would render me less stressed
So, with champagne in hand and chocolates
I headed to book in
Complete with my favourite book in tow
And can of rhubarb gin
But when I saw the front of house
I had a change of mind
For he was garbed in bright yellow
With black stripes around him lined!
And with a sting in tail, he said
“Buzz off! Get Lost! Farewell!
For you cannot stay here human!
This is a bee hotel”
Ginz&Tonic 