Are the voices in my head too loud for you?

Past Times

Odd moments spent sorting through family archives.  There is nothing like a good delve - and I never cease to be amazed by the richness of my inheritance.  Seeing the primary sources behind the stories I was told growing up have been touching.  Researching others and realising they were largely apocryhal has been intriguing! 

I guess to some degree seeing history repeat itself is fascinating.  Personality traits replaying across generations; careers choices; the hopes and fears expressed in letters home.  Much to ponder and celebrate.

I've heard it said that we do not grow up entirely until both our parents are dead - and now - almost a year after my mum's death - I can't help but agree.  There is something powerful about exploring the past through my own filters and interpretative skills rather than through my parents. Maybe it is also something about getting to the tipping point in my own life when I have, in all likelihood, less life ahead than I have lived before.  The past is now rich and dense with experience.  The future is tempered by the past - but also charmingly enticing.  The present invites me to put both together and reflect from the perspective of being me.

Time to turn a page and start a new chapter.

Stay True

As I write a puppy (ownership is now disputed - "Look what your dog is doing!") is moving methodically through the study 'collecting items' - rather like a womble.  Overnight our beautifully docile Newfie has become 4 months old and with it he has discovered sex; being stroppy; climbing on the bed and marching round the house with a bath mat in his mouth!  Adolescence in dog terms doesn't last forever - but - for now - "Leave" and "No" are being used alongside the usual "Good Boy" and "Where's Mummy's Beautiful Butterfly?"  (If you have seen the animation It's a Bug's Life you'll remember the caterpillar Henrich - obese and desperate to be a butterfly.  One day he sprouts the tiniest wings and his friends, realising he can never fly unaided, help him launch into the air - "I'm a Beautiful Butterfly!"  The Caterfly is heard to cry with great joy.  Humph could pass for a very round creature of indeterminate fluffieness (20.45kg).

Heard today from one of my oldest friends after a long pause.  We have both been ill in not dissimilar ways.  It was a joy to be in contact.  Her timely gift was greatly appreciated too.

We believe in spreading blessings too.  Generosity breeds generosity.

A day of jobs and a smashing lunch with a friend in a restaurant I didn't know.  It was a great time; shared ideas and experiences.  She is becoming a very valued person in my life.

Good to talk through how I manage Borderline Personality Disorder with someone who cares hugely but won't humour me!  I think it is brilliant when folk summon the courage to actually ask what they want to know.  I do understand that a lot of people do feel their mental health is very personal and they don't want to discuss it - but I think it is important - for me and others - that if I can talk about what it is like - it might go some way to dispelling some of the contemporary myths and prejudices surrounding mental health.

Blood test this morning.  Lots of phials filled - the practical part of managing medication.  It's a good job I am not squeamish in the least.

Explored Fortrose after lunch in the pouring rain!  It is a very attractive little place - full of atmosphere.  Went down to a scenery observation point and gazed out into the mist over the Firth in the certain knowledge that on a clear day we can see acrosss to our home.

Slence; At Work

It is an absolute joy to have the energy (at least some of the time!) to be taking bookings for The Sanctuary once more and begin to schedule my life into some kind of pattern.  The Bohemian in me detests routine in quite a violently adolescent kind of a way - and yet I am the first to recognise that I - probably above many - actually thrive on structure. 

Left to my own devices without a timetable - precious little gets done.  Once a timetable is in place I am pretty conscientous about following it.  I like to see the rewards of a morning well spent - so - I now have my timetable.

Humphrey is free running for short walks inbetween lead work - and is swimming!  He loves the sea and looks a little like an otter as he doggy paddles away.  We are eagerly awaiting the arrival of a bitch Newfoundland pup in the late Autumn (favoured name at the moment - Constance - Connie for short).  We are on the waiting list.  Humphrey is such a charming temperament we are very much hoping that if he passes all the relevant heart and other checks he will be released by his breeder for mating.  We are very fortunate to have found out that the kennel that provided Humphrey's Dad for the mating with his mum is due a litter of black pups at the beginning of September.  None of them are directly related to Humphrey - so this would be a good place to get a puppy from.  Apparently we have to mate with a black bitch if we have a brown dog - so apart from a few seasons when my partner will have to take Humphrey away while a young bitch learns to become a woman(!)  It might be possible with the relevant endorsements lifted to breed! 

A friend has bought a Newfie bitch pup too - so I am hopeful that she and Humph' can also have puppies - and if not puppies - then at least be playmates.  Humph is a few months older - so when she's a little older I must have a Newfoundland 'Teddy Bears Picnic'!

Back to work...  What a great ring that has to it.

Out of the Blue

Dido's death last week has left a huge whole in our family.  The other dogs are doing very well - but they have missed her too.  We are hoping to get another puppy in the Autumn.  The 'boys' need the civilising influence of a female about the place!  We are on the waiting list for another Newfie.  If all goes well and the relevant breeders are happy to remove the relevant endorsements, we may well breed.  It would be a wonderful new interest - and something I would enjoy hugely.  I do like nurturing new life.

Out of the blue a property has come up which might work as a community base.  It is over on the West Coast and includes a manse and a former free church on the shore of a loch.  We are going over on Thursday to take a look.  We will probably stay overnight in the caravan to give us time to get a sense of the village community.

It is good to be thinking again about community and what it might mean.  Encouraging.

I feel very blessed that opportunities are appearing and that I have the chance to explore all kinds of creative possibilities.  It is good to feel well too.  I am not back to my old habits with regard to regular meditation yet - but I am enjoying relaxation exercises at the beginning and end of my day.

As I write a thunderstorm is gathering and the occasional crack can be heard.  The weather is more like April than August!  Humphrey looks fascinated and is bobbling his head to and fro.

Dido and The Whale

The evening before last, our eldest dog, a Golden Retriever died.  It was all very sudden.  She became ill the same morning and was rushed to the vet.  Some hours later it was clear that she was bleeding internally.  The sense was that a tumour - previously undetected - had probably burst.  We were able to say goodbye and acknowledge the look in her eye - that enough was enough.

Dido has left a huge gap in our family life.  She joined our fledgling family not long after we married and she was the only dog remaining who dated back before we began fostering.  I can remember her welcoming our adopted son - and continually licking his head if he came within reach!  Her surrogate puppy.

Dido was a fine retriever - much admired for her looks - with a gentle temperament and a keeness to please.  Her favourite game was to fetch objects.  In her younger days she knew several nouns and could "fetch the pen" or the remote on command.  She has left a huge whole in our lives.

On the day Dido died there was great drama on the shore at Alturlie Point as a sperm whale beached.  We watched its death throes as did many bystanders.  The sperm whale was forty and forty-five feet long.  We have sinced discovered from our vet and the coastguard that he was almost certainly gravely ill when he beached.  The coastguard felt he was under-size for his age and had probably been ill for some time.

I was very touched to see that the local police put up a road block and police tape so that onlookers walked the last part to the point and did not go too close to the whale.  On the outgoing tide his position shifted a little to the end of the track to our house.  People stood; mostly speaking in subdued voices or in silence.  Some were crying.  It was a very powerfully evocative sight.  Such a noble creature entering shallow water to die.  Apparently his mate had remained with him for as long as possible and then finally swam away.  Very moving indeed.  Two noble spirits gone.

Look Back

I have been thinking alot about the fact that no matter how much we live in the present moment, we are still, to some extent, encompassed by the past.  I think the train of thought was triggered by an afternoon at the weekend scanning documents and old photographs.  Just a glimpse at some interior photos of the house I grew up in took me straight back there.  I was intrigued that I dream about this house a great deal but it is always as it was when I was a child.  Most of the photos I was looking at during the weekend were taken in the late 1970s and early 80s.  I had completely forgotten how the house had changed, particularly after my father's death and before the move to Cambridge.

I have been recognising how arbitary memory appears.  Digging deeper, the selectiveness of memory seems very poignant.  I had missed out the adult memories of the property and selected the earlier 'interpretation' of where and how we lived.  I often find I dream about times which did not feel comfortable and safe for me.  I suspect my subconscious is doing an excellent job in managing early trauma and helping me to heal.

I am fascinated by tbe memories we consciously select too.  The parts of our story we dwell on as well as those we shove to the back of our minds.  What is the image of myself I am creating with such a strong editorial through line?  Which parts am I ignoring or failing to be-friend?

I am very aware I have sublimated a great deal to do with my theatre-based past.  It is painful to recall that this was for two reasons.  Firstly, the Church invited me to choose between vocation or theatre.  I chose a vocation to serve the Church but grieved for many years as a consequence.  Shutting out my creative instincts seemed the most effective way of stultifying the pain.  Secondly, every time it became known I had some sort of theatrical background I seemed to be invited to 'do' sketches etc... for the church.  I had been brought up in the world of professional theatre.  At the time I found it difficult to make the cross over to amateur expectations.  Now I feel differently about the creative process - but at the time I couldn't be quite as flexible or forgiving in my heart of the well-meaning soul who didn't bother to learn their lines or thought it a huge laugh - and so I thought it best to avoid Christian Drama rather than see it as a creative opportunity.

Funny how looking back offers a different reading of events.  Now I can't imagine why I needed to be so precious!

Sorted

I've spent most of today working my way through more of my mother's effects.  It has been a powerful experience and I find I can't do it for too long before something catches and I realise just how much I miss her.  Like most people it's the little things that catch me out.  I have been sorting out the small geological collection my Mum accumulated over the years following her degree in Geology and Geophysics.  I could remember where she found some of the specimens.  It was a family joke that she collected pet rocks after one outing when she had asked my brother to paddle across a stream to pick up a particular stone - only to be told it was actually a duck.  She needed glasses - certainly - but from then on her collection had a name!

I found a file full of photographs and pictures taken from magazines of wild animals.  I knew she loved animals but I didn't know she had made a collection particularly of monkeys and wild cats; part of the inner life I had been unaware of.

This afternoon I changed gear and took someof the files of photographs and memorabilia through to the study and began scanning them onto my computer.  I found everything from a picture of my father in his fireman's uniform from World War II through to a photo of me on the day I graduated with my doctorate.  At first sight it seemed a higgledy-piggledy collection until I saw on the envelope "Special".  Everything is, in actual fact, meticulously organised.  Mum had prepared beautifully for me to work my way through her effects and know exactly what everything is, when the time came.  That in itself is very moving and very typical of her; it feels like a final act of extraordinary love.

I have been particularly moved by photos of my brother and I as children.  Also programmes, posters and photos from the early years when my parents married and set up their own entertainments business specialising in Gulliver's Puppets.  I found a programme for a show my Grandfather had put on.  He was on the bill, second act in the second half, but he had given top billing - closing the show - to his new son-in-law and daughter.  My Mum always said that her father could be difficult profesionally and personally - however - for this show at least - he rated his daughter's work.  He was never a person to risk putting a poor act on to close a show.  I wanted to show her the programme and remind her.

My childhood came flooding back helping out at shows and learning how to set up and strike Punch and Judy - getting a bonus payment if I did it in under 5 minutes.  I think I need to paint myself through some of these memories - they are powerful, colourful and warm.  They were also suppressed once I realised that in a world populated with people who have rather more 'normal' upbringings it isn't always wise to go on about the weird and wonderful world of magicians, puppeteers and variety artists.  Now I know that this is a rich seam of memory and formation and it deserves to be celebrated.

Puddles

House work dominated today.  Our bedroom has been reclaimed from the ministrations of a puppy.  He has taken his role seriously and thinks it is a great wheeze to steal and shred toilet rolls.  This morning Humph stopped us both in our domestic busy-ness as we looked out the bedroom window to see him splashing around in a large rigid dog bed we have put outside in the garden for afternoon doggie snoozes.  At least we now know he loves water!  There was an impressive array of wet patches on the carpet.  I am not sure how many were rain water.  We are still working on house training - he is great except when he is excited or preoccupied.  He is only 3 months so that is most of the time!  According to Puppies for Dummies time is on his side.

Humph is a very independent young soul.  Most of the afternoon he slept on the decking looking resplendent in the afternoon sunshine.  I had to smile as the other dogs daintily stepped over him to get in and out of the garden - even the cat!

After seeing Humph thoroughly wet today and glistening I think one of his middle names should be Marley - his dredlocks were stunning.

Lines in the Sand

The weather has been stunning and I have taken to meditating out on the decking by our bedroom door.  Even with my limited sight, the sounds, smells and warmth have been very powerful and life-affirming.

Our son has been home and has helped progress the cutting down of the Leylandi.  But. in amongst his helpful periods, he has left enough messages sublimally to help us realise he is going through a tough period right now.  I think it is harder than ever to be a teenager these days.  Our young are exposed to so much that it is little surprise that they find it almost impossible to decipher what is and isn't acceptable or life-enhancing behaviour.  Without any clear filters through which to assess all that is thrown at them, I suspect many adolescents spend vast amounts of time very frightened at the deepest level.  Carrying a knife is more about fear and an inability to make sense of situations in a safe, non-confrontational way than it is about bravado.

I wonder what the most helpful response is to the challenges facing our children.  Clearly protecting them or judging them are both equally counter-productive.  Perhaps all we can do is to show as clearly as possible how we cope - without thrusting our value systems down their throats; maybe all we can do is listen and encourage them to trust their instinct and judgement.  Maybe all we can do is to be effective boundary keepers - drawing the line in the sand which it is advisable not to cross.  We then have to stand back and, now and again, watch them deliberately rub the line out, kick the sand up behind them and march off into the middle distance!  It is hard - but an important part of testing boundaries and making one's own mind up.  I am currently washing the sand out of my eye!

Humph now weighs 16.45kg and looks like a 'proper' dog - although his coat is a bit of a giveaway!  He still resembles an enormous fluff ball!

Timber!

We have been plagued recently with a number of telephone calls for Scottish Hydro Electric.  They began a few days ago and had almost reached the point where one of us was going to phone Scottish Hydro and see if we could find out what was going on!  A very kind soul rang back after his failed attempt to log his  metre reading with us .  He, along with many others it seems, made the easy mistake of phoning the date on their estimated reading card instead of the free phone number.  Mystery solved.

Our son is home and as I type is out with his Dad cutting down huge Leylandi trees.  The first crack and fall has resulted in brilliant sunlight flooding the small garden we whimisically refer to as the Paddock and our bedroom.  The difference is amazing.  Although the wood is pretty gunky, in these financially strapped times if we leave the sap to dry out, it may well be OK to burn through the winter.  They tend to be a little like fire crackers - but heat is heat.

Wonderful to see the two of them working together - our son so nearly a man - helping and popping in and out.

I caught a smashing documentary last night with John Barrowman exploring his own sexuality and whether he is the product of nature or nurture as an out, gay man.  None of the research was new - but it was presented in a highly personable format with John Barrowman as the guinea pig.  I thought it a brave attempt to restore sanity to the demonising myths around homosexuality.  I watched some of it with my partner and son - and felt we were all the better for seeing it.  It made a stark and necessary contrast to my other TV watch last night.  I am glad I only caught the final minutes of a rather odd documentary on the new Anglican Alliance - that sounds like an over the counter cure for indigestion - you know the one?  I refuse to give the organisation credence by printing its name. 

I couldn't help thinking as I watched Archbishop Akinola's ego growing palpably with each round of hyperbole and chorus of certainty regarding the sinful nature of the liberal church, that it will be an awfully great adventure not to have to pretend to be a Church as wide in our doctrine as we are varied in our spirituality - and simply get on with the business of being inclusive without having to worry about those who want to represent a different interpretation of the Gospel.  A covenant would be a work of convenience not an authentic expression of belonging.  Let those who historically have been persecutued by a Canterbury-centric Church have the freedom to be what they believe they are called to be.  In the end we are all judged not by what we say we believe but by our actions; by the moments when we risk our very selves.

I have no doubt Archbishop Akinola and many others are risking their very selves and I delight in that.  I think schism is actually a sign the Holy Spirit is working with great energy and discernment.  People who need power to create identity and who need others to sign on dotted lines of belief soon find that within their organic ranks apostasy will coagulate and spawn new life - as division begets further division - and different dotted lines become demarcation lines and departure points. 

Staying together no matter what is a good strategy when you are on a life raft in shark infested waters - but at a time when globally we are living through a technically, socially and economically highly unpredictable global experience - diversity may actually add strength and much needed sustenance to the basic tenets of the overall diversity of the Christian faith and its accompanying spiritual journey.

The trouble with breakaway movements is that generally speaking a number of disaffected folk with strong, unmet agendas often jump ship to join the new emerging ideology.  That can apply to the liberal as well as the conservative aspects of the Church.

I hate the way 'orthodox' has now been degenerated into meaning conservative regarding the use of the Bible and social and moral teaching - it used to mean an acceptance of the received teachings and beliefs of a value system - in all it's complex and provisional forms - not the creation of dogma as an evangelistic tool to put some clear, blue spiritual 'water' between African Anglicans and Muslims or politically right wing westerners and an emerging highly pluralistic, essentially hedonistic society.

A voice has said: "Hello Mum" through the study window.  The sun is shining.