eyes wide open
Monday 30 January, 2006
Does anyone else out there suffer insomnia?
I only get it occassionally, mercifully, but when I do it is terrible. My eyes are wide open, I can't switch my brain off, I feel wired and energetic. Last night I woke at 1.30 a.m, lay there trying to relax myself and coax myself back to sleep for an hour...then I gave in, got up, made myself a 'Relaxing' tea (ha!) and watched an hour of crappy television. (TV programmers are so cruel to insomniacs...you have the choice of BBC World news (depressing!), Porn informercials (gross!) or bad B-grade movies from the early 80s (oh joy.)
This morning I feel remarkably chipper...but I'm anticipating the disintegration into tiredness as the day progresses, I have a vision of my future and it involves muchos cups of coffee and maybe even some dark chocolate...
Posted on 30 January, 2006 | 8:01am | 2 comments |
the way back in
Sunday 29 January, 2006
I'm feeling better today. Not elated or brilliant, but better.
The 'way back in' for me is always a combination of:
-going for a walk somewhere beautiful, like along the river or through the bush...breathing in the air and stopping to look at the swamp irises or the baby ponga fronds unfurling.
-breaking my routine in some way
-writing in my journal...venting, doodling, pasting, scribbling and thinking 'aloud' in written words.
-reading some political writing which swiftly reminds me how privileged I am and helps me to get over myself
-lying down on the lounge floor with my head between the speakers, listening to my current favourite CD very loud. (Current favourites are Bachelorette, Bloc Party and The Veils.)
and writing here helps, too, it really does. So thanks for 'listening'. I'm a bit more smiley today.
Posted on 29 January, 2006 | 7:27am | 0 comments |
fraudulent
Friday 27 January, 2006
Listen up...
I had a delightful afternoon tea with a new friend the other day. We were talking about the ebb and flow of creativity and she said something like, "but I think for you, even the down times are still full of creativity" or words to that effect...meaning them as a compliment, I know. But I protested and said, "No...no...I often feel so empty." Then she said something else very nice, but I was in no mood to be gracious about compliments so I said nothing and let the subject change to a new direction.
As you know it is the school holidays and I am caring for both children all the time and right now I am feeling so squashed, creatively. It feels like there is never enough time for the inner workings of my brain to do what they need to do ... and yet when I do get pockets of time, I waste it reading novels, baking biscuits, scrawling self-pitying nonsense in my journal. I'm driving myself nutso here.
I go though phases where I feel like a real writer, like the main actress in the fabulous golden glow of my life...then I spend the other half of the time feeling mean, scratchy, uninspired, inert...like a FRAUD. Today I feel like I fraud.
I think this lovely blog community that in so many ways is so fruitful and aesthetically rich and inviting, can also be terrible in a way because all we see of people is their bestest, most beautiful selves..their 'perfect' kids, clever creations, the pretty corners of their homes...
so today, I wanted to tell you a secret - sometimes I am an arsehole, a bad mama, a neglectful friend, a person who presents herself to the world as a writer but can go days at a time without writing so much as a shopping list...and I wanted to tell you this, not so much to get it off my chest, but to show you how pathetically, predictably, wonderfully, tediously HUMAN, I am.
Posted on 27 January, 2006 | 9:04am | 2 comments |
accident and emergency
Thursday 26 January, 2006
Yesterday I had my first trip to the A & E since I was in a car accident aged 15. Magnus fell down the back steps and one side of his head swelled up to frightening proportions. I nearly threw up when I saw it - I was very unimpressed with myself, actually. Instead of being calm and efficient, I swore lots and loudly, freaked out, dry-retched and generally behaved like a liability.
The doctor gave him a thorough check-over and within an hour the swelling went down amazingly. This morning he has a nasty bruise but the swelling is all gone. I think it was the best thing to do - to rush him to hospital - just in case.
He's been a full-time walker since last week and he is falling over a lot. His big brother -fed up with holidays- keeps tripping him up or pushing him over, for entertainment, I think. My poor wee boy is covered in bruises and scrapes.
Last night I went out to my sleep-out where I do my writing and wrote for four hours straight. There is nothing like a (small) brush with mortality/disaster to force the creative hand! Carpe Diem and all that.
I think I'm going to get Magnus a baby-size bike helmet to wear until his balance gets better. Kids, huh? When they aren't being annoying, they are tugging at your heart-strings and making you pray for their longevity!
Posted on 26 January, 2006 | 8:07am | 2 comments |
soar
Wednesday 25 January, 2006
"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom."
-Anais Nin
Posted on 25 January, 2006 | 7:25am | 0 comments |
i bought meg white on trademe
Tuesday 24 January, 2006
I do love trademe! You never know what might turn up. My friend Lawson told me that he just narrowly missed buying a TEAL airlines set of portable stairs...you know, the stairs they wheel up to the plane? Why did he want it? He has a TEAL airline obsession. What was he planning to DO with it? Put it in his lounge OF COURSE.
I bought brand new UK Buffalo trainers with flames up the sides off trademe, and everytime I wear them people breathlessly ask where I got them...and I have the satisfaction of knowing that the odds are no one else in NZ will have a pair. After all, with footwear it's all about exclusivity, right?
Anyway, here is my latest purchase - as you all know, I love street art. This is a street art stencil sprayed on to canvas. I'm going to give it to a friend for his birthday.
So, Drew, get 'thinking about your doorbell' - 'coz next time it rings, it might be a postal courier!
Posted on 24 January, 2006 | 7:55am | 0 comments |
getting into 2006
Monday 23 January, 2006
I had a bit of a funny start to the year. While most people were laying about in the sun, I was teaching from 9am-7pm at a course that I found very extending and challenging. I learned a lot and it shook me up in lots of ways - some bad, some good.
Anyway, I feel like the year has started off in an odd way. I haven't had any time to lie around with a book, I haven't done as much summery stuff as usual. I haven't thought about the year and what I want to happen.
Most unusually for me, I haven't had time to make new years resolutions! So last night I took a look at last year's ones (which I wrote in time for the 1st of February because on New Years Eve 2004/5 I gave birth to Magnus, which was a bit distracting.) They were:
-get driving
-get published
-get fitter
That's right - I can't drive. Well, I can...I USED to. I have my license...but I didn't drive for about ten years when we were living in London, Bristol and Wellington because we didn't have a car. We have a car now, but I have developed an irrational fear of dying by car accident.
Anyway, last year I didn't get driving. I stayed in my fearful, chicken-shit mindset. I did have a couple of small publishing successes, but of course would always like more! And I did get really fit - started running and swimming, did really well until about September when I had a bad month of 'overwhelment' with work and children and my fitness regime started slipping...
SO! the crux of all this is that I think I'm going to be dull and have the same resolutions again. I used to write new years resolutions lists that would take up pages - but I'm learning to make ones that are specific and simple, and not make too many.
I've been practising my driving, I bought a yoga tape from the op-shop last week and have been doing that. I've also organised for a friend to watch Magnus once a week so I can go back to my yoga class once it begins for the year. And after I finish this, I'm going to make my first writng submission for the year.
And another approach, that I don't need to have as a resolution because I try to adopt it every day is:
to live in the moment, be grateful for my life and continue to find joy in small things. It is amazing how difficult it is to do these things, to avoid getting swept along in domestic irritations and irrellevant minutiae...but I'm going to keep trying and trying and trying. What more can a girl do? Viva la vida!
Posted on 23 January, 2006 | 9:45am | 4 comments |
Mr. Broccoli
Saturday 21 January, 2006
This is what happens when you are taking photos of your family eating a picnic dinner and you say to your five-year-old stinky boy son, "SMILE!" when he is eating broccoli.
Eeuw. Is it just me, or does he look a bit like LOTR's Gollum? That scene where Gollum eats the raw fish?
He was cute, once.
Posted on 21 January, 2006 | 8:44pm | 0 comments |
small day in
Thursday 19 January, 2006
I'm NOT at the Big Day Out today and Sleater Kinney are.
This is making me feel very grumpy.
Last year LE TIGRE were there and I wasn't. I always swore that if Le Tigre came to NZ wild horses couldn't keep me away...wild horses I could probably have coped with, but I wasn't to know that I would end up having a baby a couple of weeks before they played. I guess I'm not enough of a punk-rawk mama to take a two-week old child to the Big Day Out.
This year, I probably could have done it...at a stretch...but things like money, guilt and geography have stopped me. Next year I'll be able to go and no one cool will be on the billing, I bet ya.
I saw The White Stripes on TV3 news last night - they were funny. The interviewer asked Jack White what he would be doing in NZ when he wasn't playing music. He put on a faux-English accent and said: "I expect I will be golfing with Iggy". Meg White said: "You don't PLAY golf" and Jack said: "Iggy will teach me."
The collage above is the title of my favourite Le Tigre song - a kick-arse anthem to tenacity in the face of deluges of bulls**t.
Sleater-Kinney, Le Tigre - I love you. My current wish is that I get to see you live before either a) you split up or b) I die.
Posted on 19 January, 2006 | 8:05am | 3 comments |
collage: theory and practise
Wednesday 18 January, 2006
I've been doing collage in my journals for a few years now. The other day at the library, I thought I would get a book out about the art history of collage, so I could learn more about it and perhaps improve what I'm doing...
I learned that Braque and Picasso invented collage...that it is a C20th creation that arose out of the sudden proliferation of freely available printed ephemera...that it's beauty comes from the "unexpected collision of disparate elements" and then I stopped reading and, after a quick look at the pictures, snapped the book shut.
Reading all the theory and analysis was really KILLING the joy of making collages for me. It was sucking away my will to make art. I'm trying to work out why, as I write this...? It isn't the case with writing - I enjoy reading writing theory and 'How To' books - I always come away inspired and with renewed energy after reading them.
But that book is going back to the library, and I'm going to stumble forward with my amateur art...making it instinctively and without too much thought, which seems to be the way it works best for me.
Posted on 18 January, 2006 | 7:17am | 0 comments |
Saint Nick (Cave)
Tuesday 17 January, 2006
Check this out.
If Nick Cave is a saint, then Sarah Laing is a god! Sarah painted this Nick Cave icon as a wedding present for her friends Steve and Nat, (Nick Cave worshippers).
I love the cigarette with smoke trailing to the ceiling...and she has his face just right, too.
Apparently Steve and Nat played "Into My Arms" at their ceremony. Sure beats "You Fill Up My Senses" by John Denver. (Apparently the most-played song at weddings.)
If all the saints were this attractive, I would be devout!
Posted on 17 January, 2006 | 7:26am | 0 comments |
Maya's stripy sock poem
Monday 16 January, 2006
Every Tuesday I get in my email in-box a 10-line poem from Maya Stein. I like her work a lot. She writes about everyday things in an often profound and always thoughtful way. What a gift to get a poem once a week amongst all the work emails and spam! You can sign up for a weekly dose of Maya here.
Anyway, I was thrilled to get the 28th December poem because it is a stripy sock poem!
ON SECOND THOUGHT
Though I did as much as I could to avoid retail
I didn't realize how much love I could feel
for a pair of striped socks.
I mean smitten, gut-struck, heart trembling for
knee-highs with an interlocking tango of color
only J. Crew would know to call "persimmon," "pear," and "parsnip."
The slimmest percentage of cashmere, the toes double strength, and holy God,
I'm done for, just like that, slipping fingers around an ailing Visa card,
palms aching for another caress at the stripes, inches from a perfect, pleasured union.
"On second thought," I pant into the thick and torrid air. "I'll take two."
***
Yaay for Maya and for poets everywhere who dare to put their work in public spaces!
Posted on 16 January, 2006 | 7:25am | 1 comments |
happy new year, especially to magnus
Sunday 15 January, 2006
Happy New Year, everybody!
What an action packed year it has been for me so far...whew! I haven't even had any time to make New Years' Resolutions yet.
This photo is of me and Magnus an hour or so after he was born. I look all exhausted and pleased (and check out those huge boobs!), he looks exhausted and asleep. He turned ONE on New Years' Eve! I can scarcely believe a whole year zipped by so fast. I started this blog when he was two and a half months old and I was so immersed in life with a newborn that the blog felt like a real life-saver, a link to the 'outer world'. I don't feel like that so much now...the blog is more just something for fun and inspiration than something to keep me alive!
Now he is blonde and bonny and big and nearly walking.
I spent last week teaching on the Creative Processes course and felt very much like a professional and less like I am 100% defined by being a mother...I was frantically busy with my students and I EVEN FORGOT ABOUT THE BOYS FOR HOURS AT A TIME! Wow.
Now my dear friend Sarah is about to pop with a new boy baby. Her baby will be here in about two weeks time. I'm feeling excited about the new human bean, nostalgic too, and also kinda glad I'm through that first year...it's always the bit I find hardest with having babies.
Having Magnus was so different from having Willoughby. With Magnus, I knew what to expect, I had counselling before the birth to ensure I didn't get PND again, (it worked and I didn't get PND again), I kept writing and working (from home) and so didn't feel like I 'lost' myself like I did with Willo...
Happy New Year to you, to Magnus and to Sarah's soon-to-be-born...having babies is a scary and magical thing that tests and challenges and brings out the worst and the best of us. Magnus has taught me a lot about myself in the last year...and here I am facing 2006 with a big old dose of excitement and optimism!
Posted on 15 January, 2006 | 2:25pm | 2 comments |