Eventyr

Thoughts of the Outdoors

And so, slowly, I am returning.

Spring was spent watching the wild primroses growing inside the conservatory; the outdoors breaking in to the quiet security of my home.  Now the cherry blossoms have fallen from the trees and I find I am out of time.

Time to start moving again, regroup and replan.

The Passing of Time

It used to be that if you searched for my name the first thing that came up was a review for an awful game (Aesthetic Deletions) that I created for 24 Hours of Inform in 2003.

Thankfully time has passed. My name is now associated with other things.

After five years, the review of the game is no longer the first thing people see about me.

Phew.

Street Greeting

"You look tired" he said as I reached my car that morning.

"Do I?"

Shaking his head he rephrased himself, "Do you think you look tired?"

I shrugged at the stranger, and looked up at the grey morning sky.  Winter was creeping in and everywhere was damp from the recent rain.  "Everyone is tired at this time of year."

"Is this your car? I cleaned it for you."

I looked at him, this stranger who had halted me.

"The birds, you know.  I have a woollen sock.  It works well, wool.  It just wipes off, like this.  See?"

I looked at him as he wiped at my car with a white woollen sock.

"I'm going to clean my steps using it next."

I muttered my thanks and excused myself.  Interesting kindness and odd words.

Running Wild

There was an odd feeling deep in my bones tonight.  Like spring in autumn, a bounce in my step, a desire to run wild. 

I was on the bus home, cider in my veins, on my way to my family home, my childhood bedroom, my work.  To do work.

I almost rebelled.  This feeling pushed. 

In a moment, in a flash, I would have been off the bus, out to go dancing and socialising, rebelling as if I were still young.  I am still young (I am!) but, as the crowd reminded me as the bus pulled past, not that young.  It has been more than twelve years since I first went to that nightclub.  So long ago.

And yet this need still pulsed through me.  Why do I need to work?  Why can't I still run wild?  After all I do still live at home.  I am still a student.

Instead the bus drew me on, drew me home, to the life that is still in flux as I fail to grow up or live young.  The life in which I failed to decide who I want to be.

I run late, searching for things that cannot be found.  Like a white rabbit joining the hunt for snarks.

Feeling the Walls

I don't know whether it is poor spatial awareness, poor balance, or just a love of tactile sensation, but I feel the walls when I walk. 

As a child I would run my hand along the fence, rat-a-tat-tat, on my way home.  I did the same with the walls, but they made a less interesting sound.  I did the same with a Yucca, and cut my hands.

My trailing hand feels the path.

I didn't learn a lesson from that yucca experience and today my hands still follow walls, radiators, window panes, wood.  I know where I have been from the textures on the walls I pass.

Texture, balance, whatever.  I feel my way wherever I go.

(Not sure if that's just me, and an odd compulsion that is all my own, or a perfectly normal behaviour that I have just chosen to vocalise.)

Bounding Feet

Today I realised I had lost my walk. 

I was walking at the time.  Baffled, I almost stopped.

When I was younger a friend used to joke I had the Newman walk.  To his mind all those who went to Cardinal Newman School came out with a distinctive walk.  I had it, my brother had it, my friend's ex-girlfriend and another friend's niece and nephew all had it.  A fast-stride high bounce walk.  Bobbing while striding.  Purposeful. 

These days I amble; slow, flat, no pace or drive.  Comfortable but not powerful.

'I've lost my walk' I was thinking as I walked along by the level just now, 'Should I try and find it?'  And as I was thinking these thoughts on came a song on the radio: Here Comes the Hotstepper.

I enjoyed that walk, but I shall wait and see what the future holds for me walk-wise.

Finding Order

Yesterday I cleared.  Shuffling things in my small living space.

The strange thing I realised is that being back in your childhood bedroom causes interesting filing issues.  Fitting a lot of things gathered over many years into a small space is never easy... 

Where *should* the pop-up pirate game be slotted*?  Does my croquet set really belong with my shoes and glockenspiel**? Where is the best position for my top hat? My hourglass? My Thundercats VHS videotape or my Storyteller cassette tape?  How does the logical ordering of mask, stone and dried flowers work?

I'm finding my own order.

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* The answer turned out to be on top of my PC under my workstation.  Sometimes these things are necessary.

** Another case of 'spiel'.

Spiel

After a brief discussion about the etymology of the word spiel I looked it up. 

I now know:
game in Afrikaans is wedstryd
game in Danish is leg, spil
game in Dutch is spel
game in French is jeu
game in German is Spiel, Partie, Spiel
game in Italian is giuoco
game in Latin is venatio, ludus
game in Norwegian is spill (which I knew already)
game in Portuguese is jogo
game in Spanish is baraja, juego
Game Translations

I am entertained, and vaguely satisfied, that spiel is rooted in game/play.

Burning the Man

I fear my memories will fade. 

I hadn’t realised the true pain involved with Burning Man; the heat, the tent-snapping storms, the stinging dust that swells your hands and feet, the blistering walking distances, the need for radical self-reliance and vinegar. 

Yet, somehow, whether deliberate or not, this makes the place.  You need each other, a community whole.  Everyone gives, everyone tries to make the experience good for all.  Everyone contributes from volunteering, to running theme camps, even just in keeping the place free of MOOP. 

It is a community trying to have fun and express themselves in a location that is, simply put, out to get you.

We drove in at dawn, past the words, to Will Call and my ticket.  The sun broke across the playa; it wasn’t morning mist refracting the light, it was dust.

We were camped at about 2.40, spanning between Grasslands and Habitat, with the lovely people associated with Wolf and Lamb and the Sapphire Portal.    Their shade structures astounded and their showers were by far the best in town.  I might not have got to know many of them well, but I will always love them all for providing my lovely home.  Just as I will always love the people I travelled up with for their forethought, planning and browbeating.

Despite the pain*, I had a week I will hold in my heart and treasure for a long time.

I still dream of it.   I will return. 

My fracturing memories in no clear order:

Dawn over the playa, dragonflies mating, my battery-powered fairy-lights that lit up the world and the moth that loved them, the sapphire portal, camelbacks and dry mouths, long walks, the bliss of cycling (although not on the dark sand), the ‘musical’ portaloos, ‘high strung’ aka hammock-land and lovely naps, the rebuilt man glowing in the dark, the necessity of tutus, joy of water misters, my poor aim with waterpistols, great cthulu and duck the bike guardians, hair that will not move for dust, the problems with tutus, eating at the snack food glory hole, the volunteers dancing on the bar at centre camp, the beauty of tinned pineapple and cold cold margaritas, Barbie death camp, dance dance immolation, watching the lights spin through 3D glasses, the slow burn of the temple, the cheers at the thunderdome, animal crackers, trampolines, rebar, the physical pain of packing up and leaving, "they don't let it stop them", the tiny room of mirrors at the hive, visiting spikes, centre camp and lemonade, the fear the rain will turn the dust to glue, giggling at friends at the roller disco, the draining of the coolers, chasing glowing balls in the dark, monkeys swinging round in the dark, the drying shower water stained by the beetroot people, the Cheshire cat art car (amongst others) sailing by in the dark like giant luminescent leviathans in the deep (where us humans were but small fry), my first ride on an art car, getting hit by swinging western doors, missing people, finding people, my amazing escape from sunburn, the man who told people they were beautiful with all sincerity as he passed them in the crowd, the pickled runner bean in the bloody mary, how smoking summoned dust storms two days running, vitamin water, climbing on vans for the view, dancing until dawn, night golf and a crocodile head, the gift of lovely pasta bolognese, remembering my cup, forgetting my cup, the dust that creeps in everywhere, visiting Hobbiton, queuing for ice, hugs from the tequila-giving eyeball riders, getting lost in the dark and somehow still found by friends, sitting on a sofa in the middle of nowhere in the night reading the letters, air raid sirens filling the air and an explosion that rocked the world, the simple realisation that I was home.

[Photoset] [other flickr photos: 'burningman07']

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* I'm really proud I went to burning man, camped in the desert and came away without the normally inevitable sunburn.

Breaking Patterns

*** Warning: This is quite a self-indulgent post for me. ***

... And so I took a holiday.  Somewhat.

Looking back on the last several years there is a pattern.  I have been on holiday several times.  The majority were busman’s holidays.  I have invariably brought work from home with me as well for good measure.  I've had no holidays without work. 

That’s just what you do.

(Especially in research.  It’s not like I can leave my research at the office.)

So I took advantage of the fact that I was going to the states to present (x2) and work as a student volunteer at a conference in DC to go on holiday.   I extended my flights and bought others.  I planned a tour.

(I took some work with me to be getting on with of course.  Who needs tourism when you have editing to be getting on with?)

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The first week away was at the conference.  Working, presenting and socialising turned out to be pretty full-time, so I didn’t get my additional work done.  I hadn’t shaken myself out. 

I did have a good try with the facepaint though. [Photoset]

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The second week away involved imposing on an acquaintance in LA.  ‘Put me up, I’ll be quiet and get on with work. I’ll be good, you won’t even need to talk to me.’ 

This started a shift.  I did that work I’d brought with me, I procrastinated with tv, but somehow, inevitably I slowly faced the fact I was somewhere new, not Brighton.  I was away from all close friends, all procrastinating work.  I didn't know what to do with myself - going out exploring on my own was unthinkable. 

My rhythms broke, my thinking changed. 

For the first time in a decade (or in my life?) I slept in front of people (people I didn’t even know well) with trust – they came, went, chatted, sewed while I slept.  I went out and met new people.  I slowly  remembered just a little bit what it was to be self-sufficient, to understand that my mood was my own and, fundamentally, that I actually quite liked my own company*.  I still wasn’t comfortable with the idea that I was completely on my own, but I was working on it.

I made it out and explored. [Photo Set]

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Week three (and a bit) was in Burning Man, about which I shall write more and separately.  I didn't camp with my friends from Brighton, a chance choice which helped me further expand this idea of my own individual coherence.  It was hard.  By the end of the first day (after two days awake) I was hot, lost, dehydrated and fretting that I had friends out there somewhere that I couldn’t find.  I had no laptop, no mobile, no work to read, to hide behind, and I was somewhere alien to everything I knew. 

Over the days I slowly coalesced my thoughts, and grounded myself.  It was lovely when I found my friends, but it made me realise how much I missed my once independent spirit.  I re-evaluated my fear of walking about alone; was alone so bad? Where was my random self-reliance? 

I don’t know at what point things shifted, I don’t know that they ever did completely.

All I know is that by the time I left I was happy and content in myself.  Closer to someone I recognised. [Photoset]

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Week four culminated with the journey to San Jose from Burning Man, where I realised I was brave enough to rekindle an old friendship, which in turn led me to San Francisco, views, beaches, twisting roads in town and mountain, the smell of eucalyptus, sons of butcher at high speed and good laughs.  The next day I took my time, rediscovered sleep, encouraged randomness met up with Sophie and went exploring.  Oddly happy. [Photoset]

Thankfully this set my mood well for the two days and four flights that my odd travel plans had left me for the journey back to Brighton.  I didn’t mind the occasional security issues**, the fact I almost missed one of my connecting flights due to my phone resetting its clock, and I actively rejoiced when my bags turned up with me at my final destination.

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Hopefully I will carry the memories of this time with me for a good while longer. 

I had a holiday.  I welcomed randomness and wonder back into my life. 

More astoundingly  I... relaxed.