Order

Today I have been having a "Sleeping with the Enemy" moment. You know, that bit in the film when Julia Roberts opens her cuboard doors, and all the tins are stacked beautifully? O.K, so it is majorly creepy. But what bliss - someone has come in to your house, and done that. Question: do you have to sleep with an enemy to get your house in perfect order? I'm not sure I know too many. But that lovely feeling of everything neat and just so. Addictive. Yes, I am a virgo, and yes, obviously anal. And clearly I need to get out a whole lot more. How many of us truly can sit with chaos, and just enjoy being. My Canadian friend Carol always says "they're not gonna put on your grave 'she kept a neat house'" - and I love her house. So what are those naughty cuboards saying?? Well, I am cultivating nerves of steel. Oh yes. I will leave them. Just as they are. Let them chatter away, I am not listening.

But couldn't resist just hanging these wet tea towells together, as they looked so colourful and inviting........

Weaving Threads

Just as I was ready to settle down with a glass of wine yesterday evening, I heard those words uttered from my 12year old, guaranteed to strike terror into any parent - "I've just washed my hair, can you plait it into a million tiny plaits??" Oh. Well, I talked her down from a million to about 25 - that kid has alot of hair - and so off I started. But then that rare, blissful moment, as I tuned into a different scene. A cosy sitting room, late winter storm outside. Theo on the sofa playing with little metal soldiers, lost in his own world; Holly sitting reading while her hair was transformed. Mark sitting with us, all of us quiet and busy in our own things. But together. No television, no arguing. Just quietness. And I thought, hold onto this, it is surely precious. A small moment of just being normal.

Holly and I have two identical woven bracelets made of wool around our wrists. One red, one green. The red one we made together back in September, when we were at the amazing 13 Moons festival on Dartmoor. A large tent of powerful women, threading a long piece of red thread around us all, which later got made into our warrior bracelets. Holly had just started secondary school - a big old wobbly time for all the family - and needed to find a bit of her own power. The green bracelets she made for us both a couple of weeks ago, "to bind us together mummy". I guess she can't see that thread that was there between us at her birth, and will always be there, silent and strong in my heart. But I remember thinking, how much longer will my growing girl want to be so visibly joined to me. She is nearly ready to step onto that path that pulls away from me, that strong journey to herself. And how it aches me. So for now, I am wearing my green and red threads, as is she. And it feels so good to be still woven entirely into and around this childs life.

Different Rhythm

These have been long days.....with little else other than knitting, rocking, looking out of the window, dreaming. It should have been blissful, but the truth is, post-flu, I have been forced to slow down to "stillness" and it has been painful. While I watch a storm of work and washing grow around me. I asked the Universe for a complete break, thinking of long walks and deep breathing, and this is what I got, a big viscious germ invading my body. File note: be more mindful of precise wording next time. But today I am noticing a new rhythm entering me, and it is slower, calmer, ocean time. I bet that all the jobs will shrink to fill this new amount of time. I'm thinking that everything will get done. And if it doesn't, it didn't need doing so badly in the first place. As Kesty says, "my pace is slow...." - a mantra repeated over and over.....and I am beginning to believe it. Oh joy.

Hope

There are people putting the world back together again. Piece by piece, hope by shining hope. Will today see such a day? We will pause, as we watch one man step forward, holding all our collective dreams. Let our hearts be open, and know that we can vision a different world. I know we can. But I also know that, in Carolyn Hillyer's words, "it takes time to birth a mountain".

Breakfast time

At 7.00am I need a little candlelight to soothe these jangling January nerves.....getting children up for school in what seems like the midddle of the night. And after all that Christmas sparkle, well, everything is so dark, and relentless. I guess that's what the Solstice is all about - trusting that the light will return. So here is a little of our breakfast table - minus the dollops of jam heading for the carpet, the homework undone, unbrushed hair and teeth. Gentleness in chaos. My sometimes life.

Can it really be January?

Can it really be so cold, so blue, so, so January......
when somewhere in the middle of last week there was this...

the most curly, the most green, the most lush bean on the Spider Lane allotment.....

oh yes. and some.

Sunday 18th January 2009

Dedicated to our beautiful Earth and to all paths that open our hearts to Love