I have been thinking that I have been missing you for way too long.

Why sometimes do things not get easier?

Why do you wake up every day and instead of it getting less it gets more?

Why can you feel the man digging the hole in your chest as time goes on?

Why does it feel like it's getting further away instead of nearer?

Why can't it be now?

I've been here before, sat on the floor in a grey, grey mood.

I don't know what to write.

"So don't," you might respond.

It's true - I have nothing in mind that I want to share or discuss or get out. However, I feel a need to get out into the world somehow. I feel stuck on a bus in a traffic jam, put on hold, trapped in an ascending lift... I can see the next step I'm taking, even though I don't know if it will work out, and want to be getting on with it. I know that rest is important, that taking a step back, looking at things and realising what it is you're doing/feeling/thinking is good in the long term. However, now, that's getting a bit old.

I suppose it's hard to find short term things to do when you already have mid and longer term ones in your head. It feels a bit like treading water or swimming back to shore when all you want to do is swim right out on the Atlantic and catch you a fish that's bigger than gigantic! Again, yes, the rest is good. But I can rest when I get there, too.

That's all.

There's a heart I love; I'm going to take it with me when I go.

"It's a funny thing about coming home. Looks the same, smells the same, feels the same. You'll realise what's changed is you."

and

and

We're all leaving; even the ones who stay behind.

So, dear friends and blogettes, tomorrow I set off on the first part of my life adventure as an uninstitutionalized person. I will not be blogging/tweeting (thank goodness)/facebooking for quite a while, mainly through personal choice, and so for a last hurrah on the blog front.

I must say that I have found packing incredibly difficult. Not because I particularly want to take a lot of stuff, or because I can't go places without my favourite 'such-and-such'. Mainly because once you start packing things it is difficult to stop. I could quite happily go away right now with my flute and teddy bear, maybe CH4, and not miss anything. [In this situation that probably wouldn't be sensible and may result in frostbite, you get the point though...] However, once I start packing t-shirts I feel bad about leaving behind my 6th favourite behind when actually it's not far away in sentimental value from my 5th favourite. So should I just leave all my favourites and take a load that I don't care about at all? You see the situation on the t-shirt front alone?!

I guess life's a bit like that too. Moving from place to place you collect so many people and places, little bits and bobs so when you move on to the next bit unless you have to leave it all behind it is very hard to accept that actually you can't take it all. There is a chorus in The Weepies song 'Slow Pony Home';

And all that time, I felt just fine
I held so many people in my suitcase heart
That I had to let the whole thing go
It was taken by the wind and snow
And I still didn't know that I was waiting
For a girl on a slow pony home

The thing is when packing your bags you are 95% sure that you can come back to your room and all the things you love that you left will be sitting there (gathering dust, sure) and everything will be fine. You can't do that with people. Cause each of us is doing the same thing and it will change us as we do it. We won't be able to go back to 'that room' and they will still be sitting there, because people shouldn't gather dust. What is dust but dead matter that was once part of us; surely we mustn't stay frozen for so long that what we did manage to let go of settles on the surface!

So off into the world we go and everyone is affected by that, because that is life. I don't like this image of life as a road, a journey down a road. I don't think that we each have a path etched out for us. I think that life is more like a garden, or the countryside, where you see something that interests you over THERE and you go to check it out, and other people who have been attracted to it are there to (though maybe they saw something different over this way.) It's about exploring and meeting people along the way rather than getting to a destination.

So I'm off to explore the next bit after sitting in my little cave frightened to go anywhere proper all summer. I'm heading over to look at the sea for a bit and then who knows?! If you fancy coming along to count the rabbits then you are more than welcome to join me. (There will be knitting and singing aplenty.)

Shalenipo

I don't want to waste your time with music you don't need...

Good afternoon.

I promised another Spotify playlist to fill your ears with warmth and your heart with beauty... and here it is!

If you don't know what Spotify is or how to make the following work, please refer to my last blog post about this where all shall be revealed.

Click here to open the playlist.

1. Over The Rhine - I Don't Wanna Waste Your Time

2. Lucy Schwartz - Gone Away

3. Mark Erelli - Hope Dies Last

4. Rachael Unthank and the Winterset - Blackbird

5. Low - When I Go Deaf

6. Tom Waits - Take It With Me

A fairly downbeat set, but I am finding them all very heart-touching in their own special ways. Reflective, ponderous, thoughtful and perhaps all also a little hopeful? Such is my mood.

I hope to give you another few playlists before I head off adventuring for a while.

Afraid I'm not in a chatty mood, just a listen-y one. Reap the benefits while you can!!

Enjoy!

Dear Sir, fine Sir, could you tell me is it true what's written in your book?

I blogged on my anticipation of the Darwin Song Project CD about a month ago. My copy arrived a few days ago and I have been listening on repeat since, not an uncommon phenomena for a new CD with me, it must be said...

It is quite simply wonderful. You really have to get yourself a CD and lie in your bed one morning and listen to it! I would suggest a CD rather than a download, as you get a lovely booklette with the lyrics and little blurbs written by the artists about each song.

Some of the lyrics are so beautifully poetic:

Nature never did betray the heart that loves her

As I shall not forsake the heart that loves me so

When this earthly pain has passed

And your soul is free at least

Will you be waiting there to meet me when I go?

- 13. Will You Be Waiting (Polwart, Smith, McShane)

[the first line of that is actually "pinched from Wordsworth"]

Some are quite hilarious, my favourite being:

It's hard to speak about him without sinking to abuse

They say that he's an Englishman, but that's still no excuse

...

He made us smart and clever, he even gave us tools

Like guns and bombs and rifles, that shows you God's no fool.

- 16. We'll Hunt Him Down (Lowe)

[in the form of an outlaw ballad, brilliant!]

I could go on and on about the lyrics, but everything is so beautiful in this CD. The musicianship, the amazing production and mixing of a live concert, the variety of voices and styles woven together with a purity and naturalness that is so fresh.

So I direct you to places to purchase this for yourself:

Play

HMV

Amazon

or iTunes, if you are so inclined (tut).

[Also look out for another Spotify playlist in the upcoming days. Not DarwinSP related.]

There are things inside my head I can't express.

http://www.steve-butler.com/troubles.htm

Full linkage and credit and everything to Steve Butler...

Troubles of my own

there are things inside my head I can’t express
turbulent and angry none the less
and the people who surround me continually astound me
they grumble and they groan
haven’t we got troubles of our own?

there are people who I meet but cannot touch
our mutual discomfort is too much
and the sadness of it all seems to underline my fall
I think I should be home - haven’t I got troubles of my own?

and love is such an undefined emotion - though it fills my mind
I hear its constant tone, rising to a drone
hovering and floating round my home

there are things we said I still don’t understand
arguments that shifted and dissolved in our hands
and in the end I think we could have saved it if we’d wanted to
by then the bird had flown
it seems we both had troubles of our own

there are ways in which I never will be whole
limitations built into my soul
and the people who surround me hurt themselves as much as me
listen to them moan, we’d rather be alone
haven’t we got troubles of our own?