Tuesday, November 15
Tuesday, September 13
measuring by frog, dear god, on meditation
Sir found, to her great delight, a frog tape measure. In a box. Sir looked some more, and found many other comforting delights.... an un-picker, a pair of tiny tweezers. In a box. More investigation. Tiny love heart jewellery. Hanging green curtains. A green bedside table cloth. Goth gloves and a tiny black cat calling her name. A large caramel tart with fur grinning on her scratching post, waving an inviting mischevious tail.
Long time between righting the psyche means a long time between writing. Things are changing and have been challenging. But which Sir can come home and find these beautiful gifts of presence? The knowledge that loved ones and loved creatures have been in and inhabited a space is such a treasure. Allowing time to pass, existence to be, creatures to inhabit a space and leave their trail of being like a waft of the pure scent of love.
Good change is hard work. Starting from the bare psyche and forging into the unknown of more howling windswept thoughts. Trying to be present in the moment while listening to guided meditations. Making appointments and keeping them. Talking honestly. Wondering if there will be any change... to the mind, to the heart, to the pattern of thoughts that lie in ones brain. Sitting with feelings. Wondering, in desperation if one really has the capacity for change and creation at all.
Exhaustion.
Teaching evolution again has made Sir's day. Convergent, divergent, analogous, homologous. Homo Erectus, Homo Habilis, Australopithecines, Homo Sapiens sapiens. homo homo homo homo. Ha! HOMO!!
Whatever.
Trying to create an new space is not hard... if you have the tools. The tools come from the work of knowing one's self. Plug in the new revelations that have been discovered and see what happens. A new script, however, means an unknown future. The potential for joy can be expressed as a function, f(j)= w.a/p, where j = joy, w= mind & body work, a=awareness and p=being present. Confused? Sir too.
Long time between righting the psyche means a long time between writing. Things are changing and have been challenging. But which Sir can come home and find these beautiful gifts of presence? The knowledge that loved ones and loved creatures have been in and inhabited a space is such a treasure. Allowing time to pass, existence to be, creatures to inhabit a space and leave their trail of being like a waft of the pure scent of love.
Good change is hard work. Starting from the bare psyche and forging into the unknown of more howling windswept thoughts. Trying to be present in the moment while listening to guided meditations. Making appointments and keeping them. Talking honestly. Wondering if there will be any change... to the mind, to the heart, to the pattern of thoughts that lie in ones brain. Sitting with feelings. Wondering, in desperation if one really has the capacity for change and creation at all.
Exhaustion.
Teaching evolution again has made Sir's day. Convergent, divergent, analogous, homologous. Homo Erectus, Homo Habilis, Australopithecines, Homo Sapiens sapiens. homo homo homo homo. Ha! HOMO!!
Whatever.
Trying to create an new space is not hard... if you have the tools. The tools come from the work of knowing one's self. Plug in the new revelations that have been discovered and see what happens. A new script, however, means an unknown future. The potential for joy can be expressed as a function, f(j)= w.a/p, where j = joy, w= mind & body work, a=awareness and p=being present. Confused? Sir too.
Sunday, May 29
Constipated May, Haunted June
It feels like walking through water.... then through jelly.... then through honey. Then it feels like one stops and cannot move, just catch the things that are hurling through the end of semester towards one's head. SAC corrections, lesson preparations, student teacher, VCAA assessment training, revision Seminars, practice exams, more correction, AEU leadership training. The sense of reality very quickly travels from "yes, amazing work, of course I'm on top of it" to "aaaaaaaarrrgh!!!, leave me alone!!!"
Overwhelmed? Slightly. Wanting to escape? Absolutely!! Feeling pressure to be the reliable sensible looking after fur children co-parent? Hmmmmm
Sir has been slowing exposing and peeling back the layers of her onion heart. The smell is sharp and tears prick easily onto her cheeks. Knifework is dangerous... mother always said so. Except that "don't lick the knife!'' always made Sir really want to lick that sharp edge and feel the numb edges around a sharp cut.
Before the start of this journey, Sir thought that being able to cut out one's heart and look at it in the kitchen table would be good enough, a good solution to a little problem. Easy enough to see where the black holes were, where the fatty tissue could be scraped, where the silly putty should be applied. Now, Sir realises that therapy changes things.
When one is aware of self, aware of pain and no longer looking through alcohol goggles, things hurt more or less, relatively.
However, the heart that has been cut out of the body for minute examination and repair suddenly seems both irreparable and unbearably beautiful. The hole where Sir's heart was starts to ache as she looks at the journey described, the pathways from the past, the parallel tracks of reality that Sir has been existing in and travelling on. The fragments of self that trauma created have grown and survived in this bleak barren landscape of self hatred and loathing. My god! How is it that such a place exists, let alone allows growth in Sir's psyche?
So. What to do with the heart?
Sunday, May 1
Not walking, floating.
This is my favourite time of the week. Sunday evening.
The sun is just setting. The smell of roast weaves its way around the soft sounds of sleeping wife and snoring felines. Ah how things have changed.
We made it. Here to this home that is nothing like the last. Time can be spent here in many ways... but most importantly it can be spent in the ways of the living. Occupied by moments of hearts of pulsing and life affirming creativity. It is peaceful here. Because we make it this way. Our interactions and thoughts are positive and loving. The direction of our love and affirmation in toward the future. Our movement is bound forward together but not too tightly.
Sir has found the strength to unclasp her hands. So fearfully clutching the things that defined her being, so desperately being afraid. Letting go of the fear of being unworthy and unloved has been like turning on an electric lamp in a candle lit room. Suddenly all is so clear and defined.... including the shadows and the dark places.
But more importantly, the light has shown the good things. The way to stand alone but know one is not alone. The ability to walk in the parallel pathways of healing and loving. That the doors made of pain can be opened those dusty dark rooms aired... movement and settling where before there has been only tight constriction.
Relief. Comfort. Sleep. Love.
The sun is just setting. The smell of roast weaves its way around the soft sounds of sleeping wife and snoring felines. Ah how things have changed.
We made it. Here to this home that is nothing like the last. Time can be spent here in many ways... but most importantly it can be spent in the ways of the living. Occupied by moments of hearts of pulsing and life affirming creativity. It is peaceful here. Because we make it this way. Our interactions and thoughts are positive and loving. The direction of our love and affirmation in toward the future. Our movement is bound forward together but not too tightly.
Sir has found the strength to unclasp her hands. So fearfully clutching the things that defined her being, so desperately being afraid. Letting go of the fear of being unworthy and unloved has been like turning on an electric lamp in a candle lit room. Suddenly all is so clear and defined.... including the shadows and the dark places.
But more importantly, the light has shown the good things. The way to stand alone but know one is not alone. The ability to walk in the parallel pathways of healing and loving. That the doors made of pain can be opened those dusty dark rooms aired... movement and settling where before there has been only tight constriction.
Relief. Comfort. Sleep. Love.
Friday, March 4
on the politics of invisibility and peace
Sir has arrived home from the Yr 12 Camp.
Yes yes, amongst the disclaimers of "this one time, at Yr 12 camp", & "at this Yr 12 Camp We......".
No. What happens on camp, stays on camp.
The bestest beastiest teachers must know why... we are dehydrated, inhibited, censored shells of our former selves during and (especially) after camp. We are a tiny cog in the machine of the education bureaucracy in the beginning and a shade of that cog by the end. The lines of communication are cut in such a manner that it is difficult to contact each other let alone students or parents of students while Camp ensues. Camp is the "c" word... it is hell and continues to be hell.
As a professional; and having stated "what happens on camp, stays on camp", we laugh in the faces of the civilians that think this statement to be a joke. It is not. The shimmering vision of Sir's home, with almost katten and cat running wild, is a mere fantastic construct while one is on camp. The reality of night watch, outwitting 17 year olds and sexual harrassment, defusing "punch on" bombs, finding hidden girls and punishing the "party room", redirecting youths at large with nothing but voice and prior relationship (if any), is time consuming. So.... we don't sleep.
Yes there is a "Leaders" cabin. Where are the leaders? Who are the leaders? We are all. Awake, walking, roving, knocking on doors.... until 6am, thats where. What happens when a teacher goes to sleep? She wakes up another one to take her place. True? True.
This post is a pro teacher rant (of course), *but* also a pro queer teacher rant. There are lots of situations that occur on camp that are about he/she him/her them/they it's/his. There are also lots of situations that are about she/she, him/him, her/her, it/they. Where does Sir find herself? Right on the interface of he/her she/she it/them. Ha!
In the distance at home in the katten/cat haven, hearing the 6pm Buddist bell ring/the 7pm "homemade icecream" truck bell ring, this idea is at a very comfortable distance. But Sir does not want to relegate the things that happen on camp to the back parts of hir memory any more. There is a place for the queer peacemakers. And everyone knows it.
Why else put the two peaceful ladies (one openly queer, one extremely peaceful and forceful..... at 2am) in with the cook and the MC at the end of the cabin of interface? Because the cook and the MC will be exhausted and the queer will have control of those "strange girl" cabins. And will control those "strange girl" cabins. Again and again. The relationship is clear.
Will control. What a hatefu use of terminology. As if young people are to be controlled. No. Respect and unity. Love and kindness. Until disrespect... then, well, negotiation and trust. This point is crucial. Without trust, there is no relationship... ergo without trust there is no love.
Love of the other is not easy. This is why women and women of difference (colour, race, sexualiy, class, charisma, power) are separated aoutomatically by those in power. This is why the others are placed together.. to placate each other. Is this the best way to proceed? Perhaps... when we speak of youths that are queer and those that care for them. But adults? More, much more thought needed from those in the higher cogs of bureaucracy.
Yes yes, amongst the disclaimers of "this one time, at Yr 12 camp", & "at this Yr 12 Camp We......".
No. What happens on camp, stays on camp.
The bestest beastiest teachers must know why... we are dehydrated, inhibited, censored shells of our former selves during and (especially) after camp. We are a tiny cog in the machine of the education bureaucracy in the beginning and a shade of that cog by the end. The lines of communication are cut in such a manner that it is difficult to contact each other let alone students or parents of students while Camp ensues. Camp is the "c" word... it is hell and continues to be hell.
As a professional; and having stated "what happens on camp, stays on camp", we laugh in the faces of the civilians that think this statement to be a joke. It is not. The shimmering vision of Sir's home, with almost katten and cat running wild, is a mere fantastic construct while one is on camp. The reality of night watch, outwitting 17 year olds and sexual harrassment, defusing "punch on" bombs, finding hidden girls and punishing the "party room", redirecting youths at large with nothing but voice and prior relationship (if any), is time consuming. So.... we don't sleep.
Yes there is a "Leaders" cabin. Where are the leaders? Who are the leaders? We are all. Awake, walking, roving, knocking on doors.... until 6am, thats where. What happens when a teacher goes to sleep? She wakes up another one to take her place. True? True.
This post is a pro teacher rant (of course), *but* also a pro queer teacher rant. There are lots of situations that occur on camp that are about he/she him/her them/they it's/his. There are also lots of situations that are about she/she, him/him, her/her, it/they. Where does Sir find herself? Right on the interface of he/her she/she it/them. Ha!
In the distance at home in the katten/cat haven, hearing the 6pm Buddist bell ring/the 7pm "homemade icecream" truck bell ring, this idea is at a very comfortable distance. But Sir does not want to relegate the things that happen on camp to the back parts of hir memory any more. There is a place for the queer peacemakers. And everyone knows it.
Why else put the two peaceful ladies (one openly queer, one extremely peaceful and forceful..... at 2am) in with the cook and the MC at the end of the cabin of interface? Because the cook and the MC will be exhausted and the queer will have control of those "strange girl" cabins. And will control those "strange girl" cabins. Again and again. The relationship is clear.
Will control. What a hatefu use of terminology. As if young people are to be controlled. No. Respect and unity. Love and kindness. Until disrespect... then, well, negotiation and trust. This point is crucial. Without trust, there is no relationship... ergo without trust there is no love.
Love of the other is not easy. This is why women and women of difference (colour, race, sexualiy, class, charisma, power) are separated aoutomatically by those in power. This is why the others are placed together.. to placate each other. Is this the best way to proceed? Perhaps... when we speak of youths that are queer and those that care for them. But adults? More, much more thought needed from those in the higher cogs of bureaucracy.
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