Viktor Frankl, Man's Search For Meaning

From all this we may learn that there are two races of men in this world, but only these two — the “race” of the decent man and the “race” of the indecent man. Both are found everywhere; they penetrate into all groups of society. No group consists entirely of decent or indecent people. In this sense, no group is of “pure race” — and therefore one occasionally found a decent fellow among the camp guards.

Viktor Frankl, from Man’s Search for Meaning.

A book I intend buying as soon as possible.

Making The Days Quiet ...

Piano piano, in Italian.  Langzaam in Nederlands.  Yavaş yavaş in Turkish - I know these words in every language I've played with.  

Slowly slowly ... and so I am moving like that, playing with photographs, reading a superb book by a New Zealand author and spending time with my cousin, Julie, as she wanders the world, transitioning from her old job in the Cayman Islands to a new job in New Zealand.

It's like that ...

 

France ...

You must learn one thing.

The world was made to be free in.
Give up all the other worlds
Except the one in which you belong.

David Whyte, extract from Traveling With Pomegrantes.

I was in France these last 5 days, near Lyon, for a beautiful wedding and was startled to realise that not every hotel offers good internet connections.  The one I was on was pre-Flintstones and I was unable to reach the back-end of my website.

It was disappointing because I use my blog like a journal on occasion.  I was reading a superb book full of ideas that I would love to have noted and there were photographs like the one below, taken that first evening.

And now, two full days to process a few hundred wedding photographs before flying out unbelievably early on Thursday.

Tot straks.

On Days Where Joy Bubbles Up ...

Perhaps it began yesterday ... that bubble of joy that floated up out of me as I laughed with my new hairdresser.  He's about 65 and he's a delight.

I took my long hair to him a couple of months ago.  I went in knowing it was serious, that I hadn't had a professional cut in a very long time, maybe 2 years ... and that the time of the supermarket, do-it-yourself, dyes had to come to an end.

He sighed, he worked for hours, he fixed everything, cutting away so much hair I wondered, over the days that followed, if I wasn't related to Samson ... that my strength hadn't disappeared with my hair.

But a strange thing happened.  It wasn't as short as it initially felt but, even better, I had more hair than I'd ever had.  He had worked some magic that made it all lively and almost wavy.  A miracle really but one that I hadn't thanked him for.

Some colour 'adjustment' is required and so I biked over to book an appointment and voila, before I knew it, joy was simply bubbling out of me as we talked of my hair.

Last night, after a very warm 27 celsius day, I slipped outside with my laptop and sat in the  garden a while.  The swallows were still screaming around like the kamikazes they are but as the sun went down, out came the bats ... on an insect-eating mission.  I didn't know we had bats but we do.  It was beautiful out there in the garden that Gert made.

This morning began with the arrival of a most exquisite and much-longed for book.  Eduardo Galeano's Children of the Days - a calendar of human history had arrived.  Thank you very much, Gert!  I opened it and fell in.

It's as beautiful as imagined, more beautiful than I knew a book could be perhaps.

29 January

HUMBLY I SPEAK

Today in 1860 Anton Chekhov was born.

He wrote as if he were saying nothing.

And he said everything.

But there was still more joy out there waiting for me.  I had promised to phone Dave and Jude, another set of old friends from far-away.  We had enjoyed catching up with them when back home at Christmas. visiting just as they were just setting off on their grand return to Africa, with children.

Talking with them is like drinking from an ocean of joy.  Somehow they fill me up.  We talked for 2 hours and more about everything important and good.

The bell rang again and more parcels arrived.  Gifts for Miss 9, all the way from New Zealand, t-shirts for Gert, and voila, a  gift of music all the way from Australia.  I'm listening to that as I write this.  Thank you to Paul.

Tonight I have a 3-hour photoshoot.  I'm working with a friend who has pulled me into an exciting project of hers.  I suspect it will be intense but foresee more joy is entirely possible. 

Money ruins so much and while I need it, getting involved in projects that engage my heart and soul ... they're not to be sneezed at. 

In these days I tell myself that, okay, perhaps I'll die poor but by crikey, I feel so rich in stories ...

I owe email and phone calls.  Please forgive me.  Replies to follow in the weeks ahead. 

Found, Discovered, Loved ...

 

I believe in stories, in story-telling, because a story can answer a question without reducing that question to banality. ‘Who am I? is a huge question, and the answer develops, unfolds, reveals itself throughout the whole of our life. At birth, we are only the visible corner of a folded map. The geography of the self is best explored with a guide, and for me art is such a guide. I write fiction because I want to get nearer to the truth.

Jeanette Winterson, extract from an article titled Oranges.

I have been dipping in and out of Jeanette Winterson's writing, trying to be patient as infection then  antibiotics run their course.  The antibiotics are exhausting even though I know they're doing good work and so, I am living quietly, in-between hanging out 5 loads of laundry (unbelievable!) and working out how to cook duck ...

I have never cooked duck.  Not ever.  But I do rather enjoy it and find myself wondering why I wasn't raised on duck and rabbit, back in that country that had plenty of both.  And I have been making small inroads into my office space here, trying to make it more beautiful somehow ... but perhaps that simply involves sunshine coming in through the window.  Belgium isn't really doing sunshine this year.  It's grim.

I am reading and sleeping, and trying not to sleep more, and writing and reading ... and then there's the housework.  It's like that.

Interesting people and art found in recent days.

I loved this.  An article about my favourite bookshop in the world, so far. 

Then this seemed like an invitation to consider Bradley Manning's actions, asking what you might do if you saw what he saw and understood all it meant. 

And this, begun as a search for the writer who described how his book was born.  He talked of the stories here... They chose me. You know, they touched my shoulder or my back, saying, "Tell me. I am a wonderful story and deserve to be diffused by you, written by you. So, please, write me." And I said, "Well, I’m so busy. No." "No, that’s an alibi. You must write me," the story said. And so I began—I ended writing the stories, and later have a very hard process of selection, trying to say more with less. And after this process, the only surviving texts or stories are the ones I feel that are better than silence. It’s a difficult competition against silence, because silence is a perfect language, the only language which says with no words.

I hope to buy the book, Children of the Days: A Calendar of Human History, as soon as is possible


And this.  Wait for the last question (there are only 3) David Gregory asks Glenn Greenwald.  An example of the best way to  reply to an increasingly biased or 'owned' media.

Lastly, I found Sophie Blackall and simply adore her work.  Another book for my books I would like to own list.  It's long.

So this is a little of what I have been doing in these days.

 

 

Eduardo Galeano, Writer

Scientists say that human beings are made of atoms, but a little bird told me that we are also made of stories. And so, each one has something to tell that deserves to be heard.
Eduardo Galeano, extract from an interview about his new book Children of the Days.

I so very much believe this ... that everyone is a story, everyone is full of stories.  His interview is fascinating and made me think I should look for this book of his.