The news doesn't get any hotter than this!!
We have put a deposit on a flat.
Our current lease expires at the end of August.
We require a third bedroom, a quieter location, and quiet neighbors.
We had been afraid that to achieve all of this at about the same price as we are paying now, we would have to decamp to a location farther north than our present one a stone's throw from the American School.
One day last week I was sitting at the Abbey Cafe having a cappucino with MomA. A "lettings agent" drove up and got out of his lettings-mobile to get a coffee from the cafe. MomA recognized him as someone who had been involved with her search for an accessible ground-floor flat. He introduced himself to me and gave me his card. He was in a rush to go take some photos of a property nearby, but would be back in his office within a half hour. I was told to stop in anytime.
Half an hour later, there I was in his office. We chatted a bit. I learned that the property of which he had just take the photos was a unit in my building, and in fact was the one right next door to mine, which was just vacated by a 92-year old woman whose daughter had finally found her a spot in a Polish-speaking care home. The agent then told me what his original career was, and it was as an actor in musical theatre. He mentioned the name of an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, "Starlight Express".
My jaw dropped open. At the urging of Hubster's mom and dad, he and I had seen Starlight Express on our honeymoon here in London in the summer of 1986. We had wanted to see CATS, but couldn't get tickets for the night we wanted, so "settled" for this other show. It was FANTASTIC! I didn't think a musical about singing train-cars could be good, but this one was! It had been partially based on the original Thomas the Tank Engine books by Rev Audry. Each actor, on roller skates, no less, personifies an engine or a coach. The engines are Greaseball, an Elvis-type Diesel engine, Papa, and Rusty, who are steam engines, AC/DC, an androgenous electric engine, etc. Some of the coaches are Dinah the dining car, Ashley the smoking car, Belle the sleeping car, Dustin the hopper who is filled with aggregates ("Aggregates are really great-- Aggregates never complain!") and CB the caboose. Each car has a story and song that moves the plot along, and the show is punctuated by races between the different types of engines, each of whom is paired with a coach. Poor Rusty the outdated steam engine dreams of a Higher Power to help give him the strength he needs to win the race. He finally has a vision of the Starlight Express, the Midnight Train who gives strength to all who call on it.
We bought the soundtrack (on cassette tape!) and listened to it ad nauseum. It was another one of the selections that we always played on road trips, especially after our Son was born. Son was into trains anyway, so a musical about them was just the thing to entertain us on long car rides.
When a travelling version of the show came to Boston, Hubster and I went to see it. It wasn't nearly as good as the original, as they producers had taken away the ramps that went around and through the audience, on which the races took place, for insurance reasons. In 1999 when we were here in London on holiday with both Son (then aged 11) and TeenE (then aged 6) we went again. And now, here I was ten years after that, face-to-face with an actor from the original production!
With in a week, Mr. Starlight Express had found a property for us which had not even been entered into their computerized system. It "ticked all our boxes", so we had a look at it this morning, and gave him a deposit check directly.
If all goes well, our new location will be around two corners from the American School, a stone's throw from the Starbucks on St. John's Wood High Street, within spitting distance of the hospice at "John & Lizzies" hospital, three properties from Sir Paul's back garden, around one block from the gym at Lord's Cricket Ground, super-close to the 139 and 189 buses on Abbey Road without having them going by under the windows all night long, and one minute from Bus stop E from which we board the #46 to Paddington Station when we go off to Heathrow Airport. Lets hope that all the assorted paperwork goes through and we are able to be in residence in our new home by mid-August!
Love and Light
- BlogMama
- London, NW8, United Kingdom
- A "recovering academic", I have left the world of research and teaching Psychology. My current focus is on offering hypnotherapy, Reiki, and spiritual support for clients and hospice residents. I like to express myself through the arts, especially drama (the quirky-comic relief part),stand-up comedy, painting, and the fiber arts.
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Monday, June 1, 2009
I See GOD, preceded by ARC Angels
Monday, May 25, 2009.
Unlike the family in South Wales who recently saw Jesus in the goo left on the cap of a bottle of Marmite, I had a more personal encounter with the divine last week, and it occurred at the Royal Albert Hall.
The Allen family of Ystrad, Rhondda, Wales, UK, whose mother/grandmother is seriously ill, were comforted recently by the appearance of a face-like blob of brown yeasty goo which manifested itself as they were making sandwiches . "People might think I'm nuts, but I like to think it's Jesus looking out for us” said Claire Allen, daughter of the ill woman, the South Wales Echo reported, after she and her husband and children agreed that the blob of goo WAS a sign from God.
My own encounter with a manifestation of the divine took place several days earlier at a concert by blues and rock guitarist Eric Clapton. Readers of a certain age may remember the graffiti that used to pepper London in the mid-1960’s, which famously declared that “Clapton is God”. The graffiti is said to have appeared in the underground station in Islington, north London, and soon was spotted in other areas of the city and the world.
I married into Clapton fandom. Before that, I had been aware of EC’s music and loved both it and his contributions to songs by George Harrison and the Beatles, especially “While My Guitar Gently Weeps”. I didn’t really own any of his recordings, however, until I bought the “Crossroads” boxed-set compilation for Hubster, on tape cassette, no less, for his very first “Father’s Day” gift in 1988. That was when my true appreciation for Clapton’s guitar genius really began to grow, and I’d like to think that all the hours we spent listening to that music with baby and toddler “Son” in the back seat of the 1988 Chevy Nova might have had some influence on his own musical talent.
When Clapton announced last winter that there would be two weeks of concert dates at the Royal Albert Hall in May, I was ecstatic. Son might be visiting us then, I was informed, so I tried to score some tickets for the guys to go. Unfortunately, the tickets I could find were about 200 GBP apiece, roughly 350 dollars each at the time. As we had only recently left the rolls of those “between jobs”, I decided to let it go.
The dream of scoring Clapton tickets awoke again in April. Several weeks before, Hubster’s dad had passed away after a long illness. I thought that an evening out at the Royal Albert Hall listening to one of our favorite musicians of all time and space would be just the thing to cheer us up. A brief stint trolling the listings on “Gumtree”, London’s answer to CraigsList, showed me that someone had spare tickets in the 4th Row!! I wrote to the person, and received a price quoted at 120 GBP per ticket. After running it by Hubster, he was still of the mind that it was too much money to spend. I reluctantly told the gentleman to release the tickets to whoever was next in the queue. I was secretly afraid that the tickets would be fakes, and Googled the guy who was selling them. He was listed on a professional development website as an employee of L’Oreal. Was I worth it? Evidently not.
A few weeks later, Hubster was watching a Clapton documentary on telly. “Clapton is coming!” he said in a reverential tone. “Yeah, and we could have been there, in the FOURTH ROW”. I was not happy. I guessed it was just not meant to be.
On the Thursday before the 3-day “late May Bank Holiday Weekend” (which kicks off the summer season here as Memorial Day does in the US) I received an email from an address that looked familiar. It was from my “new best friend”, Nir Malka, of L’Oreal employment fame. It turned out that he didn’t trust the guy who wanted to buy the tickets not to just turn around and sell them at a huge profit. His friends were all busy due to the bank holiday weekend, and he and his wife were going the night after the long weekend. He wanted the tickets to be used by REAL Clapton fans, and would sell them to me at FACE VALUE, which was 75 GBP each. He wrote that I seemed to be a nice person. Did I want the tickets? I didn’t hesitate long. YES!! If Hubster still felt HE wasn’t worth it, I’d sell his ticket (at face value to a real fan). I made a plan to meet Mr. Malka at the South Hampstead Tube station, a few bus stops up Abbey Road. It was if there was some kind of force orchestrating the whole thing.
As I waited at the station I checked out every guy that exited from the Tube. My Googling had revealed that Mr. Malka was Israeli and a Clapton fan. How old would he be? He could have been any of the scores of middle-aged men emerging from the stairway. After a 10-minute wait, someone approached me. He turned out to be a lot younger than I expected. I asked him if he worked for L’Oreal, and indeed he did. He and his wife had just moved to London within the last year. He told me that when he had Googled me, my participation in a Spiritual Art Show had turned up, along with a photo of me, TeenE, and a paintings I did of a mountain in Scotland and of Glastonbury Tor. We did “the deal”, knowing all the while that our tickets-for-cash exchange was being captured by security camera. (You have to have a street-vendor’s license in order to sell tickets on the street in London—this is to prevent scalpers.)
I re-boarded the 139 bus and sailed down Abbey Road in utter triumph. I was afraid to tell Hubster what I had done, as I sensed that in his current mood he would not be amenable to spending the money that way. I was correct. After a heated “discussion”, I decided to sell his ticket by posting a sign in Starbucks. Surely SOMEONE in NW8 would want to spend 75 pounds on a ticket to hear Eric Clapton FROM THE FOURTH ROW! I made up the sign, and then heard Hubster say resignedly “Oh I’ll go……….” Now don’t trouble yourself too much there, Sir!
So we went. On Bank Holiday Monday afternoon I got decked out in floral dress. “You’re NOT going to a garden party!” TeenE announced. She convinced me to let her be my stylist for the evening. She picked out a black short skirt and a white short-sleeved silk top embellished with some black silk roses around the neckline. Necklace and earrings of silver and topaz were added, the full makeup (with “rock-chick” eyeliner) was applied, my hair was teased and put up with combs, I removed my support hose, put on black tights and my and my extra-cool black pointy flat shoes and I was ready to Rock and Roll!
Off we went on the Jubilee Line and the Number 9 bus. I found “our seats” in the Section A, row 4, seats 9 and 10. We were early enough to have time to grab a bite and a beer in the bar before the opening act. When we returned to our seats, our coats and brollies had been moved across the aisle to an EVEN BETTER LOCATION. It turned out seats 9 and 10 of Section A, Row 4 were at the corner of the stage, angled in such a way as to have a completely unobstructed view, being in the second row of a diagonal set of 3 seats. Hubster even had space to stick his feet out in the aisle, and there were NO HEADS in front of either of us!!! Thank you again, Nir Malka! He had tried to describe to me the magnitude of the awesomeness of the seats, but I just hadn’t comprehended it!
The opening act was called “The ARC Angels”. They were a very good blues-rock group from Austin, Texas. You could tell that they “hadn’t just fallen off the turnip truck”, as Grandad used to say. They even played an old McCartney tune from the RAM album, called “Too Many People”. I marveled at the fact that even though they were very, very good, the audience seemed so laid back as to appear uninterested. Oh well. Even after the lead singer wished us all a Happy Bank Holiday there was hardly a “woo!” to be heard.
After the Arcangels left the stage there was a short “interval” where the roadies set up the stage for Clapton. Finally, as the guitar god took the stage, the audience erupted into a smiling mass of applause and ovation. Then, it quickly re-seated itself and settled politely into a quiet listening attitude. It turned out that the audience behavior I had witnessed before was due to cultural mores. Most members of the audience refrained from tapping their feet, nodding their heads, or “chair-dancing”. They listened almost stock-still. I couldn’t do it. You could tell who the Americans and other non-British were: we were tapping, and nodding away, albeit no less raptly. Dancing in the aisles was strictly forbidden by the ushers.
The different levels of the Royal Albert Hall are arranged almost like reverse tiers of a wedding cake. The floor in front of the stage is divided into four sections of chair seating, surrounded by what I would call a sloped “loge” section. Above that, the lower boxes, and multiple tiers of boxes and sloped loges rising above that. Finally, up at the top, a gallery of Standing Room Only. THOSE folks were allowed to dance. We were treated to over two house of blues and rock that transported us into another realm. I had tears rolling down my face during “Wonderful Tonight”, which is about how much a husband loves and adores his wife.
One thing that I had remembered to bring with me when getting ready was “protection” of the aural variety, and I was certainly glad of it. Our seats, being there in the angle between the stage and the side of our section, were approximately eight feet from an enormous set of amplifiers. I used the earplugs in both ears for the Arcangels, but decided that I would be sacrificing sound quality for decreased decibels. During Clapton’s performance, I kept IN the left earplug, which faced not only the stack of speakers, but certain permanent hearing damage had I not used “protection”. The right ear was angle back toward the rear of the hall and did not require any prophylaxis. It was a little odd to leave the hall after the concert with only ONE ear ringing.
So, “GOD?” you say? Does she really think he’s GOD? “A” god, yes, a “guitar god”. One who has mastered his craft in such a way that the hand of “God” seems to be present, spark of the divine that exists in all of us, but that only a few kindle and stoke until we are able to present our true lights to the world. An article in Christianity Today claims that Clapton’s favorite hymn while growing up was "Jesus Bids Us Shine":
Jesus bids us shine with a clear, pure light,
Like a little candle burning in the night;
In this world of darkness, we must shine,
You in your small corner, and I in mine.
Throughout his life, Eric has succumbed to addictions to both heroin and alcohol, and has overcome them. He has faced the unimaginable tragedy of the death of his young son, yet still had faith enough to remarry at over 50 and to start a young family. To sum it up his own spirituality I’ll quote Clapton himself from the song “Presence of the Lord”:
I have finally found a place to live
Just like I never could before
And I know I don't have much to give
But soon I'll open any door.
Everybody knows the secret,
Everybody knows the score.
I have finally found a place to live
In the presence of the Lord.
May his music continue to inspire us to connect with something greater than ourselves for many, many generations.
Unlike the family in South Wales who recently saw Jesus in the goo left on the cap of a bottle of Marmite, I had a more personal encounter with the divine last week, and it occurred at the Royal Albert Hall.
The Allen family of Ystrad, Rhondda, Wales, UK, whose mother/grandmother is seriously ill, were comforted recently by the appearance of a face-like blob of brown yeasty goo which manifested itself as they were making sandwiches . "People might think I'm nuts, but I like to think it's Jesus looking out for us” said Claire Allen, daughter of the ill woman, the South Wales Echo reported, after she and her husband and children agreed that the blob of goo WAS a sign from God.
My own encounter with a manifestation of the divine took place several days earlier at a concert by blues and rock guitarist Eric Clapton. Readers of a certain age may remember the graffiti that used to pepper London in the mid-1960’s, which famously declared that “Clapton is God”. The graffiti is said to have appeared in the underground station in Islington, north London, and soon was spotted in other areas of the city and the world.
I married into Clapton fandom. Before that, I had been aware of EC’s music and loved both it and his contributions to songs by George Harrison and the Beatles, especially “While My Guitar Gently Weeps”. I didn’t really own any of his recordings, however, until I bought the “Crossroads” boxed-set compilation for Hubster, on tape cassette, no less, for his very first “Father’s Day” gift in 1988. That was when my true appreciation for Clapton’s guitar genius really began to grow, and I’d like to think that all the hours we spent listening to that music with baby and toddler “Son” in the back seat of the 1988 Chevy Nova might have had some influence on his own musical talent.
When Clapton announced last winter that there would be two weeks of concert dates at the Royal Albert Hall in May, I was ecstatic. Son might be visiting us then, I was informed, so I tried to score some tickets for the guys to go. Unfortunately, the tickets I could find were about 200 GBP apiece, roughly 350 dollars each at the time. As we had only recently left the rolls of those “between jobs”, I decided to let it go.
The dream of scoring Clapton tickets awoke again in April. Several weeks before, Hubster’s dad had passed away after a long illness. I thought that an evening out at the Royal Albert Hall listening to one of our favorite musicians of all time and space would be just the thing to cheer us up. A brief stint trolling the listings on “Gumtree”, London’s answer to CraigsList, showed me that someone had spare tickets in the 4th Row!! I wrote to the person, and received a price quoted at 120 GBP per ticket. After running it by Hubster, he was still of the mind that it was too much money to spend. I reluctantly told the gentleman to release the tickets to whoever was next in the queue. I was secretly afraid that the tickets would be fakes, and Googled the guy who was selling them. He was listed on a professional development website as an employee of L’Oreal. Was I worth it? Evidently not.
A few weeks later, Hubster was watching a Clapton documentary on telly. “Clapton is coming!” he said in a reverential tone. “Yeah, and we could have been there, in the FOURTH ROW”. I was not happy. I guessed it was just not meant to be.
On the Thursday before the 3-day “late May Bank Holiday Weekend” (which kicks off the summer season here as Memorial Day does in the US) I received an email from an address that looked familiar. It was from my “new best friend”, Nir Malka, of L’Oreal employment fame. It turned out that he didn’t trust the guy who wanted to buy the tickets not to just turn around and sell them at a huge profit. His friends were all busy due to the bank holiday weekend, and he and his wife were going the night after the long weekend. He wanted the tickets to be used by REAL Clapton fans, and would sell them to me at FACE VALUE, which was 75 GBP each. He wrote that I seemed to be a nice person. Did I want the tickets? I didn’t hesitate long. YES!! If Hubster still felt HE wasn’t worth it, I’d sell his ticket (at face value to a real fan). I made a plan to meet Mr. Malka at the South Hampstead Tube station, a few bus stops up Abbey Road. It was if there was some kind of force orchestrating the whole thing.
As I waited at the station I checked out every guy that exited from the Tube. My Googling had revealed that Mr. Malka was Israeli and a Clapton fan. How old would he be? He could have been any of the scores of middle-aged men emerging from the stairway. After a 10-minute wait, someone approached me. He turned out to be a lot younger than I expected. I asked him if he worked for L’Oreal, and indeed he did. He and his wife had just moved to London within the last year. He told me that when he had Googled me, my participation in a Spiritual Art Show had turned up, along with a photo of me, TeenE, and a paintings I did of a mountain in Scotland and of Glastonbury Tor. We did “the deal”, knowing all the while that our tickets-for-cash exchange was being captured by security camera. (You have to have a street-vendor’s license in order to sell tickets on the street in London—this is to prevent scalpers.)
I re-boarded the 139 bus and sailed down Abbey Road in utter triumph. I was afraid to tell Hubster what I had done, as I sensed that in his current mood he would not be amenable to spending the money that way. I was correct. After a heated “discussion”, I decided to sell his ticket by posting a sign in Starbucks. Surely SOMEONE in NW8 would want to spend 75 pounds on a ticket to hear Eric Clapton FROM THE FOURTH ROW! I made up the sign, and then heard Hubster say resignedly “Oh I’ll go……….” Now don’t trouble yourself too much there, Sir!
So we went. On Bank Holiday Monday afternoon I got decked out in floral dress. “You’re NOT going to a garden party!” TeenE announced. She convinced me to let her be my stylist for the evening. She picked out a black short skirt and a white short-sleeved silk top embellished with some black silk roses around the neckline. Necklace and earrings of silver and topaz were added, the full makeup (with “rock-chick” eyeliner) was applied, my hair was teased and put up with combs, I removed my support hose, put on black tights and my and my extra-cool black pointy flat shoes and I was ready to Rock and Roll!
Off we went on the Jubilee Line and the Number 9 bus. I found “our seats” in the Section A, row 4, seats 9 and 10. We were early enough to have time to grab a bite and a beer in the bar before the opening act. When we returned to our seats, our coats and brollies had been moved across the aisle to an EVEN BETTER LOCATION. It turned out seats 9 and 10 of Section A, Row 4 were at the corner of the stage, angled in such a way as to have a completely unobstructed view, being in the second row of a diagonal set of 3 seats. Hubster even had space to stick his feet out in the aisle, and there were NO HEADS in front of either of us!!! Thank you again, Nir Malka! He had tried to describe to me the magnitude of the awesomeness of the seats, but I just hadn’t comprehended it!
The opening act was called “The ARC Angels”. They were a very good blues-rock group from Austin, Texas. You could tell that they “hadn’t just fallen off the turnip truck”, as Grandad used to say. They even played an old McCartney tune from the RAM album, called “Too Many People”. I marveled at the fact that even though they were very, very good, the audience seemed so laid back as to appear uninterested. Oh well. Even after the lead singer wished us all a Happy Bank Holiday there was hardly a “woo!” to be heard.
After the Arcangels left the stage there was a short “interval” where the roadies set up the stage for Clapton. Finally, as the guitar god took the stage, the audience erupted into a smiling mass of applause and ovation. Then, it quickly re-seated itself and settled politely into a quiet listening attitude. It turned out that the audience behavior I had witnessed before was due to cultural mores. Most members of the audience refrained from tapping their feet, nodding their heads, or “chair-dancing”. They listened almost stock-still. I couldn’t do it. You could tell who the Americans and other non-British were: we were tapping, and nodding away, albeit no less raptly. Dancing in the aisles was strictly forbidden by the ushers.
The different levels of the Royal Albert Hall are arranged almost like reverse tiers of a wedding cake. The floor in front of the stage is divided into four sections of chair seating, surrounded by what I would call a sloped “loge” section. Above that, the lower boxes, and multiple tiers of boxes and sloped loges rising above that. Finally, up at the top, a gallery of Standing Room Only. THOSE folks were allowed to dance. We were treated to over two house of blues and rock that transported us into another realm. I had tears rolling down my face during “Wonderful Tonight”, which is about how much a husband loves and adores his wife.
One thing that I had remembered to bring with me when getting ready was “protection” of the aural variety, and I was certainly glad of it. Our seats, being there in the angle between the stage and the side of our section, were approximately eight feet from an enormous set of amplifiers. I used the earplugs in both ears for the Arcangels, but decided that I would be sacrificing sound quality for decreased decibels. During Clapton’s performance, I kept IN the left earplug, which faced not only the stack of speakers, but certain permanent hearing damage had I not used “protection”. The right ear was angle back toward the rear of the hall and did not require any prophylaxis. It was a little odd to leave the hall after the concert with only ONE ear ringing.
So, “GOD?” you say? Does she really think he’s GOD? “A” god, yes, a “guitar god”. One who has mastered his craft in such a way that the hand of “God” seems to be present, spark of the divine that exists in all of us, but that only a few kindle and stoke until we are able to present our true lights to the world. An article in Christianity Today claims that Clapton’s favorite hymn while growing up was "Jesus Bids Us Shine":
Jesus bids us shine with a clear, pure light,
Like a little candle burning in the night;
In this world of darkness, we must shine,
You in your small corner, and I in mine.
Throughout his life, Eric has succumbed to addictions to both heroin and alcohol, and has overcome them. He has faced the unimaginable tragedy of the death of his young son, yet still had faith enough to remarry at over 50 and to start a young family. To sum it up his own spirituality I’ll quote Clapton himself from the song “Presence of the Lord”:
I have finally found a place to live
Just like I never could before
And I know I don't have much to give
But soon I'll open any door.
Everybody knows the secret,
Everybody knows the score.
I have finally found a place to live
In the presence of the Lord.
May his music continue to inspire us to connect with something greater than ourselves for many, many generations.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
It's Not Easy Being Green
Day One: In which I travel to Ireland, do a “bit o' pinning”, meet many Murphys, and rendezvous with Son in Killarney.
After the fifth call from Son asking me if I’m planning to rendezvous with the Guilford College Choir’s concert tour of Ireland, it begins to dawn on me: he really does want me to come. I held off making any definitive plans, however. My procrastination turned out to be a good thing; half of the choir group was delayed in the US by Delta Airline’s admission that the plane they were supposed to be on had a flat tire. They were flown from Raleigh, NC, to Atlanta, GA, to await the next day’s flight to Dublin. I learned of this late Sunday night, at a time when I was assuming they were in the air over the Atlantic. When the phone ring and it was Son, I became a little alarmed until I heard the whole story.
Son told me the entire itinerary wouldl be pushed back by a day. I was skeptical of this because of the hotel logistics, but after consultation with Hubster, I decided to make flight arrangements. It cost only 39 Euros to fly from London’s Heathrow to Cork. At this point, I was assuming that I would rendezvous with the group at Blarney Castle on the following Sunday, after they toured and perform in Dublin and Waterford. If I were to fly to Cork on Saturday, and then back from Shannon in western Ireland on Tuesday, my return fare will be zero Euros. Yes, that’s right, Zero. This does not include taxes and fees, which come to about thirty Euros. If I wanted to check a bag, that would be another twenty Euros. Seat assignments cost two Euros if you choose to sit in the middle of the plane, seven Euros if you want one of the seats in the front, or in an exit row. I decided to travel light and sit in steerage, which is what I imagine my great-grandmother Katherine Kirwan (Bahlke) did when she fled the Irish Potato Famine and arrived in the US with her brother at the age of 16.
In planning my itinerary, I allowed only a short transfer time between landing at Cork airport and departing Cork by train on my way to Killarney. In the interim between buying the plane ticket and actually leaving for Ireland, I have discovered that the group will be at Blarney Castle on Saturday instead of Sunday, and that there probably will be no time for me to meet them there. I figure it’s OK if I don’t kiss the Blarney Stone, as I already have the gift of gab, perhaps thanks to “Nana” Katherine Kirwan Bahlke. Fortunately, everything went according to plan. I left A Flat on Abbey Road at about 9 am, and headed out to Circus Road and the #46 bus to Paddington. The Heathrow Express train that was boarding at the platform closed its doors just as I passed through the barrier; so I got to take my time getting on the train across the platform and stowing my luggage. Fifteen minutes after departing Paddington Station I arrived at the connection to Terminal One at Heathrow, home of Aer Lingus.
Once at the Heathrow stop, I ran like a rat in a maze as I made my way down a very long tunnel in the general direction of Terminal 1. I passed through security, at which there was NO LINE, and had so much extra time that I decide to sign up for IRIS, the eyeball identification system that is supposed to help speed one through Immigration on the way back into the UK from international destinations. The last time I tried to sign up on my way out of Heathrow, I was told that even though I am a resident of the UK, I did not have enough qualifying flights in my passport to be allowed to use the system, and anyway, that TeenE would not be able to use the service. They didn’t seem to believe me at that time that I don’t always travel with TeenE, but this did not deter me from trying again This time it worked! They took digital images of my irises both without and with my glasses on, gave me a piece of paper, and I was off. Once again, there was no wait. I now had over an hour to kill in the departure lounge before my 12:15 pm flight.
In the Heathrow system, everyone for all the flights congregates in a general waiting area replete with duty-free shops and snack and coffee emporia. Never one to assume that there will be food on a flight, I loaded up with provisions: I figured a sandwich, a bottle of water, and a grande latte would tide me over on the one-hour flight into the unknown. Of course, I had already packed granola bars and chocolate bars in my bag, so there was no danger of starvation. I suspected that I would not have time in Cork to get lunch as I tried to make a 2:25 pm train. After stocking up, I then repaired to the seats to await the posting of my gate. Departure gates are not announced until about a half hour before boarding is to begin. Once I was informed of my departure gate by both the monitor and the disembodied voice, I went on the most amazing journey. I was upgraded from a rat in a maze to a hamster in a HabiTrail cage. Moving walkways helped shorten the travel time on the straight-aways, but it took at least fifteen minutes to navigate the semicircular glass tunnels that connected the different “pods” of gates. It was a mixed crowd of tourists, business people, and Irish returning home at the gate.
The Aer Lingus flight was efficient and non-eventful. All announcements were made first in Gaelic, then in English. I hadn’t expected that; I just never even gave it a thought. I had scored a window seat so that I could watch the takeoff and landing, but the cloud cover obscured everything. All I saw was the wing.
The Cork airport was tiny, on a par with Tri-City airport in Johnson, Tennessee, or Asheville, North Carolina. There were two immigration agents, one for European Union passport holders (including the Irish) and one for Non-EU. I was third in the queue for the Non-EU, and was chomping at the bit to get through, given my tight train connection. It was now 45 minutes to train departure. Unfortunately, the couple at the head of the queue had not secured whatever paperwork they needed to enter, so they took ten minutes of processing. Meanwhile, the majority of our flight were EU, and they ALL passed through the other line by simply waving their passports at the man. When they were all through, that nice man beckoned to those of us in the sluggish queue to come on over. Two questions and an entry stamp later, I was in.
There was no queue at the taxi rank, and the kind Irish gentleman driver told me that he’d have me at the train station in under ten minutes, which was correct. He explained to me that all of the election posters that plastered the town (complete with larger-than life photos of the candidates) were for the upcoming European Union parliamentary elections. I don’t know much about EU politics, but I know that immigration to the UK is easier if one holds a passport from an EU country than one from the US of A. Just after I entered the train station, the skies opened and the rain began to fall.
My destination by train was Killarney, on Ireland’s west coast, in the county of Kerry. I had purchased the train ticket online, at a cost of twenty Euros, and just had to wave the ID number of my transaction at Miss Murphy behind the counter and I was presented with a full page itinerary with a peel-off ticket emblazoned with a holographic security strip. I was impressed by the high-tech ticket. Of course, the train on which I rode was just an ordinary train, but the scrolling LED announcement board presented the information first in Gaelic, then in English. The announcer did the same. I learned that “Corkaigh” is Cork and “Malla” is Mallow.
We passed through beautiful spring-time countryside. I have decided that the Irish invented the color green. There were so many shades of it interlocking and blending in the landscape that it was hard to tell where “mossy green” ended and “grassy green” began. I sat at a table and drank in the landscape, which consisted of undulating green hills, grey cloud-laden skies, small cream colored homes dotting the hills, and bright spots of mustard yellow provided by the blooms of the gorse bushes. Once in a while a grey stone wall would hem in some ecru sheep
We passed by Blarney Castle on our way to Mallow, where I had to change trains. Just in case the Guilford College Choir was out there somewhere, I waved.
At Mallow, two young fellows entered the train and decided to sit at my table, which was surrounded by four seats. The one nearest to me had breath heavy with whiskey (the “water of life”, in Gaelic). They were sports fans going to Killarney to watch a football match on TV as they must have been in a “Blackout” area for the match. Perhaps they were Scottish. I’ll never know. They kept complaining that “after all, they’re playing in our country” and seemed very bitter about the necessity of their journey. Whiskey-breath had an accent so heavy that even if I discounted the fact that he was slurring his speech, I could not understand him at all. I had pulled out my knitting and the complicated pattern for a drop-stitch scarf that required a lot of counting, so I hoped they wouldn’t try and engage me in conversation.
I’m sorry to report that this ploy failed. Whiskey-breath, who fancied himself a comedian, turned right to me and asked me a question. “Blah blah blah blah pinnin”. I ignored him. He came back with it again. This time I looked at him. He could have been Quentin Tarantino’s love child. I’m sure the look on my face must have been “Are you talking to me?” He tried to communicate with me two more times. Aha! He was making a comment about my knitting. He had been saying “I can see that this one likes a bit of pinning”. I guess that is what they call knitting in Ireland or wherever he was from. I tried to make it clear that I could not understand what he was saying. His friend, Stripe-Shirt, translated for him “She doesn’t understand what you are saying”. I told them that I was working on a complicated pattern, and that if they noticed that my lips were moving as I knitted, they’d know that I was counting and couldn’t really talk. After another stop or two they moved across the aisle, to my great relief.
I took another cab from the Killarney train station to the Best Western Eviston House Hotel, centrally located on “New” Street in the shopping district. The Guilford College Choir had not yet arrived, but their guide had phone from the coach and they were expected shortly. After being checked in to my room by a Ms. Murphy, I decided to go over to the Tourist Office around the corner and pick up some area information and maps. By the time I got back, the coach was parked and a horde of fresh young faces was disembarking. Son glimpsed me through the lobby window and I was greeted with a big bear hug.
The choir had an hour and a half before they had to reboard the coach in concert dress for their Saturday evening performance. Sunday’s “gig” was to be at an Alzheimer’s unit of a “Care Home” affiliated with a church just outside of Killarney. When the parish priest heard that this was happening, he invited the choir to sing a Saturday night Mass. I asked the tour guide if it would be OK for me to ride with them to the service, and she introduced herself to me. Her name was Odile Murphy, and she is one of the nicest people ever. She said not only would it be all right on Saturday night, but that if I wanted to join them on their morning trip to a local scenic spot the next day, that would be fine, too.
Son and I scarfed down some sandwiches from the Subway across the street, and then sat in the lobby chatting before he had to go upstairs to change into his tux. All 60 of us boarded the coach and then the mist turned back to rain as we headed out of town toward Killcommon. Ms. Murphy came over the PA system with an announcement: “We’d like to welcome Doug’s Mom to the tour bus”. This was answered by a resounding chorus of “Hi, Doug’s Mom”. I stood and waved, and told them, my name. They all laughed and I replied with some witty banter. Son poked me with his elbow to get me to shut up so I did. Meanwhile, Ms. Murphy reminded us that “Kill” means “stream”, and I thought of the instances in New York State where it is used in the same way “Fishkill”, “Peekskill”, etc.
Killcommon was an uncommonly beautiful spot. It was now half past seven in the evening, and the sun was nowhere near setting. The rain stopped as we disembarked the coach. We entered a modern church built in the round, with the part behind the altar made of bentwood staves like the inside of a prow of a ship. Between the staves there was a gorgeous patchwork of colorful stained glass illustrating animals, people, and natural motifs from the Bible and from Ireland. Mass was packed; either a show of support for the choir (who had been added on with very short notice) or that is just what one does in Ireland on a Saturday night.
The choir sang with no instrumental accompaniment. Their sound was breathtaking in the perfect acoustics of that church, and I was moved to tears by the beauty of the whole experience. I remarked to someone later that it was the first time I had ever been to a mass that was not a wedding or a funeral. They sang about four selections during the service, and one could tell that the congregation was not used to such…lengthy… musical offerings. They were eager to be on their way after the hour was up.
I was wondering if they would all disappear, or if there would be a “coffee hour” at 8 pm. Fortunately for the choir, most of whom had not eaten anything, there was a generous spread of “tea” at the Rectory across the street. Several generous women stood by to refill our tea cups and pass around the plates of sandwiches and homemade sweets. We all felt warmly welcomed. At about half past eight I was ready to return to the coach and walked outside to take in the evening. It was chilly, so I boarded just as the mist returned.
We returned to the hotel and Son changed out of his tux. We found the last two seats in the pub just as the musical act was warming up. The pub, called Danny Mann’s, bills itself as Ireland’s Most Famous Pub. I’m not sure if it’s true, but they do offer live music most nights, and Saturday night’s group was The Molly Maguires. They played an entertaining mix of traditional Irish vocal music. Son and I enjoyed some Carlsburg (I know, it’s not Irish, but I hadn’t developed a taste for Guinness yet) and I chased it with a shot of Jameson whiskey, served neat, with water on the side, in honor of my Dad. God forbid that a bartender or waiter should pour the water into the whiskey glass! I decided to carry on the tradition, sans ice.
By a quarter to eleven pm, I was well and truly ready for bed. I knew that the “young people” would be up much later, so said my goodbyes. Son walked me to my room, and we agreed to meet up in the breakfast room the next day. I slept well, and was only awakened once by the sound of some merrymakers singing their way down the street. You could hear the sound getting fainter and fainter as they made their way out of town.
What a happy day!
After the fifth call from Son asking me if I’m planning to rendezvous with the Guilford College Choir’s concert tour of Ireland, it begins to dawn on me: he really does want me to come. I held off making any definitive plans, however. My procrastination turned out to be a good thing; half of the choir group was delayed in the US by Delta Airline’s admission that the plane they were supposed to be on had a flat tire. They were flown from Raleigh, NC, to Atlanta, GA, to await the next day’s flight to Dublin. I learned of this late Sunday night, at a time when I was assuming they were in the air over the Atlantic. When the phone ring and it was Son, I became a little alarmed until I heard the whole story.
Son told me the entire itinerary wouldl be pushed back by a day. I was skeptical of this because of the hotel logistics, but after consultation with Hubster, I decided to make flight arrangements. It cost only 39 Euros to fly from London’s Heathrow to Cork. At this point, I was assuming that I would rendezvous with the group at Blarney Castle on the following Sunday, after they toured and perform in Dublin and Waterford. If I were to fly to Cork on Saturday, and then back from Shannon in western Ireland on Tuesday, my return fare will be zero Euros. Yes, that’s right, Zero. This does not include taxes and fees, which come to about thirty Euros. If I wanted to check a bag, that would be another twenty Euros. Seat assignments cost two Euros if you choose to sit in the middle of the plane, seven Euros if you want one of the seats in the front, or in an exit row. I decided to travel light and sit in steerage, which is what I imagine my great-grandmother Katherine Kirwan (Bahlke) did when she fled the Irish Potato Famine and arrived in the US with her brother at the age of 16.
In planning my itinerary, I allowed only a short transfer time between landing at Cork airport and departing Cork by train on my way to Killarney. In the interim between buying the plane ticket and actually leaving for Ireland, I have discovered that the group will be at Blarney Castle on Saturday instead of Sunday, and that there probably will be no time for me to meet them there. I figure it’s OK if I don’t kiss the Blarney Stone, as I already have the gift of gab, perhaps thanks to “Nana” Katherine Kirwan Bahlke. Fortunately, everything went according to plan. I left A Flat on Abbey Road at about 9 am, and headed out to Circus Road and the #46 bus to Paddington. The Heathrow Express train that was boarding at the platform closed its doors just as I passed through the barrier; so I got to take my time getting on the train across the platform and stowing my luggage. Fifteen minutes after departing Paddington Station I arrived at the connection to Terminal One at Heathrow, home of Aer Lingus.
Once at the Heathrow stop, I ran like a rat in a maze as I made my way down a very long tunnel in the general direction of Terminal 1. I passed through security, at which there was NO LINE, and had so much extra time that I decide to sign up for IRIS, the eyeball identification system that is supposed to help speed one through Immigration on the way back into the UK from international destinations. The last time I tried to sign up on my way out of Heathrow, I was told that even though I am a resident of the UK, I did not have enough qualifying flights in my passport to be allowed to use the system, and anyway, that TeenE would not be able to use the service. They didn’t seem to believe me at that time that I don’t always travel with TeenE, but this did not deter me from trying again This time it worked! They took digital images of my irises both without and with my glasses on, gave me a piece of paper, and I was off. Once again, there was no wait. I now had over an hour to kill in the departure lounge before my 12:15 pm flight.
In the Heathrow system, everyone for all the flights congregates in a general waiting area replete with duty-free shops and snack and coffee emporia. Never one to assume that there will be food on a flight, I loaded up with provisions: I figured a sandwich, a bottle of water, and a grande latte would tide me over on the one-hour flight into the unknown. Of course, I had already packed granola bars and chocolate bars in my bag, so there was no danger of starvation. I suspected that I would not have time in Cork to get lunch as I tried to make a 2:25 pm train. After stocking up, I then repaired to the seats to await the posting of my gate. Departure gates are not announced until about a half hour before boarding is to begin. Once I was informed of my departure gate by both the monitor and the disembodied voice, I went on the most amazing journey. I was upgraded from a rat in a maze to a hamster in a HabiTrail cage. Moving walkways helped shorten the travel time on the straight-aways, but it took at least fifteen minutes to navigate the semicircular glass tunnels that connected the different “pods” of gates. It was a mixed crowd of tourists, business people, and Irish returning home at the gate.
The Aer Lingus flight was efficient and non-eventful. All announcements were made first in Gaelic, then in English. I hadn’t expected that; I just never even gave it a thought. I had scored a window seat so that I could watch the takeoff and landing, but the cloud cover obscured everything. All I saw was the wing.
The Cork airport was tiny, on a par with Tri-City airport in Johnson, Tennessee, or Asheville, North Carolina. There were two immigration agents, one for European Union passport holders (including the Irish) and one for Non-EU. I was third in the queue for the Non-EU, and was chomping at the bit to get through, given my tight train connection. It was now 45 minutes to train departure. Unfortunately, the couple at the head of the queue had not secured whatever paperwork they needed to enter, so they took ten minutes of processing. Meanwhile, the majority of our flight were EU, and they ALL passed through the other line by simply waving their passports at the man. When they were all through, that nice man beckoned to those of us in the sluggish queue to come on over. Two questions and an entry stamp later, I was in.
There was no queue at the taxi rank, and the kind Irish gentleman driver told me that he’d have me at the train station in under ten minutes, which was correct. He explained to me that all of the election posters that plastered the town (complete with larger-than life photos of the candidates) were for the upcoming European Union parliamentary elections. I don’t know much about EU politics, but I know that immigration to the UK is easier if one holds a passport from an EU country than one from the US of A. Just after I entered the train station, the skies opened and the rain began to fall.
My destination by train was Killarney, on Ireland’s west coast, in the county of Kerry. I had purchased the train ticket online, at a cost of twenty Euros, and just had to wave the ID number of my transaction at Miss Murphy behind the counter and I was presented with a full page itinerary with a peel-off ticket emblazoned with a holographic security strip. I was impressed by the high-tech ticket. Of course, the train on which I rode was just an ordinary train, but the scrolling LED announcement board presented the information first in Gaelic, then in English. The announcer did the same. I learned that “Corkaigh” is Cork and “Malla” is Mallow.
We passed through beautiful spring-time countryside. I have decided that the Irish invented the color green. There were so many shades of it interlocking and blending in the landscape that it was hard to tell where “mossy green” ended and “grassy green” began. I sat at a table and drank in the landscape, which consisted of undulating green hills, grey cloud-laden skies, small cream colored homes dotting the hills, and bright spots of mustard yellow provided by the blooms of the gorse bushes. Once in a while a grey stone wall would hem in some ecru sheep
We passed by Blarney Castle on our way to Mallow, where I had to change trains. Just in case the Guilford College Choir was out there somewhere, I waved.
At Mallow, two young fellows entered the train and decided to sit at my table, which was surrounded by four seats. The one nearest to me had breath heavy with whiskey (the “water of life”, in Gaelic). They were sports fans going to Killarney to watch a football match on TV as they must have been in a “Blackout” area for the match. Perhaps they were Scottish. I’ll never know. They kept complaining that “after all, they’re playing in our country” and seemed very bitter about the necessity of their journey. Whiskey-breath had an accent so heavy that even if I discounted the fact that he was slurring his speech, I could not understand him at all. I had pulled out my knitting and the complicated pattern for a drop-stitch scarf that required a lot of counting, so I hoped they wouldn’t try and engage me in conversation.
I’m sorry to report that this ploy failed. Whiskey-breath, who fancied himself a comedian, turned right to me and asked me a question. “Blah blah blah blah pinnin”. I ignored him. He came back with it again. This time I looked at him. He could have been Quentin Tarantino’s love child. I’m sure the look on my face must have been “Are you talking to me?” He tried to communicate with me two more times. Aha! He was making a comment about my knitting. He had been saying “I can see that this one likes a bit of pinning”. I guess that is what they call knitting in Ireland or wherever he was from. I tried to make it clear that I could not understand what he was saying. His friend, Stripe-Shirt, translated for him “She doesn’t understand what you are saying”. I told them that I was working on a complicated pattern, and that if they noticed that my lips were moving as I knitted, they’d know that I was counting and couldn’t really talk. After another stop or two they moved across the aisle, to my great relief.
I took another cab from the Killarney train station to the Best Western Eviston House Hotel, centrally located on “New” Street in the shopping district. The Guilford College Choir had not yet arrived, but their guide had phone from the coach and they were expected shortly. After being checked in to my room by a Ms. Murphy, I decided to go over to the Tourist Office around the corner and pick up some area information and maps. By the time I got back, the coach was parked and a horde of fresh young faces was disembarking. Son glimpsed me through the lobby window and I was greeted with a big bear hug.
The choir had an hour and a half before they had to reboard the coach in concert dress for their Saturday evening performance. Sunday’s “gig” was to be at an Alzheimer’s unit of a “Care Home” affiliated with a church just outside of Killarney. When the parish priest heard that this was happening, he invited the choir to sing a Saturday night Mass. I asked the tour guide if it would be OK for me to ride with them to the service, and she introduced herself to me. Her name was Odile Murphy, and she is one of the nicest people ever. She said not only would it be all right on Saturday night, but that if I wanted to join them on their morning trip to a local scenic spot the next day, that would be fine, too.
Son and I scarfed down some sandwiches from the Subway across the street, and then sat in the lobby chatting before he had to go upstairs to change into his tux. All 60 of us boarded the coach and then the mist turned back to rain as we headed out of town toward Killcommon. Ms. Murphy came over the PA system with an announcement: “We’d like to welcome Doug’s Mom to the tour bus”. This was answered by a resounding chorus of “Hi, Doug’s Mom”. I stood and waved, and told them, my name. They all laughed and I replied with some witty banter. Son poked me with his elbow to get me to shut up so I did. Meanwhile, Ms. Murphy reminded us that “Kill” means “stream”, and I thought of the instances in New York State where it is used in the same way “Fishkill”, “Peekskill”, etc.
Killcommon was an uncommonly beautiful spot. It was now half past seven in the evening, and the sun was nowhere near setting. The rain stopped as we disembarked the coach. We entered a modern church built in the round, with the part behind the altar made of bentwood staves like the inside of a prow of a ship. Between the staves there was a gorgeous patchwork of colorful stained glass illustrating animals, people, and natural motifs from the Bible and from Ireland. Mass was packed; either a show of support for the choir (who had been added on with very short notice) or that is just what one does in Ireland on a Saturday night.
The choir sang with no instrumental accompaniment. Their sound was breathtaking in the perfect acoustics of that church, and I was moved to tears by the beauty of the whole experience. I remarked to someone later that it was the first time I had ever been to a mass that was not a wedding or a funeral. They sang about four selections during the service, and one could tell that the congregation was not used to such…lengthy… musical offerings. They were eager to be on their way after the hour was up.
I was wondering if they would all disappear, or if there would be a “coffee hour” at 8 pm. Fortunately for the choir, most of whom had not eaten anything, there was a generous spread of “tea” at the Rectory across the street. Several generous women stood by to refill our tea cups and pass around the plates of sandwiches and homemade sweets. We all felt warmly welcomed. At about half past eight I was ready to return to the coach and walked outside to take in the evening. It was chilly, so I boarded just as the mist returned.
We returned to the hotel and Son changed out of his tux. We found the last two seats in the pub just as the musical act was warming up. The pub, called Danny Mann’s, bills itself as Ireland’s Most Famous Pub. I’m not sure if it’s true, but they do offer live music most nights, and Saturday night’s group was The Molly Maguires. They played an entertaining mix of traditional Irish vocal music. Son and I enjoyed some Carlsburg (I know, it’s not Irish, but I hadn’t developed a taste for Guinness yet) and I chased it with a shot of Jameson whiskey, served neat, with water on the side, in honor of my Dad. God forbid that a bartender or waiter should pour the water into the whiskey glass! I decided to carry on the tradition, sans ice.
By a quarter to eleven pm, I was well and truly ready for bed. I knew that the “young people” would be up much later, so said my goodbyes. Son walked me to my room, and we agreed to meet up in the breakfast room the next day. I slept well, and was only awakened once by the sound of some merrymakers singing their way down the street. You could hear the sound getting fainter and fainter as they made their way out of town.
What a happy day!
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Row, Row, Row your Boat? 100th posting!
Hello again dear readers. Herewith is the 100th blog posting, in which I am run over by a kayak (on dry land).
Please pardon the blogger’s hiatus: I was so busy living my life that I ran out of energy to chronicle it.
Here is a list of things I could have been writing about in the past month:
--Hearing the news that my father was admitted to the hospital for treatment of a clot in his leg (DVT) on his 85th birthday.
--Going away for an overnight in the Cotswolds and taking a hike through a pasture filled with horses, over a stile, and into another pasture filled with sheep and lambs. Having the shoe sucked off my right foot by a rogue mud patch. Having to wash my shoes and socks in the sink at the hotel.
--Taking a break in the hotel’s Jacuzzi spa, and having the same shin and ankle pain that I experienced after my last transatlantic flight, complete with swollen ankle and bulging blue veins.
--Trying to reach a private doctor through email about said problem, and getting no response (he was away). Trying to get an urgent care appointment through the NHS. (I was told to call the next day and get a same-day emergency appointment).
--Carrying on with my social plans. The St. John’s Wood Women’s Club annual Spring Luncheon was to be held in a restaurant in Camden. The plan was to take a canal boat from the Little Venice area of London (near Maida Vale in W9) along the Regent’s Canal to Camden.
--Becoming the only woman on the face of the earth to be run over by a kayak on dry land. Now I have your attention!
As I and 50 of my new best friends were walking down the towpath on the way to the canal boat, I was walking carefully as the veins in my shins were swollen and throbbing. I had the canal to my left, and I noticed a man passing me to my right, along the wall. He was carrying a lilac kayak. For some reason, he couldn’t have waited for the group of us to pass his put-in point. He had to walk up from behind us and insert himself into the middle of the group. Then, instead of waiting for us all to pass, he either lost control of (giving him the benefit of the doubt) or unwisely, decided to swing the boat around and put in perpendicular to the water’s edge. There was no warning that this was about to happen, and no time to react. I was broadsided in the front of the shins by the boat. This knocked me off balance, and I took a step forward to avoid falling backwards on my ass/hip/head. As I stepped forward, the boat came back at my shins for another bite. This time, I “decided” to fall forward INTO the boat, and wound up smashing down on my rear end into the molded plastic seat of the kayak.
At least eight women leapt towards me with cries of “are you all right”? I sat dazed in the seat of the kayak which now rested on the asphalt towpath. The Australian young man said “You walked into my boat!!” The women asked if I was hurt. “Just my ass, and my pride”, I answered. They couldn’t believe I hadn’t broken anything. The Aussie kept on trying to blame me for falling into his kayak. After about five attempts, to which I said nothing and wouldn't even LOOK at him, he finally said it was completely his fault, but he never apologized. Of course, the story of my shins was just too long to try and describe the pre-existing condition, but now they REALLY hurt. After a minute or two I got up and hobbled over to the boat and boarded it gingerly. The two glasses of wine I enjoyed at lunch at the restaurant Gilgamesh that afternoon certainly helped to soothe my wounded ego, if not my throbbing shins.
The next day I was able to see one of the GPs in the NHS practice to which I belong. She thought, given the conditions of the initial pain (an airplane flight—my legs were fine when I got on at Heathrow, and in agony when I got off in Boston for my father-in-law’s funeral) that an immediate assessment for DVT was in order. I was pretty sure that was not what was causing the swollen veins in my shins and feet, but I wasn’t going to tell her how to do her job.
I was referred to the Rapid Assessment Unit at St. Mary’s Hospital Paddington. This unit seems to exist solely to assess for DVT. There were two other patients there that afternoon, both with swollen ankles and calf pain, both in their 80’s. It turned out none of us had DVT. The nurses told me that what I was doing to treat the painful veins was correct, and to keep doing it (I have entered the land of Support Hose). I am keeping systematic track of changes in barometric pressure (airplane cabins), heat (Jacuzzi baths) and monthly hormone status, as the swelling and pain in my shins is brought on by the same conditions as most of my migraine headaches. I tried to get the private GP, who works with the dive chamber in a nearby hospital, interested in studying my shins and re-creating the symptoms with systematic manipulation of the experimental conditions, but I was not taken seriously.
So I came home with a second pair of support hose (trendy black!), some Ibuprofen with codeine, and a new appreciation for the National Health Service.
Other news includes the fact that we are looking for a bigger flat or house, and that I have been to Ireland for the first time. Details of that trip shall follow when I get the pictures uploaded. I thought I’d spare you a gory photo of my shins…
Please pardon the blogger’s hiatus: I was so busy living my life that I ran out of energy to chronicle it.
Here is a list of things I could have been writing about in the past month:
--Hearing the news that my father was admitted to the hospital for treatment of a clot in his leg (DVT) on his 85th birthday.
--Going away for an overnight in the Cotswolds and taking a hike through a pasture filled with horses, over a stile, and into another pasture filled with sheep and lambs. Having the shoe sucked off my right foot by a rogue mud patch. Having to wash my shoes and socks in the sink at the hotel.
--Taking a break in the hotel’s Jacuzzi spa, and having the same shin and ankle pain that I experienced after my last transatlantic flight, complete with swollen ankle and bulging blue veins.
--Trying to reach a private doctor through email about said problem, and getting no response (he was away). Trying to get an urgent care appointment through the NHS. (I was told to call the next day and get a same-day emergency appointment).
--Carrying on with my social plans. The St. John’s Wood Women’s Club annual Spring Luncheon was to be held in a restaurant in Camden. The plan was to take a canal boat from the Little Venice area of London (near Maida Vale in W9) along the Regent’s Canal to Camden.
--Becoming the only woman on the face of the earth to be run over by a kayak on dry land. Now I have your attention!
As I and 50 of my new best friends were walking down the towpath on the way to the canal boat, I was walking carefully as the veins in my shins were swollen and throbbing. I had the canal to my left, and I noticed a man passing me to my right, along the wall. He was carrying a lilac kayak. For some reason, he couldn’t have waited for the group of us to pass his put-in point. He had to walk up from behind us and insert himself into the middle of the group. Then, instead of waiting for us all to pass, he either lost control of (giving him the benefit of the doubt) or unwisely, decided to swing the boat around and put in perpendicular to the water’s edge. There was no warning that this was about to happen, and no time to react. I was broadsided in the front of the shins by the boat. This knocked me off balance, and I took a step forward to avoid falling backwards on my ass/hip/head. As I stepped forward, the boat came back at my shins for another bite. This time, I “decided” to fall forward INTO the boat, and wound up smashing down on my rear end into the molded plastic seat of the kayak.
At least eight women leapt towards me with cries of “are you all right”? I sat dazed in the seat of the kayak which now rested on the asphalt towpath. The Australian young man said “You walked into my boat!!” The women asked if I was hurt. “Just my ass, and my pride”, I answered. They couldn’t believe I hadn’t broken anything. The Aussie kept on trying to blame me for falling into his kayak. After about five attempts, to which I said nothing and wouldn't even LOOK at him, he finally said it was completely his fault, but he never apologized. Of course, the story of my shins was just too long to try and describe the pre-existing condition, but now they REALLY hurt. After a minute or two I got up and hobbled over to the boat and boarded it gingerly. The two glasses of wine I enjoyed at lunch at the restaurant Gilgamesh that afternoon certainly helped to soothe my wounded ego, if not my throbbing shins.
The next day I was able to see one of the GPs in the NHS practice to which I belong. She thought, given the conditions of the initial pain (an airplane flight—my legs were fine when I got on at Heathrow, and in agony when I got off in Boston for my father-in-law’s funeral) that an immediate assessment for DVT was in order. I was pretty sure that was not what was causing the swollen veins in my shins and feet, but I wasn’t going to tell her how to do her job.
I was referred to the Rapid Assessment Unit at St. Mary’s Hospital Paddington. This unit seems to exist solely to assess for DVT. There were two other patients there that afternoon, both with swollen ankles and calf pain, both in their 80’s. It turned out none of us had DVT. The nurses told me that what I was doing to treat the painful veins was correct, and to keep doing it (I have entered the land of Support Hose). I am keeping systematic track of changes in barometric pressure (airplane cabins), heat (Jacuzzi baths) and monthly hormone status, as the swelling and pain in my shins is brought on by the same conditions as most of my migraine headaches. I tried to get the private GP, who works with the dive chamber in a nearby hospital, interested in studying my shins and re-creating the symptoms with systematic manipulation of the experimental conditions, but I was not taken seriously.
So I came home with a second pair of support hose (trendy black!), some Ibuprofen with codeine, and a new appreciation for the National Health Service.
Other news includes the fact that we are looking for a bigger flat or house, and that I have been to Ireland for the first time. Details of that trip shall follow when I get the pictures uploaded. I thought I’d spare you a gory photo of my shins…
Sunday, April 19, 2009
CLOSE TO THE EDGE (I get up, I get down)
Anybody who was invited along on today’s walk and chose not to go missed a real doozy.
I left the flat at noon and boarded a number 13 bus north up Finchley Road. Destination: Golder’s Green, London, NW11 location of my old 1978 flat and a particularly fine park that is connected to Hampstead Heath. The weather forecasters had predicted a fine, sunny day, with temperatures slated to reach all the way to 19! I don’t know what that is in Fahrenheit, but suspect it is pretty warm.
A looooong hike was planned, in order to get me into shape for a scheduled, guided walk through the scenic bluebell woods of Buckinghamshire on May 6th. As I have been having foot and ankle problems ever since I fell flat on my face on the pavement in Feb, and then again after my flight over to the US created a severe case of shin splints, I thought I had better test out the old pins and see if I could really attempt a nine mile hike. The Heath is a good place to hike, and besides, if I had to bail out at any point, there is easy bus access back to NW8 from several locations around its perimeter.
I headed out-of-doors in my new hiking cropped-trousers, a long-sleeve cotton shirt, and a fleece. My backpack contained wallet, phone, water bottle, “oyster card” for bus fare, umbrella (although there was not a cloud in the sky, I’ve learned not to trust that particular sign) mp3-player, Proust’s Swann’s Way (see previous posting) a guide to walking tours of Hampstead Heath, my knitting, and my new sketchbook and charcoals.
As soon as I was on the bus I realized that I had forgotten to move my orthopedic arch-supporting insoles from the new sneakers into the old walking shoes. “No problem!” I thought. “I’ll just pop into the Boots the Chemist (think CVS) up in Golder’s Green and buy another pair of insoles. After about twelve minutes, we rolled into NW11 and I was disappointed to see that the interior of Boots was pretty dark. “Oh well,” I said to myself. I’ll just walk until the feet start to hurt and then sit and sketch/read/knit for a while.”
I went back “down” Finchley Road a few cross-streets, popping into the local Sainsbury’s Supermarket to see if they had the required foot-gear. They had a full complement of hosiery, but no insoles. I went up to West Heath Ave. and walked up the long drive into Golder’s Hill Park. After a minute, I saw a tantalizing wooden gate. Aha!! The secret back entrance I have been looking for since I moved to London a few months ago. I had remembered that there was a short-cut from my old flat which took me down a tiny path and into the park, and there it was. The path was bordered by a riot of Forget-me-Nots, looking up at me with their clear blue eyes, and lined with the fallen blooms of a red camellia-bush. Spring is in full force here!
I walked back out to the main road so I could find my way in next time, then retraced my steps into the Park. It was now 1 pm, and I started “the clock” on my walk.
The Park was teeming with hundreds of people, and thousands of blooms. Purple azalea, pink camellias, orange azalea, pink rhododendrons with white throats and crimson rims, beds of unknown purple flowers, and the first bees of the season were being admired by people and dogs alike. The tea café was absolutely loaded with people. I decided to make a preventive visit to the loo, and it was a good thing I did, as it allowed me to walk further than I ever have before.
Before taking off again, however, I decided to rest up on the grass. The sun felt so good warming the earth. I could feel its warmth on my skin, but it wasn’t too hot. It was just right for taking off the fleece and watching the tots for a few minutes. Then—onward and upward.
A helpful sign pointed the way out of Golder’s Hill Park and into the Heath proper. Another one pointed me in the direction of the Hill Garden and Pergola. I had seen this area in December when the St. John’s Wood Women’s Club did our walk of the Heath, when nothing was in bloom. I was looking forward to seeing it in its late April clothing. This is a garden that used to belong to the grand house nearby: a HUGE pergola with multiple terraces, steps, and hidden garden knots. It may be the most beautiful garden in London. Back in “the day” (1978) it was derelict and closed and one was advised to avoid the area. The corporation of the City of London renovated it in the 90’s and it was reopened in 1995, I was informed by a sign.
I had deliberately left my camera at home so that I would not waste precious walking time taking close-up photos of colorful blooms. Why then, you may ask, did I bring my sketchbook? There is no good answer to that question. A nice bench near a reflecting pool beckoned and I decided to sketch for a bit. I haven’t drawn in several decades and felt more than a little rusty, but enjoyed it thoroughly. My sketch of the area around the reflecting pool does not show the clumps of children who were attempting to scoop out tadpoles with their nets, and the toddlers who were vigorously whacking the surface of the water with long sticks. These activities held their attention for at least half an hour, so who can blame the parents for wanting a little down time? The pool was only four inches deep so no one was in any danger of much in case they fell in, unless it was a coating of green algae.
After a while, I decided to press on. I passed into some more familiar territory, recognizing the path I used to take to skirt around the formerly dangerous pergola area. Soon I was crossing North End Road near Jack Straw’s Castle (a pub) and stopping at an ice cream truck on Spaniard’s Road, where I learned that the proper name for sprinkles (i.e. “jimmies”) here is Hundreds and Thousands. My soft-serve vanilla cone (the only option) was pierced with a Cadbury’s Flake candy, dipped in the multicolored sprinkles, and drizzled with chocolate syrup. The only thing that could push me into a more fully ecstatic state would be my favorite music, so I whipped out my iPod and cranked up the Yes. (More on my musical ecstasy later)
Duly fortified, I entered the main part of Hampstead Heath on the bikeway. This is part of the route I used to take between Golder’s Green and Highgate back in the day. A brisk pace for about ten minutes, which I matched with brisk licks to my melting ice cream cone, brought me to the highest point in London, where a lovely view of the village of Highgate stretches out. The grass on that lawn was about eight inches high, and will not be mown all summer. I went to the fenced-in area that is apocryphally known as the burying place of Boudicca, ancient Queen of the Icenii in pre-Roman times. It now contains a grove of relatively young cypress trees. The entire fence is encircled by benches, and I was able to sit for a few minutes and “tune in” to the energy of the place. “A sacred grove” is what came to me, although evidence of recently charred wood in a fireplace means that my impression may have come from some modern-day Druids.
I continued down the hill through an allee of beech trees, and over to Parliament Hill, from which a lovely panorama of the London skyline can be seen. There were about a dozen para-sail type kites being flown by children and adults, and the area teemed with hundreds of people and dozens of dogs. The Heath is certainly THE place to be on a fine Sunday afternoon.
By this time it was about half past three, and I decided to descend back into civilization via the Hampstead side of the open space. From there it would be easy to hop aboard the number 46 bus and be back at the flat in relatively short order. The music, however was communicating directly to my feet, and instead of going down Well Walk (NW3) toward Rosslyn Hill Road and a certain rendezvous with the number 46 bus, I kept on going.
Google Earth informs me that I took the following route:
South on Parliament Hill, passing Nassington Road, which jogged something in my memory bank, but I could not figure out why. Now I remember it is where NH-Sis-in-Law lived for a few weeks after her own Junior Year Abroad adventure at the University of Warwick in the year _____ please provide via a comment, Beth.
The next portion of the walk was designed to connect the dots in my mind between the locations I knew on EAST Heath Road with those on WEST Heath Road (not to be confused with West Heath AVE as traversed at the beginning of my hike.) I headed Northwest on EAST Heath Road, crossing Well Walk, Well Road, Squire’s Mount, and Heath Street. Next, west past Branch Hill, passing Hermitage Lane, Elm Walk, Westover Hill and Eden Close. At “the T” in the road, I turned South on WEST Heath Road, and followed it along until I got to Finchley Road. I figured I’d walk south on Finchley Road until my iPod ran out of juice or my feet gave out, whichever came first. I passed the Scuba-Diving store (really! In London, of all places!!) passed Burgess Hill, and decided to cut over to the 139 bus to Abbey Road via Fortune Green Road. I passed the Hampstead Cemetary (I never knew it was there) and shortly found myself on West End Lane, where I waited ten minutes for a bus the rest of the way.
The Google Earth “ruler” application allowed me to plot all these twists and turns in detail. From stepping off the 13 bus in NW11 to getting on the 139 in West Hampstead, I clocked 5.89 miles. From the throbbing in my right knee and foot, I’d have put it closer to 8 miles, but computers apparently don’t lie.
Why was I able to keep going after thinking I’d give in after about four miles? I’ll give the credit to the music of YES, my favorite music of all time and space (in this lifetime, at least, in addition to the Beethoven, Schuman, and Hildegard music on which I grooved in other lifetimes) Several years ago, I was interviewed by my mentor and friend Kurt Leland for his 2005 book Music and the Soul: A Listener’s Guide to Achieving Transcendent Musical Experiences. Kurt’s interest and experience was mostly in the realm of classical music and jazz, not the rock’n’roll that has been the soundtrack to much of my life, although he and I are about the same age. My goal was to expose him to music that I use deliberately to change my level of consciousness. He was able to describe in esoteric and energetic terms exactly how my favorite music moves through the levels of the energy centers. During today’s walk, I listened to Close to the Edge, which I have always used for “energetic smudging”, i.e. clearing out stale or stagnant “vibes” and moving up and down through wakefulness into transcendence, in which one feels connected to a higher state of consciousness than one’s own individual mind. Also on today’s playlist: “Awaken”, from Going for the One, which Kurt Leland describes as “beginning in the visionary realm…and soon cross(ing) over into the sublime realm. Most of the fifteen-and-a-half-minute song is a luminous macrorhythmic wave that gently undulated through each of the levels of the seventh (expanded consciousness) center, providing one of the longest periods of exposure to the expanded consciousness of this center that I’ve heard in rock music. In the yoga of listening, “Awaken” provides an excellent object of meditation to open the seventh center for those who are more attracted to the sounds of rock than classical music.”
The third piece of YES music that was propelling me forward on the final stretch was “The Gates of Delirium” from their 1974 album Relayer. Kurt Leland reports that “The remarkable thing about this song is that it not only moves through the crisis zone of irrationality, but eventually achieves the grace” of the energy center he refers to as “cosmic consciousness”, “one of the few examples…that I’ve so far encountered in nonclassical music.
So, I was in an altered state, you might say, of expanded consciousness, feeling both at one with the world and apart from my body, while feeling connected to my soul and the wisdom and energy of the universe. Kurt quotes me in his book as saying the following about the music of YES:
Marjie “ tells me that some Yes fans use drugs while listening to their music, but she has never done so. She emphasizes that the consciousness-altering aspects of Yes’s songs are in the music. Drugs are not required to become aware of or be affected by them.” (p. 251) Who needs drugs when you have musical ecstasy combined with movement through a mystical place on a sunny day?
And you thought I just went for a walk!! I was really attending a service in honor of the Divine Source while moving across that portion of the world we call “Hampstead Heath”.
You can read more about Kurt Leland's ideas about how music affects us at his Music and the Soul blog: www.musicandthesoul.blogspot.com
I left the flat at noon and boarded a number 13 bus north up Finchley Road. Destination: Golder’s Green, London, NW11 location of my old 1978 flat and a particularly fine park that is connected to Hampstead Heath. The weather forecasters had predicted a fine, sunny day, with temperatures slated to reach all the way to 19! I don’t know what that is in Fahrenheit, but suspect it is pretty warm.
A looooong hike was planned, in order to get me into shape for a scheduled, guided walk through the scenic bluebell woods of Buckinghamshire on May 6th. As I have been having foot and ankle problems ever since I fell flat on my face on the pavement in Feb, and then again after my flight over to the US created a severe case of shin splints, I thought I had better test out the old pins and see if I could really attempt a nine mile hike. The Heath is a good place to hike, and besides, if I had to bail out at any point, there is easy bus access back to NW8 from several locations around its perimeter.
I headed out-of-doors in my new hiking cropped-trousers, a long-sleeve cotton shirt, and a fleece. My backpack contained wallet, phone, water bottle, “oyster card” for bus fare, umbrella (although there was not a cloud in the sky, I’ve learned not to trust that particular sign) mp3-player, Proust’s Swann’s Way (see previous posting) a guide to walking tours of Hampstead Heath, my knitting, and my new sketchbook and charcoals.
As soon as I was on the bus I realized that I had forgotten to move my orthopedic arch-supporting insoles from the new sneakers into the old walking shoes. “No problem!” I thought. “I’ll just pop into the Boots the Chemist (think CVS) up in Golder’s Green and buy another pair of insoles. After about twelve minutes, we rolled into NW11 and I was disappointed to see that the interior of Boots was pretty dark. “Oh well,” I said to myself. I’ll just walk until the feet start to hurt and then sit and sketch/read/knit for a while.”
I went back “down” Finchley Road a few cross-streets, popping into the local Sainsbury’s Supermarket to see if they had the required foot-gear. They had a full complement of hosiery, but no insoles. I went up to West Heath Ave. and walked up the long drive into Golder’s Hill Park. After a minute, I saw a tantalizing wooden gate. Aha!! The secret back entrance I have been looking for since I moved to London a few months ago. I had remembered that there was a short-cut from my old flat which took me down a tiny path and into the park, and there it was. The path was bordered by a riot of Forget-me-Nots, looking up at me with their clear blue eyes, and lined with the fallen blooms of a red camellia-bush. Spring is in full force here!
I walked back out to the main road so I could find my way in next time, then retraced my steps into the Park. It was now 1 pm, and I started “the clock” on my walk.
The Park was teeming with hundreds of people, and thousands of blooms. Purple azalea, pink camellias, orange azalea, pink rhododendrons with white throats and crimson rims, beds of unknown purple flowers, and the first bees of the season were being admired by people and dogs alike. The tea café was absolutely loaded with people. I decided to make a preventive visit to the loo, and it was a good thing I did, as it allowed me to walk further than I ever have before.
Before taking off again, however, I decided to rest up on the grass. The sun felt so good warming the earth. I could feel its warmth on my skin, but it wasn’t too hot. It was just right for taking off the fleece and watching the tots for a few minutes. Then—onward and upward.
A helpful sign pointed the way out of Golder’s Hill Park and into the Heath proper. Another one pointed me in the direction of the Hill Garden and Pergola. I had seen this area in December when the St. John’s Wood Women’s Club did our walk of the Heath, when nothing was in bloom. I was looking forward to seeing it in its late April clothing. This is a garden that used to belong to the grand house nearby: a HUGE pergola with multiple terraces, steps, and hidden garden knots. It may be the most beautiful garden in London. Back in “the day” (1978) it was derelict and closed and one was advised to avoid the area. The corporation of the City of London renovated it in the 90’s and it was reopened in 1995, I was informed by a sign.
I had deliberately left my camera at home so that I would not waste precious walking time taking close-up photos of colorful blooms. Why then, you may ask, did I bring my sketchbook? There is no good answer to that question. A nice bench near a reflecting pool beckoned and I decided to sketch for a bit. I haven’t drawn in several decades and felt more than a little rusty, but enjoyed it thoroughly. My sketch of the area around the reflecting pool does not show the clumps of children who were attempting to scoop out tadpoles with their nets, and the toddlers who were vigorously whacking the surface of the water with long sticks. These activities held their attention for at least half an hour, so who can blame the parents for wanting a little down time? The pool was only four inches deep so no one was in any danger of much in case they fell in, unless it was a coating of green algae.
After a while, I decided to press on. I passed into some more familiar territory, recognizing the path I used to take to skirt around the formerly dangerous pergola area. Soon I was crossing North End Road near Jack Straw’s Castle (a pub) and stopping at an ice cream truck on Spaniard’s Road, where I learned that the proper name for sprinkles (i.e. “jimmies”) here is Hundreds and Thousands. My soft-serve vanilla cone (the only option) was pierced with a Cadbury’s Flake candy, dipped in the multicolored sprinkles, and drizzled with chocolate syrup. The only thing that could push me into a more fully ecstatic state would be my favorite music, so I whipped out my iPod and cranked up the Yes. (More on my musical ecstasy later)
Duly fortified, I entered the main part of Hampstead Heath on the bikeway. This is part of the route I used to take between Golder’s Green and Highgate back in the day. A brisk pace for about ten minutes, which I matched with brisk licks to my melting ice cream cone, brought me to the highest point in London, where a lovely view of the village of Highgate stretches out. The grass on that lawn was about eight inches high, and will not be mown all summer. I went to the fenced-in area that is apocryphally known as the burying place of Boudicca, ancient Queen of the Icenii in pre-Roman times. It now contains a grove of relatively young cypress trees. The entire fence is encircled by benches, and I was able to sit for a few minutes and “tune in” to the energy of the place. “A sacred grove” is what came to me, although evidence of recently charred wood in a fireplace means that my impression may have come from some modern-day Druids.
I continued down the hill through an allee of beech trees, and over to Parliament Hill, from which a lovely panorama of the London skyline can be seen. There were about a dozen para-sail type kites being flown by children and adults, and the area teemed with hundreds of people and dozens of dogs. The Heath is certainly THE place to be on a fine Sunday afternoon.
By this time it was about half past three, and I decided to descend back into civilization via the Hampstead side of the open space. From there it would be easy to hop aboard the number 46 bus and be back at the flat in relatively short order. The music, however was communicating directly to my feet, and instead of going down Well Walk (NW3) toward Rosslyn Hill Road and a certain rendezvous with the number 46 bus, I kept on going.
Google Earth informs me that I took the following route:
South on Parliament Hill, passing Nassington Road, which jogged something in my memory bank, but I could not figure out why. Now I remember it is where NH-Sis-in-Law lived for a few weeks after her own Junior Year Abroad adventure at the University of Warwick in the year _____ please provide via a comment, Beth.
The next portion of the walk was designed to connect the dots in my mind between the locations I knew on EAST Heath Road with those on WEST Heath Road (not to be confused with West Heath AVE as traversed at the beginning of my hike.) I headed Northwest on EAST Heath Road, crossing Well Walk, Well Road, Squire’s Mount, and Heath Street. Next, west past Branch Hill, passing Hermitage Lane, Elm Walk, Westover Hill and Eden Close. At “the T” in the road, I turned South on WEST Heath Road, and followed it along until I got to Finchley Road. I figured I’d walk south on Finchley Road until my iPod ran out of juice or my feet gave out, whichever came first. I passed the Scuba-Diving store (really! In London, of all places!!) passed Burgess Hill, and decided to cut over to the 139 bus to Abbey Road via Fortune Green Road. I passed the Hampstead Cemetary (I never knew it was there) and shortly found myself on West End Lane, where I waited ten minutes for a bus the rest of the way.
The Google Earth “ruler” application allowed me to plot all these twists and turns in detail. From stepping off the 13 bus in NW11 to getting on the 139 in West Hampstead, I clocked 5.89 miles. From the throbbing in my right knee and foot, I’d have put it closer to 8 miles, but computers apparently don’t lie.
Why was I able to keep going after thinking I’d give in after about four miles? I’ll give the credit to the music of YES, my favorite music of all time and space (in this lifetime, at least, in addition to the Beethoven, Schuman, and Hildegard music on which I grooved in other lifetimes) Several years ago, I was interviewed by my mentor and friend Kurt Leland for his 2005 book Music and the Soul: A Listener’s Guide to Achieving Transcendent Musical Experiences. Kurt’s interest and experience was mostly in the realm of classical music and jazz, not the rock’n’roll that has been the soundtrack to much of my life, although he and I are about the same age. My goal was to expose him to music that I use deliberately to change my level of consciousness. He was able to describe in esoteric and energetic terms exactly how my favorite music moves through the levels of the energy centers. During today’s walk, I listened to Close to the Edge, which I have always used for “energetic smudging”, i.e. clearing out stale or stagnant “vibes” and moving up and down through wakefulness into transcendence, in which one feels connected to a higher state of consciousness than one’s own individual mind. Also on today’s playlist: “Awaken”, from Going for the One, which Kurt Leland describes as “beginning in the visionary realm…and soon cross(ing) over into the sublime realm. Most of the fifteen-and-a-half-minute song is a luminous macrorhythmic wave that gently undulated through each of the levels of the seventh (expanded consciousness) center, providing one of the longest periods of exposure to the expanded consciousness of this center that I’ve heard in rock music. In the yoga of listening, “Awaken” provides an excellent object of meditation to open the seventh center for those who are more attracted to the sounds of rock than classical music.”
The third piece of YES music that was propelling me forward on the final stretch was “The Gates of Delirium” from their 1974 album Relayer. Kurt Leland reports that “The remarkable thing about this song is that it not only moves through the crisis zone of irrationality, but eventually achieves the grace” of the energy center he refers to as “cosmic consciousness”, “one of the few examples…that I’ve so far encountered in nonclassical music.
So, I was in an altered state, you might say, of expanded consciousness, feeling both at one with the world and apart from my body, while feeling connected to my soul and the wisdom and energy of the universe. Kurt quotes me in his book as saying the following about the music of YES:
Marjie “ tells me that some Yes fans use drugs while listening to their music, but she has never done so. She emphasizes that the consciousness-altering aspects of Yes’s songs are in the music. Drugs are not required to become aware of or be affected by them.” (p. 251) Who needs drugs when you have musical ecstasy combined with movement through a mystical place on a sunny day?
And you thought I just went for a walk!! I was really attending a service in honor of the Divine Source while moving across that portion of the world we call “Hampstead Heath”.
You can read more about Kurt Leland's ideas about how music affects us at his Music and the Soul blog: www.musicandthesoul.blogspot.com
Friday, April 17, 2009
I'm So Tired/Golden Slumbers
Hunh? What time is it? What day is it? On which continent am I located? Is there a Starbucks nearby?
Answers: 1:35 am, Saturday April 18th, Western Europe, Yes.
TeenE and I left Boston at 9 am on Wednesday, which necessitated getting up at 5:45 am. Although I was only in the US for ten days, I had completely adjusted to Eastern Daylight Time and had gone a bit overboard with it, staying up past midnight and sleeping until 9 am towards the end of the trip. The beginning of the trip was filled with tossing and turning produced by excruciating leg pain, so I guess the sleep deprivation and jet lag would catch up with me sooner or later.
Wednesday night, after a 12 hour trip door-to-door, I slept from 2 am to about 10 am. It is much easier to sleep without hot pain shooting up and down your shins and ankles. Thankfully, I did not have a repeat experience of the high altitude-induced shin splints, so was able to walk off the plane and hike the two miles to the immigration desk without having every step produce agonizing pain.
Thursday night I tried to go to sleep on the sofa at 12 midnight, but was unable to turn off the brain. I got up and wandered to the kitchen, found a snack, and tried again. It was 2 am by the time I was finally lulled into dreamland by the number 139 Night Bus chugging past the window at regular intervals. I vaguely remember waking up and seeing it was light out, and registering that Hubster was leaving the flat. "Have a good one!" I managed to mumble perkily from my perch on the sofa.
The next thing I knew I was lying there thinking "It must be around 10 or 11; I should probably get up." I wandered back into the kitchen, where I found to my surprise that it was one o'clock, as in the afternoon. I had been stretched out for almost eleven hours. The last thing I dreamed about before I woke up was that I was on a bus tour to Ipswich. In my dream, I remembered having been on that same tour several years back, but this time, they didn't have my name on the list, so I wasn't supposed to be there. "But I remember it; it's IPSWICH, like the clams." I'm pretty sure it was a tour to Ipswich, England, not Massachusetts (where the clams are from). Maybe that was my port-of-entry back from the dream world.
It surely wasn't Ipswich, but St. John's Wood. I tried in vain to wake TeenE for about a half an hour, then had success. After having lunch and puttering around, I headed out into the drizzly day.
First stop, the pharmacy in the hospital to pick up a prescription. The pharmacist, whom I call by his first name, told me what the price was "after your discount". "What discount would that be?" I asked him. "Don't you work here?" he asked, and was surprised that I didn't. I reminded him that I Volunteered at the hospice, but that they could pay me AND give me the discount if he wanted to... I guess that's what happens when you have your volunteer gig in the same place as your NHS doc, you therapist, and your front-desk reception buddies for whom you bake and with whom you stop by to chat as its on the way to everywhere else you need to go.
Next stop, Starbucks, for my first and only cup of coffee of the day at 2:30 pm. I was happily reading Proust (an assignment from the therapist) and copying down inspiring quotations on the nature of novel-writing when I spotted that ubiquitious medic making a cameo appearance. He came and went with alacrity, having things to do and patients to see.
When the hard rain that was falling drifted back into drizzles, I wandered back to the flat, where I made the Irish beef stew I had planned for dinner, and turned it down to simmer for a few hours. Then, a quick call to a friend in Massachusetts, and was so exhausted that I decided to stretch out for a bit. The bit turned into almost three hours. It was 8:15 and still light out when I got up. Hubster had come home somewhere in the interim, so I knew the stew hadn't burned.
I sent TeenE to bed at around 11pm, but I know she is still up as she just passed me in the hallway at 1:30 am. A quiet evening of TV,Facebook and knitting brings me back full circle to 2
am.
Facebook, you ask? Yes, one of life's pleasant time-wasters. Is it any worse than endless hours of computer solitaire? No, it's probably better, as you can actually connect with real people who are your friends and relatives. What a kick to be "chatting" with Annie, one of the inner circle from Wellesley College days! I also managed to use one of the applications that randomly generates different alter-ego names for you.
For example, my Italian name is : Marietta Ferrari.
I like being named after a fast car!
My Super-hero name is: The Invincible Enigma, or,
as Annie called me, IE Woman!
My Barbie name is: Bad-Taste Barbie. Enough said!
My Drag Queen name is: Leslie Licorice. Lick this!
My Witch name is: Jairia the Not-so-Ugly Witch. cackle cackle!
My Angel name is: Harachel the Angel of Knowledge.
And... for the piece de resistance, my Stripper Name is...
wait for it...
Ginger CherryDeep. SPICY!
It's 2 am. On that note, I'm going to sleep.
Answers: 1:35 am, Saturday April 18th, Western Europe, Yes.
TeenE and I left Boston at 9 am on Wednesday, which necessitated getting up at 5:45 am. Although I was only in the US for ten days, I had completely adjusted to Eastern Daylight Time and had gone a bit overboard with it, staying up past midnight and sleeping until 9 am towards the end of the trip. The beginning of the trip was filled with tossing and turning produced by excruciating leg pain, so I guess the sleep deprivation and jet lag would catch up with me sooner or later.
Wednesday night, after a 12 hour trip door-to-door, I slept from 2 am to about 10 am. It is much easier to sleep without hot pain shooting up and down your shins and ankles. Thankfully, I did not have a repeat experience of the high altitude-induced shin splints, so was able to walk off the plane and hike the two miles to the immigration desk without having every step produce agonizing pain.
Thursday night I tried to go to sleep on the sofa at 12 midnight, but was unable to turn off the brain. I got up and wandered to the kitchen, found a snack, and tried again. It was 2 am by the time I was finally lulled into dreamland by the number 139 Night Bus chugging past the window at regular intervals. I vaguely remember waking up and seeing it was light out, and registering that Hubster was leaving the flat. "Have a good one!" I managed to mumble perkily from my perch on the sofa.
The next thing I knew I was lying there thinking "It must be around 10 or 11; I should probably get up." I wandered back into the kitchen, where I found to my surprise that it was one o'clock, as in the afternoon. I had been stretched out for almost eleven hours. The last thing I dreamed about before I woke up was that I was on a bus tour to Ipswich. In my dream, I remembered having been on that same tour several years back, but this time, they didn't have my name on the list, so I wasn't supposed to be there. "But I remember it; it's IPSWICH, like the clams." I'm pretty sure it was a tour to Ipswich, England, not Massachusetts (where the clams are from). Maybe that was my port-of-entry back from the dream world.
It surely wasn't Ipswich, but St. John's Wood. I tried in vain to wake TeenE for about a half an hour, then had success. After having lunch and puttering around, I headed out into the drizzly day.
First stop, the pharmacy in the hospital to pick up a prescription. The pharmacist, whom I call by his first name, told me what the price was "after your discount". "What discount would that be?" I asked him. "Don't you work here?" he asked, and was surprised that I didn't. I reminded him that I Volunteered at the hospice, but that they could pay me AND give me the discount if he wanted to... I guess that's what happens when you have your volunteer gig in the same place as your NHS doc, you therapist, and your front-desk reception buddies for whom you bake and with whom you stop by to chat as its on the way to everywhere else you need to go.
Next stop, Starbucks, for my first and only cup of coffee of the day at 2:30 pm. I was happily reading Proust (an assignment from the therapist) and copying down inspiring quotations on the nature of novel-writing when I spotted that ubiquitious medic making a cameo appearance. He came and went with alacrity, having things to do and patients to see.
When the hard rain that was falling drifted back into drizzles, I wandered back to the flat, where I made the Irish beef stew I had planned for dinner, and turned it down to simmer for a few hours. Then, a quick call to a friend in Massachusetts, and was so exhausted that I decided to stretch out for a bit. The bit turned into almost three hours. It was 8:15 and still light out when I got up. Hubster had come home somewhere in the interim, so I knew the stew hadn't burned.
I sent TeenE to bed at around 11pm, but I know she is still up as she just passed me in the hallway at 1:30 am. A quiet evening of TV,Facebook and knitting brings me back full circle to 2
am.
Facebook, you ask? Yes, one of life's pleasant time-wasters. Is it any worse than endless hours of computer solitaire? No, it's probably better, as you can actually connect with real people who are your friends and relatives. What a kick to be "chatting" with Annie, one of the inner circle from Wellesley College days! I also managed to use one of the applications that randomly generates different alter-ego names for you.
For example, my Italian name is : Marietta Ferrari.
I like being named after a fast car!
My Super-hero name is: The Invincible Enigma, or,
as Annie called me, IE Woman!
My Barbie name is: Bad-Taste Barbie. Enough said!
My Drag Queen name is: Leslie Licorice. Lick this!
My Witch name is: Jairia the Not-so-Ugly Witch. cackle cackle!
My Angel name is: Harachel the Angel of Knowledge.
And... for the piece de resistance, my Stripper Name is...
wait for it...
Ginger CherryDeep. SPICY!
It's 2 am. On that note, I'm going to sleep.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Leaving on Jet Plane
Hello dear readers. I am back at the flat on Abbey Road, after having been away for almost two weeks. As you can read below, my father-in-law passed away on April 2nd and all of the family gathered in New Hampshire.
It was a difficult time of greiving but it was heartening to see the three generations of Hubster's family sharing the loss together.
I was able to deliver "Nana's sweater" in person to my mother-in-law. It is also known as Shiri Mor's raglan-shaped swing cardigan knitted with multi-colored short rows, pattern #19 from page 86 of the winter 2007/2008 issue of VOGUEknitting (US). I substituted a silk/wool/cotton blend for the wool in the pattern, and made it in shades of larkspur blue.
My trip also included a trip to see my sister "NeedhamSis", who is staying upbeat during her post-surgery radiation treatments. We had a wonderful visit in the springtime sun and I got to hear all about her son's acceptance at Villanova in the class of 2014.
I also visited my dear friend Melissa, who is receiving chemotherapy for Lymphoma. In her care-coordination blog, she wrote that she was developing a super-hero alter-ego to enable her to better deal with her journey. She calls her alternate-self the "Pred-a-nate-Her", due to the massive amounts of Prednisone she must take along with the other chemo drugs.
Never one to sit idly by when I could be creating something, I took her journal entry as a personal challenge. A length of hospital-green tencel cloth had been left by me in my in-laws' garage since last summer, and Nana was eager to move it on out. I brought it to Mary Ann at the Knittin' Kitten in Cambridge, MA, and we discussed possible ways of embellishing it and turning it into the Pred-a-Nate-Her's Cape. Two days later, we had a completed cape, which contained a green batik heart being supported by magenta people, and rows of circles containing cats, who of course are Reiki Masters in their own right. What else would they be doing when they sit all over us humans and purr? They are sharing their healing vibes...
Here is a photo of Melissa aka The Pred-a-Nate-Her. Please send healing wishes and prayers to her and to NeedhamSis. Thank you.
It was a difficult time of greiving but it was heartening to see the three generations of Hubster's family sharing the loss together.
I was able to deliver "Nana's sweater" in person to my mother-in-law. It is also known as Shiri Mor's raglan-shaped swing cardigan knitted with multi-colored short rows, pattern #19 from page 86 of the winter 2007/2008 issue of VOGUEknitting (US). I substituted a silk/wool/cotton blend for the wool in the pattern, and made it in shades of larkspur blue.
My trip also included a trip to see my sister "NeedhamSis", who is staying upbeat during her post-surgery radiation treatments. We had a wonderful visit in the springtime sun and I got to hear all about her son's acceptance at Villanova in the class of 2014.
I also visited my dear friend Melissa, who is receiving chemotherapy for Lymphoma. In her care-coordination blog, she wrote that she was developing a super-hero alter-ego to enable her to better deal with her journey. She calls her alternate-self the "Pred-a-nate-Her", due to the massive amounts of Prednisone she must take along with the other chemo drugs.
Never one to sit idly by when I could be creating something, I took her journal entry as a personal challenge. A length of hospital-green tencel cloth had been left by me in my in-laws' garage since last summer, and Nana was eager to move it on out. I brought it to Mary Ann at the Knittin' Kitten in Cambridge, MA, and we discussed possible ways of embellishing it and turning it into the Pred-a-Nate-Her's Cape. Two days later, we had a completed cape, which contained a green batik heart being supported by magenta people, and rows of circles containing cats, who of course are Reiki Masters in their own right. What else would they be doing when they sit all over us humans and purr? They are sharing their healing vibes...
Here is a photo of Melissa aka The Pred-a-Nate-Her. Please send healing wishes and prayers to her and to NeedhamSis. Thank you.
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