Somewhere

So today is one of those down in the dumps for no reason, anxiety-ridden, want-to-hide-under-the-duvet days. Now it could have something to do with over-indulgence on Friday night, so I'm not exactly innocent in all of this. Motivating myself to do something today has been tough, but that was the entire point in the Year of Celebration - to force myself, on days like these , to be positive.

Research-wise I've been very lazy today. Today is Kristen Stewart's birthday, but anything Twilight-related will make me more depressed. It is also Elle Fanning's birthday and I've been wanting to see Sofia Coppola's Somewhere for quite a while so I rented it off of iTunes, though have yet to actually watch it (off-book deadline for Sand in the Air is on Monday so I'm line-reading). Seeing as my sister lives just down the street from Chateau Marmont (where the film is set) I could have completed the day by heading up there for some drinks, but instead my dad's friend Tal treated my sister and I to an early dinner at the delicious Palihouse on Holloway Drive. It definitely lifted my spirits and by the end of the evening I was in a much better mood. Tal and my father have some serious similarities and although they only knew each other for a couple of years before my Dad's death they had become very close. In honour of Tal and my dad I've chosen My Funny Valentine for today's music, as they both are not-so-secret crooners and it's one of their favourites:




Sir Francis Bacon passed away on April 9th, 1626, and served as Attorney General of England. Fitting too, as Dad and Tal were/are both lawyers so today's quote comes from him:

"If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts he shall end in certainties."

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Street Fight Aftermath

Image
I have been in hiding. I spent years on this blog revealing my truth, but then I became trapped. I somehow began to believe that I couldn’t share my reality anymore and that belief imprisoned me. It imprisoned me at a time when my mind had become a madman and was living to torture me. Haunted by the continuous splatter of sounds that were crunched, smashed, thrown together and weaved with a poisonous thread; a ricochet of memories, feelings, thoughts and voices. A downright cacophony of crazy.  Photo: Nicola Muirhead So, I shared. Six weeks ago, I took to social media and finally expressed how the last 18 months of my life had truly been in a post called “The Street Fight”:  “It’s been several months since I’ve posted. In the mental health narrative, we love stories of rebirth, renewal and redemption. We watch the phoenix burn and we are inspired when we see that phoenix rise from the ashes, but we rarely bear witness to what happens in between. Brene Brown calls
Read more

Kintsugi and the Beauty in Broken Things

Image
'Hidden Damage'  Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering  There is a crack, a crack in everything  That's how the light gets in. - Leonard Cohen Kintsugi ("golden joinery" or "golden repair") is the Japanese art form of repairing broken pottery with gold. It treats the breakage and repair of the item as part of its history, its journey, its existence. Rather than hiding the damage, it brightly illuminates the repair, inviting the world to see its improved beauty. Just like pottery, we humans can crack, splinter, break, shatter. These knocks remain part of our being and, whilst a brave face might create a temporary disguise, nobody can hide forever. At least I couldn't. To heal, I found I had to expose. Kintsugi treats the crack as merely an event in the life of the object, not a reason to end it. Kintsugi knows that something is more beautiful for having been broken. As someone who considers them
Read more

The Alphabet Years: A is where the adventure begins

Image
It’s 24 days into 2018 and I’m only now sharing my new year’s resolutions. I am, however, giving myself a pass because mine aren’t just for one year, they’re for 26. Since university, I haven’t planned my life more than a few months ahead. I thought I was a free spirit, but I now believe it was indicative of the opposite – one caged by fear. One that’s scared to plan and be disappointed; terrified to make goals, in case I miss the goalposts. The letter A is for... x While I had an incredible past year of achievements, I experienced something akin to daily stress fractures on my brain, which created fissures and cracks in my mind triggering mania and depression in rapid cycles. Now, I have chosen to unlock the cage: I’m committing myself fully to my creative endeavours all while travelling wherever this wild spirit finds itself drawn to, because that spirit was slowly dying. I was not in a good way. Now, here I am with the vastness of life stretched out before me. These e
Read more