tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36475183198826158952024-03-03T10:07:03.893+11:00The Maroon Diariesin which Lady Demelza relates her Adventures, Musings and InspirationsLady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.comBlogger103125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-7142840964043344022023-03-01T22:05:00.001+11:002023-03-01T22:05:08.654+11:00a poem for an old loverwhat magic is this <div>that can draw such visceral glory, </div><div> glittering and scarlet,</div><div>from the scars of these bitter old wrecks</div><div>we carry ourselves around in</div><div>the peal of an ancient song</div><div>pounding in our ears</div><div>tugging at my skirts</div><div>what magic is this</div><div>this pounding and tugging</div><div>what magic is this</div><div>pouring forth like a river</div><div> melting</div><div>we pour forth </div><div>cascading over the roughs</div><div>we make a waterfall </div>Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-86137415981090482892022-12-31T15:29:00.002+11:002022-12-31T16:58:16.199+11:00Lady Demelza's Year in Books 2022<p> New Year's Eve and the annual reckoning of the books - my favourite holiday ritual! You can click on the link at each book's title to find out more about it. <br /></p><div style="text-align: left;">1. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17879908-traditional-healers-of-central-australia?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=8zTdtBQ0ET&rank=1" target="_blank"><i>Traditional Healers of Central Australia: Ngangkari</i></a> by NPY Women's Council Aboriginal Corporation 2013 </div><div style="text-align: left;">2. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29615052-fight-like-a-girl?ref=nav_sb_ss_1_16"><i>Fight Like A Girl</i></a> by Clementine Ford 2016</div><div style="text-align: left;">3. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15010106-desert-country?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=1xCJgoLuWM&rank=1"><i>Desert Country</i></a> by Nici Cumpston 2010</div><div style="text-align: left;">4. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/32758901-all-systems-red?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=gkJdiKUSGB&rank=1">All Systems Red</a></i> by Martha Wells 2017 </div><div style="text-align: left;">5. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36223860-artificial-condition"><i>Artificial Condition </i></a>by Martha Wells 2018</div><div style="text-align: left;">6. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/619848.Splitting"><i>Splitting </i></a>by Fay Weldon 1996</div><div style="text-align: left;">7. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25746699-the-sudden-appearance-of-hope"><i>The Sudden Appearance of Hope</i></a> by Claire North 2016</div><div style="text-align: left;">8. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23692271-sapiens"><i>Sapiens </i></a>by Yuval Noah Harari 2011 </div><div style="text-align: left;">9. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35519101-rogue-protocol"><i>Rogue Protocol</i> </a>by Martha Wells 2018 </div><div style="text-align: left;">10. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57944090-how-we-became-human"><i>How We Became Human</i></a> by Tim Dean 2021 </div><div style="text-align: left;">11. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40130093-once-upon-a-river"><i>Once Upon A River</i></a> by Diane Setterfield 2018 </div><div style="text-align: left;">12. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/37004370-the-memory-police">The Memory Police</a></i> by Yoko Ogawa 1994, English translation by Stephen Snyder 2019</div><div style="text-align: left;">13. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/50014902-the-rain-heron"><i>The Rain Heron </i></a>by Robbie Arnott 2020</div><div style="text-align: left;">14. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57941561-soil"><i>Soil </i></a>by Matthew Evans 2021</div><div style="text-align: left;">15. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/46756.Oryx_and_Crake"><i>Oryx And Crake </i></a>by Margaret Atwood 2003</div><div style="text-align: left;">16. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/39977280-the-second-cure"><i>The Second Cure</i></a> by Margaret Morgan 2018 </div><div style="text-align: left;">17. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16113737-the-reason-i-jump"><i>The Reason I Jump </i></a>by Naoki Higashida 2007, English translation by KA Yoshida and David Mitchell 2013</div><div style="text-align: left;">18. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13648.Gifts"><i>Gifts </i></a>by Ursula K. Le Guin 2004<br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">19. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4989.The_Red_Tent"><i>The Red Tent</i></a> by Anita Diamant 1997<br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">20. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/251688.Breakfast_at_Tiffany_s_and_Three_Stories"><i>Breakfast at Tiffany's and Three Stories</i></a> by Truman Capote 1958</div><div style="text-align: left;">21. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/615991.Fly_Away_Peter"><i>Fly Away Peter</i></a> by David Malouf 1998<br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">22. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2570116-stradbroke-dreamtime"><i>Stradbroke Dreamtime</i></a> by Oodgeroo Nunukul 1982 </div><div style="text-align: left;">23. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/78433.The_Blind_Assassin">The Blind Assassin </a></i>by Margaret Atwood 2000</div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;">Looking over this list, I reckon the book that had the most impact on me this year was <i>Soil </i>by Matthew Evans. It's absolutely turned my understanding of a lot of things about how nature works completely around and inside out. And I love it when that happens. Yes, there were quite a few bits that were tedious with excessive amounts of supportive statistics being listed, and I know that many readers complained that this made it fizzle out, so I found it expedient to just skim a bit through the boring bits, and then get to the marvelling in wonder at the next idea presented in the next chapter. It's so exciting. </div><div style="text-align: left;">The one that really did fizzle out, though, was <i>Sapiens </i>by Yuval Noah Harari. It started off with the marvelling in wonder at some brilliant ideas, but the discourse really degenerated as the book went on. Some of the wild tangents it went off into by the end were quite dismaying. <i>How We Became Human</i> by Tim Dean was a much better exploration of the subject. That's the one I would recommend. </div><div style="text-align: left;">Everything Margaret Atwood does is brilliant. She just can't help herself. <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">I was surprised to discover that the original character of Holly Golightly was really very different than Audrey Hepburn's iconic representation in the movie when I read the gorgeous novella <i>Breakfast at Tiffany's</i> by Truman Capote. This writer's stories were superbly crafted. It was a beautiful little gem of a discovery in a tiny, remote op shop I passed through on a road trip. Blessed be the Op Shop Faeries! for all the literary treasures and surprises they bring into my life. <br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span></span></div>Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-13544354116978611792021-02-14T12:21:00.001+11:002021-02-14T12:31:49.589+11:00Lady Demelza's Year in Books 2020Here we go for my traditional yearly book list, which traditionally I would publish at New Year. However, I seem to have spent most of January floundering around like a shipwreck, and I'm just finding my feet again now. I can face things like embedded links again. Here is what I read in 2020.<div><br /></div><div>1. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/33153571-the-night-brother?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=5Kjr9WO4Qy&rank=4"><i>The Night Brother</i></a> by Rosie Garland 2017</div><div>2. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43864583-to-the-land-of-long-lost-friends"><i>To The Land of Long Lost Friends</i></a> by Alexander McCall Smith 2019</div><div>3. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36628420-melmoth"><i>Melmoth</i></a> by Sarah Perry 2018</div><div>4. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/845386.Journal_of_a_Solitude"><i>Journal of a Solitude</i></a> by May Sarton 1973</div><div>5. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/81034.Heroes_and_Villains"><i>Heroes and Villains</i></a> by Angela Carter 1969</div><div>6. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/89717.The_Haunting_of_Hill_House">The Haunting of Hill House</a> </i>by Shirley Jackson 1959</div><div>7.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2805695-mother-sister-daughter-lover"> <i>Mother, Sister, Daughter, Lover</i></a> by Jan Clausen 1980</div><div>8. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43808723-everything-is-f-cked"><i>Everything is F*cked</i></a> by Mark Manson 2019</div><div>9. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52527550-the-animals-in-that-country"><i>The Animals in That Country</i></a> by Laura Jean McKay 2020</div><div>10. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43575115-the-starless-sea"><i>The Starless Sea</i> </a>by Erin Morgenstern 2019</div><div>11. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40737717-boys-will-be-boys"><i>Boys Will Be Boys</i></a> by Clementine Ford 2018</div><div>12. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/45449501-sand-talk"><i>Sand Talk</i></a> by Tyson Yunkaporta 2019</div><div>13. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/910444.The_Great_Cosmic_Mother"><i>The Great Cosmic Mother</i></a> by Monica Sjoo & Barbara Mor 1987</div><div>14. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4891257-nightflowers"><i>Nightflowers</i></a> by Kathleen Stewart 1996</div><div>15. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/198487.Fireworks"><i>Fireworks</i></a> by Angela Carter 1974, rev. ed. 1987</div><div>16. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40229412-too-much-lip"><i>Too Much Lip</i></a> by Melissa Lucashenko 2018</div><div>17. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1488101.Rosie_Little_s_Cautionary_Tales_for_Girls"><i>Rosie Little's Cautionary Tales for Girls</i></a> by Danielle Wood 2007 (re-read)</div><div><br /></div><div>I reckon the star of the year was <i>Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World</i> by Tyson Yunkaporta. I feel like this is the next level of uncovering the truth of Indigenous history and culture in this country since Bruce Pascoe's <i>Dark Emu</i> debunked the myth of the hunter-gatherer. Mind blown. And then blown again.</div><div>Special Mention goes to <i>The Haunting of Hill House</i> by Shirley Jackson. I had wanted to read this book for years, and in 2020 I finally found a copy. Now I understand why it is such a masterpiece. The intellectual thrill of the brilliance of the writing matches the psychological thrill of the classic horror story. </div><div> And the dud for this year was <i>Everything is F*cked: A Book About Hope</i> by Mark Manson. This bloke is interesting and clever and his writing is entertaining, but his philosophy just doesn't hold up to the varieties of reality that we have to negotiate in this world. </div><div>You can also see my reading lists for <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2020/02/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2019.html">2019</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2019/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2018.html">2018</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2017/12/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2017.html">2017</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2016/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2015.html">2015</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2015/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2014.html">2014</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2014/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2013.html">2013</a> and <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2012/12/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2012.html">2012</a>.</div>Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-19396299413122203812020-05-18T16:37:00.000+10:002020-05-18T16:41:28.501+10:00and then there were ten little Vintage Children's Book Illustration cards My mum loved the bunting I made from children's book pages, and she asked me to make her some cards with pieces of similar pages. I didn't want to buy new cardboard and matching envelopes to make a set, though, that would be going against my buy-(almost) nothing-new guidelines. But then I found a set of ten matching cards, new and unopened, in an op shop. They had pictures on the front and logos on the back, but the insides are blank. So, this is what I came up with.<br />
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I covered the logos on the back with some scraps of book pages or wrapping paper. Each card has its own matching square envelope, with the postcard squares and everything. Schmick.<br />
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And there we go, that's a project finished that I started years ago and have been meaning to get around to finishing one day for all the time in between. Satisfaction feels! </div>
Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-22343256620645767022020-02-02T13:14:00.000+11:002020-02-02T23:04:47.738+11:00Lady Demelza's Year in Books 2019Haha you thought I'd forgotten, didn't you! No, it's not that, but my procrastination is rotten. My book reading habits are also still suffering terribly at the hands of social media. But anyway, here we are.<br />
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1.<i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/380234.Lost_Souls"> Lost Souls</a></i> by Poppy Z. Brite 1992<br />
2.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6417951-every-word-is-a-bird-we-teach-to-sing"> <i>Every Word is a Bird We Teach to Sing</i></a> by Daniel Tammet 2017<br />
3. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28228849-the-8-week-blood-sugar-diet">The 8-Week Blood Sugar Diet</a></i> by Dr Michael Mosley 2015<br />
4. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2116855.Soul">Soul</a></i> by Tobsha Learner 2006<br />
5.<i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35942557-aspecting-the-goddess"> Aspecting the Goddess</a></i> by Jane Meredith 2018<br />
6. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4965.Year_of_Wonders">Year of Wonders</a></i> by Geraldine Brooks 2001<br />
7. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/37560351-my-mother-s-house">My Mother's House</a></i> by Colette 1922, English translation by Una Vincenzo Troubridge and Enid McLeod 1949, and <i>Sido</i>, 1929, English translation by Enid McLeod 1949, published in one volume 1953<br />
8.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38650989-witchcraft-into-the-wilds"> <i>Witchcraft into the Wilds</i></a> by Rachel Patterson 2018<br />
9. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35128889-the-clever-guts-diet">The Clever Guts Diet</a></i> by Dr Michael Mosley 2017<br />
10. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6490566-there-once-lived-a-woman-who-tried-to-kill-her-neighbor-s-baby">There Once Lived a Woman Who Tried to Kill Her Neighbour's Baby</a></i> by Ludmilla Petrushevskaya, 1987 - ?, collected and translated by Keith Gessen and Anna Summers 2009<br />
11. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/33776481-pagan-portals---australian-druidry">Australian Druidry</a></i> by Julie Brett 2017<br />
12. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8303977-the-sound-of-a-wild-snail-eating"><i>The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating</i> </a>by Elisabeth Tova Bailey 2010<br />
13. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7945295-my-mother-she-killed-me-my-father-he-ate-me">My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me</a></i> edited by Kate Bernheimer 2010<br />
14. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21401526-dark-emu">Dark Emu</a></i> by Bruce Pascoe 2014<br />
15. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13499777-white-time">White Time</a></i> by Margo Lanagan 1999<br />
16. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41716946-the-gameshouse">The Gameshouse</a></i> by Claire North 2019<br />
17. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/42899201-the-dreamers">The Dreamers</a></i> by Karen Thompson Walker 2019<br />
18. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25614984-spark-joy">Spark Joy</a></i> by Marie Kondo 2016<br />
19. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49441632-the-ten-thousand-doors-of-january">The Ten Thousand Doors of January</a></i> by Alix E. Harrow 2019<br />
20. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43550676-the-girl-in-red">The Girl in Red</a></i> by Christina Henry 2019<br />
21. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25526296-every-heart-a-doorway">Every Heart a Doorway</a></i> by Seanan McGuire 2016<br />
22.<i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/44909177-frankissstein"> Frankissstein</a></i> by Jeanette Winterson 2019<br />
<br />
It was absolutely delightful to discover the works of Ludmilla Petrushevskaya - that is some dark twisted stuff there.<br />
<i>The</i> <i>Sound of a Wild Snail Eating</i> is one that I would recommend to everyone. A short, easy read that is profoundly meaningful and possibly life-changing.<br />
There were loads of pretty crappy books along the way that I didn't finish and they haven't made the list, and that is a very good thing.<br />
You can also see my Year in Books for <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2019/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2018.html">2018</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2017/12/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2017.html">2017</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2016/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2015.html">2015</a>,<a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2015/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2014.html"> 2014</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2014/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2013.html">2013</a>, and <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2012/12/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2012.html">2012</a>.Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-69629038280370420722019-01-01T09:57:00.000+11:002019-01-01T10:47:16.470+11:00Lady Demelza's Year in Books 2018Well I must say I am ashamed at the paucity of this list, yet again. I have recently been learning about how social media changes your brain, making it want to take in information in small pieces and articles, rather than reading books the old-fashioned way. I've had to realise that this is an issue, and I've started making some changes to address it. I hope that my efforts will be reflected in the next Year in Books.<br />
<br />
1.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/32940060-the-walworth-beauty?ac=1&from_search=true"> <i>The Walworth Beauty</i></a> by Michele Roberts 2017<br />
2.<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15910611-bright-young-things?ac=1&from_search=true">Bright Young Things</a></i> by Scarlett Thomas 2001<br />
3.<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25110927-the-children-s-home?ac=1&from_search=true">The Children's Home</a></i> by Charles Lambert 2016<br />
4. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20829032-after-me-comes-the-flood?ac=1&from_search=true">After Me Comes the Flood</a></i> by Sarah Perry 2014<br />
5.<i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29502605-christmas-days?ac=1&from_search=true"> Christmas Days</a></i> by Jeanette Winterson 2016<br />
6.<i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10836471-midwinterblood?ac=1&from_search=true"> Midwinterblood</a></i> by Marcus Sedgwick 2011<br />
7. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25733573-reasons-to-stay-alive?ac=1&from_search=true">Reasons to Stay Alive</a></i> by Matt Haig 2015<br />
8. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11406137-the-summer-of-the-bear">The Summer of the Bear</a></i> by Bella Pollen 2010<br />
9. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/344308.Songs_of_the_Gorilla_Nation?from_search=true">Songs of the Gorilla Nation</a></i> by Dawn Prince-Hughes 2004<br />
10.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/32940060-the-walworth-beauty?ac=1&from_search=true"> <i>Dragon's Green</i></a> by Scarlett Thomas 2017<br />
11.<i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2990226-kleinzeit"> Kleinzeit</a></i> by Russell Hoban 1974<br />
12.<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2078294.The_Olive_Readers">The Olive Readers</a></i> by Christine Aziz 2005<br />
13.<i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/894658.Nightwood"> Nightwood</a></i> by Djuna Barnes 1936<br />
14. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35892355-folk?from_search=true">Folk</a> </i>by Zoe Gilbert 2018<br />
15.<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23462649-neverwhere">Neverwhere</a></i> by Neil Gaiman 2000<br />
16. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/60929.Dawn?from_search=true">Dawn</a></i> by Octavia E. Butler 1997<br />
17.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6891151-the-year-of-the-flood"> <i>The Year of the Flood</i> </a>by Margaret Atwood 2009<br />
18.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22041082-all-the-light-we-cannot-see"> <i>All the Light We Cannot See</i></a> by Anthony Doerr 2014<br />
19.<i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6826861-little-hands-clapping?ac=1&from_search=true"> Little Hands Clapping</a></i> by Dan Rhodes 2010<br />
20.<i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23878.Chronicle_of_a_Death_Foretold"> Chronicle of a Death Foretold</a></i> by Gabriel Garcia Marquez 1981, English translation by Gregory Rabassa 1982<br />
21. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40533213-the-colours-of-all-the-cattle?from_search=true">The Colours of All the Cattle</a></i> by Alexander MacCall Smith 2018<br />
22. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5425708-payback">Payback</a></i> by Margaret Atwood 2008<br />
23.<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36440684-the-river-of-consciousness">The River of Consciousness</a></i> by Oliver Sacks 2017<br />
24.<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34211746-la-belle-sauvage">La Belle Sauvage</a></i> by Philip Pullman 2017<br />
<br />
I think the best book I read this year, just by a fraction of a hair's width over the other top books, was <i>All the Light We Cannot See</i> by Anthony Doerr. I was disappointed in the ending, but actually that just made it all the more realistic, so I couldn't fault it for that. A sublime book, I'll be interested to see other works by this author.<br />
I must give a mention to <i>Songs of the Gorilla Nation</i> by Dawn Prince-Hughes. An autobiographical true story of an autistic woman who learns how to 'be human' from a band of gorillas in a zoo. Yes, I said true story. It's amazing.<br />
<br />
The worst book I read this year, <i>Nightwood</i> by Djuna Barnes, apparently isn't a crappy book at all, it's <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nightwood">critically acclaimed</a>. And that's probably why I made myself keep reading it after the first chapter, but it was a crappy reading experience, that's for sure. I felt like I was trapped in someone's bad trip. <i>Reasons to Stay Alive</i> by Matt Haig was a complete fail. I didn't find one thing in it that felt like a compelling argument to stay alive. The parameters of his arguments were not consistent with my life experience. Anyway, I'm still alive. I have a to-read pile of books. That's a reason to stay alive. The books are in this world.<br />
<br />
You can also see my earlier Years in Books for <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2012/12/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2012.html">2012</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2014/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2013.html">2013</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2015/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2014.html">2014</a>, <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2016/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2015.html">2015</a> and <a href="https://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com/2017/12/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2017.html">2017</a>.Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-58331689600912103982018-04-02T23:02:00.001+10:002018-04-02T23:28:06.168+10:00in which our Heroine discovers she has Autism Spectrum Disorder, and it really explains a lotToday is World Autism Awareness Day. Many people in the autistic community would prefer it be known as Autism Acceptance Day, or even Autism Appreciation Day. For me, the acceptance and the appreciation flowed very easily, once I had the awareness I had been missing most of my life.<br />
<br />
Ten years ago, I had no idea that I was autistic. I didn't see myself as being anything like the image I had of what an autistic person is like, which was probably, as for many people of my generation, associated with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rain_Man">Dustin Hoffman's <i>Rain Man</i></a>.<br />
<br />
Looking back, the first clue could have been reading <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Curious_Incident_of_the_Dog_in_the_Night-Time"><i>The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time </i>by Mark Haddon</a>. Did you ever have the feeling that there was something about you that was so very different to everyone else you knew, that you felt you were completely alone in this experience? And then one day, did you happen to discover, through chance or as a result of your own investigations, that there was<i> someone else out there who felt the same?</i> Do you remember how utterly miraculous that feeling was? That's what I had reading that book. I was in floods of tears half the time I was reading it. I had to stop and calm myself down enough to turn the page. The main character, Christopher, was the one, the only one that I had ever known of, who <i>really knew</i> how I felt. But at the time, I thought that all the sensory processing issues I had so much trouble with were due to my temporal lobe epilepsy. It seems to me they must be related, there is such an overlap in the experiences. And there is, indeed, a high incidence of epilepsy in autistic people. We don't know what the connection is, but there obviously is one. It still didn't occur to me that I was autistic myself.<br />
<br />
Then another fictional character came into my life - <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sheldon_Cooper">Sheldon Cooper</a> on <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Bang_Theory"><i>The Big Bang Theory.</i></a><br />
<br />
I started watching <i>Big Bang</i> when it first started screening here in Australia, and I loved it. It's bloody hilarious, and right up my alley with all the science references. But a strange thing started to happen as I got to know the characters better. Sheldon frequently comes out with statements that seem absolutely, outrageously wrong to everyone else, and he just can't understand what <i>their</i> problem is. And the audience laughs, because it's funny. But over time I came to realise that most of these crazy things he said were actually how I really, secretly thought about things myself. Only I had never, ever told anyone I really felt this way. I hardly even admitted it to myself. Once he was right in front of me on my TV screen, I could see it so clearly. Secretly, I actually am Sheldon. I've spent my whole life not letting anyone know that I am actually Sheldon, because one difference between he and I is that I know how completely socially unacceptable it is to behave and talk to people like that. And I've done a damn good job of it. I almost fooled myself. I really might still have no idea if Sheldon hadn't come into my life. <br />
<br />
It's never openly stated that Sheldon is autistic, and the show's producers insist they did not intend to create an autistic character. I can accept and respect their explanation - they just invented a character, and when he developed, it turned out that he was autistic. But it seems to be to quite obvious to the vast majority of <i>Big Bang</i> viewers that of the range of 'issues' in Sheldon's life, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autism_spectrum">Autism Spectrum Disorder</a> is certainly a significant one. <br />
<br />
At this point, rather than just continuing to debate my relationships with fictional characters, I began some proper academic research into ASD. The more I read, the more the light bulbs went off, and the more my difficult experiences made sense. I took those online tests you can find, and they told me that I'm probably autistic. After four years of reading and research, and of regular light bulb moments along the way, I was pretty certain that I must be on the spectrum. In 2013, reading<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspergirls"> Aspergirls by Rudy Simone</a> was the clincher. My mum found a copy of this book and read it too, and she said, quote, "If that's not you, I'm a monkey's uncle."<br />
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The crucial piece of information was learning that ASD tends to present differently in girls than in boys. Girls are often good at a particular neurological mechanism called 'mirroring' which allows you to mask your autistic traits and behave more like a neurotypical person.<br />
<br />
It was amazingly easy for me to get a diagnosis at this point, which was incredibly fortunate, because it seems that most people have to go though some kind of hell to get a formal diagnosis. I told the psychologist I was seeing for counselling about all this, and it just happened that they had a specialist in ASD working at their clinic, and I was able to get an appointment with her. She said, oh yes, definitely, and that I was probably completely mentally exhausted from all the effort of masking my autism my entire life. I couldn't agree more.<br />
<br />
When I got home I was so thrilled and excited, my goddessdaughter said to me, "I don't understand. Why is it good that you're autistic?" And I explained that it's the fact that I got a diagnosis that was so good, and making me so happy. Now, it's so much easier to explain to people and help them understand what is going on for me.<br />
<br />
When I tell people who know me, especially those who have known me for a long time, they are surprised. The reasons they give for thinking that I "can't be autistic!" are my high level of emotional literacy and good social skills. They are usually under the same assumptions of stereotype that I was before I started seriously researching the condition.<br />
<br />
Five years on, and I am completely comfortable in my identity as an autistic person. I don't have any value judgement around autistic identity - it's not worse, or better, than neurotypicality, it's just part of the natural diversity within humanity. It has helped me in so many ways to understand myself, and to identify ways to negotiate life a bit more smoothly. I wonder, I do, how life might have been different if awareness had been better while I was growing up, and I had been identified as autistic at a younger age. But then again, there's no point going down the rabbit hole of might-have-beens. I am thankful for the level of awareness in society now. When I don't get a joke (which is really very often - my main difficulties in social communication are <a href="https://senmagazine.co.uk/articles/articles/senarticles/semantic-pragmatic-disorder-the-reality-behind-the-label">semantic-pragmatic issues</a>), instead of just giving a blank, quizzical stare, I can say, "Sorry, I have Asperger's, and I don't get jokes." Now this is wildly oversimplifying the truth of the situation, but it's wonderful how well people cope when I make this statement. They understand! Miracle of miracles! They drop the joke and just move directly on the next bit required by the social interaction we are sharing. There's no awkwardness, no sense of being judged at all. It is such a huge relief to have this one recurrent problem in my life solved just by making this brief statement. Anxiety levels plummet.<br />
<br />
Sheldon has come a long way in his character development during these years, too. I am always so thankful that he came into my life. I couldn't imagine how different everything would be if he hadn't. He's like a real person to me, because his influence and effect on my life has been very, deeply real.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-69651373816190404962017-12-31T23:13:00.000+11:002018-01-01T08:30:16.314+11:00Lady Demelza's Year in Books 2017Hello dear readers, I hope you are enjoying your New Year's Eve celebrations. I am getting back on track with publishing my book list in a timely fashion. I'm afraid it's quite paltry pickings this year. I've had a lot going on. Not to mention the discovery of streaming services and binge-watching...<br />
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I've linked the title of each book to its page on <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/">Goodreads</a>, so you can click through and quickly get an idea of what kind of book it is.<br />
<br />
1<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8567975-glad-no-matter-what?ac=1&from_search=true">Glad No Matter What</a></i> by SARK 2010<br />
2 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/70948.The_Subtle_Knife">The Subtle Knife</a></i> by Philip Pullman 1997<br />
3 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/873921.Wise_Children">Wise Children</a></i> by Angela Carter 1991<br />
4 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17987501-the-forbidden-library?ac=1&from_search=true">The Forbidden Library</a></i> by Django Wexler 2014<br />
5 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14624517-the-palace-of-curiosities?ac=1&from_search=true">The Palace of Curiosities</a></i> by Rosie Garland 2013<br />
6<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16060560-the-great-automatic-grammatizator-and-other-stories"> <i>The Great Automatic Grammatizator and Other Stories</i></a> by Roald Dahl 1982<br />
7<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/70949.The_Amber_Spyglass"> <i>The Amber Spyglass</i></a> by Philip Pullman 2000<br />
8<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/161662.Gypsy_Cante?ac=1&from_search=true">Gypsy Cante: Deep Song of the Caves</a></i> selected and translated by Will Kirkland 1999<br />
9 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1366638.Caught_In_A_Story?ac=1&from_search=true">Caught in a Story: Contemporary Fairytales and Fables</a></i> edited by Christine Park and Caroline Heaton 1992<br />
10 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29770508-working-class-boy?ac=1&from_search=true">Working Class Boy</a></i> by Jimmy Barnes 2016<br />
11 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30825151-precious-and-grace">Precious and Grace</a></i> by Alexander McCall Smith 2016<br />
12<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/47122.Lady_Oracle?ac=1&from_search=true">Lady Oracle</a></i> by Margaret Atwood 1976<br />
13 <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13497675-the-boy-who-could-see-demons?ac=1&from_search=true"><i>The Boy Who Could See Demons</i> </a>by Carolyn Jess-Cook 2012<br />
14<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28256439-the-hidden-life-of-trees?ac=1&from_search=true"> <i>The Hidden Life of Trees</i></a> by Peter Wohlleben 2016, translated by Susanne Simard<br />
15 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21458054-past-the-shallows">Past the Shallows</a></i> by Favel Parrett 2011<br />
16<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/119919.Roll_of_Thunder_Hear_My_Cry"> <i>Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry</i></a> by Mildred D. Taylor 1976 (re-read)<br />
17 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/879420.Tanglewreck">Tanglewreck</a></i> by Jeanette Winterson 2006 (re-read)<br />
18 <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17332969-the-100?ac=1&from_search=true"><i>The 100</i> </a>by Kass Morgan 2013<br />
19 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22924002-day-21">Day 21</a></i> by Kass Morgan 2014<br />
20 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/32075861-the-essex-serpent?from_search=true">The Essex Serpent</a></i> by Sarah Perry 2017<br />
21 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35516388-the-house-of-unexpected-sisters">The House of Unexpected Sisters</a></i> by Alexander McCall Smith 2017<br />
22 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23264825-homecoming?ac=1&from_search=true">Homecoming </a></i>by Kass Morgan 2015<br />
23 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25493853-the-bear-and-the-nightingale">The Bear and the Nightingale</a> </i>by Katherine Arden 2017<br />
24 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36453128-the-beginning-of-the-world-in-the-middle-of-the-night?ac=1&from_search=true">The Beginning of the World in the Middle of the Night</a></i> by Jen Campbell 2017<br />
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The best book I read this year was <i>Tanglewreck</i> by Jeanette Winterson. Well hello, it's Jeanette Winterson. And she manages to explain the nature of space, time, reality and quantum physics in a kids' book. Clearly a winner. I would also like to recommend <i>The Essex Serpent</i> by Sarah Perry, a juicy Victorian Gothic novel, packed full of some wonderfully delicious sentences. I'll be looking out for more of her work.<br />
<br />
The crappiest books I read this year were the first three of the <i>The 100</i> series by Kass Morgan. I can't blame the books, I knew they were teenage romance trash when I got into them. The thing is, they are set in a post-apocalyptic world, and I just love me a post-apocalyptic world. I got through with a lot of letting my eyes glaze over and skim past all the mooshy nonsense, and enjoyed the science fiction aspect. Still, after three of these, I couldn't face the fourth, and gave up on the series. Always remember, life's too short to read crappy books.<br />
<br />
And I pray to the gods of literature, please, please help me to get my reading mojo back in 2018. This booklist is totally insufficient for a Lady's intellectual and cultural needs. I want more!Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-45213792908774157852017-01-17T23:51:00.000+11:002017-12-31T10:38:41.851+11:00of the Death of a Lady's ManI had plans to spend New Year's Eve the same way I usually do, keeping out of the heat as much as possible, and writing up my Year in Books blog post. But something very dramatic happened that changed not just the day's plans, but an awful lot of my life. Around 4:30 am on December 31st, 2016, I found Mr CJ dead in the garden. This is the story of how that came to be.<br />
<br />
Followers of this blog will have noticed that I've spent the last several years as a carer for Mr CJ. He had been sick for seven and half years, slowly declining all that time.<br />
<br />
It started with a headache that wouldn't go away, no matter what. Some months of hospitals and testing later, it was discovered that he had arthritis in his neck, featuring a growth spur that was pressing on the nerves as they exited the spinal column at that point. That meant chronic pain in his head, neck, arms and shoulders, limited mobility in his arms and hands, and reduced sensitivity in fingers that limited his dexterity. We slowly got used to this new life, revolving around visits to doctors and hospitals, keeping track of meds, and living with endless pain.<br />
<br />
Then three and a half years ago, he had a short stay in hospital with pneumonia, and it was discovered that he had emphysema. Yes, he was a heavy smoker. The lung specialist thought it likely that he had lung cancer, and if he did, he'd probably only have around six months to live. It took more than two months to get through all the testing that confirmed that he didn't have cancer, just emphysema. It gave us a long time to think about the idea of him dying soon. But he hung in there, huffing and puffing and inhaling enormous quantities of Ventolin and other medications. Before long he could not lie down at all, as he couldn't breathe lying flat. He slept in a chair. He basically spent most of his life in his chair. But he was still really happy with his life in a lot of ways.<br />
<br />
He really loved this place we have been living in, this house in Nimbin. Nimbin was a wonderful experience for him. It's like very few places in this country in that Aboriginal people are respected as traditional custodians here, and have higher status in the community than white people. He'd spent a lot of his life, especially the early years, copping shit pretty badly just for the fact of being Aboriginal. All that was turned around here. He was respected when he walked down the street in Nimbin, and addressed as Uncle. Not that he did a lot of walking down the street, especially toward the end when he could only manage to walk about 25 metres at a time, but word had spread and everyone knew who he was. I don't think he ever dreamed that he would experience such a thing in his lifetime, and it meant a hell of a lot to him.<br />
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It was only about six months ago that another spell in hospital revealed that he had congestive heart failure, a complication caused by the emphysema, and also two blood clots, which meant he had to take blood thinners forever to reduce his risk of stroke. His legs swelled up because his heart wasn't pumping the fluid around properly, and often developed cellulitis, requiring antibiotics. By now he was taking up to 20 or so tablets of all different kinds daily, as well as three different kinds of puffers for his lungs. We knew he didn't have too long to go, but whether that was a few weeks or months or years, we couldn't know.<br />
<br />
He had one thing on his 'bucket list.' He wanted to go to Sydney to see this brother, and he wanted to drive. <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2016/09/lady-demelza-in-big-smoke-of-sydney.html">We did it.</a> Later, the doctors said it was a wonder that he survived the trip, and made him promise never to drive more than a hour or two away, ever again. He promised. He had done what he wanted to do.<br />
<br />
There was a bit of excitement two months ago when he died for 31 seconds while having a cardiogram, but was revived. We all wanted to know, what happened, but there were no reports of seeing his ancestors or a white light. He just remembered hitting his head on a monitor as he was jolted into consciousness. The funny thing is, he seemed to really perk up for a while after that. I used to say the shock must have done him good. He became more wakeful and generally involved with things, his mood was positive, and everyone said he was looking well.<br />
<br />
Everything seemed normal in his last few days, if this abominably hot weather we have here in the summer can be called normal, which I maintain it is not. Around 10 or 11 pm on the night of Friday 30th, I found him looking around the kitchen in that expectant way. I made him a toasted cheese and tomato wrap. He sat in his chair, eating it and watching <i>The Big Bang Theory</i> on DVD. I went back to sleep.<br />
<br />
When I woke up, I didn't know what time it was, but it felt like the early hours of the morning. He wasn't in his chair. I needed to know where he was at all times, in case he'd fallen over or passed out, which had happened several times. I got up and looked out the window, and he wasn't in his chair on the verandah, either. I looked all over the house. It seemed impossible that he could just not be here anywhere. I looked in every room again. Finally I went out into the garden, and there he was, lying flat out on his back, with his head on the wormwood bush, looking so peacefully asleep, like he'd fallen over and passed out again. But this time, he didn't wake up. For all the wondering how much longer he would live, it seemed impossible that it could be today, now. I bent down to listen to his breathing. There was none.<br />
<br />
The thing to do in such a situation, of course, is to call for an ambulance, so that's what I did, post-haste. And this is where we get to the bit that I wish, of all the things that happened that day, could have been different.<br />
<br />
The people who answer the phone for these emergency calls have a certain script they have to follow. He told me to do CPR, and how to do it, which I knew well enough in theory, though I'd never actually performed it before. And so I started doing CPR, pushing hard and fast on his chest, then breathing into his lungs, and hearing and feeling my own breath come out of them in the exhale. It was hard, really hard. He was lying in such a spot in the garden that he had the concrete path running along one side of his body, and the fishpond on the other. I had to get up high above him to push down on his chest with my weight, and then get down low beside his head to reach his mouth to do the breathing. A lot of scrabbling around with my bare legs on the rough concrete. My knees were scraped, and stung for the rest of the day. The palms of my hands grew blisters from pushing against his chest. Did I mention that it was unreasonably hot? Even at this traditionally bitter pre-dawn hour. I don't think the temperature had dropped below 27℃ the entire night that night. I can't think of another occasion where I put so much sheer physical work and effort into one short block of time in my life. Did I say short? I don't know how long I was going on like this, but if felt like a long time, and I know that it must take an ambulance the better part of half an hour to get from Lismore to Nimbin, even with sirens and lights and high speeds. I kept telling the guy on the phone that there was no point me doing this, he was already gone. He kept saying "You've got to give him the best possible chance." So now I know what their script tells them to say when they get these calls. I was terrified when I heard something crack, but the guy on the phone said that that meant I was doing it right, and to keep going. So I kept going. I kept fucking going. Sweat was running off me in rivers. I didn't think I'd be able to keep going, but I had to, because the man on the phone was telling me to. I wondered what would happen if I collapsed. I kept going. It was hot and hellish and horrible and so violent. That's what I hate the most about this part of the story. It was such a fucking violent way to treat his body, when he had only just finally attained the peace he so deserved. I wish so much that I could have just sat in the peace of the quiet of the night and been present with him at this most sacred moment. I knew, inside myself, that that's what I should have done. But instead I followed instructions. The air smelled of fresh wormwood.<br />
<br />
It was a great relief to just stop when the ambos arrived and let them take over and hook him up to their little electronic machine. I knew he was gone, but it was a whole new level of real to actually see the flatline running across the little screen. A moaning noise came out of me when the ambo said out loud, "Yes, he has passed," and I didn't understand why, because I already knew he was dead, and why should it make a difference for him to say it?<br />
<br />
Immediately I rang his brother to tell him, he's gone. I held the phone out over his body so his spirit could hear the cries. That was when our housemate, Sister F, came out, alerted by the lights of the ambulance and the noise. And I told her too, he's gone, he's gone, he's gone. They put a white sheet loosely over his body.<br />
<br />
The light of day was just starting to break by now. One of the ambos got a proper look at me, and it was clear from his reaction that I didn't look so good. He said I needed to drink some water right now, and Sister F brought it to me. Then they all went out the front of the property to wait for the police to arrive, and I was alone with him, and had that precious moment of peace that I wished I could have claimed from the start. I lay down on the concrete alongside him, and I held his hand, like I had through so many painful tests and procedures and long dreary hospital hours, and I got to hug him without causing him pain by doing so, for the first time in seven and a half years. I breathed in the scent of the crushed wormwood, now stained with his blood, and I let my eyes drink in the sight of the deep peace that his face wore. He had wished to die at home, and not in a hospital. He got to die lying on this good earth, in the garden he loved, under the stars. It was just so beautiful, beyond any words, so I took photos.<br />
<br />
It just so happened that a local elder of the Bundjalung nation, upon whose land we dwell, had been living in the shed in our backyard. He heard the whole thing, and he waited. When Sister F first asked me if she should go and fetch him, I said no. I didn't want any more people coming along, I just wanted to be quiet with him. But a while later I realised it was the right thing to do, not for me or for him, but for the land, for this land that had carried his pain for all this time and now held his spirit and was witness to its passing. He came striding through the grass and the dawn light, dressed in his totem colours and carrying a stick that is sacred for reasons that I will likely never be privy to, speaking to the spirits of the land in their own language, this man's own mother tongue, the language of the Bundjalung. I recognised one word - bugelbeh - it's all right. It was so beyond real that it was like being in a scene from a movie.<br />
<br />
I'd always imagined that if or when this happened, the ambos would just load him straight up in their ambulance and take him away, and that would be it. So I wasn't at all prepared for what came next. Firstly, if they attend a DOA, the ambos have to call the police, wait for them to arrive, and hand it over to them, without disturbing the body any further. It took at least a couple of hours for them to arrive, I think. I sat by him the whole time. An enormous bruise started spreading out over his chest - that had been caused by me doing CPR. He started to cool down - though not by much, as air temperature was near 30℃ anyway, and he slowly started to stiffen into rigor mortis. When I wondered what might be a good way to mark this event with ritual, I thought of how he would always buy a beer for his loved ones and ancestors on the dates of their memorials, have a drink with them, and then pour their beer onto the earth. I don't drink beer, but it just so happened that I had a bottle of Pink sparkling wine in the fridge, for the first time since last summer. And I knew what to do - I would have a drink with him. I got the Pink, and opened it, and poured a little of it into his mouth, and drank my toast to his spirit. I drank the bottle over the course of the morning. God knows what the coppers thought of me polishing off a bottle of champers amid all the goings-on, but I felt they knew better than to be judgemental. They were pretty good. They did their job.<br />
<br />
There was a lot more waiting for a special forensics guy to come out and declare that this was not a crime scene, and then more waiting again for the doctor to come on so he could sign the death certificate. There was a statement to be made and recorded in the little notebook and initialled on every page, and a form with which to identify the body. Then some more waiting for the 'contractors' to arrive, which was how the police referred to the undertakers. Sister F and I found this rather hilarious, in a very noir kind of way.<br />
<br />
There was one really amazing thing that happened while the waiting was going on, and that was the ants. First, there were just a few ants crawling on his feet. Nothing unusual there, that's what happens to any feet that happen to stand still for more than about 30 seconds around here. It was quite surreal to see them swarm and for him to remain still, and not brush them away and kick his feet to shake them off. Then more came, and more, and they climbed higher and further across his body. It was Sister F who first noticed this, and the highway they had formed between their nest on the other side of the house and his body. She called out, "Look, the contractors are here!" They had already begun to take him, tiny drops of sweat and blood at a time, into the earth, where they lived. It was wonderful to know this had happened, as he would have loved to just be buried right there in the backyard, if only that weren't completely unacceptable and illegal. They swarmed for about an hour, concentrating on the juicy bits, and then just faded away once they had collected what they came for. Many blessings were given upon the ants for their work.<br />
<br />
The sun was high in the sky by the time the human contractors arrived, well on its way to reaching its daily high of over 38℃, and it beat down horribly upon them in their shiny little black suits, as they wrestled to fit a 90+kg corpse into a body bag without falling in the fishpond. When it was all done, it was near midday. His body had lain there on the earth, crushing the wormwood bush, for around eight hours, and I could finally go and lie down. There would be a smoking to do after sunset, and then a New Year to ring in.Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-16866680013301684742016-12-25T23:52:00.000+11:002016-12-25T23:54:55.831+11:00of Treasure Found - the 100-year-old Autograph BookIt's not often that I get the opportunity to mark a centenary, but this is such an occasion, so I want to share something special with you. <br />
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I've had this book for about nine years or so now. A friend of mine found it in a rubbish skip on the street in Five Dock, an inner western suburb of Sydney. He knew it was precious and saved it, but he didn't know what to do with it. It was when I showed him <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2015/04/on-discovery-of-art-of-altering-books.html">my altered book art</a> that he decided that I loved old books enough to appreciate such a treasure, and he gave it to me. I don't know what to do with it either, either than love it and be amazed by it.<br />
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One hundred years ago, at Christmas in 1916, this book was presented to Dorothy Wickham Bate for Music. The latest date I can find recorded in the book is 1936. For twenty years, Miss Bate kept this book with her, adding new friends and memories to it regularly. I don't know why she stopped keeping it - there are plenty of blank pages still left - or where it was in all that time from 1936 until my friend found it, or how it ended up in a skip on the street after all that.<br />
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The book has been printed with beautiful decorative motifs, lines and spaces for autographs.<br />
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Dates are scattered randomly throughout the book. Miss Bate has used this book by opening to a random page each time rather than keeping a chronological order. A Mr Fred T. Berman, B.A. of Five Dock skipped ahead to the last page as early as February 5, 1917 to write thereupon<i> "The end crowns all: /And that old common arbitrator Time / Will one day end it. / For tho' the day be ever so long, / At the last it singeth to evensong."</i> Some of Miss Bate's friends signed just their names and the dates.<br />
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Many wrote short poems or passages; most of these have some religious flavour or moral lesson, while a few are humorous.<br />
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<i>"Once I had money and a friend</i><br />
<i>On whom I set great store,</i><br />
<i>I lent my money to my friend</i><br />
<i>And took his word therefore.</i><br />
<i>I asked my money of my friend</i><br />
<i>Naught but words I got.</i><br />
<i>I lost my money and my friend</i><br />
<i>Pursue him I would not.</i><br />
<i>But if I had money and a friend</i><br />
<i>As I have had before,</i><br />
<i>I'd keep my money and my friend,</i><br />
<i>And play the fool no more." </i>- unsigned<br />
<br />
<i>"It is hard to find a friend</i><br />
<i>It is hard to find a hope.</i><br />
<i>It's harder still to find the towel</i><br />
<i>When your eyes are full of soap." - </i>D. Bate 1916<br />
<i> </i><br />
<i>"Life is mostly froth and bubble,</i><br />
<i>Two things stand like stone,</i><br />
<i>Kindness in another's trouble,</i><br />
<i>Courage in your own." </i>- Miss Burwood, 1921<br />
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Some have drawn original artworks, little sketches and cartoons.<br />
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Most exciting for me to discover were a few extraordinary inclusions, such as a white envelope lying loose between the pages, not fixed in. On the front is written 'Autobiography. Miss Nobbs (Five Dock)' and on the back flap, 'N. Brailey, 14 Elizabeth St., Five Dock, 2046.' Inside is this photograph of two women in military-style uniform standing in front of a van, a S.D.C.A. St. Andrews Hut Tea Canteen, whatever that is exactly. The logo bears a motto - 'FOR HEALTH AND FREEDOM' and the van is apparently sponsored by a National Emergency Fund. It is parked in front of the arched doorway of a stone church. There are three typewritten pages fixed together with an old stud. The heading says 'AUTOBIOGRAPHY of JESSIE NOBBS, and memories of old FIVE DOCK.' That is a story in itself, of course, and I plan to share this precious document more fully with you in another post.<br />
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In 1916, of course, the Great War was raging, on the other side of the world perhaps, but very much at the centre of people's lives. Women and girls of all ages were called upon to knit socks and other comforts for soldiers on the front. In those days of trench warfare and footrot, I imagine that a fresh, new, dry pair of hand-made socks would have seemed like manna from heaven. A pair of Dorothy's socks made their way to a Sergent Henri Hiver of the 264th Regiment d'Infanterie, and he sent her this letter of thanks, written with exquisite penmanship and barely coherent English.<br />
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He provided his address...<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLR2-W7a3Ls20W7m_2wNMkZ4S8Nq0tuxDHp6BAHXWToVUuLeHUYUC_76CaReu1xb6dapcqw5xCEUksxKYxoBdrUOaeUm5ew4TLhLT6uTyc7ZevER73fuoIO6mye4TmCREN1pUao11p9nq9/s1600/abook11.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLR2-W7a3Ls20W7m_2wNMkZ4S8Nq0tuxDHp6BAHXWToVUuLeHUYUC_76CaReu1xb6dapcqw5xCEUksxKYxoBdrUOaeUm5ew4TLhLT6uTyc7ZevER73fuoIO6mye4TmCREN1pUao11p9nq9/s400/abook11.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
...and she sent him a postcard in return, bearing this 1829 image of Como, Sydney.<br />
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It sailed to France but failed to find him, and was returned still in its envelope, where I found it, loose between the book's pages. I cried.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9zsK2XjbcINxTYADJTUjCvA6wDjfeaK4ZgNnoG54J7yXjdL9KxVIpzsQEQ0J1f_tzZR3CDx4po0wET9ChgJ673QS8Qd9F8XjBtp_d9za1-UxP5eO3DQt2Ut8nFriXDvA2tVjOWlbjfASc/s1600/abook13.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9zsK2XjbcINxTYADJTUjCvA6wDjfeaK4ZgNnoG54J7yXjdL9KxVIpzsQEQ0J1f_tzZR3CDx4po0wET9ChgJ673QS8Qd9F8XjBtp_d9za1-UxP5eO3DQt2Ut8nFriXDvA2tVjOWlbjfASc/s400/abook13.JPG" width="400" /></a> </div>
Someone has made a note of a 2nd Lieutenant Robert S. Lasker of the Royal Air Force, who was killed in May 1918.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbOGxKFJ7e0AWWrkq-PDq-n7kSEsY8elRqIopaK_g8X4CT_Wrg0JQEW3rWpLlblD8mCx2BzMDK4r0dGXSlAiUaqoIOKw1az3kfm9E00_1TmsYr3Xfeeh9U6e8cCo4-6eMXoFBzuKVQQrGY/s1600/abook7.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbOGxKFJ7e0AWWrkq-PDq-n7kSEsY8elRqIopaK_g8X4CT_Wrg0JQEW3rWpLlblD8mCx2BzMDK4r0dGXSlAiUaqoIOKw1az3kfm9E00_1TmsYr3Xfeeh9U6e8cCo4-6eMXoFBzuKVQQrGY/s400/abook7.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
And there is this amazingly odd, very utilitarian postcard that must have been issued to soldiers serving overseas. Lew Nicklaus was able to send word on September 9, 1917, that he was quite well and had received his parcel.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWjLIAw1lFJ3mLijFFFvz1b1Ej0DUygdje-whA7fmEMlUN5swESAMu6akoFyvyVLIfvX2zCM76nHItKD9AhrSbKkgLbhPIzHpIRStdunKvV4mkxoTHq-TxE_jKbobu6tQoE9LK8kiDneXl/s1600/abook8.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWjLIAw1lFJ3mLijFFFvz1b1Ej0DUygdje-whA7fmEMlUN5swESAMu6akoFyvyVLIfvX2zCM76nHItKD9AhrSbKkgLbhPIzHpIRStdunKvV4mkxoTHq-TxE_jKbobu6tQoE9LK8kiDneXl/s400/abook8.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>
If there are any descendants or relatives of Miss Dorothy Bate looking around on the Internet for traces of their ancestors, it is my hope that one of them will find this post with their search engine. Wouldn't it be wonderful to find a rightful home for this most precious treasure? <br />
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Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-36849275313395169832016-09-28T09:10:00.000+10:002016-09-28T09:10:21.906+10:00Lady Demelza in the Big Smoke of Sydney Oh, dear Reader, it's so exciting - I'm in Sydney, and just thrilled to bits to be here.<br />
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It's been several years, and I'd forgotten how much I love this city, which is surprisingly much, given that I can't stand cities generally. Somehow, there's some magical effect here in Sydney that protects me from all the distress of sensory overload and allows me to just delight in the teeming humanity and the heights of human culture.<br />
Maybe it's because this was my first home. At least, the first one I remember. I was born in Melbourne, but my parents moved to Sydney when I was just a year old. I was eight when we left, so that's some pretty formative years that I spent here. So maybe there is some ghost of my childhood spirit, or a guardian angel from my early childhood that still dwells here, and makes this city so marvellous for me. I was actually just feeling really daunted about the trip here, thinking I would be overwhelmed as I usually am by travel and by cities. And then I arrived and all the magic came pouring back to me. Somehow, here in Sydney, the crowds are not overwhelming, the traffic is not unbearable, and the pace is just exciting rather than terrifying. I was even excited to discover that my hotel has a light well. Imagine, living in a place where there is need to build light wells! It should be terrible, but somehow, I'm delighted.<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhhuNkQOBDT83fv8-2P1leG5nN5sqj7TgyhvMH6q1PofEpRgnfb-lWnD5HfdGecPdWe505fw3KrwEFu_iNKsB0VFXaol5mjkKn28PJU9XzYWPZX2sVRf7bvAeSuwTj8AobzMf6EXhPrtCz/s1600/sydneylightwell.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhhuNkQOBDT83fv8-2P1leG5nN5sqj7TgyhvMH6q1PofEpRgnfb-lWnD5HfdGecPdWe505fw3KrwEFu_iNKsB0VFXaol5mjkKn28PJU9XzYWPZX2sVRf7bvAeSuwTj8AobzMf6EXhPrtCz/s400/sydneylightwell.JPG" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I will never be able to explain why this seemed so beautiful to me when I discovered it on the way to my room.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
I know that Sydney must have changed a lot since I was a tiny kid, but
it feels the same. It smells the same. The dirt and the graffiti and the
stone walls look just the same. Even the buses are the same blue and
white as they were when I rode on them with my mum more than thirty
years ago.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI6hrwfG86uhM7-8UBYPo_hTWdIgjVVoTE6dsGz99SQNinGHo5zQcUyi5DKwDwIPmn-mulZcIouFGRCGAkcTmEq87opM6FSoKzJExc7ag3VvH5erZlbk3jHUNq6S5Vmg9Iym78jfCGfTsg/s1600/sydneybus.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI6hrwfG86uhM7-8UBYPo_hTWdIgjVVoTE6dsGz99SQNinGHo5zQcUyi5DKwDwIPmn-mulZcIouFGRCGAkcTmEq87opM6FSoKzJExc7ag3VvH5erZlbk3jHUNq6S5Vmg9Iym78jfCGfTsg/s400/sydneybus.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Just below my hotel early this morning</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Today is also the first day in several years that I have woken up to being a free and independent agent. Mr CJ is in the care of a family member, and I have three days off from being a carer. Oh my goodness, the freedom is just thrilling. Me, Sydney, a good pair of shoes and nobody needing me - the world is my oyster, as they say. Off I go!<br />
<br />Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-56661011058171094702016-08-20T22:34:00.000+10:002016-08-20T22:34:17.499+10:00of Washing Up, Interrupted by Unexpected and Astounding Beauty<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">One of my
biggest frustrations in the pursuit of blogging is the failure of a
photographic image to match up to reality as I perceive it. I see something,
and I want to share it with you. So I take a photo, but when I look at the
image I have captured, it doesn’t look at all like what I was seeing. And so I
can’t share the experience, and I give up on the fledgling blog post. I have
tried a few different devices in my search for verisimilitude, and I don’t know
if the better camera is producing a ‘better’ image or not, to me, it’s just
another version of the image that’s not the one I saw.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I went to start
doing the dishes a little while ago, (as one must, repeatedly, apparently) and
I was struck with one of those moments that I wanted to share with you. Beauty
can always be found in the most unexpected and unappealing places, even in the
dirty dishes in the sink.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There was a bowl. It had been filled
with peaches and cream, and then when it was empty, filled with water and left
in the sink. And a butterfly had landed in it, and just stayed there, lying
flat, no doubt stuck to the water by the opalescent, shimmering scum of the
cream on the surface of the water.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Well, it probably would
technically be a moth if I bothered to find out which it was. But it was so
beautiful, I have to call it a butterfly. It was so beautiful, I wanted to
share it with you. So I got my camera, and took some pictures, and they look
absolutely nothing like the butterfly and the bowl of creamy water that I could
see. But something as unexpected as the butterfly itself happened – the photos
are beautiful images too, even if they are different to what I saw. I could see
that. So I’m sharing them with you anyway, even though they are not the
beautiful sight I saw in my kitchen sink tonight.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">These are taken
with the flash,</span></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFcbdNwj3fjtbBOwBO80paEXz_Ts9g0-TjVkGGGPs532omvVXMakEtw5Ys4YLVALGF9w2jxwGe8rQUDpm3i2d_kPvOIIOcmZmvCYtL4SWBIHdxVIHA3t-8RhbBBocc2VWm4_6-acB6TQWM/s1600/butterflybowl1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFcbdNwj3fjtbBOwBO80paEXz_Ts9g0-TjVkGGGPs532omvVXMakEtw5Ys4YLVALGF9w2jxwGe8rQUDpm3i2d_kPvOIIOcmZmvCYtL4SWBIHdxVIHA3t-8RhbBBocc2VWm4_6-acB6TQWM/s400/butterflybowl1.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfniRepP-3-DH_2_opxZai0mq57szCjBWaxYtc54aS9CPy3xtdWqSHJmB0xsQcfE8fXHbtU7KgyP8VrXXhLGic5uFiifql3S2hXPfuZAQ3bPFvyXS9TNJfTX6NFbzKH20UgJc_0vWPpBHr/s1600/butterflybowl2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfniRepP-3-DH_2_opxZai0mq57szCjBWaxYtc54aS9CPy3xtdWqSHJmB0xsQcfE8fXHbtU7KgyP8VrXXhLGic5uFiifql3S2hXPfuZAQ3bPFvyXS9TNJfTX6NFbzKH20UgJc_0vWPpBHr/s400/butterflybowl2.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">… and these are without the flash. Just more
versions of something I didn’t see, but all beautiful.</span></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcKWn4BiY3OyU3UgjE48Yvf50NtHLwmDe_A9fgNSkWKu0D16MmizdEuqNR_CQoB1eQrk3wC9nHWlfiLCXhfxoi4qTYYFdhxyAQ1P_Ph8KC_VN9ovVym_bR5ql6BmdEyU4IGhzX6WOp6MjS/s1600/butterflybowl3.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcKWn4BiY3OyU3UgjE48Yvf50NtHLwmDe_A9fgNSkWKu0D16MmizdEuqNR_CQoB1eQrk3wC9nHWlfiLCXhfxoi4qTYYFdhxyAQ1P_Ph8KC_VN9ovVym_bR5ql6BmdEyU4IGhzX6WOp6MjS/s400/butterflybowl3.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihxLLoDzLJCb1EViZAns-R68Ic0VZwx_b0_XAGTpo7HkvfozJ5EZPIlOLTwvaQzVcsYfGbFP_70E6q6co-60fW4EDRttkYTILZZ7x9CGQ3kVaAOsGPbNEm24XhPqJdcfXOhFY7jNh0bI5N/s1600/butterflybowl4.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihxLLoDzLJCb1EViZAns-R68Ic0VZwx_b0_XAGTpo7HkvfozJ5EZPIlOLTwvaQzVcsYfGbFP_70E6q6co-60fW4EDRttkYTILZZ7x9CGQ3kVaAOsGPbNEm24XhPqJdcfXOhFY7jNh0bI5N/s400/butterflybowl4.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I
stared at the butterfly for so long. It’s like I was trying to fill my eyes up
with the perfection of its beauty while it so fleetingly existed, to imprint it
in my mind that I could always recall it and thus hold the experience forever. I
tried to understand what about it made it so perfect and so beautiful, but the
nature of perfect, fleeting beauty is not to be understood, but marvelled at. I
marvelled. There were the delicate brush strokes of a fine Chinese brush
flowing along the wings, the antique hues of sepia, earth and umber. There was
the silk-shiny sheen, shaded by the muffled, faded, matte patches on the underwings
where the top wings would rub against them. There were the countless layers of
geometric patterns in the wing design and the shape of the creature’s body
itself, unfolding as I stared, like a shifting kaleidoscope. I could see the
antennae as being like rows of eyelashes, rather than unaugmented prongs, and I
could imagine how it felt to feel things through them. Time and space fell away
and the whole universe revealed itself, floating in a bowl in the dirty dishes
in the kitchen sink.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I had to tear myself away,
eventually, as dishes won’t wash themselves, it turns out, no matter how
beautiful the butterflies may be. I really meant to wash all the dishes,
sacrificing the beauty of the butterfly to a fate that was already foregone.
But somehow I managed to wash all the dishes except that one bowl, and it’s
still sitting in the sink, full of creamy water and beautiful butterfly. I know
it can’t stay – but I can’t bring myself to be the agent of its demise. I’m
hoping that Mr CJ will disturb it with his next dirty dish, and I won’t have to
witness it. I’ll get up in the morning, and it will be gone.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I wanted
to share it with you. I can’t show you or tell you exactly what I saw, but I
can share with you that it was beautiful, and that it was awesome, and that
will just have to do.</span></span></div>
Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-34362797493550835042016-05-23T15:20:00.000+10:002016-05-23T15:20:55.367+10:00of the Vintage Crockery CollectionI have begun photographing my collection of vintage crockery before I take most of it off to a collector in town. Of course I wish I could keep them all, because they're so beautiful. But it's time for a Decluttering, so off they go. <br />
<br />
I found all these pieces in op shops. As you can imagine, there have been countless beautiful treasures I have found since I let my blog lay fallow. Today, let's start catching up with some plates.<br />
<br />
Johnsons of Australia<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWW4rm9R0PL5sKRODRAGT9FJPNKaaOta4acpeJ3iyP30g_6wRqDBKOEvhuANDxsMSsp5T7eLCxYZ_tvxP33O6sMdvatmiuS2zvKK3Cn_5BBA1bG3-trfUgtw4DBeALeZH2dOJmv9zrBuha/s1600/crockery1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWW4rm9R0PL5sKRODRAGT9FJPNKaaOta4acpeJ3iyP30g_6wRqDBKOEvhuANDxsMSsp5T7eLCxYZ_tvxP33O6sMdvatmiuS2zvKK3Cn_5BBA1bG3-trfUgtw4DBeALeZH2dOJmv9zrBuha/s400/crockery1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Midwinter by Stonehenge, England<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLqSIpAk0n-b51Z0Q2TZTqfeXb3GOw7KCt22iECe_zqEcJ4oZShyTJLPicHDoVzkMLGc7jw1-lL3JZvAkiL5R6QyPdKeLWQeeObEDVIYp8dVapkdl201wgVBLhF1E6EVD70JXju6iuTRHg/s1600/crockery2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLqSIpAk0n-b51Z0Q2TZTqfeXb3GOw7KCt22iECe_zqEcJ4oZShyTJLPicHDoVzkMLGc7jw1-lL3JZvAkiL5R6QyPdKeLWQeeObEDVIYp8dVapkdl201wgVBLhF1E6EVD70JXju6iuTRHg/s400/crockery2.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Johnson Brothers, England - there are three different sizes of this one. I love that they are oval rather than round.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyvMKpO0sIXMRgU8P_upcZVJgtOUrxdm7E7FAzPMo3U86n4YhuEkkL7f0J_P41zgIrd-ZG01aeuRDhOaLo0ROo-Lhcwvs9zTRBGFT6TZrb6pqxE_0-lg3phVUS5MoxEBWfbIvvORDF5-BA/s1600/crockery3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyvMKpO0sIXMRgU8P_upcZVJgtOUrxdm7E7FAzPMo3U86n4YhuEkkL7f0J_P41zgIrd-ZG01aeuRDhOaLo0ROo-Lhcwvs9zTRBGFT6TZrb6pqxE_0-lg3phVUS5MoxEBWfbIvvORDF5-BA/s400/crockery3.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Two small plates from Japan<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7LsQBAWlegBnSkFI_tQqrhEj4RHKvKucmfmLf6oPjODIIumXivxLNQtMayj1wBvyGaFMTjqnu_fog4n89pEJk6Snyi9VsdkjNHW1r2FaqOWGnczcfYbplYz6T5A59Fl3odBiJ9zaT9yWz/s1600/crockery4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7LsQBAWlegBnSkFI_tQqrhEj4RHKvKucmfmLf6oPjODIIumXivxLNQtMayj1wBvyGaFMTjqnu_fog4n89pEJk6Snyi9VsdkjNHW1r2FaqOWGnczcfYbplYz6T5A59Fl3odBiJ9zaT9yWz/s400/crockery4.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Tiny dishes. Top two - England, bottom - Japan<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbOqUf-QK1PvRjHYmyvk7h3GbZYetHAA5ZhNFCrNXPcOQ_RGbpXkY9XNmSKRBeQKDbGM_IRnVrbZz799eHzPMhJTb0idvJ0QyRue9KjXEmvP0OpKAQBl3fhp7mGf5sZVHPwj2lSS1m_SJf/s1600/crockery5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbOqUf-QK1PvRjHYmyvk7h3GbZYetHAA5ZhNFCrNXPcOQ_RGbpXkY9XNmSKRBeQKDbGM_IRnVrbZz799eHzPMhJTb0idvJ0QyRue9KjXEmvP0OpKAQBl3fhp7mGf5sZVHPwj2lSS1m_SJf/s400/crockery5.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
England<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguzerdRr_kr8lfdBz_LEJzbvnVmTmifE6EqZaM_n3IlzUt2AVLN0SrYXIx2xyF_I_EwEtv-fEpECjFbtuWg8C7t62qX5iiAn3wKL-aP6rhqYPF12Z5otcIJOlOuB5wU8cT2hfGv2h0zjWH/s1600/crockery6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguzerdRr_kr8lfdBz_LEJzbvnVmTmifE6EqZaM_n3IlzUt2AVLN0SrYXIx2xyF_I_EwEtv-fEpECjFbtuWg8C7t62qX5iiAn3wKL-aP6rhqYPF12Z5otcIJOlOuB5wU8cT2hfGv2h0zjWH/s400/crockery6.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Two more from Japan<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF494P4qaQGYfdILy4YFoD_9CJEaXTDjCSA04LTuUVG8ILvZh9qYFHYpj4lKaFVhFpvf-H8fSC93ue5rWKRs577CxGw5JXQkdvxXKppDqm8Id2TCaWJVmJ-SsOcyZfHqF1iWCjB9uvhuhZ/s1600/crockery7.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF494P4qaQGYfdILy4YFoD_9CJEaXTDjCSA04LTuUVG8ILvZh9qYFHYpj4lKaFVhFpvf-H8fSC93ue5rWKRs577CxGw5JXQkdvxXKppDqm8Id2TCaWJVmJ-SsOcyZfHqF1iWCjB9uvhuhZ/s400/crockery7.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Burgundy Rose by British Anchor, England<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUS3Ff5uklXoe4RbRr1-lksjviaf57iNnhOi9qL8hC_cLdN-4vyJ69iNdRygQ9vO30oXyXHLDG1qlPZ26fIk66pHig-_s4618eAqt160aUhp-nOwj4wnP9So4zQ9gRcIj7jnS3IyzmYeTB/s1600/crockery8.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUS3Ff5uklXoe4RbRr1-lksjviaf57iNnhOi9qL8hC_cLdN-4vyJ69iNdRygQ9vO30oXyXHLDG1qlPZ26fIk66pHig-_s4618eAqt160aUhp-nOwj4wnP9So4zQ9gRcIj7jnS3IyzmYeTB/s400/crockery8.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
This pair is unusual for the difference of just one small motif between them. Johnsons of Australia<br />
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Classic scenes. Left - Crown Lynn, New Zealand, right - Swan Inn by J Broadhurst & Sons, England</div>
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Mikasa, Japan<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilxUmA8ioRpKEVhM9UT7RMVkh0EZNJG-8fW2GOw1KAWA25J2r6pWQk6OLUI4Cu2AScBKYhfEX6nWGO5wLbjL0RD3cLCEN0YzMB9Zs1xKiESSSATAR56pNNARJkmd1WBiAyFs5iAqQb6h9I/s1600/crockery11.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilxUmA8ioRpKEVhM9UT7RMVkh0EZNJG-8fW2GOw1KAWA25J2r6pWQk6OLUI4Cu2AScBKYhfEX6nWGO5wLbjL0RD3cLCEN0YzMB9Zs1xKiESSSATAR56pNNARJkmd1WBiAyFs5iAqQb6h9I/s400/crockery11.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-57176821917605935082016-05-15T18:50:00.000+10:002016-05-15T18:50:52.544+10:00on the Proper Disposal of Old Journals<br />
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I used to
keep journals. I kept them lovingly, faithfully and well. Journalling was an
important and cherished part of my life. I discovered so much of myself through
my journals. Or at least that’s how I remember it.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Because my journals were
so important to me, I’d keep them every time I edited my possessions in order
to move house. By the time I turned 30 I’d collected a big, heavy pile of
journals. It might not look so big to some – I’ve often read writers’ accounts
of having piles of old journals stacked from floor to ceiling in their attics
or cellars. I’m guessing that these are mostly the kinds of people who have
houses with attics and cellars and get to stay put in them for long periods of
time. But me, every fucking time I moved house or even re-organised the one I
was living in, I’d have to pack the fucking things up, lug them about from here
to fucking there, and find somewhere to bloody well store them again. You can
tell how frustrated I’ve become by this by all the fucks.</span></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnvJRfWsoTH3ogYhdewppPn_12YJmB650muUooTQ6P_hcfNX3iGHNV40DezrtwQUe74L1iVUG6Lqti0Qeduo-Z5NRP6haWRpzFixZzyvq9z9FWlhzwzNk1Z53bWvhl8znB6hrYJAkiERLG/s1600/journals.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnvJRfWsoTH3ogYhdewppPn_12YJmB650muUooTQ6P_hcfNX3iGHNV40DezrtwQUe74L1iVUG6Lqti0Qeduo-Z5NRP6haWRpzFixZzyvq9z9FWlhzwzNk1Z53bWvhl8znB6hrYJAkiERLG/s400/journals.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Baggage - extremely literally</td></tr>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"></span> </div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">It was around this
time that I pretty much stopped journalling. I was just too daunted by the
thought of more fucking heavy books to carry around with me when next it would
come time to pack. I couldn’t bear it. And so I stopped writing. Yep, that’s
pretty sad.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I first started thinking about (shock, horror) getting rid of
at least some of my journals a few years ago when I was packing up to move up
from Victoria. I thought long and hard and deeply. I even googled ‘should I get
rid of my old journals?’. Most of the pages that Google offered me were blog
posts written by people wondering the same thing as me. The verdict was pretty
clear. Nearly everyone who commented on any of these pages said no, no-one
should ever dispose of one’s journals, because one day at some point in the
future there just might be someone who would benefit from reading those
journals or some part thereof, and it would be a terrible disservice to the
future of the human race for one to willfully prevent such a thing from
happening. So I packed the fucking things up again. And still didn’t produce
any more.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And now, I want to keep a journal again. The dread of the pile
of accumulated journals growing heavier hasn’t lessened, so I had to ask myself
again, well, how about if I got rid of at least some of them? And so, of
course, I had to ask Google as well. Google has certainly changed its mind on
the subject.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This time I found people considering the content of their
journals more closely when questioning the proposition of getting rid of their own
journals. Many confessed that they discovered that their early journals, at
least, were full of a lot of stuff that they didn’t really have any interest in
holding onto any more. <a href="http://remadebyhand.com/2012/06/old-diaries-paper-shredders-and-permission-to-let-go/">This post here by Erin Kurup</a> is a great example. I love how she came to this realisation - "They were negative, whiny, obnoxious, phony. And you know what? I knew the words were fake<em> as I was writing them.</em> I remember deliberately choosing what to record based on what I believed the record I thought I was supposed to write would look like."</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Many people told of sorting through their journals,
throwing out the things that they didn’t need to keep a record of any longer,
and keeping the things that were still important to them, now, at this time.
They reported that they were glad they did it.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So I dug my suitcase full of
old journals out from their dusty storage corner. I started at the beginning,
with my earliest ‘serious’ journal. I started it when I was nineteen years old
and embarking on a very intensive journey of psychotherapy. I’d been told that
I could cure my depression by working with this psychotherapy, so I worked it
very hard. And all these years later, well, yes, I’m glad I did it. It didn’t
cure my depression but it gave me some decent tools for managing my emotions.
The journal from this time is very much a therapy journal, very much a
torturous exploration of why on earth I might be so fucking miserable – or scared,
mostly. So many of the sentences in it start with “I’m scared.” It details the
crappiest bits of my relationship with someone who has since passed away. There
is really no need for there to be a record of all that stuff. I don’t need to
keep it any more.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So I tore all those pages out. I kept some things, like
the art therapy pieces that were the most special to me.</span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqqAeu2zYqoJp8ZtWdWgfA-DMrftfgy9DSAEhmICasLAYbQZ_h2GttWGyEWrJBxBnPyZdHKVEplLCtAyyMQE85J10kJ8xIXgUz-BKBTKnSEPuKeKn7_1BmxAa1kAPj2oPpkOiasInM67YT/s1600/journalart1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqqAeu2zYqoJp8ZtWdWgfA-DMrftfgy9DSAEhmICasLAYbQZ_h2GttWGyEWrJBxBnPyZdHKVEplLCtAyyMQE85J10kJ8xIXgUz-BKBTKnSEPuKeKn7_1BmxAa1kAPj2oPpkOiasInM67YT/s400/journalart1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjamasBNH_aZH_kGdg3Vcz9p-q_GnYrTX29uzL0Rgx2hSQ_0QFspHkLtAVw6P33E7QpmyvXfakAdAF6yhnJO5QlQhygjNuItYy4D0ksIt2pdpLlNfi6Vb9aPhhH7IFgtKvwiVtMHLyTLjuZ/s1600/journalart2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjamasBNH_aZH_kGdg3Vcz9p-q_GnYrTX29uzL0Rgx2hSQ_0QFspHkLtAVw6P33E7QpmyvXfakAdAF6yhnJO5QlQhygjNuItYy4D0ksIt2pdpLlNfi6Vb9aPhhH7IFgtKvwiVtMHLyTLjuZ/s400/journalart2.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"></span> </div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I also kept the pages on which
I’d recorded my dreams. I’ve always found it a very powerful practice, to
record and pay attention to my dreams. Reading them long after I’ve forgotten
them, they are still speaking to me. Some of the smaller journals are dedicated
entirely to dreams. It looks like I’m going to have to keep those ones for the
time being.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">By the time I got to the end I’d removed at least 90% of the
pages from the journal. And as for the proper way to dispose of old journals,
this was widely discussed in the blog posts I read. For me, it could only be by
burning them. Fortunately I have a proper fireplace where I can do such a thing.
And whoooosh, off they went, up in flames.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And then I picked up the next
journal, in chronological order, and continued.</span></span></div>
Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-32989343918525937542016-05-06T09:05:00.001+10:002016-05-06T09:05:47.732+10:00on the Pursuit of Happiness
<br />
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;">
I came
across this quote by Australian writer Hugh Mackay last night. It struck a
chord with me, and I’ve found my thoughts returning to it throughout the night
and this morning. It articulates my own feelings on the subject quite well.</div>
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<div class="Ct">
"I don’t mind people being happy – but the idea that everything we do is part of the pursuit of happiness seems to me a really dangerous idea and has led to a contemporary disease in Western society, which is fear of sadness. It’s a really odd thing that we’re now seeing people saying 'write down 3 things that made you happy today before you go to sleep', and 'cheer up' and 'happiness is our birthright' and so on. We’re kind of teaching our kids that happiness is the default position – it’s rubbish. Wholeness is what we ought to be striving for and part of that is sadness, disappointment, frustration, failure; all of those things which make us who we are. Happiness and victory and fulfillment are nice little things that also happen to us, but they don’t teach us much. Everyone says we grow through pain and then as soon as they experience pain they say 'Quick! Move on! Cheer up!'. I’d like just for a year to have a moratorium on the word 'happiness' and to replace it with the word 'wholeness'. Ask yourself 'is this contributing to my wholeness?' and if you’re having a bad day, it is.”</div>
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</div>
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The
western world has a culture of trying to be happy, trying to find happiness, to
follow our bliss or however you want to put it. But in spite of all this
freedom to do so, we’re not getting any happier than our ancestors, who never
had a cultural construct in which to question whether or not they were happy
with their lives, and whether they might have other options, or what they
should do to make themselves happier. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Life was just what it was, and they got on
with it. I believe they were better off for it.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’ve had clinical depression
for nearly 30 years. I had two major nervous breakdowns before I left my teens,
and another in my mid-20’s (which was most certainly partly caused by trying to
follow an idea of happiness, and being bummed that it didn’t work). I had a
huge breakthrough when I just gave up thinking of happiness as something that’s
important. I don’t even ask myself or wonder if a particular course of action
will make me happy or not – it’s not even a criterion for decisions. And I can
affirm that life is definitely better and easier this way.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This is an attitude
that gets me a lot of criticism from people who are strongly engaged in a
philosophy of ‘positivity’ and are into searching for happiness. They think I
might be depressed because I fail to pursue and find happiness. I know that’s
not true. Depression is a constant – it’s just the state of my brain, probably,
I think, as a side effect of having epilepsy and autism. Just faulty wiring.
How I deal with depression and the rest of my life is another matter – that’s
an active, continuing process and function. It turns out that trying to be
happy really doesn’t help at all, and just wastes a lot of energy that could be
put into making life as it already is easier to deal with.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">It’s not that I don’t
feel happiness. I often feel happy. I recognise that I’m feeling it and I
appreciate it. I do feel sad more often – that’s part of clinical depression.
My point is that I no longer measure the balance or deliberately try to change
it. I just get on with life anyway.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Gratitude is a buzzword I’m hearing a lot
of people go on about lately. Apparently, we can all make ourselves happier by
reminding ourselves to be grateful. It’s pretty much an industry in itself
these days, where you can buy a blank book that says ‘Gratitude’ somewhere on
the cover, which is supposed to make it somehow more useful in making life ‘better’
than a plain blank notebook would be, or attend a ‘gratitude’ workshop for a
fee. I can see that this would have benefits as a cognitive training exercise,
for some people who are unduly obsessing on needs or desires and forgetting to recognise
or acknowledge all the wonderfulness along the way. But it’s become
oversimplified in the process of commercialisation into an equation where
basically, more gratitude equals more happiness, and therefore, if you don’t
have enough happiness, you must be in need of more gratitude.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I experience
gratitude deeply, profoundly and frequently. Several times a day, I’ll
spontaneously need to have to take a second to take a breath and allow the
intensity of the feeling of gratitude to wash through me. I don’t need to make
myself do this, it just happens. A lot. Common triggers include lying down in a
comfortable bed, reading excellent writing, the taste of food, the kindness of
others, and the beauty and sheer marvel of the natural world. This happens
consistently, regardless of whether I’m in a good or a poor mood or state of
mind. I sometimes wonder whether I have a need for God in my life partly out of
need to ascribe some agent of existence toward which I can direct my gratitude.
I often read that people tend to forget God until they’re in trouble and need
help, and then they pray. I find the opposite happens to me – I can forget God
for a while, until I’m confronted with something, usually a phenomenon of
nature, that overwhelms me with wonder, and then I need God to have something
to be thankful to, and to rationalise the thrill, not the misery, of existence.
So I know that a lack of gratitude is not the cause of my depression.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I think
people find the nature of my illness confronting. They don’t want to believe it
exists, perhaps, so they try to define clinical depression as a lack of
something – sufficient pursuit of happiness, or whatever – on my part. I’m not
buying it. If you want to follow happiness, and you’re not hurting
anybody else in order to do so, well off you go then, whatever floats your boat
and bakes your potatoes, mate. I really can be happy for you, truly. But if you’re
trying to tell me how to fix life with happiness, you’re wasting your time. I’ve
already tried out that particular philosophy, and I know that I’m better off
without it. </span></span></div>
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Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-60627404505821407872016-01-01T13:24:00.000+11:002016-01-17T23:58:47.178+11:00Lady Demelza's Year in Books 2015Hello dear readers. I'm very pleased to say that 2015 was a very good year in books for me. Especially through the autumn and winter, so many really excellent books passed through my hands. I must admit,<a href="http://goodreads.com/"> Goodreads</a> deserves some of the credit. Checking out their recommendations and 'other readers enjoyed' I've found a few precious ones I might otherwise never have heard of, such as <em>The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August</em> by Claire North. Absolutely brilliant.<br />
<br />
Each book title is linked to its page on Goodreads, so you can quickly see what kind of a book it is. <br />
<br />
1.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15841930-true-brews?from_search=true&search_version=service"> <em>True Brews</em></a> by Emma Christensen 2013<br />
2.<em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22401556-mothers-grimm?from_search=true&search_version=service"> Mothers Grimm</a></em> by Danielle Wood 2014<br />
3.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16142170-awake-in-the-dream-world?ac=1&from_search=1">Awake in the Dream World: The Art of Audrey Niffenegger</a></em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16142170-awake-in-the-dream-world?ac=1&from_search=1"> </a>by Audrey Niffenegger et al 2013<br />
4.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6678091-gypsy-boy?ac=1&from_search=1">Gypsy Boy</a></em> by Mikey Walsh 2009<br />
5. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18635092-the-truth-is-a-cave-in-the-black-mountains?ac=1&from_search=1">The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains</a></em> by Neil Gaiman, illustrated by Eddie Campbell 2014<br />
6.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9570.Another_Roadside_Attraction?ac=1&from_search=1"> <em>Another Roadside Attraction</em></a> by Tom Robbins 1971 (re-read)<br />
7. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23164983-hollow-city?ac=1&from_search=1">Hollow City</a></em> by Ransom Riggs 2014<br />
8. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/634125.The_Submerged_Cathedral?ac=1&from_search=1">The Submerged Cathedral</a></em> by Charlotte Wood 2004<br />
9.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7783191-the-invisible-gorilla?ac=1&from_search=1"> <em>The Invisible Gorilla</em></a> by Christopher Chabris & Daniel Simons 2010<br />
10.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16056498-the-autistic-brain?ac=1&from_search=1">The Autistic Brain</a></em> by Temple Grandin & Richard Panek 2013<br />
11.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/86895.The_Djinn_in_the_Nightingale_s_Eye?ac=1&from_search=1">The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye</a></em> by A.S. Byatt 1994<br />
12.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17061.Coraline?ac=1&from_search=1">Coraline</a></em> by Neil Gaiman 2002<br />
13.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2213661.The_Graveyard_Book?ac=1&from_search=1">The Graveyard Book</a></em> by Neil Gaiman 2008<br />
14.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/609514.Murder_in_the_Dark?ac=1&from_search=1">Murder in the Dark</a></em> by Margaret Atwood 1983<br />
15. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/63697.The_Man_Who_Mistook_His_Wife_for_a_Hat_and_Other_Clinical_Tales?ac=1&from_search=1">The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat</a></em> by Oliver Sacks 1985<br />
16.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1169669.Dear_Greenpeace?from_search=true&search_version=service">Dear Greenpeace </a></em>by Simon James 1991<br />
17.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/641087.The_Country_Diary_of_an_Edwardian_Lady?ac=1&from_search=1">The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady</a></em> by Edith Holden, 1906/1971<br />
18. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40833.Turtle_Diary?ac=1&from_search=1">Turtle Diary</a></em> by Russell Hoban 1975<br />
19.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4596235-sweet-poison-why-sugar-makes-us-fat?ac=1&from_search=1">Sweet Poison</a></em> by David Gillespie 2008<br />
20. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6395688-what-the-world-will-look-like-when-all-the-water-leaves-us?ac=1&from_search=1">What the World Will Look Like When All the Water Leaves Us</a></em> by Laura van den Berg 2009<br />
21.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15990088-mattress-actress?ac=1&from_search=1">Mattress Actress</a></em> by Annika Cleeve 2012<br />
22.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/758037.The_Women_In_Black?ac=1&from_search=1"> </a><em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/758037.The_Women_In_Black?ac=1&from_search=1">The Women in Black</a> </em>by Madeleine St. John 1993<br />
23.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/226541.The_Goddess_Companion?ac=1&from_search=1">The Goddess Companion</a></em> by Patricia Monaghan 1999<br />
24. <span id="goog_1110363666"></span><em><a href="https://www.blogger.com/">The Surgeon of Crowthorne</a></em> <span id="goog_1110363667"></span>by Simon Winchester 1998<br />
25.<em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/241823.Women_Who_Run_With_the_Wolves?ac=1&from_search=1"> Women Who Run With the Wolves</a></em> by Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Ph.D. 1992 (re-read)<br />
26. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6295065-the-end-of-overeating?ac=1&from_search=1">The End of Overeating</a></em> by David A. Kessler 2009<br />
27.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/193755.The_Diving_Bell_and_the_Butterfly?ac=1&from_search=1">The Diving-Bell and the Butterfly</a></em> by Jean-Dominique Bauby, English translation by Jeremy Leggatt 1997<br />
28.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20706317-the-first-fifteen-lives-of-harry-august?ac=1&from_search=1">The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August</a></em> by Claire North 2014<br />
29.<em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2573668-the-runaway-brain?ac=1&from_search=1"> The Runaway Brain</a></em> by Christopher Wills 1993<br />
30.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11899.The_Hours?ac=1&from_search=1">The Hours</a></em> by Michael Cunningham 1999<br />
31.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38447.The_Handmaid_s_Tale?ac=1&from_search=1">The Handmaid's Tale</a></em> by Margaret Atwood 1985<br />
32. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5907.The_Hobbit?ac=1&from_search=1">The Hobbit</a></em> by J.R.R. Tolkein 1937<br />
33.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2497026.The_Watch_Tower?ac=1&from_search=1">The Watch Tower</a></em> by Elizabeth Harrow 1966<br />
34.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2003968.How_to_Cook_a_Galah?ac=1&from_search=1">How to Cook a Galah</a></em> by Laurel Evelyn Dyson 2002<br />
35.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11213439-brain-bugs?ac=1&from_search=1">Brain Bugs</a></em> by Dean Buonomano 2011<br />
36.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7245033-the-world-beneath?ac=1&from_search=1">The World Beneath</a></em> by Cate Kennedy 2009<br />
37.<em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6240.An_Imaginary_Life?ac=1&from_search=1"> An Imaginary Life</a></em> by David Malouf 1978<br />
38.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18298890-cuckoo-song?ac=1&from_search=1">Cuckoo Song</a></em> by Frances Hardinge 2014<br />
39.<em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7662095-along-the-enchanted-way?ac=1&from_search=1"> Along the Enchanted Way</a></em> by William Blacker 2009<br />
40.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12666103-a-face-like-glass?ac=1&from_search=1">A Face Like Glass</a></em> by Frances Hardinge 2012<br />
41.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/186190.Forrest_Gump?ac=1&from_search=1">Forrest Gump</a></em> by Winston Groom 1986<br />
42. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1009042.12_Edmondstone_Street?ac=1&from_search=1">12 Edmonstone Street</a></em> by David Malouf 1985<br />
43.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9818423-five-bells?ac=1&from_search=1">Five Bells</a></em> by Gail Jones 2011<br />
44.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15738357-twilight-robbery?ac=1&from_search=1">Twilight Robbery</a></em> by Frances Hardinge 2011<br />
45. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13596973-love-and-hunger?from_search=true&search_version=service">Love & Hunger</a></em> by Charlotte Wood 2012<br />
46.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6306969-an-edible-history-of-humanity?ac=1&from_search=1">An Edible History of Humanity</a></em> by Tom Standage 2009<br />
47.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17690370-wired-for-culture?ac=1&from_search=1">Wired for Culture</a></em> by Mark Pagel 2012<br />
48. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16071734-trains-and-lovers?ac=1&from_search=1">Trains and Lovers</a></em> by Alexander McCall Smith<br />
49. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1818222.Moon_Over_Minneapolis?ac=1&from_search=1">Moon Over Minneapolis</a></em> by Fay Weldon 1991<br />
50.<em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2547248.The_Dawn_of_Time_?ac=1&from_search=1"> The Dawn of Time</a></em> by Ainslie Roberts & Charles P. Mountford 1969<br />
51. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/546644.The_Fifth_Child?ac=1&from_search=1">The Fifth Child</a></em> by Doris Lessing 1988<br />
52.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/349596.Verdigris_Deep?ac=1&from_search=1">Verdigris Deep</a></em> by Frances Hardinge 2007<br />
53.<em> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2887550-houndsley-and-catina-and-the-quiet-time?ac=1&from_search=1">Houndsley and Catina and the Quiet Time</a></em> by James Howe 2008<br />
54. <em><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/226527.The_Language_of_the_Goddess?ac=1&from_search=1">The Language of the Goddess</a></em> by Marija Gimbutas 1989<br />
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The best book I read this year was, without a doubt,<em> The Submerged Cathedral</em> by Charlotte Wood. It was a completely random find in an op shop. It caught my eye just because of the author's last name - I had been keeping an eye out for any books by Danielle Wood. I opened it up and read the three or four pages of the prologue, and I swooned. I felt a thrill running up and down my body. The visceral pleasure of the beauty of the words was just intoxicating. And it stayed that intensely marvellous all the way through. Once every page or so I would have to put the book down and just breathe and feel the astounding impact of the words on my brain and spirit. I didn't always like what was happening in the story. Some of the characters really pissed me off. But it didn't matter, it was a superlative jewel of a book. <br />
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Because this year contained so much high quality reading, I find myself unable to come up with a shortlist of other really good books. At least half the books in my list were amazing or excellent or some other superlative. <br />
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There were a few that took a considerable amount of skimming to get through, such as <em>The Runaway Brain</em> by Christopher Wills, but they all contained something I really wanted and I was willing to wade through the dross to find it. <br />
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The crappiest book I read this year was <em>Five Bells</em> by Gail Jones. It started off promising. It described Circular Quay in Sydney, a place I'm very familiar with and fond of, from the points of view of two characters, one of whom was really happy, and one who was really depressed. I know that. I know how Circular Quay looks when I'm happy, and when I'm depressed. I loved how she captured the reality of there being different places in the same place, depending on one's perception filtered by mood. But then, nothing happened. Seriously, nothing. There was only one page which contained an event of any significance. I kept on, thinking surely, something must happen to bring it all together in the end, but no.<br />
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A special Crappy Book Mention goes to <em>Forrest Gump</em> by Winston Groom. This is an example of that incredibly rare thing, a movie that was better than the book it was based on. In this case, the movie is orders of magnitude better than the book. Watch the movie if you haven't seen it yet, but don't bother with the book. <br />
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I'm now up to about page 50 of the 1100+ page monster of a volume that is the seventh and final volume of the Obernewtyn Chronicles, <em>The Red Queen</em> by Isobelle Carmody. I waited impatiently for something like three or four years for her to get around to publishing it, and in that light, the time it will take me to get through it doesn't seem like so much. <br />
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I'm continually reinforcing and refining my strict rules about not wasting any time reading crappy books, so I'm looking forward to another fabulous year of books in 2016. There's<em> so many</em> out there. <br />
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You can also check out my Year in Books for<a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2015/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2014.html"> 2014</a>, <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2013.html">2013</a>, or <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2012/12/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2012.html">2012</a>.Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-5117726869663824612015-04-27T11:54:00.000+10:002015-04-27T11:54:12.027+10:00on the Discovery of the Art of Altering BooksI dabbled in many forms of visual arts during my youth, but I didn't discover the one that really captured my heart until I was about 26 years old. It was quite an auspicious beginning, really.<br />
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I was modelling for a life drawing class. We were in an art studio, and there were several art books generally lying around. I was holding a 20 minute pose when I found myself facing a stack of books on a table. Anyone who has ever done life modelling will know what it's like to have a single perspective of a particular space for an extended period of time. Mostly, it's really boring. And so, of course, I made the effort to read the titles from my almost-upside down sideways perspective (relative to the books, not the floor. I was just standing there. It was the books that were askew.) One title really intrigued me. It was<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/402445.Altered_Books_Workshop"><i> Altered Books Workshop</i> by Bev Brazelton</a>. I couldn't wait for the break so I could look at the book. And the few minutes I had to flip through that book turned out to change my life.<br />
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Fortunately, my local library had a copy of it, so I was able to take it home and go through it at my leisure. I had never even heard of altered books before. And wow, I was so in love. I wanted to try this. But here, I had the dilemma that many altered book artists encounter in the early days. We are taught from our earliest years that we should never deliberately damage or deface a book. It's hard to break that, even for the love of art.<br />
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It was then that, most fortuitously, I was given an unexpected gift from a friend. It was a copy of a 1958 edition of <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25159340-droll-stories?ac=1"><i>Droll Stories</i> by Honore de Balzac</a>, but significantly for me, it was already damaged. A section in the middle of the book had a corner ripped out through several pages, enough to remove a small amount of text. It was the green flag that gave me permission. I started tearing pages out, in the name of creativity, not destruction. It was absolutley thrilling. And this is what I have ended up with.<br />
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I never got around to doing any decoration on the cover. It looks pretty sad and beat-up from the outside. But there is a clue that treasures lie inside - ribbons and papers and bits and pieces poking out the edges.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjplHqTv5Bqc0SNKoTGnBKnju7w9OgYQLeZ9ZU2E4Jpi_JNLckvdize_GhHloHcFC_OLs4QElbWVWwM5QntOk0M_Vj5rpdEfkqkc8i-A2d7VcziSMoI893N_lOV233J0hee5vFyrd_Pzq3o/s1600/book1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjplHqTv5Bqc0SNKoTGnBKnju7w9OgYQLeZ9ZU2E4Jpi_JNLckvdize_GhHloHcFC_OLs4QElbWVWwM5QntOk0M_Vj5rpdEfkqkc8i-A2d7VcziSMoI893N_lOV233J0hee5vFyrd_Pzq3o/s1600/book1.JPG" height="400" width="300" /></a></div>
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I kept most of the title pages and the information about the book reasonably intact. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzd8KJYk2TL_ONjSRC71EMSsRYCkNRdE2jk_E6HEeYMBT0IimAg-EcFiqzqd0t_ryYgzSvglsPaVSNghKSrcNuD-9SZ3HZtIvTs2U4IEoUBaWSx3K4hipEjGvIlpsFR4WJBvjqHTbJNKv-/s1600/book2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzd8KJYk2TL_ONjSRC71EMSsRYCkNRdE2jk_E6HEeYMBT0IimAg-EcFiqzqd0t_ryYgzSvglsPaVSNghKSrcNuD-9SZ3HZtIvTs2U4IEoUBaWSx3K4hipEjGvIlpsFR4WJBvjqHTbJNKv-/s1600/book2.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></div>
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Did you know that there is actually a word for those brown spots that grow on books as they age? It's called foxing. Isn't that lovely? I'd much prefer to think that my hands and forearms are foxing as I age, rather than growing liver spots. <br />
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And after that, pretty much anything goes. These are some of my experiments in my first altered book. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA0ZDVXEBUixX1dCz6XF5DXNtzXqteP0LoNXHRBiuyOSG-eL0WGGpcWcCQfPxMx-AK_RuP1eUPKqboRWFcY6QWy6DNe_w8Ke8LDYe4c86gJXByIFLpDUMm0tDItGWmhH0SFlraEAbHuquv/s1600/book4.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA0ZDVXEBUixX1dCz6XF5DXNtzXqteP0LoNXHRBiuyOSG-eL0WGGpcWcCQfPxMx-AK_RuP1eUPKqboRWFcY6QWy6DNe_w8Ke8LDYe4c86gJXByIFLpDUMm0tDItGWmhH0SFlraEAbHuquv/s1600/book4.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></div>
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The spread above includes one of my favourite photographic images ever. It's one of those free postcards, from a brand called rose&dressed, that I found on my travels in Switzerland. To me, this is a modern archetype, an ultimate essence of feminine power. <br />
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It's also a place to keep my treasured cards and postcards from loved ones. <br />
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I'm now on my fourth altered book, and I've done lots of other interesting things with books since then, such as using them for wallpaper. But this book remains one of my most treasured special possessions.Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-15306396836377655882015-01-01T19:29:00.000+11:002015-11-01T12:35:27.375+11:00Lady Demelza's Year in Books 2014Hello and welcome to my annual Reckoning of the Books!<br />
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Since <a href="http://livingthesimplelifeiwant.blogspot.com.au/">Moonwave</a>'s excellent comment on <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2013.html">last year's Year in Books</a>, I have discovered <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/">Goodreads</a> and joined up, so you can see a really, really long list of books if you check out <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/33181812-lady-demelza">my profile there</a>. And here, each title on my list links to that book's page on Goodreads, so you can find out what kind of a book it is pretty quickly. In some cases, where the author has their own website or blog, I've linked the author's name to their home sites.<br />
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1. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13557337-haroun-and-the-sea-of-stories"><i>Haroun and the Sea of Stories</i></a> by <a href="http://www.salman-rushdie.com/about-2/">Salman Rushdie</a> 1990<br />
2. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20880285-the-minor-adjustment-beauty-salon"><i>The Minor Adjustment Beauty Salon</i></a> by <a href="http://www.alexandermccallsmith.co.uk/about-the-author/">Alexander McCall Smith</a> 2013<br />
3. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25460.Animal_Vegetable_Miracle?from_search=true"><i>Animal, Vegetable, Miracle</i></a> by <a href="http://www.kingsolver.com/">Barbara Kingsolver</a> 2007<br />
4. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13531044-whole-larder-love?from_search=true"><i>Whole Larder Love</i></a> by <a href="http://wholelarderlove.com/">Rohan Anderson</a> 2012<br />
5.<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8361584-opal?from_search=true"> <i>Opal - The Journal of an Understanding Heart</i></a> by Opal Whiteley 1920, adapted by Jane Boulton 1976 (re-read)<br />
6. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/248787.The_World_Without_Us?from_search=true"><i>The World Without Us</i></a> by Alan Weisman 2007<br />
7. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1022699.The_Lollipop_Shoes"><i>The Lollipop Shoes</i></a> by <a href="http://www.joanne-harris.co.uk/">Joanne Harris</a> 2007<br />
8. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13153973-peaches-for-monsieur-le-cur"><i>Peaches for Monsieur le Cure</i></a> by Joanne Harris 2012<br />
9. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24983.Doomsday_Book"><i>Doomsday Book</i></a> by Connie Willis 1992<br />
10. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6535755-anne-of-avonlea"><i>Anne of Avonlea</i></a> by L.M. Montgomery 1909 (re-read)<br />
11. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9529.The_Shadow_of_the_Wind"><i>The Shadow of the Wind</i></a> by Carlos Ruiz Zafon 2001, English translation by Lucia Graves 2004<br />
12. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7681608-aspergirls?from_search=true"><i>Aspergirls</i></a> by Rudy Simone 2010<br />
13. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2206449.Mistress_of_the_Art_of_Death"><i>Mistress of the Art of Death</i></a> by Ariana Franklin 2007<br />
14. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17313898-madness"><i>Madness</i></a> by <a href="http://katerichardsaustralia.wordpress.com/">Kate Richards</a> 2013<br />
15. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/116236.The_Education_of_Little_Tree?from_search=true"><i>The Education of Little Tree</i></a> by Forrest Carter 1976<br />
16. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7140917-our-tragic-universe?from_search=true"><i>Our Tragic Universe</i></a> by Scarlett Thomas 2010<br />
17. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3396.Red_Dog?from_search=true"><i>Red Dog</i></a> by <a href="http://www.louisdebernieres.co.uk/">Louis de Bernieres</a> 2001<br />
18. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7599854-new-york"><i>New York</i></a> by <a href="http://www.edwardrutherfurd.com/author.html">Edward Rutherfurd</a> 2009<br />
19. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7550814-stuff?from_search=true"><i>Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things</i></a> by Randy O. Frost and Gail Steketee 2011<br />
20. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7937653-the-mind-s-eye?from_search=true"><i>The Mind's Eye</i></a> by <a href="http://www.oliversacks.com/">Oliver Sacks</a> 2010<br />
21. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2659997-stolen-innocence"><i>Stolen Innocence</i></a> by Elissa Wall 2008<br />
22. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17646.The_Tent?from_search=true"><i>The Tent</i></a> by <a href="http://margaretatwood.ca/">Margaret Atwood</a> 2006<br />
23. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15943685-the-uncommon-appeal-of-clouds-by-alexander-mccall-smith"><i>The Uncommon Appeal of Clouds</i></a> by Alexander McCall Smith 2012<br />
24. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11149465-leonard-cohen?from_search=true"><i>Poems and Songs</i></a> by Leonard Cohen 2011<br />
25. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/749829.The_Arcanum"><i>The Arcanum</i></a> by Janet Gleeson 1998<br />
26. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1062274.Animals_In_Translation"><i>Animals in Translation</i></a> by Temple Grandin and Catherine Johnson 2005<br />
27. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/902747.Holy_Fools"><i>Holy Fools</i></a> by Joanne Harris 2003<br />
28. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11342925-poems?from_search=true"><i>Poems 1972 - 2002</i></a> by <a href="http://www.leunig.com.au/">Michael Leunig</a> 2003<br />
29. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/818811.Escape?ac=1"><i>Escape</i></a> by Carolyn Jessop 2007<br />
30. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8193750-triumph?ac=1"><i>Triumph</i></a> by Carolyn Jessop 2009<br />
31. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5288867-the-lot?ac=1"><i>The Lot: In Words</i></a> by Michael Leunig 2008<br />
32. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23108339-the-house-in-via-manno?ac=1"><i>The House in Via Manno</i></a> by Milena Agus 2006, English translation by Brigid Maher 2009<br />
33. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12440848-the-venetian-contract?ac=1"><i>The Venetian Contract</i></a> by Marina Fiorato 2012<br />
34.<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11020173-ragnarok?ac=1">Ragnarok</a> </i>by <a href="http://www.asbyatt.com/Default.aspx">A.S. Byatt</a> 2011<br />
35. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/465048.Geisha?from_search=true"><i>Geisha: Women of Japan's Flower and Willow World</i></a> by Tina Skinner and Mary L. Martin 2005<br />
36. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49011.The_Bloody_Chamber_and_Other_Stories?from_search=true"><i>The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories</i></a> by Angela Carter 1979<br />
37. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/103408.Thinking_in_Pictures?from_search=true"><i>Thinking in Pictures</i></a> by Temple Grandin 1995<br />
38. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2794395-the-princess-bride"><i>The Princess Bride</i></a> by William Goldman 1973<br />
39. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6048136-90-day-geisha?ac=1"><i>90-Day Geisha</i></a> by Chelsea Haywood 2008<br />
40. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7985298-alex-s-adventures-in-numberland"><i>Alex's Adventures in Numberland</i></a> by <a href="http://alexbellos.com/">Alex Bellos</a> 2010<br />
41. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10189920-the-tell-tale-brain"><i>The Tell-Tale Brain</i></a> by V.S. Ramachandran 2011<br />
42. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/836640.Autobiography_of_a_Geisha"><i>Autobiography of a Geisha</i></a> by Sayo Masuda 1957, English translation by G.G. Rowley 2003<br />
43. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/386187.Midnight_in_the_Garden_of_Good_and_Evil?ac=1"><i>Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil</i></a> by John Berendt 1994<br />
44. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9042320-diy-fashion?ac=1"><i>DIY Fashion</i></a> by Selena Francis-Bryden 2010<br />
45. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6393242-the-math-book?ac=1"><i>The Math Book</i></a> by Clifford A. Pickover 2009<br />
46. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18080204-the-goddess-and-the-thief?ac=1"><i>The Goddess and the Thief</i></a> by Essie Fox 2013<br />
47. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9673436-the-invention-of-hugo-cabret?ac=1"><i>The Invention of Hugo Cabret</i></a> by Brian Selznick 2007<br />
48. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/72587.Good_Bones?ac=1"><i>Good Bones</i></a> by Margaret Atwood 1992<br />
49. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1488101.Rosie_Little_s_Cautionary_Tales_for_Girls?ac=1"><i>Rosie Little's Cautionary Tales for Girls</i></a> by <a href="http://www.daniellewood.com.au/">Danielle Wood</a> 2006<br />
50. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11168664-the-neurotourist?ac=1"><i>The Neurotourist</i></a> by Lone Frank 2007, English translation by Russell Dees 2009<br />
51. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/89723.The_Lottery_and_Other_Stories?ac=1"><i>The Lottery and Other Stories</i></a> by Shirley Jackson 1949<br />
52. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17621087-bodies-of-subversion?ac=1"><i>Bodies of Subversion: A Secret History of Women and Tattoo</i></a> by Margot Mifflin, rev. ed. 2013<br />
53. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17333444-the-witness-wore-red?ac=1"><i>The Witness Wore Red</i></a> by Rebecca Musser 2013<br />
54. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/55139.The_Year_1000?ac=1"><i>The Year 1000</i></a> by Robert Lacey and Danny Danziger 1999<br />
55. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/279769.The_Leaf_And_The_Cloud?ac=1"><i>The Leaf and the Cloud</i></a> by Mary Oliver 2000<br />
56. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18601926-year-of-no-sugar?ac=1"><i>Year of No Sugar</i></a> by Eve O. Schaub 2014<br />
57. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6346975-moonwalking-with-einstein?ac=1"><i>Moonwalking With Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything</i></a> by Joshua Foer 2011<br />
58. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6881206-the-night-bookmobile?ac=1"><i>The Night Bookmobile</i></a> by <a href="http://audreyniffenegger.com/">Audrey Niffenegger</a> 2010 (re-read)<br />
59. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15842705-raven-girl?ac=1"><i>Raven Girl</i></a> by Audrey Niffenegger 2013<br />
60. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2715.Salt?ac=1">Salt: A World History</a></i> by Mark Kurlansky 2002<br />
<br />
Choosing a 'best book' from this list provided something of a classification dilemma. If I were to choose the best book on this list, it would have to be <i>Opal</i> by Opal Whiteley, which as far as I'm concerned is one of the best books ever written by anyone, anywhere. But I can't very well go giving it my 'best book' award every year that I re-read it. That wouldn't be fair, would it? This also rules out<i> The Night Bookmobile</i> by Audrey Niffenegger, which is one of my favourite stories, but also a re-read for this year. So I've decided to belatedly award <i>Opal </i>my Best Book for 1998, and move on to the present. And the Best Book of 2014 is... ta da da-da... <i>Animal, Vegetable, Miracle</i> by Barbara Kingsolver. This is a really <i>important</i> book that should be read by anyone who eats anything that they didn't grow themselves, but also, it's written by Barbara Kingsolver, who is absolutely <i>brilliant</i> and has turned all these facts of life, the miserable and the miraculous, into an immensely enjoyable story. <br />
<br />
Special Excellence Awards for the runners-up go to <i>Year of No Sugar</i> by Eve O. Schaub and <i>Alex's Adventures in Numberland</i> by Alex Bellos, and the special award for making me laugh out loud goes to <i>Red Dog</i> by Louis de Bernieres.<br />
<br />
The crappiest book I read this year was <i>90-Day Geisha</i> by Chelsea Haywood. Now, come on, Lady Demelza, shouldn't the title have tipped you off that this book is written by someone who has no idea what they are talking about? Shouldn't you have known better? The answer is yes and yes, but I was sucked into this one because it was the first time I came across a published personal account of a Western woman's experiences working as a hostess in Tokyo. I really wanted to read about this, because there was once a time, when I was younger and hotter, that I seriously considered going to Tokyo to hostess. I reckoned I'd be good at it - I'm a qualified English teacher, and clever conversation is totally my thing. Of course I soon had to admit the reality that my epilepsy wouldn't let me survive in Tokyo anywhere, let alone in nightclubs. I never went. But when I found this book, I saw it as a 'sliding door' into a reality that could have been mine, if things were different. I started off feeling really excited to learn all the little backstage details of the industry, but as the facts gave way to personal reflection, it became clear that the author is just a vain and selfish little brat and I couldn't care less how she goes about fucking up her life. I was already more than halfway in before I realised where this book was going - which was nowhere - and so I stuck it out 'til the end. That's a few hours of my life I'll never get back. Though at least I can now be glad that my epilepsy stopped me from going to Tokyo and I can stop wondering about what might have been. <br />
<br />
Special crappy awards go to <i>Holy Fools</i> by Joanne Harris and <i>The Venetian Contract</i> by Marina Fiorato, just for the abysmal endings. Both these books were happily cruising along as some nice historical fiction until they got to the end. Then <i>The Venetian Contract</i> suddenly took a ridiculous turn for the absurd, and <i>Holy Fools</i> ended so badly that I actually felt emotionally angry with Joanne Harris for choosing to publish such an idea.<br />
<br />
You can also check out Lady Demelza's Year in Books for <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2013.html">2013</a>, or for <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2012/12/lady-demelzas-year-in-books-2012.html">2012</a>.<br />
<br />
I'm linking in with Click Clack Gorilla's <a href="http://www.bookpunks.com/year-books-long-list-book-lovers-blog-hop/">Book Lovers' Blog Hop</a>. Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-83208742507463414192014-12-31T17:13:00.000+11:002015-11-01T12:36:36.635+11:00of the Faerie Guardian TreeUpon considering my previous post, I felt that the special tree right in front of my home deserved a bit more of an introduction. I've lived so close to her for so long that she has really become a part of the household in her own right. She does protect me directly from the sun and the rain, and beyond that, I feel she has a spiritual guardianship role to this little spot. And yet I still don't know her name. I don't know the proper names of a lot of the plants up here, as they are different to the ones I know from the southern states. As for her personal name, as kind as she is to me, she hasn't chosen to share that with me yet. So she's just the Tree, with a capital letter to distinguish her from all the other trees.<br />
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When I first arrived, you couldn't exactly tell there was a tree there, so much as infer its existence by the presence of branches poking out of the top of an enormous tangle of weeds. An afternoon's work and a five-foot pile of compost later, I discovered the tree, and her family of bromeliads and bird's-nest fern that grow around the trunk. Not to mention the mysterious holes. I <i>love</i> holes in the trunks of trees.<br />
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So, here is my lovely Tree's graceful canopy.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9jppH_ljivnWsKaftjKVWf7pKltZ67GRANI_lwO5yFwI9TiOgK4IxVr173-xVXFBcJy_cpf4Pk07_qu7BStVgA0nqSigLiJmvRLtsleXaikg86nqWGczzdBT5R0UxPvL_b9QYhHrWJDlx/s1600/tree1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9jppH_ljivnWsKaftjKVWf7pKltZ67GRANI_lwO5yFwI9TiOgK4IxVr173-xVXFBcJy_cpf4Pk07_qu7BStVgA0nqSigLiJmvRLtsleXaikg86nqWGczzdBT5R0UxPvL_b9QYhHrWJDlx/s1600/tree1.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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And these are her delicate flowers.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgs5GcqbwaG6qz_J-J5tBOQTnayEh1Cpx7IhLfDPY2cD_tCijWwJhsvdiEX4evlrHJHji_GOhWZUgbMv9ODe-7dUw6CyQ9XeBq22d0s4hLp5pmF1O3zAcPSszYmBShk0ZAMt3sMmlIhs0Eo/s1600/tree2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgs5GcqbwaG6qz_J-J5tBOQTnayEh1Cpx7IhLfDPY2cD_tCijWwJhsvdiEX4evlrHJHji_GOhWZUgbMv9ODe-7dUw6CyQ9XeBq22d0s4hLp5pmF1O3zAcPSszYmBShk0ZAMt3sMmlIhs0Eo/s1600/tree2.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
This is her shapely trunk, that is home to an entire ecosystem of living things in itself.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7qcjmZ9FCkepGDO9L10TM02R-pwQmNiAlkIcpEgnfcVs2gsBVWq75HxbWQG7u4qwDU_p20oQy7-3zjxhxcHu-AW_z1OscshzVs3kZ8z2cbO9PYvF7GG7oesn2LM7TX3KttaSunvcZl9XF/s1600/tree3.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7qcjmZ9FCkepGDO9L10TM02R-pwQmNiAlkIcpEgnfcVs2gsBVWq75HxbWQG7u4qwDU_p20oQy7-3zjxhxcHu-AW_z1OscshzVs3kZ8z2cbO9PYvF7GG7oesn2LM7TX3KttaSunvcZl9XF/s1600/tree3.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>
And this is what I mean about the mysterious holes.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijbdBLnW2hgH2T5an-I9aHQYfcoZgZvT7mOSf0Ao5PRp5WqHaANIRzRpxI7K4MYDqPrTlPNkEOh1gce-SVabuOgovD5hyphenhyphen8kWadihOgG1iiqO_oluN-4V_zisOEquqmQFzy67-gMbk4u0gl/s1600/tree4.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijbdBLnW2hgH2T5an-I9aHQYfcoZgZvT7mOSf0Ao5PRp5WqHaANIRzRpxI7K4MYDqPrTlPNkEOh1gce-SVabuOgovD5hyphenhyphen8kWadihOgG1iiqO_oluN-4V_zisOEquqmQFzy67-gMbk4u0gl/s1600/tree4.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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Her space was loosely marked by a rough ring of stones around her base, but at some point a few months ago I got inspired. I started to go on regular rock-hunting trips along the edges of the waterways. I played around with them and this is what I ended up with.<br />
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It's the first rock wall I have ever built, and I am so proud of it. I must have done a decent job of it, because it hasn't fallen down yet. I've filled it in with forest litter and cow manure and started a herb garden of those particular herbs that are known to be unpalatable to cows.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiljWxrhzcNa7lM39J0bX9ZGll3t9rr9JyJ7YSGRMs0ROj_EEhxNHYFXm3zmrFMGKMmneXZfB_ehIwdYNNHpKqeZTGAYeWomtWNKr8m5lQhxI4bs2qjAXzhO0tw83ZyN5SfMjGDQ04b2DMj/s1600/tree8.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiljWxrhzcNa7lM39J0bX9ZGll3t9rr9JyJ7YSGRMs0ROj_EEhxNHYFXm3zmrFMGKMmneXZfB_ehIwdYNNHpKqeZTGAYeWomtWNKr8m5lQhxI4bs2qjAXzhO0tw83ZyN5SfMjGDQ04b2DMj/s1600/tree8.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>
So far I have thyme, rosemary, mint and lavender. They get morning and afternoon sun and seem to be thriving happily. Apparently, cows will not eat these herbs until they get really hungry, and the cows that come up here look so amazingly sleek and healthy and well-nourished that I don't think there's much danger of that happening. Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-6860206967448253122014-12-24T20:52:00.000+11:002015-11-01T12:37:22.090+11:00of the Cow Cage and the Drunken Lettuce Babies<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
This is the view from the door of my new home, looking out.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRBczBPEP2GkTWo2InvVyeT11teMZ0PDUE-7Dh2R8DTyGxwEXdvEVrzXNuzvUEU6GMlZFh5HI9DsmrVijFJbo_pFjjukdRwDajp0QJTNzi26F-y-lyJQi46JpoCNQKZhHZVFx-_olfRvdx/s1600/cc1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRBczBPEP2GkTWo2InvVyeT11teMZ0PDUE-7Dh2R8DTyGxwEXdvEVrzXNuzvUEU6GMlZFh5HI9DsmrVijFJbo_pFjjukdRwDajp0QJTNzi26F-y-lyJQi46JpoCNQKZhHZVFx-_olfRvdx/s1600/cc1.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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Yes, I know. How can I still call it my new home when I've been here more than a year and half now? But something strange is happening to my sense of time as I get older. It was when one year had passed that I got the feeling of really having arrived, of my body knowing that it doesn't live in the city any more. I feel like I'm just starting to get properly set up and organised now. It seems to me now that you have to spend a full year, a full cycle of the seasons, in a place to really know it. Maybe when I get to the second year, this won't be my 'new' home any more. </div>
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The beautiful tree provides shade in the space immediately in front of the hut, a godsend on hot, sunny days. It's a real faerie tree with lots of deep, mysterious holes in its trunk wherein the otherwordly may dwell - not to mention an astonishing variety of plant and fungal life forms. And just beyond that, you'll see the fenced space for the vegetable garden.</div>
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When I first arrived, I assumed that the fence was to keep <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2012/05/truth-about-possums.html">the possums</a> out. I'm used to people having to fence their gardens against possums. But it turns out that even though there are some possums around here - I can hear them at night - they seem to stay in the depths of the bush and not come near the dwellings. No, it turns out that this fence was built because of <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/the-neighbours-at-my-new-home-are-bunch.html">the cows</a>. They will wander right up to the hut and munch anything that takes their fancy. And so I call it the cow cage - not for keeping cows in, but for keeping them out.</div>
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The metal walls for raised beds were in place when I got here - and that's about it. There wasn't much dirt in them, and no plants except for the weeds which would cover the whole surface of the ground inside the cow cage every time you turned your back on them. It's taken me all year to build up the beds and start some plants, and the garden bed is still operating at barely half of its full potential. I've still got a long way to go. The cows are doing their bit to help - I go down to the cow paddock and collect the manure to fill up the garden beds. Then the worms come back, and we start to get new soil. Maybe by next summer it will be the bursting bed of greenery I see in my mind's eye.<br />
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Earlier this year I read <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25460.Animal_Vegetable_Miracle?ac=1"><i>Animal, Vegetable, Miracle</i> by Barbara Kingsolver</a>. It's an amazing book that should be read by everyone who eats any food that they haven't grown themselves. I was inspired to do my little bit by finding an heirloom seed company to order seeds from, rather than supporting a multi-national company that is using its profits to patent and interfere with genetic material. I found <a href="http://www.thelostseed.com.au/">The Lost Seed</a> company online, and ordered an exciting array of seeds with such exotic monikers as Early Blood Turnip beetroots, Violet Sicilian cauliflowers and Drunken Woman lettuces. <br />
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I planted the Drunken Woman seeds while under the influence of a bottle of sparkling wine that was a birthday gift, and throughout the early spring we enjoyed the partly-maroon leaves of genunine Drunken Woman lettuces, planted by a genuine Drunken Woman. When they started to go to seed, I let them go, just to watch what would happen, even though I had no particular ambitions of seed-saving. After many years of growing various lettuces, I finally got to see what lettuce flowers look like. Not very impressive, is the answer.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW6S9FqXxQ9bUQHTdqVeaIj9C8djT3CTzD5tgKOVJh2vvL9h6lBgX8PVUv1hP3H3XwZy1r-Kxm2Ryz4dqzsT-6OBocy3KQAtMuI2fas78D6k8cPwVDJbx-IXOWk8ivdJKMUxMgElGychDm/s1600/cc3.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW6S9FqXxQ9bUQHTdqVeaIj9C8djT3CTzD5tgKOVJh2vvL9h6lBgX8PVUv1hP3H3XwZy1r-Kxm2Ryz4dqzsT-6OBocy3KQAtMuI2fas78D6k8cPwVDJbx-IXOWk8ivdJKMUxMgElGychDm/s1600/cc3.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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But oh, what a wonderful garden-type surprise I got when I looked a little closer one day.<br />
Babies!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5fTP3gVv3OvKSfam0gPITqmRB1ww6mkaMr7FTKkQWvyBZqM6l8xgNUWkho1nVZAadsimQTR-IEohLGQdr-beQZEpX9dwhCUBKdFlB0zXIBWx96_ZLNj3CKc1LQWQpfg-lAHK-CMQpkRUj/s1600/cc4.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5fTP3gVv3OvKSfam0gPITqmRB1ww6mkaMr7FTKkQWvyBZqM6l8xgNUWkho1nVZAadsimQTR-IEohLGQdr-beQZEpX9dwhCUBKdFlB0zXIBWx96_ZLNj3CKc1LQWQpfg-lAHK-CMQpkRUj/s1600/cc4.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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And over here- more babies! This is my first experience with <i>self-seeded</i> lettuce. I was so excited, I jumped up and down. Maybe you have to be a gardener to get that.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkGX145arTrb96KYSSChOB_eJ4-OSRVQNhUZ-Z76ykj8XXZjoeQLkxb0iKCFzupYc_-ZeZMZigk9UUUbvzT_8RXF_0k1tQFZL660cVmf3jZsZHI4bUpA-f8AIZadk40vFSpJZIH03LIapv/s1600/cc5.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkGX145arTrb96KYSSChOB_eJ4-OSRVQNhUZ-Z76ykj8XXZjoeQLkxb0iKCFzupYc_-ZeZMZigk9UUUbvzT_8RXF_0k1tQFZL660cVmf3jZsZHI4bUpA-f8AIZadk40vFSpJZIH03LIapv/s1600/cc5.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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When I showed Majikfaerie, she said something along the lines of that was typical of the drunken sluts to just breed all over the place. I defended their anthropomorphic honour and pointed out that they are clearly good mothers, because the babies are healthy and well-nourished. It just goes to show, <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2014/03/on-my-mother-pisshead-with-thanks-to.html">drunken women can be good mothers too</a>. <br />
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And if all that wasn't exciting enough, this is the view just in front of the cow cage.<br />
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<br />Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-11436513354699572952014-07-06T21:05:00.000+10:002014-07-06T21:05:00.921+10:00in the Poetry Corner - Michael LeunigIf you're not from Australia, there's a very good chance that you have never come across the work of <a href="http://www.leunig.com.au/">Michael Leunig</a>, which in my opinion would be a great tragedy. How much harder it would have been to work out this whole life caper without his divine words of wisdom to guide me along the way.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://leunig.com.au/images/cartoons/how-to-get-there.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://leunig.com.au/images/cartoons/how-to-get-there.jpg" height="504" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.leunig.com.au/index.php/cartoons/cartoons">source</a></td></tr>
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Leunig is known primarily as a cartoonist, as that's how he came to be known to the world - creating regular socio-politicial commentary cartoons for <i><a href="http://www.theage.com.au/">The Age</a></i> newspaper. He is absolutely brilliant at managing to capture an incomprehensively complex human emotion or situation in just a few scrawly little lines, but I think we'd all agree that he's not exactly a fine artist. I think it's kind of hilarious that lately he is being considered in those lofty Fine Art circles and given exhibitions and having limited editions released of his scrawlings that are selling for enormous amounts of money. I reckon Leunig would be finding it all rather amusing himself, actually. He may not be producing Fine Art, but he makes true, human art, that touches the soul and will continue to do so regardless of what the art critics have to say about it. For me, his art and his gift, his soul, it seems to me, is more that of a poet, and he does manage to squeeze an awful lot of poetry into his cartoons. Sometimes the poem is more powerful and doesn't even really need the picture, but he has to put one in, you know, because his boss is paying him to produce cartoons.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>The path to your door</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>Is the path within,</i></div>
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<i>Is made by animals,</i></div>
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<i>Is lined by thorns,</i></div>
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<i>Is stained with wine,</i></div>
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<i>Is lit by the lamp of sorrowful dreams,</i></div>
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<i>Is washed with joy,</i></div>
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<i>Is swept by grief,</i></div>
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<i>Is blessed by the lonely traffic of art,</i></div>
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<i>Is known by heart,</i></div>
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<i>Is known by prayer,</i></div>
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<i>Is lost and found,</i></div>
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<i>Is always strange,</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>The path to your door. </i></div>
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Leunig writes about the human spirit, and the spirit of nature, and all the terrible things that the various governments and institutions of the world are doing to destroy it. He calls society on its hypocrisy and injustice, unceasingly and unflinchingly. This is the role of the poet in this mad, modern world - to remind us just exactly how mad and modern it's all gotten, and to remind us of more ancient, primal truths.<br />
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<i>God help us. With great skill and energy we have ignored the state of the human heart. With politics and economics we have denied the heart's needs. With eloquence, wit and reason we have belittled the heart's wisdom. With sophistication and style, with science and technology, we have drowned out the voice of the soul. The primitive voice, the innocent voice. The truth. We cannot hear our heart's truth and thus we have betrayed and belittled ourselves and pledged madness to our children. With skill and pride we have made for ourselves an unhappy society. God be with us. AMEN.</i></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
- from<i> A Common Prayer</i>, 1990 </div>
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I just absolutely adore and admire Michael Leunig beyond measure and from the depths of my heart, because he understands the Truth of the Human Condition, and he bears it bravely. Well, he probably has days when he's not so brave, but he still manages to bear it and keep on living and loving and sharing his beautiful art with us. I'm so very thankful that through his words, he is a beautiful, loving and forgiving part of my life.<br />
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As one would expect of a sensitive soul, Leuing has experienced his share of depression through his life. Of all the reams that have been been written on the subject of advice for the individual suffering from depression, I reckon this succint little piece is the best ever put down on paper.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://leunig.com.au/images/cartoons/lifeache.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://leunig.com.au/images/cartoons/lifeache.jpg" height="515" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.leunig.com.au/index.php/cartoons/cartoons">source</a></td></tr>
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And when it comes to the exquisitely unbearable pain of a broken heart, Leunig is there for us again, telling us what to do with a poem. I can tell you from hard-earned personal experience that this remedy is also reliable.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://leunig.com.au/images/cartoons/when-the-heart.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://leunig.com.au/images/cartoons/when-the-heart.jpg" height="512" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.leunig.com.au/index.php/cartoons/cartoons">source</a></td></tr>
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But of all the blessed miracles that are Leunig's cartoons, I think this one is my favourite.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcmocA5KPwiA-x3XUs8RQxGWlt25CTdrtfpb35feOQmFlw9MulPG05_2RiZX7fLnzWpz1BhB7gXShHkFevOMYKHn0DqBkTrorDtujsxKFct18AQ1h6_ZpJOQN1Hf32nmMiL6q8jt5C6dJ9/s1600/thehaves2526thehave-not.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcmocA5KPwiA-x3XUs8RQxGWlt25CTdrtfpb35feOQmFlw9MulPG05_2RiZX7fLnzWpz1BhB7gXShHkFevOMYKHn0DqBkTrorDtujsxKFct18AQ1h6_ZpJOQN1Hf32nmMiL6q8jt5C6dJ9/s1600/thehaves2526thehave-not.jpg" height="440" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.cartoonsimple.com/2012_10_01_archive.html">source</a></td></tr>
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You see, I actually have done all those things he's described here, the singing in the moonlight and the joyous tears and the running off with gypsies and feasting and dancing and all that. And oh, the sweet memory of it is indeed one of the greatest treasures in my life. Whenever I'm feeling poor or disadvantaged or powerless or oppressed, I look at this cartoon to remind me of the truth. That I am a Have, and I am blessed. <br />
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<i>All images and poetry remain copyright Michael Leunig and are reproduced here in the context of review.</i>Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-30867234613539116172014-05-24T20:49:00.000+10:002014-05-24T20:49:31.955+10:00on a Better Way for Tony Abbott to Save MoneyOur Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, wants to cut the national spending on the Disability Support Pension. And fair enough. We're expensive, us sick people. I have no idea how much money the government has spent so far on keeping me alive, but I reckon if I knew the actual figure, even I would find it offensive.<br />
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It's not just the sick people that are too expensive. He's cutting spending all across the welfare and housing sectors, and making it more expensive to get health care or tertiary education. The nation is in debt and in need. We all have to do our bit.<br />
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For example, as of next year, people under 30 will not be able to receive any unemployment benefits until they show they have been looking for a job for six months. So if you're in your 20's, and you're on a low wage, you probably don't have much in the way of savings. If you lose your job, or you get bullied and abused at work and can't cope with it, or you get sick and can't get to a doctor at the right time to get the appropriate medical certificate, suddenly you can't pay your rent. Then you're homeless, and once you don't have a home to put it all in, you lose all your stuff. And then you have nothing and it seems impossible to get back on your feet again. It may well be impossible without the support of friends, family or charity organisations.<br />
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I've been dependent on the Disability Support Pension since the age of 18 - my whole adult life. Tony's worried that this has been a waste of money, and that I should have been made to help myself by supporting myself. It's true that there have been some relatively brief periods in my life where my health was fairly good and I might have been able to support myself. But without reliable income support, I would have just lost everything every time I had another relapse. Looking back as objectively as I can, I really believe that without the pension, I wouldn't be alive by now. I wouldn't have made it. I can see if that if the welfare system were in the state it is in now when I was 18, I'd really most likely be dead by now.<br />
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And that's okay. I can appreciate the desire to create a fitter, leaner, stronger society the way we did in prehistoric times, by eliminating the weak. But it's obvious what's going to happen to here. We're going to end up with a whole lot of dispossessed and mentally ill people running around on the streets, committing crimes out of desparation and upsetting decent, tax-paying folks. It's going to get ugly. Fortunately, I have a better idea.<br />
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If Tony would just invest a few dollars in a few discreet, hygienic euthanasia centres in all the major cities, then all us useless, non-productive, overdemanding disadvantaged people could be taken care of quietly, neatly and painlessly. No mess, no fuss. No more crazy people, no more frail elderly, no more mentally handicapped, no more useless lazybones to just suck up all the taxpayers' dollars into the endless black hole of welfare. Only the fit, functional and employable will be left to enjoy the limited resources of our earth. It sounds like utopia. For the common good, I'll even volunteer to go first. Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-50762357392443504802014-04-25T12:51:00.000+10:002014-04-26T22:29:44.318+10:00on ANZAC Day, or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Soldiers<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://cas.awm.gov.au/screen_img/010451" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="295" src="https://cas.awm.gov.au/screen_img/010451" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.awm.gov.au/commemoration/customs/last_post.asp">source: Australian War Memorial</a></td></tr>
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I used to be a pacificist. It was so simple - War is Wrong, any violence is wrong, anyone choosing to participate in it is wrong, and that's that. I knew how right I was with all the confidence and ignorance of a member of a generation that has never known war.<br />
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I grew up in Australia in the 1980's, where there was no war. The blackfellas had long been defeated and their history revised. War was something from history books, something that other, less intelligent countries still did, something you could see on the news, but it was never a part of my life. I was 13 when Australia went to the Gulf War, but I didn't know anyone who was involved, and couldn't see what it had to do with us at all. And because my priveleged, peaceful, Western society was all that I knew, I thought it was normal. I had an image of the history of the world as being mostly peaceful, interrupted by bouts of terror and violence occasionally. I didn't see how <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anzac_Day">Anzac Day</a> really had anything to do with me or my life.<br />
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The first suspicions that something didn't quite add up in this theory came to me when watching nature documentaries - David Attenborough and that kind of thing. I would watch these shows about animals living in the wild and I would be in floods of tears, distraught at the horrific violence and suffering that creatures in the wild will routinely face. Everywhere, the evidence said that the natural world is violent, the nature of life and survival is inherently violent. Mating, birthing, feeding, preying and dying - all so horribly violent, all so utterly natural.<br />
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Life went on. I got older, and my life diversified into areas I wouldn't have expected. I started to get to know people who had never had the luxury of the chance to articulate a pacifist philosophy. I watched as the world went about its business. I read and studied. I learned that contrary to my prior impression, humanity had been in some kind of state of war for most of its existence - that war is the rule rather than the exception. I realised that the media is far more interested in exposing the horrors of war than in participating in glorification propaganda ever since they realised they could make more money that way - and yet war is as big a business as ever. Increasingly, my hippy ideals just didn't hold up to the harsh light of reality. They were really falling apart by the time I found myself living in a seedy boarding house in an inner suburb of Sydney, the kind of place where you step over unconcious junkies in the hallway to get to your room, and violence was a seething backdrop to the everyday.<br />
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Even with all these swirling uncertainties, I was still pretty shocked when I first got to know Mr CJ and heard about his intense pride in his family's military history, and in his own profiency in the pugilistic arts. It took me a while to understand where he was coming from. He grew up being beaten up just about every day of his childhood, until he got big enough to fight back. The practise of violence was simply a matter of survival for Mr CJ and his peers. There was no point questioning it. <br />
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The first year or two we lived together was an intense process of challenging and reforming beliefs for both of us. I came to understand the truth of the role of violence and war in our society and history, and to not just apply a black-and-white blanket ideal to every situation without discernment. Mr CJ, meanwhile, came to understand the joys of a peaceful, loving social group, and different ways of dealing with conflict. <br />
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Besides these intense philosophical dialogues with Mr CJ, I put myself on a study course to learn more about the history of warfare and the role of war in my society, with a wide range of books, films and documentaries. I think it started with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Band_of_Brothers_%28TV_miniseries%29"><i>Band of Brothers</i></a>. When it came on TV, Mr CJ wanted to watch it. He said it was a great show. It was the sort of thing I would have usually avoided watching, but I made myself watch that series and try to really look at the events unfolding from the perspectives of the individuals involved, rather than just writing it off with a 'War is Wrong' slogan. It was a powerful experience. Of all the texts I studied, this stands out in my memory now, a few years later. So does the stunningly beautiful film <i><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkKkAg4Ew-s">Joyeux Noel (Merry Christmas)</a>,</i> the TV series <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33XatWuJH70"><i>Foyle's War</i></a> and the book <a href="http://www.alexandermccallsmith.co.uk/books/other-titles/las-orchestra-saves-the-world/"><i>La's Orchestra Saves the World</i> by Alexander McCall Smith</a>, one of my favourite writers. The TV series <i>M*A*S*H</i> has had an incredibly deep influence on me, as I discussed in <a href="http://themaroondiaries.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/of-black-dog-idiot-box-and-mash-unit.html">another blog post, here</a>. I started to realise that war, like natural disaster and other shared traumas, brings out the best of humanity as well as the worst, and that nothing about the world I know could exist without the history of warfare - it's so inextricably linked with every aspect of our society. Of course, our efforts to reduce violence and conflict, and to engender a peaceful society, are also a fundamental aspect of our humanity - part of the best of us, something we can apsire to. As with so many things, the truth lies in paradox.<br />
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And finally it coalesced, an understanding of what Anzac Day is meant to be about.<br />
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Ultimately, it's a love story. A terrible and tragic love story, but no less proud of its love for the suffering it has borne.<br />
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The reasons for the Great War are still unclear to me now after trying to understand it for several years. Yes, yes, the Archduke was assassinated and all that. But still, the conflict itself is incomprehensible. How could people do such a thing? With respect to the politicians and governments that got us into this mess, the individuals who can sit in a desk and sign a paper that sends thousands of men into combat, well may we ask this question. But for the men who signed up to fight and found themselves amid a hail of bullets, thousands of miles from home, ninety-nine years ago today, I think I understand it now. I think most of them went to fight because they loved their families. Whatever they understood of the conflict themselves, the government sold them a way by which they could show their devotion to their families, and shipped them off to the war. And when they got there and saw the horror, they were so afraid. They wanted nothing more than to not go out there. But they looked around at the faces of their mates standing by them, and they saw that their mates were also afraid, but also, they tried not to show it. And they all looked at each other confronting their fear, and they decided that as long as their mate had to go in there and deal with this, well, they were going to stick by their mates and not let go. Nothing else mattered. For the first time in their lives, race and class and other social divisors were irrelevant in the thick of this passion. The orders were given, and that is what they did. They went into that slaughter because they were sticking by their mates, and they did not let go until the carnage claimed them, not a one of them. <br />
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<i>Greater Love Hath No Man</i>.<br />
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And that's what it is, at the core. That a man would walk into the living pits of hell and lay down his life for the love he felt for another person. And it should humble us, and remind us to be grateful for the heritage this love has laid down in our world, for all its tragedy.<br />
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I might have been from such a priveleged generation that was never called to war, but the war comes to many of us in different ways. For me, it has mostly been in my battles with depression. Of all the weapons I use to fight this battle, the most powerful is the love that I feel for my friends and family, and that they feel for me. I have no doubts that this love is the main reason I have not surrendered in battle, and why I'm still here to fight. In this way, the ANZAC spirit is alive in me, and in all of us who keep fighting to live and love another day.Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-6867428581933838952014-03-30T00:26:00.000+11:002016-02-03T21:29:49.334+11:00the most astounding Dance Scenes ever filmed<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Salma Hayek playing Frida Kahlo in <i>Frida</i>. I think this is the single most erotic scene ever filmed, and nobody even had to take their clothes off.</div>
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The Roxanne Tango from <i>Moulin Rouge</i>. I would barely average one trip a year to the cinema, but when <i>Moulin Rouge</i> was screening, I went five times to see it on the big screen.<br />
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The Cell Block Tango from <i>Chicago</i>.<br />
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Yes, I've just realised myself. These are all tangos. I must really like the tango. Okay, no more tangos, I promise.<br />
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Michael Jackson's <i>Thriller</i> has so many layers of cultural references by now that I couldn't even begin to try to unravel them and watch this objectively. But it <i>rocks</i> as hard as it ever did. I have no idea what happened to this man in the end, but when you look back, my god, he was so extraordinarily talented.<br />
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And there has to be some belly dancing. Something raw and authentic and unpolished, like <i>Gadjo Dilo </i>with Rona Hartner and Romain Duris. I couldn't decide between the scene where they dance together, or Rona Hartner's solo, so here are both of them. <br />
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<br />Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3647518319882615895.post-68976809638251277052014-03-22T16:31:00.000+11:002014-03-22T16:36:44.653+11:00on my Mother the Pisshead; with thanks to DionysusOne of the best things about my childhood was that my mother was a functional alcoholic.<br />
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I realise what an unusual statement this is, and I want to start with a kind of disclaimer and apology to anyone who might find it upsetting or offensive. I do realise that an enormous number of people have suffered terribly due to their parents' alcohol abuse. I know that the cost of alcohol abuse and related issues like drink driving is tragic and bitter and huge for our society as a whole, and I wouldn't want anyone to think that I was being disrespectful or flippant about the issue. But my story was different.<br />
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I never even realised that my mother would, under current conventional terminology, be considered an alcoholic until I was in my late 20's. I happened to be visiting with her on the day of the weekly shopping trip. At this time she was living in a remote area, and had to stock up on all her supplies, alcoholic and otherwise, for the whole week. Her weekly budget of alcohol came to six bottles of wine and two bottles of bourbon. There was more for her husband. By now I knew the current definitions. I did the maths, and a light bulb went off in my head. "My mother is an alcoholic."<br />
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A generation ago, my mother would have been a 'heavy drinker.' Now the term is 'functional alcoholic,' because my mother's alcohol intake has never had a negative impact on her life, or none that I can see. In fact, it made our lives better. There was never once a single evening during my childhood when there was not dinner on the table, not a single morning without her up before us and a clean uniform to wear, not a single occasion when she didn't turn up whenever I was expecting her to pick me up. She never started drinking before dinner on a school night or lunch on a weekend, except for Christmas and the Mother's Day barbeques. She never fucked anything up because she was pissed. She was completely functional as a caregiver. She just happened to drink a lot, as well. Even at the time I had my lightbulb realisation, long after her children had grown up and left home, my mother was caring for newborn orphaned lambs, which necessitated going out in the freezing winter night every four hours to feed them with a bottle. That's hardly the actions of a person sick with an addiction. <br />
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My mother is naturally a very friendly, sociable, likable person. She's fun, and she's funny. She has a great sense of humour and can always get people laughing. She's quite dismayed that her children have not inherited her easy sense of humour. Regular readers will know that I take things way too seriously. Some people get mean and nasty or violent when they get drunk. But my mum just gets more fun and more funny the more she drinks. It was absolutely wonderful to hang out with her like this when I was a kid. Some of my best memories from my later childhood years were the weekend evenings when we would just sit at the kitchen table, my mother and I, and chat, listening to cassette tapes. She would drink triple bourbon-and-Diet Cokes and I drank the Coke straight. As the evening wore on, and she got drunker, she would get funnier and funnier until I would end up literally rolling on the floor in helpless laughter, clutching my stomach and yelling for mum to please stop being so funny, because it was hurting my stomach to laugh so hard. She would earnestly try to comply with my request, and the sight of her trying to pull her expression into composure was so hilarious that I would go off again, tears streaming down my face. <br />
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Other weekends she would go out nightclubbing with her best friend, who was 15 years younger than herself, and into that kind of thing. My sister and I adored our regular babysitter, Miss N. She would come and stay the night and we would make popcorn and stay up late watching Nightmare On Elm Street or The Terminator. Miss N would let us do whatever we wanted with her hair. She would sit placidly, munching popcorn and watching the screen, while I sat on one side of her and my sister on the other, and we would each style half of her hair in our own way. We got out the sprays and mousses and gels, the crimper and the blowdryer, from the bathroom. We plaited and teased and combed and sprayed. This was the 80's, remember. Miss N's boyfriend often came to spend the night as well. We just adored him too. He was a drummer in a band, and would often turn up with big, sore knots in his shoulders after the previous night's gig. He taught me how find the knots with my fingers and work them out. Basically, I learned the skills of a professional massage therapist. (Again, I realise how this might sound off in the current climate, so I will stress that there was never anything inappropriate about it. All above the waist and above board.) This has turned out to be one of the most significant practical skills I ever learned during my childhood, much to the great benefit of those whom I have had an opportunity to be able to help. Even now, I'm using these skills almost every day, which is very important for Mr CJ with his chronic pain condition. He gets terribly painful knots in his neck and shoulders, and I can work them out, and ease his pain. This is real-life practical magic. <br />
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The morning after a night out, Mum would have a Hangover, and would stay in bed late. We loved this, because we got to take a pile of coins from the jar under the kitchen sink and go the shop to get her green icy poles and hot chips and sour cream, the official Hangover Food. We were also allowed to get whatever lolly or ice cream we wanted while we were there. <br />
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And so I never noticed that my mum was an alcoholic. We just knew the word 'pisshead'. That's what a lot of her friends and family would say - "Ah, you're just a pisshead, love." They meant it with affection and admiration. Most of them were pissheads, too.<br />
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Australians generally drink quite a lot of alcohol. The average, blue singlet-wearing, Aussie working man will think nothing of knocking back half a dozen stubbies (375mL bottles) of beer after a day's work. And I should point out that Australian beer has a much higher alcohol content than common American beers. I didn't turn out to be an alcoholic myself. In fact, by Australian standards, I'm not much of a drinker at all. On a hot day, I might have one cider rather than six beers, and I usually still stick to the Coke, straight. I did have a few periods in my 20's when I engaged in what would be defined as regular binge drinking, but they each only lasted a few months and then faded away without me having to make a concious effort to reduce my alcohol intake. But like a true Australian, I can really put it away on a special occasion. And like my mother, I'm a highly functional and pleasant drunk. Like the Italians, I really enjoy cooking while drunk. I can polish off two bottles of sparkling wine and still produce a damn fine roast chicken dinner with all the trimmings and gravy from scratch. Last week was such a special occasion, my birthday. I'm pleased to note that at thirty-six years of age, I can still put away two bottles of wine and wake up without a hangover. That's doing well. <br />
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My mother cut down her drinking significantly when she got into her fifties and our doctor told her she was at risk of diabetes. She didn't develop diabetes, and of all the health problems she does experience, none of them are related to her alcohol consumption. Of all the curses that the gift of Dionysus has lain upon the burden of humankind, we were granted with a blessing. It made the hard times better and easier, and I am so thankful. <br />
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Blessed be, Dionysus, Lord of the Vine. Lady Demelzahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11889790311533568611noreply@blogger.com0