What I Am Trying to Say...

This poem, by Mary Oliver, wraps up what I was trying to put into words yesterday... . 

Credo

My inner- writer will give me no rest until I do this. That is, write a Statement of Faith. 

This is SO HARD. What possible purpose would it serve? Who knows or cares? 

I'm time-wasting, because as of this very moment, I have no idea what I'm going to say. So it's down to my subconscious to bail me out again: I shall take this opportunity to give my Right Brain the reins, and let rip: 

I know that the Cosmos of which I am a speck, is more than 99% void. I look upon the void with wonder. I wonder  that I am matter, and I wonder that I am conscious. Life is of inestimable value, conscious life even more so. I, you, everyone: so rare, so precious. 

There  rises from deep within me a profound gratitude for Being. This gratitude is unfocused, but real. I delight in every manifestation of life, especially in those three lives I helped to bring into Being. My children. 

I have searched and searched for meaning, and for a purpose in my life, and have not arrived at any conclusions. This is what I think today, tomorrow I shall be as happy as I am now to write something quite different.

As there are as many purposes in life as there are gurus to tell me what they are, I may as well invent my own. Like you, I will do this in accordance with my personality, my  upbringing and my circumstances. 

I discovered that ' I believe ' is too passive. So I ditched it for, I will. And maybe I will. I hope so!  Here I am: 

 I will do what brings me peace.

I will pursue happiness.

I will revel in adventure. 

I will make myself laugh, and in doing so, I hope to make others laugh too.

I will endeavour to gladden the hearts of those I meet, and I will not always succeed.

If I have to be angry at all, it will be FOR others, and not with them.

I will try always to be kind.

I will react to the suffering of others - in all it's manifestations - with compassion, and I will,when I can, do what I can to alleviate it.  

I will retreat into silence from time to time to connect with Gratitude, and give thanks for Being.

I will never forget how to play.

I will accept that this form will fade and die. Whether there is another form to come, doesn't matter: this one flawed, but perfect, life will have been enough. 

I will make every day count by continuously calling myself back to being conscious and present in every moment. 

I will remember love: that it is the most lavish and beautiful of gifts, that it never dies,  and is never wasted.

I will try to remember how flawed I am, and bring no judgement down on others. 

I will forgive myself for my imperfections, and offer the same gift to others.

And finally:

I will remind you, wherever you are, whoever you are, that you are loved. 

Letter to My MP

Dear Mark Harper,

I am deeply disturbed by the tactics used by agents of this government with regard to apprehending illegal immigrants.

If, as it appears, men and women are being targeted for arrest based on the colour of their skin, I object most strongly. This is not the behaviour of a civilised nation, and it is NOT done in my name. 

I cannot approve either, of the 'Go Home' message that is being trialled, I understand, in areas of London. It has awful fascist undertones, even if not by design. 

Those who came to live here illegally are often dismissed as 'economic migrants' and so they may be, but many have escaped from unsafe homes, the very kind that I doubt you or I would care to see them returned to. 

Apply the law by all means, but let's proceed with methods commensurate with our national values of fairness, justice and compassion.

Yours sincerely,

Mary Francis

"If Women Over Sixty...

... Said what they really thought, there would be an outpouring of wisdom" 

So a nice lady called Marianne, Tweeted today and I laughed! Lord! How I laughed! Marianne says sweet things, and I do too sometimes, because they do no harm. As to whether they do any good, why, that's another matter entirely. We hope so, Marianne and I. 

Ekhart Tolle says that if humanity was a person sent for a psychiatric analysis she would be declared insane, and I thought about this for a bit, and I think it's true. Stupid, brutish, greedy, fearful, deluded, miserable, manipulative ( and manipulated) unconscious and ... . 

What am I thinking, that could make me so disgruntled? ( What a lovely word! Will I ever be "gruntled"? What are these "grunts" I am dissing?) 

I am thinking of the people who use Twitter to threaten and abuse. I am thinking of the 'Go Home' advertisements being trialled in areas of London, and then I have to stop thinking, because so many other and worse thoughts lie just beyond reach where I want them to stay. 

How does the wise-woman in me, now that I've reached the age of  wisdom, deal with the insanity of my kind? (Presumably, as I have been over-sixty for nearly three years now, I already am... Dealing with it, I mean. )

"Ninety seconds" is the answer. I will deal with it for ninety seconds. See, this is how it works. Your brain senses something that is going to upset you, and releases the bio-chemicals that are going to make you feel mad, and they will flood through you AND DISSIPATE in ninety seconds. How do I know this? Because I have just finished reading, 'My Stroke Of Insight' by Jill Bolte Taylor: she knows because she's a neuroscientist who did the work, and I know because I'm a wise-woman-in-training who did the reading. 

So for a minute and a half you just have to let the body do its  thing, and then the cave-person can go and lie down again and you can choose. I have been mad for a minute and a half, because that's how this body of mine works, and now do I want to go on being mad? That's the choice, and that's where being sixty- plus comes in handy. I have been mad many, many times before and I know it serves little purpose other than  to give me migraines. 

Being mad at a fool who tweets obscene things isn't going to stop him. Expecting the current administration to think with its heart isn't going to happen. I know this, you know this. So I'm just going to let the cortisol or whatever it is (I'm guessing) wend it's way out of my bloodstream and I'm going to accept my futility, my culpability, Then I'm going to do what I CAN do. 

I can write to my MP, calmly, quietly, and say that when your government attempts to further increase fear and insecurity in a woman whose home may not be safe, like yours, you do not do it in my name. When you arrest a man on suspicion of illegal activity because of the colour of his skin, you do not do it in my name. ( I guess, cynically and accurately, the idea of 'trialling' this behaviour is to find out whether ordinary people like me, are willing to stomach fascism, or whether we'll speak out against it.) 

I can resolve to be sweet on Twitter, and always wait ninety-one seconds before I decide not to respond to a madman. 

 Wisdom indeed. Will it get better as I get older? Not so much, I hope, I want always  to be open to the possibility of doing foolish things...