Friday, April 29, 2005

shake ya booty

it's friday. it's a 3 day weekend. start it early. . .

check out the link above and scroll down for Bootystition. an all time fave of mine.

must. do. some. work.

x.

random thought . . .

if posting the URL to another's website on your own site is called *linking*, should posting the url to another's blog on your own blog be called *blinking*?

x.

Wednesday, April 27, 2005

like surfin'?

2 posts in one night. what's come over me?
finally getting the links list sorted over there on the right. all are worth more than a few moments attention.

will being adding lots more in coming weeks as i get my blogging ass firmly in gear.

thanks for the feedback. your emails are much appreciated. please don't stop rocking.


somewhere in the world it's happy hour. LA probably. but here it's way past bedtime.


have a great Wednesday. . .

x.

it's ALL about community. we get to carry each other.

if you could bottle a weekend . . .

some nice photos taken over the weekend on jude's mobile are over at her blog - that's me off in a daze in the cowboy hat wandering through the country park with the lads. and the sculpture is an amazing addition to belfast's waterfront. more on that later in the week.

ten weeks today 'til we head to Provence. patience is a very inconvenient virtue to which to aspire.

a correction: daniel is not yet 4. he's only 3 and a half (ish). which makes his taste in music (see yesterday's post below) even more remarkable, let alone his vocabulary. he took a deep breath while on saturday's beach walk and said, utterly unprompted, "michael, i love your house. it's beautiful." an hour earlier he had stepped into the kitchen, and announced, "cary. . .[dramatic pause] . . .i love Greenbelt" and promptly turned on his heal and ran back into the garden. daniel is very into making such announcements. i hope he never grows out of such honest expression.

were i honest there is so much more i would say. but here's the rub of a blog: you start finding your voice and then you start editing your voice because this is ultimately a public, not a private, space.

was going to post some stuff i read at ikon ::virgin territory:: but in trying to do so i am overcome with a sense of panic. a guy approached me and asked for the details of the book from which i had read.
i didn't get to find out who he is or where he was from but i passed over the book so he could take down the details. the book was delta of venus by anais nin. i suspect he has no idea what he is letting himself in for. ::shudders:: i hope he is an intelligent reader. if i could turn back time and warn him . . .

off to think about something else so i can sleep

x.

Monday, April 25, 2005

flesh of my flesh

a little gem from last night's ikon... a new song from Pádraig:

flesh of my flesh
bone of my bone
your skin is warm
but your hands are cold
warm them on me
warm them on me
let me look at you,
warm me on you

my blood is red
it heats my skin
your skin is beautiful
it turns me in-to me
ah, have you burned
at the thought of me?
Like i have burned
when i am missing you.

I'd kiss your body
if you were close,
i'd kiss your lips
i'd cover most of your skin
with my love
with my breath.
with my yearning
for your flesh.

(C) Pádraig Twomey, 2005

Joyous weekend of chilling with Jude. Precious times.
Saturday afternoon was spent over a picnic and trip to the beach with Chris and Daniel (aged 4) and Jonah (16 mnths). Both are rock stars in the making. Daniel shared his "mix" on Chris's iPod - which included the following artists:

The Police
Sigur Ros
Prefuse 73
Biffy Clyro
Eliot Smith
Fischy Music for kids

at only 4 these are some of his favourites. fischy music is linked above. fabulous kids songs that are more than bearable to the adult ear - very affirming and funny. tuesday night group has been known to feature daniel leading us in a song or two. this is christian music for kids complete with hand actions that doesn't make me recoil in horror. very. very. cool. almost as cool as daniel and jonah themselves.

off to enjoy the sunshine. further ikon extracts to follow.

x.

Thursday, April 21, 2005

a sleepy late night note

Well it's nearly three o'clock in the morning. busy writing notes and browsing through piles of books for points of inspiration for this coming sunday's ikon ::virgin territory::
preparation for this one has been coupled with some major stress and also sickness in the team and it's been a hard one to pull together - some radically different perspectives around the table. i'm finding that being in reflective mode has been a blessing and a curse. i am so aware of my interactions and yet it has been hard to distance myself enough to work out the best way to lovingly engage. . . especially when we are exploring an issue that really awakens my feminist instincts and a desire to see us radically challenge the historical suppression of experience and expression. ikon is attempting to speak beyond liberal and conservative boundaries. sometimes i find that harder than others. it's part of the lifelong learning curve i guess.

if we can get our act together ikon will soon have a blog of its own and i hope we can put the poetry, reflections, song lyrics, liturgies and maybe even pictures of rituals gifts and of course the community on it each month. will no doubt be kind of like lifting the curtain in the emerald city. . . hehe.

tattoo is healing well and i plan to post a photograph this weekend. when jude is here. can't stop doing a little dance at the thought.

major news of the day: Provencal sojourn 2005 is booked. flights are booked. the title above gives a link to the site of our home from home.: L'Isle sur la-Sorgue. a slice (or should that be tranche) of heaven. . .

Easter is crying, as only a feline can, at the window to be let in - i guess i should go. and i am very tired. up again in 4 hours. must. sleep. i'll try and gather my thoughts on the train.

sleep well dear friends. peace be with you.

x.

Wednesday, April 20, 2005

Performance Anxiety

hmmm. so what the heck should i write about tonight?

plan from here on in is to scribble thoughts on the train and post from work - a glitch in the system has been solved (touch wood) and i can now access the blog dashboard from my desk. this new plan should make for more regular posts and keep Pip happy.

meanwhile . . . meanwhile, i'm metaphorically drumming my fingers until we confirm the plans to return to Provence in June/July. and indeed drumming the other hand waiting for Jude to arrive on Friday. i have no patience. rather appropriately itunes is playing our soundtrack album - jason mraz - as if to only taunt me further.

at ::tuesday group:: we are working our way through "the bible makes sense" by bruggemann. some seriously amazing ideas contained therein. we are changing. i know i am. this little gathering for food and sharing is shaping the rest of my week. i'm looking less at the big things and more at the small. 'bout time. i mentioned prayer for the second week in a row. look out. is that the sound of four apocalyptic horsemen thundering our way?

here's the opening line of tonight's chapter - which kind of floored us all:

The Bible has notions of life and death that are very different from those we have today. Whereas we think of life as the continuing function of the individual organism and death as the cessation of such functioning, the Bible understands life and death in covenantal categories. Life means to be significantly involved in a community of caring, meaning, and action. Death means to be excluded from such a community or denied access to its caring, meaning or action.
The more one considers that . . . the more one is provoked to see things in a whole new light.
Bruggemann's writing style is not always the most poetic but his theology is deeply radical. I'm not sure if the Bible quite makes sense yet, but something is being revealed and I am seeing in a new light. even the most cynical heart can be got at.

Are we building an inclusive community built on caring, meaning and action?

we can but try.

sleep well friends.
x.

p.s the title above links to my site of the week. enjoy.

Sunday, April 17, 2005

menstrudrama

well it would appear my stressing and worrying over possible tension ridden friendship was all for naught and no doubt a product of my hormone addled body. ain't PMT a bitch!

yesterday spent three and a half hours dropping leaflets through letter boxes across the Holywood Hills for the green party NI. for those who don't know the location, that's kind of like doing three and half hours of stairmaster. in the rain. upside, apart from the obvious political self satisfaction, was getting up close to some amazing properties. man there are some wealthy people up in there them hills. though shalt not covet they neighbour's 4 storey georgian townhouse!

this week i shall be mostly preparing for next weekend's ikon, ::virgin territory::
mojo firmly back in place, i am buzzing with excitement for this one. we're going glam. we're celebrating the flesh as radiant. i'm bringing anais nin. footloose. rufus. padraig's bringing st john of the cross. ricky's bringing walt whitman. where else could we do this. be this. i love it.

speaking of rufus, fabulous pics of the queen of queens at jude's blog - see right. roll on belfast on 18 May.

i'll come back later with something more poetic. in the meantime here's a gem of quote from my favourite theologian - dear freddie b, which i guess could be a mission statment for ikon:

a wedding. a handshake. a kiss. a coronation. a parade. a dance. a meal. a graduation.a Mass. a ritual is the performance of an intuition, the rehearsal of a dream. the playing of a game.
a sacrament is the breaking thorugh of the sacred into the profane; a ritual is the ceremonial acting out of the profane in order to show forth its sacredness.
a sacrament is God offering his holiness to men; a ritual is men raising up the holiness of their humanity to God.

from Frederick Beuchner's "wishful thinking: a theological ABC", New York: Harper & Row, 1973.

blessings -
x.

Friday, April 15, 2005

who taught us how to feel


lost my mojo somewhere this week. . .
it's been quite a while
just don't seem to have the wherewithall to deal . . .

i feel a close friend has pulled away - his voice is different. his texts seem different, lacking punctuation.
he and i say so much but he never allows expression for raw emotional feeling unattached to thought,
we so rarely say what we feel and now i've not the
faintest notion of how to tell him that for all the wonderful moments
gracing these days
it is pulling me down that i fear he is pulling away. that it makes my gut ache.
maybe it's me. maybe when we next meet he will waltz in like there's no distance at all.
or maybe he's the one who's falling and needs a hand.

i wonder is this what she meant when, on lithium, she said she couldn't cry.

She comes apart in the avalanche
Fades out like a dance
And crawls back into bed when it's over *


Later . . .

IM with annie.
talk of our tattoos - actual and desired.
some quiet tracks on the iPod...

and the burden seems lighter already...

and the precious memories of the day are so much clearer.
i saw stocki tonight. and iain. and chris. mike slipped his arm through mine as iain sang.

and right now i'm listening to the frames' plateau.

it's all taken care of. yep.

* ryan adams - avalanche, from love is hell pt 1.

Saturday, April 09, 2005


jude. france. 2004. roll on the return sojourn. Posted by Hello

5 days later - in gratitude

well , big thanks go to pip wilson for caring about my whereabouts or lack thereof.

this is the curse of the blog - at the very time when you need people to be throwing up good thoughts into the ether for ya, your life is just too damn busy to even check your email, let alone think about getting a blog posted.

so here is the last five days in shorthand:
sunday: bad day that started out so well - with a seemingly disasterous encounter with technology (see monday). cried watching dr who. long phone chat with ewan. snow in toronto. he continues to confound me with his beauty. i am so glad he's with Miriam.
i miss them so damn much it still aches.
monday: walked to work absolutely terrified that i had killed the external hardrive of a dear colleague, having borrowed it to share music. in tears by the time i reached the office. what a way to start your first full time week on a job. nathan, said colleague, totally unfazed. did everything he could to put me at ease. he is living grace incarnate. but "what if i really have killed the hard drive?" still keeps me from deep restorative slumber.
tuesday: worked a full day and then most of night. 3 hours sleep. for the last time, typed reports of child abuse. listened to dennison witmer as comfort. (see title for link) tears on the keyboard.
wednesday: wrecked. see tuesday. was thinking about jude as i drank my large mochaccino to go with extra shot of espresso - that just maybe i was getting a taste of what her months of inhumanly long working hours must have felt like. and as i mused on this in my foggy state she sent me one of her serendipitous 'i love you' texts as she journeyed to work. spooky and beautiful in equal measure.
headed to padraig's for dinner at night. wine. great food. wine. great chat. wine. great people. wine. a game of cranium. need i say dani and were slightly drunk. i was warm in the bosom of people i adore. and i celebrated finally only having one job - the great weight lifted. anna calls. we are booked to go to edinburgh for a weekend in june for a luverly girls (and boys) reunion.
thursday: helped coordinate much needed spring cleaning at work. went for 'one pint' with my colleague, mary, at twenty past five. left pub at eleven. twas a very big pint of guinness m'lud. level five communication. much shared. much learnt.
friday: more spring cleaning. hormonal. feeling the lack of not being able to access hotmail or blog from my work station. nervous about tattoo. nathan called as i walked to meet pete and ricky for weekly ikon planning meeting. the hard drive is not dead. and he will be able to hear the 2.1 GB of music i shared with him. he wanted to put my mind at rest. what a dear soul he is. ikon meeting agreed will be ::virgin territory:: (exploring sexuality) on 24 april. gave way to a couple of hours in company of dani and deb - who are so vibrant and beautiful.
so full of energy. they know a lot abut colouring your hair and i think that may be my next ::first time for everything:: adventure. jude called while we were chatting. her first live week with steve lamaqc has gone great. she's coming to the next ikon. will we come to france for a week? hell yes..
home: HUGE debate with michael over tattoo. all's well that ends well. it's going ahead. 2.30 saturday after zero28 meeting. argument resolved and a promise that michael will enthusiastically accompany me to tattooo parlour. i check email for first time since sunday. more mail than i know what to do with but to learn a friend is destined to survive her cancer battle. beautiful self penned poetry from padraig. gareth wants me to write for the zero28 website. he has faith in my ability. pip has been worried have i fallen off face of earth.

so much good stuff. so many beautiful human beings.

so. roll call. will we please be upstanding and raise a glass to:
michael, ewan, mir, jude, pip, nathan, dani, deb, padraig, the luverly girls, mary, claire, gareth and pete: none of it makes sense unless i'm living it with you in engaged commitment.
i feel so wrapped in bubble wrap. i hope i can return the gesture .

said to dani and deb - why don't we have commitment ceremonies for our friendships. to make vows and say, "i plan to love you 'til i die?" why indeed?

in the meantime - i need to hit the hay and rest for the big day.

if the tattoo gets cocked up - the meaning holds. this right now is the truth i believe so strongly i will brand it to my skin:

from the beginning to the end: the secret name of God is Love. YHWH - AMOR.

mum always said God moves in mysterious ways but God nearly always moves through people. i think maybe she was onto something...

x.