Equilibrium

An odd entry for a day like today, when everything is at sixes and sevens because of snow, but there does seem to be more of a balance – for me, that is. Something to do with being able to live to my own timetable for the first time since June.  No teaching;   few real-world commitments (the odd lecture; a meeting; an appointment to have my hair cut – correction, my fringe cut).   I finished teaching yesterday, and went to the last course lecture this morning.  No classes to prep last night meant I drifted for most of the evening – walked the dog a couple of times through a swirl of fat snowflakes, rang my mother, rang Himself (twice), walking through a swirl of proper, fat snowflakes; read a paragraph here and a paragraph there; wrote a couple of short emails; waited for my ‘real’ work, the one that merits the label ‘full time’, to wake up.  It woke up this morning. (And yes, it does strike me as odd, maybe even perverse, that I work best when the rest of the world is going into hibernation.)

 

I experienced a kind of epiphany at the weekend.  I had always assumed that  the epiphanic would be exhilarating, exciting, perhaps even blissful, and, at the very least, pleasant. It wasn’t: I was infuriated and grouchy and returned again and again and again to the source of the fury. I felt I’d suffered an imposition – yet another imposition; yet another unwarranted imposition.    I hadn’t. Actually.  At least I hadn’t been imposed upon by someone else.  I’d imposed upon myself. Again.  And decided there and then I’d give up being nice, accommodating, friendly and become selfish and difficult and so forth. (The fact that the vocabulary for this isn’t at my fingertips is indubitably a tribute to a convent upbringing!) 

 

But. 

 

Stamping about being self-absorbed and unaccommodating and so forth turned out to be too much like hard work. (Some would put this down to my not having had enough practice.).  My enthusiasm for this quickly waned. It is, I  decided, probably better just to be - without art.

 

So here we are. Me, myself, I.  Unplugged.   

 

And what does this entail?  Disengagement, mostly, on reflection.

Not disengagement.  Mindfulness. 

 

And I am, once again, back in the domain of the Zen.

 

Things I do in a way akin to mindfully include training a dog, teaching, reading and writing; weeding the garden; singing.  They do not seem to include – or at least, they don’t as yet seem to include anything that involves other people – even proximity to other people.  Is isn’t the same as being focused, as often the problem is that of remaining unfocused enough to drift. To stop what I think is termed ‘scanning’ .

Harry Potter

and the Deathly Hallows

(which I’m reading for completeness)

is deathly writing.

I confess I haven’t not enjoyed any of the books more than I’m not enjoying this one – shoddy writing; poor plot (not unusual); lack of pace (partly due to poor writing); with the biggest failing being that the children just aren’t interesting enough to be main characters.  The story needs the adults to make it work, and consequently, the book is one-paced, slow and sludgy.  The idea of the book as TWO films is, frankly, appalling.

I’ll finish the book, if only to enable me to argue from a position of strength that the Harry Potter books needed to be reigned in from the second volume on.  The knowledge that these  books with have been celebrated as Great Literature by the Great British Reading Public is truly embarrassing.

Sweet 16 …

16 weeks that is – not years; and not that sweet at the moment , to be frank.  I’m talking about Millie, who is indeed 16 weeks today, and – right on cue - teething.  She must feel very uncomfortable, poor little thing.  But she’s gnawing everything, and I have to admit that once she starts gnawing me, it’s hard to respond with all sympathy.  Ice cubes help, and carrots from the fridge.  However,  it appears there are times when she is soothed only by ripping newspapers, decimating the cat’s toys and gnawing my fingers. 

She’s making great progress otherwise; and thanks be to everything good, she’s finally got the hang of housetraining.  For several weeks she’s been letting me know after the event, but for the last few days, she’s been letting me know when an accident is about to happen. 

Today, another  milestone: having grown out of her crate, she’s graduated  to boot-and-dog-guard.  She isn’t terribly keen on the idea yet, but after a couple of adventures she’ll probably be fine. It must be more comfortable for her.

The dog guard took some time to fit – far, far longer than the billed 15 minutes.  I hope it proves similarly recalcitrant with regard to deconstruction, particularly deconstruction by puppies.

Today she has also shed her puppy collar for something altogether more adult, and is now sporting a fine, red, reflective collar.

Here’s a photo: taken, not today, but three weeks ago.  We were strolling along West Sands at St Andrews: