Portrait of a gate.

Tags

camping., childhood, cottages, cows, farms, funerals, gates, memories, stories

I am particularly fond of gates.

I don’t mean the suburban wooden ones, built high enough to keep intruders out and to prevent me from looking into garden’s (an interest of mine as I pedal along, the saddle of my ‘high nelly’ yellow bicycle affording me a good view) but rather the old farm gates of the countryside.

The ones that did a real job, of keeping animals in and providing a means of something to lean on and a place to allow the ‘leaner’ to gaze and dream and pass the afternoon from. 

I love to sketch, paint and take photo’s of these gates and I see them as an art. A craft I hope will not die out. 

To my eyes they are a thing of beauty.

I would like to share some images of them.

But first a story:

                                  The gate.

I am walking with my mother and two of my sisters along a small road.

It is summer and we are camping below at the sea, as we do every year since I can remember.

The road, with its green strip of grass down the centre, is potholed and splattered here and there with fresh cow dung.

It twists away from the sea and towards the mountains.

On either side, the dry stone walls twist with it. The stones loosely heaped back up where they had been previously pulled down to let cattle through and then rebuilt. Tangles of wild dog roses and honey suckle drape and spread over the stones and in places, neglected fuchsias have formed themselves into small trees and are bent in the direction of the prevailing winds.

‘Watch where you are putting your feet’ my mother calls after me, as I break into a run and disappear around a corner. She is more worried about my getting cow dung on my new summer sandals than twisting an ankle in a pot hole.

Tasting honey from fuschia flowers is my new favourite occupation at eight years of age and I stop just long enough to suck the stamen and taste the sweetness before racing on to the next bush, leaving a trail of discarded bloody blossoms behind me.

I can hear the clinking of the empty bottles my mother is carrying and my sisters voices rising as they quarrel over who will carry the egg box.

We have an arrangement with a nearby farm to buy milk and eggs from them.

As I round another corner I see old Mrs Kavanagh leaning on her gate at the gable of her cottage.

The gate is old and the bars are rusted in places.

The broken pieces are held together with twine but although dilapidated, the gate is still strong enough to hold her weight.

For Mrs kavanagh is what would have been described back then as ‘stout’.

I am afraid of her.

Not for any particular reason except she is very old , with a face wrinkled by almost ninety years of salty atlantic storm’s, so I stand in closely in the shadow of the bushes and wait for my mother and siblings to catch up.

And while I wait I observe her from my hiding place.

Her hair is grey and covered by a black scarf. She has a black apron tied around and nearly covering a flowery frock. Her feet are encased in a pair of oversized mens wellingtons which had been cut roughly around the tops to allow for the stoutness of her legs.

The back of one of the wellingtons is split and I can see a bit of wooly sock protruding. Around her wellingtons a new bull calf is shoving and butting, and doing his best to escape and follow its mother, who can be heard bellowing from a few fields away.

I am torn between my urge to befriend and console the calf and my fear of herself.

The latter wins and I stay put and follow her gaze instead.

Squinting against the sun I can just make out the main road and walking slowly along that road, I can see a line of people following a black car.

I look back to see if that is what she is staring at and then back to the road again and though young I can sense the sadness in the way she is leaning on the gate.

For old Mrs Kavanagh, too tired and arthritic to make the journey to church and graveyard, is watching the funeral of her husband from the gable of her cottage.

Her razor sharp eyes, which in her younger days could spot a stray sheep a mile off on the side of a mountain on a rainy day, can identify every mourner following that hearse even from such a distance. (Or so I heard the adults say later)

I also heard later how my father had offered to bring her to the church in our car, as cars were few and far between in that part of the country back then, but she had refused, perhaps preferring to do her mourning in privacy by her familiar black gate.

At this point my family catches up with me and beauty the old sheep dog, her coat matted with burrs comes barking towards us alerting Mrs kavanagh of our approach.

She turns and waits in dignified silence for my mother to arrive at the gate.

My mother holds out her two hands and reaching over the top most bar, warmly enfolds the gnarled and battered ones in her own and offers her condolences.

We see our chance and rush to the gate.

kneeling down we call ‘sucky sucky’ as we have heard the farm children do. We stick our hands through the bars and shriek in delight as the calf sucks furiously on our fingers, whilst Beauty, not to be left out, pushes her way between us to be petted and fussed over too.

Our laughter drowns out the gentle rise and fall of my mothers voice and the lilting sadness of Mrs Kavanaghs replies, as the clouds sweep in from the north west and white horses appear on the sea and the mountains disappear into the mist.

                                               The end.

SOME GATES WHICH DELIGHT ME AND ONE WHICH I HAVE STOPPED TO SKETCH:

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Nine bean row’s etc……

Tags

cottage, dreams, goats, hens, hives, nine bean rows, poetry, seasons, Yeats

I like the pitch of your green corrugated roof.

Your pink painted doors catch my eye.

You would suit me fine (if I could break out a window here or there),

let some light in, on my writing table.

Hens out front I think.

Barnevelders (double laced) welsummers or Faverolles,

good layers.

calm and heavy,

no escape artists please.

(Those polish bantams are the limit)

I’ll be too busy writing to chase you lot down some boithrin.

Yeat’s nine bean rows I’ll have here,

and a hive for that bee.

Two apple tree’s, one pear,

A cherry too?

maybe.

A single row of spuds?

definitely.

(more if my back is able).

and speaking of backs, behind the house theres a fine space

for a milking goat.

Winter!

I would lay the fire from broken branches,

and maybe a sod or two of turf.

(Once when camping in a wild place someone left me a bag of the stuff,

I suspect the bachelor farmer who lived up the boreen)

Spring!

The smell of apple blossom will make me lift my head and drop my pencil,

draw me outside.

to gather warm eggs.

Summer!

I’d work ‘en plein air’,

pick beans,

(dinner would consist of beans, potato and an egg)

And ‘warm goats milk’ I hear you enquire?

Nope I’ll settle for wine.

and after, swim drunkenly in the nearby lake.

Autumn!

Honey would furnish my bread.

With fresh goats cheese

And the last of the beans, a nourishing stew.

Winter!

What made you come around again so soon.

A guerilla Cyclist (Trying to get from A to B in a civilized fashion)

Tags

authority, bicycles, buses, guerillas, the system, trains, weather

THE HAUNT OF A GUERILLA BICYCLE (guerilla bicycles are said to frequent wooded area’s with muddy paths and other places avoided by Station Masters and Bus Drivers)

DEFINITION OF A GUERILLA : A MEMBER OF A SMALL INDEPENDANT GROUP TAKING PART IN ACTIVITIES PERFORMED IN AN UNDERCOVER AND IMPROMPTU WAY WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION AND AGAINST A LARGER GROUP.

THE GUERILLA GROUP: Myself and the yellow bicycle.

THE TARGET: the system (trains mostly)

SETTING THE SCENE: 

Its dark and cold and wet.

The rain is coming down in torrents. I am struggling. My head is bent down against the wind.

My hood has blown off and my hair is stuck to my head. Rivulets of water are flowing into my eyes but if I take my hand off the handlebars to wipe them away, I nearly lose my balance.

I cycle on blindly.

Thats the downside of my morning commute so far.

The upside is I reach the station at six twenty two and my train isn’t leaving for another eight minutes.

I might be waiting even longer than eight.

The Powers that be seem to delight in any excuse to cause a delay and take great pleasure when there is one.

‘The signals are down at Connollys station’ They call out in a cheerful voice over the tannoy as though announcing the winner of a competition.

‘Heavy rain and danger of flooding has delayed the seven am train. We would like to apologise for any inconvenience caused’ sings out a very unapologetic sounding voice.

And my favourite of all  ‘Leaves on the track have delayed the eight thirty train until further notice.’

I can imagine they would be ecstatic if it snowed.

My waterproof trousers make a swishing noise as I cross the familiar marble floors to the turnstyle. The feeling returns to my fingers in the warmth of the station and I fumble in my bag for my ticket.

I am just about to blip myself and the yellow bike through when I hear a voice echo through the empty station.

‘Hey you’

I look around. There is no one else in the station except a man sitting behind the glass in the ticket office.

Our new station master! resplendent in shiny jacket and peaked cap

‘Yes you’ he repeats when he sees me looking at him.

He beckons to me and I push my bike over obediently.

He looks at me balefully from over his cup of coffee. a warm scone, the butter melting on it, lies at his elbow and there is a newspaper with the horse racing page open in front of him.

‘No bikes allowed on the train at this time’ He says.

‘But’ I push a strand of wet hair out of my eyes ‘I always bring my bicycle on at this time. The old station master never minded’.

‘Not anymore’ he says pompously, reaching under the table and pulling out a booklet. With a flourish he finds a page and jabbing a butter smeared finger at some print.

‘See! It says here, no bikes until after ten am.’

‘Thats such a stupid rule’ I say ‘There is hardly anyone on the train at this time of the morning what difference does it make if I take the bike on there’s plenty of room for it It’s not in anyones way and I need my bike so I can be in work on time AND when I get off duty at eight thirty it means I will be in time for the eight forty train home’.

I recover my breath after my long sentence.

I was going to point out that lots of people take their bikes on this train but I didn’t want attention brought to them in case they suffer the same fate I am about to.

Anyway his face was getting redder and redder so I thought I better stop.

‘NO BICYCLES’ he repeats loudly jabbing his finger at the page again.

I stand for an instant wondering if I should persevere with my argument but he has turned his attention back to his racing page and his scone.

I push my bike back outside and lock it to the bike rack. I was now not only cold and wet but also very grumpy.

Then a thought strikes me.

Everything happens for a reason!

Maybe this is the morning I would have been knocked off my bike as I cycled on the busy ‘four laned no bicycle path’ road from the station to the hospital.

I decide instead of being annoyed I would see it as ‘a sign’ and so as I pass the him again I smiled and nod, silently thanking him for perhaps saving my life.

He looks at my smiling face suspiciously.

‘Rules are rules and thats that!’ He calls out after me smugly.

‘We’ll see about that’ I murmur but I keep that thought to myself.

I mull over a way to beat the system as the train trundles along, smiling everytime someone with a bicycle comes on board.

The first bike came on at bray, a large station with lots of train officials who probably just turned a blind eye. Which made me realise it was just my misfortune that I now had Mr Self important as my new station master.

I was ten minutes late for work and I headed home on the later train feeling tired and grumpy having missed my regular one. But I reminded myself I was alive and was happy again.

THE PLAN:

The next morning my alarm clock went off early.

I arrived at the station thirty minutes earlier than normal.

The main doors were shut as I suspected would be the case, but the side entrance was left open for very early commuters.

I slipped my bike through the side gate and wheeled it along the dark platform to the end and hid it behind a bin out of sight of the security camera’s, then I walked out of the station and bought myself a welcomed coffee at a tiny early morning coffee stand and waited.

Standing hidden in the shadows of a tree sipping my warm drink, I kept one eye on the station clock and one eye on the door.

At exactly seventeen minutes past the main doors slid open and there was my station master.

He darted across the road to the coffee kiosk and returned in exactly 3 mins with his coffee and his scone and a newspaper tucked under his arm.

I waited a few minutes to give him time to get settled then strolled casually through the empty station towards the barrier.

I glanced over at him as I passed his glassed in boudoir.

He was looking at me suspiciously with some butter dripping down his chin. I longed to tell him to wipe it off. To look ‘the part’ for his very important job but instead I called out a cheery good morning and clicked my self through.

I walked back up the darkened platform, pulled the yellow bike out from behind the bin and we boarded the waiting train.

I was in plenty of time for work.

That evening I got my usual train home, but before I cycled away I synchronized my watch with the clock at the station.

THE STING:

The next morning I got up at my usual time and arrived at sixteen minutes past and again stood, this time with my bike, hidden in the shadows.

Lo and behold at exactly seventeen minutes six, the doors slid open and the enemy ran across the road. I bided my time until I heard him bossily ordering his coffee and scone and quietly I slipped unnoticed through the station door, across the marble floor, pushing the yellow bicycle, and out the other side onto the platform.

My third morning I arrived at the station at exactly eighteen minutes past and pushed my bike through unheeded.

And have continued to do this successfully since.

AND LATER:

In life there is always another of the same ilk somewhere in the vicinity, a cousin a brother, maybe even a twin.

Yesterday I spent the morning in a small village further along the train line, exploring its quirky laneways and taking photos of the harbour.

I planned to meet a friend for coffee on the other side of the city later in the afternoon so I arrived at the station at twenty seven minutes passed past three, three minutes before the time bikes were no longer allowed on the train.

I was stopped by the station master with a ‘no bicycles allowed at this time’ speech.(He looked very like my station man, possibly a brother) I argued that it wasn’t yet half past. He cleverly kept up the argument for three mins then looked at the clock and said ‘well it is now’ and refused to let me through.

I wheeled my bike out and cycling as fast as I could to the next station about 2 kms further along I chanced my arm (it was now 35 mins past). I pushed my bike over to the barrier, looking hopefully at this station master.

He just smiled and waved me through.

But its not only a syndrome of station masters.

Bus drivers can be affected too.

My son in law recently told me how he had arrived at the bus stop one day after work just as the bus was closing its doors. He tapped politely on the doors to alert the bus driver that he wanted to get on.

The bus driver shook his head and sat waiting to pull out into the traffic (which he couldn’t do as the traffic was so heavy). My son in law tapped again. If he didn’t get on this bus he would have a long wait (being a country service it only went every hour).

But the bus driver refused to open the door even though he was STILL unable to pull out.

So my son in law turned and started running.

He ran all the way down D’olier street, out onto college green. He ran on past trinity college and down Nassau street until he arrived at the next bus stop seconds before the very same bus delayed by the heaviness of the traffic pulled in. I would have loved to see the expression on the bus drivers face when he opened the doors at the stop.

Which also leads me to consider another commuter plight.

MAKING SENSE:

The train arrives from the city center into our little station every thirty minutes! It would seem the sensible thing that the bus would pull in and the passengers going further afield could hop off the train and continue their journey by bus.

But no! that would seem too sensible.

Instead the bus pulls off three minutes before the train gets in and the people getting off the train have to wait another 27 minutes for the next bus to come to complete their journey.

However

Sometimes if you are very lucky and the train is a wee bit early and the bus a wee bit late and if you are young and agile and swift of foot and strong enough to push everyone aside, you may get out of the train and across the station and out through the door to the bus and gain a foothold before the bus moves off.

Then you ‘the hero’ or ‘the guerilla’ as I would prefer to refer to you as, pretends to drop your money and with one foot in the doorway of the bus and one on the pavement you root frantically about your feet as if searching for your lost bus fare exclaiming loudly ‘there it is’ and ‘look here’s another euro’.

And while you are carrying out this delaying tactic, all the passengers of the train seeing their chance, surge out of the station en masse, climb over you and onto the bus and there is nothing the bus man can do to stop them.

So you see! sometimes we, the innocent public, in trying to get about our daily lives peacefully, to work, to home, to see our families, to visit friends, to do our shopping, to go to the library to visit sick relatives in hospital, to go to school, to go to college, using public transport, are forced to resort to impromptu actions which I would prefer to refer to simply as ‘guerilla activities’.

Sometimes it is our only hope of getting from A to B on the same day.

SOMETIMES OUT OF SHEER DESPERATION WE HAVE CONSIDERED LEAPING ABOARD A  MOVING TRAIN JUST LIKE IN THE OLD COWBOY MOVIES.. 

 

Say nothing and keep saying it (The art of being quiet)

Tags

books, calmness, chatting, dogs, families, hospital, patients, philosophy, psychology, talking, the yellow bicycle

(MY LOCAL LIBRARY, THE SOURCE OF MANY A GOOD BOOK ON PSYCHOLOGY)

I feel that at some point this post is going to head off on a tangent,  as though you pushed a riderless bicycle off down a hill. It may end in a jumbled heap at the bottom. What can I do but run after it and see where it goes.

The other day, when pedalling the yellow bicycle in my usual contemplative manner, I decided to do a revamp on my mind, an inventory if you will.

A sort of autumnal clean up of the brain.

I felt there were a few issues to be addressed and nowhere better to address them from then the saddle of that bicycle.

Its when I’m pedalling along quietly on the yellow bicycle that I get inspiration or gain some wise insight, mostly about myself and usually about things I need to change. Sometimes its about reaffirming things I’m happy with, Sometimes it’s about revisiting things I do that might irritate others but that I quite like in myself, and seeing do I still like them.

I know various scraps of psychology, most of which I have gleaned from books on the subject (which will probably annoy qualified psychologists) e,g I am aware of our basic instincts to be loved, to belong, to be accepted. Of our huge fear of not being liked. (A fear which long ago could mean being pushed out of the clan and left on our own to survive in the wilds and probably end up being dinner for a pack of wolves.

I have read much about my amygdala, that little almond shaped structure in my brain, and my hippocampus, a complex and important organ, a part of the limbic system, where emotion meets memory and causes me to respond, not freshly to the present situation, but (because my amygdala is decoding my emotions and my hippocampus is involved in storing and retrieving previous incidences) from past experiences instead.

Fine when living in ancient and wilder times, but in the present, it can get me into trouble if I react with primitive instinct, instead of calmly thinking things through.

Interesting and mind boggling.

Am I obsessed with myself?

Probably, but its only now I am giving myself permission to be totally honest about who and how I am, to look at my good points, to acknowledge my failings. to examine the ones that need a bit of work.

I try not be too hard on myself or resentful of others. I tryo ignore who has what or who seem to work less but have more.

To forget about those high up in jobs who appear to not be adding much to the work force.

To realise how happy I am in my job. How fulfilling I am finding it and acknowledging that it is worth far more to me than the money I get paid for doing it.

I am learning to stand my ground, to ask for help when there is too much thrown at me and NOT to be a martyr marching around muttering resentfully to myself about ‘poor me’.

I am learning to admit I am not superwoman. There are days when I will cope and days when I wont!

Yes I am learning all this from the saddle of my bicycle.

So!

There I was, pedalling towards the library to get out yet another book on the subject when a dog came running across the road towards me.

The first thing that struck me was its eyes were piercingly blue and it was rather wolf like in appearance.

I jumped down, keeping the bike between me and the dog, not quite sure what its intentions were.

It sniffed the yellow bike and began to slowly wag its tail.

I thought it might be lost.

Just then a woman with two dogs on leashes came around the corner.

My ‘wolf’ turned its attention to the two dogs, sniffing and wagging its tail and they responded likewise.

‘Its not mine’ I explained to the woman, ‘I think its lost’.

‘Possibly’ agreed the woman in a quiet voice, ‘I’ll take him down to the vets, they may know him’. She slipped her hand deftly down amongst the dogs faces, unclipped the leash off one of her two and clipped it onto the stray dogs collar.

I froze, memories of our alsatian came flooding back!

‘Dont go near Sabre when he is eating’ My mother constantly reminded us. ‘Don’t put your face down to him’!  The list of ‘don’ts’ grew longer until eventually he bit my brother and had to be put down.

Interestingly,  My father also had three ornamental ponds in the garden, He must have been trying to tempt fate!

An alsatian, three ponds and eight children. Something was bound to give but we all survived to adulthood.

‘Are you not afraid of being bitten’ I asked, thinking she was very brave to put her hand down so near some many teeth. I had visions of the three dogs turning on each other, then in a frenzy on the woman and finally on me.

‘Ah no’ she said calmly ‘He seems friendly enough’.

‘Come on bess’ She called her other now leashless dog and the four of them set off down the road.

Her obvious ability to read doggy signals impressed me but not as much as her calmness.

And I became aware of my own excitability.

I was once described by someone close to me as an alka seltzer. ‘I can’t believe that someone as lively and as fizzy as an alka seltzer is going to die anytime soon’ He  exclaimed when I first told him of my life threatening diagnosis.

Not only am I fizzy, I am also inclined towards talkativeness.

When were children it was my father who talked.

He sat at the head of the table holding forth (he also got his dinner first and the best cuts of meat, the softest whitest florets of cauliflower and the crispiest of roast potatoes) and we had to listen.

Oh how I was bursting inside with all the things I had to tell. The stories I wanted to relate.

But I learnt to keep my head down, chew my food neatly, hold my knife and fork properly and keep the area around my plate clean and food free. We were promised a prize if we did so and most of us eight children complied and even won, with the exception of one brother (not the bitten one) who cried if anyone looked at his plate.

‘She breathed on my dinner and now I can’t eat it’ He would wail, while we would eye up his plate greedily hoping he would carry out his threat.

But my mother would sooth him and encourage him to eat up as she bustled back and forward serving us all and when she finally got to sit down with her own dinner, we had finished and were itching to get away from the table and my dads sometimes funny but more often boringly repetitive stories.

So I gathered up all my chat over the years and held it inside me until I became a nurse and then I put it to good use.

For though I am good at listening, which is essential because listening is very important part of nursing, I also needed to be good at talking.

I have to reassure, cajole, promise, explain, advise, instruct, talk to families , talk to doctors, to my colleagues, to other departments, to secretaries, to kitchen staff, to my director, to visitors who are lost etc etc,

Yes I have to talk a lot.

And I do and I am not ashamed to admit to it.

But recently I met my match.

My patient! Just over very big surgery and when others would have been zonked still from the anaesthetic, he was like a wordly waterfall.

Words poured out of him in torrents.

He talked while I explained the call bell, fixed his Intravenous infusion, checked his wound, straightened his catheter, pinned his drains safely to his hospital gown, took his temperature, checked his vital signs, fixed his pillows, gave him a pain relieving injection, gave him an anti clotting injection, gave him his intravenous antibiotics, readjusted his Oxygen, gave him his nebulizers.

He told me about his children, his wife, his dog, his neighbours, his cousins, his nieces, his nephews. He strung together words like christmas lights, twinkling and sparkling, strings and strings of them joining together and swinging along.

The next day he continued as I washed him and got him out for his first walk. He told me about his village, his thoughts on public transport , on the government, on the european government, on Obama.

As we passed the male care assistant on the corridor he remarked ‘He’s working hard’ within earshot and when we had passed continued ‘its not always necessary to say hello, sometimes a compliment within earshot will suffice, just enough to let him know we are acknowledging him.

‘If he is busy maybe its not necessary to say anything at all’ I said.

He looked at me as though I was mad.

When we got back to his room (He had at this stage covered the importance of good neighbours, the newly introduced water taxes and the price of coal) I sat him down and put the oxygen saturation probe on his finger.

His saturation rate had dropped a bit.

‘Talk to me’ I instructed ‘It willl bring up your oxygen level’.

He thought for a minute, then looked at me shyly.

‘Do ya know what?’ He said with an embarrassed smile ‘I can’t think of anything to say……..

 

MY LOCAL CHURCH, A GOOD PLACE TO GO IF YOU DON’T WANT TO TALK……..

If the shoe fits (and other footlike considerations)

Tags

barefoot, birkenstocks, cancer, cycling, families, feet, plantar fasciitis, punctures, shoes, the burren, walking

My feet are strong and straight and made for walking and dancing, especially on moonlit beaches and in other wild places.

The yellow bicycle has a puncture and I have plantar fasciitis of my left foot.

Between the two of us we are a pair of ‘crocs’.

I have never really considered my feet. Never paid them too much attention other than keeping my toenails trimmed and sometimes even painted.

A good dollop of moisturizer rubbed on them after my shower and I could dance the night away and walk or cycle home afterwards.

I have only occasionally worn high heels and often walk barefoot.

I shop for my shoes in the natural shoe shop and buy my lovely coloured sandals in the birkenstock shop on wicklow street.

My preference always ran to simple natural shaped flat shoes.

‘Who left these bloody great canal barges on the step’ my dad used to roar if ever he tripped over my shoes (I was not the most tidy of people) which I felt was an unfair description because though my feet were strong and large, they were also beautiful and straight, no bent toes, no callouses, no hallux valgus. Certainly not the feet you would associate with canal barges.

But my dad had a way of labelling people and things unfairly and although I’m sure he never intended it, those labels stuck for the rest of our days.

‘Don’t let stephanie pour my tea, she’ll scald me. Don’t let her touch the radio, record player, she’ll break it! Let Imelda do that, she’s good and practical! Dont give Mark the keys of your car he’ll wreck it. Let stephanie mind the little ones she’s good at that. Give that to angela she will make a better job of it. etc etc.

Maybe he was right, but I think his labelling of me as the awkward one made me only more so and to this day I never show impatience when it comes to breakages and spillages either with my own children or with my grandchildren.

But let me impart one more shoely fact:

When we were little (because there was so many of us) as our feet grew too big for our shoes, my mother would cut the toes out to form a sandal effect and then as our ever growing feet made their way over the edge of the sole, these shoes were passed along from child to child as the shoe fitted.

The result being that not only did some of us rarely get new shoes but we rarely got shoes with toes in them.

We were the epitome of recycling long before it was cool to be so.

But I will stand corrected on this fact as childhood memories can be filled with self pity and drama…

And with my father being an architect, we were not poor, so it maybe unfair of me to suggest we were.

But back to my plantar fasciitis.

A few months ago I had developed the same problem in my right foot.

My right foot/leg and I have a little thing going on, a team effort thing, a sort of non spoken agreement (it being my leg of much love and respect due to the fact it literally saved my life) that it will let me know by pain or ache or lump or bump that something is amiss and I will in turn act swiftly.

You see we are both aware that those ‘feckin’ cancer cells maybe lurking mischievously and will need to be dealt with with speed and without mercy.

So I went for an xray…

Which thankfully showed nothing sinister! just a small heel spur causing my PF, inflaming the ligaments..

So I did the exercises: the ball rolling. the tendon and ligament stretching, the toe/towel grappling, and one day I realized it was magically gone.

I patted my leg gratefully and thanked it for its hard work and apologised to it once again for what I had put it through. The necessary extensive groin dissection where all thirteen lymph nodes were yanked out and thrown away (thankfully only one was positive but its not easy or even possible yet to put back the innocent ones) and I was left with a leg who’s natural defences were at a minimum.

Yes, my Right leg has had a tough few years and needs encouragement and love and care and attention and I will do my bit and listen to it, and rest it when its tired and try to protect it from scratches and cuts which isn’t easy as I love to tramp or cycle along rough terrain and explore hills and rivers and forests.

I always carry a bottle of savlon to dab on its cuts and bruises because having no lymph nodes means its more open to infection

Since my leg dilemma and despite all my cycling, to the shops, to visit family, to work, to the cinema, to the pub, I never take for walking for granted.

That simple art of putting one foot in front of the other, pushing off alternatively(or together if you want to jump along) and propelling ones self along continues to amaze me.

Feet are an intriguing feat(pardon the pun) of engineering.

All those bones engaging with each other, twenty six of them when last counted and thats just one foot, connecting with each other and moving smoothly.

One of my favourite foot things to do is to go barefoot walking in stony places.

My favourite being the Burren.

 

That land of smooth undulating limestone slabs especially when warmed by the sun just lends itself to such pleasures.

I have written a post about this already (see below)

https://thewomanontheyellowbicycle.wordpress.com/2014/01/30/barefoot-in-the-burren/

Today I am still wearing my Birkenstock sandals, even though it is november, and I plan to carry on wearing them for as long as I can, hopefully into december, maybe even into the new year.

My feet are STRONG and like my right foot I expect the plantar fasciitis in my left foot will disappear soon and just as magically.

I am not so sure about the puncture of the yellow bike:(

 

 

 

Beliefs of an optimistic introverted bicycle owner.

Tags

arty types, bands, Bewleys, bicycles, cancer, coffee, Dublin, friends, furnace mountain, introverts, music, optimists, philosophy, tea

THE EVENING (WHERE I MEET THE BAND)

Forgive me if I am somewhat unrestrained in the use of the word ‘believe’ but the title should have forewarned you. 

I am an introvert. (I am also an optimist, but more about that later)

Many would question my claim and see me as quite the opposite as I am good at dealing with large groups of people.

However I believe my apparent extrovertism may well be a learnt trait from my years working as a nurse rather than a natural one because being a midst the noise and turbulence of a crowd causes me a major degree of stress.

And after, I need to retreat to some solitudinal place and gather my energies for the next onslaught.

So, When I recently received a message from a friend to say a mutual virtual friend was coming to Dublin with a band in which her daughter was a musician and would I like to go and see them and then meet her after, my initial reaction was to say sorry but no.

I had just finished three long needy people filled days at the hospital and I just wanted to retreat to my quiet space where there is no television, no intrusive noises and write or paint.

But my optimistic side came to my rescue.

Ah yes! my optimistic side…..

I believe that life is filled with goodness and that good things always happen to me and if something not so good occurs then there is a reason for it, maybe a lesson to be learned, a change to be made,

I believe that though the outcome may not be what I want initially, things always turn out right in the end.

A sort of ‘maybe yes! maybe no!’ kind of philosophy.

The kind of philosophy I use when an occurrence happens that others perceive as misfortune,

Its probably how I got through my illness,

I remember when people looked sadly at me and said ‘Oh poor you! you are so unlucky to get cancer’.

But instead of feeling unlucky I thought ‘maybe yes! maybe no!’

That was six years ago and I’m still alive and kicking and the cancer seems to have gone and I cannot say that getting it was a ‘bad’ thing but rather the opposite.

For it stopped me in my tracks, pulled me to my senses and made me change my life for the better.

Oh how I had fallen into unhealthy ways. Working in an area that was too stressful for me, drinking too much wine, not getting enough sleep, eating in a way that didn’t nourish and energize me.

I had also gone through a very traumatic divorce a few years before and hadn’t given my self any time to recover from it,  I had just put my head down and kept going( I had no choice really) I needed to find a roof for over our heads, to be able to pay bills etc etc etc (how boring and self pitying it all sounds now). My body was probably shouting at me to slow down but I didn’t listen to it, So maybe it thought ‘nothing like an old dollop of cancer to make her listen!

And I listened.

I also believe that the kindness and generosity of others should never be dismissed, So shutting down my lap top, I got out the yellow bike and cycled to the dart station and headed Town wards.

The sugar club is on Leeson street and I hadn’t been there for many years.

My friend had told me I was on the guest list but when I said my name at the desk no one had heard of me.

Disappointed? maybe yes! maybe no!  A sort of relief actually, I had done my bit, I had given sociability a try and now I could go home to my cozy room and my own company.

But just as I was turning to go I heard a voice calling out my name. ‘Come with us’ A long haired girl was standing with three others holding various sizes of instrument cases.

There was no mistaking them!

They could only be ‘The Band’

I scuttled after them.

‘She’s with the band’ My long haired girl announced to the door keeper, nodding at me.

‘She’s with the band’ she repeated to the girl at the ticket kiosk,

‘She’s with the band’  she announced to the bowing smiling officiates,

‘I’m with the band’ I said to myself as I headed up the steps of the auditorium and found a plush seat at a table with a candle and ordered myself a glass of wine.

I have no fear of attending occasions alone, At my age I do not need to prove I have friends (I have a few, whom I really do not deserve due to my odd optimistic introversion).

The band (of which as you know by now I am with ) came on stage and the night of music proceeded

I could use the words ‘Brilliant energetic exuberant enchanting emotional warm joyful heart lifting heart soothing foot tapping moving sad tear flowing smiling laughing’ to describe their music and song.

But!

I  believe that when it comes to music (except for the basic, good/bad, slow/fast happy/sad descriptions) no words can do justice in describing what you are actually hearing.

It would be like me telling you that the sky in Van Gogh’s ‘starry night’ was blue and expecting you to be able to visualize it…

So here they are and I am entranced…

I don’t like using the word ‘ought’ or ‘should’ or ‘must’. I like to leave people to decide such things for themselves.

But feck it!

You just OUGHT SHOULD MUST go and hear them!

Because if I, the introvert, who prefers to stay at home and write or paint, found myself just wanting the night to go on and on, to just sit and listen forever, to laugh to cry to tap my toes and wag my shoulders (and if there had been space enough) to get up and dance, then they have to be phenomenal.

I believe music must excite or sooth, must touch my soul, must bring out emotions in me. Its got to make me smile, even if tears are also flowing, its got to be familiar to my ears but also new.

There are only so many notes out there but to arrange them in such ways that bring pleasure and recognition is the art of music.

The Music Of Furnace Mountain did just this, familiar but different.

Such lively tunes and gentle song’s.

And the fact that I realized I no longer longed to be home, the fact that they had turned, for that evening, my introversion into extroversion as I turned and smiled and nodded at those around me, meant they were not only phenomenal but they were magic also…

THE DAY AFTER (WHERE I MEET HOLLY)

‘Ring a ring a rosie as the light declines, I remember Dublin city in the rare old times’

Well I don’t, but my father who was born in Stoney batter, one of Dublin’s oldest enclaves did, and he regaled us with many stories of his childhood. Gurriers hanging off the backs of trucks, mitching from school, collecting jam jars and getting the price of a cinema ticket from the ‘jamjar man’.

My best memories of Dublin are from my student days, rooting for vintage clothing in the dandelion market, attending gig’s up in Taylor’s Hall, trad sessions in O’Donoghues and hanging out with ‘arty types’ in Bewleys cafe.

I loved Bewleys, I would meet my best friend there and over a white coffee and a sticky bun we would change the world in a single afternoon.

Exciting things happened in Bewleys and the nuns who taught us had left us in no doubt of that. They lived in terror of the place and up to the time we finished school and escaped out into the world, they reminded us daily of the woes that would befall us if we frequented it. They never told us what these woes were exactly but implications were men,drink,drugs and sex, so we flocked there.

‘If you DO insist on going there ‘ they sighed resignedly ‘at least tie your hair up (they offered us elastic bands to do so) so you won’t look like MERMAIDS or you will be surely inviting ‘trouble’.

We longed for ‘trouble’ so we threw the elastic bands into the rubbish bin and grew our hair so long we could sit on it.

I remember once a bearded young man walked by our table and dropped a folded piece of paper in front of me. We sat staring at it until eventually egged on by my friend I carefully unfolded it and smoothed it out. On the front was a phone number and on the back was written these words ‘I have just returned from heaven and the stars up there speak only of you’.

Whether the words were meant for me or whether he had someone else in mind and it was the only piece of spare paper in his pocket, didn’t bother me. By the time I looked up he was gone.

We were never encouraged to be vain and I never considered myself a a thing of beauty, but my friend whom I still consider my best after all these years told me I was.

Was it better that I didn’t realize it? maybe yes maybe no! I was certainly grew up being unselfconcious. But not having great belief in my appearance meant I married the safest and most disastrous man on the planet. Was that a bad or a good thing?, maybe yes but more likely no. I have the two most wonderful daughters from that marriage.

But that was then and this is now and here is Bewleys.

http://bewleys.com/bewleys-grafton-street-cafe/our-heritage

And in we went ( Holly and I) and even though the smell of coffee wafted around the marbled tables and the crimson velvet high backed couches and past the Harry Clarke stained glass windows until it reached the high ceilings stained by years of cigarette smoke from the time when it was cool to smoke, we ordered ordinary tea for two and a berried scone, which came with butter AND cream.

And over that pot of tea we chatted for hours whilst we covered all manner of subjects and thought’s and idea’s and notions (call them what you will) and discovered we were like minded.

And I knew I had known her from other times, that we had surely bumped into each other in the greater scheme of things, in lives past or places long gone, in other dimensions even.

For I believe we didn’t just come on this planet to reproduce our genes and die! I believe we also came here to connect and share our dreams and stories and songs and to form new friendship.

It also occurred to me as we sat sipping our tea and agreeing that everything happens for a reason that if I had gone out to the phone box and dialed the number on that sheet of paper all those years ago, would I be telling a better story now?

Maybe yes! maybe no!