I've moved! Join me at myownduende.tumblr.com :)
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Love
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| https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/430013_10150589064728141_14524668140_9241613_415725184_n.jpg |
Monday, February 20, 2012
Gustav
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| Gemma amalgamated a quote and this painting Hope II by Gustav Klimt and posted it to me today. I studied Klimt intensively in year 12. It was a great time. Lovely |
Perspective
Today my wound has been infected and so I've spent a lot of time on my bed listening to new music and gaining a new perspective...of my ceiling. Especially of my Cambodian mobile :)
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Friday, February 17, 2012
Duende as a passenger
Tonight I experienced a profound duende that has lasted for the last 5 hours. I went to see a brilliant musician, Passenger, in the Garden of Unearthly Delights. It was my first proper outing since this cancer thing...I was very apprehensive about being out with people when my tears flow at the drop of a hat lately. I needn't have worried...I was transported into an alternate realm where the deepest emotions were at the core of humanity.
To be present to such a passionate display of authenticity was humbling and magical. The fear and grief of the last two weeks washed through me as my eyes filled with salt water and I took stock of my life. Instead of intellectualising the hard facts, I let the emotions gently bathe my soul and transcend cognitive demands.
It's been a long time since I've had one of these soul gripping moments when everything makes the most perfect, yet complex sense and I'm no longer a worry ridden body. When the very meaning of what it means to be human is simplicity, with no further explanation required. With Passenger's trembling soulful performance I connected with a life force that screamed that all of this other stuff didn't matter.
I have once again been gifted this delicious drive to express myself through art, through tears, through writing that has been niggling me for most of my life. I just want to cry out to this thickening in the air, the swirling stars of my imagination, the clutching at my heart. I need to be that person. I need to tell of my pain, my joy, my confusion, my passions, my desires. I need to know and be known.
To be present to such a passionate display of authenticity was humbling and magical. The fear and grief of the last two weeks washed through me as my eyes filled with salt water and I took stock of my life. Instead of intellectualising the hard facts, I let the emotions gently bathe my soul and transcend cognitive demands.
It's been a long time since I've had one of these soul gripping moments when everything makes the most perfect, yet complex sense and I'm no longer a worry ridden body. When the very meaning of what it means to be human is simplicity, with no further explanation required. With Passenger's trembling soulful performance I connected with a life force that screamed that all of this other stuff didn't matter.
I have once again been gifted this delicious drive to express myself through art, through tears, through writing that has been niggling me for most of my life. I just want to cry out to this thickening in the air, the swirling stars of my imagination, the clutching at my heart. I need to be that person. I need to tell of my pain, my joy, my confusion, my passions, my desires. I need to know and be known.
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Beginning
I created this blog a few days ago. The idea was to fill it will things which inspired me whether it be art, film, photos, or quotes. The things that pop up in my life and give me the delicious tingling down my spine of a world of new possibilities.
Today I found out I most likely have cancer. As someone who processes through writing, I thought I would create a new blog for this. However I don't believe the world should be separated into pain and pleasure, good and evil, right and wrong. I believe in an integrated whole world, not a dualist perspective. I believe in a mingling of joy and sorrow. Therefore here is my space for inspiration and reflection on this journey.
"The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he's always doing both.”
The facts haven't reached my soul yet. I'm pretty good at intellectualising this situation and googling the right foods to eat and the risk factors. I've been lying in bed tonight for two hours, going through all the usual "why me's?", being angry with all the health professionals I've seen in the last few years who didn't pick up on this. The fact that it took 3 ultrasounds in the last 6 months until I got answer. The doctors who dismissed my symptoms as normal.The thousands of dollars I've spent on supplements and health treatments in the past. But really, none of this matters. It's just facts of what happened. It doesn't actually mean anything. It is what it is and I need to be present to who I am in this moment of reality. Yes, that probably means I'm going to go through cycles of grief. Probably be more coherant some times than others.
Tonight the harsh irony hit me that my stomach is so swollen that I look pregnant; I'm going to be opened up like a cesarean next week, yet there will be no long awaited beloved baby at the end of it. I am grieving all the children I never had and longed for over the years. I was desperate to be a mother.
I want to apologise to all my friends who have got married and had children...I've been so very envious of every one of you. Every time I saw a photo of your beautiful children it was painful to feel so left behind. Now I must face the reality that this is probably now forever my lament.
How does one face their own mortality? Part of me is at peace with who I've been and how I have lived. Part of me wishes I followed my dreams earlier. I was so excited about dedicating this year to art school. I'm so glad I had the experience of Cambodia last year, of fulfilling a dream to work in a developing country and push myself out of my comfort zone. I'm so thankful for all the children with disabilities I've worked with and who have touched my life so profoundly. Jered, Gemma, Miles, Donovan, Christopher, Nhung, Adriana, Scarlett, Sok, Rebecca, Todd, Anthony, oh dear Anthony. You made me real when you put your little hands in mine for security and gifted me with your trust.
I am so grateful for all the people in my life who have stepped in and out or remained in my sphere. For deep friendships, not so deep friendships, friendships I wished were deeper, for that is the nature of things. I'm sorry for being inauthentic sometimes when my self consciousness has created a barrier. There is absolutely no room for pretense and protection anymore. I'm out there, raw and vulnerable and open. I can't afford not to be.
I've often felt my life is one big epic movie. It's had so many poignant and melancholic episodes, it's almost like I'm representing a character outside of myself. In some ways I think I am. I remember writing songs and singing with the trees when my parents separated. I remember talking to the land, the flowers, plants and trees where I grew up and wistfully seeking 'home' in a sunset. The numerous poems I wrote in high school which echoed the burden I felt I was carrying. I've always felt that divine presence of being looked after amidst sadness. When I cried out to the wind or scrawled chalked pleas for justice on our concrete tank as a child I had a strong sense of communing with an incomprehensible being.
It's just started raining outside. Rain has always been my comforter. My perspective-giver. It make me so content that I am not in control. No-one can dictate the weather. This comforts me greatly. The weather brings unity to humanity, we are all in it, we all have to live with it and adapt to it. It's like a reminder to just breathe and "be in it". A bit like the movie Garden State "you're so in it right now". The weather maker is here. He is blanketing the land with water as my tears flow freely. I'm going to try and sleep now.
Today I found out I most likely have cancer. As someone who processes through writing, I thought I would create a new blog for this. However I don't believe the world should be separated into pain and pleasure, good and evil, right and wrong. I believe in an integrated whole world, not a dualist perspective. I believe in a mingling of joy and sorrow. Therefore here is my space for inspiration and reflection on this journey.
"The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he's always doing both.”
The facts haven't reached my soul yet. I'm pretty good at intellectualising this situation and googling the right foods to eat and the risk factors. I've been lying in bed tonight for two hours, going through all the usual "why me's?", being angry with all the health professionals I've seen in the last few years who didn't pick up on this. The fact that it took 3 ultrasounds in the last 6 months until I got answer. The doctors who dismissed my symptoms as normal.The thousands of dollars I've spent on supplements and health treatments in the past. But really, none of this matters. It's just facts of what happened. It doesn't actually mean anything. It is what it is and I need to be present to who I am in this moment of reality. Yes, that probably means I'm going to go through cycles of grief. Probably be more coherant some times than others.
Tonight the harsh irony hit me that my stomach is so swollen that I look pregnant; I'm going to be opened up like a cesarean next week, yet there will be no long awaited beloved baby at the end of it. I am grieving all the children I never had and longed for over the years. I was desperate to be a mother.
I want to apologise to all my friends who have got married and had children...I've been so very envious of every one of you. Every time I saw a photo of your beautiful children it was painful to feel so left behind. Now I must face the reality that this is probably now forever my lament.
How does one face their own mortality? Part of me is at peace with who I've been and how I have lived. Part of me wishes I followed my dreams earlier. I was so excited about dedicating this year to art school. I'm so glad I had the experience of Cambodia last year, of fulfilling a dream to work in a developing country and push myself out of my comfort zone. I'm so thankful for all the children with disabilities I've worked with and who have touched my life so profoundly. Jered, Gemma, Miles, Donovan, Christopher, Nhung, Adriana, Scarlett, Sok, Rebecca, Todd, Anthony, oh dear Anthony. You made me real when you put your little hands in mine for security and gifted me with your trust.
I am so grateful for all the people in my life who have stepped in and out or remained in my sphere. For deep friendships, not so deep friendships, friendships I wished were deeper, for that is the nature of things. I'm sorry for being inauthentic sometimes when my self consciousness has created a barrier. There is absolutely no room for pretense and protection anymore. I'm out there, raw and vulnerable and open. I can't afford not to be.
I've often felt my life is one big epic movie. It's had so many poignant and melancholic episodes, it's almost like I'm representing a character outside of myself. In some ways I think I am. I remember writing songs and singing with the trees when my parents separated. I remember talking to the land, the flowers, plants and trees where I grew up and wistfully seeking 'home' in a sunset. The numerous poems I wrote in high school which echoed the burden I felt I was carrying. I've always felt that divine presence of being looked after amidst sadness. When I cried out to the wind or scrawled chalked pleas for justice on our concrete tank as a child I had a strong sense of communing with an incomprehensible being.
It's just started raining outside. Rain has always been my comforter. My perspective-giver. It make me so content that I am not in control. No-one can dictate the weather. This comforts me greatly. The weather brings unity to humanity, we are all in it, we all have to live with it and adapt to it. It's like a reminder to just breathe and "be in it". A bit like the movie Garden State "you're so in it right now". The weather maker is here. He is blanketing the land with water as my tears flow freely. I'm going to try and sleep now.
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
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