Dear Heart, Toughen Up.

Dear Heart, Toughen Up.

I need another suitcase. This beauty has accompanied me more than 100,000 miles and she’s starting to show her age. She’s been the perfect size though – an ample fit for a two week journey that’s not overly cumbersome to deal with. She’s modern, sleek but not flashy. Practical but with a splash of colour and a curve here or there. I’ve packed her this morning in Tennessee to realize that she’s on her last run home, while I’m leaving again from a place I’d like to stay. Time to talk tough to myself and start the next leg of my journey home. Here goes.

Dear Heart,

You will be ok. I want to remind you not to wear your heart on your sleeve but we both know it’s too late for that. You’ve dug yourself a hole you can’t get out of now, invested so deep in a place that’s far too many miles away from where your life is everyday. You’re a bit of a fool, really – but a sweet one.

You should own up to the fact, you could have stopped this years ago. Put your foot down and refused to get involved but people have this way of crawling inside of you and taking up space. The ones that are making a home for themselves in there now are too good to throw away and you know it. But you could have pulled the plug before it got this hard.

So you need to toughen up. You’ve got a couple of hours til your next flight and it pays to remember there’s a whole other family of people you love waiting there, not to mention your family back home. If you wouldn’t spread yourself out so much, maybe you wouldn’t have this problem.

Just acknowledge that every hello comes with a poignant goodbye. Every goodbye is easier when you’ve planned the next hello. And this is a cycle you’ll probably be in for life now. So toughen up, Heart, get on the plane and then you can let your tears swell.

Every year you hope and pray that this year will be the one you travel one way. Every year you find a little more home here and find it a little harder to re-engage back there. Every year when leaving, you say – next year, I’ll unpack for good.

And if we’re honest, you suspect that time is a clock still ticking on things working out the way you suspect they might. You think you might have stumbled on the best of the best but it’s not something you’re brave enough to admit yet.

Here’s the truth of it, Heart. You’re lucky to have found something that is so hard to say goodbye to. Lucky to have people to return to. If you will keep expanding the boundaries and letting more of them in, you’ll always be travelling somewhere. Maybe there’s no unpacking for you anymore. Maybe you’ll always be travelling between here and there.

Maybe it’s time to accept, Heart, that home is the people and life will be a series of journeys between those you love – unless you’re prepared to give one of them up? No, I didn’t think so.

Dear Heart, you are a brave little soul. You throw yourself into loving people with everything you have and wonder while leaving feels so much like being torn apart. But without this pain, you wouldn’t have the joy of coming home. You, Heart, are at home here with these people. Truthfully though, your next stop is home too, and the next. Enjoy the travelling. Tonight, you’ll land somewhere new and begin it all again.

Good luck – you will be ok.

Self.

 

3 Simple Steps To Turn Criticism Into Triumph.

3 Simple Steps To Turn Criticism Into Triumph.

“Criticism, you are
a helping
hand,
bubble in the level, mark on the steel,
notable pulsation.

With a single life
I will not learn enough.”

Pablo Neruda remains one of my favourite poets. Beyond the schoolgirl days of Sylvia Plath and Shakespearian sonnets – Neruda was writing so politically, so astutely of his time and space that it’s nearly impossible to call him anything but a political writer.

His prowess is equal only to his capacity for immense failure at times – epic screeds of verse that would never make publication in today’s world, but in the reading and comparison of such, create the wonder of the times he landed his composition so eloquently right.

As a writer, criticism is often captured with red pen edits in my life. As a speaker, the crowd goes quiet. As a member of communities and a family – it comes in loud voices, arguments, discussions, silences and facial expressions that do not bear dissecting. Where do you face criticism? Your boss, your colleagues, your lover or your children? (more…)

Politics and Optimism: Why Annie Still Matters.

Politics and Optimism: Why Annie Still Matters.

Little girls have still got a lot to teach the world. They’ve got their own special brand of magic, to be applied liberally. In the case of Little Orphan Annie, she’s been touching hearts and brightening the outlook since 1924. How can she still be relevant?

Annie, the musical, is playing at The Civic in Auckland until July 6th.The redheaded bubble of optimism makes her way onto the stage with class and a vibrant cast of recognizable faces. The British cast and local chorus bring the story to life with appropriate intensity and execution. It’s really worth heading along to see.

Why is it worth seeing?
The music is great, the songs well executed and the stunning ensemble of orphans will melt your heart – pulling off the more complex and adorable song and dance routines.

More importantly though, you should go and see this show to remember what the human spirit is all about. The political dial is turning up in this election year, and Annie is a story about politics.

Front and centre of the musical (more so than the film, both were distinct productions) is a singular storyline given multiple expressions. One human being doing good for another human being. Human beings in power taking on a responsibility to do good, rather than to simply govern. Those with a lot, trying their best to give in meaningful ways.

A group of Hooverites living in a shantytown feeding a little vagabond girl from their own scraps.

FDR recommitting the government to getting people back to work; Democrats and Republicans working hand in hand.

Oliver Warbucks opening his home and life to a little girl with nothing.

The original Little Orphan Annie was a comic strip created in 1924. An orphan girl caught in the midst of the post-war slide into Depression (the musical and film both catch up with Annie in the early ’30s). Her optimism and hope is the captured human expression of what the American government (Roosevelt and his New Deal) were committed to offering a desperate people.

It’s important to remember that the bigger, human scale story of Annie is about how we find hope in each other and ought to look to tomorrow as a world of possibilities. It’s also a pertinent reminder that sometimes things work out just fine, despite not turning out how you’d like them too.

Don’t be fooled into just singing along. This story should be shaping your view of the world this year.

 

Wickedly Wicked.

Wickedly Wicked.

If you’ve ever

…. wondered about how the Wicked Witch of the West became so wicked, or if Glinda the Good was really … well, good….

…. felt like the odd one out in the crowd and struggled to find your place in the world….

…. experienced friendship that seemed against the odds and been changed for the better by knowing someone else….

…. and isn’t that everybody?

Then Wicked is the captivating, thrillifying musical you must experience during it’s all-star run at Auckland’s Civic Theatre. (more…)

Two Years On.

Reborn and shivering
Spat out on new terrain
Unsure unconvincing
This faint and shaky hour

Day one day one start over again
Step one step one
I’m barely making sense for now
I’m faking it ’til I’m pseudo making it
From scratch begin again but this time I as i
And not as we

Gun shy and quivering
Timid without a hand
Feign brave with steel intent
little and hardly here

It’s been two years since my last Eastercamp. Gosh, that went quickly. Didn’t feel like it at Year One, but at Year Two it seems like a flash in the pan. By Year Three, there’ll be barely a trace left… I won’t recognize the faces or the names. That’s how quickly it can all turnaround. 

Year One, I mostly just stayed home, cried, cooked and drank a little. Or a lot. But it was mostly red wine and I had a very communion-y mindset about it. It was a very sad and angry communion, so it was especially important. 


Year Two.. I mostly just stayed home but participated in some Easter celebrations, even some leading of the procession in my local community. Helped with the re-telling of the story to some 10 – 13 year olds. Told a story about being less of a priest and more of a person, singing the songs of ascent up to the Temple steps. 


I still miss the anticipation of telling the story. I miss the community of friends. My inner self trembles with anxiety that I won’t be that good again, that others will be better. Until I realize that is what I want, despite myself. I still want what has come after me to be better than I was. Doesn’t make me feel very righteous though. And maybe that’s better, the nothingness and then the desire.