To my sister on her birthday

We may not always see eye to eye
Feel or think or act alike
But I'll love you 'til I die
And I'm with you, come what might!

Happy 40th birthday!

Life

Dark, strenuous, dizzying and repetitive yet strangely beautiful when seen from above.

The Year of Yes

I wish I had said Yes!
beloved
When you asked me out to walk
among the leaves
the turning leaves
You were offering me
the sound of dreams,
And I turned you down
politely.

Not today, I smiled
Perhaps,
Maybe, tomorrow?

But I wish I had said Yes!
beloved
I wish we had shared this light.

Next time don't ask
Just take me!
Order me to dress!

I am going to need your help
beloved
To begin the Year of Yes.

by Shaista Tayabali

Blogging

In his latest and utterly ravishing blog entry, dear blogger friend Rauf (whom I met through this ancient post) reminded me that the two of us started blogging four years ago this October. I hadn't remembered this and it hit me that it feels like a lot longer: so many things have changed so dramatically since October 15 2005 that that date seems to belong to another lifetime. This blog's original purpose has long been fulfilled and rendered obsolete: people and situations change and underlying creative frameworks (necessity, inspiration and technology) change accordingly. I don't believe in definite ends so I've let The Millstone (a tribute to my favourite Margaret Drabble novel) linger on. Sometimes - though it's increasingly rare - I even find it enjoyable to come back and feed it once again, wondering what I'll think of all of this twenty years from now (I doubt anyone else will find it worth the while to come back, my kids included). I expect most entries will serve as memory triggers for happy, complex or curious episodes which haven't been registered in writing but are engraved in recondite corners of my mind, waiting to be pulled out. Were I a good writer and had the spark of inspiration they might make a good book: even the dullest things can be turned into great stories if you're a good storyteller and know how to let the " little things that would ordinarily bore you suddenly thrill you".(*)

I've learnt so much from other bloggers during these four years! I've enjoyed the enormous privilege of glimpsing into their minds and dispositions, their experiences and worlds! Rauf (Daylight Again), Mariana (Gatochy's Blog), Sylvia (Kókosbolla), Gert (gertsamtkunstwerk), Tina (Swiss Miss), Ruth (synch-ro-ni-zing), Peter (Peter's Paris), Jill (Caffeine Court), Heather (Dooce), Catherine (Petite Anglaise), Lucy (Lucy Pepper), Claudia (O Mundo de Claudia), and so many others: thank you, I owe you immensely!



(*) Thank you Ruth!

A Noiseless Patient Spider

A noiseless patient spider,
I mark’d where on a little promontory it stood, isolated,
Mark’d how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,
It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,
Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.

And you O my Soul where you stand,
Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,
Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold,
Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my Soul.

-- Walt Whitman --

Weekend

First ever apple and autumn fruit fair at nearby Waddesdon Manor. Fun but nothing compared to Brogdale where we might return during the upcoming half-term break. Beautiful crisp weather.

Blog Action Day - Climate Change

“Climate change is the biggest threat to all our futures. It will affect every individual, every family, every community, every business and every country" -- Gordon Brown

Do your bit towards reversing climate change:

• Turn off lights when you leave a room
• Only boil the amount of water you need in your kettle
• Turn off televisions, videos, stereos and computers when they are not in use - they can use between 10 and 60% of the power they use when on
• Close curtains at dusk to keep in heat
• Let your clothes dry naturally rather than using a tumble drier
• Turning down the thermostat for your heating by 1 degree could cut your heating bill by 10%
• Use economy programmes on dishwashers or washing machines
• Use energy saving lightbulbs - they use a quarter of the electricity and last much longer
• Insulate your hot water tank and pipes
• Fit seals to externals doors, skirting boards and floor boards to reduce heat loss - 15% of heat is lost through draughts and 15% through the floor
• Make your windows draught proof or fit double glazing - this cuts heat loss in half - up to 10% of heat is lost through uninsulated windows
• Fit loft insulation - which should be at least 200mm thick to be most effective - 25% of heat is lost through an uninsulated roof
• Fit wall insulation - up to 33% of heat is lost through uninsulated walls
  

Do Good!

Fabulous

Beloved Dust

And you as well must die, beloved dust,
And all your beauty stand you in no stead,
This flawless, vital hand, this perfect head,
This body of flame and steel, before the gust
Of Death, or under his autumnal frost,
Shall be as any leaf, be no less dead
Than the first leaf that fall, --- this wonder fled.
Altered, estranged, disintegrated, lost.

Nor shall my love avail you in your hour.
In spite of all my love, you will arise
Upon that day and wander down the air
Obscurely as the unattended flower,
It mattering not how beautiful you were,
Or how beloved above all else that dies.

-- Edna St. Vincent Millay --

Rubaiyat

St. John's College in Cambridge

Those who pursue the scientific way
In a different language display
Their ignorance and the way they pray.
They too one day shall be dust and clay.

-- Omar Khayyam --

Favourite movie scenes

Three Days of the Condor on imdb

September

The goldenrod is yellow;
The corn is turning brown;
The trees in apple orchards
With fruit are bending down.

The gentian's bluest fringes
Are curling in the sun;
In dusky pods the milkweed
Its hidden silk has spun.

The sedges flaunt their harvest
In every meadow-nook;
And asters by the brookside
Make asters in the brook.

From dewy lanes at morning
The grapes' sweet odors rise;
At noon the roads all flutter
With yellow butterflies.

By all these lovely tokens
September days are here,
With summer's best of weather,
And autumn's best of cheer.

-- Helen Hunt Jackson--

Sensory Perspective

Gauguin

Tahitian Women On the Beach, Paul Gauguin, 1891.

"Life being what it is, one dreams of revenge." -- Paul Gauguin.

For my adored Mother

We will all be thinking of you all day long. Good Luck.

Scenes from Friday evening

It's 14º C outside and it's raining with a vengeance.

Coffee in Heaven

You'll be greeted
by a nice cup of coffee
when you get to heaven
and strains of angelic harmony.

But wouldn't you be devastated
if they only serve decaffeinated
while from the percolators of hell

your soul was assaulted
by Satan's fresh espresso smell?

-- John Agard --