Diary of a Desperate Exmoor Woman

New Adult? A genre too far?

2012-02-09T03:13:00.000-08:00

Recently on Twitter, I saw a young writer I know asking for recommendations for ‘new adult’ books. New adult? WTF? And that was pretty much what I said to Becca. She told me not to be snippy (and I said I wasn’t; I was just deeply puzzled) and she sent me some links. St Martin’s Press are doing it, she said. So I took a look.

St Martin’s Press reckon this is a new, ‘previously unidentified’ genre and go on to explain that, ‘New Adult is about young adulthood, when you are an adult but have not established your life as one (career, family, what-have-you)’.

Apparently it’s all about ‘transition’; about ‘coming of age’, about people who, while legally ‘adult’, are still finding their way. According to blogger Cally Jackson ‘The protagonists in these books are too mature to be considered YA protagonists, but they’re not worldly enough to be considered Adult protagonists. They’re too old for YA but not old enough for Adult fiction. So where do they fit?’

It seems to be chiming a chord. Blogger Jessica Lawlor laments the lack of these adult inbetween novels. ‘While I love YA books and adult books, I can’t help but feel like an entire demographic is missing,’ she says. ‘I’ve yet to come across a really great book about someone in their 20′s dealing with the issues twenty-somethings deal with; their first couple of years out of college, starting their first real jobs, finding an apartment, dealing with issues of drifting friendships, relationships starting to get serious…the list goes on and on.’

Hmm. So we need another genre, yet another subsection to slot books into? I had a quick Google and, yes, it seems that new adult fiction, also known as ‘post-adolescent literature’ (oh my!) really is starting to happen. Wikipedia says:

‘This category is intended to be marketed to post-adolescents and young-adults ages 14 to 35. This age group is considered to be the lucrative 'cross-over' category of young-adult titles that appeal to both the young-adult market and to an adult audience.’

I don’t know about you, but the word that sprang out there was ‘lucrative’. How desperate are publishers becoming? I know it’s tough out there but… Do we honestly need another brand of ‘youth’ writing? And up to age 35?? Oh, come on! In fact, targeting anyone over 16 is pushing it, as far as I’m concerned.

When I was 16 I was reading Dostoevsky, Hesse, Hardy, Goethe, DH Lawrence (and no, not just the dirty bits in Lady Chatterley), Le Carre, Susan Howatch and so on and so forth. I was being a pretentious little shit and lapping up Gide, Maupassant, Balzac and Mauriac in French and Lorca and Valle Inclan in Spanish (yeah for fun – at school it was all Moliere, Racine and Corneille). And yes, I used to write letters to my best friend in Latin but hey… you know what I’m saying. If someone had suggested I read books for ‘new adults’, I’d have given the mother and father of all eyerolls.

When I left university, I devoured modern literature as fast as I could. I wanted to catch up; I was just seriously turned on by people who caressed, shocked, beguiled with words – Peter Carey, Ian McEwan, Russell Hoban, Patrick White, Knut Hamsun, Lawrence Durrell, Mervyn Peake, Italo Calvino, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, John Fowles, Angela Carter, Milan Kundera, William Golding…the list goes on and on. I wanted to read about everyone and everything - about old people, young people, people in all kinds of places and all kinds of situations. I was living my wild twenty-something life - the last thing I wanted was to read about how other people just like me were living theirs. Shit no.

Okay, so I loved literature, I adored words. Maybe I’m being a crashing lit-snob here? Maybe I’m missing something. Maybe we need to help ‘young people’ (yup, even those 35-year old babes) get into reading?

But, but, but… isn’t it just a bit, condescending? Are modern ‘young people’ so lamentably poorly educated and unimaginative that they can only read books written especially for them, with characters their own age, going through their precise ‘life transitions’? Where does that leave the rest of us? Are they going to come up with a genre just for me and my ilk – neurotic middle-aged women living in gloom and penury in the countryside? Neurotoruralpremenopausal lit? Seriously, where would it end? No, let’s not go there.

Since when did books have to be shoe-horned into such precise categories? At this rate, all books will end being written like Mills & Boon – to a precise, paragraph by paragraph, formula. Literature by numbers. Are we getting to the point where a writer of ‘adult’ fiction won’t be able to employ a child POV or that of a ‘new adult’ (up to age 35 – sorry, still blinking wildly at that).

Though, hang about, there is a bright side to this. If a 35 year old is a new adult, that makes me…? Probably not even middle-aged. Positively sinfully youthful in fact.

Anyhow, what do you reckon? Am I being a miserable old bag? While you're pondering how to say 'yes' without being unutterably rude, I'll leave you with a short suggested reading list for ‘new adults’…fabulous books that felt absolutely no need whatsoever for a special category. Bet not one of them would make a ‘new adult’ list from a modern publisher.

Catcher in the Rye – J D Salinger

Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh

The Secret History – Donna Tartt

The Magus – John Fowles

The Group – Mary McCarthy

Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte (and Jane Eyre by Charlotte)

All Jane Austen and a shedload of Hardy

I Capture the Castle – Dodie Smith

Angela Carter – The Bloody Chamber

The Alexandria Quartet – Lawrence Durrell

Titus Groan - Mervyn Peake

Bet I missed loads, huh? What would you put on the list?

And, on re-reading, I find myself arguing with myself (again)...just a bit. But, no...let's leave it like this. Tell me what you think.

What doctors don't tell you...

2012-02-08T03:36:00.000-08:00

Remember Accutane (Roaccutane), the treatment for acne? In 2001 it was selling in its billions. It seemed like a miracle cure. But not for everyone. The father of a young man who’d committed suicide after taking Accutane approached Dr Doug Bremner, Professor of Psychiatry and Radiology at Emory University in the US. He asked if there could be a link between the drug and severe depression. Dr Bremner investigated and found that, yes, the drug did indeed have an effect on the brain and could cause depression, so severe that it could lead to suicide or psychosis, in some people.

‘For those who suffered from extreme scarring acne it was something of a miraculous treatment,’ says Dr Bremner. ‘However the evidence started to mount that for others it was a death sentence. Over the next few years it was estimated that between 300 and 3,000 young people on Accutane had either committed suicide or killed others.’

I met Doug Bremner on the writing website Authonomy. I read his book, The Goose that Laid the Golden Egg about the Accutane case and how he played a key role in having the drug withdrawn from the US market, not just for its potentially depressive effects but also because it seemed it could cause birth defects and stunt growth. I remember him being harassed and harried for his brave stance – taking on the might of a vast pharmaceutical giant takes one helluva lot of guts.

It touched a chord with me as I have always been concerned about the way pharmaceutical companies rule the medical industry. So I asked Doug if he would answer some questions and he kindly agreed. If you’re remotely concerned about your health (and particularly if you have children) do read through and follow the links - you might like to buy his books too. It's a long post but it's important. You simply can’t stick your head in the sand over this stuff – and, sadly, your doctor won’t always give you all the information you need.

EJ: Your first book was Before you take that Pill: Why the drug industry may be bad for your health. Which drugs cause you the most concern? Which should we be wary of taking?

DB: The drug I get the most negative feedback on from patients is isotretinoin (Roaccutane in the UK, Accutane in the US until it was taken off the market in 2009 and is now sold as generic isotretinoin). This drug can cause depression, suicide, psychosis, mania, irritable bowel syndrome, cognitive problems, sexual dysfunction, and a range of other problems. At its peak 80% of people on it were taking it for non-cystic acne, i.e. acne that would not lead to scarring. I recommend using retinol cream first (not much is taken into the bloodstream) and using Roaccutane as a last resort and then at doses half of the recommended dose.

EJ: That’s damn scary – and good advice. Any others?

DB: The antibiotics in the fluoroquinolone group like ciprofloxacin (Ciproxin in the UK and Cipro in the US) and levofloxacin (called Tavanic in the UK and Levaquin in the US) can have some pretty nasty side effects. They are used incorrectly in 81% of cases, usually in the form of an overkill form of first line treatment for urinary tract infections in women. These drugs can cause cartilage and tendon damage which can lead to a snapping of tendons. If you are a runner you should exercise extra caution. I also get a lot of feedback that they cause strange psychological and neurological symptoms and can interact with withdrawal from psychiatric medications like benzodiazepines.

The third drug I have gotten the most feedback about is the birth control pill or oral contraceptive (OCP) Yaz or Yasmin, also known as Janya in the UK (generic is drospirenone and ethinylestradiol) which is associated with psychiatric side effects like mood swings and depression. All of the OCPs can do this but this one seems to be particularly problematic. I recommend using an IUD or other form of birth control, because I do not think it is natural to flatten out a woman's monthly variation in sex hormones estrogen and progesterone.

EJ: The pharmaceutical business is a vast moneymaking machine. Reps target GPs in the hopes they will use their products. How can we be sure our doctors are giving us the right medication?

DB: I think consumers should educate themselves about their medications. That is why I wrote my 'Pill' book. I have heard from a number of people who said that having the book around literally saved someone's life when they realized a problem was related to a med the person was on. I also think patients have the right to ask physicians to give full disclosure about any money they receive from the pharmaceutical industry, whether it is payment to give talks or be in studies or free meals or gifts. Many "studies" are actually marketing campaigns to pull in doctors to a new brand of medication-- the industry calls them "seed studies".

EJ: I agree. Any suggestions as to what we should do, as ‘patients’ when we’re prescribed a drug? I assume you’re not saying we should avoid all medication?

DB: No, of course not. I prescribe medication myself. I'm just saying to educate yourself, don't passively rely on your doctor. That way you can avoid unecessary medications and recognize bad interactions within yourself. Remember that 400 years ago Paracelsus basically said that the goal of medication treatment is to offset the negative side effects with positive outcomes.

EJ: A lot of us go online to check out health conditions and medication. But there is simply so much information out there and it’s easy to become confused and lost. Any sites you recommend?

DB: Studies show that over half of medical websites contain misinformation (including one we did on websites about psychological trauma and mental health). I have a couple of hundred articles on my website and on ezine

I also recommend community forums like medications.com because that is a great way to find out if other people are suffering from similar side effects. Sometimes the medical community takes a while to catch up to what patients are telling them.

EJ: You also target vitamins and supplements. What are your major concerns? Should we not take these products?

DB: I am not against all vitamins and supplements. Many supplements are beneficial for a variety of conditions and women and vegetarians, in particular, could benefit from a well-balanced multi. The main vitamin I am concerned about is mega-doses of Vitamin A, since it can lead to thinning of the bones and does not prevent cancer, in fact it may increase the risk in smokers. My main point is they can have side effects just like prescription medications can -- they should not be considered risk free.

EJ: In the UK, there is a strong move towards regulating natural medicines – herbs, homeopathic preparations etc. What are your feelings about that? Is it sensible or is it a case of the pharmaceutical companies not liking us taking medicine into our own hands, potentially taking away business from them?

DB: In general I am not in favor of increasing government regulation. If you grow catnip in your garden do you need government inspections? A possible exception might be a supplement like the weight loss aid Ephedrine which has been linked to sudden deaths.

EJ: A lot of my readers have young children. What concerns should they have? What particular advice would you give?

DB: A lot of children get ear infections and antibiotics are overused as in many cases the infection is not a result of bacteria, and even if it is, a "wait and see" approach will lead to resolution. Antibiotics at best reduce by one day the time period of the infection. "Wait and see" has been shown in research studies to be the best approach since it avoids bacterial resistance which can increase the number of subsequent infections. Wait and see involves giving tylenol or aspirin for fever and using topical medicine for pain relief.

I also am concerned about the over-extension of vaccines, especially Gardasil and flu shots.
Another big problem, especially in the US, is overuse of antipsychotic medication in small chilren.
You can see a link to my posts about medications in children here.

EJ: Going back to your books, I was amazed at how personal your accounts are. The Goose that Laid the Golden Egg is certainly not a dry medical read – it’s as much about you, and your search for your family and identity, as about your battle with the pharmaceutical giant, Hoffman-La Roche. Why is that?

DB: I had an agent (who later died) who warned me that some people might not like the "two story thread" of the book, and in fact the people who didn't like it complained about the personal part of the story. In fact it made some people very uncomfortable. For me it was a story about honesty and emotional integrity, and for me coming clean about my past was very tied in with coming clean about the risks of a particular medication (ie Accutane). In both cases not doing so could be potentially lethal.

When I wrote it, it was also a time when a lot of stuff was coming out about what is essentially the corruption of leaders in academic psychiatry (which is where I do my "day job") by the pharmaceutical industry, and I felt like I wanted to make a clean sweep. In summary, if you are looking for a knight on a white horse story, this isn't for you, but it is a more accurate description of what it is like to be in my shoes, and there are a lot of other people out there like me.

EJ: You talk, towards the end of the book about alternative forms of healing. Do you now favour an integrated approach to healing?

DB: I think people take the spiritual part out of healing and recovery at their own peril. We don't fully know how or why people get better. Our own treatment studies for PTSD these days are focusing on effects of meditation training and a program for promotion of mind and body. I personally have used acupuncture and found it helpful.

EJ: I remember from Authonomy that you had a lot of persecution from the pharmaceutical industry. Is that continuing? Any thoughts on how we might get away from this situation whereby our health is being potentially comprised by big business (supported by government)?

DB: Not so much since Accutane was taken off the American market in 2009. They've moved on to other big money makers that I am not called as an expert on. I think the US court system is out of control in terms of drug litigation. They are allowed to spend way too much time and money trying to discredit experts against them. Also, sunlight is the best disinfectant, that is why I came out and wrote openly about what happened, while in the beginning I mostly kept it to myself.

EJ: What’s next for Doug Bremner? Any more books in the pipeline? Where are you in professional terms? Hopes for the future?

DB: Since the 'Goose' book I have been writing screenplays and one of them called 'Catania' (about five Italian sisters who return to their home to divide the family art and furniture) got to the quarterfinals of the PAGE competition for screenwriters in 2011. I am planning on producing that as a film with my daughter this summer. I am currently working on a novel called 'Hearts" about a cardiac surgeon who can fix other people's hearts but not his own (being posted on twitter @heartnovel, my twitter name is @dougbremner). I just sort of move to whatever interests me, but am not ready to give up my day job, which is as a psychiatrist and researcher in the area of posttraumatic stress disorder in women abused in childhood and in returning soldiers from Iraq.

EJ: Good to hear all that and huge good luck. Before you go, could you give us your top ten tips for maintaining good health?

DB: Sure.

1. Don't smoke

2. Drink in moderation (or not at all if you choose)

3. Cook your own meals and grow your own fruits and vegetables, if possible

4. Eat fish at least once per week. It’s more about lessening reliance on red meat. Vegetarians should be fine – gaining protein from beans, pulses, nuts, seeds.

5. Exercise more than three times a week (even if just brisk walking)

6. Practice stress reduction (yoga, meditation, etc)

7. Know everything you can about your prescription medications

8. Have supportive and nurturing relationships

9. Use psychotherapy if you have depression or anxiety or unresolved issues from the past

10. Get your blood pressure checked

I'm tempted to add make your own beer and wine (which I do) since I saw your husband is a beer writer

JA: Ah, that takes me back to childhood, when my parents made their own beer and wine. My husband just likes to drink the stuff! J Huge thanks, Doug…

Okay, so there you have it…for more detailed information on all this, do buy Doug’s books..and check out his website and blog.

Facebook? Fakebook? Freakbook? F***book?

2012-02-07T03:40:00.000-08:00

So Facebook has plans for a $10bn share offering? 443 million people log on daily and Mark Zuckerberg has got first one, then two billion in his sights. That’s kinda freaky. I’ll be honest, I have a love/hate relationship with Facebook. Mainly I detest it. In fact, it pretty much pisses me off on a daily basis. On the whole, it’s just the sheer inanity of the thing. The same funny pictures doing the rounds; the same quizzes and memes; the same plugs for books and services; the same ‘Yippee, my book is now #523 in true life dog stories (toy breed subsection) on Amazon.’ Oh God, does that sound horribly cynical?

I hate the way the ads show that they’re monitoring your likes and dislikes, grabbing your information and squirreling it for future use. I don’t get the causes thing. Yes, I’m against child pornography; no, I don’t think homophobia is particularly clever; but how does my clicking a button on Facebook change anything? Where’s the practical change here? I guess you'd argue it's about raising awareness but, really, is it more that it make us feel better; that it's a way of showing we’re decent people, part of the tribe?? Am I missing something? Please tell me if so.

I hate the invasiveness of its apps – the way it nabs what people are listening to on Spotify or what they’re reading in the Guardian and spews it out to all and sundry. I can’t stand the ‘join my event’ malarkey. Sometimes I sit with a glazed expression, watching the moving sidebar thingy, with the lols and pmsls and endless cute kittens and inspirational quotes and just feel nauseous. Like, like, like, like. Bleugh, bleugh, bleugh, bleugh. Don’t get me started on games. I. Don’t. Do. Games. No, not Farmville, not Bejewelled, not Scrabulous, not none of ‘em. Not noway. Not nohow. I did my stint on Farmville for James and that cured me for life. Jeez, am I grumpy old bag or what? J

lightwork.org

So, why do I stay on it? Why don’t I just delete the whole thing? Well, I did…a while back. And then realised I was cutting off my nose to spite my face. Because sometimes it’s damn useful. For example, my fitness gurus put updates on their FB profiles so yesterday I avoided a wasted trip down to the river for kettlebells cos I knew that Trisha couldn’t get down cos of the ice. Handy. Equally there are family members that, for some strange (but I’m sure good) reasons all of their own, don’t do other forms of communication – so I can keep in touch with them in a surreal sort of way – even if talking to a Buddha rather than a real face is slightly weird. And other people I love are on it and it’s a way to keep in touch with them.

One thing I did a while back was clean out my timeline. Totally. Removed pretty well all my pictures too. It’s not that I had anything particularly incriminating or shameful on it – just that I realised I didn’t want my entire life, likes and dislikes available on-line. This blog is quite enough angsting and splurging and making an arse of myself!

Sometimes I do wonder if it’s a young thing. My son loves Facebook. He says it makes him feel part of the pack. Hmm, maybe that’s why I don’t like it. I figure it’s a good way to introduce him to the potential pitfalls of the Internet. I don’t hang over him all the time but he knows that Adrian or I might drop in unannounced any time and that seems to be enough to keep him from going crazy. If one of his friends posts something a bit…inappropriate, it’s a good opportunity to talk about stuff. Though of course it begs the question, do you mention it to the child’s parents? Hmm.

I also drummed into him that he must ONLY accept friend requests from people he knows in real life. Okay, so you could say that’s hypocritical of me but there’s a helluva difference between worldweary old me and a 13-year old lad. I’ve tutored him in the avoidance of viruses and phishing scams. Do I let him on my timeline? No. Because my list is relatively wide open, sometimes people publish stuff I wouldn’t want him to see. Likewise, I don’t accept friend requests from under-18s. Of course, if your account is family-only (or you don't have friends like mine), that’s something quite different.

James is pretty canny. His friends aren’t always so switched-on. I think I told you the story of one lad who came over and boasted he had a coupla hundred friends. When I took a closer look my hair nearly turned white. We did a lot of unfriending that afternoon.

I keep an eye on the addiction thing too. Facebook addiction is, apparently, a real syndrome. Yup, 'they' researched it. Take the test...

Are you suffering from FAD? If your answer is straight No, then answer the following questions honestly:

The first (or second) thing that you do when you log on to Internet is check your Facebook page.
You constantly change and update your status and Wall updates.
You are so involved into the Facebook World that you even post things like “ going to sleep “ or “ I am tired “.
As soon as you click a picture, you rush to post it Online on your Facebook albums.
You become agitated or restless if you can’t get Internet to check up your social networking updates.
You feel too delighted or too sad depending upon the comments you receive on your profile or pictures, comments etc.

Sometimes, however, I feel a weird rash of fondness towards Facebook. Someone or other will pop into my head and I’ll trundle over and see what they’re up to; maybe I’ll leave them a message; maybe not. It’s just nice to know they seem to be okay (though, really, who ever knows?). Or they do the same for me and it brings a smile to my face. Or someone will appear just as I’m thinking about them and a spontaneous exchange occurs. It’s less formal than a phone call or an email – just a quiet stroke or a bit of fun and banter. I also take a childish pleasure in dismissing the ads on my page, citing ‘against my views’ for pretty much everything.

The new timeline thingy? Well, it doesn’t rock my boat but not much I can do about it. Given I only have about six posts at any time on my entire account, it’s never going to be a thing of beauty. J I’ve found pinterest for beauty, anyhow – you’re welcome to follow – click the widget on the sidebar or here.

But, back to Facebook. I guess what I think is what I always think. Each to their own. Whatever suits you. Maybe the bottom line is use Facebook, rather than allow Facebook to use you. And, if you have children, keep a beady eye.

What do you think? Love it or loathe it?

Oh, and btw, my anti-guru loves Facebook and always likes...new friends. So say hell o.

My dirty little secret...

2012-02-05T02:47:00.000-08:00

It’s about time I came clean. Fessed up to my secret vice; my dirty shameful secret. Please don’t think the less of me for this… We all have flaws, some more fatal than others. J

Rather like an Exmoor track...

Okay. Deep breath. I’m a secret petrol head. Yup, I love cars. Not any old car, I hasten to add - ideally they need to be fast cars or deeply trashy trucks. Nothing much inbetween. Yes, yes, yes, I know…I’m into environmental stuff. In fact I’m a pretty deep shade of green, not quite at the ‘the world would be better without humans’ stage – but not that far off… and yes, yes, yes, cars are hideous polluters. Hideous.

But, what can I say? I get a kick out of driving cool cars….fast.

Now, let’s have a reality check here. A sad reality check. Right now, I drive the most hideous car in the world – well, not far off. Arsebiscuit Toyota RAV4. Pale gold. Dubbed ‘The Bauble’ and about as fecking useless as its Christmas tree decoration namesake. The thing is neither fish nor fowl – neither comfortable saloon nor hardcore off-roader. It handles like a drunken supertanker and drinks like an elephant. Seriously seriously crap car.

How cool is that?

Second confession. I watch Top Gear. Oh yeah (and the new series starts tonight – oh sweet serendipity). James and I ooh and aah over the supercars and apparently I look very funny when the reasonably priced car bit comes on as I lean into the bends, shift gear and grind my heel into the mat shouting, ‘Put your fecking foot down!’.

Third confession. Jeremy Clarkson makes me laugh. Yes, he’s an arrogant tosspot but he’s a funny tosspot. And I like that Top Gear is kinda real. They take chances; they do their own stuff and, oh my, their travel journeys are beyond awesome and I am beyond envious. Oh, you know how I love road trips and sometimes I just wanna get behind the wheel of a car and just drive, drive, all day, all night…

Anway. I’ve had a motley crew of cars over the years. My favourites:

My very first car, an ancient (1967) VW Beetle – red. Impossible in heavy rain, freezing cold in winter, but gutsy brilliant little car. Laughed at ice. Played with truckers on my long journeys up and down the M1 and M6. Gutted when the suspension cracked. Got it welded. Ran for years.

Toyota Celica – the old shape. Red. Cool as shit. Wouldn’t let Adrian drive it.

Mitsubishi Shogun - first four-wheel drive. Solid as a tank. Great off-roader.

Suzuki Vitara – spunky little four-wheeler…cheap as chips but a great little car. Hugely underrated.

Don’t talk technical to me. I’m no mechanic. I can’t think of anything worse than lying on my back under an engine. I just like driving them…the good ‘uns. So, often, when we’re driving, James and I play fantasy car fleets. Adrian rolls his eyes – he really doesn’t give a toss.

And I’ve narrowed my current list down to these…

Porsche 911. Pure nostalgia this. My favourite car when I was 18. Erik the Viking recklessly promised he’d buy me one for my 21^st birthday. Sadly, when that came around, he’d managed one of his spectacular downturns. Never mind. Just a great-looking, fun to drive, car. Ultimate cool.

Noble M600. Fast as feck. Bit of a looker. To be honest, it's a bit flashy for me and crap visibility but James loves it, so it made the list. Made in the UK. So, buy local huh? Car miles, y'know? Hey, positively virtuous. J

Toyota Hilux. The indestructible one. I love trucks – the older and more battered the better. This would be my workhorse of choice. It wouldn't stay that colour long on Exmoor!

Audi A7. The family car. For cruising up the motorway in comfort. Audi make great cars (have had several), responsive, good acceleration, nice handling. Forget Mercedes and BMW – Audi are WAY better. End of.

Ford Mustang GT5. Okay, so the handling is crap but if you’re gonna have a muscle car, you gotta have a Mustang, right? Pick me up, put me down on a US highway and let's go eh?

Ford Focus. Don’t laugh. If you want a nifty little runaround, this has to be it. I’d have one of these for city driving – nippy in traffic and a perky little parker. Okay, so that's the rally version... And?? Your point?

I could go on but I can feel your eyes glazing over. So let’s have a bit of road music, huh?

Hair (reprised)

2012-02-03T02:35:00.000-08:00

So. Despite the bloodbath (I mean, the home hair colouring) my mane was still a mess. I simply have TOO MUCH hair (on my head, I hasten to add). It's getting heavy, weighing me down. I swear to God it's adding a couple of pounds to the scales. When I do Zumba and tie it up in a high ponytail it sort of does its own dance, to a different beat, which feels very weird – a bit like playing different rhythms with each hand on the piano. Anyhow.

'I really need a haircut,' I told the SP. He looked benignly at me and gently licked my hand in sympathy.

'I REALLY NEED A HAIRCUT!' I shouted (in my head, of course) at the universe in general. And lo!

‘Any bloggers around Taunton want a haircut and colour?’said Twitter. Right there and then. Bloody hell.

So I said, Yes please. And they said Next Thursday okay for you? And I said, Sure. And they said Great. And I said Look, I should warn you that when I review things I’m honest, sometimes brutally so. And they sort of gulped (well, maybe I imagined that but I could sort of hear it in the pause between emails) and then they said, No Problem. In an Oh shit what have we let ourselves in for? sort of way. And I said Great. So there we were. Thank you, Universe. Thank you, Twitter. Thank you, Sarah Hodge hairdressers.

And there I was. A week later - yesterday, in fact - in Taunton. And first I met another Tweeter (sorry, can’t do Tweep), Nicki (@waysidehealer) at Brazz for a quick cuppa. And she was as lovely as I expected. And we swapped teabags (as you do) – my Yogi tea for her Pukka – and talked social media and healing and the universe and so on.

Lucy, Charlotte, Karly, Maria

And then on to Sarah Hodge. Big friendly smiles as I walked in (always a good sign). No, scrap that. HUGE friendly smiles. Okay, you can argue that they knew I was coming and that I would be writing about them, but I promise you, after years in this business, you can tell when it’s put on and when it’s the real thing.

Karly took charge.

‘So, what do you want?’ she said, lifting up bits, peering, trying not to snort out loud. Now that's a big question, I thought.

'With regards to your hair,' she clarified. Another mind reader, huh?

‘Heck, I don’t know,’ I said. ‘What do you think? You’re the expert. Do whatever you think.’

Oh no. She wasn’t letting me get away with that.

‘Okay…’ she said slowly, patiently. ‘What don’t you like?’

‘Bobs,’ I said firmly. ‘I really hate bobs. I mean…’ Backtracking quickly as I glanced around and spotting a couple. ‘They’re great on other people but not on me. Oh, and not brown. Or black. I tried black hair once and I looked like a dead person. Other than that...anything. Apart from badger stripes.’

She nodded understandingly and kept asking questions. I have never thought about my hair so much. And finally she reckoned she'd cut a bit, heave off some of the sheer volume of the stuff, and that she might run through some high and lowlight thingies through it.

‘But that won’t be very dramatic,’ I said. ‘I mean, for the blog. You’ll want a total transformation. Before and after shots. You know, long red hair to bright blonde, er, bob or something.’

She gave me that puzzled look. People never understand that, as a journalist, it's in your genes to do whatever it takes for a good story and if that means putting your health, sanity, reputation, life...looks even…on the line... you’ll do it.

Anyhow. She had that comforting confidence that all good hairdressers have and I was fed up of fighting in general so I put up my hands and said, ‘Do with me as you will.’

And very delightful it was too.

First up, it was warm. WARM. I got back feeling in my fingers for the first time in months. Then lovely Charlotte gave me a head and neck massage before she washed my hair. And they fussed around me and generally made me feel deeply pampered and welcome. And interesting conversation too. Okay, so not ghosts and space cleansings this time, but Karly and I chatted about press and privacy, about state versus private education, about business and marketing, and about who had had the dodgiest hair extensions back in the 80s.

And, while I had rather hoped for a wild dramatic change, I had to confess she was probably right. It looked...rather nice. And it felt – delicious – sort of soft and shiny rather than a wild ball of tumbleweed. And they pressed ‘product’ on me and I promised I’d use them (with fingers crossed behind my back). And I walked out feeling all sort of smiley. Because, frankly, it wasn't just a good haircut and colour, they made me feel great. And, honestly, that’s a huge part of the hair salon thingy, isn’t it?

What? Oh, you wanna see? Okay dokey… My webcam has broken so you’ll have to make do with the crappy phone pic, I’m afraid.

And I drove back over the Brendons, to catch a bit of snow and ice action. As the sun was starting to set. Plain beautiful. Just like my day.

Sarah Hodge has salons sprinkled around the South-West – Taunton, Tiverton, Chard, Honiton, Barnstaple, Wellington, Bridgwater. See their website www.sarahhodge.co.uk

They’ve also got a new drop-in salon in Taunton called (doh!) The Salon.

Oh, and things I learned:

* If you’ve got wild hair (or have children with long tangly tresses) you might want to check out the Tangle Teezer – looks like something you get out of a cheap cracker but works seriously well (and gives you a scalp massage at the same time). www.tangleteezer.com

* If you've got wild hair (part two) you need to sort of twist bits of it into sausages before you dry it - this is called 'twisting' apparently and 'stops fluff' (another technical term).

* A thingy called a 'wand' (by Babyliss) is THE 'phenomena' - you wind your hair round it and it goes sort of ringlety (but not in a bad Victorian way). Will I get one? Nah.

* Find a salon with adjustable basins (no neck crick) and - ideally - massage chairs. Oh heaven!

* If hot chocolate tastes like warm milk, it means the machine has run out of chocolate.

And this morning I said to Adrian. 'Hair. How come it needs cutting?'

And he shook his head and carried on leafing through his cookery book.

'I mean, take dogs. Their hair doesn't grow. In fact, animals never need their hair cutting. Apart from sheep. I suppose it's once you start cutting it, then you have to keep on?'

'I haven't a clue.'

'But it's interesting, isn't it? Don't you wonder why?'

'Never give it a moment's thought.'

I sighed. He rolled his eyes. 'You can't get cross because I'm not interested. It's biology. I'm interested in other things.'

'Like beer.'

'Like ghosts.'

'You don't believe in ghosts.'

'So what? I can still find them interesting. Fictionally. I don't believe in fiction but I still read it.' He paused.

'Anyway, pubic hair doesn't grow.'

I decided to leave the conversation right there.

And if anyone knows. Why hair grows... Tiddly pom...please tell me. And sorry about all the ands - it was an and sort of day.

The Tree of Life

2012-02-01T05:48:00.000-08:00

Ach, for heavens' sake, this image won’t let me go today. I keep trying to edit and it keeps nudging me; more than flirting, it’s head-butting me. So, hands up, I give in. You want to be seen, be seen. I bow to Your boughs. Take root here. Grow.

The Tree of Life.

It’s there in every civilisation, every body of myth, every culture. I work it in Qabalah, Kabbalah, call it what you will…journeying up, down, across the shining paths, its branches, its roots. From Malkuth to Kether and then out into the swirling emanations, the Veils of Negative Existence.

The Tree of Life speaks to the unconscious mind. It has its own tongue, its own fingers. You may touch the Tree but the Tree reaches back and touches you too.

Gnothi Seauton – Know Thyself. The only real authority is inside oneself. Search within. And here's a quote that keeps nagging at me. My anti-guru keeps saying it and now every book I open is echoing it.

‘Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. For everyone that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth, and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.’

As above, so below.

As within, so without.

"Your own self-realisation is the greatest service you can render the world." Sri Ramana Maharishi

'Pilgrimage to the place of the wise is to find escape from the flame of separation.' Rumi

'I am closer to you than yourself, than your soul, than your own breath. Why do you not see me? Why do you not hear me?' Ibn Al Arabi.

'Each bush and oak doth know. I AM.' Henry Vaughan.

'The heart is nothing but the Sea of Light...the place of the vision of God.' Rumi.

'I am thou and thou art I; and wheresoever thou art I am there.' The Gospel of Eve.

'Humanity is being taken to the point where it will have to choose between suicide and adoration.' Teilhard de Chardin

'The world today hangs on a single thread, and that thread is the psyche of man.' C.G. Jung.

Dreaming is free

2012-02-01T03:18:00.000-08:00

Goodbye and good riddance, January. Sheesh, what a particularly nasty month you were. I’m still reeling from the amount of death, disease, discord, debt, destruction, desperation, depression, deception and despair you dispensed with such damned doleful dark delight. Doesn’t D just have the very ring of doom? Dread, with a D on either end, sums it up. And really such a dreary month, so dismal, doleful, dank and dire. And so much damp…the windows are breeding mould again; I spend dolorous days digging at the crystal froth sprouting from the damn walls of the dank dungeon.

But. We made it. Well, most of us, anyway. We’re still standing. Okay, so some of us are hobbling on crutches; some of us are clutching our hearts; some of us are poking desperately with sticks at doctors and bailiffs. But we’re still here. More or less.

And now it’s February. Yes, it still seems cold and damp, dreary and dark on the outside but look closely and there are small signs that life is beginning again. Snowdrops are scattering the hedgebanks on Exmoor. In fact, if I squint hard, I can see them out in the garden from my turret window too.

In Native American tradition this is known as the ‘Cleansing Time’; the time when the world is scoured and purified before the cycle of life starts over again. It’s the pause before the fresh start. And before a fresh start, you need trust and hope.

Today or tomorrow (depending on your tradition) is Imbolc, that the Christian Church transformed into Candlemas - the festival of lights. It marks the midpoint of winter, halfway between the shortest day and the spring equinox. It’s the festival of hope, of trust, of dreaming of better times to come.

I’ll brave the icy garden to pick some snowdrops (superstition says you shouldn’t bring them into the house before Imbolc). When Eve sat weeping after being expelled from Eden, the snow fell all around her, her tears turning to ice. An angel took pity on her, caught a snowflake in his hand, breathed on it and let it fall to earth as the first snowdrop. The flower bloomed and hope was born.

I have this little ritual I usually do at Candlemas. I’ll wait until darkness falls and sit quietly in the velvet black. Then, slowly, one by one, I’ll light tiny candles (whispering a wish with every one). Gradually the light will increase. It will, it will.

Our ancestors held on hope as they looked out on the bleak landscape; they had faith that the sun would return. Imbolc is about keeping faith – in ourselves, in those we love, in life.

Even when it seems as though life has taken everything; even when you are let down and hurt, dejected and despairing, the one thing nobody and nothing can take away from you are your dreams.

Dreaming is free.

Of course there is another way. Sometimes you look at the snowdrops and the little candles and you just say, oh feck it! Feck the lot of it! And then you just crank up the music, set the controls for the heart of the sun and you just, just, just….

Taboo - the psychology of the unthinkable

2012-01-30T09:03:00.000-08:00

Lennie in the Chariot of Death

I was working at City Limits magazine back in the 80s when my friend George came up to my desk. ‘I’ve just come back from THE weirdest place,’ she said. ‘And met THE weirdest guy. He’s causing a stir in Hackney with this car called The Chariot of Death. He’s mad. You’d absolutely love him.’

How could I resist? So I trundled off to visit Lennie Lee and, boy, did he love to create an impression. On our first meeting he calmly offered me some of his blood (in a communion goblet) and wondered if I fancied signing a pact with the devil. He then asked if he could paint my portrait – and proceeded to scrawl with thick felt pen on a vast sheet of paper on the floor – I watched my face turn into a series of sigils and symbols. ‘Have you captured my soul?’ I asked with a frown. He just raised a sardonic eyebrow.

We became very good friends.

Lennie is one of those people who simply never compromise. He’s a true artist, a free thinker, a provocateur. He loves to shock, to challenge, to appal. Everything interests him and he sees incredible beauty in the most mundane, commonplace, despised places, people and objects. But, above all, he’s fascinated by taboo. ‘I target things that are hidden,’ he says. ‘I want to confront people with their assumptions in the hope they will be released from fear.’

Taboo. Now, there’s another subject that fascinates me. Why is it that certain subjects, images, objects, practices are deemed not just revolting and disgusting, but beyond that - not to be considered, not even countenanced. Even to think about them is somehow to infect yourself. It’s this belief that some ideas are so incredibly dangerous that the very thought itself is sinful. Interesting, huh?

What are your taboos? What pushes your buttons? Think about it if you dare. What is so sacred you cannot bear even to contemplate it? Psychologists call it the ‘mere contemplation’ effect – the observation that there are times when, merely to contemplate a decision, marks you as morally suspect. One thought too many. The psychology of the unthinkable.

Some taboos are logical, reasonable even. Homicide is generally a sensible taboo (though deep green activists could probably argue against it quite plausibly). Incest isn’t a great idea, from a strictly genetic viewpoint. Cannibalism isn’t too bright, given you can catch a form of encephalitis from human flesh. The rest, really, are moral and shift according to your culture.

Yet they get us very hot under the collar. They even help us clan, herd. Certain issues, images, ideas are considered so sacred that if you even have that ‘one thought too many’ you are instantly outside the herd, you have shown disloyalty to the cause; you’re an apostate. Politics offers a very mild example. The other day someone dared to post on Facebook that she was surprised to find herself agreeing with something a Tory politician had said. Within seconds her post was bombarded with fury. ‘That bastard’; ‘that prick’, and so on. Had they even read the opinion? Of course not. It was pure kneejerk. Tory = evil Etonian rich prat. It works the other way too, of course. Politics? Meh.

Anyhow. Lennie. Not a guy who’s afraid of poking a stick in a nest of rattlesnakes. I won’t post his more extreme images or videos up here as I don’t want to offend delicate sensitivities. If you do decide to click on the link, BE WARNED that there are some pretty extreme images. Here's the link: ENTER. Don't blame me if you don't like them. I have to add, however, that there are some very beautiful images there too - it's not all blood and guts and gore.

But he does look at things most of us shy away from – sickness, personal shame, fear and prejudice. Blood, vomit, disease, death, mental illness, food. He touches the boundaries of morality, taste, religion, politics, shame – and what he calls ‘unpopular culture’.

‘I’m interested in the power of certain objects to create strong emotions,’ he says. ‘Subject matter that people find disgusting and fascinating. The contradiction between the civilised surface we present and the animalistic violence that lies beneath.’

Food for thought. And, talking of food, I’d suggest you don’t visit his site if you’re about to eat your supper. Shock or schlock? You decide.

If you want to read further on taboo, I’d suggest you check out Philip Tetlock, a psychologist who has conducted research on whether certain taboos have logical reasons or if they are pure affect. He questions whether taboo is compatible with any idea of intellectual vigour, arguing that - surely - any idea is worth thinking about...even if only to determine whether it is wrong.

Note: All images are ©Lennie Lee, reproduced here with his permission. Please do not reproduce without his permission. Many of his images are for sale via his website.

You just don't know...

2012-01-27T02:26:00.000-08:00

Communication. Talking. Saying what you feel, what you mean. Being honest. Seriously, why are we so bloody crap at it? I write this agony aunt column every month for Natural Health magazine (yeah, yeah, don’t laugh) and really, I could answer pretty well every dilemma in one word: TALK! Spit it out. Say what you’re feeling.

Don’t be mean: say what you mean.

Cos most people aren’t psychic. They won’t intuit what you feel. They won’t hear the words unspoken. You have to bite the bullet and say it. Not in an aggressive ‘you total manky bitch’ or ‘you ignorant fecking bastard’ way – but in a straightforward, honest ‘this is how I feel’ way. Simple huh?

So why don’t we?

I guess sometimes it’s because of fear. If you know someone will act with anger or aggression, that’s good reason to keep schtum. But then, I wonder, should you really be around someone who reacts that way in the first place? Sometimes, maybe, you don’t want to ask the question because, in your heart of hearts, you’re scared of the answer. Or you’re scared of looking and sounding foolish, of making an arse of yourself.

And some people, of course, use silence and lack of communication as a kind of power game.

But really, all of it drives me crazy. So much misunderstanding. So much time, so many opportunities, lost through lack of words. So much hurt and pain sometimes. Through lack of truth and honesty.

The mind, left to its imaginings, can be an inventive beast. It can come up with all kinds of scenarios; all sorts of hurt and paranoia. And thought is creative. How we think can affect how we feel. Magicians would go one step further and say that how we think can affect matter – because, really, it’s all just different forms of energy. So we should be careful with our words, with our thoughts, with what is said and what is thought. With what is unsaid. Can something be unthought though? No. Only pushed away or buried or – better - replaced with something new.

Anyhow. Let’s be honest (ho ho), I’m not always great at the communication stuff myself. I’m not one of life’s great splurgers. Generally I don’t talk a whole load, truth to tell. I love silence. And silence loves me. And, yes, sometimes there can be too many words banded about. I once spent a car journey pondering the maths on how much Adrian speaks in comparison to me – I think it was a ratio of 750:1 or thereabouts. I’m a good listener though – most journalists are. I guess it's balance again - a question of knowing when to speak and when to shut the feck up.

Last night there was a deep and not remotely comfortable silence in the house. Adrian and James weren’t talking. Again. Ye gods. To be fair, Adrian is pretty good at expressing how he feels. And he will readily admit if he’s done wrong. But James is a tougher nut to crack. He’s a Scorpio, one of life’s natural silent brooding types. I’m determined that, if I can teach James one thing, just one thing (after the self-esteem thingy of course), it will be to communicate; to be honest about how he feels. To state his feelings clearly, openly, without losing the plot. Yes, that will sometimes bring him heartache, of course it will, but it will also save him heartache in the long term. So, after a suitable period elapsed (cos everyone needs to wallow for a bit), I followed him, cornered him in his lair and made him look me in the eye and talk. And eventually he did. And instead of launching off into ‘And he said this…’ or ‘And it’s so unfair…’ he talked about how he felt. He spat it all out and felt – he said - much the better for it.

As the old adage goes, better out than in.

So, today, maybe…try being honest. Say what you feel. Is there an elephant in the room? Name it. Something you’ve wanted to get off your chest for aeons? Shift it. Can’t say it? Write it. Put it in a letter and sign it with a kiss (or knot). Because, really, life can be too short for miscommunication, misunderstanding. Yet another person I know died this week (no, no, please no commiserations – I didn’t know him well – the husband of a friend). She heard his key in the door but he never came in. When she went to see what had happened, she found him dead on the doorstep. You never know how long anybody has got. Use your time wisely eh?

Can you catch a nightmare?

2012-01-26T03:30:00.000-08:00

Every so often an image stops me in my tracks. A few weeks back a friend gave me a pile of old magazines. A few days ago I was flicking through one and this image just smacked me in the face.

It’s huge apparently – 8ft by 11ft – a watercolour entitled The Island by the American painter Walton Ford. No, he’s not some nineteenth century botanist – the painting is recent – 2009.

I just keep staring at it. At this seething writhing knot of creatures. It’s painfully graphic – the thylacines (as I found out they were) are ripping and biting, not only the lambs but one another. And yet somehow it’s not a frenzy. The lambs seem resigned somehow; the thylacines equally uninvolved somehow. And, aside from one creature in the background, the predators are not eating their prey. In fact, one lamb floats, forgotten in the water, as the two nearest thylacines sink their teeth into one another. So it is not hunger? They bite out of habit; out of boredom; out of nature; from enforced captivity? Yet nobody forces them to stay - there is no enclosure, no fence. They are their own prison guards.

The more I looked, the more I saw. The one lamb, quietly swimming away, blood on its coat. The thylacine seeing it (surely?) and looking as though it will pounce. But will it, can it, leave its knot, its island of flesh?

The lamb at the top of the pile stands, almost stoically, the sacrifice, as jaws clamp around its back. Another is, somehow, miraculously, blood-free – right in the centre of the mass. It jumps. Can it escape? Or will it land straight in the maw of the spectator creature, shoulder-deep in the water. The water is curiously calm, blue-green, not stained with blood and gore.

What does it mean? I’m still thinking about what it means to me – which is, ultimately, the bottom line, eh?

The artist called it ‘a sort of fever dream’ and questioned the role of predator and prey. For, see, the thylacine was also called the Tasmanian Wolf or Tiger yet it was neither wolf nor tiger but actually a marsupial (yes, a cousin to kangaroo and wallaby). It was native to Australia and New Guinea and, over several million years apparently it evolved itself into a mean-ass predator, an antipodean velociraptor. It was extincted (yeah I know it’s not really a verb but why not?) on the mainland way back but the thyracine survived on Tasmania until the early twentieth century. As Walton Ford said, in an interview in the New Yorker:

‘The animal scared the hell out of the settlers. It looked like a wolf but with stripes, like a tiger, and they could get up on their hind legs, which made them even scarier. The settlers were sheepherders, and they built up this myth of a huge bipedal nocturnal vampire beast that sucked the blood of sheep. The settlers put a bounty on these animals and began killing them off in every possible way – poison, traps, snares, guns. The last known one died in captivity in the nineteen-thirties, but they lived on in people’s imagination.’

They do. They certainly live on in my imagination. And maybe in others too. This morning, at 5am, I was woken suddenly from a dream by a piercing scream. James.

‘I had a nightmare,’ he said.

‘Tell me,’ I said.

‘There was this creature. Like a wolf or a dog but it stood on its hind legs. There was a light over its head. It was coming for me.’

Had he seen the image? Yet how would he know the thylacine could stand on its hind legs? There was no mention of that in the magazine. Had he read anything about werewolves or anything lately? No, he insisted (and it’s true, he avoids that kind of thing like the plague).

Maybe it was another beast? I’ve been reading lately about familiars, about creatures that can do the bidding of their masters and mistresses. About one, in particular, from Scotland, that appeared like a wolf, standing on two legs, rapacious, blood-thirsty. And I wondered, given we are all connected by subtle energy, can you catch a nightmare? Can you pick up a thought-form, a beast, a fetch, a familiar, by telepathic connection. Had the visions in my head seeped into James’? Yes, that sounds far-fetched (sorry for the pun) but is it, really?

We are careful about what our children read and watch but should we also be careful about our own thoughts and feelings? I do believe that moods can be contagious (if you don't know how to protect yourself from them), that we can (whether consciously or unconsciously) project feelings onto others. Children are particularly impressionable. Sobering thought, huh?

Anyhow, what images have jumped at you lately?

Should writers blog?

2012-01-25T08:50:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I was scrolling through a writing forum and I read a post by an author whining about blogging. Specifically she was moaning that writers are increasingly being urged to blog, to tweet, to engage in social media. Did writers really have to write blogs, she said? My answer was pretty simple: if you don’t like blogging, don’t do it. Doh. Horses for courses and all that.

But then I thought a bit more about it and I started to scratch my head. This is a writer speaking. A WRITER. Someone who uses words; who communicates with words; who presumably loves words. And I was really puzzled.

People often ask me why I blog. After all, writing is my day job. I’m a journalist and an author. Words pay my bills. Well, in theory. J So why on earth would I want to spend my spare time writing for free? Er, because I enjoy it.

This blog is my place: the place I can rant, moan, emote, pontificate, whine, laugh, throw all my toys out the pram, whatever… There is no editor telling me to cover this and that; no marketing department asking me if I'm reaching my demographic.

A blog post – 500 words or thereabouts - takes probably half an hour maximum to write. It’s a limbering up exercise, if you like, before I flex my fingers and start on the usual writing work of the day.

Hmm, maybe not a good reason...

‘But what should I write about?’ say the reluctant author bloggers. Holy crap! Look around you. What excites you? What interests you? What flirts with you? What tugs you by the shirt-tails? If I had the time I could probably write four or five posts a day. Seriously. Because life is interesting. People are interesting. The world is interesting. Isn’t it? Surely, I wonder, it should be, and above all if you're a writer.

I think maybe the problem comes because writers feel they should write about writing (yawn). Or they should be reviewing books (which is all well and good but it’s bloody time-consuming) or interviewing other authors (which can be interesting and is something I do occasionally – but not all the time). But why? Why should you limit yourself to anything?

Blog alpaca!

Some people are very focused in their blogging. They write purely about parenting, or food, or pets, or fitness, or politics or knitting or gardening or…hell, I dunno. Alpacas or juggling. Niche. And niche is nice if you can do it. Niche can be madly commercial. A guy I knew made a tidy living out of baseball mini-league or whatever it’s called. And all power to his bat. But you have to be one of those single-minded people, someone with a particular hobby or a focused passion (or, alternatively, your blog is your business and so you’re talking work). Personally I can’t do that. I get bored staying on message.

But let’s think about writers and blogging again. What purpose does a blog serve a writer? Why might a blog be a “good thing” for a writer? On one hand, it’s a showcase. Firstly, it shows the raw state of your writing, without any editing. Trust me, the copy of even some of the most famous writers looks a bit ropey round the edges before it’s knocked into shape by editors (I would name names but, having been discussing Online Defamation Law with some lawyer friends, I’ll be cautious…) Secondly, it shows you’re flexible, that you can write up a storm on any bloody thing you choose. I’ve been given journalism work via my blog. I’ve been approached by agents because of my blog. I’ve been taken on amazing trips (giving me huge inspiration for my writing) because of this blog.

Connect with your audience...

On the other hand, it’s a way to connect with your readers. A lot of people who read my books also check out the blog. At first I worried that my honesty, my fallibility, would put them off. But it seems not. I think blogging is maybe a way of giving a bit of yourself; of showing what makes you tick; that you’re approachable, human. Of course, as an author that might be exactly what you don’t want to give away. In which case I’d say, why not share other aspects of your work – poetry, short stories, character sketches. Or share some of your inspiration – music, other people’s words, images. If people love your writing, they will want to know more. Why not be generous? Oh how I wish more of my favourite authors would blog, or be more generous in their blogging.

And then, on the one foot (having run out of hands). Blogging as sales ploy? Hmm. Do people buy my books because of my blogging? I doubt it. I don’t mention my books that much. Maybe I should. But then, see, blogging becomes just a form of marketing and that’s boring again. However I’m sure that some people’s blogs encourage readers to buy their books. Why wouldn’t they?

Can I squeeze out another fecking poem?

Then, the argument continued, aren't there too many blogs out there already? Aren't blogs just self-indulgent waffle, word-wanking? Well, maybe. But then again, you could say that about a lot of writing in general, couldn't you? Someone said that they would rather spend their time writing their fiction, or coming up with a poem or whatever. And that's a good argument. Providing you are writing those things. I dunno about you, but I have a limit on sustained creativity of the novel-writing kind. And I sure as hell couldn't sit writing poems all freaking day.

Anyhow. I ask myself again. As a writer, should you blog? No, of course not. No should about it. Do what you bloody well like! Should you want to blog? Well now, that’s a different question altogether. What do you think?

Earth Hour and beansprouts

2012-01-24T03:16:00.000-08:00

I keep writing blog posts and deleting them. You ever do that? Sometimes it’s enough to write something just for you. Once you’ve written it, there’s no longer any need to publish it. Sometimes I feel like that about everything I write, come to think of it. I wonder if this post will make it? J

Anyhow. I got sent an email about Earth Hour. And I took a look. And I thought, yeah, why not? It’s organised by the WWF and the idea is simple. On 31 March 2012, at 8.30pm (GMT), everyone turns off their lights for one hour, right across the planet. Now you can guess why I like this, huh, given that here in Dulverton we had our own mini Earth hour last week?

It’s not just about saving electricity; it’s about thinking about the planet, about our current home and how we have a big global problem going on and that being NIMBYish, sticking our heads in the sand and saying ‘I’m alright, Jack’ ain’t gonna solve it. Maybe it’s too late anyhow… Maybe we’ve already reached the tipping point and swung over. But still…it’s a beautiful world, it really is. Just open your eyes and look around you. While you still can.

But anyhow. Earth Hour. Yes. Nice idea. The guys at WWF suggest you make it special. Go somewhere awesome to watch the switch-off – like the Eiffel Tower, the Pyramids of Gizeh, Sydney Opera House… Or stay at home with candles and fire (so, much like most nights for me.. J) and cook a special meal (so, not like me…)

They’ve got a bunch of chefs on-board to suggest ideas for cool cookouts. Some 'celebrity' (yuck). But I’m rather taken by the recipes of Ching-He Huang – obviously cos they’re vegetarian but also because I’ve never been wild on Chinese cooking (don’t get beansprouts, don’t see the point of water chestnuts) but these look quite…tasty. And I do so love to change my mind...

Red cabbage and edamame salad

Serves 4

50g shredded red cabbage

100g edamame beans (you can buy frozen)

1 medium Fresno chilli, deseeded and finely chopped.

1 tablespoon light soy sauce

1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil

1 tablespoon rice vinegar

Toss all ingredients together in a bowl. Chill for 20 mins and then serve. Yeah, I could do that!

And then she cooks up Veggie Mama – the monster of all stir-fries for Mother Nature. But there’s way too much to type out here so I’ll link you to the vid… Nice.

Sweet potato brown rice

Serves 4 to share

300g brown rice

400g sweet potato (peel and cut into small chunks)

600ml water

Wash the rice well, until the water runs clean. Put all the ingredients into a pan and bring to the boil. Once boiled, reduce to a simmer and cook on a low heat for 20 minutes. Fluff the rice and serve immediately.

Then there’s pudding, of course…

And, finally, tea…

Bon apetit…

Star Wars

2012-01-18T07:34:00.000-08:00

Star Wars have broken out in the Bonkers House. I came back from kettlebells last night in the church (yes, when it's too horrible outside we swing our bells in the Congregational Chapel, being careful to avoid the altar) just in time to catch the end of Stargazing Live on BBC2. Perched on the chair next to the fire I was trying to listen to the bit about black holes when Adrian walked in and talked all over it.

‘Ssssh,’ James and I chorused.

‘But it’s nearly over,’ he replied.

And indeed we’d missed the black holes entirely.

‘Sssh. I want to hear if they’re going to mention Dulverton,’ I said.

But the titles came up and that was that.

‘They probably won’t come after all,’ Adrian said. ‘The weather forecast is atrocious. Won’t be able to see a thing.’

‘But, but… Of course they will.’

He raised an eyebrow.

Adrian has been remarkably dismissive about the whole issue of Dulverton going dark for the BBC. Since I heard we were going to be asked to turn out the lights, I’ve been asking him repeatedly to fix the sensor light on our gate. This is supposed to come on obediently if anyone approaches at night (so any burglars will be able to see their way and won’t sue us for breaking a leg on the steps) but it’s broken, like most things here, and so is on permanently. I'd do it myself except...

‘I’d burn myself,’ he said. (yup, that's why I won't do it). ‘Anyhow, what’s the big deal?’

Then, today, he came back from town having spoken to our neighbour. ‘This BBC thing,’ he said. ‘It’s a bloody big deal, you know.’

Really? Well, stone the flipping crows.

‘There’s going to be police and wardens and everything. They’re going to stop people in cars and not let them go through.’ He looked irritated.

‘Well, of course they are,’ I said. ‘A whole bunch of car headlights isn’t exactly going to help the pitch black bit, is it? Anyhow, it’s not as if they’ve sprung it on us – the notices have been up for weeks.’

He frowned. ‘But I hate all this telling us what to do crap. Controlling bollocks.’

I raised an eyebrow. ‘Since when have you been so anti-establishment?’

As a founding member of the Carshalton Anarchist Front (Greyhound pub branch; complete with black beret and bandit mask) I’ve never been too fond of authority. But I really really want Dulverton to go really really dark. Why? Well, partly because if this comes off, it should help boost the tourism our town needs and deserves. But mainly because this is about stars! Stars. STARS.

Hundreds of billions of galaxies burning in universes. Stars so ancient that their light has taken millions, billions even, of years to reach us. We are seeing history, we are looking outside time. Stars talk to us of mind-freaking infinity, of crazy impossibility, of wild incandescence, of beatific transcendence. No wonder we try to transfer their qualities onto poor human substitutes – onto the shimmery pseudo gods and goddesses of Hollywood onto whom we project our own desire to shine, for immortality. For in the Pyramid texts of ancient Egypt the deceased was told to become the ‘imperishable star’ and hence live forever.

In alchemy the many conflicting parts of the self are brought together to form a supernova, the One. Equally the black hole has been equated with the nigredo – the ‘black blacker than black’ - of psychic fragmentation, of total despair. The soul moves outside the event horizon of space and time.

Okay, so maybe that’s a bit deep. But I think there’s another reason we should look up and stare at stars. Ren Warom touched on it in her comment yesterday. She talked about an experience that was ‘unnerving and humbling’, about the knowledge of how small we really are and how huge the universe is, and how it ‘blew the fuses in my head for a while.’

Yes. Yes, yes, yes. It does. It really does. But, you know, I feel it gives us the perspective we humans often lack. We see our reality as so firm, so certain. We think we have the god-given right to trample all over this planet, and all over our fellow inhabitants. Yet, if you look further, if you project yourself out there into the stars, you see, as Ren says, just how freaking small we are. Then think about our planet and where it fits into that immensity and everything suddenly feels very different. That’s not to say we’re unimportant or that we do not experience physicality around us. But we are not the big cheeses and our reality is not as rock solid as our senses soothe us.

It reminded me of this passage from Symphonic Bridges, talking about how the Earth’s structure is in direct contradiction to the stability that realists value so much.

“Beneath the crust and the brittle upper mantle (the lithosphere), the semi-fuel zone (asthenosphere) and the lower mantle – there is the boiling zone ‘D’, where the mantle meets the iron core: white hot fluid metal (5800 degrees Celsius). So, ‘How do we sleep while our beds are burning?’

This whole bizarre structure rotates on its axis, with the speed of a spot on the equator reaching 1670 km/h. If we add to this the dizzying speed of the earth’s revolution around the sun: 107280 km/h, we’ll see ourselves on a monstrous, breathtaking Ferris wheel, suspended in the infinite space together with other ‘mechanisms’, similar and different… Countless.”

Scary? Maybe. But awesome. Madly awesome. Bit freaky maybe? Yes. Of course. But we have to try to grasp what we can; we have to have the heart and guts to move out of our comfort zones.

“This is what conscious living is about,” Marek continues. “To be aware of the context (as much as we can grasp). Then having our feet firmly fixed on the ground will acquire an entirely different significance.”

So tonight I will be missing Zumba. I’ll be out with the rest of the town, in the dark, concentrating on breaking up the clouds so we can see into the sky. I’ll be thinking about my place, not just in the world but in the universe, in the cosmos, in beyond that event even. Hey, you might see me on television. Except... umm…hopefully it’ll be too dark to see. J

PS – just as I was writing this, Adrian came along and stood at the threshold of my turret.

‘That light,’ he said.

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘Well. We could turn off the electricity from the mains.’

I smiled. ‘Yes, we could.’

Now why the freak didn’t I think of that??

Stargazing

2012-01-17T04:50:00.000-08:00

A full moon is shining, bathing the woodland in a pale unearthly gleam. Then it passes behind clouds and the darkness deepens. At first it seems silent but then I hear the sudden cry of a fox, the hoot of owl; a rustle in the undergrowth; sounds I don’t notice by day. As my eyes become accustomed to the dark, I see and feel the landscape in a totally different way.

Do you fear the dark or embrace it? Me, I love the countryside at night. Whether by moonlight or in the pitch dark of the occult moon, it’s a whole different world.

Everything is more intense. Your senses are more alert. It’s just more…I dunno…spine-tingling, exciting. Yet our society generally shuns the dark, turning almost obsessively towards the light. Why else do we keep the street lights on and bathe every building in brightness? Is it because, deep within us, there still lurks an atavistic fear of the dark – of wild animals and menacing human enemies? Do the shadows conjure nightmares of ghosts and ghouls and things that hiss and rustle in the night? Or is it that we rely so much on the sense of sight? Once darkness falls, the advantage shifts to those creatures which use other senses. What we can’t see often frightens us? But at the edge of fear comes excitement, no?

Try it. Turn off your torch too. Our eyes have something called dark adaptation so that, during low light levels the body produces a photosensitive chemical called rhodopsin. When bright light hits the eye, the rhodopsin splits into two leaving you night blind (which is why you can’t see in the dark after turning a bright torch on and then off again).

Yes, you gotta take sensible precautions but really, don’t let fear put you off embracing the magic of a dark night. Of course, there’s night swimming too, and boating – is there anything more magical than moonlight on water? But I save that for summer. J

Then, of course, there are the stars. One of my greatest joys, when we lived out on the moor, perched on top of a hill, was to lie out on the grass on a summer night and watch the star-tangled magic skies. Dazzling star dancers in stately swirls of symphonic splendour. Okay, that’s enough sidereal alliteration. I used to send myself quite dizzy, projecting myself into the Milky Way to join the dance; imagining myself huge, embraced by supernovas.

But anyhow. I’m pleased that our Exmoor skies have been recognised as some of the darkest in the country. We’ve been designated a Dark Sky Reserve, the first in Europe. Actually this does puzzle me as, when I look at a Google satellite map of Europe there are some helluva big tracts of open countryside out there but hey…I’m not complaining. We’ve got it so we’ll sure as hell milk it!

Truly, if you love dark skies, if you love watching the stars and planets, that whole great big amazing universe out there (and the ones beyond), this is the place to come. Because of our lack of light pollution, it makes it a great place to come to starwatch. We also boast a DarkSky Discovery site over at Wimbleball Lake.

Now, I don’t know if you’ve been watching BBC Two’sStargazing LIVE with Brian Cox and Dara O Briain. But tomorrow (8pm on 18^th January) Dulverton is going to be the star of the show when astronomer Mark Thompson asks all of us here in town to turn off our lights. The idea being that we show the rest of the UK just how amazing a sky without light pollution may be. Apparently they’re bringing astronomers (tame ones, I hope) and telescopes. As they say on their leaflet –

There’s a whole universe of incredible wonders above your head, isn’t it time you looked up?

Oh, and check out Exmoor Star Gazers....

Oh (again), and in typical Dulverton fashion the local businesses have joined in with some fabulous window displays. Even the estate agents are getting in on the act with some truly terrible puns!

light pollution from shop opposite!

Er...I'm cleaning

2012-01-15T12:23:00.000-08:00

Last night I went to my friend Gill’s house for the evening. I love her place. It’s so welcoming, so reassuringly normal, about as far from Bonkers as you can get. It’s not just that it’s deliciously warm, it’s beautifully clean. Ordered. Uncluttered. But above all clean. Her kitchen gleams. No really, it glitters like a vampire’s skin. You can see the wood on her table. Open her fridge and you don’t recoil in disgust. There is no gloopy alien lifeforce colonising her cooker.

It was late when I got home so I didn’t really notice the house much, except for tripping over a pile of something someone had thoughtfully left on the stairs. Why didn’t I see it? Because there's no light on the stairs. Having hurled your entire body weight against the door to shoulder your way in (you wonder why I work out? I need the muscles), you are then plunged into darkness the moment you slam it shut and have to feel your way up two flights of stairs (incidentally passing the Loo of Doom and the Cellar of Spirits – renamed after Lorraine’s visit – and barging your way through the partying entities). Once through the door into the kitchen, you move from pitch darkness to a forgiving penumbra (there are lights but half the bulbs don’t work). Anyhow, shadows hide a multitude of sins.

But this morning, in the unforgiving glare of cool low winter sun? Oh hell. We live in a pigsty. And, given our homes reflect our minds, that what we see around us mirrors our inner world? Oh dear. L

So. I got cleaning. I know, I know. I was shocked too. But I hauled James off the Xbox, armed him with a timely sponge and pointed him in the right direction (ie told him to spin round, pick a spot, any spot, and start scrubbing). Now then, is there anything more beautiful than the sight of a teenage boy on his hands and knees, cleaning? Okay, so you do have to put up with the whole underpants showing over the low-slung jean thing (does ANYONE get that?) but hey…

Incidentally, do your children clean? My mother was adamant that all boys should know how to clean, cook and do the laundry. Just as she believed girls should be able to fix cars and use a drill. She said she’d never forgive herself for bringing up a man who couldn’t fend for himself; who expected women to do all the domestic work.

I’m following her lead. James is a good cook; is handy with mop, duster, scrubbing brush and vacuum cleaner. I’ve taught him the fine art of reading clothing labels and he can sort of iron (because that’s all his teacher can do).

Anyhow. The cleaning was actually relatively pleasant because we’d been given a whole bunch of Greenscents products to try out. Greenscents are a local company who make household products with absolutely no chemical nasties.

I didn’t think I’d get excited about cleaning products but really these are pretty fabulous. I love them mainly because they smell divine – I’m hard pressed to choose between the mint and the citrus scent for general cleaning. Lavender always wins me over in the laundry department. Even Adrian’s a convert. He reckons the wood floor cleaner is ‘the business’. ‘Tell ‘em I like the smell,’ he says. ‘And it does a really good job.’

Yes, I’m plugging these guys, I freely admit it. There are several reasons.

1. I like local. I like to support small businesses, particularly those that give a damn about the environment.

2. I don’t like harsh chemical cleaners. I don’t like what they could potentially do to my family’s health and I don’t like what they do to the environment.

3. They’re damn good products. They do the job and make your home smell nice.

They are more expensive than the stuff you get in Tesco or whatever but I think they’re worth the extra. Will I continue using them when this lot is finished? Yes, I think so. £2.50 for washing up liquid is a bit steep but the laundry liquid is a total keeper. At £4.75 it’s around the price of the conventional stuff and it washes a treat. I don’t usually use fabric conditioner – it’s a hangover from when my son was small and had appalling skin problems (conditioner can exacerbate eczema etc). But I’m hooked now on all our stuff smelling so damn…fresh. However, if essential oils cause irritation (and they can – natural isn’t always the answer!) there is also an unscented range.

Sheesh, all this domestic goddessery and nice housewifery business is a bit alarming. Time to strip off the pinny and get back to my usual slatternly ways.

If you want to find out more about greenscents, check out their website – www.greenscents.co.uk

Hair

2012-01-14T08:42:00.000-08:00

It all started out so well. I woke at 6am after a full six hours’ sleep, having enjoyed some weird dreams and a certain amount of astral decadence.

Zumba had worked its usual magic, the sun was shining, the frost was crisp and the day was bright. I did my morning meditation, Tibetans and then spent a pleasant hour at the gym.

Something was nagging at the back of my mind but I couldn’t for the life of me think what it was.

‘Where is it you’re going this evening?’ asked Adrian, as I got back, shouting over the sound of the vacuum cleaner.

Shit. That was it! Last night at Zumba, Kate had said, ‘You are going tomorrow night, aren’t you?’ I stared at her, head on one side, sweat dripping attractively from my nose. ‘Carolyn’s birthday?' she prompted. 'At Gill’s?’

‘Huh? What? Oh. Yes. Yes. YES! Of course I am. I hadn’t forgotten. Of course I hadn’t. You thought I’d forgotten, didn’t you?’

She rolled her eyes. ‘Right. Well, if you’re not there by 7.30pm I’ll ring you.’

What can I say? I have a bad memory. I blame it on having too much in my head - I need to run defrag on it, get it all filed a bit more neatly. Anyhow, going out was okay. I could do that. Except…shit. I looked in the mirror and the mirror sort of took a little gasp and half-looked away before realising that it was being impolite. What the bejesus had happened to my hair over winter? It had taken on a life of its own; become a small satellite state. Frankly it was a bit scary and I don’t scare that easily. And if it scared me, was it really fair to take it with me to the home of a really nice person; to inflict it on other really nice people; including poor Carolyn who was having a big birthday and needed soothing not stressing? No.

I did wonder about cutting the bastard stuff off altogether, to put it in its place. My mother trained as a hairdresser in the war – her mother had refused to have her evacuated and so apprenticed her to the nearest shop. She got off lightly really; a bit further down the road sat the undertaker and the butcher. But anyhow, I must have the hairdressing gene, right? Plus I used to watch the hairdresser when I had one. And it’s all in the way you run the hair through your fingers. But when I mentioned on Twitter that I had my scalpel ready, poor Erica nearly fell off her pouffe.

Colour then. A while back I’d been sent a couple of packets of Naturtint to try out. I’ve seen this stuff in the health shops – it promises to dye your hair without the really nasty chemical shit that goes in most home-dye products. But then, I also had a packet of henna I’d picked up in the hippy head shop in Taunton. The last time I used henna I was at university, sharing a flat with a girl from Iran and a girl from Iraq (yes, in the early eighties – fortunately they were pretty mature about it). At first I thought they were shitting in the bath and felt very suburban in my outlook (while sticking to the shower). When I found out it was henna, I felt even more parochial. But they just smiled and taught me how to apply it to make red hair even redder. But that was, um, decades ago.

Once again I asked Twitter and it wasn’t terribly forthcoming. Just one firm reply: Henna. Given it was from a guy I decided that I should probably do the opposite so I went for the Naturtint.

Last time I did this I had a lot LOT less hair. This time I seemed to get more of the stuff on my face, neck, cleavage than on my head; not to mention liberally splattered around the bathroom. Given the shade was called Fireland, it looked like I’d been butchering a pig; or taking slices out of myself. Anyhow, I finally got it all on and went about my business, quietly lamenting the fact that, were I in a salon, I’d be sipping tea and reading crap magazines by now. Then, of course, I got caught up reading something interesting and clean forgot all about it.

‘How long have I had this stuff on my head?’ I asked Twitter.

A flurry of alarm came back from the women in the crew – summarised as ‘too freaking long; take it off NOW!’ and a laconic, ‘Keep it on, see what happens’ from the guy. The latter was tempting because, honestly, the idea of taking it off was just too exhausting. Eventually I did – mainly because it smelt a bit odd. Not unpleasant, just…alien. ‘Rinse until the water runs clean,’ said the instructions. Half an hour later I was getting dizzy.

But, at last, tis done. And it’s rather nice really. Now if I could just do something about the sheer VOLUME of the stuff...

Nitty gritty. Why should you worry about using ‘normal’ hair dye? Well. The usual stuff contains some pretty unpleasant chemicals. Ammonia wrecks your hair eventually (I can attest to this having bleached my hair to death in the 80s – seriously, it was slime). Resorcinol is an irritant to eyes and skin and can affect the central nervous system (symptoms can include dizziness, restlessness, unusual heartbeat). Parabens (which are in all kinds of things – check your labels) have been linked to the development of cancer.

Naturtint doesn’t include any of these which has to be a good thing. It uses chemically light alternatives. But does it deliver? Yes, actually, it’s not half bad. The colour is good – bright but not brash. I'll be honest, it doesn't last quite as well as the full-on chemical brigade but that’s a small price to pay. There’s also a range called Reflex (a non-permanent colour rinse) that doesn’t even contain peroxide or PPD and hence is suitable for pregnant women.

Of course, the totally natural solution would have been the henna. Next time maybe. J

Naturtint costs £9.99 . See www.naturesdream.co.uk for details of stockists and videos of how to apply (hmm, probably should have checked that first).

Let's try, try again...

2012-01-13T10:27:00.000-08:00

cosy...

I tell you, left to my own devices I’d probably spend most of the day (not to mention the night) meditating. The place I go to makes much more sense than the ‘real’ world around me. But we live in this world and have to be of it while we’re here so, sadly, it’s not really an option.

‘I sometimes think you’d be happier in a monastery,’ said Adrian the other day. ‘Or tucked away in some cave.’

I paused and frowned, pondering the question.

‘Oh God,’ he said. ‘I wasn’t serious.’

‘Well, ’ I said, smiling. ‘It would have to be a very warm cave. In a desert maybe.’ J

But really…I go through phases – of engagement and disengagement. And I think that’s okay actually. It’s part of my process, what I think of as my alchemy. What people often don’t understand about alchemy (magick, personal growth, call it whatever you fancy) is that it isn’t a linear process; it spirals; it loops back on itself. You often have to repeat the same stages over and over on different levels of that multi-dimensional labyrinth; each time slightly differently, with new insights.

Anyhow, process work is another way of navigating through the labyrinth. I’ve mentioned Arnold Mindell before and now I’ll try to explain a little more. If you find ‘normal’ meditation tough, this might be the key. It’s a bit complicated so, if you’re interested, I’d really recommend you read Working on Yourself Alone, the most accessible of his books. Mindell was a physicist who became a psychoanalyst and he marries science and psyche in a way few can with any aplomb. He believes that the key to change (should you want to change, of course, and many don’t) is not to dampen down the ‘lower’ drives (greed, jealousy, anger etc) but consciously to identify with them; to allow the troublesome parts of the personality to express themselves. Hence, he feels, Eastern meditation practices which focus on detachment are not necessarily advisable for most people.

Riding the horse backwards...

‘A possibly new dimension in meditation would be to accept and process all events, including anger, jealousy and greed, in order to reveal their life-giving potential,’ he says.

So, we don’t reject the shitty bits of ourselves; we don’t stamp all over our anger or fear; we don’t hate and reject our pains, our flesh, our illnesses, our weaknesses. Instead we use those feelings, we amplify them to discover what they’re trying to say.

It’s basic alchemy. You take the signals you receive (from your body, your thoughts, your senses, other people, the world) and apply focus (meditation) and by amplifying and cooking them you bring them to completion.

‘The alchemist’s gold is greater contact with experience of, and sometimes even insight into, our own and other’s nature,’ says Mindell.

But what is process? Basically it’s the information that comes to you, from all kinds of directions. Mindell identifies six main ‘channels’.

1. Body feeling – breathing, sensory perception, aches, pains, body awareness.

2. Visualisation – seeing with the mind’s eye.

3. Hearing – what you hear…externally and internally.

4. Movement – spontaneous movement, tics, twitches, spasms.

5. Relationships – how you and other people relate, including transference

6. World phenomena – how you and the ‘outer’ world interact.

Meditation, says Mindell, is a multi-channelled process which is at work all the time. I love this. It means you take meditation out of the lotus position and into the world, into every moment of your day. Actually, in his later books, he describes how you can take it into the night too (learning how to meditate while asleep – that’s my next challenge).

But to start, close your eyes. Ask yourself, which channel am I in? Start with just three – inner seeing, feeling, hearing. Are you feeling something in your body? Seeing something with your inner eyes? Hearing something (maybe even just your breathing?). Don’t use your outer eyes because looking happens too spontaneously – your eyes are too busy noticing things, being fascinated by what you want to become. Equally, normally our bodies are constantly shifting. So, by closing your eyes and not consciously moving, you become aware of other channels. Whatever you see, hear or feel -amplify. If you have some ache or pain, focus on it, check out where it’s coming from, where it’s going to. If it becomes uncomfortable, you may find you switch channels, to avoid the confrontation – you may stop feeling your body and instead ‘see’ an image in your mind’s eye or become aware of your breathing. For now, that’s fine. Just see what comes up. Don’t judge, just become aware.

Mindell often finds that by working in this way, people not only gain insights into their psyche, their bodies often heal too. He has even worked with people in comas – strange but true. Of course, some people resist change, even when they hurt (psychologically or physically). ‘Pain is not enough to motivate people to change,’ Mindell says. ‘There is something else, a strange, unpredictable element which is required before people can work out problems and alter their lives. This element is a mixture of discipline, love and enlightenment.’ Interesting.

But should we work on ourselves? Actually yes, we should probably try. If you consider the earth is a system, a field – then you can’t just throw stuff out. There’s nowhere for it to go - you’re simply putting your crap out into the system. We all have a duty, really, to process our psychic waste just as much as we should compost our peelings and recycle our bottles.

What will our children be eating?

2012-01-12T07:31:00.000-08:00

The problem with progress is that often you reach a tipping point. You can’t go back. Sometimes this can be good of course. Someone commented on my last blog post that maybe the answer to racism is to mix up our genes until we are all one big juicy gene chowder. That would be good, yes? Well, it might be one solution though it would take quite some time and inclination.

But when it comes to turning our food into genetic soup, well, I think we need to need to be deeply racist; we keep to keep the genes firmly segregated. Spiders should not mate with tomatoes. No sirree.

I spent a fair bit of time researching this many years back and what I saw scared the bejesus out of me. Because the thing is, once you let GM loose in the environment, you can’t put it back in the lab. The genie is well and truly out of its bottle.

Yesterday Linda Lazarides, a nutritional expert I’ve known for decades, sent me a message via LinkedIn:

“Hi Jane, I was horrified to be informed Sainsbury's may be taking a positive stance in favour of GM foods.”

What? I checked out the link she sent and it seems that Sainsbury’s brand director had given an ill-advised quote to Farmer’s Weekly saying, in effect, that Sainsbury’s were missing an opportunity to be involved in the GM industry. The CEO of Sainsbury’s has now apologised and reassured customers that Sainsbury’s will continue to listen to their customers and won't be stocking GM food. (is it just me that hears 'for now' tacked onto that?)

But I’m not reassured. Not remotely. Because, even if the UK stands firm, the rest of the world isn’t. And you can’t contain GM. You simply cannot have GM and non-GM. GM contamination of conventional and organic crops is already increasing. The US rice supply has already been contaminated by a ONE YEAR field trial of GM rice. In Canada, the organic oilseed rape industry has been destroyed by contamination from GM rape. In Spain, GM maize is wiping out organic cultivation. The time has come to choose between a GM-based, or a non-GM-based, world food supply. The two can’t co-exist. The problem is that, if some places choose to grow GM, it affects us all. Effectively we’re all stuffed.

Why does it worry me? Because we simply don’t know the environmental consequences or the health consequences. We have no idea. It’s an imprecise science with unpredictable outcomes. We have NO idea what GM food could do. There are very few studies on the effects of humans eating GM food (interesting that) but animal studies have shown that GM foods can have toxic effects, including shifts in the immune system, accelerated ageing and genetic alterations.

As toxicologist Dr Suzanne Wuerthele of the EPA (US Environmental Protection Agency) says, ‘We are confronted with the most powerful technology the world has ever known, and it is being rapidly deployed with almost no thought whatsoever to its consequences.’

Oh but, say the pro-GM brigade, people in the US have been eating GM food for ages with no ill-effects. But how would they know? They’re not labelled.

So why is it being promoted? The powerful pro-GM lobby says that it is going to save the world, that GM will feed the world. No. GM food won’t solve the world food crisis. Expert analysts also doubt the much-touted ability of GM crops to increase crop yields and to decrease or end the need for pesticides. In fact, data shows that GM crops in the US need more, not less, pesticides.

So then. Why? Money. Politics. What else? L

It’s your choice of course. Although, sadly, it won’t be our children’s choice. They will have no choice.

My devildaughter, the Mistress of All Evil (coming up to 14) lent me a book recently. It's a dystopian YA novel called Uglies by Scott Westerfield and it's pretty (ho ho) good. But the scene that stayed with me, long after I shut the book, was one in which the protagonist, escaping from the 'perfect' world comes across a vast field of beautiful white flowers. Then, suddenly, a helicopter appears and flame-throwers burn the ground. Why? she asks. Why did you do that? Because, the flame thrower explains, the white orchids were once the rarest flowers but genetic modification turned them into the ultimate weed - a monoculture, crowding out every other species of plant and animal. Biological zero.

Want to know more? Probably not. But should you feel inclined GM Watch is very informative.

They also have a great links page which will plug you into all the latest research, campaigns and actions, wherever you are.

We're all racists

2012-01-11T03:09:00.000-08:00

‘We’re all racists,’ Bea Campbell said to me, way back in the day. At the time I was affronted. ‘How can I be a racist?’ I spluttered defensively. ‘My adopted father is part aborigine and my foster sister is West Indian.’ I nearly went on to say, ‘and I have loads of black friends and if I don’t have a black boyfriend it’s not for want of serious trying’ (but, thankfully, I stopped myself). Bea just looked at me and sighed.

It took me nigh on twenty years to realise that she was absolutely right. We are all racists.

Of course, on a physiological level, racism is totally absurd, quite risible. Peel away our skin and you’d have to be a forensic pathologist to tell the difference between us. Our rational, civilised, nice psyche baulks at it too - and quite rightly so. But on a deeper level, psychologically, it’s a very different story.

Of course you’re already spluttering; already planning your defensive/appalled/caustic comment. Because that’s what we do. We make up our minds before we have even read something through to the end. We jump to conclusions. We do what I did with Bea Campbell. And, (particularly when it comes to racism) we tie ourselves in knots (I read Liz Jones’ piece on the Diane Abbott affair with a deeply furrowed brow – in fact I read it three times and still can’t make head nor tail of it).

I've thought about writing this post several times but over the last few days I've watched the old game play out on the Authonomy forum and so I figured it was time.

Anyhow, let’s pull back a bit and look at why we make these boundaries, why we put ourselves in groups, why we have this urge to divide. In fact, let’s not even talk about black and white to begin with…let’s start with something a little less …emotive.

‘Why do you feel so strongly about being Welsh?’ I asked Adrian back during the rugby world cup or whatever when he was in full Cymru am byth (Wales Forever!) mode. Again.

‘It’s my heritage,’ he replied with a shrug. ‘It’s what I am; it’s where I come from.’

‘But, see,’ I said. ‘If you came from the borders, back in time, you would have been – alternatively – Welsh and English.’

‘Well…politically,’ he conceded. ‘But I’d still be Welsh.’ Is that racist? In that the corollary is ‘and thank feck I’m not bastard English’ then yes, of course it is. J

But what does it mean to be Welsh? I looked up ethnicity online and it seems nobody really knows why we do this; there is no *real* reason for our tribalising. It’s a societal thing. There are a whole bunch of views and, to be very honest, none of them really answered my question. Take this…which probably came the closest.

"Constructivism" sees both primordialist and perennialist views as basically flawed, and rejects the notion of ethnicity as a basic human condition. It holds that ethnic groups are only products of human social interaction, maintained only in so far as they are maintained as valid social constructs in societies.”

So having tribes helps us hold together as societies. Really? But it still doesn’t really answer my question. And then, see, a few days later Adrian was at it again… ‘Bloody South Waleans…’ he muttered. Not sure what they’d done this time, apart from existing and being south of Dolgellau. ‘Bloody Cardiff. ’ Yup, even the Welsh (a small nation for sure) can’t help dividing itself further – North v South. And in Llandudno, Adrian’s home town, they do it too. ‘Oh they’re from up the valley…’ said with a certain element of scorn. ‘Llanwyrst.’ With an eyeroll.

I see it here too – on Exmoor – within our tiny towns. Dulverton v Bampton. Within Dulverton itself – cliques, groups, sub-divisions. If it’s not race, it’s class, or sexuality or politics or – shit knows – football teams, werewolves v vampires.

So I started looking into sociology and social psychology and there aren’t really any definite answers there either. We humans compete for material resources or for social rewards, I’m told. We have a ‘natural inclination’ for aggression and if that aggression is not unleashed on an agreed ‘enemy’ it turns inwards onto our own societies.

Rene Girard saw ‘collective violence as sacred’; as the ‘great remedy’ for communal life. He talked about the scapegoat as ‘absorbing all the internal tensions, feuds, and rivalries pent up within the community…a deliberate act of collective substitution.’ Scapegoat? Yes. We have lynched and burned and gassed the scapegoat many the time before. Hold that thought – I’ll come back to it.

But really, why is conflict latent at our core?

Psychically, I think, it’s because we’re set up to divide things into two. Me and you; us and them. Difference is part of the human condition. If we didn't feel different, we would be One. We wouldn’t be here. We’d have moved on. We see the world in twos so we can make choices; so we can say No. Two is freedom. Yet, paradoxically, it is also irresolvable conflict, standoffs, stalemates, obstinacy. So One is impossible and Two is a pain in the arse. Is there a solution? Think about that word and hold that thought.

Meanwhile, back on the Authonomy forum a big brave knight jousted a dragon (I mean, a filthy racist). Did he ask the dragon what it was doing? Did he seek to understand why the dragon said what it did? No. Instead he chose to hit the ‘report abuse’ button and incited the mob (I mean, other members of the forum) to do likewise. And, because racism is such an emotive word and we’re all so damn scared of it, people did just that and the government booted the dragon off the site.

'Hurrah,’ yelled the crowd, waving their pitchforks. ‘We killed the dragon.’

‘No,’ said the brave knight, polishing his spear. ‘I was the dragon slayer.’

And then it all got very messy indeed as, having made one scapegoat, they felt better for a bit but then a few people went, ‘Huh?’ and so they hunted around for another one and found another guy (this time he just happened to be black) and started all over again with him.

But really. Why do we scapegoat? Because it’s far more comfortable to point a finger at someone and go ‘Look! Filthy racist’ than to confront the racism, the separation within ourselves. There was an opportunity, on that forum, for people to feel the discomfort in what they saw as racism and to explore that feeling; to try, maybe to understand its source rather than just push it under, squash it down…again. This is contentious, I know, but truly – have our other ways of dealing with racism worked?

I believe there was an opportunity to look at the ‘field’- what Arnold Mindell calls the unconscious, collective, polarised patterns that lie behind racism and collective conflict. To engage in ‘worldwork’, working with the psychosocial fields that reach beyond boundaries of race. To use a little deep democracy (in which all voices are heard – both those around us and those inside us – often they’re the same!). As Mindell puts it: ‘Deep democracy is based upon the realisation that everyone is needed to represent reality. A sense of justice arises only in connection with community, with inner peace of mind, sustainable ongoing relationships, and worldwork that processes the tensions between groups.’

It’s interesting stuff – check out The Global Process Institute & Worldwork website at www.worldwork.org I’m not sure I agree with all of what he says but it’s a bloody good start.

But people didn’t question; they didn’t look within. More correctly, they didn’t look between. In alchemy, separation is the process of establishing Two. You and me. Us and them. The next stage is Conjunction. People mistake this – they see it as the two becoming one. No. Conjunction is reaching Three – you, me and Between. Yes, it’s subtle, I know. But just think about it. I reckon it’s the saving grace.

Meanwhile, about that particular filthy dragon. Is he a racist? No more than you or I. And, actually, if people knew his ancestry, they might be very very surprised. J

Okay, I've said my piece...over to you...

Lie back and relax...

2012-01-09T07:29:00.000-08:00

Okay, so this may surprise you but I don’t believe in January detoxing. I don’t believe in harsh resolutions. I don’t believe in punishing regimes. Sheesh, guys, this is January. JANUARY! Some of you are lucky enough to live in lovely warm places but for those of us who don’t, the last thing our bodies need is being brutalised right now.

I worry that by focusing on this idea of ‘detoxing’ as a short sharp process, we’re missing out on longterm health and wellbeing. Far better, surely, to shift your mindset so you simply don’t want to tox your body, your mind, your spirit anymore?

And, anyhow, when it’s cold outside and lonely inside, the last thing you need is more stricture. Which is why I buck the trend and make January pampering month. I don’t eat crap but I do tend to eat slightly more than usual; warm nourishing food. Alright, so that’s mainly dhal – because, dear God, I do love dhal. Yes, I work out and I am beyond grateful that Zumba and Kettlercise have started up again. But you wouldn’t catch me pounding the pavements at dawn (but, hey, if you enjoy it, go for it).

Those of you who know me will know I’m not remotely high maintenance. Even if I weren’t broke I wouldn’t spend a fortune on clothes or stuff generally. If I lost all my worldly goods tomorrow it wouldn’t really bother me – in fact, I’d likely feel quite liberated. But the one thing I would lament would be my bath.

I figure the world is divided between those who shower and those who bath. Don’t get me wrong: if you’re hot and sweaty after a morning workout, the shower’s the place. But, come evening, my before bedtime ritual always involves a hot deep bath. Immersion in water. Total immersion in water – yeah, sometimes I go under and make like a mermaid…it’s a habit started in childhood and hard to break. J But mainly I just float.

Y’know how I was talking about being solutions the other day? Well, water is the universal solvent. A glass of water is charged particles dancing – a fandango of minerals and elements. We are composed of 85 percent water and water makes up nine tenths of our blood, plasma, lymph, urine, saliva…even our cerebrospinal fluid, even our synovial fluid.

Check out any creation story and water will be there… Check out pretty well any ancient culture and there will be rituals for bathing. Check out any form of spirituality and water flows through. Look at the work of Japanese photographer Masuro Emoto who photographed the effects of loving words and prayers versus harsh and harming words and thoughts on frozen water crystals. The thoughts that harmed produced forbidding whirls while the prayer created lacelike formations. Check out old Leonard Orr who discovered rebirthing in his tub. Look all over the world – from the Mayan cenotes to the banias of Russia; from the Turkish hammam to the Jewish mikvah; from Hindu temple bathing to the Japanese cult of the bath.

Ah, I could go on and on. There are a million and one ways you can bathe. A gazillion rituals and routines for physical health and psychological wellbeing. Me? I tend just to soak and muse; to relax into the breath and to let my mind wander in pleasant places.

Yes, I add unguents. Of course I do. But never nasty synthetic stuff – I don’t get why anyone would want to bath in chemicals. I’m supremely lucky in that I get sent a fair amount of bath products for testing. Some I quietly lose to the local raffle but some I just adore...

These are my keepers...

Aromatherapy Associates – I still adore their Deep Relax bath oil but lately I’ve been quite turned onto their Support blend (lavender and peppermint)

Ila-spa – Sheer, total decadence. Their rose Bath Oil for Glowing Radiance is an all-time favourite. One of these days I must also test out their salts.

Weleda – Seriously good prices for lovely pure scents. Their lavender is a world away from sickly synthetics – deeply calming.

REN – It’s the Morrocan Rose otto bath oil here – divine. Complete the experience by using their scrub beforehand for silky skin.

Connock London – Their soothing bath oil is heaven – a more exotic scent than the others with oils of kukui, macadamia and tamanu. I massage this one into my skin first and then soak in the bath – it leaves the whole body decadently soft.

Taer – This Icelandic company has a range that looks as beautiful as it smells and feels. I’m in thrall to the Glacier Bath Oil that somehow makes your body feel hot and cold at the same time! Not to be used during pregnancy or if you’re breastfeeding.

Think those are the main ones. Having road-tested Pukka Herb’s (www.pukkaherbs.com) new ayurvedic skincare range (it’s excellent) I’m really hoping they will come up with some bath goodies soon.

However, if you can’t run to purpose-bought potions, never fear. If I run out, there’s no way I reach for the synthetic stuff. I’d rather use a couple of drops of essential oil mixed with a little milk. Or pop a few drops of essential oil (lavender or citrus scents work well) on a handful of salts (a mix of sea salt and Epsom salts works well).

Then just lie back….and dream… Happy January.

Connections...

2012-01-09T02:58:00.000-08:00

Did you look out for signs over the Twelve Days? Those inbetween, interstitial, liminal days? Did you snatch a glimpse of the year ahead by paying attention to the oracles all around you? I did. Well, of course I did. What did I see? Let’s not go there. Let’s just say it’s going to be an interesting year.

One word kept coming up again and again. Connection. And one symbol kept coming up over and over. A web. It culminated in the beautiful image Caitlin Matthews posted on Facebook of not one, but several webs, webs within webs. The Web of Wyrd. That links everything, everyone. Touch the edge of a web and the reverberations are felt throughout the entire structure. For yes, we are all connected. Each and every one of us.

I watch the interwebs (there we go again) and I see people who are scared; who are worried about the world. They are scared about what we’re doing to the environment; to the economy; to one another. And they have good reason to be concerned. We are doing terrible things to our beautiful world. We do terrible things to one another. We do terrible things to ourselves.

Several months back I remember saying to Marek, ‘How can we save the world?’ and he replied. ‘We can’t. We can only save ourselves.’ And I thought about it and I figured he was absolutely right. For, truly, you can’t ever change other people. You can only change yourself. I'm not talking about being selfish; about ignoring what is going on in the world - far from it. It's simply that you cannot force people to change; you cannot make them see the world your way. No matter how much you would love them to do so.
In Symphonic Bridges, Marek puts it like this...
"I wish my parents would choose to join me in my spiritual exploration. I wish they would decide to take up the rejuvenation and longevity. The latter doesn’t make sense without the former, of(f) course. I wish my mother would learn to swim and ride a bike finally. Even at the age of eighty or something. I wish I didn’t think that I should have rather used Simple Past tense after all the above ‘I wish’s’. Wishful thinking…

Wishing is all I can do really. I can’t even persuade my sons that eating meat is bad for them. Will they blame me in the future for my not being strict enough with them about it now. If they ever go on vegetarian diet. Maybe I should just make them give up this barbarian habit. But wouldn’t it be a violation of their freedom of choice? We all have free will. Though freedom ends where our decision would lead to hurting other people.

Therefore, I choose to avoid enforcement of any ‘spiritual imperatives’. Instead of telling my wife, children, parents and other people what they have to do to live a better life, I just keep setting a good example. That’s what I believe it is anyway."

And that's just talking about simple things like diet. We're contrary creatures - the moment someone says we 'should' do something, we tend to want to do the polar opposite. Look at the storm in a teacup today over the government telling us how much alcohol we should be drinking - or rather not drinking. Look how defensive the US becomes over genetically engineered food or carbon emissions. We don't like being told off.
But if we all changed…? If we all became alchemists…? If we all saw beyond the greed and the need and the fear and the defensiveness? Oh then, then…who knows what would happen? Remember the tale of the hundredth monkey?

And at Zumba the other night, Debbie played this as our cool-down track…

And this morning, on Twitter, lovely Melpomene played a Cat Stevens track which made me think of this…

And this…

Yeah, it always adds up to one thing… Love. Just Love.

Resolutions? Solutions?

2012-01-04T03:42:00.000-08:00

2012, eh? I’ve been a long way away, a long way awhen… So forgive me while I come back, while I come to. It may take some time...

Resolutions? We toss the word around but what are resolutions? A breaking into parts, a reducing of things into simpler forms. Where does the root of resolution come from? Solvere, the Latin verb that means to loosen, to untie. What is a solution? Solutio – the resolution of a difficulty. In chemistry, a liquid containing a dissolved substance. In alchemy… Well…

I dunno, you can pursue this if it interests you. If it doesn’t, just skip to the music (it says the same anyway, just in a different way). I’m simply throwing out thoughts…images…words… I can't tell you anything. Only you can tell you.

Today, I wonder. What does it mean, to dissolve? To become a solution? Resolution of a difficulty? The end of Self, of separation? Purification? Knowledge of our consciousness/ subconsciousness/ unconsciousness? Clear running water dissolving the elements of the rocks through which it passes. Clarity of thought and action. Letting go of poison, of toxicity, releasing the rigidity of the past, of our inheritance (what MaSte would call our genetic and contextual conditioning) our ‘karma’. And finally, of course, the river leads to the sea, the wide open sea. The Great Sea. Mara. Binah. Emotions - of all kinds. 'Bad' as well as 'good'. Acceptance.

So, anyway. You wanna resolve? You want to be a solution? Yeah, me too. J

Under the Same Sky

2011-12-29T06:57:00.000-08:00

This reality thing… How is it that so many of the people I am closest to are those I have never met in ‘real’ life? What is real life? Adrian laughs at me when I talk about my online friends, my ‘tribe’, my ‘family’, my whatever. ‘Have you actually met this one?’ he says. And I frown. Because, really, unreally, I don’t see it matters. And I have this suspicion that the internet has a deeper purpose – of putting back in touch people who are geographically disparate but connected in far more important, yet subtle, ways.

You’ve already met quite a few of my people but today I’m going to introduce to another. Genevieve Graham. I met Genevieve on Authonomy – she had posted her book Under the Same Sky and the moment I started reading it, I just knew it was a winner. It’s the story of a girl, Maggie, gifted with ‘the Sight’. She dreams of a boy she calls Wolf and – oh my – he also dreams of her. As they grow up, she in South Carolina, he in the Scottish Highlands, their dreams become clearer, turning into visions that bring them comfort, love and inspiration. Even life-saving protection. They yearn for one another but, slight problem, they’re on different continents. And, even more problematic, this isn’t the era of bucketshop airlines. It’s 1746 and – if you know your history – you’ll know it isn’t the best time to be a young guy in the Highlands. After war ravages his home and his family, Andrew (Wolf) sets out on a journey to the New World to find the woman he has always loved. But she isn’t living an easy life either. Under the Same Sky may look like a bodice-ripper (my one gripe is the cover that Penguin have chosen for the book). Appearances are deceptive…but I’ll let Genevieve tell you about that.

Anyhow. Under the Same Sky is poised on the verge of publication so I figured it was time to talk to Genevieve about her book.

EJ: Where did you find the idea for this book? Did it spring into your head fully-formed or did you start with an image, an idea?

GG: I had a rough idea in my head that I wanted to write an adventure. How’s that? Oh. A little more info, huh? Okay. I’d read Diana Gabaldon’s “Outlander” series four times, and I’d just watched Colin Farrell in “The New World” for the umpteenth time, so I was definitely in that frame of mind. I love sagas, stories about journeys. I wanted the plot to stretch out for the duration, not knowing within the first couple of pages who will be doing whom.

EJ: How do you write? Are you a plotter or do you let the story unfold as you go along?

GG: I’m a … what’s that term? Pantzer. I write by the seat of my pants. At some point I put my foot down and figure out the general direction, try to figure out what the plot actually is, but my favourite thing is writing whatever’s playing out in my head, then going back and not remembering actually writing that part.

EJ: Why Scotland?

GG: It started with the “Outlander” books. Those growling Scottish burrs and grungy kilts got it all going for me. Scotland’s a place I’ve always wanted to experience. Lots of people say Scotland “calls to them”, and I’m one of those people. So, since I haven’t been able to go physically, why not travel in my head and on my keyboard?

EJ: Grungy kilts eh? J And why 1746? Why was it important to set your novel at this particular time?

GG: Again, Gabaldon’s books influenced that. Until I read that series I’d had no clue about Scottish history. I didn’t really care about history at all until then, and now I’m amazed by all of it. 1746 was not only an exciting time period, but it was a monumental year for Scots. That one day on Culloden Moor wiped out their entire way of life, meaning they had to create a whole new existence.

EJ: Maggie and Andrew have visions of one another, can see and hear one another on another dimension. Have you experienced anything like that? Are you psychic in any way?

GG: I love the world of psychics and have some gifted friends. I’ve experienced “things”, and I definitely believe in it all. I’ve been told I am psychic and just need to learn how to listen, but so far all I can do is read what my characters are saying. My husband and I know what each other is thinking most of the time, for which we’ve coined the silly phrase “psychicivity”.

I saw a psychic about four years ago, and she had no idea I’d written anything. She was reading tarot for me and said every card she turned over screamed, “published”. Good thing she didn’t see something a little less … happy.

EJ: Why do they have this link? You don’t explain in the book why they are so drawn to one another.

GG: I suppose you could say it’s destiny, a destiny they can fulfill because of the strength of their individual psychic gifts. They say we only use 10% of our brains. What’s the rest of it doing? If we were all that gifted, if we all could feel like they could, maybe discovering our destiny and finding our soulmate would be just as clear. Just imagine.

EJ: Under the Same Sky is marketed as ‘historical romance’ but it feels more than that to me – how would you describe it?

GG: Though the cover definitely suggests romance, I shy away from that term. I was very fortunate that Berkley/Penguin saw it that way, though. I call it ‘historical adventure’ with strands of fantasy woven throughout.

A little note about the cover: When an author is fortunate enough to be published by a major publishing house, they rarely have input into their covers. The cover of Under the Same Sky is absolutely beautiful, its imagery and colours eye-catching. Unfortunately, it’s not representative of the story. This book is not a “bodice ripper”, as many people say the cover suggests. It’s not a stereotypical romance.

EJ: Inevitably I loved the shamanic aspects of this book – tell us a little about how you researched the Cherokee. Why did you pick this particular people?

GG: I loved working with the Cherokee. Truth is, I had absolutely no idea there were going to be Cherokee in that book until they burst out of the trees that day. Most of the research I did about both them and the Highlanders was through historical re-enactors, who are passionate about all things in “their” time period. I met them online. The man with the insight to the Cherokee (who I chose because they were the prevalent tribe in that area at that time) was Iron Head Vann. I found him through his terrific website, www.cherokeebyblood.com Iron Head (also known as David) is the great-great-great grandson of ‘Chief’ Rich Joe Vann of the Old Cherokee Nation. He is hugely knowledgeable about all things Cherokee and has been very generous with that knowledge.

EJ: Tell us about your publishing journey? You went the traditional route of finding an agent first, yes? Any tips for would-be novelists on getting published?

GG: Yes, I queried for an agent for a while (felt like forever), and, like most authors, I almost gave up. Everywhere I posted the book it was met with compliments, but most agents replied with something like “No one’s buying historical fantasy genre crossovers” or “Nobody’s signing debut authors right now.” Then I joined Authonomy.com where I met so many terrific authors, including both you and Gemini Sasson, author of Isabeau and many others. Gemi generously referred me to her agent, and he decided he wanted to represent me and my book. I am tremendously lucky to be represented by Jacques de Spoelberch, a well-respected agent with an incredible reputation.

My #1 tip for writing has to be that writers need to write from the heart, not the head. Let the story take you on a journey. That way readers will want to take the voyage with you.

EJ: Are you going to be doing a lot of publicity for the book? Will people be able to meet you anywhere for signings etc? Point us in the direction of your schedule maybe?

GG: Authors these days—especially debut authors—have to do a lot of publicity on their own. I’m doing what I can, through a full blog tour this month, through facebook, through my newsletter … I’m always open to ideas! I’m also doing readings and signings at two libraries in Nova Scotia as well as in a couple of other places. Here’s my schedule.

EJ: Tell us about your next book, Sound of the Heart – which is being published in May. And what are working on now?

GG: Sound of the Heart was a surprise to me. When Berkley/Penguin US contracted me to write Under the Same Sky, it was with the request that I write a companion novel as well. I don’t want to give away anything in the book, but I can say the story occurs in the same time period and begins in Scotland. The hero in Sound of the Heart is a Scottish warrior. He is forced to join the very army he despises in order to search for the woman he loves.

So, there you have it. And what are you waiting for? Go buy Under the Same Sky (yes, you can pre-order) rightaway! Huge good luck, Genevieve…my as yet unmet friend… J

Anyone for rejuvenation?

2011-12-28T03:07:00.000-08:00

Right now I’m missing my favourite forms of exercise. Classes close over Christmas; so does the gym. No Zumba, no kettlebells, no supersets. I love exercising with other people – it makes me work that bit harder; it pushes me; it gets my competitive edge going. But, hey ho, needs must and if I’m thrown back on my own devices, so be it.

Way back I said I’d talk about yoga and I will. In fact, let’s start with Tibetan yoga. Five deceptively simple exercises that promise to give you vitality and wellbeing; longevity and rejuvenation. Nice huh? I discovered them way back when and did experiment with them but never made them a regular part of my regime. Then MaSte talked about them in the Labyrinth, said he did them every day, and so I dug out my old book and had another go. They’re good; they’re damn good. Actually they’re damn tough to begin with but you can take them at your own pace and gradually build up to the recommended 21 repetitions.

Sooo. What’s the story? Legend held that a hidden monastery deep inside Tibet zealously guarded a secret of everlasting youth and remarkable rejuvenation. Then, in the early part of the last century, a frail and elderly retired military officer, named Colonel Bradford, journeyed to Tibet in search of the rumoured “Fountain of Youth”. He found the monastery and was surprised to find that the magical rites were no more than five simple exercises, based mainly on yoga. They were easy to learn and only took only around 15 minutes a day to perform. But the effects were incredible. When Colonel Bradford returned to the West his friends simply did not recognise him - he looked half his age.

How can such a simple routine prove so effective? Esoterically speaking the five rites are based on balancing the chakras, the seven swirling vortices of subtle energy located roughly along the spinal column. They are also connected with various glands in the body. The first (lowest) chakra centres on the reproductive glands; the second on the pancreas; the third on the adrenal glands; the fourth on the thymus; the fifth on the thyroid; the sixth on the pineal and the seventh and highest on the pituitary gland. The five Tibetan rites stimulate the flow of energy throughout the body and encourage the chakras to function at peak capacity. Mind and body are brought into harmony. When we are young and full of vitality, our chakras all spin at the same, very high, speed. As we get older, stress, unhealthy lifestyle choices and emotional distress all take their toll and the chakras no longer work in harmony but start to spin out of synchronisation, eventually causing disease, decay and other symptoms of ageing. The five rites are designed to persuade your chakras to click back into gear once more.

But hey, even if you don’t believe in chakras, even if you’re making those little whirling circles with your forefinger round by your head (which, incidentally, is giving your crown chakra a mini workout) there is little doubt that the exercises would still have far-reaching benefits on both body and mind. They provide the body with a programme of deep but gentle stretching that can help keep both the spine and its supporting muscles supple.

They cost nothing to do and you don’t have to stir out of your living room. Yes, some are tough to begin with but start off slowly and gradually build up strength and stamina. However if you have a bad back or serious health problems, check with a qualified yoga teacher or physiotherapist before embarking on them. They are pretty challenging for the back so take it easy until you build up strength.

THE FIVE RITES

Ideally, perform the five rites first thing in the morning as they are highly energizing. Wear loose comfortable clothes and work on a yoga mat if you can. Eventually you will perform each exercise twenty-one times. However to begin with, aim for ten or twelve repetitions of each move. Make sure you breathe fully during each exercise. Allow yourself a few moments in between each rite. Simply stand quietly, with your hands on your hips and breathe in, through the nose and out through the mouth. Repeat and then move on to the next rite.

Once you’re comfortable with the rites you can perform them two or three times a day if you wish.

THE FIRST RITE: Spinning. Simply stand erect with your arms outstretched, horizontal to the floor. Now, spin around until you feel slightly dizzy. Make sure you are spinning clockwise, from left to right. Don’t be surprised if you can only manage half a dozen spins to begin with - with time you will be able to build up your spinning.

Tip: before you begin to spin, focus your vision on a single point straight ahead. As you begin to turn, hold your vision on that point for as long as possible and then refocus on the point as soon as possible.

THE SECOND RITE: Lie on your back with your palms resting on the floor. Inhale and gently pull your chin towards your chest (as if you were doing an abdominal crunch), at the same time as you point your toes and lift both legs straight up, keeping your lower back pressed against the floor. Now exhale as you slowly lower your legs and head to the starting position. Rest and then repeat.

Tip: this will be difficult unless you have very strong abdominal muscles. Try lifting your legs in a bent position to begin with.

THE THIRD RITE: Kneel with the balls of your feet on the floor and your knees about four inches apart. Place your hands behind you with the palms resting against the tops of your legs, just below the buttocks. Keep your back straight, and allow your head to drop forward so that your chin is resting against your chest. Now, inhale through the nose and arch your back, pulling your shoulders back, and lifting your head up and back. This will open the chest. Hold for a few seconds and then exhale and return to the starting position. Repeat.

Tip: take in as deep a breath as you can, to expand your lungs fully. Be careful and take it slowly. Don’t overstretch or strain.

THE FOURTH RITE: Sit with your legs in front of you, your palms on the floor and your fingers facing forward. Rest your chin against your chest. Inhale, and lift your buttocks and let your head drop back so that, in one smooth move, you’ve straightened your body from shoulders to knees to make a table. Your feet should be about six inches apart, your knees bent at right angles and your chest and abdomen parallel to the floor. Your arms are straight. Contract the muscles in your legs, buttocks, and abdomen and hold for a few seconds. Exhale, return to the starting position and repeat.

Tip: Keep your breathing steady and relaxed through this movement. If you feel out of breath, stop and rest.

THE FIFTH RITE: Lie face down, and push your torso up so you’re supporting yourself on your hands, as if you’re in an extended push-up/cobra position. Both hands and feet should be about shoulder-width apart. Only the palms of your hands and the balls of your feet should be touching the floor. Tilt your head back and arch your back so that you’re looking up and ahead. Now inhale and lift your hips straight up so your legs and spine are both in a straight line and your body forms a perfect triangle with the floor (downward dog). Hold for a few seconds, then exhale and return to the starting push-up position and repeat.

Tip: If you have back problems try a modified version: start in the push-up position and then move your buttocks back as you inhale until they are almost resting on your heels. Lower your head towards your chest and keep your arms straight.

Actually, there is also a sixth rite. But it’s all about transmuting sexual energy and I think we’ll leave that for a later date, eh? There’s enough here already to be going on with… J

For more information read Tibetan Secrets of Youth and Vitality by Peter Kelder (HarperCollins)

There are plenty of demonstrations of the Tibetans on YouTube. Some (like the example below) are very fast and energetic. I have always performed them quite slowly, meditatively but I guess it’s up to you. This video shows them clearly but the chap demonstrating isn’t terribly aesthetic – though, of course, he’s not doing badly for someone who’s 150!

If he’s too off-putting, try her instead… J The stretches inbetween help a fair bit…