Alternate climate change ad

Very funny if you haven't already seen this ad https://www.getup.org.au/campaign/ClimateCleverer&id=128

Excuse those not in Australia - it's a reference to a rather lame greenwash ad campaign that's been running lately as our federal government tries to belatedly get on board and demonstrate interest in climate change.

speechless

Do you ever just have not much to say? Some combination of random thoughts and complex images, a slightly sour taste of carbohydrates turning into sugars that comes from a meal eaten an hour ago, a blinky wetness that comes from tired, a song that reminds you of an uncle, and makes you feel sad to know that he will die, an accidental eye contact with a stranger with a mean mouth on the train, who stares at you with hostility and you kind of can’t help but look back at, a quietness that comes from having just woken from a nap, a cloudy patchwork thinking time, no narrative.

work-life balance a go go

Fast becoming a work-aholic. Finding myself at desk well into the evening, often. (How often do we think that it's reasonable to do that? How many late nights or extra hours is healthy - how many a bad habit?) Partly because I can, there's no one waiting at home for me (except my cat and he sleeps till I get home), no cooked dinner going cold. Partly because I find it interesting and there's a very fine line between work and fun for me when the work is interesting (in fact I often have to make myself not listen to music while I'm there late or I might actually forget to stop and go home.. you know, hypothetically). Partly because I have heaps on and I'm bad at saying no. Partly because I like it when it's quiet and there's no-one else around to get in the way of thinking and writing - kind of balances the chat and coffee breaks in the day. And yes, probably partly as an excuse to not be in a romantic relationship (when would I have time? with what spare energy?) or to be in contact with my family more often (don't have time, sorry, analysing data). The problem is I don't mind it, for a few days (or if it's when I feel like doing it), but when it feels like a 'need to' then after a few nights I get tired and resent being there at all. And daydream about leaving, resigning and going to an island.

That's all a bit tragic and lame isn't it? Oh well, I guess the first step is admitting it.

I get quite defensive and take the high moral ground about the issue when anyone close to me suggests that maybe I should 'just be firmer with yourself' or similar. I often feel like other people don't understand that feeling of enjoying what you do, being driven to do it right - a heady mix of fascination and perfectionism. In fact I don't think it's about strictness, strictly berating myself for working late again wont help the root causes, I don't think. Maybe the root causes are more to do with remembering to be kind to myself (hello, it's dinner time and you're hungry - go home, hello you're tired, go home), working on a sense of entitlement to my own feelings in the face of other people's, and maybe making some structural changes like factoring in some other things to get me out from the office and into the world. Just being more comfortable with saying no would be an excellent start.

But then today I had a flash and thought 'maybe I want to be an academic' - as if that would help. (Tho' I did think it might be more my pace, self-directed research rather than externally directed, more time for publishing, and I quite like teaching...) So had a moment of being convinced I would enrol for my PhD n the next few years. Ahuh, that's a great strategy for gaining work-life balance, just ask any PhD student... right??

The studio was meant to be a useful transition from working too much at the day job, to working a bit more on my own interests, but so far - oh the irony - all the long hours at work have made it hard to find the energy to get it set up properly. By the weekend I'm tired and ready for just seeing people and catching up on sleep, cooking, hanging out. I feel like if it was set up I would be using it, but that burst of energy, planning, to do list ticking required to actually get me there is so painful I can't be bothered. A bit like the feeling I had when I lived in the mountains I guess and was too tired from commuting to move house closer to the city. But when I did I was so relieved. Could be also that the working long hours has been a handy excuse for not getting into the studio - we are complex beasts and decision making, moving towards change can come in fits and bursts - inspiration, resistance battling it out in the depths of our psyche. And certainly doing something I like just because I like it and not because it's 'good for the world' or what someone else needs is exceptionally hard for me. So re the studio, it's actually been a month and I'm still not in there. Paying rent, have keys - sure, that bits easy, but not kitted out or using the space. (But am drawing, daily, starting a morning routine, which is something).

So, back to the work thing, was thinking about setting myself some working hour targets - someone was telling me about how they all set actual targets for work-life balance in their office, eg. 'leave office for walk at lunchtime 3 days a week', 'miss yoga no more than twice in any month' - to make triggers to let them know when the balance isn't right. Maybe I should do that. LIke 'leave work no later than 6.30 for 4 days out of 5' Maybe sign up for another weeknight class, make lans to meet friends on weeknights more often. And keep practicing saying 'no, I'm already booked up, thanks anyway' to new work. Something.

Any tips? Well meaning ones please - I'm already too tired to handle mean comments.

Also known as the 'mingle escape'

'Can't comment at work so emailing my comment instead' seagreen regular comments:
"I know what you mean. :) The first conference I ever went to for work, I went off and cried on the fire escape cos I was so painfully unsure and shy. (I may have also been a touch premenstrual) And I am forever grateful to the round-shouldered pale-dumpling-skinned fundementalist christian man with the odd beard and cardigan who came up and talked to me when I made myself go back into the conference room."

She notes "I still see him at conferences from time to time".

Tee is for like totally green t-shirts

If you are in the US these guys do organic cottton T-shirts, with enviro themes, and give $5 for each one to environment groups. Cool huh?
http://www.consciencetees.com/mens-shirts1.html

Kitsch and cute pro Kyoto t-shirts made in Canada:
http://shop.posch.ca/collections/t-shirt-skirty/

And, in the UK, thinking about eco-dyes and organics:
http://perfect.betterthinking.co.uk/perfect/default2.htm

Bring on summer.

Speaking of facebook...

(What? Weren't we? Everyone always is)

'Facebook - all your ex lovers together in cyberspace at last!' (like almost all of them, it's really creepy)

hurrah.

Conference. Day two. It’s a small world.

The client whose report I am meant to be tidying up while I am away, is here, at the conference also. She is kind and friendly to me and introduces me to her contacts. I feel awful at having ever said mean things about her accent which I observed sounded a little like the red headed politician who rose to prominence in Australia a few years back for her race-based policies and was widely ridiculed for her past life in a fast food outlet. Yes her. And yes her accent is similar, but I really shouldn’t have said it.

Conference. Day two. The shower hurts.

The shower in the hotel room spurts jets out so hard that if I stand front on it hurts. I am not joking, it’s like a torture instrument, I have to turn down the flow, stand with my back to the jet, and keep moving so the pain is a little distributed. I’m loving this hotel – can you tell? The nipple cripple* shower is very much in keeping with the 1950’s enamel style bath, so short you have to fold in two to get in (I did, last night, it was great), the splodgy carpets that reveal that someone didn’t read the small print that said ‘warning – this carpet spot cleaner may not be colour-safe – please test on sample before applying’, the staff at the breakfast buffet discussing their pay, hourly rate, complaining about the cleaners low rates, the waiter with big grey open eyes and shock hair who tells me about his acting courses and seems to be only 17 yet patiently explains to me how agents have a quota of people of each certain look, to keep their rates of return high, and is Florence Nightingale patient when I dither pre-coffee about whether I want cereal or eggs, and if eggs, done how, with what kind of bread, somehow is all very 1950’s cute, somehow quaint, somehow tacky, somehow ok.
*Australian term, please excuse.

Conference. Evening One. I mingle over dinner.

I arrive, and mingle, doing the edge in to the first group I see. They shift slightly and smile, which is nice. One of the guys is someone I spoke with at lunch. I then keep talking to them and end up at the same table when we are herded into the ballroom for dinner. Dinner is nice, good vego. Gluten free for the man sitting next to me. I am polite, I ask questions, I am on best behaviour, I barely crack jokes, I have no-one to be silly with. The woman I talk to replies with a thin smile any time I open up and offer opinions so I stop doing this and instead nod and make banal comments and prompting questions. I am meant to be mingling, justified the dinner extravagance to myself as a networking opportunity. I leave with one business card and think ‘I am an abject failure at networking, and I don’t even really care that much’. I leave, going past the bar in which there are countless football fans celebrating the just-ended match of Australia versus Argentina. A little flicker of thought says ‘stay, drink in the bar’. I have a quick flash of talking with tall dark and handsome strangers, which melts on second thought and is replaced by standing talking to sports mad Aussies in scarves, which all, either way, seems like too much hard work. I leave instead and weave back through the cold streets between imposing Victorian mansions and middle-aged dinner party street goodbyes, and find myself in just minutes back in the tiny airlock of my room. Shoes off. I write a postcard and wonder idly about whether I was ever the kind of girl to have wild solo bar adventures or whether I was always the type to come back to a cup of tea and my thoughts. After all it’s an early start in the morning and I have work emails to write. Maybe this is what they call responsibility. Maybe I’m rediscovering demure. Maybe it’s early menopause.

Lets workshop that

Conference. Day one. I am so well behaved these days.
Once upon a time I would have been here with a friend, a friendly colleague, or bumped into someone I knew from another organisation. We would have giggled about other people or speakers. I would have slipped out after lunch for a nap upstairs and then come back mid arvo to rejoin the conversation. Maybe. Today, I stay fighting the post lunch weariness, in an almost dark room, with speakers on and on, and only a short walk at lunchtime to wake up my metabolism. I look half heartedly at displays in the break, I even strike up conversation with a stranger and then include the man standing kind of alone with his lunch plate, and then listen to details of organisations and organizational politics of a restructure, so similar to so many I’ve been in I can almost recite the issues by rote (but am well behaved, so don’t). I nod and smile and try not to say anything stupid, try to seem like a sensible, serious person who knows stuff (a bit much really when you’re tired from a late arrival in town the night before, feeling a little grey and run down like the weather outside, and trying to fork your meal held torso height and not smile leafy teeth at anyone or dribble oily pesto pasta down one boob.

I sit through the afternoon session, again taking notes, listening to every words, thinking of people who I might tell about particular programs, until the nagging sense of tiredness threatens to dissolve me, and I muster my courage, push to one side my concerns about how the speaker will feel, what anyone else might think of me (derr – likely nothing, likely no-one will notice or care), and like a true rebel, I leave, one speaker, that is, 20 minutes, before the day ends. Woo hoo!
You see I could have stayed for the last talk, endured that last bit of sitting in the dark being bored, but there is a dinner, and drinks in the foyer start directly the last session ends, then drinks in the dinner room, then dinner. It could have morphed into one long, 14 hour day of smiling and making small talk with strangers. Which is just about my idea of hell.

So I slip out, walk briskly the few blocks to my hotel, take off my shoes, make a cup of lemon tea, and enjoy the feeling of being alone, in quiet. Anticipate a quick 10 minutes on the freshly made bed, maybe a little read. Maybe do something to my hair, change my top, put on lippie. Modern workplaces and their associated events are not very considerate of the introverted amongst us are they? Turns out I am not a very good mingler, except in short bursts, or when I feel like it. I have to reserve some mingling energy for dinner. I estimate that every 10 minutes alone now helps recharge my batteries for approximately an hour of being around people later in the night. Heaven forbid I live somewhere actually crowded, or in a family of loud people – how would I cope?

NB if the post lunch nap were reintroduced to daily life I think much of my urgent need to get away for a break would be averted.

librarian chic(k)

I quite like the public library. Why is that? It's the down at heel vibe, the cardigan wearing librarian cliche, the kids books sections with bean bags, the computers with clunky keys, the pay dirt of mystery novels you'd be too embarassed to own but might be happy to read on a Sunday afternoon, art books, access to photocopier without any guilt (office workers everywhere I'm assuming have snuck the occassional personal print/photocopy, and I am amongst them, but I feel pangs of furtive guilt as I swiftly whisk the pages about my holiday flights or comic strips from the print tray, I know it's barely ethicaly defensible, it's much more pleasant doing it slowly and with grace at a library), the cook book section with enough cooking pics of fantasy dishes that real people will never get around to making to keep the most voracioues voyeur satisfied. Also I love the people, the rag tag motley bunch of folk who will be there when you are, people with loud children, people laughing at their emails, people groaning at fustrating news on websites, librarians cranky and talking too loudly about large print texts so someone sight impaired with perfect hearing. Being up close and personal with strangers in public places, I think it's really healthy. Even borrowing a book that has been thumbed by countless strange hands seems really healthy, subversive almost, in this hygiene obsessed cult of the individual type inner city life. I'm sure it builds trust on some really primal level to be sitting next to strangers who are well behaved, who are constrained by the rules of the place that you have both chosen to be in, and hence don't leer at you, or stick a knife out at you, or ask you for money, or look past you with glazed eyes and large bags of shopping. You feel somehow contained, part of the same time and place, and paient of other people in a library. A bit like cafes, I think they can be the same thing, but in a library it's more pronounced, because people are often there as individuals, not speaking to others. You feel each other's presence more. Viva la library.

NB I love the bookshop too - this isn't an either or love affair, it's quite an open relationship.

Picture this

These are some amazing photos.

http://www.chrisjordan.com/

“As an American consumer myself, I am in no position to finger wag; but I do know that when we reflect on a difficult question in the absence of an answer, our attention can turn inward, and in that space may exist the possibility of some evolution of thought or action. So my hope is that these photographs can serve as portals to a kind of cultural self-inquiry. It may not be the most comfortable terrain, but I have heard it said that in risking self-awareness, at least we know that we are awake. “ Chris Jordan

write on

Oh alright then, go on. I shouldn't. But, seeing as you suggested it...

Post that is. I should write in that birthday card for my Godson (but what to send a 7 year old? And do I want to stay on present giving terms to all 700 of my younger cousins? And anyway shouldn't I call?), should finish that wee dram of typing for work (he he almost wrote 'wee drab' - much more fitting). Should put away my washing. Should read one of the enticing second hand books I bought on sale at the weekend. Should brush my teeth and hop into bed and get some early zzz's. Should catch up on reading other people's blogs. Should once and for all decide on furniture for my studio and stop fart-arsing about. Should finish the zine I've started, ready to put on that friend's stall. Should write sensible lists, get a plan, get fit, get tidy, get a clue, get laid, get ready, get a life. Should have a beauty regime. Should have aspirations, preferably colour coded.

But despite all that, here I find myself again. Daydreaming out loud, making little words pressed on the screen. Singing to fruit. Shining light through the alphabet. Imagine that you can see the light shine out from the screen and that it makes paterns on your two wet eyes that mean things, and that through this black crawl we talk. Imagine that. Recollect and marvel with me that this is new and only something our ancestors have been doing for minutes, relatively speaking, in the life of humans. The writing bit I mean. The typing bit is a blink, hardly a blink. Imagine if we were all tooling around together outside, near small houses we had made, making things, collecting food, holding babies, watching clouds pass, painting wooden shields, threading beads on thread, with no strokes of dark brush to speak between us, we would have only throat and grunts, and sniff and lick and roar and bite and laugh and murmur. And smell, the silent jolt of fear or lust sent through scent. And the visual and tactile assessment of flesh, snap of leaves and wind direction and lustre of hair and the roughness of stones, to tell us things, to tell us stories full of meaning about how things work. Or maybe we would have words, some words, simple words, and songs to sing back from times before we were remembering. Sounds and rhymes, rhymes that sound like the things they were, rolling in patterns and echos, spooning through the air their like sound on like.

Now there is less texture in telling things, the writing is a smooth affair, fingers touch smooth keys and hear only the patter of fingers scuttling across imagined plains. So we squeeze places and thoughts into the cracks between words, let paradox slyly emerge, play with shades of grey as best we can with black on white.