Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Edgar, The Insufferable

Today it hit me why Edgar (who packs quite a feathered sledgehammer!) came into my world.  For years, for some unfathomable reason, I've drawn crows.  One would think, because of the parrots in my life, and because of their jewel-like colouring begging to be painted, that they are the ones which would people, rather bird, my sketchbook.   But no, although I have drawn the odd galah and scaly-breasted, a crow is my bird of choice. 

And so one chose me, in a plausible demonstration of sympathetic magic.  Which is a good a way as any to lead into an Edgar update.  In short, he's doing very well.  He's fed as often as he wails for food and is in glamorous black plumage.  He has a bath every few days when I put the birdbath in his aviary to keep his black top hat and tails in tip top condition. 

But he's also becoming somewhat overbearing, or should I say overcrowing.  When I'm under the gazebo, at the bird table, trying to make up everyone's feed in the morning, or dismantling it in the afternoon, he's walking all over the coop cups, stealing the green scratchie used to scrub the water dishes, nicking the plastic coated wire used to affix Dimitri's water dish to the mesh.  Marching with his size 14 dirty crow feet over and through everything I'm trying to do, while keeping up a continuous grumbling complaint.   I've taken to picking him up, which he hates, and dropping him onto the ground.  Of course he doesn't hit the ground as he can fly but at least he's off the table.

When I put the food out in the morning, despite the fact that he has been fed first (and sat with and cajoled just to make sure he's had enough and he's full), he follows me from aviary to aviary, landing with a solid thump (a delicate ballet dancer he ain't) on top of the cages.  Poor Dimitri and the budgies don't cope as well as the galahs to his heavy footed marches across the aviary roof.  The galahs watch, raise their crests, sometimes give little cries of alarm but Dimitri flops to the ground (with one wing he has no choice but to flop) and scurries for a cover that isn't there.  I have put a large solid tin box (that won't disintegrate in the rain)  on the aviary floor which he has used once or twice so maybe he's getting the idea.  The budgies fly from one end of the aviary to the other while Edgar races across the top chasing them.  (He has a similar reaction to the advent of a blow fly, this fevered excitement and giving chase.  Of course, like the budgies protected by wire, a blowfly easily outmaneuvers him).

Edgar frequently puts things in things.  He picks up bits of bark or a stick or food, if I let him, and puts it in whatever hole he can find, even if the hole is one he makes at the base of a grass clump.  Cracks in the concrete, the holes in a brick, the hole in a screw-on food dish, the gap between my toes - anything where he can push his prize in with his surprisingly strong beak.

The other day he had a conversation with a crow and flew off in its direction.  Here we go, I thought, he's made contact.  But he was soon back with no crow in tow.  I feel bad sometimes as it is obvious he is often trying to tell me something important that has nothing to do with food.  But I, being a thick human,  have yet to translate what he says with such fervour.    Which is all quite sad.  I spend a fair amount of time with him if I can.  He seems to like having his head massaged and seems to relax while my fingers back stroke his head feathers.  Edgar makes it obvious when he doesn't want me to leave by running/flying in front of me as I head to the house.  One misstep would be disastrous so I am very careful.

When I am working outside I hope he will hang around then for companionship but as working outside usually means I have something in my hand;  a rake, a bucket, a wheelbarrow, a chipping hoe, he doesn't come near me.  Guess crows have been prosecuted so long by long narrow exploding things, it is hardwired into them to stay away. 

Wonder what would happen if I started drawing elephants?

Sunday, March 20, 2016

Mini-Mysticism and Yard Work

Sometimes the answer(s) to the Universe and the strange mystery of my existence at this time, in this place, with this particular consciousness seems very close.  A flash of illumination flickering behind the veil of the everyday.  So close I almost get it at the same time as it remains as distant as a star.

 It happened again this morning, picking up fallen poinciana seed pods, walking to the box trailer, throwing them in and going back for another load.  The every day.  Doing without thinking of anything in particular when suddenly, like a wash of sun-lit warmth, it is there.  Or here.

It is a strange feeling, the commonplace threaded through with Mystery.  I am very small and very ego-constrained and very me labelled  at the same time as this immensity of Being courses through and around me.   And this immensity does not conform to labels or description or words.

Yet it is as comfortable as an old shoe.  A reminder that despite the Trumps, global warming, Parkinsons, aging and the house not selling, it really is all right in the end.

There's nothing I can do, or am capable of doing, to enhance it or take it further.  Chasing it is like staring hard at a dim star in a black night.  The more you look, the less you see.  Because it is fleeting and as swift as a white-tailed deer, the only way I can feel it is peripherally; an acknowledgement, a mist of gratitude and love.  Then it's gone and I am picking up seed pods and trudging to the trailer.

Mini-Mysticism and Yard Work

Sometimes the answer(s) to the Universe and the strange mystery of my existence at this time, in this place, with this particular consciousness seems very close.  A flash of illumination flickering behind the veil of the everyday.  So close I almost get it at the same time as it remains as distant as a star.

 It happened again this morning, picking up fallen poinciana seed pods, walking to the box trailer, throwing them in and going back for another load.  The every day.  Doing without thinking of anything in particular when suddenly, like a wash of sun-lit warmth, it is there.  Or here.

It is a strange feeling, the commonplace threaded through with Mystery.  I am very small and very ego-constrained and very me labelled  at the same time as this immensity of Being courses through and around me.   And this immensity does not conform to labels or description or words.

Yet it is as comfortable as an old shoe.  A reminder that despite the Trumps, global warming, Parkinsons, aging and the house not selling, it really is all right in the end.

There's nothing I can do, or am capable of doing, to enhance it or take it further.  Chasing it is like staring hard at a dim star in a black night.  The more you look, the less you see.  Because it is fleeting and as swift as a white-tailed deer, the only way I can feel it is peripherally; an acknowledgement, a mist of gratitude and love.  Then it's gone and I am picking up seed pods and trudging to the trailer.

Sunday, March 13, 2016

The Grand Old Party Isn't Grand Anymore

My parents were Republican.  Politics was often discussed at home although as a child I found the subject boring and didn't listen.  They voted for Barry Goldwater and circulars from the John Birch Society used to come in the mail.  Politics was something they agreed on and when it was the subject of conversation the atmosphere was congenial.  Too often nothing was discussed in the family home and the atmosphere was charged with unspoken antipathies.  Therefore, in a strange sort of way, I associated being Republican with being family.

I remained Republican until I started to travel.  There was no epiphany, no great revelation when I switched from conservative thinking to a more liberal viewpoint.  It just happened over time.  Even so, I still have a fondness for the lumbering elephant that is the Republican icon.

Until now.  Well, that's not entirely true.  Republicans seemed to lose their way with Reagan and his political love affair with the Iron Lady Margaret Thatcher.  Republicans lost the ability to empathize.  If people were doing it tough, too bad.  The American Dream is that anyone, no matter their circumstances or background, can aspire to be President.  If you didn't raise yourself from the mire by your bootstraps then you weren't trying hard enough. 

I grew up a little and started paying attention to world affairs and the States part in them.  I saw that we put on our combat boots when American interests, usually oil interests, were threatened.  With a seemingly endless supply of money to convince the subject country to see things our way, we used the military, the CIA, sanctions, diplomatic pressure, assassinations and skullduggery to get what we wanted.  Americans, so proud and powerful, arrogant with power, didn't pay enough attention.  We were the honourable nation.  If we were doing this overseas, than we had to be in the right.  The USA could do no wrong.  But we did and we are.

We got away with it and it worsened until we had Guantanamo Bay; government sanctioned torture and the flaunting of the Geneva Convention.  And we weren't even ashamed enough to try and hide it.  Guantanamo Bay and all that it meant to our decaying morals was flaunted.  It was the first time I was ashamed to be an American.

And this is just world politics.  We also have the legalized corruption of the Super Pacs, Big Business and the thing which will kill us all, climate change, which Rubio, the baby-faced poster boy of 'moderation'  said is not man made because temperature change is normal

I used to envision the GOP as being made up of venerable white-haired old men, rather like my childish image of God (mom asked me once to draw what I thought God might look like.  I drew a white haired white man inside a big heart).  The Grand Old Party isn't grand any more.  It's not even Great.  It's Grubby and mean. 

Now there's a kind of morbid fascination watching it's death throes.  The dreadful thing is, it is taking the USA with it.  That that suntanned, fairy-flossed, middle-aged Ken doll has made it this far without being chucked out on his ear, illustrates how deep the rot goes. 

Poor Fellow, My Country.

Thursday, March 10, 2016

Music, Parkinsons and Dementia

On ABC the Catalyst program was Music on the Brain.  It was about the power of music to help those with severe Parkinsons and dementia.   A man with advanced Parkinsons could hardly walk.  It was as though his feet were stuck to the floor.  Music was played, music he chose that was meaningful to him.  The man who could hardly walk began to waltz, slowly but smoothly. 

A woman with advanced dementia, who rarely smiled, spoke or interacted was played music through an ipod.  She sang along with the music, she smiled and afterwards had a meaningful conversation about the music.

The Catalyst episode can be viewed here:  http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/4421003.htm

Years ago I noticed that people who composed, conducted or played music seemed to live longer than non-musical folks.  Live longer and keep all their marbles.  George Martin, the fifth Beatle, died today aged 90. 

Music is the only art form that moves with and through time.  It moves through our blood with the rhythm of our beating heart.  Music moves us to tears or creates that 'oceanic feeling' of awe and joy.
Music has power.  To music we march to war.  With music we are stopped in our tracks to listen to its transient beauty.

I listen to classical music every day.  Mostly, I admit, it is the quiet backdrop to reading or drawing or computing.  I've stopped listening to it when I do yoga finding that I am quieter and deeper within the practice without the distraction.  When much-loved pieces come on, I stop what I'm doing, crank up the sound and stand in the sweet spot in front of the speakers to absorb it through my skin as well as my ears.  Like most people I love music.  I love classical but I also love Joni Mitchell and Ella Fitzgerald, 'world music' (India, Spanish, African, Middle Eastern) and favourite movie soundtracks.

But imagine if my life was music.  What if I wrote, played or somehow created music.  I notice that I feel better after singing for any length of time.  I used to sing all the time.  I rarely sing now which is sad.  To sing with all one's might requires total privacy.  At least for me.

Did music come before language?  Why then do we love birdsong so much?  And the music of crickets and the slow deep music of the sea?  Does it resonate in our blood?

When I saw the awakening through music of those who had been lost in the dim wilds of dementia I cried.  When I saw the man who couldn't walk dance, I cried.  I didn't look at Richard but I began to mentally list his favourite songs.

Wednesday, March 9, 2016

It Is What It Is and Natalia Pencil Drawing

Waiting to head into town for the second of our third weekly appointment with the gym.  How things have changed.  Richard used to have to wait for me while I made myself ready for an outing.  Now I wait for him.  No matter. 

It is what it is.  I love that sentence.  It is what it is.  Like Stein's 'A rose is a rose is a rose'.  Stating the obvious?  Obviously.  But what depths of meaning, like reflections of mirrors in other mirrors.  It is what it is.  One can rail, whine, complain, laugh, curse or cry but it still is what it is. 

I know that I colour situations, reality, with my opinions, formed through the particular coloured lenses I wear that day, or even that moment.  On a good happy day, when I am confident, well rested, with optimism wafting around me like a sweet perfume, minor annoyances aren't even annoying.  It is what it is.  On a bad day, when I am tired, worried, fearful, minor annoyances become major.  Yet it still is what it is.  My perceptions change, my reactions change but still it is what it is. 

So, I actually started this post to show an ongoing pencil sketch of Natalia.  But as usual, Sidetrack Sally, got sidetracked.   Nevertheless, here it is. 
Looking at a photo of my work is as telling as looking at it in a mirror.  There is obviously a bias in my vision which causes me to see things askew.  Rather like how I ride.  Yoga and the better familiarity with the unevenness of my body illustrates how crooked I am when I ride even though I feel straight.  At least photos and the mirror can help me to find the faults and correct them - if they are not too severe.  I've made changes since those photo.  I'll post the final version when it's complete.

At least it does look like Natalia.  Richard, her besotted 'Dad', should be well pleased. 

Monday, March 7, 2016

Edgar the Free, sort of

Edgar is a free bird ... sort of.  He hated being confined to the aviary at night.  As soon as the door closed he grumbled, whined and called continuously until dark and began again at first light in the morning.  Of course he isn't free as he hasn't shown the slightest skill in food foraging and is completely dependent upon me for food.

He is growing in confidence and skill with flying.  I think he's almost got it and then he demonstrates he hasn't by flying into the side of the house this morning.  Otherwise he is going from tree to tree, from tree to top of aviary and top of aviary to ground to be fed inside the aviary.  (I think it is worth keeping that habit going as,  if we were to suddenly sell the house, he has to come with us when we move). 

Edgar is a handsome and healthy bird.  The right wing droops a little when he is relaxed and is still about 6 inches shorter than the left.  He flies well but hasn't shown the desire to fly high and long so don't know whether it's because there's no need or because he cannot.  I do feel sorry for him as he should be with other crows and here he is on his own with us.  I tell him every day what a marvelous little being he is and try to convey how much I love him but I'm not a crow so what value is that to him?  I'm not outside all day every day either so most of the time he is on his own.  If I'm outside he hangs around, even running after me sometimes which is a bit dangerous as he's so quick and tends to get too close to my feet.  Other times I'm outside doing things and he is doing his own thing elsewhere so he's not emotionally dependent upon me in a clingy sort of way. 

Heck, I just don't know what to do with him.  I can't teach him crow and he can't learn human so guess we'll just bumble along as best we can.