Well three years to the day in the early hours (3am to be precise) I got the phone call from the Macmillan Nurse up in Sunderland that my father had passed away from lung cancer.
Now I could be all maudlin about this but instead I’m going to listen to this Stan Getz/Dizzy Gillespie concert, which opens with a rather manically upbeat version of “A Night in Tunisia”. Somewhere on a higher frequency, beyond our doors of perception, my dad is listening to it with me too 🙂
A sort of mini-album of stuff that gets me up and at’em in the morning. A Yin-Yang with Funkadelic sitting in the middle as a turning point, and Strapping Young Lad as the Yang-as fuck noisy ending 😀
Enjoy 🙂
Click above to play as a YouTube playlist.
Here’s the full track listing.
1. Angelo Moore (Fishbone) – Optimistic Yes
2. Bold as Love – Jimi Hendrix Experience
3. The Shamen – Move Any Mountain
4. Funkadelic – Free Your Mind and Your Ass Will Follow
“Get up and go for the gold!
The Time is now, here with us!
Manifest your creation!
Reclaim your power!
Affirmative.
Motivate don’t procrastinate!
Walk like a god, don’t sucka like a dog!
On Christmas Day we went to Rachel’s Church as we usually do and a fine time was had by all (even though I’m not a Christian the energy is quite agreeable there and I always have a fine time even if the sermon is a bit dull or dodgy in my opinion).
The Christmas service is always short. The Kids get to bring one of their presents up to the front. Henry treated them to an enthusiastic explanation of his new Bat Cave. The leader then swiftly goes through all the necessary prayers. This year instead of a sermon they showed a quick clip of an old James Stewart playing an old man whose imagination brought him into the nativity scene he was putting together and face to face with the baby Jesus. Here’s a link on You Tube, its from Mr Kruger’s Christmas.
It’s a monologue wonderfully put together about his relationship with Jesus. I’m sure it resonates with a lot of Christians, but all I could think of while I was watching was of a younger Jimmy Stewart in a film that I watched once and had a huge powerful effect on me. I had no idea why at the age of 10 why the tale of a soft spoken bachelor who believed in a giant white rabbit called Harvey had such a powerful effect on me. Why I thought it would be great to grow up to like Elwood P. Dowd;
“Years ago my mother used to say to me, she’d say, “In this world, Elwood, you must be” – she always called me Elwood – “In this world, Elwood, you must be oh so smart or oh so pleasant.” Well, for years I was smart. I recommend pleasant. You may quote me.”
I must watch the whole thing again. For me it has a lovely whimsy, at worst heartwarming and uplifting, at best sincere and truthfully.
This scene I find especially touching and relevant at this point.
“E-Squared: Nine Do-It-Yourself Energy Experiments That Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality“
This little book has brought me so much Joy, so much AWESOME and WIN! since I first bought and downloaded it back in August of last year. It confirmed a lot of things that I’ve belived in small chunks in a hit and miss sort of way over the last 20-10 years and pulled it all in into a coherant whole.
Its written in very happy straightfoward language, without alot of the hippy-dippy gobbledygook that certain self-help/’new age’ books go into.
I kid you not when I say that your life will be transformed into a place of joy and happiness if you read and do the very easy practical experiments in the book (and of course not fall back into bad habits afterwards, although the Universe/God/Tao/Great Spirit/Thing bigger than “poor little me” does seem to keep on reminding me of the methods after I forget them).
Here’s the blurb from the Amazon page:
E-Squared by Pam Grout
E-Squared could best be described as a lab manual with simple experiments that prove reality is malleable, consciousness trumps matter, and you shape your life with your mind. Yes, you read that right. It says prove.
The nine experiments, each of which can be conducted with absolutely no money and very little time expenditure, demonstrate that spiritual principles are as dependable as gravity, as consistent as Newton’s laws of motion.
Rather than take it on faith, E-Squared invites you to prove the following principles:
There is an invisible energy force or field of infinite possibilities.
You impact the field and draw from it according to your beliefs and expectations.
Your connection to the field provides accurate and unlimited guidance.
The universe is limitless, abundant, and strangely accommodating.
This is where I and my immediate family especially are at the moment. I wouldn’t be surprised if you said you were too. You could argue that we are always in Transition but its especially acute at in this particular time frame.
Globally you can see it on the news as the Head Less Chicken Collective makes its final desperate play to exert Total Control over us all. Truly amazing sad stuff, which if I had not seen the Gentle Infinite that is coming to us all I would be totally freaking out now.
Henry and Evie even had their own “Transition Day” at infant and junior school respectively a couple of weeks ago. Henry is loosing his baby talk and becoming quite a cheeky little lad. Evie is blossoming into quite a mirthful razor sharp girl. I’m going to have get my self in shape to keep up with this pair 😉
Which is kinda where I’m at the moment. Too long have I neglected my body and its now limiting what I can achieve. Plus there’s a very real possibility of life threatening disease that could hit me any time in the next 10 years. I’ve a family history of heart attacks, strokes and diabetes type 2 and dofus here is half again his ideal body weight over or as my mate Keary says “How are the two of you” 😉 So slowly and steadily I’m getting a grip, its early days and the changes are barely perceptible at moment. More a gathering of the forces with a increased amount of hydration 🙂
The Day Job is about to change big time or small time since we are going thorough an organisational Transformation. Might be good, might be bad, but the team I’ve had the pleasure of working with for the last 5 years will slowly dissolve over the next year or so. Time to leave the glided cage that I’ve sat out the early days of both my children, the house extension and the death of my father.
D101 Games morphs as I come to the end of its initial waves of games. This has been worrying as some collaborators and allies have left the little collective and new dancers take the stage . I know overall its got longevity, a future and most importantly remains ball dropping fun. Currently bringing OpenQuest 2 to a glorious close and putting together River of Heaven a truly inspirational sci-fi rpg written by my mate John Ossoway, with a sound track by my old mate Keef Baker (which is basically the bright optimistic electronic album I always hoped he would pull out of his creative hat some day) and illustrated by rising star Peter Frain. As far as my old muse Glorantha goes I’m finishing off a couple of unreleased books, but I’ve come to the reason I’m ok with the fact that I’m on hiatus on running in the setting even at conventions. I’m also working on a confusing amount of stuff which I’ll work on some sort of plan to bringing into being on my upcoming two weeks off work. Then I can at least mention it to the outside world to start getting interest up 🙂 Had fun updating the website over the last couple of days, so its responsive and works on all these new fangled smart devices 🙂
Been away in a secluded part of the Cotswolds for the last five days. Quality family time despite having a nasty viral cold. Each day brought some new joy or discovery and the whole break gave me some distance and perspective from my everyday life, without descending into naval gazing.
Inspirations..
Seeing everyone battle through really stinky colds and have a real good time despite of the rather glum weather.
The cottage a real calm place of healing, were it was the small touches of decoration that set the mood rather than swamping piles of ‘stuff’.
Visiting Stratford upon Avon and William Shakespear’s Birthplace. Having the ever charming Henry humbled mid charm offensive by a tall red haired actress who commanded the room with an impromptu rendition of the intro to Henry V. Seeing Evie’s interest in the history of the house. Chuckling slightly at both of them referring to it as the “Haunted House”.
Exploring Bourton on the Water, which like a lot of the area had been touched by the flooding the week before. Seeing the children’s delight at the place, which is good since this is where we are going to be staying for two weeks in the summer. A solid family day 🙂
Visiting the Roll Right Stones just up the hill from were we staying. Seeing the whole family’s spirits being lifted from deeply tired and foul to laughing and full of energy as we reached the stones. ‘Feeling’ the stones awake as I walked into the centre, and experiencing an intense (but subtle: no tales of hair standing on end here) uplift after I walked clockwise round the circle and then back into the center, which seems to have worked on all levels of my being. One immediate benefit seems to be that my cold is rapidly diminishing in power 🙂
The meal that we had at Ask Italian in Morton on the Marsh straight afterwards, which saw all the family on good form and was also inspiring in the way it was presented and content wise. I went into it thinking Pizza Express/Bella Italia and now Ask Italian, is this is going to be much of a muchness? Turned out to be yes one hand by no on the other.
Gazing up at a star filled night sky with the kids.
Seeing the Birds of Prey at the Cotswolds Falconry Centre, always a joy but this time learnt a lot more about them and their behavior and how the lure of an easy life at the centre keeps them there. How each decision is based up how much work has to be done for food.
This music seems appropriate for the way I feel 🙂
*the title reference is that Tolkien’s Shire is supposedly based upon the Cotswolds.
Man my psyche has been through the grinder the last couple of days. I’m not even going to touch on on the mini-break down I had Saturday gone (its one for me and my friends over a chill pint of beer 😉 )
The World on the News gives the illusion it is going insane and that’s feeding back into my head at the moment, as my energy levels appear to drop as winter looms threatening.
But actually beneath the projected false reality, its ok
Its very much a crossroads situation..
Whose truth are you going to pick?
“The Sky is falling and I want my Mommy” (Fear)
Or
“We are all One, experiencing life together”
(Love)
I’ll take the high (energy) road and I’ll have more fun getting were we are all going anyway 🙂
