Madness of Childhood and ‘Mad to be Normal’

 David Tennant always is an interesting actor.  He takes challenging roles, including that of R. D. Laing in ‘Mad to be Normal.’

This is not a film review, but I look back on my childhood in the Sixties and the way my mother behaved almost in a schizophrenic fashion throughout my life.  There was the ‘liberal’ woman who was a party girl, some one who actually smoked pot on at least one occasion, knew Timothy Leary, was quite happy to embrace the philosophy of Aldous Huxley, and yet coldly declared that any one who took drugs ‘should be lined up against a wall and shot.’  What sort of statement is that?  What is more terrufying was the constant threat that, if I failed to behave properly, or ceossed some invisible psychological line, she would send me for electric shock therapy.  

I kid you not, as a friend of mine used to say.  She did use that as a threat frequently.  I have tried to suppress many of these facts since her death.  I truly did love her deeply.  She gave birth to me, and she was my mother, and she gave me many beautiful traditions, and an appreciation of elegance and beauty, but...   BUT... if I cannot tell the truth now, I will go to my grave with the impossible weight of a childhood and adolescence that was overshadowed by her almost careless sadism.  

I look at my sister, and she has become the monster my mother created and supported through six decades.  I fled in order to avoid that fate.  

My sister, like the very emotionally damaged childhood sweetheart, became the recipient of my mother’s determination to brand some one with the taint of lunacy.  Omce I moved on, she would say to all and sundry: ‘Well, V. Is mentally ill, of course.’ I never told my sister this.  It would have been rather cruel.

Memento Mori

 

Some one posted this on social media, and the comments all were flippant or negative.  ‘Gross’ was one simple denunciation that appeared again and again, but why is revulsion so deeply ingrained in our culture that the photograph of a tooth of a loved one set in precious metal to be worn as a memento  mori or talisman inspires negative responses instantly.  Instantly, without any hesitation.

I always have felt that we do not treat Death with the respect it deserves, nor in fact do we even consider any real relationship with this inevitable force of Nature.  In fact, like the horrible phenominon of the ‘nursing home’ substituting the basic care of the elderly and infirm by their own families with a sort of long term storage until Death, we entrust the preparation of our dead to professionals.  

In Islamic tradition, when any one dies, the body is taken to the mosque where members of the family of the deceased wash and prepare it for burial.  There are no artificial fluids piped into the corpse, no elaborate artifice to stiffen or alter, no cosmic makeovers.  The family washes the body lovingly and thoroughly, and burial usually occurs shrtly afterwards.

Just as we pay for the care of our infirm and elderly, we pay for the entire business of bidding farewell to our dead.  We somehow believe that money is an acceptable substitute for our natural duties.

We therefore have little firsthand experience with the last chapter in the life of any human being.  Is it any wonder then that people recoil from any REAL part of an individual who has died even in the form of a single tooth?

Our own heritage includes cults that honoured human heads.  There are many tales of severed heads who acted as Oracles, including the Northern god Mimir, the Celtic Bran, and others.

Necropolis 2020: The City of the Pandemic

(Above, my self portrait with a photograph of the original drawing done by my grandfather, Condé)

All my life, since I wrote my first story at the age of five on paper towels taken from my school’s toilets, I defined myself as a writer, not a painter.  It was a definition that I had to make in a way, as my grandfather’s vocation as a painter was the ultimate family role model.  From the earliest age, the philosophy of devoting all, to ART rather than any practical pursuit of wealth or security in life, was drummed into my brain.  Along with that was its corollary: ‘Art demands suffering.  All great artists must suffer.’

The effect of that philosophy essentially produced a childhood and adolescence wherein my mother, rather than empathising or sympathising with any traumas I endured, patted me on the back and congratulated me for taking another beating in the service of the almighty god of Art.  

I do not exaggerate here, and I loved and still love my mother, but that principle was toxic.  Childhood is hard, but a good parent should lend a helping hand when a child stumbles or is struck by a blow.  Acceptance of sadism as a natural even necessary agent in the creation of an artist should be repudiated.  

Well, that is neither here nor there.  I took up painting after I was diagnosed with breast cancer, and created my first significant oil painting after radiotherapy.  It is a self portrait that was based on a portrait my grandfather did of me when I was five.

It is significant for a number of reasons.  By the time I painted it, my mother was dead.  The original was in one of the houses my sister and I inherited jointly as beneficiaries of the most dreadful Trust one ever could create, a surefire path to torture, given the fact that we were made co-Trustees as well, and my sister, like Sauron, does not share power with any one.

It may lack technique and skill, but it makes up for that in its unflinching honesty.  It remains a record of everything that child had to endure.  And the cancer and the death of my mother made a part of me a child again, a terrified little girl at a point where the world she knew suddenly lay in ruin round her.

I used to look at the original, and see the innocence of childhood there, but it was a portrait, even then, of a victim.   It was, after all, when I was five that my mother divorced my father.

I never thought of that before.  I simply thought of being a little girl who wanted to be a writer, who could read and loved books even at that early age.  I slept on a mattress on the floor beneath a big easel in a flat that my mother and I assume my father had rented in the same building where my grandparents had a flat as well.  My father and mother fought constantly, and his long absences either were the cause or the result of these borderline violent altercations.  I was five.  My sister was two.  She emerged essentially unscarred from this marriage, as she simply was too young to have any knowledge or memory of the years when my parents actually were together.  

Memories of this period are seldom good ones.  My mother rewrote history to make it all appear otherwise, but here are realities I suppose I should attach to the portrait.

My Uncle Charles was an alcoholic and had a bad car accident.  He came to visit, and I, never having seen any one damaged like that before, was terrified of him.   His face was covered with cuts from shattered glass.  He looked like a monster from a horror film, not like the Uncle I knew.   So much so that his visit, coupled with my general sense of misery and apocalyptic fear, prompted me to run away from home. I had a clear destination.  There was a beautiful church about half an hour’s walk from the flat that had a little play area for children that included a kitchen with a pretend cooker and pretend food and dishes.  Somehow, I felt I could live there by myself and, as it was the house of God, be safe and secure.

Some one rang the police, however, and I do not think I ever reached the promised land.  I was brought back to that uncomfortable world where I knew that my father no longer would be included.

My mother changed the story into some quasi-religious pilgrimage by a child who wanted to see Christ at the age of 5.

My other memories of that time are of the budgie who dashed its brains against a window, and my mother consignimg my baby blanket to the rubbish bin.  Why would a parent do that to a child against her will at a very uncertain time?  My mother repeatedly got rid of the things I most treasured, never ever asking for my permission or consent.

My other prized possessions were little Matchbox dinosaurs.  I do not know the maker, but they individually were boxed, with a portrait of the dinosaur on the box.  I did have an actual Matchbox toy as well.  It was a cenent mixer.  

My mother blithely gave all of these to a male cousin while I still was very young.  I was heartbroken.  She could be so oblivious  to any one else’s psyche.

Now we come to my other significant painting.  I have been struggling with it for almost two months.  It began as a view of the hillsides of Umbria.  Somehow, it lacked something, so I added two rivers that met in the centre.  That still did not complete the landscape.  I added a little cave.  Still not quite right.

Last night, I realised it was not an ordinay hillside with houses, but a necropolis based on the visit to Tarquinia, and the way the Etruscans made their dead part of their lives.

So here is my Necropolis of 2020, honouring the victims of the Pandemic, even if the death or loss of some of the tombs was due to another cause.

I want people to look at this and finally acknowledge the pain and loss.  I want them to be ashamed of ther attempts to lay blame somewhere, whether it is to point a finger against China, against the bats, the minks, the government of any nation, or any one or anything else.

This is Nature at her most brutal, culling this planet.  If you respond with hostility towards others, or refuse to join a common cause for all humanity, then you have been weighed against the Feather and found wanting.

China was the first to suffer, but what did we do?  Did we acknowledge the grief and pain of the Chinese who had lost family and friends to the virus?  No, we blamed China and in doing so, neglected to arm ourselves to wage a very grim war against an enemy that is more powerful than any human being.

Then the world drifted insanely in some countries to a political agenda, to a spurious link between a virus and a political map.   In doing this, we enabled hostility and magnified differences of thought to an absurd degree.  In nations where the pandemic was addressed as a medical issue, and people simply obeyed the necessary dictates of science and reason, there was victory, and lives were not lost.

From the first, loss of lives in many cases were unnecessary, but humans sacrificed other humans.  The way that the nursing homes became death traps comes to mind.

Friday the 13th

Where can I disembark from this nightmare, and sign up for a new adventure?  This world is filled with lies and deceit, even when it is not intended to harm deliberately.  I guess they order lockdown because no one ever told the truth.  The medical profession is very selective about its facts and its precautions.  There is no consistency.  No one wants to admit he or she may be ill with this virus.  No one tests anything but temperature and yet the twenty questions include gastro-intestinal upsets, and symptoms associated with the common cold and ‘flu.  What the hell does asymptomatic actually mean when the definition embraces every symptom known not only to humans but animal kind?

People are not even in sync on any level, whether solidarity in terms of family or community.  Very little open discussion it appears.  Things are more on the order of: this is what I am doing.  Take it or leave it.

The Residue of Childhood Hurt

Having the usual argument today about that hoary chestnut of ‘the sins of the fathers’ and wondering how so many anti -Christian liberals can embrace such a fundamentalist Biblical principle.

I certainly repudiate it.  In fact, I believe in a statute of limitations even for sins committed in my own lifetime.  If I were to punish or retaliate against the symbols of my own oppression, and the rapes that were wantonly committed, cocks and balls would roll into baskets in greater numbers than aristocrats’ heads during the Reign of Terror or the devotees of Cybele and Attis during the annual procession where the greatest gift was a man’s own cock and balls, self-severed.

Let the Sun move on, and the shadows pass.  As long as a cock does not talk back, it can be a useful tool.  A tool, yes, even when it is controlled by and attached to a human being, but one that theoretically, could serve out a little joy along with its other side effects.

I did not turn against the male gender of the species, even though badly treated by too many.  There are women as well in the list after all.  I do not see a vagina dentata every time I look at a woman.

Even where the pandemic is concerned, I easily could see myself as a primary target if I had a persecution complex.  I actually do not, but my shield arm is exhausted, and my blade needs ro be sharpened and sanded again.  It has been a rough couple of years.  If I am less than eager to take on some cosmic burden meted out now against my ancestors, I would say that would be a natural response.  I am not a masochist.  I am not your dog, not your slave, not your carpet to beat.  If the sky begins to rain spears, I am more inclined to grab one and hurl it now than to cower beneath a bush.

Not that this is any sort of metaphor for justifying selfish negligence where the pandemic is concerned, because I wear a masque gladly if there is even a chance it might protect your life.  I expect the same basic courtesy in return.

What it is, however, is the following:

I am not a supporter of the government under either of its megalith political parties or its policies,  so I shan’t apologise for its actions, because I never took part in the process.  At the same time, the events of 11 September represent a drop in the bucket compared to the past and ongoing violent and economic inferference and destruction of other nations and their citizens.  The double standard never ceases to amaze me.

I watched a series recently that, en passant, dealt with the nuclear attacks by the U.S. against Japan.  I knew that there were more than one, but had not really considered the reality.  They dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, witnessed and processed the horrific devastation it caused, then waited two days and dropped another bomb on Nagasaki!  There has been no so-called ‘terrorist attack’ anywhere that even begins to measure up to these inhumane nuclear attacks.  If any one is entitled to demand endless apologies, it should be the Japanese people.

I have wriiten the above on top of a post about childhood hurts.  There is some link here, but very little.  The point really is the ability to move on.  The Japanese moved on.  I moved on.  The sanest approach to life, and the one that looks to a new dawn rather than the poisonous fog of the past, is to move on.

After my mother’s dearh, the actions and attitudes of two individuals once close to me surprised me not only in the lack of ethics, morality, and common decency, but more even, because they demonstrated how deeply these people remained entrenched in childhood, in perceived or actual slight and a desire almost for revenge.  

I admit that I retained an idealistic vision of the past, a layer or veil of illusion that dominated some fantasies until I had a child.  People speak of ‘grounding’ in so many different contexts, but I became grounded in reality when my daughter was born.  I still loved fantasy and worlds created by imagination, but I no longer had any real,attachment to my childish dreams.  I would have liked a more positive history with certain past relationships, but knew those ships had sailed beyond the horizon, and the future was a far better option.

The Wide World of Abstract Art, Critics, and Navigating the Narrows of Disability

(Above, a quick photograph and I realise everything is slightly tilted, because I cannot reach any of them at the moment with anything less than excruciating pain, so let them reflect that reality.  At least I can look at them.)

‘Love or unlove me, Know or unknow.  I am that which unloves me and loves.  I am stricken, and I am the blow.’  (‘Hertha’ by Swinburne.  He is one of my favourite poets, and this was one of his best poems.  I quote these lines because it is how I feel now about exposing myself, exposing my limitations, my flaws, my struggle.  I make no ego-inflated claims.  I am sharing because that is what makes us better as human beings.  That dialogue where we do not hide behind illusions, are not trying to pretend we are something different or better.  I am not seeking your approval or any award.  I welcome responses, even if they are negative.  I was forced to look at my scars in the past year, and it was like being placed on an anvil and hit with a hammer.  It hurt, but I survived.  What I do not desire is illusions marketed by people with something to gain.  I can go to a game, and experience the best and greatest of illusions for that.  I do not want that tawdry substitute human beings slap together in order to sell their product, usually themselves, to you.)

Art is in my blood, and I have to confess that the taint of the Art Critic is in my blood or at any rate my heritage as well.  My grandfather was an artist.  He had formal training in Art, despite the disdain and shame of his mother who considered artists to be too bohemian if they pursued it as a career, on the same level as circus performers and courtesans.  She was a pillar of Society, a woman who told her son’s wife that spawning more than two offspring was unacceptable and common.  She therefore would recognise only the first two my grandmother produced.  Or at least that is the family legend according to my mother, who told this tale repeatedly.  As she was the second child to emerge from the womb, she was one of the elect, and I think that is the only reason she perpetuated the legend.  My sister inherited that awful mentality of always having to insist on being somehow special and above all ordinary members of the species.  The same elitism was instilled in me from the earliest age, but I learned to reject it as I grew more mature.

I personally value equality and people who try to claim superiority whether because of the accident of their I.Q., their personal wealth, a marriage that boosted their social staus, or some actual accomplishment, to me are less than human.  I once wrote about art critics as ‘a little lower than angels but far above the herd of humanity’ and I now would add ‘as well as the lowly creators they dissect’.  Critics make their reputation and status riding or flying on the backs of actual creators.  In many cases, books will be reviewed by other writers of the same genre, but the critic who does not write, paint, compose, film, photograph or create anything himself/herself/itself is a parasite who needs a host to exist or prosper.  A very clever and discerning parasite sometimes, even a potential Kingmaker, but not an actual creator.

One of my closest and dearest friends was a critic.  His name was John Gross, and he worked both in the States and in England for various publications, and as a critic of different branches of the arts.  He had one of the most brilliant minds I ever encountered, and Oxford asked him to take charge of some of its collections.  I believe Essays and Comic Verse were two of these.  He wrote book reviews and theatre reviews.  He had an encyclopedic knowledge of literature, art, film, theatre, and history, but he himself felt that all of his qualifications and accomplishments would count no more than a grain of sand if he did not write a book of his own.

Ultimately, he wrote two in the last decades of his life.  I believe he died fairly content because he did that in the end.  

Why did he not write fiction when he loved literature with a great passion?  He confessed to me that he did not have the courage.  He so feared his own kind, the Critics, who very well could tear his brainchild to shreds.  I swear this is the Truth.  Having devoted decades to examining, slicing and dicing the creative works of others, he feared the attacks his work might elicit should he put pen to paper and show the world his own soul.

When he wrote his own books ultimately, they were not fiction.  One was a study of the character of Shylock through the ages, and the other was a Memoir.

Recently, I have seen two ridiculous adverts on social media that pertain to the ‘career’ of criticism.  One is directed towards the elderly, to encourage them to throw good money after bad basically in paying some institution for validation in the form of a degree.  The other is some sort of business that offers to promote YOUR art to ‘qualified collectors’.  This in fact disgusts me.  In fact, both of these advertising avenues make me a bit cross.  (I have included screenshots of both below.)

I am no one, apart from having enjoyed some international fame in the world of gaming for the strategy guides I wrote.  This is quite different from creating games or reviewing and criticisng them.  Strategy guides exist as an aid to gamers to allow them the fullest experience of any game.  I became involved by accident, when my eight year old daughter begged for my assistance in a farming game called ‘Harvest Moon’.  One aspect of the game is Courtship and Marriage, and she wanted her character to marry Ann, but was having no success at all.

Half the time, she could not find Ann, and when she did, and gave Ann a gift, Ann never responded with anything positive.  So I had to play the game myself, and I began to write my experiences in the form of a journal.  At some point, I saw that IGN had published guides and tips for this game.  What I saw instantly was an error.  I wrote to the guy in charge of this division to point out the error, and the rest is history.  I wrote over 250 strategy guides for them as Freyashawk.

This is neither here nor there, but it is interesting to add when I corresponded with a close childhood friend during this period, I discovered he had worked on a couple of  legendary games that included ‘The Oregon Trail’ and he initially misunderstood what I did and thought I reviewed games.  He was disgusted by that, until I clarified to him that what ai actually did was write strategy guides.  At once, his disgust changed to respect.  So he thought as little of critics as I did.

This chapter of my memoirs was not intended to embrace my career as a guide writer, but rather the effects of physical disability on my life choices.  In fact, my immersion in games was a result of increasing disability and the wonderful illusion of mobility and freedom that games offered.  I will discuss that more in snother chapter.  What I wanted to do now was explore abstract painting, and how it has changed my perceptions and vision.

My grandfather could paint in any style, with all the formal training he had combined with natural talent.  He had a business and personal connection with a famous artist named Benjamin Brown.  I now believe Brown was the reason my grandfather dabbled in the creation of detailed drawings and etchings, because Benjamin Brown built some of his reputation on this type of art. He was a master of oil and watercolour as well.  In fact, my childhood was blessed in that my family had works by Benjamin Brown on our walls as well as works by my grandfather.

My mother was a collector of art as well as everything else that came into her hands by any means.  She always declared that she pursued Art History and her ultimate lifelong involvement in the ‘art world’ as a docent, a teacher, working at a gallery for art instead of cash, sitting on committees for various institutions and charities for one reason and one reason alone: she was dedicated to the promotion of my grandfather’s Art.  

Regrettably, she never had the time to do anything of substance with respect to Condé’s art.  My daughter even offered to make his art the subject of her Art History thesis, but the timing was ‘not convenient’.  I realised finally that her real smbition was one she achieved: being recognised locally as a patron of the Arts, working for social esteem and status instead of money and somehow somewhat losing sight of the real legacy left by my grandfather to the world. 

As co-beneficiary of my mother’s estate, I theoretically inherited half of the art works she owned, but multiple thefts and actual burglaries have resulted in the loss of many of the paintings I loved.  I am the eldest grandchild, and the one who actually watched my grandfather paint, and yet I have less than any of my cousins and far less than my sister, although we were intended to share equally in all things.

Initially, the disclosure of the magnitude of these thefts, being robbed essentially of my birthright, almost destroyed me.  It combined not the loss only of the physical inheritance, but the betrayals by my family as well as those committed by a very old friend whom I once loved.   I was incandescent with rage, overwhelmed by grief... well, I could describe all the negative reactions infinitely, but I came to realise I was destroying my own psyche by dwelling in the tent of bereavement and loss.

I am a forgiving individual.  I always refused the option to become bitter and twisted, whatever injustice or bad luck was meted out to me.  I did not want the evil in the world to infect me, to transform me or rob me of light.  I have been forced to face and overcome some ugly monsters and terrifying landscapes in my life, but the past year and a half have been the most difficult paths I ever had to navigate.

I was diagnosed with Stage 3 breast cancer at the same time my mother finally told me the truth about her medical status.  She had Stage 4 lymphoma and had been told she had six months to live.  She came to visit for the last time at the same time I lost a breast.  The months that followed were consumed by the combination of my radiotherapy, multiple procedures and sharing her struggle and agony only through telephone conversations.  That was brutal.  I felt impotent and yet, she told me repeatedly and very clearly to focus on my treatment.  She wanted me to survive.

I now understand there was a poisomous hidden undercurrent to this.  My sister did not want me there.  If I were not there physically, I would be removed from the equation.  

I urged my mother to do whatever she thought best.  Love has nothing to do with material gain.  For me, it is objects as repositories of memory, and as proof of the power of beauty that is more important than money.  To be robbed essentially of these, unique creations that were filled with emotional significance for me, and that were part of my mother’s identity as well, has been almost impossible to process.  I understood her interest in local,artists, but it was the loss of my grandfather’s work has that hurt the most.  

It was then that I decided to paint.  Curiously, my mother always wanted me to become an artist. As some one who did not enjoy reading much, the idea of me as a writer neither pleased nor satisfied her.  She really viewed her children always as somehow part of her.  I suppose that is natural, but it is not in the best interest of the child to be bound tightly to a parent’s ambition or vision.  I resisted.  I ffelt stifled somewhat by her powerful presence.  Like Sauron, she was not capable of sharing the stage with any one as an equal.  One had to serve, to be a pawn rather than a Queen, and God forbid one ever should reach the other side of the board to earn a crown.

That was simply who she was.  Second of seven children, carrying far too much responsibility as a child, with a father who was both despotic and a fountain of creativity and genius, who himself demanded service and unquestioning obedience... what else could she have been?  

I wonder now what she would think of my newfound need to paint.  I wonder if she would hate my work as much as she disliked my social satire and poetry.  

I remember that, on one of her visits, she asked my daughter what she thought of an exhibit at a local museum.  She hesitated, and I began to say: ‘I think it...’  My mother instantly cut me off saying, ‘I don’t care about your opinion.  What you think doesn’t matter.  I want to know what Freya thinks.’

My daughter was visibly horrified.  I was a little taken aback myself, although I was very familiar with my mother’s manner and her belief that she was not bound by ordinary rules of courtesy or consideration.  Looking back now, I wonder if she really meant to imply my opinion was worthless or simply wished to hear from Freya without any reference to a third person.

In any case, having lost the best of my grandfather’s abstracts, I have determined to create my own Condé abstract paintings.

Although my grandfather worked with different media and styles, he ultimately preferred abstract painting with oils.  I have no real training, unlike him, but I did sit in his studio as a child, watching him for hours as he worked.  I always loved his paintings, even though generally preferred representational art from earlier periods in history.  I was not drawn naturally to the work of other abstract artists or the various schools that were born after the 18th century.

My aim here was to see through his eyes and experience what he experienced as a creator.  The extent to which I have succeeded amazes me.  No, my work is not brilliant.  It is very flawed.  At first, I did not even pay attention to those flaws.  I was floundering in a vast sea of colour and texture, and I loved the adventure.

Gradually, though, I am making a little progress, at least where my own aspirations are concerned.  My daughter, who has years of training, has given me great advice.  She says that Art is a process, and that the process is what counts here.  I am engaging with the canvas, and the oils, and trying to capture a little of that magical world that consumed my grandfather’s life to such a degree that he could not pursue anything else.

It was my daughter as well who encouraged me to frame my own work.  ‘Everything looks better in a frame’ she declared.  How right she was!  Furthermore, framing a piece is a form of validation.  It provides me with another level of interaction as well.  When I look at my abstracts on the wall, new visions and stories emerge.  If I hang them differently, the entire meaning shifts sometimes.  It is incredibly exciting to have these conversations with my psyche, and with my imagination.  Of course, I could have similar discussions with an abstract painted by a great artist, but this is far more satisfying, because it is something concrete that I actually did.  For better or worse, it represents my labour.

Some people have been very kind about my art.  Some people have said something like: ‘You could sell that one.  I would buy it.’  That is not anything I wish to do.  It is not why I paint.  I am glad if some one likes it enough to pay and place it on a wall, but perhaps that is not even the truth.  Perhaps it is what that individual thinks I want to hear, and it isn’t.  I want the person to see something, to engage a little.  I want a response that has nothing to do with acquisition or money.  Do you see what I saw in my mind originally?  Do you see what emerged ultimately?  Do you see something I do not see?  Where I am concerned, most of my work is an ongoing conversation.  As long as it does not reach a dead end, it is worth pursuing.  Even if I come to an end on that road, if the view is good, I will keep making the journey.  Remember that I am disabled physically.  I need windows that offer wide vistas.  I need fuel for the imagination.  I need some validation, even if it is my own, so I have a reason to keep finding new experiences.

Life’s Worst Foes

 There are so many reasons not to write now.  My most powerful incentive to write when I was young was an appreciative audience.  The most exciting interactionI had was the audience for a novel I wrote at the age of 13.  It was based in an imaginary world inspired a little by Nepal, but the characters all were living an almost aristocratic existence and, despite the fact that they, like me were in their early teens, no one had any parents.  In that sense, it was a little like the novels by E. Nesbit.  There weredearly loved parents in her books, but they were absent always, and the children had an unusual degree of freedom, minded only by an overly burdened elderly aunt or housekeeper.

I wrote the first chapter and shared it with a friend.   She begged me to continue.  I then shared it with my family and other friends.  They urged me to continue.  Every new chapter was eagerly awaited and read, and the readers fell in love with characters I created.  That was the best part for me, to have the power to create a guy or girl real enough in the world of my imagination to evoke strong positive responses.

Alyhough I never had experienced a sexual kiss, I was able to write passionate love scenes.  I still am aroused a little myself by the memory of that turning point in the book where Bastien finally breaks his icy reserve and kisses Sophie, admitting that he does love her.

I wish to God my mother had cared enough to keep a copy of that book.  Nome of my later work had as much acclaim.  I suspect the writing was not that great, but the experience was.

I took writing classes randomly later in life at the local University not so much to learn how to write as to share work with others.  I met my furst husband in one of those classes.  I alwaus enjoyed collaboration, because it was effortless and so much fun.  One of the hooks that a childhood friend used on me recently in order to try to gain control of my mother’s assets was the idea of literary collaboration.

‘Let’s rewtite our story!’ he offered.  ‘Let us give it a happy ending.’  Nothing in the world could have been more enticing, and at the start, I actually thought he appreciated me as a writer.  In fact, he could not have cared less.  That hurt more than the significant financial loss he caused me.

The other disturbing and thoroughly unsatisfying aspect of this collaboration was his desire to manipulate the ending not towards happiness, but towards my suicide.  There is something kind of mental about that, and certainly is not something to inspire confidence in him.

Knirps Umbrella, Juggernaut and Buzkashi

 The Knirps Umbrella, Edwin and Juggernaut:

My memoir of the day features the Knirps Umbrella from my days as a Law student.  In the year above me, there was a bloke named Edward who represented the epitome of the conservative nature of the general perception of what a barrister should be.  One of my best friends ( chiefly because she had the room next to mine at Chamberlain) had aggressive social ambitions.  She discovered that Edward's hone address was a 'stately home's in the country.  He dressed very smartly and was top in his class.  As a first year student, he won the top prize for being the best in his year.  (I won the same prize a year later.)  As part of his turnout, he always carried a leather case, a sterling fountain pen, and this unique folding umbrella made by Knirps.

My friend was so impressed that, thinking he had to be connected to the aristocracy, she promptly captured him as her boyfriend.  I gently mocked all the pretensions by calling him Edwin.  At the same time, I coveted a Knirps umbrella as it was the most alien, cool shape I ever had seen.  As you can see, apart from the convenience of being a folding umbrella that could be stasged in a bag or briefcase, it was rectangular rather than round.

When I next took the train to London to shop, I bought a Knirps umbrella of my own.  I believe they sold them at Harrods.  It was exorbitantly priced,  but those were the days when a University education cost next to nothing before the next Tory government applied American profit based standards to everything, so I had a bit of  pocket money for frivolous expenses.

The virtues of the Knirps, like Edward, proved to be an illusion in terms of its visual promise.  It had an extremely complicated folding system and had to be dried thoroughly after any use or it is essentially would be ruined.  It was a nightmare in practical terms.  Yes, it looked fabulous when it was folded into its slim rectangular case, but I first began to carry another 'real' umbrella for actual use while dangling the Knirps units strap simply as an accessory to the 'well-dressed law student' and it looked fabulous with my Jaeger suits and Bally boots.  (Those were my pre-punk days.)

Edward proved to be an illusion as well at least in terms of the fanciful aristocratic character my friend had perceived.  I stopped mocking him and stopped calling him Edwin when she discovered he was the son of the housekeeper at the stately home and instantly terminated the relationship.  He was brilliant.  That was no illusion, but that was not as important to her as finding a lawyer to marry as her personal stairway to social advancement.   I felt sorry for him after that, but I daresay he did well for himself on his own merits and possibly even has ascended to the judicial branch of the House of Lords.  God only knows what became of the Knirps.  

A little postscript to all of this: My friend did marry 'well' to the point where her daughter ultimately was able to represent the rich girl in an episode of a rather horrible British reality series called 'Poor Little Rich Girls'.  As for fashionable 'well-dressed students' at my University, another friend and I were chosen to act in a film called 'Juggernaut' after we responded to a call for 'well-dressed students' on the University announcement boards.  The students who showed up for the 'cattle call' at the docks were ALL students from the Law Faculty.  

We had no lines.   We portrayed friends or relations of the first class passengers waving them off on their ill-fated voyage in the freezing rain.  (No Knirps allowed.  It had to be portrayed as a merry event and we had to hold and then release balloons into the sky.)  There were at  least two dozen takes of this minor scene before they let us go.  We spent most of the day on it, with a short break for lunch that was supplied as a small portion of soup in a plastic cup.  We were paid five quid each for our services.  (I recall we had to sign a rather substantial contract at the start of the day, which certainly cost them as much in paper as the actual pay they doled out )

The end of this tale is that Amelia and I both caught severe colds front long exposure to the cold and rain and spent more than five pounds on cold remedies.  As for our acting performances, we were featured live on television that evening on the local news, which made us the talk of the town for 24 hours, bug the entire scene was cut from the cinema version of the film.  If you can find a version on tape,  you can see me in my favourite Jaeger suit waving blithely to some random person on deck.

Although I portray this adventure as a grim proletarian tale, Omar Sharif was Amelia's mother's tenant at her flat in Paris, so we were able to demand admittance to him, and he ordered a very good tea for us.  He was handsome and very charming, although I sensed he entertained us a little reluctantly. Her mum was declared one of the seven most beautiful women in the world by Vogue.  Safia Tarzi held the world record for the highest ascension in a hot air balloon, and was killed a few years later when her balloon exploded in the skya few miles from Paris.  Another amaxing woman and influence in my life.  I will devote more to her later.  Meanwhile, with refernce to Omar Sharif, she complained often and bitterly that he and his friends had broken some valuable porcelain pieces while in resepidence at the flat at the Avenue Henri-Martin.  I seem to recall he played cards a lot, had a passion for bridge perhaps.

This is a photograph of Safia Tarzi I found online.  She had quite a connection with Vogue back in the day.  She was Afghani royalty, and the family fled with immense riches when the monarchy was abolished.  She was married very young to a doctor and they lived in Paris.  Amelia was the only child of that union.  The couple divorced almost immediatel snd Safia never remarried, although she created a very toxic situation by stealing one of Amelia’s boyfriends and creating a rather long relationship with the guy, who was at least a decade younger than she was.  

Safia was daring, intelligent and creative.  She was an afdent feminist at a time when women, despite their support of the banner of women’s rights, held back personally.  Safia was rich enough not to care, having jettisoned the husband who might have held her to a more traditional role.  She drove a black and white Corniche with her matching balloon to meets across Europe.  She designed and modelled her own unique creations.  She bragged about being the only woman allowed to play the very physically demanding Afghani game known as Buzkashi that is similar to polo.  It originally featured an enemy’s head instead of a ball, but that was changed to an animal’s head by the time she saddled her horse to play on an otherwise male team.

Cicely Edmunds and Agatha Christie, a Rose Garden and Murder

 'Ordeal by Innocence': sciatica and other effects of stenosis and scoliosis are so severe now that I am not functional physically, and will not even attempt to sleep in a bad tonight.   Last night was like being tortured on the rack.  I cannot recline in the recliner but the pain is least severe when I sit.  So back to nights in a chair.  My poor cats will be very upset, but hope  this horrible regression will be brief.

(Caveat: these posts really are notes to myself, which is how my novels always were formed, and how my paintings come into being as well.  I do not wait to publish.  Everything is a work in progress.  I give social media a little window into my thoughts and ideas, and if this provokes any interest or dialogue,  that is fantastic.  For me, these posts are part of an ongoing conversation with Life, with memories,  and opinions of art, music, books, film and television... and of course, people whether they shine brightly only in memory now, having died, or whether they still are here to engage with me on some level.  I do not require agreement with my views.  I welcome any dialogue, and any opinion of my work.  It is a constant struggle now, mainly because of the exhausting influence of pain, but I will not allow myself to put off my ambitions again.  Too much time has been stolen by recovery from surgical procedures, cancer and all those treatments and effects.  People may think that being confined to a chair would represent the best opportunity to write or paint,  but levels of pain do dominate choices.  For the month of November, however,  I signed up for a project that simply counts words.  They may be 90% rubbish and 10% usable.  The percentages may be even less in my favour, but what I promised to myself was production daily of 500 words, and so far, even though I think I may not ht ave logged on the site, I have exceeded the 'bare bones' skeletal requirement.

I read all of Agatha Christie's books when I was possibly 8 or 9, at the same time I first read Thackeray and Mary Renault, and every classic I could find.  My parents did not consider Agatha Christie as deserving, but I thought she was brilliant.  At that age, I missed some of the sexual and social elements in all the 'adult' books I read, but still engaged thoroughly.  I read 'Ordeal by Innocence' on a visit to Berkeley to see Cicely Edmunds,  who played in the San Francisco Symphony and had a gorgeous little house that bordered the Rose Garden.  A good read sitting outside at a perfectly magical venue.  Is it any wonder this is fixed in my memory?  I recall the warm breeze, the scent of hundreds of roses,  the gentle buzz of bees as they made their journey from flower to flower, and being completely enthralled by the book I was reading.  I did not want to put it down, even for a good lunch.  En passant,  I realise now that Cicely Edmunds was one of many amazing role models from my childhood.  She had shaped her own career and life perfectly.  The location on a hill next to the Rose Garden, as well as the little house filled with carefully chosen collections of art works, exquisite furniture, rugs, and little unique items were conducive to every positive current in the river of life.  She had earned the lifelong respect of other musicians,  and although the job was demanding and even exacting, she enjoyed it and embraced every musical challenge with zest.  She was a member of the Symphony when Seiji Ozawa became its conductor.  The appearance of that handsome innovative Japanese star in the world of classical music was very exciting for her.  She shared that sense of excitement with us.  He was charismatic and unique, and although I would have been aware of him as a listener of classical music, a more profound sense of him and his influence was provided by Cicely.

Back to Agatha Christie:

In recent years, I have become a little jaundiced about Agatha Christie simply because her work has been done to death in film and television, and when a new production is released, my immediate response is a sigh of almost annoyance.  Yet here I am, watching the ever-wonderful Bill Nighy in this 2018 mini-series, acknowledging that there is a valid reason why people continue to engage with the work of Agatha Christie.  They are not simply puzzler 'who-done-its'.  This version certainly is worth watching.

Postscript: Bill Nighy of course has given us many stellar performances, but one of my personal favourites is his role in 'Love Actually', a film that is on my annual Christmas Cinema de Condé programme, along with the Christmas episode of the fantastic Australian series,  'Mother and Son'.

Best Memories of La Jolla

As children in La Jolla, we had an incredible number of amazing shops and markets.  Some were upscale like Jergensens but others offered unique ethnic foods at a time when most other places did not have such a variety.  One of my favourite places was called C&M, where I became addicted to their Artichoke Frittatas.  I have travelled throughout ItalIa, have frequented Italian groceries in other countries and cities, from San Francisco, to New York, to London.  I never found a frittata to match theirs.

Many thanks to a Facebook group for old La Jollans called ‘La Jolla Homegrown’.

The Flowering of a Garden of Sociopaths

 I now have a great deal of personal experience here.  It was not an area of expertise I would have chosen, and as the sociopaths were individuals I actually loved or cared about deeply, the interactions have proved to be very painful.  For a sociopath is incapable of empathy or even of perceiving other human beings as equals.  Certainly they will satisfy their own needs and desires without ever giving others a second thought.  The ones I have known were considered to be ‘gifted’ as children and this gave them a sense of entitlement and somehow deserving more than ordinary people.

After beginning these notes, I found that some one recently shared an article from the New York Times purporting to have written by a psychiatrist who is a sociopath about her failuress as a wife and mother.  To me, the entire premise of disclosure for any purpose other than notoriety is bogus.  A sociopath never is sorry, nor interested in making amends.  What does interest them is manipulation of the audience.

To return to the past, and the chrysalis of the sociopaths I have known, I really believe that the gifted programme was pivotal in setting the format for their prceptions of Self.

I was one of those ‘gifted’ students as well, and I was arrogant and careless with the feelings of others to some extent when I was young.  I was bullied and mocked a little for being different and for being two to three years younger than every one else in my classes.  I could have become embittered and sadistic if I had obsessed upon that too much.  I could have taken any opportunity for revenge, I suppose, and made people feel misearable, helpless and small.  I could have embraced all of the old ‘Seven Deadly Sins’ and had a rather evil existence.  The fact is that I awakened one day and recognised that I really did not like to hurt other people, but this was not the critical realisation.

My epiphany was based on my own need to heal myself from the damage caused by trauma and old wounds.  The only way to do that wascby understanding why the people who had hurt me had done so.  What motivated them?  I had to learn how to put myself in the skin of another human being to solve the question.  Once I understood what motivated the action that hurt me badly, I could move on.  In many cases, I found that the system of victimisation or sadistic behaviour was not really personal or specific to me.  In some cases, it was caused by insecurity, as so often is the case when a child bullies another.  It can be part of the herd mentality or simply protective colouring.  Go along with the crowd and join in the taunting or teasing because you do not want to be a target yourself.  That is kind of normal really.  

We were resented at school by many who otherwise might have become friends because we were culled from the group and placed in exclusive very small groups based on I.Q.  When my daughter went to school, I was very happy that this awful practice had been discontinued.

Part of education is socialisation.  I skipped three grades to graduate at the age of 15.  There was nothing normal about that, and I think part of the reason I hated school so much was because my age and the lack of continuity with a single year group alienated me from almost every one.

What was less forgiveqble than the responses of my peers was the attitude of the teachers towards me.  I was treated with kid gloves.  My teachers generally behaved as though my intelligence intimidated them.  I challenged them constantly by inventing sources and creating quotes in languages I had invented.  I wrote an entire poem in Medieval French for my French class.  I inserted fake ‘memoirs’ into my essays for History classes.  Why did no one take me to task?  Why did no one slap me down for my nonsense?  The only things I needed from education were socialisation and discipline.  I was given neither.  Almost everything I ever learned was from books that I read.  One can read books at home.

I desperately wanted some kind of real friendship and acceptance.  The closest I came to that was by creating the Motley Crew, an acting company that was formed to convince my mother that we were not children having fun, which she would have not allowed, but young artists who were pursuing a serious academic aim.   As my own classmates were three years older than I, I cast my sights on my sibling’s class, as they were closer to my age.  We wrote a play after asking each potential member what character he or she wished to play.  It was kind of a wonderful concept.  It is really a pity that two members of our group became sociopaths and I therefore really no longer have any genuine connection with either.  Another who probably was my best friend has died of cancer.

The only girlfriends I had, with one notable exception in Vivienne, hit on me, and not having either experience or encouragement in dealing with affection or infatuation from members of my own gender, their advances soured our friendship.  One of those friends later committed suicide.  I lost contact with the other girl who was from Germany, and I do regret that.  

I only gradually recognised the sociopaths in my life.  One really does not want to believe they exist in everyday situations.  Hannibal Lector is not the neighbour who lives down the road ordinarily, although I did discover that a man who killed his girlfriend, then cooked her head in a pot and ate it had been a neighbour of mine in the East Village in Manhattan.   

More later.  My hand is cramping badly now.  It truly amazes me that the sociopaths I know, rather than showing compassion for me as a disabled woman, had the scent of blood in their nostrils, and a mentality of ‘survival of the fittest’.  In their view, I deserve nothing because they are so much stronger physically and more mobile.  They are not more intelligent by any means, and that could be another reason they want to bring me down, because I actually am an equal, and they refuse to acknowledge that.  God forbid there are people who remind them they are not as unique and soecial,as they think.  King and Queen of their Dung Heaps is how I look at it.  Oh yes, they are richer than I and always will be, and some of those assets have been stolen from me.  One of them told me in so many words that as I owned ‘no assets of significant value’, I should surrender control of my share to her borderline criminal partner.  The other one expected me to roll over, allowing him to act as Trustee of any assets I ultimately acquired... and why should I do that?  If he had been honest, I might have considered that option, but past friendship only counts for so much , and discovering significent theft and pilfering by this one, not to mention the fact that I will fight to the death if need be for the rights of my daughter, marks the end of that road.  No, I will not involve the police.  I will do it my own way.

I do not think sociopaths are born.  I do not think they become sociopaths at the age of 12, like Jewish children who acquired the mantle of adulthood at that age.  I think the descent is gradual, and somehow the choices they make and often, the benefits reaped by manipulative, greedy, and dishonest actions, encourage their sociopathic tendencies.

I always try to be courteous, and I have a tendency to allow people their fantasies, as long as they do not harm me or ohers.  I believe that this response of mine may have led these sociopaths to believe that I do not know the difference between fantasy and reality.  In fact, I am and always have been almost painfully conscious of reality.  I have an excellent memory as well.  I still am hurt profoundly by the knowledge that a close family member and a close childhood friend whom I even once considered my sweetheart only perceive me as a ‘mark’.

A Tale of Life and Death, the character of Julian

Julian muses: 

She is the kind of woman that makes one feel like royalty, or even the son of a god.  She is a woman who took my breath away with her audacity, her intelligence, her sense of honour and above all, her presence.  Not the most classically beautiful woman in the world perhaps, but there was an inner light that dazzled and sometimes blinded me.  You may think me a fool, but I was not the only man to kneel willingly at her feet, nor the only one to offer my life to her.

In this day and age, when every one has turned away from the old values, when religion is the topic of vulgar jests and matrimony has become meaningless except for financial benefits, a matter that no longer is blessed with the potential of children much of the time... perhaps you will find the concept of unconditional love and obedience absurd.  Hanging from a cross, I had time for reflection and I am not a man who is gullible or ignorant.  After the first hour, I begged to be allowed to kiss her exquisite feet and to pledge my allegiance to her.

Now you may create your own sordid scenario based on a mistaken notion that my acts were driven by a desire for sexual gratification, that she was Mistress, not of the souls of men and women, but of drama.  I expect you did not pay close attention to the very first thing I said to you:  She is the kind of woman that makes one feel like royalty or even the son of a god.

You probably thought she fed upon her own power and loved the idea that SHE was royalty (which she was by heritage actually) or that divine blood and authority ran in HER veins.  I do know that she thought we all had a birthright that could raise us far above our current social status, far beyond any considerations of money, career or whatever else defines us in the eyes of society.  And THAT was her power, her gift to all who came to her for help.

Much has been written about dominance and submission... once taboo, it has become common currency in the bedroom and the boardroom.  What she offered was far beyond all of the vulgar commerce or partner agreements.  Beneath her whip, I was reborn.

Characters of Antoine and Julie

For the novel, portraits of a couple too common in reality to ignore.  

Antoine: Do you really need that fan and second light on when you're in the bathroom?'

Julie: Let's see... i'm in there about 2 minutes.  But I guess... why don't you just follow me about and instruct me on how to become a total asshole?

Julie:  The latest thing is to start every complaint with 'Note:'  Does he EVER listen to himself?

Abusive behaviour is corrosive.  It is eating away at my soul day by day.  I try to ignore his absurdities and his contempt, because I know it really is directed towards himself.  I seldom have known any one who hates himself so much and cannot deal with it in a slightly more positive fashion. He is a real 'kick the dog' personality and the sad part of it is that, as a successful salesman, he was able to conceal this aspect of his personality from me entirely until it was too late.  I met him at the wrong age, the wrong time and the wrong circumstances.  The fact that God decided to allow this man to plant the seed of life in my womb changed everything.  From that point onwards, my life was devoted to my daughter and what I felt would be best for her.  I remembered the nightmare of growing up in a broken home, of having my Mum remarry and the constant power struggle between her and her new 'family unit' and my real father, who spent the last decade of his life living alone in a sad little hotel so that he could stay close to us.

I do not understand how women kill their abusers frankly.  It elevates them to a position they do not deserve.  I would not go to prison for any man or woman. Would you be willing to go to prison for killing a mosquito or cockroach?  Why then would you be willing to ruin your future for an abusive man or woman?

It makes one think of Lou Reed’s album ‘Berlin’.

‘Caroline says as she gets up off the floor,

You can hit me all you want to,

But I don’t love you anymore...

But she’s not afraid to die.’

More about this pair later in the context of an estate item.

Sappho and Freddy Mercury

There is a part of me that would like to chuck all of the following into the nearest bin, along with all of my romantic ideals, aka illusions, and perhaps take a thunderbolt from Aphrodite's kinsman and hurl it down onto the heads of all of those who have deceived me, insulted my intelligence and humilitated me since my mother died.  Most of these individuals are people I should have been able to trust and certainly once were loved by me.  To know first of all that some one closely related by blood asked me for my medical records, not because of any concern for my good health and survival, but to see what the chances would be of me dying of cancer so I would be out of the picture still is difficult to process.

The general consensus appears to have been that having once been (for a brief time) a bit of a wild child, I never grew into adulthood, never actually became an individual who was eligible for anything good in life.  

Aside:  Never, never judge an individual by his or her childhood or even adolescence.  People who do not have parental or social guidance especially can spiral down quickly.  If you are a neglectful or irresponsible parent and your child does need help, emotional support or guidance and you fail to give it, count yourself lucky indeed if that child does not commit suicide.  It amazes me how any one can be egocentric where parenthood is concerned.  There are parents who look at a child and simply see a reflection of themselves, and where reality differs, they round off the edges and blur the outline.  They see what they want to see.  The child is an extension of their egos, and anything that goes wrong is shoved beneath a psychic carpet to rot.

That happened to me.  I actually nearly died because no one listened to me when I complained about severe pain and when it dragged on and on without any resolution, I did become desperate and despairing.  I was barely 21 years old, and I saw no future because I knew something was terribly wrong and no one was addressing it with any sort of logic.  Small towns, however prosperous and sophisticated they may appear, are still small towns, and the networks of gossips include members of the medical profession, sad to say.  I think society has changed a little in this respect and being young does not mean that your voice cannot be heard now.  In those days, however, it did, especially when a parent and other self-appointed experts spoke more loudly.  

All of this ended only when I moved out of the geographical area, and instantly went to a good gynecologist who hurried me onto an operating table and whisked out my very dangerous ovary.  That close call redefined my psyche.  I lost any faith in the future.  I saw how easily a disease or illness or even an act of violence could terminate any life plan.  And I admit that after that, I became very insouciant where planning of any sort of financial security or programme for old age was concerned.  I honestly never believed I would survive long enough to reap any rewards, so I lived for the day basically.  I did not squander my life, but when I had a job, I never put money aside for my old age.  I admit that freely, and I have spoken to my daughter many times of my foolishness.  There is an expression a very dear friend of mine used to use:  'We are cut from the same cloth, you and I', he often would tell me.  The fact that he was one of the most brilliant, well read individuals I ever knew made that declaration a positive one.  I would not have wished to have been a literary or theatre critic as he was, and I knew in my heart of hearts he always envied writers of fiction and wished he could have had what he perceived as the 'courage' to create fiction, but all of that aside, being cut from the same cloth as John Gross would be a source of pride.

The only reason to mention this expression is to say that my daughter is NOT cut from the same cloth where money and planning are concerned.  She is a very responsible and forward-looking individual, some one who never tried to borrow money off her family, who never abused the love of family members for her own gain, some one who really is a bit of a role model for me in many ways.  In point of fact, she may not be a role model, but what she is for me is my compass that constantly points to the honest and decent option in any situation.  Going back to the start of all of this, I tried NOT to shape my child into a duplicate of myself.  It is natural in a way to want our children to find joy in the aspects of life that give us joy, but I really really tried to allow her to become whatever she wished.

Whatever influence my mother had on her unfortunately never resulted in any validation for my daughter, and that breaks my heart a little.  My grandfather was an artist, and in our family, artists were placed as being closer to God than any mere ordinary creature.  He was not successful in making a name for himself.  He had little success in supporting a family of seven children.  It was my grandmother who held down two jobs to do that, working as both a teacher and as a nurse... but it is my grandfather who is the subject of ancestor worship.

Of the seven children, my mother was the first to have a child, and I was that child.  Indeed, my grandfather's mother (my great grandmother) was the epitome of a social snob and declared that it was indecent to have seven children, especially if one could not support them financially.  She therefore recognised only the eldest two, according to my mother.  My mother happened to be the second child.   (My mother told me this again and again, and yet just now, I realised that my great-grandmother had THREE children, not two.  So was this simply another false fact in the Book of M to lend her greater stature or legitimacy or something?). It is a true fact, however, that I really was the only grandchild to have known my great grandmother, simply because I was the first one in my generation to have been produced. Once upon a time, there was a photograph (black and white no doubt with those wonderful deckled edges that photographs and fine writing paper used to have) of me as an infant seated upon her very prim and proper lap.

This great grandmother never liked the fact that her son had declared himself an artist.  Art was something one did as a genteel hobby, but was far too bohemian to be embraced as a career.  Her other son became a Minister and a missionary minister to boot, but that is one of the traditional callings.  Ideally, the eldest son would have farmed the land, but they lost all of their land in a period of great economic depression.  My mother would tell me of the land they once held that had become valuable decades later in the very heart of various cities.  I am not certain what happened to the original farm.  She never spoke of that.

These ramblings are not for public consumption at this point in time.  I am simply trying to kickstart my writing again.  The past year and nine months have been the worst in my life.  It is ironic that I recognised this would be the case in a rather prophetic manner.  I anticipated my mother's demise as ushering in the absolute nadir of my existence, and it did.  I was diagnosed with Stage 3 breast cancer a few months before my mother died, and that was very horrible, and terrifying and painful and everything else.  The thought of BECOMING my mother physically after watching her degenerate after her breast cancer from a slender beautiful young woman to some one who was overweight and misshapen with an arm swollen to twice its size by lymphedema was a constant source of fear once I reached adulthood.  One has fears like this, but I have to admit, I never really thought it would come to pass... and then it did.  I lost the same breast she lost.  It was both better and worse for me, because I am left-handed and it was my left breast and the lymph nodes in my left arm that were taken.  She was right-handed, so her primary arm was not affected.

Undying Aphrodite of the shimmering throne/chair, daughter of Zeus, weaver of wiles, I beg you not to overpower/subdue/bring low my heart/soul with anguish and distress, dear Lady/Mistress.  Come here if ever before you heard my voice from afar, and hearken/pay attention to me, leaving the golden house of your father above,  the noble sparrows  beneath the yoke, to quickly lead or bring down to the dark earth.  Close and compact, feathers and wings moving fast descending through the middle of the heavens in a whorl or spin.  Arrive suddenly/with speed, blessed fortunate one with your smiling face aid ask:  for what again do you suffer, do you call me yet again, do you want exceedingly, yet again ask why do you suffer with your frenzied raving spirit/mind/heart?  who do you want me to persuade (ask the divinity  Πείθω) yet again into your love or affection?  Who wrongs you, Sappho?  For even if she flies, she soon shall follow and if she rejects gifts, shall lead/carry/bring them soon in return, and if she does not love, shall love soon, however unwilling.  I pray you now to break me free/loose me from thought/care/anxiety, and accomplish my desire.. and be my ally.  

Let us discuss Aphrodite specifically in the context of Sappho.

First of all, Aphrodite is not the patroness of marriage in the traditional sense.  She is the power of lust and illicit love.  She herself has been made victim to this power.

She was born near Cyprus (in other words, native to Sappho's land) from the severed genitals of Uranus, a sky god.  When Chronos castrated his father Ouranos with his sickle (a curved tool/weapon that symbolises the crescent moon, and thus Chronos, god of time, is associated with the cycles of that heavenly body), and threw the genitals into the sea, Aphrodite (foam born) emerged from the foam.  This is the version of her birth that is given by Hesiod.  In other versions, she is perceived as the result of the union of Zeus with Dione (a Titan).   In the latter, then, she would be, as the Orphics used to declaim:  'I am a child of Earth (mud) and starry heaven, but my nature is of heaven alone.'  Despite everything you say, there are associations with the ancient Cybele and the mystery religions where it is only through castration that a god emerges. 

She probably was the heir to the traditions of Inanna/Ishtar and the Phoenicians who called her Astarte.  Nonetheless, as that is not relevant to you, her name associations of 'Aphrodite Pontia' (of the deep seas) and 'Aphrodite Euploia (of the fair voyage), and her name Cypris ('of Cyprus') all surround her like the sparrows in the Ode.

Whether the word conjures sparrows or winged phalli or simply a torrent of words, it is part of this supplication or invocation to the great goddess.

Now to the affairs of the Goddess.  Married (against her will in some cases) to Hephaistos, the greatest smith in all of the worlds and a cripple to boot, but having affairs with Ares, Hermes and Dionysus himself, there is of course the famous tale of how Hephaistos created a golden net and trapped the goddess in the act of intercourse with Ares.

The result of her union with Adonis or Dionysus was Priapus.  Priapus of course is the most potent tiller of soil, the very power of fertility with his enormous phallus and association with gardening.  Here again though I see the association with older cults.

Other children of Aphrodite allegedly include Eros, Harmonia, and the mortals Aeneas and Eryx.

She is linked to the term 'mixis' which means 'mingling' and has obvious associations, but associated both with peace and with strife, as Freya herself in later times.

Described by Hesiod as 'quick of glance', 'foam-born', 'smile-loving', 'golden Aphrodite', and by Homer as 'smiling' and 'golden'.  So Sappho's description of Aphrodite responding with a smile is very classical.

I am going to take the bull by the horns here, because her association with my beloved Adonis is very clear.  She fell in love with the beautiful boy, locked him in a chest, and delivered him to the care of Persephone.  The lady of Hades then fell in love with him of course, and would not return the precious cargo to Aphrodite.  Zeus intervened and made the usual dictate where these consorts or lovers of the Great Goddess are concerned: Adonis, as a god of vegetation should spend four months in the Underworld, four months with Aphrodite, and four months of blessed solitude each year.  Thus we have here again the fate of Dumuzi who was punished by Inanna for not having mourned her disappearance into the Land of the Great Below to confront her dark sister, Ereshkigal, but simply held orgies and sat upon HER throne in the Land of the Surface, by taking her place seasonally in the Underworld to perform the role of Ereshkigal's dead consort each year for a season.

So, against YOUR desires,  let us explore the conception and life of Adonis. 

He has many different tales, because his cult obviously was adopted by the Greeks.  For the Greeks:  it all began when his grandmother Cenchreis, boasted that her own daughter Myrrha was more beautiful than the goddess Aphrodite.  This sort of boasting always leads to disaster.  The goddess punished her by causing the girl to fall in love with her own father.  In some versions, the father was Theias, king of Syria, but in others, he was Cinyras, king of Cyprus.  he was the son of an incestuous union between Theias, a king of Syria and Myrrha  or Smyrna, his own daughter.  She is defamed by the accusation that it was she, the child, who 'tricked' her father into having sex with her.  This sort of trickery definitely is one of the powers of Aphrodite incidentally.  The child of this union was Adonis.  The father was so disgusted by the event that he wanted to murder his own daughter, but she pled for her life and was transformed into the Myrrh Tree.  Myrrh incidentally is the symbol of death and is used even now in incense and in embalmings.  Adonis was spirited away by the smitten Aphrodite, hidden in a chest, became the object of a jealous dispute between Aphrodite and Persephone, and Zeus pronounced his doom.  He actually was killed by a boar, either an accident or agent of a jealous god/goddess, Artemis or Ares.   Aphrodite then transformed him into a violet flower.  They still hold the annual rites of mourning for Adonis in some parts of the Arab world as well as Iran under other names, but originally it was a festival known as the Adonis.  It involves the planting and nurturing of fast-growing grass that then is pulled out by its roots and thrown into moving water (usually a river).  In Lebanon, the river actually turns purple during a season and this was considered the result of casting the dead god into the water.

Symbols of Aphrodite include a band or girdle she wears across her chest (an ancient me that holds her powers of desire and seduction), a sceptre (another ancient me), a dove or other bird, including the goose, a wreath of myrtle, a looking glass (mirror), and often she actually rides a swan or goose.

I think the following about yoking the chariot is significant.  She is obliged to leave her father's house, and perform an act that gives her one of her powers.  The yoking of the chariot and invocation to the sparrow or sparrow to carry the chariot down to earth is not accidental.

She cannot perform this task from her comfortable throne or chair.  Moreover, she cannot fly down from heaven to earth.  She needs the sparrows and the chariot and the descent is quite dramatic and powerful.  As I wrote previously, it is like a tornado with a specific destination, arriving suddenly to Sappho.

9¤ρµα ατος Ð chariot. Ùπασδεύξαισα aor.part. nom.sg.fem. of Ùπο-ζεύγν¯υµι yoke under, put under the yoke. καλός ή όν good, noble; beautiful. «γον = Ãγον 3.pl.impf. of ¥γω lead, carry, bring. 10çκύς ε‹α çκύ quick, swift. στρουθός Ð sparrow. περί is also used in Aeolic for Øπέρ above. γ©ς = γÁς gen.sg. γή ¹ earth. µέλας µέλαινα µέλαν black, dark. 11πυκνός ή όν close, thick, compact; fast, strong; πυκνά adv. δ¯ινέω whorl, spin; Aeolic δίννηµι; δίννεντες pres.part. nom.pl.masc. πτερόν τό feather; in pl. wings. çράνω = οÙρανοà, gen.sg. of οÙρανός Ð heaven. α„θήρ έρος Ð ether, heaven; air. 12διά through. µεσ(σ)ός ή όν (in the) middle.

Furthermore, she may have a smiling face, but Aphrodite has a dark history, as dark as that of Demeter and quite similar.  Adonis, whom she loved, was held captive in a chest.  Persephone and Aphrodite become rivals for his love.  Zeus dictates the old solution of dividing the year into seasons for him to go to one and the other and then have a few months alone.  (The chest is similar to Plutarch's telling of the myth of Osiris.  According to Plutarch, it is a sort of Cinderella glass slipper tale.  Set creates a glorious chest and offers it as a gift to the one who fits inside it.  Only Osiris fits in the chest.  Set locks it and throws it into the river.  It floats to Byblos where it lands, and a tree grows round it.  Isis searches the world for him and in some versions, actually became a nurse to the queen's child.  She liberates the chest or coffin and carries it back to Egypt.  Set cuts him into pieces and all the pieces are thrown randomly hither and thither.  The penis is eaten by a fish.  Isis must make a new one through magic so she can become pregnant by her dead husband in order to bring forth Horus.)

Undying Aphrodite of the shimmering throne/chair, daughter of Zeus, weaver of wiles, I beg you not to overpower/subdue/bring low my heart/soul with anguish and distress, dear Lady/Mistress.  Come here if ever before you heard my voice from afar, and hearken/pay attention to me, leaving the golden house of your father above,  the noble sparrows  beneath the yoke, to quickly lead or bring down to the dark earth.  Close and compact, feathers and wings moving fast descending through the middle of the heavens in a whorl or spin.  Arrive suddenly/with speed, blessed fortunate one with your smiling face aid ask:  for what again do you suffer, do you call me yet again, do you want exceedingly, yet again ask why do you suffer with your frenzied raving spirit/mind/heart?  who do you want me to persuade (ask the divinity  Πείθω) yet again into your love or affection?  Who wrongs you, Sappho?  For even if she flies, she soon shall follow and if she rejects gifts, shall lead/carry/bring them soon in return, and if she does not love, shall love soon, however unwilling.  I pray you now to break me free/loose me from thought/care/anxiety, and accomplish my desire.. and be my ally.

Sappho was a poet but she was first and foremost during HER life, a performer.  Thus, every piece that now is read originally was performed by her for an audience.  She sang, evidently, and although many people have attempted to perform her work, too much information is missing to make any of this more than wishful fantasy.  Nonetheless, I believe it is vital to identify the audience.

They would be very familiar with the Goddess Aphrodite, and she would be a day-to-day part of their ordinary lives.  There would be temples where sacrifices would occur after doves or birds or whatever was being offered were purchased in a market or whatever.  It does not matter whether Sappho was religious or not.  Aphrodite would be woven into the tapestry of her life and the lives of her audience in the same way going to Mass, having a cross in the house, and other old Catholic traditions would be part and parcel of the life of any Italian during the Middle Ages or until people actually were able to rebel against the Church.  

Apart from this, an Invocation to the Goddess at the beginning of any performance would be an auspicious act, like making the sign of a Cross.  'Bless and smile upon this little song of mine'

So she sets the stage:  The first part identifies the Goddess, and probably would have been accompanied by some action on the part of dancers or musicians.  No one really knows, but it is not impossible that props would be involved as well. 

Next, there is actual drama in the form of the descent of Aphrodite, the swirling or thick spin of the sparrows, the movement of the chariot.  Whether this was accomplished simply by a drum beating out an increasingly fast rhythm in conjunction with the poetry or whether it was accompanied by dance or whatever... we do not know, but I feel that this drama is an essential part of the Ode.  it is not static.  It is not simply a recitation of Aphrodite's aspects and powers.  It brings her down to the audience with words and associated actions (even if only in the mind of the audience).

Now we come to the gist of the Ode.  It becomes very personal.  It is a dialogue between Sappho and Aphrodite ostensibly, but in fact a vehicle through which she can express the whole business of love, of desire and torment, of the nature of seduction.  Sappho demands reciprocity of affection.  She enlists the very power of the Goddess Aphrodite to persuade this mortal to respond to her, even if unwilling, to 'bring gifts'.  I think this refers to love and sex, not actual items like flowers or fine cloth or whatever lovers gave to one another.  What is interesting here, however, is that she is not asking for happiness or joy.  She is asking to be freed from her torment and anxiety.  She needs the object of her desire to submit to her, and the implication for me is that, once this is accomplished, she will move on to some one or some other desire.

I do not know what more you expect from me, to be honest.  Again, one cannot ignore the audience.  She is singing in order to involve them in her own feelings, her torment, her quest for conquest/love/lust.  There is an undertone in the entire Ode, despite the 'smiling face' reference to Aphrodite, that Sappho never will achieve any real enduring happiness.  Her quest is ongoing and infinite.  'Once again', 'again' and so on.  Her definition of passion is ephemeral in nature, much like that of the Goddess herself, who fell in love more than once.  She does not ask that Aphrodite give her the love of some one who will be devoted to her for the rest of her life, with whom she can share love on a stable basis.  She is the female equivalent of a rake, a Don Giovanni.  If she had a Leporello, he probably could have counted her conquests.  

The life of Don Giovanni held no enduring happiness or joy.  He had courage, and he had the overwhelming need to conquer women, one by one, but he did not have any emotional attachment really to any of them.  I see very much the same in Sappho. This, however, is a fundamental theme in music and poetry through the ages.  Most poems and songs do not speak of a placid, joyful existence shared with another.  They speak of torment and longing, the desire to seduce the object of desire.  What happens afterwards often is irrelevant.  It is the thrill of the chase, and the excited, enhanced emotional rollercoaster associated with 'falling in love' and trying to achieve that moment of union that would constitute victory.

The next part of this essay is to compare Sappho with Freddy Mercury from Queen.  This would be anathema to any classicist, but I find it an interesting comparison, especially with respect to 'Somebody to Love'.

Here are the Lyrics:

Can anybody find me somebody to love?

Ooh, each morning I get up I die a little
Can barely stand on my feet
(Take a look at yourself in the mirror and cry)
Take a look in the mirror and cry
Lord what you're doing to me (Yeah, yeah)
I have spent all my years in believing you
But I just can't get no relief, Lord

Then the Chorus: 

Somebody 
Ooh, somebody 
Can anybody find me somebody to love?
Yeah

I work hard (He works hard) every day of my life
I work 'til I ache my bones
At the end (At the end of the day)
I take home my hard-earned pay all on my own (Goes home, goes home on his own)
I get down (Down) on my knees (Knees)
And I start to pray (Praise the Lord)
'Til the tears run down from my eyes, Lord

Chorus once again, then:

(He works hard) everyday (Everyday)
I tryand I try and I try
But everybody wants to put me down
They say I'm goin' crazy
They say I got a lot of water in my brain
No, I got no common sense
(He's got) I got nobody left to believe
No, no, no, no

Chorus again, then: 

Got no feel, I got no rhythm
I just keep losing my beat (You just keep losing and losing)
I'm okay, I'm alright (He's alright, he's alright)
I ain't gonna face no defeat (Yeah, yeah)
I just gotta get out of this prison cell
(One day) Someday I'm gonna be free, Lord

Find me somebody to love (repeatedly, now)
Somebody (Somebody)
Somebody (Somebody)
Somebody (Find me)
(Somebody find me somebody to love)
Can anybody find me
Somebody to
Love?

Sappho cares nothing about the identity of the object of desire.  She is consumed by the pursuit.  Freddy has lost the motivation, the faith in the pursuit itself.  Sappho asks Aphrodite, goddess of love and passion, to bring her the object of her desire.  Freddy asks 'any one' to bring him some one he can love.  

So is it the thrill of the chase?  Is it the very interaction with Love and Life itself?  Do we die when we no longer care?  When we no longer can summon the energy to look for love?  To have faith?  In some one, in something?