suddenly grown, endlessly growing

Summer days dazzle as he dips
into her well of youthful vigour
it's only till he's grown a bit she thinks.
Somewhere within she knows:
her youth has bloomed
her once upon a times are faded:
uncertain futures dawn his every day.

Image (c) Author: Aug 31,2019

A day in the life ~ Navigating the Mad Giant

It hadn't started that well.

Saturday coming up for one-ish and we think we'll drop into 1 Fox in downtown jozi and poke our noses about, pick up a pint & pizza and that'd be a nice way to set up the rest of the weekend.

We'd circled around in the drizzly wet heading for a parking spot I knew which was good on busy weekdays and offered free parking if you drink at the Mad Giant.

Only no-one had said anything to the parking jockey and he nicked a twenty off me which annoyed her because CLEARLY there were empty bays outside the lot. And a misty off-on drizzly which didn't improve the mood as we walked past the empty bays down to the entrance. A girl doesn't like her hair getting frizzy before the weekend has kicked off.

So you can't blame Mrs T-Potts because she offered a moment's pause from the wet and if there're two things herself loves its books and flowers. Even if the books were leaning over a bit. It wasn't the books or the flowers that delayed us though ~ Tea pots, Tea sets. and teas, teas, teas everywhere. A quick moment to catch breath and warm fingers and toes and plunge on became a drifty "oh that's nice", "what about this" "I really can't afford ..." (~ wistfully, that one!) and it was a good 20 minutes before we stepped out to head to the Mad Giant and his inhouse brews and tables.

Looking up bits of sky were visible and the light much brighter, even though the clouds had deepened to black and steel. That was a warning sign, should've taken note!

Now, I really like the Mad Giant. Fridays the team'd trail down from the offices and fill the bar and tables with chatter and work-related stories, slag off the bosses and wipe the foam from the mouth as the brew sipped down. By the time we dispersed the stress of the working week'd be dissipated and its all become good.

You don't notice in that atmosphere that really, this is a fine dining place, with fine dining waitrons (hate that word!) and menus. Something that's glaringly obvious when the place is mostly empty and the fine waitrons are amusing themselves ~ well somewhere. Still and all it's a nice place to look at, the high ceiling, the copper vats and pipes, wooden counters and benches contrasting with the fine dining tables.

So by the time we'd done that, and decided the food hall across the way was the answer, those black clouds had closed off the sky and the light outside had dimmed. The sound of hail on a tin roof is very distinctive! and we knew as we stepped out under the afdak that we'd waited just a little too long.

So here we stand under that same afdak and think . . . "just a measly 3 meters or so from the warmth, the smells, the happy chatter in the food hall. Beers & Pizza! just 3 thundering meters away . . . " and then we lean back up against the wall. Soggy underwear and squelchy shoes? somehow just don't go that well with beer & pizza. The gods will be kind. We'll get there soon enough.

and so they were.
and so we did.

And as we sipped the beer and piled into the pizza the thought was also that here's something quite fine about standing under a sturdy tin roof with the hail clattering down, waiting for that moment when you can duck across skipping puddles and torrents and into that warm waiting space. There's nothing quite like beer & pizza to restore the blood-sugar level, is there? Time enough for a little Scientific Research!

Images all (c) Author (all rights reserved) Oct 20, 2018

a day in the life ~ Saturday morning at the Pantry Market

After a deeply thought provoking walkabout hosted by the artist Robert Slingsby at the neighbouring Circa, I wandered over into the Keyes Pantry Market to give it the once over, it being new there and all. Lots of lovely little stalls, all in a carefully coded corporate livery and not at all like the usual little market stall places.

The people manning the stalls are lovely though, and the goods yummy and worth the trouble and expense. Frequented by the kind of people whose 4x4's traverse the urban landscape, climbing pavements for parking on the weekends and shuttling hockey sticks, cricket bats and footballs during the week. The clean middle to upper classes, if you know what I mean.

This place really works for them, and curiously I very much liked it too. Space enough to gather and chat to the stallholder, try some of the wares and not feel jostled and forgotten. The stall holders like it too, they can go to the loo and not worry that their goods will be stolen or mishandled. Sometimes less definitely is better! Especially if the less has enough to satisfy the need. And I picked up a really nice pesto for a friend whose cooking talents are legend. A win all round.

And that's how it was for most of the stalls, excepting one joyous little corner in the bottom section, run by Bilkees who is Creative director at KolorKids in Parkhurst. If you go to the Who we Are section on their website you will see the very image of a director gazing professionally back at you ~ "How can we be of Service, Sir or Madam?" But here, Oh here she was simply beaming from ear to ear as she stepped away from the weekday business to just have fun with the kids coming by.

You really do see people as they truly are when catch them engaged in what they love to do, don't you? If they weren't so old & ugly I'd have my kidz there too! (well, maybe the grandkids, one day. They, of course, are perfect!)

The Fates: What lessons do the Ancient Greek Sisters have for us today?

The sisters ponder on and weave the tapestry of a life *1 Read from ... Lachesis Chlotho Atropos Conclusion

The Ancients believed the three Fates had roles at the start and ending point of their lives, and at the various crisis points. They were the mistresses of the mother thread in the life everyone, both gods and humans. Is there something to learn from it today? That's the topic of this blog post. Let's kick off with a brief summary of who they were. Looking at the image, we see

• Lachesis (the assigner, sitting at the back) she decided how long you would live for;
• Clotho (the spinner on the right, that's the thread of your life she's pulling on), Clotho spun the story of your life and intervened at critical moments in it; and
• Atropos ( on the left - the 'unturnable', preparing for the moment when she will cut off the thread) she also ensured that you never deviated from your fate.

Each of these women acted independently from the others, i.e. they could not influence each other's actions. No doubt, being women they likely gossiped about our foibles, but at the key points they acted on their own volition. No court of arbitration. No appeals. Dice rolled, wheel of fortune spun, now get on with it. You wish our leaders could act with that sort of firmness and decisiveness!

How might this work then? and what value did people get from the process? Why were they so accepting of it? Let's do a plain language, somewhat allegorical deep dive into it.

Lachesis

She had a rod which she used to calculate the length of your life. Your life would be spun on a spindle, so her measuring rod was used to determine how much thread is allocated to you. Think of it this way ~ every heartbeat is a stitch, and when all the thread is used up, your time has come.

Freedom from the fear of death
You might say that there doesn't seem to be much value in that! Not so. The ancients were very pre-occupied with the reality of death. Life was uncertain, and death or misfortune could strike at any time, from anywhere, without warning or mercy. Much like today, in fact ~ only we put it to the back of our minds. Modern life insulates us from death until it strikes those around us, and then we are overwhelmed by it. Thereafter it haunts us, a silent breathe on the nape of the neck.

Lachesis takes this most primal of fears away: this fear of dying. Since our days have been numbered, down to the last second, they were able to live life fully and without fear. You're going to die when you're going to die, whether you act with cowardice or courage, with honour or deceit, so you're free to live your life to its allotted span. At the end of your days you will be remembered for how you lived, and for nothing else. Your legacy is in your own hands. This is the promise of Religion expressed in a different way: both view death as a portal rather than as an ending. Both offer a means to immortality.

Having done her work she plays no more part in our lives: Easy job. Some goddesses have all the luck! Look at her up there with her chin in her hands, chatting about this or that while the other girls do the hard yards.

Clotho

She has skeins of twine with which to weave your life's story around the mortal thread. Not forgetting a spindle and a needle to do the weaving with.

Imagine it this way. You're living your life, and unbeknownst it's been recorded on a tapestry which can be seen by those who have sight of it - not mortal people, of course! but by those who'll judge you one day and call you to account. We have come to a Big Moment waiting on a Big Decision. Maybe your relationship with your partner has soured. Maybe chance has brought someone new into view, and temptation beckons. What to do? Well, let's see …. hmmmm. Divorce, that's an option. Murder. An Affair (sounds exciting!) Couples Therapy? Maybe do nothing (because doing nothing is a choice with consequences!)

Knowing you (as Clotho does, she's been weaving your life's story since birth!) she knows what you would do in the event of each decision, and so she weaves a different path for each choice: one that you will be fated to follow once you've made up your mind. Beware! The law of unintended consequences always applies. Clotho is also the Goddess of Chance. She (metaphorically speaking) spins a wheel of fortune and let's that influence her weaving. And so Murphy's Law was born . . . . .

Let's think about this for a moment. Your life now comes down to a cycle of issues and events that lead up to a decision point. It's your decision, no one else's. You could get someone else to decide for you, but again that's what you chose. Having made your choice you're committed to follow whatever transpires. Once begun Divorce follows its path. You can't undead your partner once the murder is done (or attempted.) There's a process waiting, with police, judges, jails and who knows what else. The affair, well that could go anywhere! And not all of it to your liking either. Doing nothing will most likely lead to a deepening of a poisonous relationship steadily souring two lives. More if there are children or other dependents in the equation. Maybe couples therapy would've been a good choice after all . . . committed couples therapy, that is.

You live your life, you're confronted with choices, make them and then you're on an irreversible path. Nothing much has changed in 5000 years, has it? To live well you must choose wisely. But wisdom is not given us, it is acquired through our life's choices and reflections: we are iron hoping to be forged into steel in the furnace of life.

Atropos

Atropos has a pair of shears, probably better to think of them as scissors, these days. They never had modern manufacturing plants. The modern Atropos probably dresses like a Goth and has a range of really cool scissors in her hand bag. And hates her parents & siblings (careful dears, those scissors have purpose!)

So what's her role then? Keeping the end in mind, once the length of your thread has run out, she makes sure to cut off any that might somehow have remained. She cuts off the thread and so ends your life's tapestry simultaneously drawing an end to your life.

She has other duties during your life. After her sister has woven the possibilities, Clotho steps away. Atropos waits until you choose and then cuts off the ends of the lives you chose against. These are your ghost lives, shadowy possibilities of might-have-beens irrevocably pruned and composted.

There is no value in the moment of cutting, the value comes later in self-reflection and awareness, if you choose to make it so. 

Wisdom begins here, because as we reflect on the lessons of our choices, and ponder our ghosted lives, so we start on our journey towards it. We come to understand that the Wisdom of our mentors and influencers are their stories partially realised in ours: the contexts of our own lives might differ, but human emotion, honour, morality and ethics and their opposites are eternal. To become wise we take the wisdom of the past and adapt it for the present, and then hand it on to the future.

So what is there to conclude?

That the process the Fates followed are a mirror of our own lives maybe?

How will your tapestry look, laid out at the end of days?

All your struggles and choices laid bare:
a legacy built from the ugliest clay in a life well lived,
or one torn down from a golden plinth?

We know and understand so much more, yet still our lives are woven under the influence of random chance and in the midst of mindless chaos, and here's the only difference between then and now: The Ancients had an external force to blame for how their lives unfolded. We can own our lives.

*1: Public domain image sourced from Wikimedia Commons