what you wish for

Hey there. Miss me? What do you mean you were too busy? Oh, come on, just because history was being made, greatness redefined and the world peace pendulum swinging wildly from extreme to extreme...

It has been a quite a week hasn't it?
Is it just me, or did the world shift on its axis a little? No, I know the answer to that. It wasn't just me.

That speech! that benediction!
That an elected leader of that nation said to his electorate that his nation needs to learn to consume the world's resources more responsibly? That he said some of the hard things that many of us concerned citizens of the planet have been grumbling about, worrying about for at least a decade?
Its so cool.

Yeah, he'll do. Well done, you guys, for choosing this one.
We wished and you wished, and they wished, and it came to pass.
Maybe its a case of - this time, everyone was very, very careful what they wished for, and this time it paid off.

So I've been a slacker blogger. Ever since Fush and Chips posted that manifesto about slow blogging, I've been thinking, about what I'm doing here and do I really have to post if I don't really have anything to say?

Actually, I don't need to blog at the moment, because Reya of the Gold Puppy always says whats in my head, and says it first. Like her post of today.

Seriously though. I started this thing in May last year, and I started it because I was angry. It was the time of the horrific xenophobic attacks in urban South Africa, and I was bursting with stuff that I wanted to say, not knowing at all who I was saying it to. Trying to undo writers' block - the kind where you have too much to say. (Writer's backlog. backblog. oh shhhh) Then I met all these incredible, warm, interested blogmates. I didn't quite expect that. Beautiful.

But suddenly I'm like, uh? How did I get here? What am I doing here? Random confessions? Navel gazing? A showcase for writing snippets that don't have a home? A marketing device? Oh my Gaaad! She has the blogger ID crisis!!! Its doing the rounds. Miranda has it, Janelle has it. All a question of scale, you see. The worker ants are restless, and the giant aardvark is coming with its big sticky tongue of oblivion.

What. is. she. on about?

I started this as a place to launch some spells, to call back the long skirted ladies of the dim and watery places (Muses, to you). Recognising some deep fertile connection between wild spaces and creative impulse, I wanted a virtual alter where I could burn some incense. Lacking a stage, a rehearsal space, I needed a sanctified zone where I could pour all my randomings. Hmmm. But now, ever restless, ever discontent with what is enough, I neeed mooooore! So I'm starting a sister blog - one that deals strictly with matters of a professional and a livelihood nature. One with a bit more focus, you understand. To go with the fact that I'm, er, starting a business. Watch this space. Actually, watch the space next door. Oh sod it, I'll send you there when there's something to read.


And in other news related to rituals gone awry and wishes with suprises attached, I attempted some clumsy rain dances for our Arusha cousins. In my garden the other night. The kind where you run outside and thank the big soggy clouds for bequeathing you with their blessings, and then try to waft some of it northeast to where Janelle and Miranda suffocate under empty white skies. The kind where you sort of take a wild stab and point the clouds in the general direction of the Ngorobob hill...several thousand kilometres away.

The next day, as I was busy cramming for this EQ course that I am in the middle of teaching (yes, this missive comes to you from ....drumroll... Witbank...client is BHP Billington. Later, I explain later.) SO there I was, a whirl of nerves and a trial of errors, sitting at my computer screen, swearing at powerpoint coz I really wanna be blogging... when I hear our tenant calling me with an edge of urgency in his voice. Irritable, I pop my head out the back door.
"Tamara, we have a disaster."
She thinks: Disaster? I'll show you a blerry disaster - wha? Water? Flood? Huh?

Turns out their geyser burst. Two inches of water on the carpet, and they come home to a spaniel standing on the coffee table to keep her feet dry. Ok, so that's their problem. My problem, is that the water is floowwwing, not dripping but flowing, through a crack in the floor that separates their flat from the downstairs garage, where MY BOOKS ARE GETTING WET!!! Boxes and boxes of the Zambian ceremony book that I published last year, and which is stored in my garage. A thousand copies of it!!! AAAAHHHHHHH!

Oh yeah, I knew this Mercury retrograde still had a suprise or two in store for me.

Luckily, I ripped open the wet cardboard on the outside and managed to salvage most of them before the seep got in. Working feverishly to haul heavy boxes out in the pre-storm heat.

So, sorry Janelle. I er, didn't manage to send the rain very far.

Aaaah. Peace, y'all.
Love and too many fussy cushions, from a B & B in Mpumalanga.

Where there is plenty of rain.