Here are some photos. Not the ones I promised of Transsylvania, though.
Instead I made them on the great plains of Hungary only a week ago.
The new camera has an awesome panorama function. Enjoy :)
This is a small bridge over a small river. It is not really an attraction or tourist site. The main road (not the highway) goes through the bridge and we stopped to see what there was to see. :)
And finally, this is me, looking for stones to play in the water :)
This is for now.
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Summer has almost gone and although the days can be scorching hot, nights are cold. I like the commencing of Autumn.
I miss writing.
I miss the self that uses words to release the tension, to explore new futures and would have beens. I am part lazy. And part I am not really left alone, to my thoughts. And part I myself kind of lost connection with those little, harmless inner voices that used to tell me what to type...
I have got my new camera, a Nikon one, my first ever Nikon, and I am back from Transsylvania. There are pictures to come soon.
But it seems that ever since I came back, I am occupied with workload. Recently I have had three proofreading jobs.
So far I have done it only to help my fellow aspiring writers in the writers' group. But now these are strictly professional readings. My mind is tired.
In my free time I do the usual garden chores... with varying success. All my first sowings were ruined by blackbirds, so I am sowing again, hoping for whatever, good luck or something.
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I am now closer to 50 as I am to 40.
Now, I may start sentences with the phrase 'When I was young'. It is unbelievable.
Suddenly, my parents, thank God they are still around, seem really, really old. Being old if you have an almost 50 year old daughter is common sense.
I don't feel old, though.
I know...They say it's not the number of years, but the way you feel that counts.
Sometimes I feel young, like... 30.
Sometimes I feel like 90.
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Sometimes I feel the Benjamin Button way.
Either that or I have feelings that bothered me when I was much younger.
Like the purpose of life and all that stuff.
I think I found answers to all those questions when I was 30, but maybe I have to find them again.
I was at home with my family and about the same age as I am today. Yet it was beyond question that I had only hours left. Just as if I were a machine with a pre~set lifespan. The time available for me could not have been expanded in any way. We accepted it as a fact and had no wish to fight against it.
My eyesight however was a different matter.
It seemed that sight, the organ itself had a longer, maybe an infinite time still ahead, so we deliberately spoiled it.
Yes, in my dream my husband poured some liquid into my eyes so as to make sight go away with me.
This is how my dream began, with eye~drops to make me, step by step, blind.
As the dream progressed, I noticed my sight getting worse and worse by the minute so I was more aware of time slipping out of my hands.
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I woke up mesmerized, afraid and full of thoughts.
Finally, in waves, my tennis elbow syndrome is declining. I still have to watch my activities and I am extra cautious with movements and weights so as to not to strain my arm.
But there is a definite improvement.
For the record I list what I found helpful: specific exercises (there are lots of them available on youtube for free); rest; refraining from certain movements and lifting heavy things; volatile oils and last, but not least: castor oil. The latter proved extremely helpful.
My son is finally home for another two weeks. He has finished the first semester of the MSc graduate training at Sopron to become a forest engineer.
Now there are only 9 more semesters to go. I know, I know, this is just the beginning. But if he keeps liking the things he studies here and the prospects of life his future diploma may hold, he will keep on marching towards his MSc title.
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My tennis elbow on the other hand feels all right. I mean it does not go away. I overloaded my body with lots of gardening stuff in mid to late October in 2015 so by early November my right forearm has become deformed. Not knowing of the condition and to avoid pain I kept my forearm in slightly arched position and it stayed. I was practically unable to straighten it. A bit frightening sight, if you ask me. So I had to visit a specialist and by mid December I received two steroid injections. The deformity has gone now. Certain movements do hurt (like I twisting my hand when I am holding onto something between my fingers such as opening a door with a key). I can not lift anything heavy and I can not chop firewood. Well, I can, per se, but when I do such activities say more than 3 (not an accurate number, just a guess) times per day my night's gone due to the pain.
I hope to get recovery by March for the pruning season.
My chances are low.
Wow.
I am beginning to sound like the Dear Cat Diary, heh.
This year the choir is celebrating its 25th anniversary. I have been a member since 2009.
The celebration takes place in December in the 'advent' season and one of the pieces we do will be the Hallelujah choir from Händel's Messiah.
My son, now a first year BSc student to become a forest engineer in 5 years, has finished 3 of his 6 exams of the first semester.
He has spent the Christmas season with us and we were able to see how he changed. He turned 19 and he is not the teenager he used to be. He is responsible and mature in many ways. I am so proud of him.
I keep my fingers crossed for the rest of the 3 exams. And this is only the first of the ten semesters :)
I played myself and arrived to my original family and was welcomed by the helpers who played my father and mother.
It felt awesome.
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During the day I took part as a helper and played relatives of other people. Again, please note that using the word 'play' is in no way to refer to the ongoing events as if they were a theatrical act. Family constellations are in no way a drama sessions in a theater or high school. Whatever :)
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If you are open minded and wish to find connections to your ancestors, wish to find more about your motives and dispositions, and wish to accept changes within yourself then this is the right therapy for you.
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Nuff said, be well!
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The following photo is from the internet. It depicts the Fishermen's Bastion. After the day was over we climbed the stairs to the Buda castle and took a one hour walk around. The Fishermen's Bastion is one of the things we saw.
We are invited to take part in family constellations.
The whole Sunday is dedicated to that. Normally, this kind of therapy is expensive, but now it is free for us (me and my husband). We have to participate the whole day and one of the sessions will be about our family.
If you are unfamiliar with this, you are advised to check this or this.
If you are sceptic, it's allright.
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We have been in one constellation a year or two ago and it was amazing. The random people chosen for their roles just behaved shockingly similar (or same) as their 'real' counterparts usually do. The session for our family took two hours I guess, but I lost the perception of time, it was so interesting, and it did solve some serious issues for more than one member of our family at the same time.
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Tomorrow during the day I may be chosen to represent someone's relative or someone's 'play counterpart'. I am a bit afraid, but also am willing to go for it for I trust it is helpful for me and for the family I am helping, too.
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Any thoughts?
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I will report on this event as soon as I can word my experiences.
The need to have some personal space to share my thoughts with anyone and no~one; with the world and with myself.
I need some time out.
My body, slowly turning 46 is telling me things. It's time to slow down. Relax and ask questions.
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I find that there are periods in life when you just ask questions. You slow the pace down and begin to wonder about things.
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I vaguely remember the questions I asked when I was 40, when I was past 30 and so on. I guess there are phases to individual development.
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I may not ask the questions appropriate for my age/position/whatever, but these are the questions I ask. I don't have other questions simply because I don't have them in my mind. Or not yet. Or not anymore.
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These days I ask about my roles, the meaning of life, the need I have to ruin# my life and myself for that matter, the lack of desires and so on. At times I tend to cry randomly. I may not be on the right path but I lack the will to correct.
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I am still around, horrified by the will to leave this whole thing as it is, mainly because I don't trust anything else will be better given another chance; drowned by guilt to not feel well when all the world is going mad and with all the good things I do have.
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(#For those thinking that I am doing things against law: no, it's not one of those 'ruining'. I am better than that.)
I don't practice English as much as I'd like to and my command of the language is failing. Bit by bit, but the tendency can not be mistaken. I am not glad with what I see, but I am not sure blogging is a good way to keep up the level.
I have been writing this blog for almost 9 years now.
I went through phases of my life and I needed this journal to keep me sane, to keep me up in the current of events.
At the same time I am sure that my life is eventless. It's just that I take things deeply.
Revise: I used to take.
I am tired and confused, but try watch things come and go, embrace them be as they are. Nothing matters as much anymore as in earlier years.
The less I write, the less I want to write (it applies not only to blogging, but to writing fiction and poems as well. Oh, the sadness of it. Sometimes I am happy with non~writing, sometimes it hurts.)
Sorry guys.
I will not delete the blog however and may return anytime with any subject.
I would fly up, to the clouds and sit on their edges and look at people talk, move and love like ants. Then I would dive down to run with wolves, kiss the tree and fear a beetle tramping above my dungeon in the ground. Oh, youth. But times these days... times are a changing. The level of the bed stays the same. With comforting walls around. Torn. With the flu I rose to the ceiling, and watched and waited for this to pass. I was ready to meet the point of no return, if it was not for your arms. But you were there and so I am here. For being torn between worlds. Times are a changing. For whatever.
I wrote 21,000 characters (space not incluled) on brooding hens, egg selection and chicken hygienics.
I have to shorten it, or make two articles out of it, but still hey, I am ready!
Yay for me.
On the evening there will be a 'Talent Show' at my kids' high school.
My kids avoid school when possible, but I volunteered to take part in the mixed choir for one song.
Yay for us.
It is a short song by Banchieri, for 5 voices (soprano, mezzo, alto, tenor and bass).
The text is translated to Hungarian. Basically it is a happy song that encougares the guests to stop watching the show and doing idle things. It calls for a washing of the hands and occupy the table that is set for dinner.
Actually, ours is the last song at the end of the 90 minute show.
We perform it right before the dinner is served.
Yay for the guests (parents and teachers).
And later on, to finish off the day, we are going to a party to friends to play board games.
I guess this is one of my best winter days like ever.
Here's some of the music I used to listen to when I was younger, youngish, young.
We ran 11 times in January, but then I got sick and the antibiotics I took caused me a pain in my joints. I had to refrain from any unnecessary movement.
Now it's February and I am working on an article.
I wish I did, but I keep doing other things.
Oh, the disadvantage of working from home...
I clean and heat the house, chop firewood, grind seeds manually for the chicken, clean their house, and practically do almost anything to avoid writing the article.
I can't recall the last time I made new year resolutions.
I have a journal, and in that I set plans for every month, and for every year. At the end of each month I check all entries, tick plans that I accomplished. More often than not, failures are explained in a few words, too.
I'll give you a glimpse of this journal:
Here are my plans for January 2015 for example... Write 6 articles on the field of agriculture (ordered by magazines). Careful excercise (I have to mind my joints). Maybe some jogging. Write a short story for a competition. More sleep. More reading.
See? Nothing exotic, out~of~my league, but nothing really mundane either.
Although on a second thought... that short story might not get written. That is a bit too much for me. The competition is historically themed and therefore is beyond my comfort zone, but miracles do happen.
But I digress.
I noticed a tendency.
Our cells are said to get totally renewed in every 7 years. It does not mean however, that you are a completely new person in every 7 years, as the transition takes place over the minute, not in one single transformation.
But I do see a pattern.
About 6 to 8 years ago, or was it 9 years ago, when I started this blog, I had to claim my intuitive self.
Until like 6 to 8 years ago, I was rather a woman of principles and ruts.
With this blog I took part in a process that some might label as unleashing, opening new horizons, getting involved in the unconscious.
Now I feel I had my part, and I should be getting more organized to move forward. I need more to be more concious of what I do.
I am not letting this blog go, and I keep writing non fiction as a hobby, too.
But I see the need to pay more attention to how I behave as a mother/wife, how do I work for my payroll, what I read, how much I sleep, how do I choose my daily fitness routine and so on.
I want to reclaim some of my former self while kind of keeping the 'new', intuitive one.
Any similar or opposite observations? This post is updated by adding a video down below. I used to listen to kd lang a lot back a couple of years ago. My taste in music has changed, but I leave it here as a reminder of the past.
Last night I had a dream in which I had the chance to verbalize things. In real life, there is this person, who used to be an important part of my life. In fact he never stopped being a person of high importance for me...
And I guess I am (was) as important to him, too.
He did hurt me at times, and he did it so nonchalantly that I have the good faith that he did not even notice how much pain his words had caused me.
I never told him about these scars he caused.
I kept on smiling.
And loving.
Oh, the fool one.
Now, in the dream, he hurt me again.
And now I objected.
The first time ever I stood up for myself and somewhat kindly tried to make him understand that he was actually hurting me now and back in times as well.
In the dream we did not get to the part when he had the chance to react to my words. I woke up. And I woke up with the intention of organizing a meeting.
We have unfinished business, and now I am ready to finish it.
And here comes the update part: When in first draft, this post was much longer. It contained bits of information that are irrelevant. The message is that I am ready to smooth bumps of the past out. Yay for me. And although I did say 'unfinished business' and did intentionally chose a photo# from this particular movie, there is no violence within me :) Be well, cheers, Your tree.
#do you still see the photo? It is a photo of the ending scene from Kill Bill, just after Beatrix killed his former mentor. The man is still alive, but is standing and is about to say goodbye.
This August this blog had its 9th anniversary and I have not celebrated it.
This is the 9th way of blogging: you have a blog and you think about it dearly, like a child, a love that was yours once, but it is a bit far away from your real life actitivites now. Lost, yet close still.
There is still at least one reader, and I would like to thank for her perseverance :)
(the concept is that you the reader should put 'there' in front of each paragraph)
- doesn't seem to be any reader to this blog, but I will continue posting anyway. Some of my old readers might drop in at any time and I don't want to bore them with the same old posts... And also, I will post whenever I have anything to say :)
- in the capital of the Czech Republic I found that particular church that helped me a lot back in 1987. This photo was taken at the Old Town's Astronomic clock, it is quite a feature of the city.
- I was again, sitting on a bench, contemplating the inside of the building, the rich pictures and baroque statues and all, and I was asking myself how was that transformation at all possible. How it started, what was the trigger, was I already in a transition, how did God or anything holy reached out to me back then.
- back in 1987 I felt that I was personally spoken to.
- I sat when a bunch of tourists flooded the church with cameras, they tried to be quiet, but when 20+ people tries to speak at the same time silence just doesn't happen, and they were soon treading practically everywhere just like a swarm of wasps.
- went the inspiration, the spiritual awareness into thin air - or so I thought, but I was mistaken again.
- I heard 'it's not in the building and you know it. it's within you, right there, within you. now be gone and be happy' and out I burst, not even noticing any of the bunch of the noisy invaders anymore.
- I practically walked with my feet a couple of inches off the ground for some considerable time.
- is something in that church, isn't it a bit of a paradoxon?
Our choir is attending an international musical festival between 17 and 20 July.
Prague, capital of the Chech Republic is about 8-10 hours' drive from the town I live.
It will be the second time I visit this city and the memories of my last (and first-ever) visit are now coming back to me.
I was 17, bordering 18, the same age my son is now, when I spent 3-4 days, 4-5 nights there with my girlfriend, now a mother of 4, living in NY state, USA. She was my best girlfriend of the highschool years, one of the few.
We set on a plane, and it was first-ever plane flight at 17, bordering 18, you know, Hungary is small, the only other occassion I had been up off the ground was a helicopter ride above my hometown I enjoyed when I was about 15.
So there we were, young ladies with a supportive family background to explore a bit of the world, to explore it on our own way.
Memories....
I started the journey as a die-hard atheist and I guess you guess the ending to that part of the story.
Ahem.
Before the journey I was contemplating ways of quickly removing myself from the depressive state of being alive. I did not jump nor did I swallow any poison or anything like that, but.... I went to Prague instead :) And although I was still wondering of ways of killing myself in any (actually: in almost all) of those poetic locations, I surely did not.
That would have been quite a stress on my dearest girlfriend, now I come to think about it.
What a heck of a selfish person I was back then....
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Now, after a bumpy ride of 5 university years and 20 years of marriage (not less bumpy), and many other events later, Prague, here I come again.
European aspen (Populus tremula) is blooming these days, actually for weeks here in Hungary. The male flower has a cotton-like flying soft structure that triggers an allergic reaction. I am surprised because this is the first time my reaction is so obvious.
I know I am allergic to ragweed (Ambrosia artemisiifolia), and I have been living with it in the past 15-20 years. Luckily for me, my symptoms have been reduced to a bearable level by eating bits of the fresh plant before and during the season.
This aspen allergy is kind of new - although when I come to think of it, ithas been getting worse over the past couple of years.
Now it reached a level where my eyes are swollen and when outdoors, I keep sneezing and my nose keeps running.
So, here's the story - I visited a therapist who is both specialist in mental therapy and applied kinesiology.
She pointed out that the Latin (and the Hungarian) name of the plant refers to a specific behaviour of aspen: that is, trembling, fluttering, wiggling, vibrating upon the slightest wind. Aspen represents my state - the way I react to my environment. I have a tendency to overreact, and a tendency to react to anything I reckon whether it is my duty or not. I want to have control over things I know I have not and the non-controlling, the continous failure to control and the continous income flow of impulses makes me nervous and exhausted.
This is the reason behind my allergy.
We elaborated on this topic a bit.
I have to learn to let things remain uncontrolled, especially if said events are none of my business, or of lesser importance. I have to focus and stay calm. Or so are the first steps of the healing process.
if any, after all these weeks and months without any activity in blogland.
I have not written much, or much interesting in the last couple of months (years?) and have neglected by blogging fellows, too.
This is not to apologize - this is to recollect all the things that happened along the time in a nutshell: we are ok, nothing seriously good or bad happened.
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I keep writing articles to three monthly magazines. Two of them requires an article each month and the third is always subject to the topic, which means that I write 12+12+about 8-10 articles a year.
I keep gardening and raising chicken for our family's need. This year I invented a small amount in buying 15 individuals of 7-day old Australorp chicken to introduce a double-purpose line to our collection.
I wrote two short stories, but more on that on my other blog. Please find yourself kindly invited to read over there about my successes and failures on the writing front.
The kids kind of hate their highschool and their attitude is kind of an issue within the family these days. Fortunately they don't to any drugs/alcohol and we don't have any of those really heavy problems, but we are a bit worried.
My husband and I are well together. Things that caused trouble in the past couple of years have either disappeared or been discussed and sorted out on mutual agreement. There is love and that is what matters.
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At this point I can't tell whether I will keep on blogging or not.
I wish to be more withdrawn, I have not used my email in the last couple of weeks, but I am still on face_book. Being there sometimes is amusing and inspiring, I do have partners to chat with, but most of the time it is frustrating and annoying.
I miss blogging when it meant that I analyzed events and emotions around me. Blogging did help me at times -
I am planning to finish Irving Stone's The Agony and the Ecstasy this month. It is a shame, but I have been reading for months - I am so not telling for how many months.
I like the book and Michelangelo's character a lot, and I guess it's only the language and the intensity of the writing that makes it difficult to read.
Kudos to Mr. Stone for his is a wonderfully woven, thick material :)
I also plan to finish a small Agatha Christie piece called No. 16. I got that for Christmas.
That book really disappointed me.
If books were scored from one to ten, with ten points given to the best ones (such as the seemingly flawless impresson about the Italian renessaince), the crime novel would receive only 2 (or 3 in a better mood - and only because I am a fan of Ms. Christie.
It is so shallow and meaningless that I wonder what made Dame Agatha write such a bad book at all. The usual suspence and wit which I admire in her Miss Marple stories is also lacking here.
Or it is just that the sunless, foggy days wear me out.
I keep making lists of things I have not done, or have done wrongly, done instead of something more reasonable, or the opposite, more while listening to my intuition.
I am almost 100 % sure that making such lists is not the best one can ever do. One should rather focus on the positive events, on the happy achievements, on the appreciatiations, the positive feedback one gets from here and there.
I know, I know.
But anyway, it's my birthday and I allow myself to spoil it as much as I like.
weekly lectures are published in chapters each Friday.
I watched the first chapter on the next week, and had to miss weeks 2, 3, and 4. now I am catching up and watch these chapters 2, 3 and 4 (three weeks) in a row.
unfortunately, the material so far has not been as satisfying as I expected.
for one, the course focuses on online storytelling (tv serials, webisodes), which is definitely not an area for me. and also, the theoretical
material they are sharing is far from being really on-the-spot. it's more like an introduction to something. a feed for discussion, maybe.
and here comes my part ... there is an ongoing debate, in a forum style, which, honest, I do not follow. it is simply impossible to read all that stuff that people all around the world contribute.
one might pick a topic randomly and read a couple of comments, but the vast amount of written material repels me.
there is no guarantee that that particular thread I read is of importance for me. and my clock is ticking.
so, this course so far is a kind of a disappointment.
I'm still in, have not unenrolled, but I have doubts about the use of it.
The link is here. I thought I'd give it a try. More on that later on. -
Right now I am polishing a 10+ page scientific paper I have translated to English. Some of the most frequent words reveal my state of mind these days: farm regulation, inheritance law, turnover, material resources, measures. Had enough I guess. I, too :) - please tell me it's not 'me, too' here, right?
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About the photos:
They were made in Poland, where we had a nice performance with the choir.
At the first evening of the 1956 revolution, usual radio broadcasting was made impossible by street fights.
Before the national radio station was moved to the building of the Parliament, journalists grabbed a few vinyl records in a hurry and later on, played them during the days of the revolution. This record, Beethoven's s Egmont overture got played so often that it is connected to the Revolution. For many magyars who think about 1956, this is the music that pops right to the mind.
I am attending a 10 week poetry course that started this Friday (27 Sept). It is organized by the writers' group and the leader is a young poet who comes to the classes from the capital. What does this mean? I've been experiencing some shift and being-out-of-place lately when visiting online sites, fb included, of writers of various genres. I felt I was the odd one out because everyone seemed to have focused on writing, and by that I mean writing every day, some no matter what, and some in genres that make the hair rise on my back. Don't get me wrong: it is a-okay to focus on writing while you are a writer. I think I've just figured out that I was just not a writer. May never be, and this feeling is kind of liberating. I am someone who writes, but writing is not my everyday profession. Writing helps me and I'd like to help/entertain/educate others, raise consciousness whatever, but I am no tradesman. I am Dario Naharis, if you like, I write when my Muse tells me so, and while I love, love polishing my style and gathering technical tips for writing, there is life and unless the not composing of a writing makes me feel uncomfortable, I do not compose anything, thank you Gustav Holst. So I feel the pressure on me is lifted and I am free again. And what will I do with this new-found freedom? I will write, you guessed it right.
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