Shiva's and Metta's Mother's Sutra

 Can't quite believe I began on Wednesday... The entire area has been managed... Gardening as ideology. I began at 8 and finished at ten. It os mo longer a laen but a species-rich grassland. I started with the spiral and had to stop every now and then,  going back and covering caterpillars and gastropod eggs shining in the green dark. The Robin appeared,  a little more careless. I listened to Huartan. I counted the types of vegetation i saw. So much indoctrination about what gardens should be like. I remembered conversations about creating mosiacs of habitat that went on amongst the wardens... on a much larger scale of course. Mosiacs of habitat... lets do this and find out... Imagine if i had taken a weed wacker to this? Everything would have been destroyed... the green feathery yarron, the seedlings of new visitors, the hibernating insects, the collector of dewdrops... all gone... for what?  Replaced by mo...

The doctor is in On this day I THINK I spent the morning gardening and then I watched some TV. At that point I received a message from Ghin's girldfriend which necessitated me having late brunch with Ghin. We talked about relationships. Relationships were hard. I said to him, if I ever have any advice to you it would be this:  1) Do not do long distance relationships because they are relationship on Highest Difficulty Level 2) Sort out your shit before going into a relationship: specifically boundaries, insecurities and trust issues. 3) Be a friend to the person first before you enter into a relationship. I have not done any of that shit by the way, but if I had my life to live over and I certainly do that. That would be my advice to anyone. Oh and sex while not that big of a deal, is also something which shouldn't be entered into casually. For so many reasons. It was very funny because my sister was telling me this video which the students in her daughter's sch...

This was a truly awesome cartoon. I can't believe that children in India all know the story of the Mahabharata. Imagine that. And to give the makers of this series their due they were excellent. They fucking knew their shit. They did the story of the Mahabharat through the lens of the Kurushetra war, one warrior or character per day. They even had Kunti and Daraupadi have episodes of their own. And I got to know new characters as well. Beloved ones, like Bheem's rakshasa son Gortaka.  I was both googling frantically and watching it at the same time. I know that Ashwatamma is seen as an asshole but honestly there isn't a single character in that story which isn't complex and sympathetic. Imagine they were able to write like that more than 5000 years ago.  Ooops have to go now. Oisin needs collected. I was leaving at 4.30 but he has told me that he is ready for collection now.

Finished Kurushetra... may rewatch it. Is the curse of having talent the monetisation of it? Over this week, I did watch Priscilla  but Coppola - once again, a story about a very young woman - teenager really - who has been a victim of the patriarchy. Like Marie Antoinette , Coppola explores the theme of a child who has been manipulated by men much older, much more experienced and richer than her. No one is spared in this her oeuvre. But this then led me down the Elvis rabbithole for a shortwhile. I think the thing which shocked me the most was how young he was when he died. Not just that he was so young, but he looked so terrible in his last years. Again, it was like he had a death wish. You cannot keep performing at that level without being able to just keep compounding the fear and the horror. What Priscilla is and was - why did he choose such a young woman? I'd say it wasn't just because she could be manipulated, but she was also his. She could be ma...

Scorpio Sunday was really my first day of doing nothing since school shut. It was only two days but it already felt like forever. Actually i'm going to do some of the back garden before the rains hit.  It is now evening. I am going to complete the blogging before I get Oisin... so... I will start at the latest post... 2.11.25 Completing the posts... I want to write about the garden and this room now that I have set both up so that they are the perfect place to work. I have many perfect places to work in the house, but this room is so lovely. It looks out to the back garden and now that I have cleaned it up, it is such a beautiful place to gaze into. It is a beautifully sunny day and the skies are clear. I have to go to the Christian Community and then after that I'll come home and clear out the gutters. The day before when I was working in the garden I turned off the music because the goldfinches were tinkling in the ash above me. I don't know what I will do wit...

Saturday is my down tools day anyway. I want to contemplate the luxury of having time to not do anything and how society makes this seem like a bad thing - taking time for yourself to do nothing. To be able to do nothing at all in between times in which you have to do lots and lots of things. How wonderful is that? If I had to construct an ideal world that would be it. The luxury of not always being on. I think Oisin came over and we did come cleaning.... oh yes, there was cleaning... I'm trying to think what day the cleaning took place... I cleaned the boys rooms... I think this was today. I hoovered and aired and folded and sorted clothes. I will tell you something for nothing. When you are in your mid 50s, you really understand so many things. It is like the world is revealed to you in some many many ways. In the small things and the larger things. In the larger things was how disinterested I was in The Iris Affair . The whole thing was really stupid. And it was real...

Chocolate Apples Stars Well Friday came round and everyone was hysterical. Everyone. Plus it was also the Halloween celebrations in school. You know, as I write this blog and update it, I realise how much my life is worth living. I must force myself to write everyday... But yes... we had the pumpkin weight guessing competition, we had a shadow play, we had cleaning the classroom, we had smores, we had a halloween sweet hunt... we had the works. It was INSANE. And then we went home. I actually cannot remember what I did between going home and collapsing with exhaustion and going to Hurtan. I have no attended more gigs in this year than I have attended in the past 5 years. Well, 3 of those years was Covid, so that doesn't count. But I've been to John Grant, Hothouse Flowers, Tirnaweren, etc... and by an Irish mile Huartan's was the best, because the audience was the best. I should have brought my mushroom costume... it was very cute. I may ...

Oisin returned from Switzerland and he was all abuzz about fondues...so we made fondue. This is very unusual as Oisin does not like cheese. The fondue for a first attempt was alright. I did eventually finish it. The thing though, is that life is so so simple right? The simple things.  But also how magical that he can now go and visit my cousin in Zurich and then return and talk all about it. He chatted about how awesome Switzerland was and how great it was to hang out with Vikki and Abe. He had also just visited London to see his girlfriend.  Oisin has become a man of the world... Ghin, a little jealous and a little stung at being left behind and being the second child had wanted to go but we said that he was not to do that. Thankfully he did not go as he had mock tests to do. Which he did well in.  But yes, on Thursday, I think this was Thursday, I was just about half sane...

I am now catching up with posts for the past week and a half... it has been usch a week and a half. It was probably last Wednesday that I discovered that a few children in my class were sitting the 11 plus. This is an exam which children here take to get into the secondary school which is called the Grammer school. I still cannot for the life of me understand what a Grammer school is. I assume it means it is a good school. One day I will be arsed to ask Chat GPT what a Grammar school is in Norn Iron... but as far as I understand it, it is a school which you go to if you want to go on to go the A levels and then university. Or have an academic education. As far as I'm concerned all education is academic. Unless you are learning something practical, which none of these people are. Also they take place in this massive classrooms of 25, 30 children. It made me very sad as I had known some of these children now for a very long time and to think that one day they would be lea...

Received a call from my sister this morning about my dad. Pa had fallen down and is now in hospital. They are checking him. Making sure he is alright. Ma was distraught, of course, and I spoke to her and soothed her. She said she regretted not telling him she loved him and I said that he knew that she loved him. My parents were so lucky - they found such a deep love in this lifetime. Many people don't even get that. The partnership was total. Which is more than I can say for the asshole which I married. Right now he hasn't signed the agreement he agreed to. He is a total waste of space. Someone said to me that he didn't have an abundance mindset. Everything he perceives is total lack.  Imagine making up your mind, making decisions with this lack. No wonder I could never get past it. It was injurious being in his presence. The longer you were there, the worse it became. The more you tried, the less it would matter. This man taught me that there must always be lim...

Redefining what elderhood is... in the drumming session today, we journeyed to Cailleach. The session itself was powerful. The image of Cailleach though was of this woman who roared through time. All of our lives, women have been controlled. Look like this, be this, walk talk like this. Then as the years pass, we shed our responsibilities and think, yes finally, having survived and flourished and aged, we have something, we are told oh now you are hag. And a particular kind of hag. Old. Invisible. Ignored. Cailleach says fuck that. You are none of those things. Unless you wish to be. Cailleach says you now time travel now... back and forth. You gather your lived wisdom like sticks and branches and you build that fire. Enormous, raging and you light it as beacon on the top of the mountain. You are unafraid, unapologetic. Now, this is your time. It has always been. I am everything in this moment. We are. Be with me child. Dont let anyone tell you anything else. You Have a voice. Use tha...

BG 3.30 - Devoid of the fever of the soul, engage in battle by dedicating all actions to Me, with (your) mind intent on the Self, and becoming free from expectations and egoism. BG 8.7 - Therefore, think of Me at all times and fight. There is no doubt that by dedicating your mind and intellect to Me, you will attain Me alone. What is the war which we battle?  Specifically, I do battle to enable children to be free from a cruel, contorting educational system which insists that exams and tests are the way in which education should be conducted. Steiner says education is for the development of the human being which is free. Free to do what they need to do. They should not be bent to the will of a system which will enslave them. I also do Forest School. And that I need to do more of. And the Salmon of Wisdom work I'm doing with Siuban. So that is my own battle. That is easy to fight daily. Well, it's not easy, but I do that. For a very long time, for years I have chosen jobs which ...

Just spoke to Ma there. I hadn't spoken to her for a week. Oisin had taken my charger and ran off with it. So I had to go and buy a new one. It was most frustrating. I wanted to talk about how awful things were now. I always thought that when people got together and realised the fuck up we had made with development, we would start to see sense and roll back the stupid decisions we have made with our planet. But sadly, this is not the case. Politics is so useless, or it is so unwieldly that it is so useless. Even Elon Musk had to leave it.  Donald Trump set s new bar for not just stupid but unethical. And the people behind him, they are morally bankrupt. The only thing they care about is money. And they don't care how they get that money. And they are racist and sectarian. And they are cruel. And people are now all about consumption. Everything is so remarkably shallow that nothing makes anymore sense.  I really don't understand the world. But perhaps we cannot understand th...

  Scorpio Last year I painted this in Singapore... it is the middle of October - September has gone with the blink of an eye. It's been mad.  I haven't done anything which I had planned to do. As usual. My reason....well... I was too tired. And I was. But that was the only reason. I have not been running, not stretching, not eating well... I haven't been looking after myself. It feels like I am slightly falling apart. And part of it is the genocide and the disbelief. And part of it is getting old. Yesterday when Ghin showed me this photo of a war reporter, I said to him, you know all war reporters are assholes don't you? I was really shocked I said this, because once upon a time I did want to be a war reporter. Then I realised that they were egotistical adrenaline junkies... and that was that. I should try and start doing stuff now though... Let's see... book tickets spend the next hour organising things and my dairy and then do the cleaning of the house which alway...

Morning Oisin in Zurich It has been another busy week. I know I only have 11 children in my class... but it is still very hard work. I have no idea how teachers with 30 children cope. That's just so insane. The good news is that the children who have been with me since Class 1 are doing really well. The children who have joined along the way are at various stages of progress and ability. The Class 1 originals have their tables and concepts - foundational concepts - in numeracy and literacy nailed down. And they are grafters. The children who joined along the way are still finding their feet. Well actually some of them have managed to adapt really well. But this week was rough. The Genocide in Palestine Going on for two years now. The Western hypocrisy and actual literal stupidity of people - I actually cannot understand how people are so stupid. I was recently told that someone I respected was a Zionist. I think you can on...

It is with a heavy heart that we now leave the bryophytes and pteridophyta - mosses, lichen, liverworts and ferns. We still have seaweed... which will be fine. But I did slightly fall in love with the liverworts and lichens this time round. That's the thing with being a Steiner teacher though - it's so great when we are able to look at different things - teach things which the class has clearly fallen in love with. It's such a privilege. This week though I am going to do seaweed till Wednesday and then take Thursday and Friday ML to do maths - things which they should have caught up with by now. Multiples, primes, factors, etc. It has been so beautiful this October. It has also been a crazy week of illness and cover and children going bonkers. The Covid-25 which I had in the third week of term has only just run its course. I have been so ill and so exhausted. I can't wait till half term.