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home in the highlands home in the highlands the highlands of scotland loom large in the imaginations of writers and members of the diaspora for those who are curious here is a perspective on life on the edge of the north from an american from the heartlands monday january 24 2022 morning ragas one and two a raga is a particular form of hindustani classical music for those with ears more musical than mine there is much to explore within the tradition and the complexity unlike most western music there is a specific association in many cases with time of day and even season as the sun was lighting up the sky this morning i remembered a concert of ragas in a church hall in a suburb of indianapolis many years ago it is music to get lost in and find yourself again it is like jazz played by musicians who know their instruments and the traditions of the music well but play within that framework riffing off each other if i can extend my mini musical knowledge with another cross cultural metaphor i remembered watching the music unfold and the feelings it created within me i miss the music and music making and the friends who dubbed me ganesh an after the elephant headed god ganesh ganesh is known among other things as the remover of obstacles and seems to be associated with travelling and good beginnings in the early morning on the far north coast of scotland those motifs began running in my head ganesh is often pictured dancing i have several images gifted to me by my friends in the one on my mantel ganesh has bells on his ankles and is dancing if you look at it for more than a moment you can hear the bells in another miniature a tiny ganesh stands still with a parasol over his head perhaps it s meant to indicate a traveller but to me it looks like the doo dah man of new orleans jazz and so what else could i do but make my own morning ragas early morning raga i perhaps the sun arrives today with news to lift my heavy tread when did my feet become so earthbound stiff and slow if i could fly what would i see instead of walls and floors and all the chores to do for those of us born out of clay and sea after coffee morning raga ii begin with mismatched socks stripes on one foot dots on the other or stars or sheep whatever once made you smile put on that smouldering red shirt today what have you been saving it for we ve already had the rainy days more than noah and his overcrowded ark endured before the flood washed the world clean again come out among the flotsam and the jetsam fabric torn and left flapping in the breeze prayer flags for wayfarers in our strange new old world posted by landgirl 3 21 pm 0 comments wednesday january 05 2022 boris johnson s new hairdo and the rhetoric of our times i am a writer i used to be reluctant to say that because i have a great deal of regard for writers and i am by nature someone who thinks i am too small for whatever needs doing in the sense i want to offer up today we are all writers a writer constructs narratives or stories we all do that to make sense of our world we need stories in which we can tuck all the troublesome details of everyday life so we can get on with things boris johnson was renowned for his singular narratives that were more expedient than factual long before he became prime minister if i were an investigative journalistic kind of writer i d insert here references and examples i m telling a story so familiar to us all now that i don t think that s necessary despite knowing he told porkies as my husband says he managed to become prime minister and that brings me to his hair again i might properly insert here examples or references to expert opinion but i hope without that we can agree for the moment that deliberately mussing up his hair was part of his self generated narrative the part that was meant to say something like gosh i may get it wrong sometimes but i am just a guy trying to do my best for the team and we were supposed to feel as if we were a team the team based rhetoric has also been the narrative of the mainstream media the news and the newspapers where we could and should get more nuanced storytelling report on covid as if it were a sporting event every day we have scores covid cases hospitalisations deaths always delivered with just the right emphasis to show some sympathy as if to counter that we have numbers of vaccinations and boosters including a grand total of those vaccinated covid is the bad guy those of us on the booster side are the good guys as with the olympics coverage we are also regularly treated to vignettes of heroes or tragedies it is of course much too simple dangerously simple that simplified story allows those not on the right team to be vilified i actually heard someone say of a person not vaccinated who died of the disease that he got what he deserved it also precludes looking at the things we can do in addition to the vaccinations to protect ourselves and our loved ones opening windows staying home when we can but most of all being kind to ourselves and to each other no matter what story we tell ourselves truth they say is the first victim of war and i think now the mainstream narrative is shifting to that of a war time drama and it begins with boris johnson s hair now that the ship he has not been steering for some time is sinking as the covid scorecard gives the game away he has combed his hair as if to say i am your captain and we will ride this out together it will take more than a haircut to get this narrative to float i think but i am often befuddled by the stories people choose to tell themselves as a writer i am starting here to construct a more inclusive narrative and i urge you all to join in no one asked for covid no one deserves whatever the wily little collection of proteins dishes up scientists don t have all the answers nor is there a single answer to any of the many questions raised by this pandemic the government could have should have done better public health has been underfunded with now drastic consequences and we need all of us to be looking around with an eye for more complex narratives beyond heroes and villains winners and losers and above all beyond any rhetoric that puts us at odds with each other posted by landgirl 2 55 pm 4 comments thursday december 02 2021 the other side of women s work i was pleased to have tentacular want to publish my poem you cant say no it is a look at women s work insert here the usual disclaimer it is not exclusively women that mend and darn and knit and stitch all maner of things some alluded to in the poem nonetheless it was invariably the death of an aunt or mother or grandmother that sent grieving relatives looking for a home for the relics for that is what they were of their loved one it is a bit of humour with some grain of truth in that whenever an archaelogist finds something that cannot be explained in their own terms it is deemed probably of ritual use and that is what had become of these pins and needles bits of wool handwritten notes the relatives knew they had some value so they would not discard them or casually cast them aside but they had lost the sense of them i never said no to their urgent requests for a safe home for the items sometimes i would get a bit of story about the person or the items but usually they were just passed on hurriedly with obvious relief and a grateful smile these donations made me sad because it meant a talented pair of hands was gone more importantly it made me sad because tools are living breathing things and they had been reduced now to artefacts it was that sadness that prompted the poem stephen king is said to be a cheerful person who writes his nightmares away my poems are often sadness that is caught and wrapped into a safer place women s work is essential and frequently invisible elizabeth wayland barber was able to learn much about linen and ancient egyptian textile arts because the linen wrappings of the mummies were of so little value that they were discarded and left in the tombs where grave goods and mummies were carried off and highly touted for marvellous insights into women s work her book is a gold mine women s work the first 20 000 years has been shared among my crafting friends and as i typed this i bought an e book version of it to read it again urban myths and conspiracy theories are said to prevail because they hold to truths that can t be disproven i fear the image of women s work as domestic frippery may be among those myths that does not easily disappear with naivete and enthusiasm i set about to fill the knowledge gap in knitting by putting together an intergenerational knit group northern loops i received funding from an agency that despite my best efforts failed to understand that knitting the ability to see something and make it a reality is intellectual property which in and of itself is valuable more valuable than the end products in many cases some of my efforts to describe what knitting could do may still be available on the internet someplace the funders best understanding was that knitters up north could do christening shawls for the london market and make some money like the women with the leftover tools the funders understood women s work only in the artefacts for me the other side of women s work is the agency of the women it should be obvious that it is empowering to be able to make things but that seems not to be understood in making things there is not only the benefit of the object created but in the conceiving and making itself makers can give voice to their feelings and effect political change classic examples are the suffragettes wearing their colours in their sashes and carrying their banners an american example is a wife who cut her husband s ku klux klan costume into pieces and reshaped it into a quilt and we know much of the history of our world because it was stitched into tapestries and that prompted another poem a testament to agency knots knots the wind like a curious calf tugs at the knot holding the farm gate shut teasing one end then the other the nut hard centre holds fast the wind moves on to test tender branches and fledglings it conjures sea foam into white horses galloping towards the shore inland it staggers like a drunk looking for a fight tumbled rubbish bins skittering along the street i know this wind like the trees in my small patch where they lean themselves leeward and hope their roots stay anchored in the patient earth i am waiting for her return when the sturdy steel gate swings free i am already there moving crab like into the wind the salt wind stinging my eyes until i can lean my shoulder into the wild gate step by step i soldier toward the gate s anchor hurled back again and again on the third try i have the gate where i want it the wind regroups the gate shakes my hands are stiff with cold but my fingers know a different kind of knot soft loops of the knitter the weaver the mender of clothes i wrap and knot and wrap and knot and wrap and knot the gate rattles the ends of the knots dance freely yielding without giving way posted by landgirl 3 40 pm 1 comments about me name landgirl location scotland united kingdom midwestern american transplanted to the highlands of scotland view my complete profile links google news edit me edit me previous posts morning ragas one and two boris johnson s new hairdo and the rhetoric of our the other side of women s work more sky than wind a pair of mittens seeing through the dark the crown no one wants ti ann am muga and a single leaf of spinach snow day in april a little garden walk archives april 2006 may 2006 june 2006 july 2006 august 2006 september 2006 october 2006 november 2006 december 2006 january 2007 february 2007 march 2007 april 2007 may 2007 june 2007 july 2007 august 2007 september 2007 october 2007 november 2007 december 2007 january 2008 february 2008 march 2008 april 2008 may 2008 june 2008 july 2008 august 2008 september 2008 october 2008 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