I am at a loss as to what to write on my blog at present. I think this is because, quite simply, I am at a loss. I also think I am struggling with the fact that my blog is directly linked to my website and somehow I feel censored by this.
Am I allowed to be human here?
Can I express how it is I really feel or should I be wearing the proverbial ‘tie to the office’ and only talk of writing and syntax and how last night I dreamt I was bitten on the finger by a jade snake with a seventies haircut? (It even had its own Facebook page and photo.)
Actually I think I already know the answer to my struggle. I have to be me or else what is the point! Even if the me at present seems somewhat reduced and broken. The truth is right now I seem to have taken up camp in a big fat field of hurt. How I got into this field has its own special story but I am here now so that’s all that counts.
If I were to give this field a botanical name I would probably choose Urtica dioica because of
(a) the ‘urt’ - which is how the French pronounce it anyway and I do live rather near the border; and,
(b) the fact it means stinging nettle which I find rather apt.
It’s not much fun I must admit sitting alone in a field full of stinging nettles and I wouldn’t recommend it. Stinging nettles hurt! And they keep on hurting! They are relentless and mean (although they do cast a lovely shade of green under a heavy, grey sky.) Unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be any way out of the field for me right now: it just seems too large, too impenetrable, too hopeless to try - so I guess I am just going to have to lie here and wait until
(a) the nettles finally wilt
(b) I become immune or
(c) some handsome farmer with a truck load of weed kill comes into help.
(By the way I cast the role of handsome weed killer to Javier Bardem at this juncture. Ralph Fiennes is far too melancholy. Oh and also by the way let it be understood I am not expecting the weedkiller to rescue me per se - the Spice Girls would never approve! Just sit with me a while. Hold my hand and walk with me. Even let me do some of the spraying. Actually he might even have one of those bi-planes to dump the stuff from a height and I could take the controls and wear goggles and we could have a wild tryst in the hay bales when it is all done.)
Sadly I can’t see any of these solutions becoming apparent in the immediate future though.
Since Iam stuck here in my hurt field I have been doing a little research on stinging nettles so I can better understand my surroundings. They’re actually quite amazing little bastards. Not only can they burn, sting and kill but they can also treat arthritis, kidney problems, hair loss, benign prostate enlargements and bites from mad dogs. Chickens also like them which is nice because I like chickens. I have also been reading about what it is that give these nettles their sting and among other things it is serotonin!! Isn’t that the happy drug? Isn’t that the mood lifter? Am I supposed to be enjoying this pain? Maybe John Calvin was on to something when he wrote:
'You must submit to supreme suffering in order to discover the completion of joy. '
Or perhaps he had just chugged down a vat of nettle beer - which you can also make from my green stinging friend!
None of this is really going to help me out of the hurt field right now but at least while I am in here I can think about how much hair I will have and the health of my prostate.
1 comment:
I wonder if you were sent in a metaphorical well wishing way a truckload of stingose, whether you could perhaps use it prophylactically to waltz your way out of the current metaphorical field in which you are situated? My strongest stingose wishes are with you!
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