From Bath to Cork with Baby Grace

A change is as good as a rest…

There has to be some truth in such an enduring statement. Certainly I’m placing my confidence there, because it looks so fierce here in Cork.

A long weekend in Country Clare in the west of Ireland, in front of the waves that surfers love…

I’ll interrupt the weekend with a visit to Limerick, to the University Concert Hall (UCH) for a concert on Saturday evening.

It’s a free concert, part of Summer Music on the Shannon (#sms09).  John Perry & friends will be live video streamed - this is a first for UL, a first for UCH (this will give you the link you need), and for all I know it may be the first time a classical music performance is being live streamed on the internet from Ireland.

Someone will contradict me if I’ve got this wrong.

I’d be grateful if you’d pass the word on to your friends who use internet, especially lovers of music, early adopters of innovations and absolutely anyone.  I ask this because I’ve been doing my best to give support to SMS by blogging about SMS, spreading the news that there is a fabulous for children to learn to make and perform music, including operatic music.

You would be helping SMS in a small but significant way by blogging this news, facebooking it or even twittering the gospel.

Have a great weekend: remember there is no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing.

Some of the latest fashion…

You won’t believe this - but it’s true.

Nothing’s been changed to protect the guilty.

Lionel Powell & I planned to fly RyanAir to Gatwick from Cork.  We were going over on Sunday to an opera @ Glyndebourne. [L’Elisir d’amore]  The flight was scheduled to leave at 1255.  We got to Cork Airport in plenty of time.

I haven’t flown much in the last year. 

I forgot that, when you check-in on-line, you don’t go to the check-in desk. Re-directed by the RyanAir women, we sat for coffee in the cafe before security.  We took our time because I was in no hurry.  Lionel was a bit twitchy.

Thru security, we lingered in the "Duty Free" shop.

My friend, who’d hardly ever been to an opera, bought fragrance.  As far as I was concerned, we were in plenty of time; the plane wasn’t due off for ages: twas only 1235 when we reached the boarding gate.

There was hardly anyone at the boarding gate except three RyanAir staff.

"Is this the flight to Gatwick?" I asked, registering the scarcity of travellers.

"It’s shut.  You should have been here at 1225", the RyanAir woman said.  She pointed to the self-printed boarding sheet.

Shock. Disbelief.  Horror.  Oh shit…

"Please ask them if they’ll open up for us" said Lionel.  I was dumb, delivering a litany of curses, internally.

"I’ll try, but they never do."

"Please" was all I could add to proceedings.

The RyanAir woman phoned someone.  I could hear her being told the flight was shut. I was almost in the phone.  "Only the pilot can allow that now".

"OK.  Thanks" replied our woman, "I’ll ask". She rang another number.  "Please" & "Oh thank you" I pleaded, feeling lost, numbly clutching a straw.

"Hi.  We have two more here.  Would you mind asking the captain if he would let them on, please?"

Silence…

I had time to visualise several nasty consequences of my foolish inexperience:  whatever we’d do we would not turn back into Cork…

"He says send them down, but that’s it."  As far as I was concerned, the most needy person could be locked out now, we were on, on, on.

What?  Did I really hear that?  Lionel was already striding on - me muttered nothing but "thank you, thank you, thank you very much…"

This is what went thru my head:

"Oh my God… What’s going on?  This can’t be happening.  This has never happened.  In the whole history of RyanAir, no pilot has ever opened a closed door.  Is the company going soft?  Will they all lose their jobs if I blog about this? Should I sell my RyanAir shares? (Joking: I don’t think I have any.) Wow.  This is amazing.  Damn it, I can’t go on Twitter on the plane and tell others…"

There were RyanAir people at the bottom of the stairs.  I thanked them.  I thanked the next RyanAir woman on the plane. It was almost full. 

Fortunately, I was separated from Lionel on the plane. We hadn’t spoken a word to each other.

I needed time to compose myself.  Squeezed into a middle seat, for once I spoke to no one on the plane.  By the time we got to Gatwick, "another RyanAir flight on time", I’d persuaded myself the gods had sent me the experience of a lifetime.

I bet there isn’t a single person in the whole world who’s ever had a similar experience.

Do you believe the story?

PS If this is the result of a RyanAir step-change-in-culture programme, I’d like someone to pass this story on to Michael O’Leary.  

That’s why there’s been nothing here since Friday…

Today’s my first day back from UK, from Glyndebourne opera.

It’s all fog outside, all clarity inside - I hope.

The opera I went to with Lionel Powell was by Donizetti.  An opera in two acts, libretto by Felice Romani, an Italian poet.  It was first performed in Milan on 12 May 1832, when Donizetti was 34 or 35. First performed in London, Lyceum Theatre 1836. New York 1838. In the Metropolitan NY in 1904 with Caruso as Nemorino. First performed @Glyndebourne 1961.

This was my first time seeing this opera at Glyndebourne.

As I looked through my ancient copy of Kobbe’s Complete Opera Book (1974 edition),  I found a cutting from the Financial Times 29 December 1976, a review of the opera written by Max Loppert.

Huge nostalgia…

I assume that was the first time I went to "L’Elisir…".  Jose Carreras sang the tenor Nemorino.  This may have been the first time I saw him sing. The rest of that cast included Geraint Evans, Ileana Cotrubas & Ingvar Wixell - all people I went on to see many times @ Covent Garden.

2009 @ Glyndebourne:

I’ll never forget the brilliant way in which Ainhoa Garmendia substituted for Ekaterina Siurina. It was as if she belonged to the show.  Incredible to think that she’d flown in at short notice. She’s from San Sebastian and has a great website.

I was a bit unmoved by Act One.  It was good - but didn’t fire me.

Act Two was electifying:

it was as if Donnizetti woke up, and wrote from a different place. The poignant passion with which Peter Auty (the voice from "The Snowman") sang the simple peasant role of Nemorina moved me (and Lionel).  He was beautiful with "Una furtiva lagrima". [5 minutes of Pavarotti’s version here.]

As Garmendia sang, I became more and more convinced that someday she’ll be a magificent Brunhilde (Rita Hunter sings here) - but let that not be for years.  She sang with great confidence and it was lovely to enjoy her soaring voice with its solid foundation.

Today, I did something I’ve never done before:

I went on an opera singer’s website & sent her a "thank you" email. I said how much we’d enjoyed her performance.  To my amazement & delight, I got a lovely reply from her.  I’ve decided I’d love to hear her sing in her home Basque city of San Sebastian (which we loved so much recently).

I woke groggy in the guest room.

During the night I left the marital bed because I snored the Wiffe to wake.

Tongue dry, mouth dry.  The result of taking 1/2 a Zispin last night before bed.

Felt dead at first.  A lump in bed.  I’d had a nightmare dream: driving a quad (or somesuch small car) over a cliff in some Alpine landscape.  Big mountains in background, a similar set of shapes on the ground in front of me.  I drove over the precipice.  Sudden fall, over the cliff. I knocked over some books from the table on the left hand side of the bed.  I felt as if I was going over the edge with a few people on board.

I jolted to wake.  Woke up. Turned over and fell back into sleep without difficulty.

How many apples have I eaten in the last few days.  Another now.

What’s my prose style?

I must contact Marion. (I mean Miriam.)

I’m so grateful to Sarah Carey for drawing this long article about mental health to my attention.

It’s from The Atlantic magazine June 2009

Written by Joshua Wolf Shenk, who’s written about Abraham Lincoln’s alleged experience of depression, this is about a longitudinal study of men from Harvard USA.  The study began in 1942 and continues.

At the heart of this article is an American psychiatrist, George Valliant. He’s been in charge of this study for 42 years.

One of the subjects was John F Kennedy who became president of USA.

I find it hard to pick out one extract to share, because the whole is so rich, but here’s an extract which sets out how Valliant see defenses, "adaptations", as falling into four levels:

"At the bottom of the pile are the unhealthiest, or “psychotic,” adaptations—like paranoia, hallucination, or megalomania—which, while they can serve to make reality tolerable for the person employing them, seem crazy to anyone else.

One level up are the “immature” adaptations, which include acting out, passive aggression, hypochondria, projection, and fantasy. These aren’t as isolating as psychotic adaptations, but they impede intimacy.

“Neurotic” defenses are common in “normal” people. These include intellectualization (mutating the primal stuff of life into objects of formal thought); dissociation (intense, often brief, removal from one’s feelings); and repression, which, Vaillant says, can involve “seemingly inexplicable naïveté, memory lapse, or failure to acknowledge input from a selected sense organ.”

The healthiest, or “mature,” adaptations include altruism, humor, anticipation (looking ahead and planning for future discomfort), suppression (a conscious decision to postpone attention to an impulse or conflict, to be addressed in good time), and sublimation (finding outlets for feelings, like putting aggression into sport, or lust into courtship)."

The day began at about 0740.

I was in the guest room (Grace in my bed.) where I’d gone to sleep after a few pages of "Tribes". (I’m trying to finish it off.)

First act of the day was to check my body: how secure was my mind?  How together? Resilient?

My anxiety was that I’d wake up falling apart.  

But, so far, so far so good: I’m well again today…  The only story in town is how to keep it so?

Three tasks, three domestic tasks in order to anchor me in achievement that satisfies me with quick wins and protects me from the fear of criticism…

Let me collect three tasks quickly and thereby feel in control - as much as that feeling is ever desirable.

I love photographs.

Have hopes & fantasies about being able to take some good ones someday.

This site gave me a humbling experience: the photographs are so extraordinary.  I’ve been to only one of the places - the Dead Sea.

How did I find this site?  Twitter: Tom Raftery ‘tweeted’ the link this morning.  Thanks Tom.  You are well worth following @tomraftery

I went to Aware last night.

Co-facilitated.   This meant that I couldn’t ’share’ what was bothering me.  So I got no outlet or advice.

But I got to listen to others, with great attention.  There is "listening to hear", to grasp the words in accents I’m not that familiar with.  There is also "listening to show" and give attention to the person.

It seems to have done me good because this morning I’m in much better form than yesterday.  I didn’t wake until after 0730 and felt sleepy, but a shower washed that away.

Today could have been a horrid day:

no meetings planned, no structure given to me.  But I made a list of 10 issues, topics, matters I intended to deal with.

So far, @1212, I’ve given myself three ticks, including ironing six shirts. (If I do a little ironing every day, I won’t feel overwhelmed by a mounting pile.)

I love giving myself ticks.

Even the frustration of not being able to get on internet for about an hour has not knocked me back today.

Keep going Paul

Oh, I took my tablets last night and this morning.

I’ve been on a development programme with Aodan Enright & his "tribe".

The term "tribe" is lifted from Seth Godin, author of "Tribes".  Aodan Enright runs a business based on bringing groups together to read carefully chosen books.

I don’t know what process he used to select the texts.  Certainly, the four books I read developed me, and offered plenty of meat for 2-hour discussions in the Imperial Hotel in downtown Cork.

"Breaking from the Pack" + "The 33 Strategies of War" + "What Would Google Do?" + "Tribes" =

"I’ve become a writer with a style that individual & becoming stronger.  The battlefield is all around and within me.  The internet & universal education has changed the ballgame irrevocably and re-located the power.  At 58, I am called to lead or die younger than would otherwise be the case, and the world for my children is here for the making…"

That’s what came out of me today when Aodan asked us to reflect on what we’d gained from the group and its work. Each sentence is my best shot at saying what I got from the relevant book.

If I had any influence, and didn’t believe Seth Godin’s view

"People don’t believe what you tell them"

I’d urge you to go out of your way to link up with @SmarterEgg on Twitter and join one of his tribes.

PS  Thank you too to all those who were in the group.

I am well.

The issue is how to remain so.  

This new diary will keep track of the struggle I experience, the effort it takes me to hold on to the confidence which is at the heart of staying well.

If I was someone who’d broken a particular leg several times, it would be natural to say that my left leg was vulnerable to breakage, that I better watch out for it. I’d be in no way ashamed to say this.

I’ve had several bouts of severe depression.  I am vulnerable to depression.  I better watch out.  I’m not ashamed of this.  But I’m not as comfortable saying this as I imagine I would be if we were discussing legs.

I got up this morning @ 0641.

There was no sound in the house.  Thankfully I wasn’t groggy, hung-over or clinging to the bed.  Grace was in there, and this meant I couldn’t be comfortable lying there with her between us. (God knows when she came in.  I have no memory of her arrival.)

At 0646, I was sat at the table in dining ‘room’ looking out at the rain and I began to write in Moleskine:

"Wet. Rain outside. Cloud cover. Huge droplets of rainwater outside on the glass.  I am up first.  Grace ended up in our bed last night but I didn’t notice.

I took 1/4 zispin + one of the anti-psychotic tablets last night…"

And on and on, writing from what struck my senses, sticking close to physical sensations…

I wrote notes to myself:

"Take back control of your life Paul.  Have your habits…

"Regain control, not control, influence so that I am less blown round by the elements.

"Become more weighty.

"Write a thank you note to Dermot & Clare…"

I wrote from 0646-0727.  I was getting back into a habit I used to have that I think has helped me.

Not only am I generally vulnerable to depression, but I felt yesterday that this vulnerability was live and close.  I felt the need to do something more than hope for the best.  I felt I needed to re-connect with all my defence-mechanisms, all the things I’d spelled  out in my "relapse prevention plan".

As a way of stopping the writing I let myself drift into poetry…

"The rain blows across the glass.
The droplets hold firm
a single stream runs across the face
and the oak branch moves
in wind.
Protected in pajamas,
feet cold on  marble flags,
a morning in July,
a Tuesday in Glanmire.
The clock ticks on
but when I look deeper into the water
I see another dribble begin
a loosening.
I see that all is not fixed,
only clinging to positions that collapse
without warning…
A birdless day so far,
no wing visible,
only the cawing of crows.
The glass holds."

That’s there to be edited later and cut back: the cliches must come out.

At least I’ve made a start with regaining the activities I need to protect me from the prospect of re-experiencing depression.

Later I put anti-inflammatory cream on my little toe, the one that’s been preventing me going to the gym.

I have no more time for this diary now.  I have to read as much as I can of "Tribes" by Seth Godin - so that I can discuss it at midday @SmarterEgg.

There are a few things I’ve let slip, and they are haunting me.

(1) The gym: I resolved to go regularly - it’s ages since I’ve worked up a sweat.

(2) The Moleskine:  I resolved to write a daily note at start of day - that too is ages.

(3) The garden: I resolved to learning how to garden - I’ve only cut grass.

This is a public admonishment of self.

Get real man.  Get back into the game, off the sideline.

There is a life to be won.

I read, treasured and was inspired by John Holt’s "Never Too Late."

So it was lovely to receive a John Holt quotation today from David Gurteen...

We teachers - perhaps all human beings - are in the grip of an astonishing
delusion. We think that we can take a picture, a structure, a working model
of something, constructed in our minds out of long experience and
familiarity, and by turning that model into a string of words, transplant
it whole into the mind of someone else.

Most of the time, explaining does not increase understanding, and may even
lessen it.

*** John Holt (1923 - 1985) American Educator ***

I take down my copy of "Never Too Late" (1978), and flick it open on a page that contains this highlighted :

In those days I was a passenger in the car of life, not a driver.  I accepted what came to me, and dealt with it as best I could.  It had not yet occurred to me that I might actually decide what I most wanted to do, and take steps to do it…" (p.48)

John Holt is one of the people who gave me the courage to release the confidence from within that enables me to write this.

For the first time in ages, I had writer’s block today.

I couldn’t get going on an article about business for Goodbiz.ie.  It felt as if I was stuck in a swamp, unable to get out from suction that was pulling me down.  I spent the whole day feeling tired and listless, lifeless and clueless.

The deadline was drawing closer by the minute.  I was faced with failure.  Complete abject failure.  I was heading over that cliff.

What I did about it:

(1) I relaxed: told myself I had plenty of time left, that  I could easily knock off the article in about an hour.

(2) Listened to radio, hoping for inspiration

(3) Wrote a bit on SummerMusicontheShannon blog, again hoping the distraction would lead to inspiration

(4) Got in the car, drove to the shop for chocolate & The Irish Times newspaper to read… more hoping 

(5) Had an americano in cafe in Glanmire

(6) Almost fell asleep in sun

None of this worked.

So I went home & logged on this blog.  I began writing…

"I’ve hit a wall and can’t start an article that’s due to Goodbiz.ie.

Writing about business is difficult…  but not as hard as doing business…"

I put down whatever came to me.  It was hard going - but it was going.  After 274 words, I used wordcount and that encouraged me: I was half way there.

Made a cup of tea, listened to a bit of Joe Duffy on radio.  

Suddenly, the universe rescued me.  An idea came from somewhere.  An angle:  What Would Google Do?   Jeff Jarvis gave me the energy I needed: for the first time all day I felt energetic and optimistic.  It became easy to reach the deadline.

What does this suggest to me?

First, it is good to begin with the difficulty…  good to write down how hard it is…

Second, every word counts… eventually they add up to something…

Third, there is a good chance the "universe" will rescue you, provided you’ve made a decent effort to deal with your problem…

Oh, I’m so glad I got that article done on time, even if it was just-in-time.

Now I can go back to the great pleasure that is SMS

Yet another blog being set up!

As if there weren’t enough distractions… Do we really need yet another? How am I going to make time to read this one too?

Oh yes, I can hear the sighs. 

• But how else can we preserve for posterity the extraordinary wealth of musical adventure that is SMS? 
• How else can we open up SMS to the audience it deserves?

Creating a blog is a fantastic way to give any communal activity broader and richer life, I think. 

The people directly involved in the experience are privileged: they are right in the cauldron of creativity. 

What about those who can’t be there, but would love to be?

What about the supporting family & friends?

A blog is a great way for people to tap into the centre.

In the excitement of a creating mentality, it’s easy to lose a sense of memory… easy to get excited and forget the hard work…

A blog is a great tool for holding on to memories.

"Let’s make summer music" is a new blog centred on SMS. 

There you’ll find lots more about this classical music summerschool in Limerick.  You can keep in touch with the proceedings.

If you like it, please tell others about it.

Thank you.