Symphony…

The end of the year is always a good time to do a recce on the year that passed and the crap I’ve done, the people I’ve pissed and wonder whether I could have done it any better, who did I miss!?!!?

 Fleetingly the challenges and obstacles of the year, the sometimes dignity of handling them with grace, streaks through the mind with Lady Godiva ish grandeur.

The word that’s doing the foxtrot in my head for now is ‘Symphony’. As defined in the dictionary, a symphony is “an elaborate musical composition for full orchestra, typically in four movements, at least one of which is traditionally in sonata form.”

This is a purely musical annotation of the word. A sonata is “a composition for an instrumental soloist, often with a piano accompaniment, typically in several movements with one or more in sonata form”.

Hmnnn… the elephant doing cartwheels in my cerebellum is wondering whether there has been any symphonic element during the year for yours truly.

So, four movements of a symphony are quite akin to the four seasons methinks: spring, summer, monsoon and winter. 

Also to the highs and lows of the year which each of these seasons denote.

Now remember that one of these movements, have to be a sonata... or playing solo. Which one of these have I been spanking the monkey at? 

I gaze unblinking until my eyes dilate better than you-know-what at a D&C procedure until the phosphenes twirl in my orbs in concentric circles.

The psychedelic moment passes and lucidity allows me to reconnoiter that there really hasn’t been one specific season that I’ve been cranking the shank, every individual period has had its fair share of sonatas.

And that is probably what keeps me sane. To be able to disconnect from the melee around me or the fracas in my mind and focus, if briefly on the evanescence and impermanence of it all. My father in law loved the phrase, ‘that too shall pass away’ and I’ve girded my loins (which explains my retroverted uterus) with it.

In the summers of the year when you flirt with the highest point in the bell curve or at winters when the dip reaches the nadir, all one needs is to take one step or maybe two, back and take a few deep breaths and introspect on how much energy one really needs to spend on the triviality that is not worth a tinkers damn in a few years, months or even days.

Now that we have established that the sonatas have been multitudinous, has the symphony been pleasing to the ear or jarred the senses. Did the orchestra have consonance and equilibrium. Did we play in tandem.

Again, those little buggers did the jig in my eyes as I stare at the screen blankly and now I see blue dots do the striptease. 

Fact is that the concinnity has been sporadic and random.

That is what this thingummy jig is after all isn’t it… of irregular cadences, the bass and the tenor going off key at times, the string quartet at loggerheads with the percussionists and the conductor throwing the baton in, only to sigh in resignation and bravely pick it up with hope that each person plays their part to the best of their abilities.

That we will celebrate the composition of different elements, even when the concerto doesn’t play to the audience, to be true to the self and not simply simper... phony.

I'm..fallible

Just finished this marvelous book by Val Brelinski, "The Girl Who Slept with God" and I couldn't have chosen a more opportune time to reading it.
Christmas has always been my favorite season. As a young girl brought up in the devout Protestant faith of my parents, Christmas was a season for love, for festivities, new clothes, presents, sweetmeats, family gatherings and above all, of faith.

Of the birth of the Lord, of new beginnings, of a better tomorrow, in short... of faith.

Val Brelinski with her utterly simple and evocative narrative describes a family that is extremely religious, not a scenario I identify myself with although there are some extremely judgmental passages about the shenanigans of the 'wicked world' and the sins that one can 'succumb' to. The teachings of a conservative church that most 'faithful' ascribe to, when it suits them of course.

The narrative draws you to a web of fallibility that each one of us subscribe to, as children, spouses and parents. Of the decisions we ascribe to thinking that we do so in the best interests of the family and how hopelessly selfish each one of them is.

There are passages in the book that make you want to exclaim with anger tinged with pain and there are those rebellious actions of a fourteen year old that urge you to simply say, 'atta girl!' You want to hammer the parents and wallop the girls at times and there are times when you simply resign yourself to the futility of all the dissent and wish we lived in a simpler world where God was your ally and not this fearsome creature who waits to punish you for every misdeed. Well God knows I'm past master at those!

The book brings back memories of personal defiance as a girl, of incredibly stupid resolutions as a parent and some pathetic behavior as a human that makes me hang my head in gut wrenching shame. Prostitutes may not confess to a priest but thank heavens I have a blog to sate this desire to expunge.

The book has a melancholic ending and you wish with every fiber of your being that its denouement was positive. And yet, though one of the protagonists is but ashes at age seventeen, the fourteen year old (alter ego?) chooses a simpler path although she's the mother of everything convoluted. She chooses to forgive, a grace that belies her age. Above all, she gives credence to that which she cannot see, but can feel.

This for me is the message of Christmas this year, that I'm fallible and will forever be and maybe that's ok... as long as I posses the honesty to accept that, the tenacity to ensure I minimize the damage and the forever faith that there is one person who is Infallible, to whom I can turn and rest my yoke when life turns dreary.

It's a new day, a new beginning and every Christmas is the harbinger of this faith, love and hope, HE's Infallible and I'm fallible.

Merry Christmas to you and yours.