Return Of The Happy Cartographer, May 1994

Through most of May of this year I was on a fabulous mission to appreciate, to drink life up, to be aware of every breath. This happiness is giddy, has a sense of intoxication. I didn’t have the budget for actual intoxication, there was only coffee and a genuine joy for life. This kind of pace is unsustainable, not necessarily a bad thing. As I am still reminding myself now, transition, and all of life is a transition, happens in oscillations; there is chaos, expansive and excitable, and there is anti-chaos, stabilising and reflective. I considered splitting this month into two posts, but that cuts off the cycle and it’s more useful to see it in one go, I think. I have bleeped the naughty word, rather than overdub and lose authenticity. Anyway, here I am, aged 24 and living in a less cramped shared house with a washing machine, which also accounts for some of my heady delight.

‘17^th May 1994

A morning in Wakefield watching people and patterns. If you sit for long enough they seem to repeat themes and motifs . Circulating time. Missed the bus but I’m not bored, my perceptive senses are developing too quickly. Some people are desperately invisible.

19^th May 1994

Buzzing again. Creativity or coffee? When I’m on a creative roll seem more susceptible to addiction. Need something to bridge the gap between me and the world.

Writing- gives frames of reference for our experiences. When a blind adult is able to see, they have vision but can’t make sense of it. They need to build references eg: colour and shape are different. Through reading I gain new perspectives and in order to write what I perceive I should become sensitised, shouldn’t take anything for granted.

The fantastic and the everyday are not so far apart.

People are watching me write. I’m an event.

22^nd May 1994

Sunday, Kitchen Table.

Spent weekend fully engaged in the moment of being. Like you do.

25^th May 1994

Canteen.

Just read Vogue because a bit of glamour is entertaining. Today I am not going home to make tea but staying out, getting a coach to Manchester and seeing Maya Angelou. This gives me some indulgent time. I have some money as well so I’m going to have a proper dinner not just an apple and a coleslaw sandwich. College is a cloistered existence but there is freedom in this enclosure, there’s books and films and art and theatre, all giving new directions and perceptions, opening up new possibilities. Sometimes I think I spend too much time watching and not enough participating, but it does aid my positive willpower, lifting me up over difficulties to see the other side.

26^th May 1994.

Sat in bed.

Maya Angelou was amazing, a goddess. As soon as I saw her I nearly cried. I’m looking at my windowsill, my own domestic altar. The icons are everyday  sacred objects – a baby sock, a lapis lazuli disc, a canteen coffee cup (unwashed) dried seaweed and juggling clubs.

30^th May 1994

Skelmanthorpe Park, Bank Holiday

Daughter and friends playing on the slide- head first, who’s the fastest, all in a chain and other such initiations into their physical environment. I’m trying to let the wind blow my thoughts clear, but it’s not the same when you can’t smell the sea. We’re going for a walk in the woods now.

Our Back Garden.

Jaunt in the woods has sprung a dream memory:

I am being dragged along a stony road on my stomach. My wrists are tied. It’s a **** of a way to travel but at least I’m getting somewhere. I think I might have been captured but I realise I can easily untie the knot. I have to travel like this otherwise the destination wouldn’t appear the same, had I sat comfortably throughout. The journey is important to the frame of mind.

I’m slightly ill, how I hate being ill, so this may explain my mood. I need to rejuvenate. Asking this quality from something else only serves as a stop gap- an attitude of gathering strength is required. I used to get this from being in the sight and sound of the sea. Now I will have to gain it from myself. This is a bumpy journey but I define myself through it.’

Meeting Maya Angelou was a confirmation that venerating the ordinary stuff was an important idea, and that one should be in charge of one’s own story. In every woman, there is a kind of goddess, and here was a woman who let hers shine. A brave and inspirational presence.

I can’t remember when I had the dream that is brought to mind while I walk through the woods herding a tribe of neighbourhood children- it is weird to read this now, because it is so true. Oh dear, I say to myself, you could have untied the knot, but yes, you would not be the same person. Some children can be told the fire is hot and some children have to stick their fingers in it before they learn; I am the latter type. The point of these revisits to previous time points is to find out how my attitude shaped my ability to be happy, not to dwell on difficulties, so some drama is left out. This may or may not undermine the power of the whole story, I am not concerned with that. I don’t want to promote drama for the sake of creating a wild story, I want to show that attitude creates a wonderful life whatever may happen, there is joy to be found.

Girl gazes at a container ship- maybe it is full of exotic shoes?