A lesson from a pineapple

Once when we lived in the Solomon Islands, we discovered that the prickly plant outside our doorstep was in fact a pineapple plant. We realised this when the top started sprouting a tiny little bud.
My mum was so excited; we were living in the tropics and she had never grown a pineapple before, so she eagerly waited and watched it grow. We would get excited updates from her about how it was going. We could all see how it was going, but she would still tell us.
Once she said "I think it might be a week or two and I think it'll be ready!"
There had been so much anticipation.
Then soon after she had made that last announcement, I walked past the plant and I saw that midget pineapple looking so cute. So I came back outside with a butter knife and I cut that pineapple off. When I looked at this small pineapple and I held it in my hands, something I had done in my eagerness, I really felt as if I had killed something.
I placed the severed pineapple back on the stem, but with dread I realised I couldn't connect it back up to it's life source. My mum found that pineapple sitting on top of the plant, detatched and withering and asked me if I had done it but I denied it in my guilt.
I guess you just have to wait for some things. Some things take time to mature.
We impatiently wonder when things will be complete and in our eagerness sever that which is growing.
It's easier with a pineapple because you can look over and see what stage it is at. Sometimes spiritually we can't see how things are progressing. In our blindness we still have to trust and take comfort from any small sign of life.

Crafting

Now let's get down to the important things.
Other than reminiscing about the way I "used to write", I also make things.

It's a hobby. Okay, perhaps it's more like a compulsion. Maybe even an obsession. I'm not sure if it's curable.

I see things (garbage really) and the first thing I think is what I could make from it.
At times this can be highly inconvenient and my living spaces can begin to look more like a I've let a monkey loose with a pair of scissors and some craft supplies.
Positive side: on a good day I can whip up a throw pillow in under 60 seconds from an old teddy bear and a discarded t-shirt

I look at green beer bottles lying in the gutter and think 'glass pendulum earrings'.
I see empty soft drink cans and think 'Christmas decorations'.
I see sticks and think 'strung together, that would make a cute natural mobile".

I wonder where this fits in with my life.
I wonder whether it will remain a hobby/compulsion/obsession or if I'll actually get to use this drive for something useful one day. I sure hope so.

I leave you with piccies of my recycled Christmas decorations. Made from Coke cans, light bulbs and old newspapers.

I keep having to tell myself to continue crafting all over everything. Even when I'm tired and I have 3 waking hours to myself and I have every self given excuse to sleep instead.
I tell myself this to keep the bug alive.
It may not be an illness, an unhealthy obsession or a nasty compulsion.
I think I need this thing. It's so part of me, my relationship with this drive seems symbiotic.
So in the light of that, I do hope this thing is not curable.

Smiles,
Meiche.

I used to write

I used to write and I loved to write.
It used to be a large part of my expression. People often say that 'writing is cathartic', and I suppose for me it has been, yet it was more than a cathartic expression for me.
It was a way for me to feel not so alone.
It was the way I dreamed and created, painting pictures in my imagination by sculpting words, words that when standing alone bore no real meaning. Yet when I used them, strung them together like beads on a string, they became beautiful.

I was always the kid who would receive the teacher's snide taunt of "Wakey wakey!" as I stared out the open window of the classroom, on an imaginary journey which generally involved talking animals, other mythical creatures (some of my own making) and possibly another dimension or two. The upside of these mental adventures was I did great on creative writing tasks. The not so upside is that I have never been great at maths or focusing on the present time frame.

I often wonder why I stopped writing. Did I stop needing it as an expression?
I have made so many "come back" blog entries, declaring "I'm back!" only to disappear for several more months.
Sometimes, usually at night when I should be sleeping but my mind is still well awake, I remember how much I have enjoyed having a written journey. I remember blogging days and how stringing those words together brought satisfaction.
I would love to be on that journey again. Perhaps I still desire for the kinship, or maybe it's purely that I miss exercising my linguistic muscle.

Whatever it is, I want to be conscious of my journey again in the way that I was before. That is why I desperately want to be able to write more than just "Oh... I used to write"

Smiles,
Meiche in Melbourne.