Category: Memoir

To smooth or not to smooth? The eternal dichotomy of curly hair.

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If you came into the world sporting insanely curly hair like me, you’ve probably had a love/hate relationship with it throughout your life.

It’s estimated that about 60% of us have curly hair. That’s a fair chunk of people who regularly decide they don’t want the hair type they were allocated because it’s not the ‘in’ thing. Of course, we shouldn’t fall victim to this eternal runway of fashion ins and outs but … advertising is a powerful shapeshifter. We want to be beautiful, have the right look, not be ‘othered’.  

To be clear, I haven’t spent my entire life obsessing about whether to straighten my crowning glory or let it do its corkscrewed worst, but here’s the thing. At times when the world has worshiped at the shrine of flowing straight locks, for us frizz heads, smooth, sleek hair seems as precious as Tutankhamun’s Golden Mask, and just as out of reach. We live our lives on that most uncomfortable of places, the horns of the to smooth or not to smooth dilemma.

People, talk about beauty shaming. What about hair shaming? Shouldn’t that be a thing too? Straight or curly, there’s always a time when what you have doesn’t cut it according to the fashionistas and you don’t feel in the slightest pretty — a topic I’ve covered in a previous post.

When I finally acknowledged a couple of years ago that I might as well have been trying to nail jelly to the wall as keep my tousled tresses under control for significant chunks of my life, I put a stop to a lifetime of denial. I stepped away from the Curly Wars and towards my best hair life, casting aside all the primping paraphernalia like so much unwanted baggage.

I was a curly-haired cherub as a child. People would positively croon over my gorgeous golden spirals … and I basked in their admiration, right? Wrong, I hated it. As I entered my teens, I realised my look just didn’t make the cut … as it were. I wanted to be a long-haired badass, not a curly-haired little butter wouldn’t melt in my mouth poppet. When my mother’s hair writ split at the ends in my early teens, I went on a long march to curly freedom.

But oh, the pain of the journey. Getting short curly hair to the bit where it’s a cascading glory not a god-awful grotesquerie builds lifelong attributes like inner fortutide, grit and determination. My recalcitrant curls couldn’t seem to stir themselves to grow any length, and for a couple of self-loathing years, I became that person. The nerdy, bookworm, violin-playing possessor of a horror story triangular frizz.

At that time, it wasn’t the curls per se that were the problem—Marc Bolan had already seduced us with his lyrical depth, “I ain’t no square with my corkscrew hair” in Telegram Sam. And I wanted to be that person. Pity the diminutive Glam Rock pioneer prematurely got curled around a tree in a pocket rocket Mini in 1977 just a couple of weeks short of his 30th birthday. The curly world mourned more than the loss of a rock legend. Think what he could have done to change the curly conversation over the years. Or maybe even the Mighty Mouse of the singing world would have succumbed to prevailing hair trends along with the rest of us Lemmings.

It doesn’t matter a damn that other people rave about your curls – curls are a personal thing.

It also doesn’t matter a damn that other people rave about your curls. Many people have put mine up on a pedestal. Everyone except me seems to love them. But curls are a personal thing. Mine weren’t the sleek Siren look I lusted after because “it is known” (a la Daenerys’s handmaids in Game of Thrones) or at least it certainly seemed to me that straight hair was perceived as more appealing and sexier than curls. As a consequence, I spent hours daily duelling the unruly little suckers with a blow dryer. I’d section my hair and brush each one over and over until it had a semblance of straightness. It was all awful for the hair, but we didn’t have the flat irons and specialised product we do now.

Ironically, I grew up in a cold climate where gale-force winds, driving rain or blizzard conditions were the prevailing weather conditions, so all the hours of smoothing went out the window the minute I stepped out the door. Remember the episode of Friends when Monica landed in Hawaian humidity with glorious sleek hair that frizzed out the minute she stepped off the plane? Been there, done that, worn the tee-shirt.

So, I started straightening in the mid-seventies, the time as some wag said, when hippies roamed the earth and footballers sported perms and ‘tashes. But it wasn’t until the mad eighties that we reached peak curl. The eighties were a riot of too much everything. I moved to London in 1981 and revelled in the excess. It was a time when fashion was said to have thrown discretion to the winds and gone plain wild. It was all about extreme individuality—the tail end of the Punk Era and the rise of the New Romantics. Big, curly hair wasn’t just a style but an attitude. In that decade, if you had straight hair, you were screwed. Hair was ‘pouffed’ to within an inch of its product-laden life. Body was the bomb. Curls reigned supreme. I was at last free to stop trying to coax my curls into conformity and revel in my great good fortune in not needing a perm to achieve the look.

By the eighties, we reached peak curl. Big, curly hair wasn’t just a style, it was an attitude. If you had straight hair, you were screwed!

Then, from the mid-nineties, it all went pear-shaped again as the pendulum of fashion swung, as is the way with pendulums. And, to my shame, I swung with it … and then swung back … and swung again.  

OK, so I exaggerate in the interests of a good story. I’m not—quite—the fashion victim I’m making myself out to be. What’s fuelled my personal curl-path more than wanting to be in with the In Crowd has been my prevailing mood. Curly is confident me—the kickass, outgoing facet of my many-faceted self. Straight has often accompanied the stressful, conflicted me, coping with times of uncertainty and change. I guess it was a way of imposing some order and feeling a bit glam.

Women are notable for slashing long hair when relationships break down. In my case, I tend to go to ground and dial everything, including my hair, down while I re-energise and recover from whatever’s bothering me. For sure, fashion trends have some impact—I don’t live in a vacuum—but it’s largely about how I’m feeling.

I’m in with the in-crowd

Anyway, in this tale with a lot of twists, I’m glad to have once-and-for all accepted that my curls are one of my superpowers. I am once more a rebel without a comb. Like the Hidden Tiger, I’m coiled and ready to spring. My hair has always been more mood than mane. I finally see that curly hair like mine isn’t just a plate of food. It’s a signature dish.

And how clever of me to come to this life-changing conclusion at a time when curly hair has become infinitely Instagrammable. Tellingly Tik Tokable. The frisson of frizz fascinates rather than frightens. Posting endless pix of your capricious curls is all the rage. It’s not just in our modern times that curls have come and gone. It’s been the same story since Eve was blamed for everything and chucked out of Eden.

Humans are contrary by nature—we’re rarely happy with what we’ve got. The curly want straight, and the straight want curly. It was ever thus. My advice? Keep calm and curl on.

Here’s my Top Twenty picks from Instagram’s curly cuties whose “spirals have gone viral”.

Courtesy of Wolf Global
  • Embracing the chaos, one curl at a time
  • Sassy, classy and a bit smart-assy
  • Born to be wild and curly
  • Twist, shout, and let those curls out
  • Curly hair, don’t care, got flare everywhere
  • Curls rule the world
  • In a sea of straight, my curls are the wave
  • Living the curly life one spiral at a time
  • Embrace the chaos of your curls
  • Let your curls do the talking
  • Sassy, classy, and a bit smart-assy… courtesy of my curls
  • Walk through life like it’s a curly runway
  • When life gives you curls, flaunt them
  • Own your curls, own your crown
  • Fearless in the pursuit of what sets my curls on fire
  • My hair isn’t messy; it’s just erupting with awesome
  • Curls are the exclamation point of my personality!
  • Perfectly curled and unapologetically bold
  • Curls on point; life on track
  • It’s not just curls; it’s an attitude with spirals.

Homemade with love and butter

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I had a little cry this morning. I was using a mixing spoon my mother gave me a few years ago to make scrambled eggs. It’s got a wooden handle and a blue rubber bowl that says “Homemade with love and butter”.  At the time she gave it to me, I could only ask, “What was she thinking?”  It felt like a sort of token “that’ll do” choice, and I figured she must have been light on imagination, drunk or high on something when she bought it as it seemed so out of character.

Thinking about it, that’s not strictly true — she was occasionally seduced by a frill or two, took the occasional little step away from the righteous path of good taste into the barbarism of floral, even frilly. I don’t recall her succumbing to motto-infested items before, but I guess there’s always a first time. 

Mostly, though, she was a flag bearer for understatement and conventional good taste. Hyperbole wasn’t something she suffered from, and superlatives weren’t in her standard lexicon. You had to dig deep to understand that describing something as “good” meant she absolutely loved it. That could be frustrating on occasion until you remembered her generation’s stiff-upper-lip approach to life.

Now, I look at the spoon and see a cherished memento given with love, if not butter. Actually, I also see a very good mixing spoon, which I use all the time, even though I snobbily dislike stuff with naff mottos. I nearly threw it away because it was far from what I would have bought myself. I’m so glad I didn’t. 

I look around my apartment and see other gifts received over the years imbued with memories and love. I associated them more with my mother than my father because she bought them. Unfair, I know, but them’s the breaks. Staring tearily into space, remembering my mother this morning, I thought again how lucky I am to have had parents who always gave generously and with love, even when times were hard for them, which they were for many years. 

My mother died a few months ago, and I miss her profoundly every day. I miss her particularly, knowing Christmas is just around the corner and, for the first time, she won’t be there. But I feel her with me when I use my naff spoon, and its naffness makes me smile … when it’s not making me cry. 

Mum loved Christmas. She spent her last one in hospital. We did our best to bring the season to her with mini lights, some decorations and presents … of course. This year, our little family will be dispersed for the first time in years, but some good friends and a much-loved niece will be joining this orphan for dinner, and the season will be jolly, reflective, happy and sad. As it should be. I will raise a glass to my beloved mother, knowing she will be there in spirit and enjoying the moment wherever she is.

As Christina Rosetti said in her 1885 poem, set by many composers to music as a carol over the years, “Love came down at Christmas.” I know it will come down again this year.

Hibernation mode deactivated

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I’m excited—I’m writing a book. Please feel free to join my happy dance. I’ve been writing my book for several months now. Unfortunately, after a burst of energy over the (southern hemisphere summer), ennui sank its fangs into the jugular of my writer’s mojo, and I went back into a slough of inertia, if not outright despond. 

This whole pandemic thing and all the other unthinkable stuff that’s going on around us has challenged me big time. It’s like someone found Pandora’s Box intact, read the cautionary tale about what happens when you open it, but thought it would be a winning idea to open it anyway and see if it’s as bad as legend would have it. Just as an aside, Pandora’s box was, in fact, Pandora’s jar. There’s a long and boring story about Erasmus usign the wrong word when he translated the story from Greek to Latin…zzzzzz. Anyway, box or jar, it was left in Pandora’s care and curiosity drove her to open it. Epic fail! Imagine her face as she watched sickness, death and myriad other evils escape into the world. Even though she shut the box as quickly as she could — well, you would, wouldn’t you? — the only thing she shut back in was hope, surely the one thing humanity needed to survive the others? Eek! You’d have to think Pandora spent the rest of her life in therapy, coming to terms with her guilt.

Anyway, back to me. I don’t think I have felt so much lack of certainty before. Frankly, I’ve been confused in these oh-so-changing and identity-obsessed times. Every time I crank up my computer to start a post, I get bogged down in the deathly dichotomy of doctrinal duality (not to mention laboured alliteration). It’s not that I haven’t had ideas; it’s just that when I start to run with one of them, so many different pathways open up that I quite literally get overwhelmed and can’t decide which to follow. Like Robert Frost, I’d go for the one less travelled, but almost all of them qualify on that count these days. 

For someone who loves to comment, this uncharacteristic state of no comment—haven’t posted a blog at all this year and only a couple last year—is disturbing. There’s been such a one-dimensionality about life. The usual rites of passage have been cancelled or postponed, sometimes more than once. My choir is on it’s fourth attempt to sing the mighty Bach Mass in B Minor. Parties, weddings, funerals, festivals, concerts, celebrations with family and friends, travel and holidays. Many of the things that anchor our lives haven’t happened. Time seems to have folded into itself. Chronological memory has stalled—it’s hard to remember what happened and when it happened because the rhythm of our lives has been messed around so badly. 

However, I had a ‘Damascus moment’ a few weeks ago. I realise I’ve been in mental hibernation. We humans aren’t supposed to be able to hibernate, but I’m walking proof “the science” is wrong on this. Think about it. Hibernation is the thing that animals do to conserve energy so they can survive adverse weather conditions or lack of food. But isn’t hibernation just one great big sleep? Not at all. They’re not all a bunch of lazy fur balls—hibernation isn’t technically sleeping, and hibernating animals ‘wake up’ periodically. Hibernation’s more a state of torpor. The animal’s heartbeat and breathing slow, and their body temperature drops significantly. But they are still capable of some activity, including suckling cubs. Sounds scarily like my last two years, except for the cub suckling bit. Oh, and hibernating bears don’t eat, drink or exercise for around 100 days. I’ll leave you to figure out which of those abstentions apply to my hibernation experience. 

If animals can hibernate to survive stuff like adverse weather, why not me ? I’ve clearly been in a state of torpor avoiding all the crap unleashed by the idiot who re-opened Pandora’s box (or jar). I’ve been in my imaginary leaf and twig-lined den waiting for better times. What? I’ve woken up too soon? Well, even bears can only hibernate for so long. 

In any case, as there is SFA I can do about any of the stuff I’ve been hoping to outlast, I figured it was time to grab some of those lemons life has lobbed in my direction and make some lemonade. It’s time to zoom in on the certainties and consign confusion to outer darkness. So, I’m writing a book about branding for the founders of start-up and early-stage businesses. You may well think this is a giant leap from writing about random shit in this blog, but developing and managing brands is what I do for a living and, after a lot of years plus a fair few cracks at the entrepreneurial life to lace through it all, I have a lot of material. You might say my stash of lemons is a big one. Much tasty lemonade should result. 

OK, I’ll stop labouring the point and move on. But I am excited. It’s going well. Energy is high, optimism is loaded, and the world is again my oyster. Hibernation mode is most definitely deactivated.

An inconvenient wheeze

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“Will it kill me?” I ask, fed up with the obfuscation that’s going on, staring him straight in the eye.

“Er … no,“ he replies, eyes focused, consultant-like, into the space above my head. 

Yay, I’m not in danger of carking it any time soon. At least, not from this. Great news, even though I do wish the man would volunteer some information instead of me having to drag it out of him like a mother trying to understand how their teenager’s school day went. Nodding to the squadron of pigs primed for take-off on the grass outside the window, I persevere with the list of questions I’ve prepared in advance.

“Will it get worse as I get older?” 

“No evidence that it will. You need to get flu jabs and stay away from people with colds,” is the best he can do after a lengthy contemplation of the inside of his eyelids. Interestingly, no mention of Covid implications. Well, I guess there’s no community outbreak currently, so I’ll give him a pass on that.

Silence descends on the room after this burst of conversational brio, and we stare at each-others’ shoes like a pair of accountants at a party, wondering who’s going to be brave enough to speak first.

What is it about medical consultants? They may be brilliant in their fields, but the ones I’ve experienced share a startling inability to communicate on any level that could remotely be called human. 

Many people believe that our stresses and emotional issues manifest in physical ways. I tend to agree with this as I’ve had minor respiratory problems for as long as I remember. My breathing kit is like a litmus test of my emotional equilibrium. When I get stressed, my voice gets all husky and breathless — think Marlyn Monroe singing happy birthday to JFK — and I get mild symptoms of a cold. As it’s always been short-lived, I’ve never really thought too much about it.  

At some point a couple of years ago, it stopped being an occasional thing. I reached some sort of tipping point where I’m coughing a lot — a worrying amount. The first year of joined-up-coughing, it stops for the summer. The second-year, it doesn’t. I’m not over-concerned as many people in New Zealand have coughs bestowed by our high pollen count from all the horticulture and similar. By mid-2019, it’s bad enough that I figure a visit to my GP is in order. Having put me through some rudimentary tests, she fobbed me off – somewhat predictably — with antihistamines. Pointless waste of time. Cough, cough, cough. Time passes, I box on. It’s my new norm. I just assume I’m stuck with it. 

By August last year, I’m notably worse and wheezing has long since entered the frame. So, I go back to see said GP, who finally accepts something is wrong, and I’m in front of a respiratory specialist faster than you can say Chronic Constructive Pulmonary Disease. The speed is courtesy of my eye-wateringly expensive private health care policy, which I’m deeply grateful I have kept going when handed the bill. It turns out, and this will likely surprise no-one — it certainly didn’t surprise me – that I have severe Asthma. However, this diagnosis was off the back of a lot of tests, and I was seriously relieved it wasn’t something much worse.

Just as an aside, try being a severe Asthmatic in the time of Covid — talk about an inconvenient wheeze. Convincing scared people that you’ve been hacking your lungs up since long before Covid-19 was even a blob on a laboratory microscope is tricky. They don’t tend to hang around long enough to appreciate the finer points of a dry cough (Covid) versus a wheezy damp one (Asthma). Forget social distancing; we’re talking crossing the street, making the sign of the ‘evil eye’ in their scramble to put as much distance as possible between them and you. And believe me, you do not want to have a coughing fit in the supermarket queue. The one benefit of coughing as if you have a 60-a-day fag habit? People stay the Hell away from you so are out of range of any ‘aerosols’ they might otherwise generously share.

But back to our action-packed story.

“I think the meds are making me worse,” I say somewhat confrontationally.

This elicits no response if you ignore the facial tick that’s starting to manifest.

“So, what happens if I stop taking them?”

“Why don’t you stop until they’ve cleared your system and then start again to see if there is any difference?” he says after another interminable silence.

This seems like quite a good wheeze if you’ll forgive the pun.

“How long will that take?”

“Couple of months.”

And that pretty much wraps it up. I sense we’re in the throes of a break-up. By this time, we have seen quite a bit of each other, and I have become accustomed to his face like Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady. Leaving for the final time, I feel a little aggrieved that he’s just booting me out into the wide world without even the safety net of a six-month callback. Doesn’t he care? Haven’t we gone to Hell and back together? This little pity party lasts as long as it takes to get out of the building. Then I think, “So what? I’ve been on my own before. I can do it. Anyway, who wants to go on stuffing their system with pharmaceuticals when there are other fun options like hypnotherapy to explore?”

Of course, I’m exaggerating in the interests of a good story, and I do my specialist a disservice. He tried hard. As we worked our way through the tools in his toolbox searching for a panacea, he visibly deflated as each failed to be The One. I think he saw me as the proverbial riddle, wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma that he was a bit peeved not to be able to solve. Damn it, why wasn’t I responding to the pharmacopoeia of Symbicort Turbohalers et al. on offer? I was pretty peeved myself. For a person whose favourite activities include singing and bushwalking, I’d hoped for better. Cough, cough, cough. Wheeze, wheeze, wheeze.

The trouble was, his toolbox was limited to the range of available medications, and there was no thought to try and identify the underlying causes or discuss this as an alternative to consider. These days, medication is generally the treatment of first resort, whatever the condition. Many things can trigger Asthma, but I do not doubt that mine resulted from a layering of traumatic events over several years, which caused no end of stress and sleepless nights. Then came a pandemic which didn’t exactly diminish the anxiety levels. 

Even though the medical outcome was disappointing — I badly wanted a quick, easy fix — I also didn’t want to be on large doses of inhaled whatever for the rest of my life and I stopped. Three weeks later, I’m sure you’ll be happy to know, I’m still here and none the worse for wear. If anything, I’m a bit better. The whole episode has helped me think differently about many things that I probably wouldn’t have if the meds had worked. As a result, I’m feeling happier and more in control, hopefully building a virtuous circle of improving lung function. 

Whatever happens from here, my pesky, inconvenient wheeze might just get me bumped up the Covid jabbing-order. Whether this is a silver lining, depends on where you sit on vaccines. I’ll take the win.

Do the Covid Shuffle?

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“Did you have a good lockdown?” the wags are all asking since we moved back to Level 1. As if it really was a war. Maybe it was? Thinking about it, if it was a war, it’s still very much alive on many fronts. The phantom menace we’re ‘fighting’ — the pesky Coronavirus — still stalks the earth.

It’s still hard to take in. It’s as if a fictitious dystopian future has jumped off the page.Life BC seems to have happened in some parallel universe … far, far away. “Unprecedented” they say. Unprecedented, ‘they’ say a lot. It’s le mot du pandemic. The top cliché of our coronavirus times. In these times, our vocabulary has extended — flatten the curve, epidemiology, self-isolation, social distancing and bubble love. ‘Quarantinis’ replaced martinis for the fashionable set, and the WFM brigade came out of lockdown Zoomed-out, near Zombies reeling from Zoomchosis. You know the drill? All that pacing up and down the living room, head shaking purposelessly from side to side, unfocused eyes looking inward to some analogue paradise of yore.

Coronavirus pushed us to a locked-down standstill. A global pause. Emergency workers diced with death, the rest of us dug in at home and were forced to deal with whatever daily reality home represented. We got creative and entertained each other in profound and emotionally charged ways. We laughed We cried. We grieved. We rejoiced. We lost our jobs. We worried about our jobs. Our businesses. We valued things we didn’t before. We applauded new heroes. We teared-up as plucky, indomitable Major Tom shuffled his Zimmer-framed way back and forward across his garden earning staggering amounts for the British National Health Service. Those of us who could, counted our blessings.

We did the COVID Shuffle. That excruciating manoeuvre as you step off the pavement to maintain the requisite distance from an approaching person or bubble, whilst simultaneously smiling like the Cheshire Cat and offering hearty greetings to avoid causing offence. Also, to have a precious moment of human connection.

It’s a bleak time for the party animals in our midst — “introverts, your extrovert friends need your help” was one of the more entertaining and ironic truths coming through from the meme land. Life in the time of Lockdown was also something of a bonfire of the vanities. What’s the point blinging-up a storm to sit at home? Actually, I did smear a bit of make-up around most days — Zoom has a certain motivating quality on that score. Occasionally ditched the leggings for a skirt, or even a dress.

But hey, we succeeded. We flattened the pesky curve. For an intoxicating number of consecutive days, no cases at all — existing, new or prospective. “FOR NOW!” said our Prime Minister, another hero of the moment. Jacindamania isn’t only a New Zealand phenomenon. I know Aussies who’ve asked her to invade and spare them from the bigoted, climate denying MAN they’re lumbered with. How right she was as we now three new cases delivered to our doorstep by returning residents. This was always likely and wouldn’t be too troublesome if the border quarantine procedures hadn’t turned out to be a monster cockup. Jacinda and her plucky little team of five mission are now royally pissed at whatever ‘them’ was responsible. We’ve all eaten our greens and done what we’ve been told at … er … unprecedented cost. Why should other people be allowed to break curfew, even on compassionate grounds? Hey, ho, it is what is.

So, on reflection, it has been a sort of is a war. For more than two months, we sequestered ourselves in our home shelters while the Coronavirus sent its silent but deadly aerosols into our communities and ravaged our economy. Many of us wondered what will be left when the dust settles. For now, we Kiwis have won a battle, but the war itself rages on around the world and the breakout this week shows how easily we could get sucked back in. But it’s not just the pandemic. As we navel-gazed our way through the Lockdown fog, pondering the meaning of life the universe and everything, for even the most fervent deniers, it was hard to ignore the inconvenient truth that our planet and our lives are globally and intimately linked. And that our certainties can be upended in a heartbeat. We now understand in a visceral and undeniable way that there are bigger and deadlier risks on the horizon if we don’t dramatically shift our values, and how we live, spend and consume.

Countries are struggling to meet their sustainability commitments. People are worried — time is not our friend. It’s as if the Coronavirus has swept the lid off a contemporary Pandora’s Box and out has poured the sickness, death and other evils which have blighted the world while we watch the horror unfold with horror and incredulity in real-time on our devices. The gap between the super-rich and everyone else yawns like a gaping chasm that can’t be bridged. Extreme weather events get more extreme. It seems as if we’re fiddling while the Outback burns.

We make pacts with our higher powers that the future will be better. That sustainability won’t be thrown out with the bathwater. We talk about “the new normal” as if it’s a point in time we are waiting to arrive at. But there’s no pre-ordination involved. The new normal is a blank canvas waiting for our artist’s brush. The only question is what do we paint? Will it be a beautiful harmonious landscape? A primal scream? A world where no-one is left behind? I’m putting my money on the latter.

Crises serve up latitude to break moulds. To change the status quo. Shock allows for more shock. We’ve been through so much, what’s a little more if it turns this moment to benefit? As New York Times opinion writer Charlie Warzel put it, “Right now, in the midst of a series of cascading, intersecting crises (racial and economic inequality, climate change, mass unemployment, a pandemic) what’s possible feels more of an open-question than any other moment in recent times.”

My sudden addiction to The Chase during Lockdown, did kick up a useful piece of trivia. Pandora’s Box didn’t only contain all the bad stuff. It also held Hope and we need Hope to soar around the world and work its magic. With hope loose in the world, I’m backing us humans to open our minds to the possible and make all the sacrifice mean something.

A good man and true

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My father died two months ago. He was 89, a sick old man and it wasn’t unexpected. In many ways our little family was glad he didn’t linger on because the last few weeks of his life were not the best of times. He was so very fragile and there was little left of our big proud Scotsman who always had a song in his heart. Despite this, when it comes down to that final good bye, I don’t think you’re ever really prepared. There’s really no way to pre-empt the emotions that are triggered when you realise one of the mainstays of your life is gone. I miss him deeply.

Dad died early on a Tuesday morning and we had the funeral three days later. It was small, intimate affair and a fitting tribute to the man. It truly was a celebration, full of joy and love and laughter. My sister and I gave the eulogies. Preparing these, we reviewed our family story at length and laughed and cried in equal measure while we pondered his life and what he’d meant to us. We discussed how lucky we were to be born to parents who gave us a wonderful and safe childhood. Parents who fed our ‘satiable curiosity’ and opened our minds to how much the world has to offer. They encouraged us to be the unique, creative individuals all human beings should be able to be. Most of all, they gave us the security to grow and experiment with our lives, knowing we could escape from whatever mess we could land ourselves in because there was always a safety net at home. We lived without the taint of violence or intimidation that is the awful reality for so many women and girls.

Of course, we had our ‘moments’ — what family doesn’t? It would also be misleading to sanctify his memory, he wasn’t’ a saint. But how many kids never experience the wonder of a kind, loving father who cares deeply for them and protects them? How many still live in terror as a drunken monster rampages round the house hitting out at anything or anyone who gets in his way? How many go hungry or have their lives and health ruined by their crack- or p-addicted parents? How many orphans simply don’t ever get to know their parents? How many have their dreams and confidence beaten out of them dashed on the rocks of ignorance and cruelty? How many kids are damaged beyond repair by toxic, Wars of the Roses style divorces?

My father was a man of high principles. An honest-to God, good man who loved and respected the women in his life and believed we could be anything we wanted to be.  In these #metoo times, we could do with more people like him. While we surely need to ‘out’ the bad apples and find ways of stopping the violence and inequality, it’s important to remember that there are lots of good guys like him around too.

Painting in feature image: William (Bill) Paterson by Joseph Guilford c 2016

 

Take your shoes off when you’re wiping your feet on me!

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At a dinner party some years ago the host came up with a provocative challenge which I’ve subsequently put to many others in the intervening years. Imagine the scene. We were still sitting around the table after dinner and and had got to that mellow point — i.e. belt-looseningly full and well wined —  where you get stuck into the really good conversations. The challenge was what would we call our autobiographies. “Great question” we all agreed.

As you can imagine, silence descended on the table for some time as we all tried to think of something suitably impressive, witty, challenging, ironic or, frankly, all of the above to impress each other with. Unfortunately, I can’t actually remember any of them because there were somer crackers, and we spent a couple of hysterical (serious LOL stuff) hours reviewing peoples’ choices against what we collectively knew about them.

Being known as Frankie to that group, I think I opted for something frivolous like Frankie’s Follies. “Not bad” was the verdict of my fellow diners as they considered the chapters that might make up this clearly racy little number. The ‘they’ at the dinner being people who know me quite well rather than the faceless ‘they’ who are generally cast as the common enemy. It was an eye-opener to understand from their comments that my fellow diners saw me as something like  Bridget Jones meets Barbarella!

Even at the time, I interpreted ‘not bad’ as ‘could do better’. Frankie’s Follies just felt feel a bit frivolous and try hard as a life story, and I’ve been on the hunt for an improved one every since. But I hadn’t been able to come up with a better option — try it, it’s really hard — until recently when I started writing this blog and now I’m spoilt for choice. The title of one of my recent pieces — @shit creek #no paddle — was a contender for a while. This was getting close I felt. Whether or not it could be the perfect moniker for MY book, it would certainly be a fab one for A book. Ultimately, I ruled it out  as I’m determined that the next part of my life will be shaped to avoid any more time wasted in the waiting room for the Shit Creek Express.

But while I was writing it, I did a lot of soul-searching about my life trying to find re-curring themes, good and bad, that underpin my story.. One of the big ones was loyalty. I’m extremely loyal person to people I care about. On too many occasions that has strayed into loyalty beyond reason where I’ve given too much — personally and professionally — putting other people’s interests way ahead of my own. Typically I’ve ended up with my head in my hands to play with; a financial loser with broken heart. That piece of navel-gazing prompted a post that’s been in the hopper for a while but, like Shubert’s majestic last symphony, remained mockingly unfinished — Take Your Shoes Off While You’re Wiping Your Feet on Me! I love this title. It’s got everything really … drama, bathos, victimhood, irony, insight … except authenticity for me now. Like the cast off @shit creek persona, the door mat who allowed too many people to wipe their feet on her is also banished from the narrative these days.

As you might have guessed, the search for the definitive title for my autobiography has become something of mission. At sleepless moments other people count sheep, meditate, name cities … whatever … I start thinking about autobiography names. Maybe this is not for everyone but, for someone who loves words, it’s the perfect way of passing time. You know the deal. When you’re sitting in a cafe or restaurant trying not to look like Jonnie-no-mates whilst waiting for friends who are running late? Or whiling way and hour or too on a cold, dark winter Sunday afternoon at home when there are no fires to fight?

Challenging other people, like my long ago host did, to name their autobiographies has produced some of the most entertaining and thought-provoking conversations I can remember. Last year when I started this blog under the title Never Succumb to Beige I think I finally nailed it! The whole idea of not succumbing to beige has  become a personal metaphor for always being who you are, despite the pressure to conform to all manner of often uncomfortable societal norms. It represents my commitment to the ideology “to thine own self be true”, even if that true self is more bling than Ming. It captures the desire to not give in. To get back in the saddle again after falling off. To be indomitable and bounce back after the proverbial shit has hit the fan. It’s also an enduring reminder of the  husk I become during my last and very damaging long-term relationship. Most of all, imagine the epitaph it would make, ‘she never succumbed to beige!

Seriously though, how do you frame your life story? After all, what’s in a name? Does it matter? A life’s a life isn’t it? Should be. Nonetheless, I think names do matter. When you name a child it does seem that their name helps shape their personalities because of some deep-rooted need to live up or down to whatever they’re called.  Someone named Storm is likely to be a very different person from a Daisy for example. You’d be a laughing stock if you were a scaredy-Storm cat. Daisy? Well … er … I’m thinking … all those dairy cows.

Parents-in-waiting agonise over what to call their embryonic children. Any one who’s started a business will have agonised in equal measure over what to call their commercial ‘baby’ because the one they choose will shape the perceptions of every person who engages in any way with the business. I think equal dedication should be put into naming our life stories because it helps identify the values by which we want to live our lives, our primary vision and mission, and distill to its essence how we see ourselves as human beings.

We can choose to do this retrospectively when the story has already been long in the telling. This is the time when we are moving towards its ending and the denouement is becoming clear. Or we can name the story early on and allow it to shape how our plot develops and ultimately the conclusion we wish it to have. Of course, we can only stack the odds — life throws all sorts of curved balls at us which, without a crystal ball or other psychic assistance, we can’t possibly factor in from the beginning. This likely will result in a least one, if not several revisions or tweaks. But that’s a good thing, in the way that a quality business plan should be a living document evolving as circumstances change and understanding deepens.

If I had my time again, I’d take great care to more pro-actively shape my life by thinking about the story I wish to write. I don’t think for a moment I’d choose the schematic that would be required in the Take Your Shoes Off When You’re Wiping You’re Feet on Me version! If I’d started out with the Never Succumb to Beige ethos, I wonder how my life would have differed? While there have been shades of both through the years, giving a positive name to my journey earlier could have saved me from going down a lot of unnecessary rabbit holes along the way. The good news is I feel like I’m tracking pretty well against my chosen epitaph!

Thanks to College Artist for the perfect cover photo.

 

 

@shitcreek #nopaddle

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Taking stock at the beginning of a new year, I have to admit that 2017 was largely shit! No really, it was! This is not something I’m particularly proud of I can tell you. It felt like I was mired in miasma of misery and mental fatigue and couldn’t fight my way clear. In fact, I was languishing in (at?) Shit Creek.

It has to be said, Shit Creek is a place with which I have had some familiarity at other times in my life so you’d think I’d be able to recognise the warning signs and take evasive action. But no, it’s the same story every time. There I am, enjoying a leisurely paddle in my trusty (metaphorical) canoe along some tranquil, pristine waterway, full of hope and anticipation about where it will take me. Somewhere along the way, without me realising it, I’ve unaccountably veered off course up a tributary that looks superficially just like the main river itself. But the previously crystal clear water sliding past the canoe has inexplicably morphed into a brackish morass and it becomes progressively harder to keep making way. Despite all the growing evidence of imminent disaster, I struggle on determinedly until I’m irredeemably bogged down with nothing but the brown stuff to be seen in every direction. And where the hell did my paddle go?

It’s not as if anyone thinks,‘what do I want to do today? I know, I’ll paddle upstream to Shit Creek for a bit of a nosy around, drink in the aroma, have a relaxing slurry bath and head home for a well-deserved shower.’ Well, you don’t do you? You make what seems like a great decision or series of decisions, and it’s not till later you realise they were actually crap (sic) choices that should have been avoided like dog poop on a walking trail because your gut was shrieking ‘don’t do it, don’t do it!’ Yet, you pursue logic at the expense of your strongest instincts and oops, there you are back in it up to your gills. Or, to follow the analogy, trying to scrape it off your shoe with a stick. Merde alors!

We’re taught that logic trumps (in the card playing sense rather than the bozo in chief one) everything else. Societal conditioning in this regard is very strong and accepted wisdom is deeply engrained. After all, it stands to reason that basing critical decisions on analysis of  facts and figures should offer a better steer for decision making than relying on intuition and inner truths with their overtones of new age woo woo. And yet … that amazing warm glow when you make a choice that just feels innately right. The antithetic dread when you decide to do something that tears at ‘your truth’, to paraphrase Oprah at the Globes last week.

So at the beginning of another year, I am mindful of the definition of insanity — doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different outcome. I’m all for going with my inner truth. Facts and figures, probabilities and statistics, logic and rational thinking will always be part of the deal in terms of making decisions. They have to be, because they are important. But of equal importance is how I actually feel about the decision under consideration. In future, where logic and intuition are at war with each other, I’ll give the casting vote to intuition — after all, intuition’s much more likely to have my has my best interests at heart and, let’s face it, logic hasn’t entirely delivered. If I do this, I’ll be swooshing happily downstream — going with the flow as it were — instead of fighting my way against the current and landing back where I started; pooped and bewildered in the waiting room for the next Shit Creek Express.

Thanks for the image to http://illegaleldredtwplanduse.blogspot.co.nz/2017/

 

I’m in with the in-crowd

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Well actually, I’m not really, but it felt like an attention-grabbling headline and I could do with some more followers! Before anyone feels aggrieved, let me say quickly it’s not completely ‘fake news’. I do know a few people who know important people and in my life I have rubbed shoulders with the odd great or goodie from time to time; junior ministers, MPs, TV/radio types, musicians, sports celebs, poets and scientists laureate etc. After 13 years in London and now 12 in the capital of a country like NZ with a population of only 4.7m, you’d have to be some kind of hermit for this not to be the case. In any case, to justify the title, I did once sit at a table next to the glorious Mr. In-Crowd himself, Bryan Ferry, in an Indian Restaurant in Kensington. Pity I didn’t know I was sitting next to him at the time!

It’s hard to get away from the sheer, unadulterated joy in having bragging rights on an in-crowd moment. My personal best story undoubtedly is the time I swam with the All Blacks (New Zealand’s legendary national rugby team and current world world champions). Think about it. Most people only aspire to swim with dolphins. This wasn’t a sort of sponsored event to raise money for the team. No one took me out on a boat seeking a pod to cosy up to. It was much more prosaic. I was a member of the gym at the Intercontinental Hotel in Wellington for several years and used its pool most lunchtimes. Said hotel is where the ABs (when you’ve swum with them, you’re allowed a bit of familiarity I’d say) stay when in Wellington. Imagine if you will. You open the doors to the pool and there they are. A posse of glorious young men rotating between the sauna, the ice bath on the edge of the pool and the pool itself. You can imagine, dear reader, the flight impulse and unwillingness to unveil the then fifty something body was very strong. But I toughed it out and took the plunge … as it were. In the end, it was a lot of fun. They were utterly charming to everyone there. A story to dine out on forever.

But there’s also the in-ness of knowing someone who knows SOMEONE. The whole concept of reflected glory. A few years ago, the brother of a good friend dated a very (VERY) famous woman who was the ex-wife of an even more famous man … and at least one other not quite so famous one before him. Nearly wrecked the brother’s life, what with being followed and spied on and generally paparazzied (if that’s not a verb, it should be). Not altogether surprisingly, the relationship didn’t flourish and the very famous women somewhat predictably went on to marry another notorious A Lister. Don’t think my friend’s little brother was either famous enough or rich enough to cut it as a permanent fixture, although he certainly was a little of the former by the time his wonder woman jumped ship, and he wasn’t exactly a pauper to begin with. He just wasn’t in the same league as her hat trick of celeb spouses.

It was mind-boggling hearing about the media frenzy that surrounded their affair. My friend’s family was described very patronisingly as ‘socially anonymous’. They weren’t super-wealthy or super-successful or super-anything other than, to my mind, super-nice, but nice doesn’t sell column inches and so they were of utterly no consequence to the editors of prurience. It wasn’t an uplifting experience for any of the family or friends. I was reminded of this story whilst watching the endlessly repeated footage marking the 20th anniversary of the death of Princess Diana in August. Love her or not — my jury has always been out — it has always seemed a cruel and pointless waste of two lives to end up in the mangled wreckage of a Merc in the small hours of the morning because your drunk driver has smashed into the wall of a Paris tunnel speeding to evade a baying pack of papps.

While my friend’s brother was able to retire to relative obscurity when his relationship ended, his experience at the time was yet another example of the collateral damage accompanying the cult of celebrity that’s endemic in our western societies. The Princess Diana story is perhaps one of the most extreme examples of the high price of fame. Even though she was alleged to have manipulated the press big time and was therefore something of a poster girl for the ‘be careful what you wish for’ cautionary tale, no-one deserves the obsessive stalking that she endured.

It’s not just the stalking, there are also all the expectations to be lived up to. How do you retain self-esteem when every inch of you and everything you do is examined and picked over by the media on a daily basis? Having a barrage of cameras shoved in your face every time you venture out is unthinkable to anyone who values a degree of privacy. There’s also the fact that if you in the public eye, you have to compete with your Photoshopped publicity look. Great to be displayed on bill boards and front covers at your air-brushed best, where blemishes have been evened out and even the contours and proportions of your body might have been changed. But how would you ever leave home as the real you?

It’s not surprising people under this sort of scrutiny succumb to diet fads and eating related disorders including bulimia and anorexia. Again Princess Dianna is the poster girl here, but there have been so many others. People who are convinced that 40kgs is the ideal body weight are on the slippery slope to long-term health complications if not pointless and premature death. Then there’s the Siren call of the party scene that’s been a trap for many of an unwary in-crowder and I’m sure the sex, drugs, rock and roll lifestyle is a blast … until it destroys you.

For many, achieving any hall of fame can entail making some unpalatable choices. It’s become all too apparent over the last few weeks that the Weinsteins and Moores of the world use their power base to pray on the wide-eyed people trying to get ahead in their orbit, generally women, who are further down the food chain. It’s a sad right of passage if you have to run the gauntlet of sexual predation from powerful men whose fame and commercial bankability has, at least until now, protected them from being outed. How many aspiring women have had to put up or shut up to rise through the ranks? Worse, how much talent have we missed out on as women have walked away from promising careers to avoid conflict?

For sure the rich and famous seem to have everything anyone could ever want, but conditions most certainly apply. I know no-one promised famous people a rose garden and they chose to go down the path that led to the red carpet, winning on the international stage, awards, unimaginable wealth and similar. But looking at the price of admission, who in their right minds would want to be in with the in-crowd? I’d much rather be socially anonymous and free to lead my life as I wish. Having said that, I like to have a bit more of the rich bit in my relative anonymity — Croesus levels sprint to mind. It’s the fame bit you can keep!

British and Irish Lions 2017 tour — a world in union!

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I was lucky enough to be given tickets for the second test in the British and Irish Lions 2017 NZ tour last weekend in Wellington. It was epic and that was only the atmosphere in the stadium. To be honest, the atmosphere was what I went for and it didn’t disappoint. The Lions … Lions … Lions chant from the sea of red supporters was electrifying and compulsive and it’s been ringing in my head all week. In my book, the antics of rugby’s ‘Barmy Army’ — the glorious, enthusiastic, contagiously cheerful, campervan-enabled mas of Lions supporters — has been the main event of the tour, rather than the rugby itself. And no one could ever accuse these guys of having succumbed to beige!

There’s something improbably beguiling about tens of thousands of good-natured fans prepared to travel all the way round the world, leaving their summer for our winter to roar on their heroes. In a world where sports followers all too often split into to fanatical nationalist and tribal divisions and go to war, this tour has left it’s eccentric, but heart warming grace in a lot of hearts here.

I would have loved to be at last nights tour finale in Auckland. Instead, I went for the armchair experience helped along by a spectacular dinner and some very good wine. And what a match it was. Nail-biting to the very last with some incredible play. The big disappointment? It ended in a draw and we have to wait so many years for the re-match as the Lions only tour NZ every 12 years. The consolation for a dichotomized ex-pat like me? That it ended in a draw and both sides therefore won.

In truth, the All Blacks should have taken it out — they had their chances, but the British bulldog in me reveled in the doughty ‘we will never surrender’ spirit of my compatriots as they fought on to the last gasp, evening the score in its dying moments. I can tell you, I didn’t know whether to sing Rule Britannia, Swing Low, Flower of Scotland, Men of Harlech, Ireland’s call or Pokarekare ana for that matter.

With an English mother and a Scottish father, I’m a half-breed. Thinking about it, I’m actually more of a ‘bitsa’ if you go back another generation or two. In addition to both of those not always harmonious nationalities vying for prominence in my loyalties having lived in both countries for close to equal time, there’s also Irish, French and German. If you go back even further there’s likely some Viking in the mix. After a couple of decades in NZ, there’s now also a fair dollop of Kiwi super-imposed on it all.

When I was a kid, I used to watch test rugby with my father — one of the few things deemed OK for us kids to stay up late for. I can still remember the excitement building during each pulsating match and dad’s highly vocal ebbs and flows as points were won and lost and Five Nations slugged it out for national glory or against one of the great touring sides like the Springboks. But when the All Blacks were involved there was an extra frisson. An exoticism that few other teams could match. After all, they had the Haka and who could every forget the first time they saw one performed? The spine-chilling moment when the All Blacks line up and lay down the challenge to the opposition. It’s a primal declaration of intent. To my childish eyes, it was truly awesome. Decades later, it still is.

Living in New Zealand, it’s very easy to support our local side. They’re just …er … so good … and they win so often … and this country’s rugby mad … and you get caught up in it all. In all seriousness, the All Blacks truly are one of the world’s great sporting brands and one of this little country’s enduring successes. It’s hard not to succumb to their might and glamour, particularly as supporting Scotland can be bit of a test in its own right. On numerous occasions we may well have sent the English homeward to think again, but we’ve never beaten the All Blacks in 30 attempts, the first being at Murrayfield in 1905. That’s not ever. Never. Not even once. OK there have been two draws so it hasn’t been a complete whitewash and you have to take the wins where you can (as it were), but it is a teeny bit one-sided and depressing even for the most ardent fan. Mostly I’m just happy if we lose respectably. Ditto England, Ireland and Wales in the context of the All Blacks.

But last night I was proud to be a Brit! Progressively during this Lions tour, the land of my fathers (and sisters and cousins and aunts) has reclaimed me. The improbable alliance that is the British and Irish Lions is uplifting in a world where there is so much strife. As once BBC commentator put it, “they (the Lions) have done it once again, from disparate parts and across old enmities. In a modern world often focused on cold commercial gain and a narrow nationalism, they remain an idea apart and a reality to inspire. As you watched the two sides merge for a shared team photograph at the end, red shirts mixing with black, Englishmen with arms round Irishmen, a Welsh skipper congratulating a Welsh man of the match, a Scotsman ending as the tour’s leading try scorer, then you did understand what it was all about, after all.”

If people like these from places with deep-seated ancient grudges and not a few contemporary ones can set them aside and revel in the moment, there’s hope for us humans and our world. 

Photo from The Daily Mail