That's what This is - a Transitional Object !

Blogging that is - as Transitional Object - well, it works for me.

Occasionally other bloggers wonder "why" or "what" about their blogging. Sometimes such thoughts evolve into a Meme - 'why do you blog' or 'which blogs do you like reading and why'. The Seahorse inspired today's post's train of thought, which is entirely mine and may not have any resonance with your blogging, or life, experience. Also the comments conversation with Charles Dawson on my post 'Show me the way to go home', that has since been percolating and encouraging of a creative whinge. (New Blogger has apppeared to have lost the ability to provide me with the required information for a direct link. bad blogger.)

It was thinking through my comment on the Seahorse's post 'What's it all about': I said "...the blog can be one's transitional object, to hold onto, to be held by, in the process of life..."

That was in the early hours of this morning, waiting for the screaming tinnitus induced by the BSO's performance of Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 4, to subside to levels (plural - lots of different tinnitus noises in and around my head) that would allow sleep. Instead of sitting here bemoaning that particular medical impairment, or the crap television at that hour, I blogged and googled and ebayed. Which saw me through the transition from being out in the world, socialising, enjoying a cultural experience as part of a group, albeit as a wheelchair user, (one of three there last evening, not bad out of an audience of about 600). Saw me through the transition from that to being home alone, battered by tinnitus, chilly because I cannot afford anymore heating oil and, dammit, therefore in need of a hug. Laptop as comfort blanket.

www.snoopy.com

When my Bump was a toddler, each morning when I got her out of bed (that warm safe space), she would find some small object and hold it in her hand - all morning, sometimes all day. It could be a wooden block, a small figurine, a piece of lego, anything provided it was hers, was something she used a lot, or was familiar with, and it was small enough to stay within her grasp. Interestingly it was always a solid object, not soft and squidgy. Most of the time it was out of sight, enfolded in her small hand, occasionally it got in the way such as when I needed to wash her hands, in which case she just swopped which hand it was in, but never let it go.

I knew enough then to realise it was important to her needs, as she went from one place (sleep/bed/unconsciousness) to the other (walking, stairs, noises, food she did NOT want to eat). It could not be taken from her, but she would relinquish it, to her pocket, or somewhere next to her, when she was ready.

When she was in senior school and I had time to begin being me again, I did a three year training course in Psychodynamic Counselling. When we trainees progressed through the canon to Winnicott*, I discovered what her important dearly held object was - a Transitional Object - to ease the anxiety and answer the need for support when moving from one state of being to another. In my childhood I, like many others, had a teddy bear (till my MOTHER TOOK IT AWAY !!!).

I now know that throughout life we/I find and use transitional objects continually, but as they are culturally acceptable they are not thought of as comfort blankets, or they are objects so often used by everyone, that no one notices them for what they are. I'm thinking 'pop' music, as an essential accompaniment to puberty and attendant angst; therefore, in the order of the technological evolution; the transistor radio carried around to the annoyance of the older generation, the Walkman, the IPod. Also, how 'comfort blanket' can you get than the present need for continual texting, for reassurance that the texting One is part of the gang, in demand, in contact with the rest of the herd/group of friends. After all, we are not babies anymore are we.

Charles M Schulz creater of Snoopy retired after 50 years of wonderful cartoons.

When I use the laptop to google and ebay, there is an element of connecting and it addresses the sense of isolation - I am often too brain tired and be-fogged to be able to blog, email or talk to friends on the phone, which is on those days when I am too physically tired/in pain to go out, fulfill commitments, shop, go for a 'walk', visit or have friends visit, but when I still need some input, some stimulation and, thanks to the laptop, I can recline and go online and do not feel quite so isolated, as many other crips testify.

Today I have had to cancel two out-in-the-world things. One, because I have not yet recovered sufficient brain clarity from last evening's exertions, to cope with being in or interacting normally at lunch in the village hall with the movement and noise of twenty or so other villagers. Two, because I am too physically tired to sit up and responsibly drive the car to the lovely cranial osteopath. I am cross about the first and disppointed by the second cancellation.

Cross about the first, because I need to make myself visible in the community as me, not as that woman in the wheelchair. The Parish Plan (on which eternal committee I sat 'till I could sit no longer), identified a need for villagers to meet socially informally, rather than for specific clubs or events, to mix and get to know one another. Corny it may sound, but it has worked well over the last year. I have lived in this village for sixteen years, longer than at least half of my neighbours, the incomers who have only ever known me disabled or, because I have not engaged in the village activities that they have, think I am the new-comer. So I have found that going to the bi-monthly sharing lunch, has been worthwhile, not least so that those villagers who do not already know me from the days when I was a fit, thin, healthy, working single mum, exercising large Airedale, cutting the grass/hedge/dog, ... can discover by seeing me and talking to me that I am not the lives-alone-female-alien-on-wheels, but an intelligent capable personable lady who is interesting to engage with and DOES NOT NEED LOOKING AFTER - YES I MADE THAT quiche/salad/pudding ! Basically, it is an opportunity to educate the populace. And it builds up my defences/allies against the bullies and gossips, of which there are always some in any community, ready to take advantage of what they perceive as the dis-advantaged.

Cross about the second, because it is inevitable (rather than my personal fault) that a single 50- something disabled female in a wheelchair, has very few opportunities to be caressed by a handsome dark haired - strike that out- treated by a (handsome dark haired) cranial osteopath. He, it, the treatment, helps the dizziness, the pain, the stiffness, and he is good company, and he reassures me about my skull scar and numbness while he works at keeping the soft tissues mobile during the healing. After fifteen years of on and off treatment, he is an old friend.

Blogging about the disappointment of not be able to do these two things, helps, and with it I make the transition from being tired and fed up about not being able to be out in the world doing the things I want to do, to moving to this place of exercising my value, re-visiting my past psychodynamic training, continuing my connection to blogging friends, compared to which, many outer life connections frankly, don't come close.

www.snoopy.com

(* D W Winnicott Playing and Reality available at Amazon books, but can I, today, manage to copy a direct link, dammit, no.)

With Friends like these

Eric Ravilious - Water Wheel

(picture unconnected to post title, just another set of wheels)

Imagine the Scene: town centre car park by the river, returning after a quick essential shop, by chance I had seen my lovely friend, the most attractive fanciable crip in a chair I have ever known, and the sun shone and the birds sang and I felt good.

Opened up the back of the van, let down the ramp, all the while sat in the wheelchair. Caught sight of a lady walking quickly, almost trotting, across the car park straight towards me in the corner I was parked in, waving, smiling, calling.

Oh hell, I thought, my brain is not in gear as I thought it was - or - have I got the wrong specs on; because I had not the faintest idea of who she was.

"Hello," she said, "that's very good for you isn't it, lets you be independent, do you do it yourself, do you, do you drive it yourself or does someone drive it for you ?"

No, I don't know who the f... she is, so what could I say, but: "Is that ANY of your business?" "Well, I was just saying how nice it is for you." "Yes, thank you."

I can be polite, in a chilling, dismissive, patronising sort of way.

I can spot them, after eight years of being targeted; the patronising nosey people who assume my day will be made better by them giving me a little of their time and view of my life.

I can also spot the really interested ones, who are diffident, polite, apologise in advance, before they ask me about my van and wheelchair configuration. Usually they are interested because they can foresee the day they might need such equipment or they know someone who does not have the information that I can pass on.

For such as those, I have all the time in the world and the goodwill to engage with them.

Meme 5 Things About Me

This comfortable couple are my maternal grandparents, Florence and Josephus.

Yonks ago Charles Dawson tagged me for 5 Things About Me. I have only just found it Charles so, belatedly, here I am.

1 When I was a young teenager I sprouted up very quickly and towered over my peers. Within a few years everyone caught up with me and now I am average at 5'6" and a bit (I have shrunk since I was 5 feet 6 and 3/4 inches), but I have this imaginary body image of being tall and willowy. Very wrong.

2 I like living alone. I may change my mnd or age may change my mind for me.

3 When pissed I revert to broad Yorkshire/Derbyshire. Not just the accent but also the sentence structures and vocabulary*. Due to Lupus drug regime, it hardly happens at all these days; just a whisper when a glass or two of Champagne or very very good red wine tempts me off the straight and narrow.

4 I yearn to throw off this country life and have a cool contemporary pad in London, or a small villa in north west Crete. I do, however, recognise that I have 'come down in the place that is right' and am content.

5 Despite it being twenty years (20 ?!?) since I was harried ... (that was a typo for married, but being a follower of Jung I will leave it in as a Freudian slip) ... and an important love departed ten years ago, I do believe that love 'is as perennial as the grass'. This belief does not conflict with No. 2 above.

* Memories: I can hear him now ... "Ger up. Thar'll get chinkcough in tha bum if thar sits on that the-er step."

Thanks for the enjoyable Meme Charles.

Now you 5 others out there - tag yourselves - but come back and let us know you have done so.

Coming soon: The Meme of 10

Why has it sunk to the bottom ?

Today's picture is the Chalice Well at Glastonbury, Somerset UK.

The gliche inspiring this post's title question has nothing, absolutely nothing, to do with Blogger forcing me to upgrade (but I am still a bit prickly about the lack of choice). The gliche is that my right hand side column appears to have sunk to the bottom of the current page. In case it is not visible to readers at this stage of their reading, scroll down to the last visible post for all the usual including list of previous posts, my links 'People to See' and 'Places to Go'. Basic stuff. Sometimes all of it has sunk to the bottom, sometimes just half of it so that the picture and basic profile is at the top, but the links and archives are at the bottom.

Please tell me what you see when you read my page. Do you, dear reader, see the same as that which I see ? Or do you experience an alternative universe - how would we know ! And if anyone else knows this template, which I like and don't want to change, is there something I am doing wrong, or not doing, that results in the sunk right column ?

Is it perhaps connected to how I used to publish a new post in Old Blogger; I never did understood the difference between the options. Now those options have disappeared. I have looked at my template, and found the point in the Html at which the side bar begins, but do not know (a) where it ends, or (b) how to move it back or even (c) where to move it back to. New Blogger gives me an option to fiddle with the template, but says I have to opt into their new template and start over. I'm tired ! And - I am a creative little flower for goodness sake, and way back in '72 at ICL in London I decided computer language was not for me, and I just want to blog, ok ! and make it look like I know what I am doing. Steep learning curves give me vertigo.

So while I have been away Blogger has reinvented itself and forced me to do the same. I will get over it. But where is the choice in all this. And, just checking, the content is MINE - isn't it ? What happens if I decide to make a £million from publishing it, between two hard covers, via a printing press, a publisher, and a book deal and resulting healthy bank balance - fantasy land I know, but there is a principle to understand here. If I did - would Blogger pounce and demand the takings or a slice of the action ?!

I have considered composing and saving first in Word, then copying it onto Blogger, but when I tried that the creative juices did not flow, I was just the work-a-day-ordinary-everyday Sally that the Muse has a hard time getting through to.

It is the knowledge that I am putting it out there beyond my perceived boundaries, that makes it work, for me.

By the way, this new facility to add labels, has let me let you know when my blog reality is really just fantasy. Just in case new readers came upon The Elusive Dorset Dragon and wondered !

The Jinx May Be Over, For Now

This picture on my laptop desktop, is placed here to celebrate finally being back in the land of the living, connected to this essential bit of life; the wonderful www and blogging. This is from my garden looking west/north/westnorthwest. Not a recent picture as I don't have a camera, well not yet.

I have been at this damned laptop (with meal and sleep breaks of course!) for three and half days, after IBM finally backed down and sorted everything, the engineer replaced the hard drive, ensured the wireless adapter worked, and that this time he had put every screw back in the right place and in the right order. Then the broadband security didn't like the look of the new operating system and sulked, until I found a lovely BT technical chap in India who took over my computer remotely and un-glitched the security glitches. That took most of today: from 12.37 to 19.10. We had to keep giving each other 'comfort' breaks. Weird. He: and how is your weather today please? Me: Very windy, rain, but mild, about 6 degrees C. How is your weather ? He: oh yes it is very wet we have it raining too and when it is not raining it is hotter but now it is colder in the rain. ( Wonderful !)

So, here I am - Fingers, toes and anything else cross-able, crossed; quietly sneaking back in, hoping the fiendish gods who have been on my back these last few weeks, don't know I am up and running, and attempt more jiggery-pokery on my life.

On the way to the library twelve days ago to use their online facilities, (as then I was still awaiting resolution of all laptop problems) I met a neighbour hobbling, who I had seen days before at the hopsical, and we exchanged the usual: "take care". If only I had taken notice ...

I bashed my car. Never did make it to the library. Nothing dramatic. Travelling at less than 2 mph in reverse gear I touched a bit of metal protruding out from the post I was maneuvering round to get into the disabled bay that was partially blocked by a county council library van. My whole rear windscreen crumpled silently into a million pieces, held together by my countryside alliance stickers and a blue badge expanded to A4 size with the message '3 metre access ramp - keep clear' which was totally ineffective in keeping 3m of tarmac clear, but held the glass together pretty well. When the glass shattered I didn't hear or feel a thing. Weird. However, when I called the library van driver over and told him, yes politely honest, that he had caused this, he slammed shut my car door, and the whole rear windscreen collapsed into the van all over (and into) my wheelchair. I crumpled. Tears, shaking, felt very sorry for myself, and a little afraid. Then thought: hang on, this is not on - so I phoned the police for assistance - and they were wonderful and helpful and stayed with me until the RAC arrived.

Three hours later, home, for the duration, without a vehicle to transport my wheelchair, I was stuck. The hire car, arranged through Motability, was designed for salesmen on motorways as an extension of themselves, and it offended me but I did enjoy the mighty acceleration and it got me to Southampton very smoothly for my Neuro osteoma check up - but the electric wheelchair stayed behind and my PA had to push me in a NHS manual chair - a shock to both our systems and not smooth.

And the washing machine broke down.
And two of my three pairs of specs broke.

Always look on the bright side of life (anyone got tickets for 'Spamalot' ?) ...

If my claim against the county council is successful, and they have already, readily, admitted the library van driver was at fault and the metal post was making life difficult for disabled people trying to use the disabled bay; not only will that pay the insurance excess ('cos my Income Support certainly won't) there should be enough for a decent digital camera.

Silver linings and all that.

Busy few days coming up, so it will be some time before I can catch up with everyone, but bless you faithful ones who have been visiting while I have been gone.