past any boulder
solid and unforgiving.
No choice but
sit down and cry,
or give up.
proving the futility
of living a dream
of daring to venture
yet a chosen path is blocked;
with elbow grease and
a little more time
finding my way
refreshes my spirit
and quickens my step.
“If you’re lucky enough to find a way of life you love,
you have to find the courage to live it.”
~ John Irving
never again,
would I walk away
from myself except
to turn away from
the image in the mirror
to live a life that fits me
even if the child that rides
my coattails dawn to dusk
wants to stay hidden and quiet
Never more,
never again,
will I walk away from myself
and, taking the coattail child’s hand,
we’ll live a life that fits us both.
“When we get comfortable with our own strength,
discomfort changes shape, we remember our power.”
~ Jen Knox, The Glass City
Obsessing over
thoughts from others
wastes time and
dilutes creativity
Obsessing over
each detail of life
puts imagination
into neutral
Obsessing over
the should haves
can turn confidence
into less than
“I got my own back.”
~ Maya Angelou
Confidence was new to Dez. At least the confidence that Em said she needed. Was this how it was supposed to feel? Looking in the mirror, she cocked her head to one side. “I’m in my 40’s! This is ridiculous.”
She was okay in her own life, but when she was around Matt, it vanished. The brash bold person she had been in her life before COVID had gone up in a puff of smoke. Finding it again had been a struggle. She felt awkward around people. Grateful to her big sister for teaching her how to apply make-up and what clothes to wear, she liked the play of it all. Her spa job had added to making this new image. But when she looked in the mirror she couldn’t see herself. Someone that resembled her hid inside the glass and she felt less than. Afraid she’d mess up her hair or her mascara would run down her face, she grew stiff and cold. How could she be grateful to her big sister and her co-workers? They had only succeeded in showing her how to cover herself up in colour and paint. Like any blank canvas she worked with. No, all that paint and makeup didn’t help. She became a shy little girl waiting for Matt to notice her. “Ugh!! Matt has seen me up close with dirt on my face and under my nails.” For a fleeting moment, she felt angry at them all, until the anger settled into her insides for listening. As a child, her dad would call her mother’s make up ‘war paint’. Well she was not going to war. Hiding herself behind a face mask was not helping. She was an artist and when a painting was going wrong she either wiped it clean or painted over it and start again. “Maybe just a bit of blush……….”
~~~~~
Working with softer colours, Dez put on the finishing touches when her doorbell rang. One more brush through her hair, a quick look at herself in the full length mirror, she went to the door. Tall and lean, Matt smiled at her and said. “You’re back!”
“How many cares one loses when one decides
not to be something but to be someone.”
~ Coco Chanel
 |
| "Just Learning" Water colour from 2006 |
Confidence was new…….
Obsessing over…….
Never more……
Finding the way…..
Intimacy came slowly….
Depth was a quality….
Everyday chores……
Needing something……
Entering into…..
**Wednesday is the next episode of Situationally Theirs. February’s theme has come early to accommodate both a new theme and this ongoing story.
“Public opinion is a weak tyrant compare with our own private opinion,”
~ Henry David Thoreau
As you can see, I’m quite comfortable. And it’s about time. The windows haven’t been opened for a very long time. When she opens the door to the outside, I just shake my paws and turn away. Fire has always frightened me ~ and yes I do know what fire is. It’s to be avoided at all costs. I don’t have the most handsome tail in the world, but I do not want it burned off. So I watched what flickered like fire and was awfully warm. But it never went anywhere so I watched it carefully for long time. For a while I would just sit and watch it to be certain. Now, I just lay down and doze. When I get too hot, there are all manner of comfortable places for me. I’m certain they are all for me, even though she thinks she should sit in one of my places.
By the way, do you think my human speak is improving? Please don’t tell her if it is. She thinks I don’t know what she’s talking about. And don’t tell her that she makes absolutely no sense when she’s trying to mimic me.
I'm off now ~ getting too warm here by the fireplace so I’m going to find one of my other beds.
A cat improves a garden wall in sunshine, and the hearth in foul weather.”
~ Judith Merkle Riley (1942 - 2010)
As the title suggests, this movie is a group of women talking. Not the chatter of idle gossip or the most recent fashions, but the serious debate about whether ‘to do nothing, to stay and fight or to leave’. Based on true events of horrendous serial and ongoing rape and domestic abuse in a Mennonite colony, the women of the colony knew they had to do something, or stay quiet. Throughout the movie, there were flashback scenes of the effects of the rapes and abuse. Sensitive to the audience, the actual violent acts were not part of the filming. Drugged, they never knew who or when they would be assaulted. They were given many reasons why they woke up with bruises, became infected or pregnant. Reasons of dreaming, making things up, ghosts or Satan were given for the behaviour of the men of the colony. After one such attack, one of the girls saw the face of her abuser, reported it to the colony elders. The abuser named the others and they were taken to jail - for their own protection. At least one woman was angry enough to attack one of them.
The women discussed how they had never asked for any kind of help at all from the men. This prompted one of the few scenes of levity in the movie when they realized that the first thing that they would ever ask of the men would be for the men to leave the colony. There were many scenes of happy children playing in the cornfields surrounding the colony.
The setting was the loft of the barn on the colony’s land. One man only was included in their deliberations: the school teacher who was there only to take the minutes of their meeting. Given the content of the movie, the gray/green/brown filter used in the cinematography was very effective in telling this disturbing and hopeful story. We do not know the outcome for the abusers, but the final scene is of a long line of carriages with children, women and belongings leaving the colony.
“Time will heal. Our freedom and safety are the ultimate goals,
and it is men who prevent us from achieving those goals.”
~ Women Talking
Directed by: Sarah Polley
Based on the novel: Women Talking by Miriam Toews
Writing Credits: Sarah Polley (screenplay by) and
Miriam Toews (screenplay by)
Abbreviated Cast:
Rooney Mara - Ona
Judith Ivey - Agata
Emily Mitchell - Miep
Kate Hallet - Autje
Liv McNeil - Neitje
Claire Foy - Salom
Sheila McCarthy - Greta
Jessie Buckley - Mariche
Michelle McLeod - Mejal
Kira Guloien - Anna
Shayla Brown - Helena
Frances McDormand - Scarface Janz
Vivien Endicott Douglas - Clara
Ben Whishaw - August
August Winter - Melvin
