Yesterday was the solstice so I set the alarm for sunset, prepared a glass of wine and a song to listen to, and stopped work to sit and watch the sky darken. This was a slow and undramatic process as the sun was behind layers of dark cloud and nary a glimmer emerged; however it was a very contemplative practice to simply sit and observe and try to get my head round the fact that I’m on a tiny patch of a revolving globe and that it’s this globe that moves, not the sun.
Many truths are counter-intuitive and hard to get hold of. Sometimes the moon seems so close you feel you could reach out and touch it, or leap up and sit on the point of its crescent. Have you ever been in the country, miles from any street lights, on a clear night? The stars seem so close it’s almost threatening; yet we persist in acting as though we are separate from them rather than being in the middle. Anyway, last night at sunset I drank a glass of wine and listened to this track and read this poem which is one of my favourites.
My new CD came yesterday too. It’s a meditative one called Zen Sky and I can almost write as I listen to it, though normally I never listen to music while working because it’s too distracting. I also downloaded a really fun EP called Fake News; all of these recordings including the solstice song are by our friend, the multi-talented local musician Chris Conway. There’s no end to the instruments this man can play or the styles he can perform in, and Zen Sky features the low Irish whistle, an amazingly evocative instrument.
So that was yesterday; today I unaccountably woke up feeling crabby and resentful. Where do these emotions come from? I went to bed feeling fine and had a reasonably good night, but this morning all these unpleasant sensations had blown in like a squall from the coast. Normally I can keep a lid on the feeling that other people are far more successful than me, that they fit in more easily – or at all – that they somehow make money without making themselves miserable in the process, and have a path in life, a direction, a purpose. Well, I suppose I have a path and a direction but without (as yet) the money or success, so from time to time feelings of envy will arise, and the Christmas round robin is an excellent catalyst for them. One which arrived yesterday featured distant relatives we haven’t seen in a while who live on what appears to be a ranch in Surrey with a lake, a small wood and a massive house. What makes it worse is that they are very nice people!!!! (gnashes teeth.) Well, this is my problem and I’ll have to deal with it.
*Sigh*
I wish they weren’t nice people and then I could hate them. I do hate the round robin though…
Kirk out
Sarada Gray 
And sometimes the opposite happens… go to bed feeling crabby, and then wake up the next day all cheerful, thinking “what on earth was all that about!?”
True
I didn’t have the wine, as I’m off the booze right now, until the gout has subsided significantly [it has improved somewhat], but I did watch the gloaming, as is my wont, while I’m having my afternoon siesta [usually just reading with feet up and the occasional nod]. At this time of year, I like to picture in my mind a trough, with our position in it slowly climbing up from the bottom, which I find is a psychological boost. The solstice is more significant for me than Christmas, and I can understand why people in earlier times felt it was something worth celebrating. I had all sorts of weird dreams last night but I did eat 2 different types of cheese for my mid-evening snack [I need food for the gout medication, but I think I’ll steer clear of the cheese in future!], but my mood was good when I woke up for the final time; that could have been relief, of course. Cheers, Jon.
Good call on the wine front. I still can’t persuade you to drink nettle tea?
I would be very willing to try it, but I’m a bit lazy when it comes to preparation of that sort of thing; my Canadian uncle drinks artichoke tea, I think to counter gout, but it’s not the most flavoursome of drinks, even sweetened with honey [“a spoonful of sugar…” and all that]. If you have a link to a recipe [if it’s any more complicated than “pick some nettles; boil them up; drink”], by all means post it, then I’ll hunt out some local nettles: they grow all year round, don’t they?
If you go to any health food shop you should be able to buy it in tea bags
I’m almost sorry to have to tell you this but you’ll have to get your head around it even further: the sun actually does move, through the galaxy at about half a million miles per hour. We’re a long way from where we were when I left this comment. 😀
Yes, I had a feeling that was the case. My head is now revolving at 900 miles an hour
From a hypothetical stationary point in space, the Earth’s orbit might resemble a never ending pattern drawn by a “Spirograph” toy.
Interesting idea