MY FANTASY ROOM

In my room you will find all aspects of my character, there is no ceiling here, nothing to stop my thoughts from flight. Above me the pure, clean dome of a parachute. I close my eyes and feel the thrill as I hurl myself out of the plane, no going back now! ‘One thousand, two thousand, three thousand.... Check Canopy! Then relax! I listen to the drone of the plane’s engine dwindle to no more than the sound of a bumble bee. I listen. I hear nothing but the pounding of my heart beating time as the toy town below grows bigger. Am I falling? I am weightless, just floating wherever the breeze tide takes me in a vast waterless ocean with more space than I could ever imagine. Everything I am, have been or ever will be entrusted into the care of a vast white mushroom canopy. Foolish perhaps, but what euphoria nature’s needle injects into my soul.
This is exciting..

My room has an ocean where I find total tranquility. I hold bread out to them, their colours shine and glisten as the Caribbean sun spears through the watery blue. I feel a cacophony of tiny tails brush against my skin as they twist and turn as one beautiful marine cloud of buoyant colour. No longer am I outside the picture, I am part of it as I reach out and gently stroke the strange wet flower arrangements illuminated by talons of sunlight. Protected in this watery greenhouse, never to stand in a cut crystal vase on a doyled window sill as their terrestrial counterparts suffer, nor will the fish ever hear the irritating sound of routine bubbles emanating from a miniature plastic diver.
This is freedom.

On the wall of my room hangs the sad fate of poor Ophelia lying in her watery grave. Sir John Everett Millais’ Raphaelite beauty is tranquil amidst a garland of fateful flowers, which, forever bright, remain an oil memorial on a canvas shroud.
This is sadness.

From Ophelia to Patsy. A character with a designer sack of neuroses who is barely visible behind a nictoine cloud of youthfulness. Patsy sits in my room blatantly ignoring ageism, sexism, alcoholism and any other ‘ism’, none of which applies to her. She thumbs her powdered nose at convention with outstanding panache and as she views my painting, asks if I think Ophelia’s dress is La Croix (Sweetie) or Westwood. Death would be more wellcome than the indignation of reaching the age when ladies’ knickers have an obligatory 18 inches between waistband and gusset! No-one will ever burst Patsy’s Bollinger bubble and this make-believe outrageous character makes me smile and inspires me.
This is fun.

From Itchicoo Park’ to Guell Park, this too is in my room. Gaudi’s bizarre stone trees, reptilian fountains and mosaics reflect my total admiration of mans’ eccentricities. Within me a desire to be outrageous in deed as well as thought. But my aspiration, like Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia, tower upward, unique but incomplete. Perhaps some things are better left unfinished. Marilyn Monroe, Beethoven’s unfinished symphony, Apollo 13 mission and the music of John Lennon. Had they continued, the magic may have been lost. A file submitted to the archive is soon forgotten, but those left open will stay alive, feeding on the curiousity of enquiring minds.
This is aspiration.

In another corner of my room sits Dian Fossey, she is quiet and does not speak to me, she has no need for human company. I watch her cocooned in the soft gentle blackness of a family of mountain gorillas. An old silver-back strokes her hair, comforting her. I see the joy in her eyes and the gentle smile as she relaxes into the cushion of this shy amiable giant and I know she is happy to be his pet for a while allowing the protected to become the protector.
This is admiration.

They have no fear of hunters here as the only hunter around is Orion, barely visible in the black velvet sky. His speck of light pierces through the darkness with countless companions in a timeless quest to reach us. Their light, an intimate glow for lovers, inspiration for the artist, a challenge for the scientist and for me, nature’s nocternal balm soothes, comforts, and the magnitude of it all reminds me just how small my room is.
This is awesome.

THE HOUSEWIFE - June Gamble

I married a man, not a house,
but they call me a house-wife.
How True!

At first it was a semi,
two individuals forever joined.
Very Cosy!

Seduced by ambition, the temptress,
Now she keeps him out all hours.
How Lonely!

Housewife, mother, daughter, friend,
Like four faces of an old clock tower.
All Different!

Ten years on, the semi’s gone;
We’re detached now.
Very Affluent!

Two cars parked in the drive,
Taking us in diferent directions.
So Busy!

The bedroom’s needs a face-lift,
‘No time’ he says, ‘Get a man in’...
Good Idea!

'TIME' by June Gamble

You lurk around me, you intertwine
constantly pulling forward, pushing me from behind
perpetual, relentless, to all mankind.

Often you’ll take a winters day,
weave it in black and weft it in grey.
then watch me as I stumble through
this sordid, troublesome gift from you.

Wherein my spirit you tightly bind
in scratchy, flaxen robes of pain.
Rivers of tears will change you mind
and you’ll drape my soul with silk again.

Then each day becomes a chain of gold
as you craft each shining hour for me.
bedecked with jewels for me to hold
and store deep within my memory.

I wait; and you drift slowly by
toying with my anxiousness.
In times of joy you wink your eye
how callous is your thoughtlessness.

No bird nor beast escapes your quest
as you give and take, and take and give.
All manner of life learn to detest
how you decide who should perish or live.

You are my friend, also my foe
without you there is nothing, and when
you have finished with me and turn to go
you will carry on; and I will end.

The son of a craftsman who worked with wood noticed a beautiful piece of rosewood in his fathers workshop which had numerous nails hammered into it.

‘Why does that lovely wood have all those nails in it dad? He asked

The father replied ‘Every nail represents a time when you have hurt or disrespected me.’

The boy was distressed by this and thought for a while.

‘I’m so sorry dad, I will changed and every time I do something nice for you, will you please remove a nail?’

‘Of course I will son, that would please me a great deal’.

After several months, the wood was free of nails and the boy felt very pleased with himself.

‘Look dad, the wood is free of all those ugly nails at last.’

‘Yes’ said his dad ‘But the holes are still there!.

THINK before saying something you may regret, words can hurt deeply and for ever.

Who Painted This?

Unfortunately, I am not the artist of this picture. I saw it whilst browsing and was captivated. I dont know the title and I dont know the artist. My task is now to find out.


I have found out - it is by Salvador Dali and is called 'Woman at the Window'.

CLINICAL DEATH EXPERIENCE

In 1988 my mother had a heart attack and was clinically dead. Fortunately she was in hospital at the time and her life was extended by another 10 years by defibrillation, drugs and the medical expertise of the staff. It was a good quality of life and a time myself and my family greatly treasure and are grateful to those true healers who made it possible.

During those 10 years my mum and I spoke a lot about her experience, she also had interest from her general practitioner, the local vicar, nurses and consultants to describe her experience to them. I recount what she told me and share it, as it gave me comfort and peace of mind. Hopefully it will also offer some comfort to those who have lost a loved one and find it hard to accept and come to terms with. I know it is their feelings of desperation and vulnerability that seek out the psychics often discredited on Bad Psychics.

The chest pains mum experienced initially were bad and she could hear little except the pounding sound of her heart beating arrhythmically. She remembered being aware of her heart’s last beat, which she described as a ‘shudder’. Medics were looking at her and as she focused on their faces the image of them appeared to her to freeze, then slowly began to dissolve ‘like a water colour painting dispersing as water fell onto it’. As she watched the image of the people faded into an extremely bright comforting light, which caused no discomfort to her eyes.

The pain ‘melted’ and she described that her body felt light ‘like wafer or tissue’. I asked mum if she was afraid and if she thought of my sister, our dad or me. She answered truthfully that she did not think of us, that she had no fear whatsoever and that she ‘felt nothing but calm and total peace, and a longing to embrace the feeling’. Mum told me she had no thoughts of anyone, living or dead, no fear, no regrets, no anxiety, no pain – absolutely NOTHING negative in her mind or body. NONE of her deceased relatives came and held their hands out to her; NO-ONE dead beckoned her; NO celestial angel hovered to welcome her – NOTHING BUT A PEACEFUL, PAIN-FREE VOID.

The medical staff defibrillated mum’s heart from nothing into tachycardia (beating over 100 beats a minute). At this point she said she suddenly felt ‘so very angry’ at being drawn away from the peace. The lights in the hospital room were bright and hurt her eyes, the noises were ‘deafening’, including a loud ‘whooshing’ in her ears as her head began to hurt and aches and pain ‘surged through her body again’. A second defibrillation calmed my mum’s heart to a more normal rhythm and thus began the pain relief and medical help that allowed my mum to live a further 10 years.

I remember during one of our deep conversations regarding life and death, asking her that when her time did come, if she could, would she come to me and give me a sign that she was ok. She laughed and said ‘Of course I will be ok – I will be dead, there is nothing NOT to be ok about’. I asked her again and she gave me a categorical ‘No’. She told me she that she loved me and that I would always have her close to me, in my memories and in my heart. She told me ‘When my time comes, then it will be over for me, I will have had my life. I don’t want you to dwell on thoughts of death. Life is for the living.’

I am lucky! We left nothing unsaid, we still debated and argued and carried on as a normal family, but we said ‘I love you’ more often and we hugged a lot. None of us have any regrets.

AUSTRALIA'S DOG FENCE

I had never seen a Fence like this before. A barrier of wire mesh six feet high, older than the Berlin Wall and longer than the Great Wall of china. A Fence so controversial that a nation of people including politicians, conservationists, tax payers and animals lovers accept the reason for it’s existence but question the ecological effect of it’s continuance. I am referring to the wonder of south-east Australia, the “Dog Fence”, all 3,307 miles of it. Snaking across the outback from the cold surf of the Great Australian Bight in the south, all the way to the cotton field of eastern Queensland, this epic Fence exists for only one purpose, to stop dingoes from killing any of the 123 million sheep within it’s boundary. Considering that Australia flourished on the woolly-backs of this £3 billion industry, it is not surprising that the government agree the need for a proper maintenance programme, paid for by a tax levied on woolgrowers.

Travelling along various parts of this wire mesh river in their souped-up four wheel drive vehicles, is an army of bushmen. To call them “shepherds” would conjure up images of solitary, tranquil individuals - and that could not be further from the truth. These woolgrowers are tougher than any ‘spaghetti-western’ cowboy you could image. Their jeans and checked shirts are splattered with the blood of lambs whose tails have been cut off to avoid blowfly infestation. The skin of these bushmen has been baked brown under an endless blue sky and powdered with a dusting of red sand, they scan the Fence through eyes which are half closed against the dust and the strength of the blinding sun. Mile after mile after mile their eyes skim the Fence looking for damage and areas in need of repair. The maintenance of the Fence cannot lapse as one dingo can kill up to 50 sheep and lambs in one night. Not for food, but just because this cousin of the coyote and descendant of the Asian wolf is a ceaseless hunter. Dingoes will chase down anything from red kangaroos and wombats to rabbits and lizards, but they favour the slow, panicky sheep. A small wolf-like creature, the dingo is a leggy dog, with a long muzzle, short pointed ears, and a bushy tail, usually ginger in colour - or so I was told. Because, ironically, the only dingoes in view were the rotting corpses impaled on the Fence. Their scalps removed by independent bounty hunters who can earn from eight pounds for the scalp of a young dingo and up to £200 for a problem dog. This creature, who has inhabited Australia for over 3,000 years coexisting with Aborigine tribes, is officially classed as vermin. As such, it is subject to the most horrendous form of death. Large metal claw traps are set, a sardonic sense of compassion compels the trappers to coat the teeth with strychnine in order to ease the animal’s death. Even though one trapper can kill around 200 dingoes in a year, estimates put todays population at more than a million. Therefore, the need for the Fence is even greater today than when it was started, and that was over 100 years ago by pioneer bushmen travelling with camels. Steel posts are erected in place of the ancient sagging wooden poles, new plastic coated mesh panels replace the rusting old ones, holes made by emus, wild pigs and camels are mended and tunnels dug by burrowing wombats are filled in. The dingo, however, is not responsible for any of the damage to the Fence. He prowls along it’s length, under the dust red sky of evening, yelping and howling at the tempting delights within the Fence’s boundary.

The ongoing battle between the woolgrowers and the dingo has escalated far beyond the protection of sheep. The ‘dog Fence’ has become a terrestrial dam, confusing the natural behaviour of Australia’s indigenous animals. Red and grey kangaroos, the great protected symbol of this continent, having freely penetrated the Fence, are without a native predator and their populations have exploded inside the Fence. They have now become the rivals of sheep, competing for water and grazing land and in response, governments cull more than three million kangaroos a year marketing the meat and hides. Could it be that the economic future for Australia’s biggest export will lie in the cultivation of kangaroo products? And if so, will the Fence be allowed to fall into disrepair or will it’s maintenance be upheld for the protection of the kangaroo instead of the sheep. At this point I will resist the urge to quote any anecdotes concerning ‘woolly jumpers’ but would remind you that no matter how mighty the predatory skills of the dingo, it can never compare with the disruptive influence that man exerts on the environment.