Please note our new address: www.sasbblethers.com Thanks!

Oh dear. That’s two Thanksgivings been and gone and I haven’t done enough thanking at all.
For Canadian Thanksgiving we went for a walk to see the trees being autumnal in the sunshine, and to thank Nature that we live in such a stunning place. Then we had a feast with curry, friends and fizz. (It turns out, by the way, that fizz in Canada is taken to mean lemonade and the like, not champagne. I wish I’d known that before I asked people to bring it to our wedding celebrations). Curry isn’t all that traditional, of course, but I am getting better at making it. I’m thankful for that. We went round the table saying what we were grateful for, but we got distracted at every turn and ended up discussing feminism, open relationships, definitions of the word radical, communication, the Occupy movement, Super Ted, gardens, and oh, a whole load of other stuff that I don’t clearly remember because Canadian Thanksgiving was a while ago and we talked a lot. It was a happy day. There’s nothing much better than a meal with friends.

Short, but relevant, aside: We did a Sunday Roast at the weekend with the neighbours. Another warming, wine-filled afternoon. It took six of us and three kitchens to manage to prepare it and we were still about an hour and a half late sitting down to eat. I made Yorkshire puddings for the first time ever. I think my grandma would be proud. We took a photo to show her and our neighbours said to D.: “Don’t you want to be in the photo?” He, rightly, noted that “she probably won’t be able to tell anyway”. That was almost sad, but actually we were happy while we toasted her with tequila, and I thanked the oven that the Yorkshire puddings had done what they were meant to.

American Thanksgiving, yesterday, was not as lovely and only thankful in a ‘gee, thanks’ kind of way. It rained. I had a headache, and exams to mark. We headed out into the puddle-soaked streets to watch the new Almodóvar film, which, thankfully, turns out to be very relevant to my thesis research, but, not so thankfully, made me realize that I have started only watching films to see if they will be useful for my thesis research. Then after the film (sometimes I slip up and say movie, but I refuse to write that on here) we messed up our bus journey and missed the sea bus which meant we missed our lift (not ride) which meant we missed the exercise class which meant we didn’t see our friends and it was still cold, still raining, and I still had a headache. Luckily the buses were busy so we could sit separately, which is always best if you’re in a mood as the not-talking isn’t quite so obvious. I sat considering the letters I’d written the day before as part of the Amnesty International Write for Rights campaign and wished they had been neater and more inspired. Then I thought probably a less-than-perfect letter is still better than no letter. Anyway, nothing much else went wrong, which I suppose I should be thankful for.

I am aware I still owe some thanks for remarkable happenings over the Summer. V. said she had released me from the thank-you-letter I owed her, which I thanked her for, but I have been mulling over thankings, and worrying that I still have a letter-debt. I was trying to write a poem, but it turned into a kind of humourous thing and I wasn’t sure about that. It might happen, sometime. Maybe by next Thanksgiving. For now I’m just grateful that I have a backlog of grateful appreciation. Given the enormity of some of the problems out there, that’s definitely a complaint to give thanks for.

Happy Apple Day! I love that there is a day to celebrate the apple. Here are some shiny red offerings from the magic tree in my parents’ garden, along with the cover of one of the best books on the subject:

I’ve just finished reading The Human Factor by Kim Vicente.(No, it’s not on the obligatory reading list for my upcoming Candidacy Exam, but it’s relevant, and a nice little brain rest after some of the stuff I’m wading through, and I had to hurry it up and get it read so I could return it to D., for whom I actually bought it.) It won a couple of awards when it was published a few years back – the National Business Book Award and the Science in Society Book Award – and though I wasn’t entirely impressed with the style of writing, I imagine it was deliberately anecdotal and idiomatic, as part of the plan for “an academic author.. trying for the first time to write a book for a broader readership” (331, Vicente).

The book examines how our relationship with technology works (or doesn’t work), looking at things as varied as toothbrushes, stoves, automated telephone systems, aeroplane cockpits, hospital machinery and nuclear power plants. His concern:

“More and more we’re being asked to live with technology that is technically reliable, because it was created to fit our knowledge of the physical world, but that is so complex or so counterintuitive that it’s actually unusable by most human beings.” (17, Vicente)

His solution: a human-tech revolution, an insistence that design should combine a mechanistic and humanistic approach, where we stop valuing ‘high-tech’ purely because it’s clever and shiny, and start to focus on creating and using technology that makes sense to us, physically, psychologically, politically, socially… Particularly interesting, for a not-very-technically-minded-person like myself, was the message that what we so often dismiss or excuse as ‘human error’ is, probably more often than not, human error caused by bad design. Perhaps bad design of the technology itself, or the conditions it is used in, or the style of training gives. Or numerous other factors.

It’s interesting that I should finish reading it the same day Steve Jobs, of Apple fame, died. And that the responses on Facebook to the news of his death are one of the deciding factors in deciding to finally delete that account. I didn’t count how many times Apple logos, quotes from his not-all-that-inspiring speeches, and other comments showed up in my news feed. Not sure if it was more or less than the recent rush of copied-and-pasted warnings about privacy changes or the ‘vaguely funny the first time you see them, but quickly very annoying shared pictures’ (“LOL, this is hilarious”). Either way it’s not what I’m on Facebook for. And that’s not how I speak, or how my friends speak, when I talk to them in the real world. It’s got to the point where I pretty much can’t tell the difference between a potential spam post or a real comment by a real person.

When I joined up in 2006 it worked as a great way to keep in touch with old friends, get back in touch with those I’d lost contact with, stalk the boys I used to fancy. Over the years, as I’ve moved countries, it worked to help me feel part of communities that I geographically no longer belonged to, but wanted to feel close to. (Old colleagues, the folk scene, old school friends and their babies, cousins and family friends, Spanish pals…) I’ve used it to browse their photos, to hear about gigs and parties and meetings, to see what’s going in the world and what’s important to different people in different places. In Vancouver it’s been a great way to help new friendships develop and start to feel part of a community here. (And to continue stalking people I fancy, of course). We even used it for our wedding invitation. So, no, I’m not anti-Facebook, per se. It’s helped develop and deepen some great friendships over the years. It’s helped us share and support and be silly.

But…. I still think I’m going to stop using it. I don’t need to list all the reasons, and there are lots. One, though, feels like reason enough for me: when it’s reached the point that I log in to make contact with my friends – the friends I have chosen, and whom I adore, and who are amazing and talented and diverse and gorgeous and funny and interesting – and find myself faced with countless repetitive pictures of cats or Apple logos or people saying ‘Facebook won’t let me …’ and a list of ‘top stories’ which a machine has selected and no sign of half the people I want to hear from, I’ve reached the point that this technology is not working for me.

I’m not going to swear off technology – Vicente’s book helped me realize that it’s not technology itself that’s the problem, but rather the way it’s made or controlled; I use email, skype, my phone. I’m interested in checking out Diaspora to see if that’s a social network I could feel comfortable with. (I definitely like the idea of it being open source and you maintaining ownership of the content you post.) I love reading interesting blogs and sites. I have this blog. I also have a nice pen and a pile of cards. I want to quit relying on connections which are less and less meaningful, which are turning into noise, so I can return to hearing, now and again (I don’t need hourly updates), when they have the time to email or write or call, the beautiful voices of my friends, before I start blaming them for the frustrating, pointless experience that Facebook has become.

Begin, slightly, slowly,
to slice the century:
all the years you have lived,
all the men you would have loved.
Quietly, take the album from the shelf.
Watchingly, start to unstick yourself.

These are the blackberries, here is the burn.
There is the bridge and the corner shop.
Once there was a table, all sat at by men
with mother in the corner, and
no knowing when
in would come the brother,
down the path would come the bairn.

Mornings were for shipyard gates,
afternoons for tea.
Evenings full of card-games
or dancing breathlessly.

Romance from the library,
crosswords from next door,
caravan by the lakeside.
Who could want for more?

Pierce, now, a little deeper; peek
inside the patterned tin,
come across the crumbs.
Linger on your brother’s friends,
the constancy of pals.
Spot the home-help’s lies,
the pile of unpaid bills.
Watch the nephew and his wife,
work their picking, probing hands.

Where does the slicing stop? Cutting in,
there is always another story
before bedtime. Always
another moment from a long,
long life of nothing very much.

It’s the Vancouver International Fringe Festival at the moment and yesterday we went along to Granville Island to see a performance. We’re hosting a couple of actors so we get free tickets – a very good thing, as there’s such a huge programme and no easy way of knowing whether it’s a great show or just a great programme description. Anyway, we ended up standing in line for Grim and Fischer “a deathly comedy in full-face mask”, the other option,about Elizabethan England, having been rejected by 13 year old S. for being “too educational”.

Grim as in reaper, and Fischer as in an elderly woman who delights in tricking the nurses in her care home, does exercise routines with tins of beans and definitely isn’t ready yet to wander off into the sunset with the afore-mentioned Grim. The old woman is lonely, mischievous, energetic. They got it just right, the props and repetitions that make up a life near its end: remote control for the always-on television, constant toilet trips, an old music box, a dead husband’s jacket. The muddle and memories that make up the days. The million minor rebellions when there’s nothing very important to rebel against. The little grasps at power in a powerless, pointless routine.

And the masks! It reminded me of a thing we saw once in the Science Museum, where a computer flashes up faces with different expressions and you have seconds to decide whether they’re happy, sad, angry, scared, worried or jealous. Sounds easy. Try it though, without any of the context, without the drooping shoulders or the fluttering hands. Try it without any of the words or the interactions or the movement. There’s so little to give it away. These masks seemed to change emotion with each movement of each character. Mrs Fischer was everything (naughty, loving, cheeky, scared, adventurous, nostalgic) without moving a muscle of her face. Even Grim looked anything but grim in the moment Mrs Fischer handed him the music-box and they became friends. Here’s a little video so you can picture them:

This makes it look funny. It was funny…and it also made me cry. Maybe it’s years of visiting elderly relatives in care homes, seeing how the spark is just about still there, despite everything. Maybe it’s that two days before, Syd, my favourite 90-something year old man died, and Peggy, his wife of sixty years saw him to say goodbye, then went back to her own nursing home and her dementia and didn’t want to be told that he was dead. Maybe it’s seeing the obvious aging of people you want to never age. Or just wondering how it must feel to know you’re going to die soon, and not feeling ready at all. Feeling, like Fischer, that there are still motorbikes to ride, and dancing to do. Probably all of that. I was laughing and then suddenly my face was doing that embarrassing screwed up thing, and I was hiding behind my hand, trying to find a tissue. It was saddest when she got Grim to put on her husband’s jacket and they danced together. It was funniest when they had a Matrix-inspired fight complete with slow motion kicks. Or maybe when she scared off the nurse with her whoopee cushion.

At the end, they took off their masks and there they were, the two young actors, looking alive and lively, thanking the audience and their families for coming. D., S. and I went for fish and chips. S. had that slightly embarrassed look a teenager has when an adult cries, and they’re not really sure why. I tried to explain, telling her how Fischer reminded me of my grandma, who blew smoke into D.’s face because she was cross he wouldn’t have a cigarette with her, and pulls faces at the nurses when they’re not looking. How at Peggy’s 90th birthday, Syd was laughing and lovely. I guess when you’re thirteen though, thirty is hard to imagine, let alone ninety. So many people don’t make it that far and, really, Syd was probably as ready as you can ever be to die, and yet … that doesn’t make it any easier to realize that, after all these years, Peggy and Syd are not sitting together, right now, surrounded by his bowls trophies, taking turns with the remote control, not quite hearing what the other is saying, getting up to make each other cups of tea.

M.: I start secondary school on Wednesday.
Me: Are you scared?
M.: Yes.
Me: I start teaching at university on Wednesday.
M.: Are you scared?
Me: Yes.

Pause.

Me: Have you got any good advice for me about how to be a good teacher?
M.: Just be kind and try to make a good impression.
Me: Ok, I’ll try. You could try doing the same. Do you think we’ll be ok if we do that?
M.: I think so. I think we’ll be fine.

Today I was quite excited to realize I am named after a small spacecraft, “designed to extend the astronomical studies in the X-ray, gamma-ray, ultra-violet, visible and infra-red regions”. Cool! I will continue with an increased sense of purpose…

It’s good timing, because I’ve been thinking about purpose and in particular that of Sas B’s bletherings which is a year and a half old. In dog-years that’s 15 and three quarters. The complicated, twisting into teenage years. The bitchy years. The bad make-up years. The inappropriately confident, stupidly insecure years. When someone else’s words keeps clanging inside and everything everyone else is doing looks more exciting. The years when you should be studying, but you’re gazing out the window, watching the sun sky, the sky darken, the stars pricking into being.

It’s good timing, because I’ve been thinking, too, about productivity. Sas B the spacecraft was fully operational for about 7 months: “The low-voltage power supply for the experiment failed on June 8, 1973. No useful scientific data were obtained after that date”. That made me a little bit sad for my newfound friend. Being productive is the best feeling. Not being is the worst. Working like a dog makes me happy, as long as I stop for a beer now and again.

We noticed yesterday sitting drinking beer out of jam jars on the porch that this year’s dog days are done. Church bells were ringing. The sunlight yellowed the top of the trees across the street, then the air was suddenly Autumn. It will start, now, to get dark and soon the rains will come, for months, and the beach days will be all wrapped up in waterproof layers.But it’s all good. I’m reading and thinking and learning and considering how to see with x-ray vision and shine ultra-violet rays into cracks and find a way through blackness with the help of a little infra-red light and hoping I can keep track of it on here. That’s a good enough purpose, I reckon, for now. Plus I’m about to make a cake for my husband. So that’s the productivity side of things covered…..

p.s.Here are details about the other Sas B.

For Pam and James

And so they came, the dizzy days
of sunlight dreams and dancing.
The ways we read of all the years:
the fears, the frowns,
Love’s always-go-round,
this merry ride of rolling coasts,
the looks and leans through singing worlds
of whiteness, finally found.

Tall fizz of glass,
the music’s laugh
is ever newly played.
Each shields the light
of another’s smile
in the cradle of a hand.

Each waking, the deciding
that I give you my today,
for we know that nothing is forever
(not even the aloneness
not even this together).
But yes, they came, and how they came,
and how we hold each other’s hearts
through life’s late sparkling game.

I think Summer is best for children. And I think we are all nearly-children in Summer.*

Cycling, eating outside, playing in the garden, staying up late.

Last night I played The Robert Atwell game** and Consequences with E. and her nephews and niece. We sat on the lawn as the sky got dark and used library books to lean on. The later it got the more often one of us had to jump up so the light would come on. The grown ups were talking round the table and we sat cross-legged and laughed and made silly jokes and said stupid things and laughed some more. I thought I was doing it because it seemed a helpful thing to do – entertain the kids, let the adults have some peace – and then I stopped thinking I was being helpful and started trying to think of words beginning with ‘k’ or funny things that the whole world might say.

Sometimes, occasionally, I wonder whether I would be sad to never have children of my own. Then I remember that it takes a village, a town, a world, to raise a child and there are plenty of people out there happy to sit and talk to the adults while someone else plays word games with their young people, or makes up silly songs, or dances with them in the kitchen or asks them questions about what they’re into at the moment. Then I think how sad if I had my own children and didn’t have time to do any of that with other people’s. I think I’d be a really good aunt.

Afterwards, after the kids had been taken off to bed, I stood talking with E. about the angst of not knowing what you’re doing with your life. People say that when they have children they stop worrying about that. But I like worrying about it, now and again, to make sure I’m on the right track. Then I rode home, alone, on my bike, dodging bumps and singing out loud.

*And there are far too many sentences beginning with ‘I’ in this blethering, which definitely does not help contradict the tedious claim that you’re selfish and self-obsessed if you don’t have kids. Oh well.
**The Robert Atwell game is better known to most as ‘Stop’, but childhood memories are strong…