Bats

Twilight is such a great time to go out walking with the dog, stuff is happening in the hedgerows, you hear scuffling noises and the snap of twigs. 

The moon is up.  There was a tease of a crescent and a handful of bright stars scattered around.

Gradually as the walking continues more stars announce themselves and sometimes as I gaze upwards they appear to pop into existence in front of my eyes. Such an amazing experience when that happens

Not for nothing is twilight considered a magical time. The shadows are still present but barely - whisps.

Tonight as we walked along a tree line we could hear the brook, that has woken up with the recent rains, trickling along. Something buzzed above my head. Looking up I saw a bat, fast flying about above my head. Turning faster than a bird, with the lightness that reminds of a butterfly but more substantial. 

Turning I saw others. I stopped transfixed and became aware that about 5 of them were wheeling around about my head, I could hear small dull clicks which I assume was their echo location. Their range was about 100 yards but the centre of this range seemed for the moment, to be me, wherever I was. This place near the trees is replete with midges no doubt a superb snacking site. 

Primo stopped and then headed away, up the muddy lane, patrolling his territory, at his steady tail up trot. Above him all the way was his very own bat. It looked amazing and like something from a fairy story, well beyond the capability of my camera. 

He returned and noticed I was still stationary and puzzled he looked up. He jumped back in surprise as he became aware of them and his ears lifted as he absorbed what he had been hearing. 

The bats continued to swirl around us and then whether bored by us, or concerned to follow the midges, they went along the tree line and out of sight.

graciousness and gratitude -- how do you score?

These two people are hard to find in the world. Which two? 
The one who is first to do a kindness, and
The one who is grateful and thankful for any kindness done.
Anguttara Nikāya 2.118

I think Graciousness is undervalued in life. I think Graciousness at work, at home and at play could make everything more sustainable, and more fun. If you can remain gracious, if you can respond graciously, you keep an open mind. You look at something you might reject easily for longer and in doing so have the open mind that perhaps you might have missed something. Because you are gracious you can hold on to what has been offered and explore it for usefulness and then from a position of exploration rather than arrogant prejudice decide how much to keep and how much to reject. Being Gracious does not subject you to accepting things or situations you don't want, like or believe in It gives you space to decide how or if to make best use of them

You accept the intention of the other - who or what ever other that might be - in giving you a gift that perhaps in the end you don't want but still honour that it was given to you anyway. Which in turn sets up more opportunity for unexpected gifts to decide about.

Gratitude runs on from this. If you are able to be gracious in the moment, perhaps you can have gratitide for the unexpected and unplanned things that come your way, look back and see how this has affected you life. And so sustain the ability to remain open to new information, new objections, new intentions, new situations, new people.

I am ranting a little in writing this here.. But I am not forcing you to read it. That would be ungracious.

I like Mr Jagger in his sentiment and ( slightly misused words) You won't always get what you thought you wanted, but you might just get what you need.



I need to hang on to this thought though, as fiercely in debate I can forget it. I am not a Buddhist either, but loved the quote.

To learn is to love

Yesterday someone mentioned that a book had been written ( it was a sensible book apparently so a bit of me had sunk already) that broke down which musical instrument a child should learn based on their personality. 

According to this book a violin player should be endowed with lots of patience as a child because it is much harder to make a note, play a tune then it is on an instrument that is plucked, bashed or blown.

Fortunately neither my parents, my music teacher or I was aware of this " must have"  skill when I was eight. 

Patience is not a natural virtue for me.  It is a learned one. Probably in part, one  I learned whilst learning to play the violin and learning to play with animals. Both are wild at heart, can snap suddenly,  you learn quickly if you have respect for one another things will go much better. 

That last paragraph is my overnight consideration of events.

However in the moment on being told this my reaction was to say "bugger"  Mostly jokingly, because had I known this I might have played one of the "easier" instruments ;-) and now be making a living at music  (I would not btw for other reasons to do with NOT ENOUGH talent)

I played the violin because I fell in love with it. I saw an orchestra playing at my school when I was 7 came home and announced I wanted to learn to play 

Persistence,  annoying patience in action, meant I did get to learn. I've put it down a few times in my life, for years at a time but as an Identity it is one that never goes away

 I still love it and  I am still learning it.  I always will be. 

Assimilation - resistance is futile

Blue Boy is staying. ( touch wood so far)  I have plugged myself into the Cat Lady Network and the Vet has checked for a chip. His details have been advertised in the local paper. This has resulted in one call. As I answered the phone I was filled with conflicting thoughts. This cat has been loved. It has no fear and no aggression and a certainty that if he asks nicely he will receive. He is sweet. In short he is lovable and I, knowing my place, am doing that.

The person on the phone started to describe him. I held my breath,  in one indisputable way the cat she described and mine are different. It was with relief that I breathed in and said  "no that's not my cat." I noticed that. I said not my cat. I hadn't realised til I said it that I had made a decision. She was crestfallen. I then heard her story, about a lost companion who was/is also loved and hope that she has better news soon.

Had he belonged to her I would have given him up. ( But - as the vet said to me as we discussed this eventuality - with my arms folded and pursed lips.  He knows me so well!)

As I talked to the Hound I referred to him as Blue Boy. He emerged from the kitchen where he spends a lot of time keeping an eye on his bowl. We  have agreed a longer formal name which is not for sharing, it might make his blue blood and pink tongue blush.

The other master and mistressess in the household are ok with this.. He doesn't make demands on them, doesn't try to use his maleness to dominate - a wise decision with my two canny females. He has seen and concluded that it would be "a funny sort of game"

He would probably prefer to say " How about a nice game of chess"

He has certainly shrewdly played me as the Master he is.

Unexpected arrival

Last week out walking with the hound late, we were enjoying the stars. The fields are a bit damp at the moment, the frosts haven't hit hard enough long enough, to make night walking pleasurable. So we were looking at the sleeping village in the dark. It's usually just the two of us.

That evening the Universe had done a sterling job with the stars. Lots of twinkling but very little moon. Sparkling  pavements. It was quiet, the sort of "eerily quiet" demonstrated on Dr Who before the Tardis arrives.   (It hasn't so far) It's a beautiful peaceful experience without noisy interruptions

There was a frost that evening, a  harsh one. We were about 5 mins in. Bouncing along Primo was bursting from one smell to another. There is a turning point where we enter another part of the village, a different set of houses and there is patch of grass here that if we pass Primo must at all costs investigate.  A long thorough investigation, the smells there must be particularly fascinating.

As his servant that he leads along I was standing patiently waiting. I could hear a strange snorting sound. It was odd and I couldn't place it for a while as this particular spot is a bit of an echo chamber. Eventually we moved on a few steps and the noise continued. Eventually I located it. There on a wall was a funny looking creature coming towards me.  It looked a bit like a very scruffy owl with 4 legs. It was light on its feet.

It saw me and jumped down onto a lower wall and continued to stare at me snorting,
By this time I had worked out it was a cat. A rather distressed one. Decision time, do I walk on, come back later without hound or approach now with the hound and risk frightening the cat away.

I approached the cat. I got very close and could see and hear it was in a very sorry state. Long haired and horribly matted, so that sitting down or lying down must now be very uncomfortable. Dog on lead in right hand. Again decision time. Do I risk putting my hand out for a savage scratch. How will the dog react. I looked down. Primo's tail was wagging furiously but he had his mouth pursed forward - he was about to wake the village with his hound ROOO ROOO ROO.

Shut up Primo! He looked surprised but he did. I reached out and touched the cat. He turned his face and looked  up at me. Hard to breathe and with eyes running. He let me touch him and just looked at me. His face spoke of sadness, his body of slow starvation, A bone bag with fur. Primo increasingly interested danced at my side.

I pic up the cat and he fell against my body relaxed through weakness. All the way back the cat rests and Primo dances along looking at it.

When I get back into the house I  take a proper look. So does the dog. He is very interested and talkative with it. The cat looks even worse in a good light than he did before. Very compliant and wide eyed.

Since then he has eaten bits as I've given him small amounts, drunk. He has spent the day at a vets whilst they check him out and remove some of his knotted hair. He now looks worse, if thats possible as he is partially shaved. They couldn't get to the rest he was too stressed, but we will return next week for round 2.

The local cat people network has been alerted to see if we can find the owners. In the meantime he is here, takes the odd stroke with dignity, navigates the other cats, and regularly leads me to his dish.

Going to be an interesting few days

Speaking of death

It is a dark time of year. And we have festivals that bring us light along with crimson red poppies against black to remember. It starts with the ghosties and ghoulies. The saints attempt to appear but they don't have the charisma to blot out the darkness, the mists and the mystery.  I like it. I like the winter approaching and the cool and the regular bright twinkly starlight.

This evening speaking to one of my oldest friends, we found ourselves discussing death. He is a half orphan and I am a total orphan.  Strange and unreal terms to use for either of us. And yet it is true.

Even though for both of us the departures were several years ago, there are times when that deep pang comes forward and very present. When you want to cry out

 " I want my Mummy"

 or

  "I want my Daddy"

For those that have been lucky to be loved I don't believe these feelings ever go away completely.

That is not to say its always sad either. Sometimes in the midst of something amazing happening there is a desire to share it very particularly with one or other parent. The thought skips across the brain like a child on the way home from school with a picture. And then you remember...

When the orphaning is new so many people report thinking they see a loved one in the street. Sometimes its a garment or the way the head is held, their gait, sometimes even a smile can take you there. When it is raw when it is new, it cuts you up inside, slays you.  But later there is a strange unreal comfort from this and even amusement.

Looking around at siblings and the children around you, you see the missing ones. It might be in a glance, a turn of phrase, an attitude to life, a laugh, a bark, a dark one liner.  Sometimes "stuff" appears to skip a generation and new people who did not know Our Originals, are manifesting things they could not know about. Where has it come from?  Is it coincidence?

Then there might be that special  shared look of those who are connected to the ones that went before, as together they observe what makes sense to only them and is an invisible bond between all of them through time.

And we know they are not gone.

Looking in the wrong place?

Watching the dog running earlier this summer from a distance  I could sense something was not right. He was lame. As I got closer I looked at his legs as he moved along. He was quite happy, there was no sense of pain, he wasn't frowning, he was accommodating it.

A phrase came unbidden into my head from working with horses. I was taught when I was quite small that you can see if a horse is lame by looking at its head. This seemed bananas at the time, and I think I said so, though probably a little more carefully, she was not one to annoy with flippancy! Anyway a hand came out and pointed to a horse running around and how the head is carried. Easily. There was another - the reason we were there - that has lame. I couldn't spot which leg it was that was causing the lameness. "look at the head" so I shifted my eyes away from looking at feet and looked at the head, the head carriage wasn't the same.  This horse was lame.

I still couldn't tell which leg it was that was out, but by shifting my gaze away from one of the possibilities, stopping trying to look and compare all legs at once , I saw the overall shape.  I had a good sense of what the horse should look like in movement and by seeing the head and then the whole shape I had a much better idea of where there was something not working right. I was encouraged to use my ears too.  I thought  my Aunt was a scary genius ( she was!)

So with Primo I reverted to what I could only do at a distance, I looked at the overall shape. I  had a good sense of what it should be and sure enough it was easier to choose which leg to pay attention to. He canters everywhere, over and under and through things, simple removal of a thorn twig and off he went, the right shape. Everything was elegant again, even when he was working hard. He had accommodated it. Sometimes as part of his running an alien object is ejected naturally, so the accommodation is a sensible response. With a thorn, that could have embedded and caused all manner of systemic problems.

Recently he had some other bother, (highly sensitive wonder hound that he is) which is now sorted. As he spurted along and charged up behind me demonstrating a fluency, speed and joy that can only honestly be described as beautiful, I realised his ears were floppy and a bit mad again. It's another "tell" which I can now use to see if he is quietly accommodating something he shouldn't be.

Dogs and Horses. My Aunt had shown me a way to look at the whole system to help decide where there might need to be an intervention.

It seems an obvious leap to me to think about how this plays out organisationally. After all Organisations are systems, made up of systems, teams, groups, right down to each one of us. Humans the most magical special systems of all.  In teams or groups or even whole organisations, commercial or not, what might be showing as problematic might not be the source of a problem. It also might not be problematic, but naturally symptomatic of something else.

Sometimes you need to have a sense of the OVERALL shape and let your gaze rest on it, your sense of it, go soft - to take in the whole - to pinpoint where there might be something wrong in the system. And sometimes when there are changes happening it is essential to have a sense of what the new shape is likely to resemble so that you can calibrate if it is progressing or stuck. Then you have a better chance of making the right intervention or letting the system right itself.