Sunday, October 26, 2014

well, nothing. it's sunday.

A long answer to a short question; my response to a writing prompt on Medium this morning...

What’s in my pocket?

Well, nothing.

It’s Sunday.

Sunday is for early morning walks and quiet moments feeling the rising sun on your back, sweat sticking to your body, the sound of your own heartbeat in your ears, your breathing quick and heavy and louder as the ground rises. And it’s for empty pockets.

Sunday is for homemade granola with natural yoghurt and honey; for slabs of sourdough caked in butter. It’s for cups of tea you hold close to your face, feeling the steam wrapping itself around your mouth and nose and tickling your ears. And it’s for empty pockets.

Sunday is for laying in the shade, the damp grass rustling beneath you, your head resting on cushions that don’t really belong outside. It’s for laying out, head in a book, noticing the shade shift as the pages turn and the sun warms you. And it’s for empty pockets.

Sunday is for dinners around the kitchen table, it’s for smiling conversations and laughter with people you call family. It’s for tall glasses of cold water and shaking salt on your vegetables. And it’s for empty pockets.

Sunday is for early nights under clean sheets. It’s for breathing in the summer air through your open window and pulling your blankets to your chin, better to be swathed in blankets than close the window. And it’s for empty pockets.

Sunday is for nowhere to be but here. Sunday is for enjoying the moments that you otherwise ignore or pretend you don’t have time for. Sunday is for nothing and for everything at once.

Sunday is for empty pockets.

kb xx

Thursday, October 23, 2014

this week #4




Watching: Twin Peaks

Never let it be said that I'm one to see things as soon as they appear, a jumper of bandwagons, an ardent follower of the zeitgeist. I'd given Twin Peaks some breathing room, nearly twenty five years worth, and have only just downloaded the first season this month. And then of course chatter starts about a return of the series, which has been confirmed for 2016. I'm sure I'll get to the new series by 2040 at least. 

Listening: No Doubt 
Just A Girl

No Doubt’s Tragic Kingdom was one of the first CD’s I ever bought, back in the days when we bought physical CD’s and not space on our hard drives. Just A Girl, in fact that entire album, has been a favourite ever since that first spin on my little CD player. Don’t blame me if this trip down (my) memory lanes results in hours spent clicking from one No Doubt hit to the next. Because that’s exactly what I did. Don’t Speak, Sunday Morning, SpiderwebsExcuse Me Mr.

You’re welcome.



Reading: Simon Armitage’s Walking Home

I saw British poet Simon Armitage at the Melbourne Writers Festival (the session was recorded for Radio National and you can listen to it here) and though previously hesitant to engage in poetry found him, his work and his story of walking the Pennine Way as a troubadour, albeit the wrong way, capturing my attention. So I bought his book and have only now got around to reading it - it’s a large TBR pile that sits on my bedside table. It’s an entertaining read, a mix of travel and memoir and laced with a little of that self deprecating humour that appeals to me. Perhaps it is my yearning for, and indeed my impending, adventure, but Armitage’s walk along the Pennine Way feels relevant to me right now. Not to say I’m planning to tackle the 256 mile walk anytime soon, perhaps it’s more in the attempting of rather than the actual doing that feels relevant. 

Anyway, that's this week.

kb xx

Sunday, October 12, 2014

i'm a magpie



What kind of blog is it? Is the question that inevitably follows the statement I blog. And one that I find somewhat difficult to answer.

This week I came across an article on The Guardian that proffered four blogging archetypes: The educator, the observer, the polemicist and the magpie. Basically the educator is the expert, the observer offers 'informed insight and analysis', the polemicist is 'provocative, opinionated and contrarian' and the magpie is the scavenger of the internet, curating content from around the web but offering insight and opinion alongside it.

I'm no expert, much too uniformed and opinionated to be an observer yet not quite opinionated enough to be a polemicist. Which leaves magpie.

The word magpie evokes images of both a black and white bird, and a person who somewhat secretly and oftentimes to their own detriment collects things in a manner that would see them not out of place on one of those American hoarding tv shows. She hoarded those issues of Vogue like a magpie, etc. 

But, there is something else to the idea of the magpie that goes hand in hand with the phenomenon that is blogging and the interwebs. Because there is a ridiculous amount of interesting stories and thoughts and pictures and video and music that this constant inter connective telecommunication has opened up. And being able to trawl and discover and then having a space to share those things - a space with more room than various social media channels - a space to catalogue your online adventures in a way that feels both intimate and wide ranging and also a way that feels current but  simultaneously forever. I mean, this blog will still be around in a thousand years, right? Anthropologists will read it and dissect it and try to determine what life was like in 2014. Right? Maybe not. 

I sometimes wonder if the way we share today, share even the most personal of feelings and thoughts and emotions, is indicative of a disjointed society. One where we don't know our neighbours or our local greengrocer. One where we could go all day without speaking words to another human being, but type thousands of words on a screen. 

But I digress. What type of blogger am I? Well, I'm a magpie. What type of blog is this? A magpie nest, I guess. A quick perusal through my most recent posts here attests to that. I've long pondered whether expanding this blog from its initial incarnations, adding to the nest if you will, was the right thing to do in an internet society that almost demands you bag a niche. Now I know I'm a magpie, this pondering seem unimportant. 

So next time someone asks me what I blog about, I'm going to say I blog about the magpie nest that is this life. I'm going to say I'm a magpie blogger. 

kb xx

Thursday, October 02, 2014

feminism as fashion statement



Fashion is, generally speaking, a series of trends. Feminism is not a trend, it is not a fashion statement.

Wednesday, October 01, 2014

in defence of YA fiction



In defence of YA fiction. Yes, this is me reading Capture the Castle - a wonderful book and apparently YA fiction, too.