Juliet Swan

Key-An-Alas

Cianalas

At first light, we leave. The road to the coastal airport is humid at four am. It's been, nearly, five years. I am excited to leave the Island of my birth and return to yours. Island of the Gods. I have my family with me and this feels good. We land on your sea-adjacent-air-strip and already I am aware how many people you touch and call back. 'Chianalas' as they say in Gaelic. The longing. The Gods dwell here, in the mountaintop and across the seas, in the blue. blue haze of summer, the purpled hue of distant islands, and the tempestuous wilds of winter.

We drive, skirting your mountains, green with spindly kefalonian fir, sage, olive groves, wild thyme. The heat is draining us of stress and energy, this is the litmus test; atoms colliding, fusion, particles separating and re-drawing. We re-tune, re-assemble and arrive at Kaminia excited, dumbly preparing for re-discovery, tentatively unfolding as mosquito's circle and the heat presses down. The gardens across the Island are in bloom. Kamelia abounds and the white frothy plant, that bursts from the mountainside. It is a good time to come, there is laughter rising from the beach, and the Bar next door and the Cantina beyond plays Spanish re-mixes, Greek pop and Jazz. All is well. 

Carrettas Nest, an oasis, verdant with fruit tree, banana, fig, olive is resting in the afternoon haze. Cicada's hide in the branches of Myrtle, juniper and mastic, and as they hum creating electricity and orchestral ceremony to our arrival.  The pool is blue and inviting and beyond the sea joins the orchestra with its rise and fall. the Island breathes gently.

Are we forgiven for leaving? The azure blue of the pool distracts our guilt. The gentle Ionian Sea, licking the toes of the beach offers no judgement. On the opposite shore, the lights of Zakynthos twinkle on, and along the beach, the lights of Kaminia awake. We sleep, lightly under the mosquito night and arise, ready to eat. In two days time it is the summer solstice, we plan to rise and enter the sea, as the sun rises and offer our thanks, our gratitude for life, for nature, for this Island.

We are not who we were. We are, all four of us changed by the events that unfolded since we last came here. Have we been flung from grace? Were we cast out from the spiritual mass? This morning. Our First. A plane wheels across the sea, a two-masted yacht makes way to its destination. Last night we returned to Medusa, the blinding goddess who turned all those who looked upon her to stone. Now she is but a shield worn to protect and reflect bad energy. We loved our outdoor meal, souvlaki, fish, pitta, feta, greek salad and all the while the Catalonian cats brushed against our legs hoping for a morsel and the sea lapped, gently, kindly. The skies filled with stars.

 

Norwich

An old friend died suddenly, his family invited friends and relatives to celebrate his life in the Dragon Hall Norwich. I have ancestors who were born and lived in Norfolk, so it was an opportunity to reflect and explore in unfamiliar territory. We left Norwich for Walsingham, Docking, stopping for lunch at Wells next Sea, then off to Great Bircham before reaching Hunstanton and turning back for home. So much space and light, so little over-development (where one village bleeds in to another). So refreshing.

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I had a whale of a time.....

I have an Arts background, so the opportunity to visit Winchester Cathedral and see their latest installation in association with Messums.org, Southampton University and artist Tessa Campbell Fraser - was one I leapt at. 

‘Whales’ is an evocative sculptural installation, capturing sperm whales hanging suspended in the Nave of the Cathedral. At rest? In-waiting? Campbell Frasers intention is that the audience will feel inclined to unravel the interspecies connection between human and animal (should that be mammal?) and this work is described as monumental. One day on, and I’m not convinced it achieves that, but it is an extraordinary experience and I fully applaud Winchester Cathedral for its offer. 

For me, the combination of Winchester Cathedrals remarkable interior, their ability to include a bright, imaginative trail for children that didn’t detract from the Art, and the additional programme of accompanying talks, tours, food, music (I really enjoyed High and Dry’s Sea Shanty performance), even a whale song sound bath… all beautifully curated to enhance the oceanic theme, deserves much praise.
I even enjoyed the blatant marketing from sponsor ‘Southampton University’ as part of their exhibition from the Southampton Marine and Maritime Institute. 

Cathedrals can be such snobby places, oozing ‘high-brow’ academic thought and culture but this experience has something for everyone and it would be a shallow human indeed who left without feeling, or sensing, the power of nature and its creatures and the imposition of man to destroy the beauty and wonder of nature as they seek to live side by side with it, or, to have simply enjoyed the interplay of light and whale song …. I was transported back to a journey to Canada when I was fifteen and visited the Natural History Museum in Ontario with my mother and Aunt. Here, I encountered whale music for the first time, at the 'exposition sur les baleines', it remained with me in my dreams for decades. 

If you can, go see Whales at Winchester Cathedral. Day or night, it is an experience to remember.

https://lnkd.in/eZyMeR3Y

AI - artificially self important? Or a force for good?

Is Artificial Intelligence (AI) embedded within internet technology going to be our downfall?

I've just sat in on a talk given by our local community police team at one of Residential Homes for our elderly residents regarding safety online, where some of the scams that are currently prevalent were discussed. 

For the criminals, it's a numbers game and they can target people all around the world with very little outlay and relatively accessible technology, plus they are often supported by larger organised crime networks but they view it as an easy way to make money, and they don't think of themselves as criminals but businessmen. 

For the victims it's miserable, and increasingly hard to spot, or avoid. Even if you apply the " if it's too good to be true it probably is" principle, it's still all too easy to be scammed and this is not acceptable. 

Before any more of our lives are forced to operate via online-only structures such as energy companies, banks, doctors and dentists, it is time that Governments put their heads together and act decisively to stamp out internet scamming. It's not just social media giants like Facebook, twitter, snapchat et al. that need to shoulder the burden, it's Governments, who have the power, authority and collective technology to impose harsher punishments on the perpetrators and whom together have the ability (if not the will) to get a grip on this before it's too late. 

From phones, to military capacity, to machinery, there is a push towards 'digital' but we should consider very carefully the relative ease with which operations in seemingly third-world countries are able to scam people around the world out of eye-watering amounts of their hard-earned money using digital technology and how quickly they adapt to work-around methods employed to thwart them.
Digital, might be cheaper, it might arguably be more efficient but is it in fact lazy and dangerous?

I've moved a long way from the sitting room of a Residential Care Home and watching a Community Support Officer reading from a very useful booklet, and I know that a huge amount IS being done to educate people of all ages - for example: 

internet matters.org
The 2023 Online Safety BIll
The National Crime
CEOP COmmand's 'ThinkUKnow 'programme
Get Safe Online.org
Internet Watch Foundation
National Cyber Security Centre
Action Fraud
UK Safer Internet Centre

...to name but a few... you'd think it was more than enough? Perhaps we are approaching the threat the wrong way around - now that AI is in the mix and in the public realm it echoes where we as a civilisation are at. Our lives have become so broad, so boundless in the online dimension (certainly not in the physical realm) and it is overwhelming in many ways to try to think what the solution might be, or what can be done to reduce the severity and impact of cyber-crime - take down the internet? Bring back analogue? Or just limit world wide communication? 

gov.uk


Spring 2024

Whilst you are waking - a memory surfaces.

I marvel at you

The mists of sleep dressing your eyelids

As they move from deep somnambulance

To a dreamy semi-consciousness

The softened muscles, contours

The hills and valleys of your landscape

Your bare-chested forests, 

Uncoiling from winter to spring, taut, vibrating

From dormant brittleness to fluid movement.

I walk your brow with my fingers,

As your abeyant dreams, touched by a cautious sun

Allow a little smile to display itself like clouds of snowdrops

And drooping daffodils,  dressing the banks of a meandering

Riverbed, swollen, sluggish, powerful.

As you emerge from sleep, the weight of burdens

Sliding like silk-sheeted storms from your bed.

And the air is perfumed by your quickening breath

As birds rise, as clouds disperse, as grass quivers

And winds calm. Spring, sweeping hesitant,

Along the lanes and byways, a light touch,

A gentle presence pulling the earth into re-birth.


Whilst you are waking I gather myself in, 

Alert to the uncurling softness, the downy yawn

Surfacing, a blinking moment of awareness

Comforting like my warm palm against your rough cheek

Or a sweet, shy kiss. I hold this moment, knowing

That soon you will rise and wander away towards summer.


February, 2024

A Cup of Tea In Bed

Quite the nicest present I've had this Christmas was a cup of tea in bed that my eldest made for me. I can't remember the last time someone bought me a cup of tea in bed, such a simple but lovely treat, full of heart. Tomorrow will be New Years Eve and in 2024 a whole chunk of my past life will have gone, many of the people in it, and the home where I nurtured my family since my husband to be and I, moved there in 2001 shortly before our marriage. The home where I saw my girls grow and flourish, entertained friends and ... so much of all that life, the memories, the love, the laughter have all withered away. My husband has decided that the woman he met on the internet and whom has been calling him, her 'boyfriend' since Christmas Eve 2022, is the one he wants to move forward with because he understood we were over. And beside she's sweet and I'm terrifying (apparently). People are complicated aren't they? There are only victims and survivors when a marriage collapses. Whilst I am grateful that the holding pattern of 2023 is now over, I grieve all those memories, all those wasted years, as I realise what an utter failure I have been. I can't pin point the wrong turn, was it getting married in the first place? Did I miss something? But as this year, this life and this marriage steam-rollers to a close, and I face the spite, and those taking pleasure in my pain, I can't see a fixed point where I failed to do what mothers do 'keep it all together'. Perhaps there were too many. It's really hard to love yourself, without tangible proof that you are loveable.

I'm just embarking on a book by Philippa Perry entitled THE BOOK YOU WANT EVERYONE YOU LOVE* TO READ *(and maybe a few you don’t). In it Philippa, a psychotherapist (artist and agony aunt),  identifies areas where people most need guidance and tools to help them through life. The first chapter is entitled 'How We Love" and why we crave connection... I seem to be losing all mine, unable to find people outside of my working life who make me feel good, and whom have the time to spend it with me. Perry says "Everyone needs to feel that they belong, maybe to a family, a project, a community, or to another person. We are creatures of connection and we deny this at our peril". Then there's 'How We Change" navigating the New for Better or Worse. I'm probably going to have to read this a fair few times and make good notes-to-self. In recent years I've lost a raft of constants and floated on a lake of uncertaintanties. My girls have grown up and are busy forming their own lives, both my parents have gone, my marriage has  inexorably failed, my finances are unstable, my future - a sea-mist. That's a lot to deal with in order to manage the final chapter 'Contentment'. I strive for that, a 'metaphorical' cup of tea in bed, a contentment in life, it's a low ambition to match my low self-esteem but it's something at least. 

It's pretty late in my life to be negotiating such a big and unnatural ending, and if I'm honest I can't find the heart or the enthusiasm to think about beginnings. I'm still processing that one of the biggest life-changing commitments I have ever made has crashed and burned, and how destructive that has been. I've made mistakes before, I've endured life events that took strength to pick myself up from but this one has somehow eaten away at me from the inside and if there's a spark of light left in me to rekindle my spirit, I can't find it. I shall have to be content with that emptiness, continue to read books that may or may not have the answer and remain calm in front of the coming storm. 2025 will be here soon enough, and if I'm there with it having survived, I can only hope that there's the promise of a cup of tea in bed and perhaps a home, cosy, welcoming, with a view from the windows, someone to take my hand, hug my shoulders and walk across a sandy bay,  leaving footprints behind as sea birds wheel overhead and waves run in and out with happy excitement. (I write that with some irony, that line of 'faux positivity' becomes not just nauseating but also exhausting).  A wise soul recently shared some wisdom on dealing with overwhelm,  'just nibble at the edges' they said. Sound advice, I shall nibble at the edges like a biscuit and hope I get to dunk it someday in a cup of tea that has been bought to me in bed.