My back hurts. The bottom bit. Not the bottom, bottom bit, but the bit just up from the bottom bit. Let's call it my lower back. It's not eyewateringly painful, or intakeofbreathingly hurty, it's just a bit grumbly. You know how if someone tells you that they have hung out your washing this isn't for information sharing purposes? Cos, you know, it's normally quite apparent without the announcement. However, they tell you just so you know that you've been a little bit annoying. Well, it's sort of like that. I don't normally need my back to tell me it's there. I know this from such things as bending and also my head being about five feet away from my toes. But right now it is choosing to make me slightly more aware of it's presence because it's a little bit cross with me.
"Why pray tell?" I hear you ask. ("Does that point need a paragraph of build up?" I hear you mutter..)
This week I have been cycling. Lots. Mainly downhill, but lots. To college I race, to Alex's I wizz, to church I dash, to Prison View I fly. It's been great. Life is a lot quicker on Esther's wheels and I can be here, there and just about everywhere (so long as it's mainly downhill) in minutes. However, it not being my bicycle and me being a bit of a scaredy cat mean that several things are true:
One. I do not have a helmet.
Two. I do not have lights.
and therefore...
Three. To compensate for this I sometimes ride on the pavement.
But other than being shouted at by both people I know and people I don't know, but do annoy, this has been fine. I was loving my new found freedom and speed. I even managed to balance a bottle of wine on my handlebars on Saturday night. This was surely the good life?
Until my back started to hurt.
You see the damage would seem to have been done not by my lack of accessories but the fact that me and the bike aren't quite the right fit. His seat is a bit low, his handlebars are questionable. I can't work gears. And so whilst we've been getting the job done, actually we've probably been shortening both of our lifespans quite considerably.
I'm about to meet Billie and Jake to go to a student Question Time with Ben Bradshaw et al. so I don't really have time to think this through, but I do find it interesting. I've enjoyed riding the bike. I haven't had any accidents, I haven't run into any trouble. I've been wanting to jump on and do it again and again, thinking that I had found the silver bullet to my troubles.
And yet actually it's been doing me quite a lot of damage that I couldn't see to start with. On the surface it's been solving one problem (lateness) but under the surface it's been creating a much bigger one (potential cripple). It would be interesting to map out how many more of Esther's bikes there are in my life that I'm not noticing the impact of at the minute.
Right, Ben. You're going to vote, yeah? Good.
Tuesday 16 March 2010
Saturday 6 March 2010
Sunflowers and strawberries ahead.
It is March and there are crocuses(/croci/crocus) and the sun is shining in the morning and the other day I didn't wear a coat one time. Fit as.
A mixture of consumerism and biology means humans aren't given the option of flying south or rolling into a ball for those five cold, dark months between November and March. Life trudges on and so we must too. We go out in the dark and come back in the dark, as they say. I feel less certain in these weeks that my spring has been wound enough to get me through til tea. I think living for sleep is almost exactly the opposite of the life we were intended for and yet in December and January that becomes the goal more often than I would like. We go on, because we're British and that's what we do, but we moan (because we're British and that's what we do.) It can just all be a bit of a hard s l o g.
And then March comes. We regain our synchronicity with the created world and everyone and thing is waking up at the same time. Yes it's chilly but we say "it's bright". Yes it rains but we call them "showers". Everything is just a little bit more cheery. It's like we hadn't realised that we'd had our knuckles clenched during the cold and as we walk outside in Spring they seem to slowly release. Tension we didn't know we were storing is being released back into the ether. It feels a little bit like we are being made new with the flowers and the leaves. Everything is fresh, everything is clear. Everything, as I said, is bright.
I'm not sure if this will quite make sense, but in my head there is quite a beautiful likeness that can be drawn between what's happening under the ground and what's happening above the ground about now. Because under the ground there are bulbs and seeds that are waiting to shoot. They've been planted in anticipation and now they're waiting for their moment. Whilst the gardner who set them knows exactly what is to come, most of the rest of us haven't a clue. And yet despite not knowing where they are or what exactly they will look like we still trust in the good things to come and that there are sunflowers and strawberries ahead.
Which is a little bit like us who tread the soil. My hope is renewed in the sunshine that there is a great big God who knows what will happen and when. He knows the times and the places, He knows where we're going and also how we get there. I don't. Not the foggiest. All I can know is where I am now and from where I have come. Yet, because of this big gardner in the sky, I still have absolute confidence that there are sunflowers and strawberries ahead.
A mixture of consumerism and biology means humans aren't given the option of flying south or rolling into a ball for those five cold, dark months between November and March. Life trudges on and so we must too. We go out in the dark and come back in the dark, as they say. I feel less certain in these weeks that my spring has been wound enough to get me through til tea. I think living for sleep is almost exactly the opposite of the life we were intended for and yet in December and January that becomes the goal more often than I would like. We go on, because we're British and that's what we do, but we moan (because we're British and that's what we do.) It can just all be a bit of a hard s l o g.
And then March comes. We regain our synchronicity with the created world and everyone and thing is waking up at the same time. Yes it's chilly but we say "it's bright". Yes it rains but we call them "showers". Everything is just a little bit more cheery. It's like we hadn't realised that we'd had our knuckles clenched during the cold and as we walk outside in Spring they seem to slowly release. Tension we didn't know we were storing is being released back into the ether. It feels a little bit like we are being made new with the flowers and the leaves. Everything is fresh, everything is clear. Everything, as I said, is bright.
I'm not sure if this will quite make sense, but in my head there is quite a beautiful likeness that can be drawn between what's happening under the ground and what's happening above the ground about now. Because under the ground there are bulbs and seeds that are waiting to shoot. They've been planted in anticipation and now they're waiting for their moment. Whilst the gardner who set them knows exactly what is to come, most of the rest of us haven't a clue. And yet despite not knowing where they are or what exactly they will look like we still trust in the good things to come and that there are sunflowers and strawberries ahead.
Which is a little bit like us who tread the soil. My hope is renewed in the sunshine that there is a great big God who knows what will happen and when. He knows the times and the places, He knows where we're going and also how we get there. I don't. Not the foggiest. All I can know is where I am now and from where I have come. Yet, because of this big gardner in the sky, I still have absolute confidence that there are sunflowers and strawberries ahead.
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