Inspired By...Literary Notes

Today I worked in London and Wednesdays in London mean one thing - Stylist magazine. And as I picked up today's issue, I noticed that it was dedicated to all things literary. Double yay!

So once ensconced on the tube, I delved in, eagerly gorging on snippets and opinions, greedily flicking through recommendations and wondering how many of the ones I hadn't read would be available to download onto Audrey (and when on earth I would get the time to read them).

I was just over halfway through the magazine when I had 'a moment'.

Part of this week's issue has been turned over to four authors invited to write short stories inspired by a summer scent. On the basis of Oscar de la Renta's Granada, Jeanette Winterson penned Days Like This, a tale of summer romance, of two hearts finding a brief respite from life in the implicit promise of balmy nights and days filled with salt, sand and sea. Quite a lovely thing to read on a sunny June morning.

I was nearing the end of the story when I read this:

...I know that happiness is in the small things that happen everyday and not in the big declarations. Don't say forever. Say now. Don't say I do. Say I am.

I stopped, looked up from the page and then looked down again, re-reading those words with a new intensity, determined to imprint them on my brain.

Now

I am

The small things that happen everyday

I closed the magazine, savouring the seconds of stillness that encircled me amid the crush of midweek commuters. A couple of stops later I trundled off the carriage, feeling a little lighter than I had when I boarded half an hour earlier.

Who knew that commuting could be so inspiring?

Commuting Gems...A Veritable Treasure Trove

Fave freebie commuting mag Stylist was a veritable treasure trove this week.

This cushion got my stamp of approval (sorry, couldn't resist!)...

I tore out this recipe...

(Skye just won the Qantas Australian Woman of the Year in the UK Award and is the Head Chef at Michelin-starred Petersham Nurseries.)

I agreed (for the most part) with Lucy Mangan's 5 useful questions for the census...

(FYI: the response to Qs 1, 3 and 5 is Eeeeeewwwww!! Qs 2 and 4 are under advisement)

...but what I was really searching for was this:

And after perusing said list, what do you think my first thought was?  

'Hey I've only seen 22 of them! Best I take this list home for future reference.'

Just what is it about a 'Bucket List' that makes one feel unread / uncultured / unadventurous / unproductive?

The Art of Mindfulness...Music To My Ears

During the week, I was flicking through Wednesday's free-issue Stylist magazine when I came across a piece on The Art Of Mindfulness which postulates that, with technology at our fingertips and able to deliver (almost) every whim and passing fancy, we have lost the ability to live in the now. 

"The internet felt like an amazing opportunity but it's made us slaves.  And unable to live in the now."

Both Susan Maushart (In The Winter Of Our Discontent) and David E Mayer (director of University of Michigan's Brain Cognition and Action Laboratory) suggest that multi-tasking is a myth and that what we are actually experiencing is the brain focusing and re-focusing so quickly on consecutive tasks that we are left feeling forgetful and unfulfilled. 

I was quite inspired by this notion of being in the 'now' so I spent the back half of last week resisting the temptation to flit between facebook, emails, sms-ing and reading during my commute - 'trying the idea on' so to speak.  I heard the classical strains of Vivaldi as I passed through Vauxhall Station in the morning, saw the gorgeous pink sunset from the train window on Thursday night (no photo to share because I was just looking at and enjoying it) and laughed until my eyes watered at my Turkish friend's rendition of an 80s-song-to-remain-unnamed (because I can't remember it!) on Friday night's commute.

So this morning I was catching up on some of my fellow bloggers musings from the week and in the spirit of mindfulness, read with single-minded determination (that means all the way through - that's right, from beginning to end - in one sitting) the latest post from Seen The Elephant about expat Russian accordionist Alexander Sheykin.  Click here, be still, and be moved by some of the most beautiful and haunting music I've ever experienced.

And all through the wonders of the internet.

Weird Science...

I was reading my free issue of Stylist this week when I came across a small box containing 'random science facts'.  My curiosity piqued, I read on to discover:

a) there are more living organisms on the skin of a single human being than there are human beings on the surface of the Earth (what, there are other human beings below the surface??)

b) the microwave was invented after a researcher walked by a radar tube and a chocolate bar melted in his pocket (what was it doing in his pocket - chocolate is for eating?)

c) an inflated balloon contains about a hundred billion trillion air molecules (I can't even imagine this number but that's quite a lot, isn't it?)

and

d) our eyes are always the same size from birth, but our nose and ears never stop growing (I don't know whether to be worried about all the little porkies I've told or to try and measure my eyes!)

These facts (and some other ones too) were all courtesy of the Science Museum promoting something called Who Am I? which apparently opens on June 26th.  Which all sounded very erstwhile and count-on-able (and maybe even worth a visit) until I re-read fact number one in the box:

Scientists don't know what makes up 90% of the Universe!

Might just stay at home....

Winning the Bread...When the Universe Provides...

One of the benefits of commuting on a Wednesday, is the free issue of Stylist, a weekly mag distributed at railway stations by a tribe of fellas prepared to brave the elements.  So every Wednesday, all crimped with chill and purposeful crowd-drifting, as I am accosted, trotting through the arched walkway from Waterloo Station to the bus, I grab this little bundle of fab pics and easy reads in preparation for my return train journey that evening...

As I read this week's on the tube home, elbow to elbow with my fellow commuters, I was drawn into Dawn Porter's 'Who wants to be the breadwinner?' and while it's a great question (and a great read from Miss Porter), it also made me think about the independent women (namely me) who win the bread just for themselves (again, yours truly).

I am in a wonderful relationship and we are very independent financially.  I have been this way my whole life - having seen first-hand the financial fall-out when circumstances change in a relationship - and have always been proud that I work hard, earn well and can reward myself rather than rely on someone else's financial means or their generosity to do this for me.

But I am with someone who has been married and was (and to a degree still is) the breadwinner so suddenly I've been able to see the non-bread-winner in a different light.  And I sometimes wonder at my being so independent and proud and resourceful...when times are tough, there's someone else to 'sort it' or rely on and from the outside, the apparent 'safety net' looks pretty appealing. 

But the other part of me still kind of rears up at the thought of not being the source of my life and responsible for my circumstances...and maybe I couldn't ever let go of that drive to create and fight for the life I want...but the older I get and the more 'lessons' that life dishes out, those black and white views get a little grey and from time to time, a little part of me wonders why I want what I want and make choices which take me down difficult roads.

That night when I got home, I flicked through a magazine which had been sitting there for a few days and I read this:

To live content with small means;

to seek elegance rather than luxury;

and refinement rather than fashion;

to be worthy, not respectable; and

wealthy, not rich; to study hard, think

quietly, talk gently, act frankly...to

listen to stars and buds, to babes and

sages, with an open heart; await occasions,

hurry never...this is my symphony.

- William Henry Channing

Funny isn't it that when you let the question come to the surface, the universe finds a way to answer you?

Let the music play on...