St David's Day, Margaret Thatcher, and Stultification

My dear Reader, I apologize for not having regaled you with an update of my life in the last few days. I thought it was a lot longer than a few days because the last update was on the 25th of February and it is now March, but I had forgotten how few days there were in February. Today is of course my name day, so sanabituranima is going to make me some leek soup, and I have bought some Cake wherewith to celebrate the occasion. I went to Mass at St Cuthbert's at 9.15 this morning; I did not succeed in rising at 6.30; I did succeed in rising at 8.45, or perhaps 8.43 or so. I had intended to spend some time in prayer before Mass; instead I did that after I had had breakfast, which I had in Brown Sugar. I know it is not called Brown Sugar, but I call it Brown Sugar anyway: it used to be its name, and so I shall still call it that, be it what colour or thing it be may. I had lunch in college; then I did about fifty minutes of piano practice. I had finished - at 1.45, for I had to go to a lecture - when a man came to the door and spoke to me to complain about my playing being "repetitive." How do you practise anything without it being repetitive? I am sorry but if you are to learn something you have to repeat it. He used the adjective "hammering," and there is one little bit, of about four seconds, which I might have hammered - though I did play it a large number of times. How else am I supposed to learn it? Anyway, I had finished. He said it was tuneful up to that point. I was not entirely sure whether it was myself, or Chopin, or my interpretation of Chopin, that he was criticizing.
Then I went to my music-therapy lecture which was taken by Janet Graham, who is the chief music-therapist in the North-East. I did not expect the lecture to be interesting, but it was more interesting than previous lectures have been. I have not seen Rachel Darnley-Smith, our usual music-therapy lecturer, for a month now. Anyhow, we had that lecture, then our group practised until about a quarter to six - from 2.15 to 5.45 is three and a half hours, so we have worked hard this afternoon. It was after that session that I bought the chocolate cake with which to celebrate St David's Day. I found out that if you want to use a machine and pay by cash you have to use a particular one which was not the one I was using since the one I was using came up with zero every time I tried to scan the cake. Also, when I walked in and out of the shop, the alarm sounded; I attributed it to my cello. No one has arrested me yet. Those alarms go off so frequently with so many false alarms that they seem to me to be almost entirely self-defeating. Not that I have any strong opinions on anything.
Well, that's not quite true. I have strong opinions on everything from Tolstoy to a teapot; Margaret Thatcher is the only thing on which I have no opinion. I do not feel I know enough about her to have an informed opinion, and the views that I have heard about her differ so much from each other that it has not been possible for me to imbibe a prejudice one way or the other by a process of osmosis.

On a not very related note, I think it does not do any good for a child to be laughed at for not understanding something, or for someone to say "How can you possibly not know / understand that?" I think it does positive harm. I don't know or understand something; you tell me, without expressing it in words, that you think I am stupid; therefore I do not ask anything of anybody who might be able to help me because they might react in the same way that you do - implying that I am stupid because I don't know or understand something -; and in failing, through this fear and false pride that you have taught me, to ask questions, or to ask for help, I paralyse myself and am unable to make any progress at all; or rather, I stultify myself; and so your unexpressed accusation of stupidity, of which you may have been entirely unconscious, has become a prophecy that has almost fulfilled itself. It is true that my pride is my own fault: but you taught it to me.

22nd February

I have listened to the first act of Siegfried this morning. I like Wagner, though many people don't. I mean his music. Flibbertigibbet. Bang! Brobdingnag. Cello. Architrave. Consciousnessstream. Inverness-shire. Crash bang wallop what a picture. Not photogenic. Gibberish.

Lector, I am half inclined to apologize for not updating for a week. But this has been owing to a combination of adventures and sickness. I hope that you, benevole Lector, will tolerate this tempowawy inconwenience.
I am tired now (I know it is only 9.45; but I have been up since 3.30 - over eighteen and a half hours). I shall write again tomorrow.

Je suis un peu fatigué

Today has been a good day, if I am now quite tired at the end of it. I managed to get up at 8, after going to bed some time after midnight. This gave me enough time to say morning prayer and get to 9.15 Mass at St Cuthbert's. I then said mid-morning prayer, after which I went to Palace Green library. Unfortunately it took several minutes for the library to open; I suspect that the people in the library might possibly perhaps maybe not have been able to find the keys to the main door. Anyway I left very shortly and went back to St Cuthbert's to say the Rosary - there were only sanabituranima, Sophie Caldecott, and myself, there. Then sanabituranima and I had breakfast in Brown Sugar or whatever it calls itself now; only we were there for so long that I decided to have lunch there as well. Then we needed to go; and I went to the library a little before two o'clock, trying to make arrangements for today, for which I have planned an Adventure. The Adventure will require an early night for me. I shall describe tomorrow after it has happened. Now I have found my itinerary for tomorrow. I was in the library trying to work out the times for various stages of a journey until 3.15 - it took at least an hour and a quarter. I must do some things before I go to bed - my alarm shall go off at six o'clock, and up, and (which is the same thing) out of bed, shall I get.

Today seems to have been rather busy. I set my alarm for 2 but did not get up until nearly 8.30; I said morning prayer, and then had breakfast at 9. I left Collingwood immediately after breakfast in time to get to Mass at St Godric's. After that, I said mid-morning prayer from my fairly new copy of the first volume of the Divine Office. I have said all of today's office now, except Night Prayer. I am intending to say all of it during Lent, and since Lent is nearly upon us, I am trying to get into the habit of it now. I would not at all recommend starting with the entire Office. I would recommend the following:

BEGINNERS

Say Morning Prayer, Evening Prayer, and Night Prayer.

INTERMEDIATE

Add Office of Readings so:

Office of Readings, Morning Prayer, Evening Prayer, Night Prayer.

[The Office of Readings can be said at any time, or even the evening of the night before. I said today's Office of Readings at midnight, which I think is a good time for it.]

ADVANCED

Say the entire Office:

Office of Readings, Morning Prayer, Mid-morning Prayer, Midday Prayer, Mid-afternoon Prayer, Evening Prayer, Night Prayer (Septies in die, &c.)


What I mean is that you should work gradually up to saying the whole thing; you won't be able to sustain it - probably - if you go from 0 to 100 instantaneously. It can hardly be done. Perhaps it cannot be done. Anyway, so much for that.

I saw a doctor today about my Brain Being Mean To Me (thank you sanabituranima): apparently I need a Yellow Form. Also I have a new campus card, although I have also found the old one. Life is not bad.

King David was a sorrowful man

King David was a sorrowful man:
No cause for his sorrow had he;
And he called for the music of a hundred harps
To ease his melancholy.

They played till they all fell silent:
Played and play sweet did they;
But the sorrow that haunted the heart of King David
They could not charm away.

He rose; and in his garden
Walked by the moon alone,
A nightingale hidden in a cypress tree,
Jargoned on and on.

King David lifted his sad eyes
Into the dark-boughed tree
"Tell me, thou little bird that singest,
Who taught my grief to thee?"

But the bird in nowise heeded;
And the king in the cool of the moon
Hearkened to the nightingale's sorrowfulness
Till all his own was gone.

I thought that my formative essay on this song was due in today; but it is actually due in tomorrow. Nevertheless, I have already handed it in. Hooray for citalopram!

I went to a mind-numbing concert of avant-garde music today. One of the pieces consisted of one note - in tune, slightly flat, and slightly sharp, for about ten minutes. Another was called "This Is Why People O.D. On Pills," and was, I am told, about an aesthetic of skateboarding. Another, by Miriam Rezaei, was good, if a little, or rather a lot, strange.

Today is the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes. Happy feast of Our Lady of Lourdes!

Remember your medication.

An Eventful Morning

I woke up several times this morning, but not properly until 8.35. I was seven minutes late for my 9 a.m. lecture. Our 10 a.m. lecture was on Skriabin, and was much more interesting. Skriabin was very strange, into theosophy and all sorts of odd things; he thought he was in communication with Martians. He began to write a piece - a special temple was to be constructed in India for the sole purpose of performing this piece, naturally - and when his piece was performed there, the world would come to an end. But Skriabin never finished it, so the world is still here. Incidentally the beginning of something he set begins "I am God."
Then I had a meeting with Patrick Zuk; it was supposed to be about postgraduate study, but we rather discussed my depression, which was a very depressing conversation, and my music therapy essay. I have been offered two weeks for me to submit a new version of the essay as a first attempt. It was a rather dispiriting meeting, simply by virtue of the subject matter and the heavy emotion.
But hey ho, away we go, kill the dragon, kill the dragon, hey ho, away we go, kill the nasty dragon.