After my first 6 months in the English school system, in 1969, the school headmaster observed me to be:
confident
left-handed
quiet
producing interesting conversation
enjoying drawing
a slow reader
occassionally shedding tears
My parents took the family on a day trip to London, to the Tate gallery. At 7 yrs I was not well equipped to appreciate the treasures on display. Mum and Dad seemed to spend ages looking at dull boring pictures of clouds (Turner). I asked permission to explore the galleries at my own pace and was allowed to wander off. I walked briskly, errr ran, around the building capturing impressions browsing for literally seconds at vaguely interesting paintings that I’ve long since forgotten.
Then. I turned the corner of a gallery to be confronted by the death of Chatterton.
His vibrant orange hair glowing, his purple velvet breaches full of warm lively texture in the daylight. The torn paper on the floor. His face white as marble. Clearly dead. I was captivated, I stood studying the painting for what seemed, to a 7 year old, like eons. I fell intrigued. Who was this beautiful man? Why was anyone that beautiful, dead before being old and wrinkly?
He became my first love. He was a local Bristol boy, I was a local Bristol girl. Later I read Peter Ackroyd’s book ‘Chatterton’ and wondered whether his death was an accident or deliberate. I visit St. Mary’s Redcliffe occassionally, the place where Chatterton reportedly discovered the manuscripts on which he forged his texts. He has remained young, beautful, and with my thoughts.
From AElla
O! Synge untoe mie roundelaie,
O! droppe the brynie teare wythe mee,
Daunce ne moe atte hallie daie,
Lycke a reynynge ryver bee;
Mie love ys dedde,
Gon to hys death-bedde,
Al under the wyllowe tree.
The early hours of a march morning, dew is forming on the grass, the clear skies above reveal more stars than I can count. After a long evening meandering around country lanes I found myself sat on the sweet smelling damp grass of the hillside. I pull my dufflecoat tightly round me for warmth. The black line of the Severn in the distance cuts the view. Above the black slash I could see the flickering lights of Cardiff. Only visible on a clear night.
Have dinosaurs roamed this very hillside? Running my fingers through the grass I pull a pebble from the earth. Turning it in my cold fingers, feeling ridges, it is a fossilised shell. The cotswolds were once the seabed. Difficult even to begin to imagine how much has happened here on this now hillside. How many people have lived and died in this world.
The enormity of my insignificance seared.
A plane rummbled across the night night sky above. Sniffling while tears silently crossed my cheek. The rough cloth of my duffle-coat sleeve clumsily failed the tear sponge test.
I love you
I love you too
Are you happy?
No
What do you need to make you happy?
Not much, just to talk to you most days to hear the stories of your life, the laughter the pain, the stuff you normally share with friends. An occasional bunch of flowers, notes that tell me you love me, they can be insulting, I’ll know from the note and thought that you love me, I just need to know it through a thought or story
I can’t live my days remembering to find time to call you, to leave you a note, to be worrying about what I should do rather than living my life now, I can’t be worrying if I’ve checked-in with you enough to keep you happy, I’ll worry about whether you’re happy. It will make me unhappy
Oh, we’ll both be unhappy
I love you
I love you too
We can’t be happy together
It seems we can’t be happy
If we break-up we’ll be unhappy, but we’ll have the opportunity to be happy with someone else.
Yes, but I love you and want to be happy with you
It wont happen
No
lets part and risk happiness
[the silence of tears]
a not-Wendy person once said to me:
“it should be ok to cry at work“
After I’d picked myself up off the floor and tended to my pending bruises (I’m prone to falling over). I considered that I’m also prone to blubbing.
I cried when they shot JR even though Dallas wasn’t a believable TV series, the acting was atrocious, and I didn’t even like JR. I can often be heard sniffling my way through a film (The Hours, Capote).
But crying at work, because of work related thingies? With some notable exceptions, for example Hospice work,
I’d really rather it didn’t happen
Examples of why crying at work does not get the (wet) blanket, or wet hankerchief, Wendy seal of approval:
Behind closed doors, in car parks, and sometimes in bars after work I’ve listened to people cry about work situations. Normally the crier is female and describes what I consider to be bullying or in my more cynical moments, out-and-out sexism.
Naturally, an opinionated Wendy believes that the answer isn’t to legitimise the symptoms of bullying (victim crying), it is to remove the cause (behaviour experienced as bullying). The person who feels like crying has the responsibility of identifying the cause and confronting the cause directly or using appropriate ‘personnel’ services to seek advice.
Asking an opinionated Wendy really isn’t a good idea because the crying might just get all contageious, twice the short-circuited keyboards and twice the unintelligable conversations, twice the tea consumption level. Really, that just wont do, now, will it?
Lets cut the reasons for crying at work 
Stories from the Hague #2
The “Het Palais” is a museum dedicated to the life and work of MC Escher. I happily spent hours looking at his wonderful prints, reading about his life, looking at photographs he’d taken of his inspirations, objects he’d owned, watching videos, playing in the virtual reality and with the optical illusions. I’ve always admised Escher’s work. Being able to visit a museum dedicated to him was a real treat.
I learned that Escher had designed a version of “Metamorphose” for the Hague Post Office.
A short walk from Het Palais is the “Maurithuis”. Another compact palacial gallery. The contents of this Gallery were exquisit: Rembrandt, Ruebens, Van Dyjck, Vermeer, Frans Hals and others I’ve forgotten how to spell. As with Het Palais, the Palais itself is a fabulous place worht visiting. The paintings were awe inspiring. As a novice, I paid particular attention to the brush storkes and techniques used.
I thought that I would never see “girl with a pearl earing” in my lifetime. I shed a little tear of joy.
