If you needed to book roses for tomorrow and you haven't, it's too late, so read this instead

I've never really "got" Valentine's Day. Where I grew up, it was a foreign celebration that opportunistic capitalists quickly picked up as a very easy way to get rich, at least one day a year. It wasn't a part of my family's tradition, or of the faith I eventually came to have. So I have little of my own to say about it.

But hopefully this will provoke some activity in your head this sleepy Sunday.

A picture from my archives that would be wholly unrelated to this post,

if not for the one heart-shaped cake tin I own. That heart-shaped cake,

with some accompaniments, eventually became my cousins' first anniversary gift from me, on the occasion of their first visit to Sydney as husband and wife. That, and the pedestrian everyday sparks of

my life and my friends', is the type of occasion I'd rather commemorate. Who wants to wait for that once a year?

Will 2011 be the year I...

Image from Project: AK-47

• wear a child soldier's dog tag to remember the priceless lives being sold to a waking, 24/7 nightmare?
• finally get my social enterprise, no matter how small, off the ground?
• fall more in love?
• advance in my personal food reform plan, choosing to make more healthful and socially aware diet choices?
• get a pet that isn't composed of pixels?
• live in faith that it makes it normal to feel waves underfoot?
• have clients to counsel?
• have my work published again?
• can play a musical instrument unhindered?

What questions are you asking about 2011?

Mangrove Mountain weekend

For months, I've needed to get away from the perpetual loud and busy of normal life. For months, it's seemed impossible.

Last week was different. Circumstances converged, producing a situation where my car could once again travel to faraway places

and I was put in touch with kind people who offered me a fully domesticated train carriage in which to spend the weekend

on the 10 hectares they call home.

I found there were horses big and small to befriend,

songs to be sung outdoors,

and jewels to admire

and exult in

while exploring private bushland.

I came away hoping

that the peace

would ride along with me back to the city

where loud and busy resume.

It did.

The greatest...

This post began life, with a sterile mouse click, as a sarcastic crack at an e-mail I received today. Said e-mail exhorts its male recipients to forward its minimally proven, scantily detailed health "warning" contents to their "wives, daughters, girlfriends". I took issue with the assumption that every guy reading the e-mail had all three of these. And it occurred to me to ask, don't the men in these guys' address books deserve to know, too, of the toxicity of dried mushroom water? And also, what do women who receive the e-mail do, since they are not given similar instructions to inform their nearest and dearest (presumably, only of the opposite sex) of what the press, the medical community, the aunties who gossip in loud whispers at every corner of Sea Park Market have failed to tell us.

> For those of you who cannot read Chinese, this message is to
> warn you against using the
>
> water you soak your mushrooms in. Most of the mushrooms on
> the market are from China,
>
> and are contaminated with chemicals (I think it is carbon
> bisulfide, correct me if I am wrong)
>
> which are soluble in water. You must discard the water in
> which you soak to soften the
>
> dried mushrooms.
>
> Guys, please forward this to your wives, daughters,
> girlfriends.

And, of course, I was riled by the implied sexism of the e-mail, because of course what it really boils down to is: men don't soak dried mushrooms; women do. So guys, your involvement in this only goes as far as forwarding the e-mail, because if anyone is going to end up stiff as a board on the kitchen floor with a puddle of toxic fungus water nearby, it's going to be one of the three women this e-mail assumes are in your life.

So, while we're occupied with boiling things down to their basic content, what's really bugging me about this e-mail is:

1. the assumption that men don't cook/prepare food, or that only women do.
   
2. the lack of detail. What about this chemical is so harmful?
3. the lack of scientific substantiation. Has anyone been lab-testing mushrooms and finding this particular chemical, in amounts worthy of being mentioned?
4. that it fails to answer this absolutely unimportant, but nonetheless nagging question. Have people not been discarding their mushroom-infused water?

Anyway... all this should prove that I do have my moments of ridiculous pettiness over the most trivial of matters. As if you needed proof. But my irritation was broken by the presence online of a good friend and hymn-harmonising buddy back home, who sent me a song and told me she misses me. That was all it took for the bubble of irritation to burst, and for me to be reminded of what really matters. More of this boiling down business. When the excess matter of my life has bubbled off into vapour, when the scum of my unresolved character flaws has been scooped aside, what remains?

A writer I know of also seemed to be in the habit of boiling things down to bare bones.

"And now these three remain," the apostle Paul wrote centuries ago. "Faith, hope and love."

"But the greatest of these," he concludes...

The greatest...

That which I hope will be all that remains when my life is distilled...

"The greatest of these is love."

Out of harm's way

While I was reading this earlier tonight, I thought of the many people I know (including me) who've had their hearts run through the blender and are still waiting for that happily ever after.

I thought of you, relocating yourself halfway around the world to be near her only to find that she wasn't prepared to do the same for you.

I thought of you, resolutely staying in the marriage even though it's been years of continual grinding pressure on your nerves and there's no tangible sign that things will ever improve.

I thought of you, bravely floating your boats and saying good-bye to dreams because you know it's for the best.

I thought of you, willing to love even when it isn't fun, wondering if it's going to work out this time.

I thought of you, with your many regrets over things said and done too soon, too late, too wrong.

And in my thinking, I said a prayer for each of us. That love would make its presence known in our lives. Strong love. Courageous love. Protective, trusting, hoping, persevering love that steadfastly builds us into the people we were made to be. That the pain of the past would bring us wisdom. That we would be healed. That instead of complaining each time those splintering blades puree our hearts, we'd learn to keep them in a safer place.

Love does the conga

Once again, the (good) unexpected happens.

Right place: check.
Right time: check.

There I was, recording a video of a Project Dance performance. I'd actually stopped recording for a while, but the sound of Latin music had me start again. Then suddenly, into frame, across the audience area, danced a couple who entirely stole the show as far as I was concerned. Their spontaneity and sincerity were so captivating to watch, I didn't even bother recording after they were done.


Doug and Cindy stealing the spotlight.

I managed to catch a few minutes of Doug Eltzroth's time this morning to show him the video of him dancing with his wife, Cindy and ask his permission to post it here. I think many of us could always do with a reminder that love needn't always be painfully sought; it does sometimes sashay right across our paths, and if the timing is right, we can capture it.

Time was limited, but I managed to learn a little about Doug and Cindy. They met through a musical in which he wrote some songs and she choreographed. Together they lead Collage, an arts collective that sums up some of the dreams I have for my own life (and that of the guy I end up marrying). It's been uplifting to watch their family in action this past weekend.

Thanks, Doug and Cindy, for being yourselves in the midst of the busyness of Project Dance, for allowing me to post this private moment of your lives, and for your ministry. I've been so blessed.