Before I came to London I put out a request, nay a plea, to my fellow bloggers and Twitterers to ask if anyone would be so kind as to help me out with a guest post while I was away because I knew I would be totally shite at blogging extremely busy with various important engagements.
I was completely delighted when the witty and charming @deililly, a Twitter compadre, shyly stepped forward and asked if she might write a post.
I have been chatting to this witty and clever young lady from the wilds of Scotland who lives with several colourful relatives and a rather persistent cat for some months now, sometimes about deep important things and sometimes about utter frippery, and I was most sorry to miss meeting her last week in London at the now infamous #partay where apparently everyone on Twitter except me had a riproaring time.
I received her post this morning which was very timely as I was just wondering what the hell I could write that would seem remotely interesting.
My own headlines are fascinating to me, but to you they’re probably quite dull. I slept for a record 9.5 hours on the plane due to miracle pills from the doctor (chief attractive quality of my MD: he will give you any pill you ask for if you are stern enough with him. I love the internet!) I played with my cousin’s charming baby all day yesterday but gave her back when she cried. Graham the hair God fixed my roots and planned a rockin’ style for Friday which he will return to do for the gig. EOS)
So, without further ado, I bring you the post from @deililly. I urge you to follow her on Twitter, too, and if you’re not on Twitter already, she is good enough reason to start tweeting all by herself!
Also, please do comment – she’s sure to respond as she’s ever so chatty and such a lovely lady.
Frontiers: Above And Beyond
Well I don’t know what I have let myself in for jumping up and saying “I’ll do it!” when MTFF asked if anyone fancied doing a guest post while she dons her funky pop star hat in London this week. Mind you I am not entirely certain MTFF knew either. She is one brave lady.
And I have found I have broken out in a bad case of Bashful Britishness. Or British Bashfulness? I can loudly give my opinion to the TV (to the news especially. The newsreaders must wonder why their ears ring nightly while they are trying to decipher the autocue,) to my mother who is generally occupying another shopping channel filled planet populated with George Forman grills, and blenders that whiz you up carrot juice of a morn while playing you a samba to shoogle your digestive juices into action and answer your email at the same time. The cat pretends to listen but only while I am holding a piece of fish. I am not used to speaking anywhere where people might actually be listening to you. And making them listen to me feels so *rude* (is that awfully British again?) Should see the shock I still get when anyone replies to me on twitter. There may even be a snoopy dance. Let’s not even get on to the joy should anyone actually send me a Direct Message (@deililly btw if you fancy reading my 140 character long ruminations on the weather, what I find in the fridge and the people I stare at on the bus. Occasionally I get lost in a city which is fairly entertaining all round. Well except for the person who has to come and rescue me.)
Mind you, claiming my blog stage fright as Bashful Britishness is probably a bit of a lie. It is just good old British Wussypantsness at hitting my own Final Frontier. I am writing a blog post. People might read it. And if I actually get to the point of giving an opinion someone might disagree with me. Urk. Then I would actually have to be able to explain why I hold such and such an opinion without resorting to harrumphy noises and the reply ‘just cos.’
I shall blame my education for this. I studied religion in another lifetime. Think of it as being four years of being given answers before you had figured out what any of the questions were. Choosing a ‘right’ answer for you personally turned into a sort of religious pin the tail on the faith donkey. Giving an opinion there involved being able to name several sources in leather bound tomes from the bowels of the library, a poncey quote (usually in French) and a knowing laugh.
I entered university chockfull of opinions and certainty. And left with a nervous tic when anyone said the word God, wondering if the table really was real and hoping to all and any gods who hadn’t fled the scene that there wouldn’t be any pink and purple zebras to change my concept of reality (Don’t ask. You really don’t know what happened. Or why tables and zebras.)
Years on and I am still mostly incoherent and deeply fearful of peering through any more windows to the Holy.
Lest the Holy peers back at me I imagine. I am determined not to catch their eye till it is strictly necessary.
I might have the right questions by then.
At the next Final Frontier if you will.
So all this makes me more and more baffled with how SURE everyone else seems to be about their religion or lack of it (we actually studied atheism as a religion. Just to really confuse us all further.) The more scientific and secular the world gets the more need people seem to have for a religion. The more humans seem capable of making or doing, the more need a lot of people have for putting the whole thing in much bigger hands. The Hadron Collider is colliding away there, perhaps with the secrets of the universe whirring out on the print outs. And… we are even less sure. To the point of wondering if the machine didn’t want to work and was in some other world/point in time/location through the Stargate trying to sabotage the scientists’ efforts.
Well it did. Till I was thinking about 18 year old me vs me now (it is amazing how watching someone that age holding forth can open the tide gates on that!) Sometimes, just sometimes, there is this wish to go back there. To be feel so sure of myself again. To dial my universe right back to where I understood it. The older you get, the more you learn, the less answers you have and sometimes less questions since another answer would just frazzle you even further. Is this new extreme style religious world a way of dialling it back? Reducing the world to something that makes a concrete sense? Somewhere you can gather with other ‘right’ thinkers and feel comfortable with your opinion since it isn’t standing up above anyone else’s. Like a very big group shouting at the TV together.
Or maybe religion is the static point we all move around rather than the other way round. Or an absent minded scientist left his lunch in the Hadron Collider and blamed a passing bird/wibbly wobbly timey wimey messing from the future. Maybe when I get older I will get more sure of my universe. I might even find an age where I know both questions and answers. Maybe I should have read those leather tomes in the library. And learned French. And how to do a knowing laugh that doesn’t sound like a witch’s cackle. Maybe I should head for the high ground and just blog about my cat. (you would like her, she is very funny. And more popular than me on the internet unsurprisingly)
What do you think?
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
I studied philosophy at university, so I feel your pain. At least for me it was the constant fear that a dancing pink elephant might spontaneously appear in the middle of a tutorial whistling a merry tune.
They never did. At least I think they never did. But as I am unable to philosophically prove that statement (I was rubbish at formal logic) I will have to go back to hiding under my duvet and gibbering.
Hey loved your guest post! You write well! do you have a blog?
Mud – and they wonder why students drink so much! Sighting (or even just the fear of sighting) dancing pink elephants and confused gods is much easier to cope with if you have had a shandy or two first I am certain. Well that is my excuse for the drink in those years and damn I am sticking to it.
Sharni – Well I do have http://deililly.posterous.com/ as well as the twitter but haven’t quite worked out what and how much I have to say yet. It is still tumbling over in my mind. Part of posting here as a guest blogger was to find out if I could manage it. Seat of pants moment there. MTFF showed a lot of faith there!
deililly, congratulations on your first blog post. i really enjoyed reading it. i envy you for being sure of what you believed in at 18- religion-wise. i dont think i ever really knew…i was just brought up as a Muslim and that’s how i lived my life. my parents are what you call “liberal Muslims” but it all seems so archaic to me.
my “religion” at 18 was womens’ right in the third world, none of that “women need equal rights in the JP Morgan workplace” rather, women need the right to exist and not get beaten up black and blue by their husband or mother in law if they decided to take up a job or learn to read and write. somehow, my belief system , my religion, has crumbled for many reasons. i dont know if i “believe” these women can ever be better off, despite the Mohamed Yunus’es of this world. my religion has let me down…
congrats again on your post, I love how you write, “Is this new extreme style religious world a way of dialling it back? Reducing the world to something that makes a concrete sense? Somewhere you can gather with other ‘right’ thinkers and feel comfortable with your opinion since it isn’t standing up above anyone else’s.” e brava. xx
Have you ever read “The Denial Of Death” by Ernest Becker? I’m ploughing my way through it at the moment, slowly, half-wishing that I had done so at University twenty-something years ago. Except, I didn’t go to University twenty-something years ago. And so am having to make up for it now.
In the book, Becker basically seems to be suggesting that all human constructs – our symbolic world – which includes religious belief, is just a very elaborate self-defence mechanism that we employ in order to kid oursevles that we do not fear death. Most of the things that we do (or try to do) throughout our lives are kinds of ‘immortality project’. Could be anything from raising a family to raising a rumpus to raising a pyramid. It is all done in order to cock the snook at our own physical frailty and impermanence. Subconsciously, of course.
I guess that incudes blogging ..? Eek! L xx
That a girl! How long have we been all nagging you? And as we knew, you haven’t disappointed!
Having grown up with a grandmother who had all the questions and answers, I beg of you, never aim for that! Not knowing might be uncomfortable, but sure beats being cock sure and not allowing something new and potential wonderful into your life.
Abby xx
Congrats, lovely post. I’m reading “year of the flood” right now, Margaret Atwood, which explores a society where environmentalism and evolution have become a religion. I think humans are wired for some kind of believe system, that it must have confered a survival advantage. Its a fascinating subject. I”m an ex catholic athiest myself, and a scientist, with a strong “faith” in scienctific method and evidence.
Great post, even more so for a first-time one. I know what you mean about this extremism and the apparant human need to find some greater power to take responsibility for things, be it God, Nature, or vampires. Drives me crazy – and I call myself a some-time Catholic. Why can’t people just take responsibility for their OWN actions rather than automatically just looking for a fall guy?
Interestingly I see this with my kids a lot; they fall over, they drop something, they mess something up, and their first instinct is always to look for someone else to blame. I’m hoping they’ll grow out of it, with time, maturity and education, but I suppose that the current trend shows that there are plenty of people out there who are somewhat older than 6 and 3 and who have yet to do so.
Depressing.
But I still liked your post – write more please…
shayma – Oh bless you love. Thank you for reading. I really appreciate it. I think your 18 year old self was an incredible lass for taking that on and saying it was wrong. That takes guts. Especially against a religion you were raised in. That creates a hurt that never leaves doesn’t it?
I think I was so sure at that through stroppiness, ignorance and very non religious parents who supported any start I got into my head (atheist father used to drive me at age 6 to sunday school every sunday with no complaint) no matter how strange it seemed to them. It is only now I really realise what a gift that was to give me.
Lozzie – The feedback and book suggestions I have from this one wee post are great!
Haven’t read that no, but shall put it on the Amazon wishlist! It is an intriguing thought and I think there is a core of truth in it. Life doesn’t come with guarantees so perhaps through religion we make some. Particularly about death, which no matter how advanced we get is still very much beyond our control.
Ooh Kiz,
What a lovely post! I had a feeling there was a bit of Philosopher in you. Growing up in Catholic Ireland where the religion of guilt was all pervasive, led to some serious questioning, reading and research in later years. How sad that religious (catholic indoctrination) education was often given preference over science studies in many schools throughout the seventies and even into the early eighties.
Many years ago, I was given a little book by a friend called, ‘The Four Agreements’, by Don Miguel Ruiz. Some of the language is “flowery”, to say the least, but it’s central tenets are simple: Who and what we are can only come from within.
– Be impeccable with your word
– Don’t take anything personally
– Don’t make assumptions
– Always do your best
All good principles by which to live. At this middle stage of my life, I can only come to the conclusion that religion was invented to allay human’s fear of death. Maybe there would have been, and continue to be, less suffering in the world in the name of religion, if it had focused more on the enjoyment of the life we have whilst alive; not on the imaginary one after death.
More blogging, please?
xxx
minibeastgirl – What have I let myself in for? You are going to be joining Picaress nagging now aren’t you?
Geekymummy – Thank you.
Funnily enough the final year of my degree spent time on religion and the environment. Deep ecology and James Lovelock’s Gaia Theory being of special interest at the time. That Atwood book sounds like another to add to my read list.
Potty Mummy – Ah the traditional ‘a big boy did it and ran away’ defence. I suspect I used that more than once myself. (secretly wish it still worked sometimes) The vampires is an interesting one. Eternal life, beauty etc. Certainly becoming a rather strange religion lately too isn’t it?
Dee – I promise to try this blogging malarkey. Though can’t promise anything too amazing in actual post quality!
Actually someone told me yesterday that they work in palliative care and finds the ones with a more religious outlook often find it more difficult. A lot of them seem to feel their god has let them down somehow. Isn’t that interesting? I think the chance of making death less significant is supposed to be a reward in religious life but it seems the human fear can still take over. Particularly if they haven’t traveled um, internally (stuck for words) with their faith. If they have just taken it at face value as a bit of a contract between them and god. Am I making sense?
Totally saving those four principles. Definitely like them.
Deililly, this was a brilliant post and very thought provoking. I sincerely hope you are going to start your own proper blog that we can all read and I want to thank you for doing a post for me while I’m away. Any time you want to do another, just let me know – you’re WELL popular!!! xoxo
Thank you for letting me borrow your lovely readers MTFF.
It was great fun to be a proper blogger for a day! Definitely would do it again.