I remember being young and feeling bored.....

My Photoshop Lightroom has finally arrived! Now I can start work on the front page of the novel I am going to upload to Kindle.
It is amazing how long it takes to get something done when you have to do five other things at the same time. Between working, writing, studying, taking care of the household and spending quality time with my son I now also have to fit in my "creative design" lesson, courtesy of the Photoshop.
I do not have time to see my friends or to go out. I struggle to find time to visit the doctor and my TLC massage voucher, which a friend got for me as a Christmas present, lies unused somewhere under the pile of other "do it at some point" papers. Is this what they call a rat race?

Publishing my novel

In the olden days if I wanted my story or poem to see the daylight I would first have to find a publisher. It was an expensive and time consuming task, but once you have found the right person - all you had to do was to sit back, relax and wait for your creation to appear on the pages of the x y z- magazine.
Now, of course, things are different. With Kindle and similar applications taking the world by storm, one can take the risk and publish his work all by himself.
The advantage of this method is that your work is no longer so edited that it becomes an unrecognisable stranger, talking in a familiar voice.
The disadvantage is that you will have to do your own editing, formatting and promoting. Formatting means you coming to terms with HTML as well as a number of fancy editing packages. You will also have to create your own front page (although you can hire somebody to do it, if money is not an issue).
In the meantime here I am, still having to hold down my day job, while preparing my novel for publication. Apart from the shortage of time, the most annoying thing for me is that editing my work and learning the HTML distracts me from the next novel I am working on.
Bizarrely, every time I am writing something, whether it is a story, a poem or a novel, I feel it is the best thing I have ever written.
At the same time I do worry that any psychologist reading my stories would have a field day. :-)

The patient explorer

Amongst the lakes, amongst the pines

I hid my most prised possession – my boat.

One cloudless day when sun is shining

I will explore the open waters – in my boat.

I’ll wash it till the musty odour fades away

And moist fresh air feels my lungs – on my boat.

I’ll sail away towards horizon

Until the moon is slowly rising – in my boat.

I’ll scream with joy while I am exploring

The craggy shores that hug the forests – in my boat.

I’ll sit and dream, then writes some notes

All while I am sailing in my boat – one day.

Happy and sad

When I remember my childhood, it always makes me feel happy and sad at the same time. Happy, because I had a great childhood, surrounded by family I loved and friends, who were always there for me. Sad, because it is not possible to turn back the clock and to repeat the experience.
I wonder if the person who did not have a happy childhood would also feel happy and sad? Happy, because it is in the past and sad because it is not possible to go back and to make it better?
I think we all are looking for something and many of us are looking for something that we did not have in the past. The lucky few are looking for something that they can find or experience in the future.

Going south (Dedicated to Elly McRock)

Moving without sound Touching the fallen leaves
Unappreciated and alone
Discovering a new world
Without power and electricity;
Without greed and social housing;
Without the tight rope of patience.
Who can move silently like you?
Staring into the night sky
And seeing so many stars
That you could never count them.
They take your breath away.
You are scared. Your heart is rushing.
You breathe fast, you think –you are lost,
Now lost forever, but there is the wind.
It is a fresh cool wind blowing from the sea.
You can hear the sound of waves.
The new world is coming. It is coming
To you today, now, look,
It is what you were looking for!
You are not lost, you just don’t know who you are.
You are trying to find yourself.

Emptiness

There is this place where emptiness dwells, looking
And feeling around for the next unsuspecting victim.
It crawls into the chest of the guy or the girl, who is impatient
Or lost, or never found. It is a monster, that feeds on fear,
But how can we not feel the fear while living in this amazing city?
The molls that live in the holes, deep inside the ground are blind
And they can not see their fate, but sometimes we are not blind
But choosing to see what is stretched in front of us
For hundred of miles in each direction. Who is the person,
Walking next to you? Is he your friend or your enemy?
In the darkness of the street lights we can not always see what our heart desires,
So we enter the streets full of hopes while we forget our sorrow
And despair, but we find more than we can hold in our outstreached hands.
Some are strong, some are weak, but we are all human.
When the emptiness enters our chest we fight and sometimes
We win, but at other times…. Who is the one to lead the molls to salvation?
And what is the salvation? Who is the king? We are. We are the key
To our future. I just want our present to be a warm place, where
Not emptiness could hide, could hurt, we are outside, because inside is cold.
We sit by the fireplace and listen, while the place lives, it breathes us in
as we are just pollution for its lungs or maybe we are a breath of fresh air
Blowing from the sea far away.

Life is back to normal.

Almost back to normal. Government is in control again and the law and order has been restored. In a strange way everything that happened brought people closer together. Many of us came out to clean up the damage and to help those affected by violence and looting.
At one point we even had teams of vigilantes patrolling the rough areas!
I think more robust police response is necessary, but also developing a strong sense of community where people look after each other and nobody is forgotten or left behind is the answer to our problems.

All is quiet in London

First proper night sleep in 3 days. People are out on the streets ready to protect their homes and businesses. The feeling is that if the police do nothing – locals will.
Sadly 3 people in Birmingham, who tried to protect their street, have been now killed.

London anarchy

The groups of mindless thugs are attacking shops and local businesses, setting some of them alight. The red busses and cars have also come under attack.
It is sad and distressing for people, many of whom have lost their homes in the fires, set off by criminals probably to conceal evidence.
It is even more frightening because some of the politicians like Theresa Mat are still talking about not using harder measures to stop them and putting emphasis on “community police” which clearly is not helping. It is good for her to talk because her house was not burned down and her business was not looted.
Somebody needs to take control of the situation and protect local people. At the moment we are just seeing police standing around with their hands tired by stupid laws and legislations,  introduced mostly by the previous government.

Feeling lonely is not an ilness

Many of us feel lonely from time to time. Today I am one of them. Feeling lonely is not necessarily about not having somebody to share you life with, nor is it about living alone. It is often a symptom of our inability to talk to each other about things that bother us, things that we miss and those that we long for.
I think that longing for a something better and feeling lonely often go together. I had a happy childhood, yet I am one of these people who are not able to look back and simply cherish the memories. I do treasure them, of course, but for me it is not enough.
When I look back at the times when I felt happy and fulfilled I long to go to the same place and to recreate what worked for me then, even though logically I know that the past is gone and no matter how hard you try to repeat your experiences they will never be the same.
Many people take drugs to stop themselves feeling lonely and depressed. It helps some but makes it worse for others, because it distorts their version of reality even further. I have taken pills once and I would never do it again.
I believe that feeling lonely is not an illness it is just a distortion between our reality and our dreams. The stories abound about people who used their feelings of anger and frustration at the injustice of their situation to the advantage of themselves and others. I wonder if is possible to take loneliness and depression and to do the same.