Melisinka

HELLO, I’M BACK!!! is what i just have to call out right now. Did you miss me??

It’s early Sunday morning and I woke with the ravens (true- I’m not being wanky, there were three of them outside my bedroom window as the day broke) and just couldn’t wait to get online, because I’ve HAD NO INTERNET ALL WEEK!!!!!! AAAAAaaaarrrrrgggghhhh! Do you know how alienating this is? All of a sudden a whole aspect of your life just isn’t there anymore. Or at least, you can’t access it, so it might as well not be there.

It is just like that moment in “The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe” when Lucy comes back from her first visit to Narnia calling out to her siblings that she’s back, everything’s okay, and although she’s been in an alternate universe for what seems like ages (hours at the very least) – her brothers and sister look at her as though she’s mad, because in this world she’s been gone barely a minute. None of you would have the slightest idea of my absence from psyber world this week, but I have been through so many boring misadventures with Optus and E-bay trying to find my way back that I’m barely a shadow of my former self… Oh you just don’t want to know…

I’m telling you right now, that it is like being relegated to another plane of existence, one where you are somehow disconnected from the rest of the world. In fact, when the modem died on Monday, there was a moment when myself and my two teenage kids were just sitting on the couch in shock. Imogen and Julz live half their life on Facebook, so the full implications of being cut off from this was only just beginning to sink in. In silence we watched the dust specks whirl around softly in the mid afternoon sun. After a while Imogen asked, “What do we do? It’s like being in a third-world country”. “Just look at that amazing dust,” I replied, “It’s rather entrancing, how much of it there is and how it sparkles… You’d never know, would you, that the air is so full of stuff?” Beautiful…. It was a moment we shared as a family that none of us will forget in a hurry, I can assure you.

I know i’ve written recently about the Nine of Wands, but that’s all I can think of when I contemplate this past week. It was no Major Arcana story, it was the small, shitty stuff that drives you insane because it wastes so much of your time and energy – PRECIOUS time and energy that you wanted to use doing some crazily fantastic art and writing and other creative genius projects – it’s ridiculous. I have felt like that nine of wands guy again, just wanting a damn good Five of Wands fight but instead feeling my stomach twist and my blood pressure rise as I sit through yet another excruciating round of Optus pre-recorded muzak and voice prompts. Is that stuff designed specifically to make you want to disembowel yourself just so you never EVER have to deal with it again? I say “It” because it’s definitely not a “them”. There is no-one there, just a system, a program of polite polemic to which you are supposed to respond in kind. Even when you finally get through to what i presume is a human voice, you are told you have been directed to the wrong area and would you mind waiting while they transfer you, so the next voice can give you instructions to go in search of the holy modem at their nearest shop, where they can’t help you so you go to an electronics store where they ask you what DL something number modem you have and send you somewhere else far, far away where they in turn tell you that you can only get cable modems from your supplier… and this was just day One.

Nine of Wands. That guy is wearing a bandanna not a bandage, and he’s getting that wand and smashing that lame line of sticks to the ground! I mean, what IS this bullshit anyway!!!!

It’s true, i’m not very Zen right now. I did some deep breathing and releasing of animal sounds which helped a bit. I told myself how going back to writing in my diary was a good thing. That Imogen and Julz coming to meet me at the tram stop wasn’t really about grabbing my I-phone in desperation, but about the love they were feeling in their hearts now that the haze of technology had been removed from our lives.

I love the haze of technology! Or to be more exact, I’m kind of addicted to it (but not nearly as addicted as Imogen and Julian… they’re just insane) That was a shock, actually, because I’d always thought it was a nice little extra, but totally unnecessary to my wellbeing. Yes, you could say that I took it for granted and didn’t truly appreciate it until it was gone. In our industry, it is very common for people to talk about how everything happens for a reason. Personally, i’m more inclined to think that stuff happens and it’s up to you if you find a reason for it or not, depending on how you want to craft your personal life story. Generally, synchronicity makes for magical realism, which i’m partial to for obvious reasons. Hardcore realism can be just so… Dostoevsky. Grim. Grey. Bleak. Depressing. I mean, it has it’s place, but I’d rather live an Angela Carter life than an Orwellian life. But i’m getting off the track here. What was i talking about? (God its just so good to be writing here again, i could go on for hours. It’s like a fix. A drug. A wonderful hit of finger-tapping goodness!!)

Oh yes, I was contemplating what the possible reason for all this mayhem regarding computers and systems of communication breakdown was for me, on a personal level. Well, i cooked more interesting meals and my children played chess by candle-light, which was rather lovely and very Little House on the Prairie. That was wholesome. And I channelled some of my righteous anger with Optus into quick bursts of furious exercise, which was good for my fitness levels (if not great for my poor heart, which was fit to explode with the shock of it all). But overall, I would have to say that it all happened so I could realize how much I love my blog. Writing in my diary just doesn’t cut it. I like my invisible friends out there, just like my invisible friend Olivia in grade 4 (named after Olivia Newton John during my long-term love affair with Grease). I like being connected to the world, all part of this web, tugging a thread here and there. I hope soon to be totally back on-line – as even now, almost an entire week later, I am only here by the good will and charity of my ever-giving boyfriend who has graciously lent me his modem for the day. May the Goddess of Technology forgive me for all the bad things i might have said or implied about Her realm in the past, and lead me into the peaceful valley of easy, quick and efficient supply and connection so that my work for the Higher Good might continue on unimpeded by the evils that abound in these wicked times. Amen and So Mote it Be Sisters of Mercy follow and guide thee…..