A few thoughts

Apologies for the blogging silence - work has been a challenge and more recently I have been felled by a nasty infection (no, not H1N1) that necessitated 24 hours at the hospital and from which I am still recovering.

I have a lot of things brewing in my brain that I want to share here but am still sorting through them. I will be posting them soon.

In the meantime, I came across this yesterday on Twitter from @paul_hewson and was deeply moved by it:

Not one day is made better in your life by holding the mistakes of others against them. Want world peace? Give grace.

Easier said than done, I know. But worth the effort

Profile.

I stole this from Laura. Who stole it from Stephanie Nolen.


Patron Saint: Stephen Lewis and Eve Ensler

Advises against: petting a coati in Iguazu, lying about who you are, wearing a Heatley sweater in Ottawa

Best piece of gear: My black leather knee high boots with 5 inch heels. I have superpowers in them

Can’t: remember my right from my left. Except in politics

Was a rabble-rousing student activist: at Carleton University. And Algonquin College

Was an anxiety-ridden graduate student whose brain almost exploded: Not was, but soon to be, at the University College Dublin

Weighs her luggage down with: expectations it will arrive where she does

Can flirt in a bar: on 4 continents

Secretly: still listens to 80s music. Would rather eat the icing than the cupcake. Will turn a pirouette when no one is looking

Recommends: Volta ice cream. Hong Kong. Sydney. Rhodes. Tokyo. The Great Wall of China. Chill Winston. My grandmother’s butterscotch pudding.

Gets bloodthirsty over: Hockey. Books. Music.

Happiest: on a patio in the company of friends

Recently discovered: True Blood.

My new crush

What an amazing gift it is to watch a well written, well acted, well directed show. Smart, sexy, funny and relevant, that my friends is True Blood. It has ruined me for other shows, truly.

And this is the object of my desire - Eric, the Vampire Sheriff. I clearly have a thing for the Nordic boys.

When Buffy met Edward

I have neither read any of the Twilight books nor seen the movie but it's nice to know I'm not alone believing Buffy wouldn't set the moody, angsty Edward straight in her usual kick ass fashion.

Worth another look

My friend Laura recently posted on her blog about some of her favourite quotes which inspire and amaze and I loved the ones she posted. Her post also prompted me to re-read one of the most inspiring pieces of writing I have ever read - J.K. Rowling's address to the Harvard Class of 2008. The Fringe Benefits of Failure and The Importance of Imagination is so incredibly honest and insightful it bears multiple readings.

The speech is filled with such goodness and here are a few of my favourite parts:

Failure gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations. Failure taught me things about myself that I could have learned no other way. I discovered that I had a strong will, and more discipline than I had suspected; I also found out that I had friends whose value was truly above the price of rubies.

The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive. You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity. Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more than any qualification I ever earned.

~~~~~~

Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced. They can think themselves into other people’s places.

Of course, this is a power, like my brand of fictional magic, that is morally neutral. One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathise.

And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are. They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages; they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally; they can refuse to know.

I might be tempted to envy people who can live that way, except that I do not think they have any fewer nightmares than I do. Choosing to live in narrow spaces leads to a form of mental agoraphobia, and that brings its own terrors. I think the wilfully unimaginative see more monsters. They are often more afraid.

What is more, those who choose not to empathise enable real monsters. For without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves, we collude with it, through our own apathy.

~~~~

If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice; if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless; if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped change. We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.