Good news, bad news

The Same Love - The Same Rights with the Same Name

Originally uploaded by blmurch

First up, the good. Yesterday, Argentina legalised same-sex marriage. All married couples now have equal rights in inheritance, benefits and adoption. See the clip here for the jubilation when the vote was passed.

(I strongly believe that the UK should allow gay marriage, and not just civil partnerships. Supporters of civil partnerships claim that it allows the same benefits as marriage. Why not, then, call it marriage? And if, as the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown said, the term marriage is "intimately bound up with the question of religious freedom", why allow heterosexual couples who have a civil ceremony to refer to themselves as "married"? Are they not also in a 'civil partnership', having married solely under civil, and not religious, law? Until the law is changed to allow same-sex marriage in the UK, there can be no equality on this matter. It truly is one rule for one group in society, and another for everyone else.)

Next, the bad. In continuing its opposition to women priests, the Vatican has issued a decree which makes the attempted ordination of women as serious an ecclesiastical crime as paedophilia. Both the woman and the bishop who performs the ceremony will be excommunicated.

I was raised a Roman Catholic. I also consider myself a feminist. The more time I devote to thinking about my faith, the more I wonder if the two aren't utterly incompatible.

Supper last night

The idea, at breakfast - something healthy and full of vegetables

The reality - post-hospital

Wenchy McWench does not have malaria, or anything worse, just a nasty chest infection. Poor chicken, she had seven vials (she insists it was pints) of blood taken, and is now crammed full of antibiotics that make her sick. The only thing that cheered her up was the rather yummy doctor who talked us through her results. I get the feeling that he was just glad to be talking to someone young and friendly...

Care package

There are times I'm very grateful that I work part time. I can be there to provide support to others when they need it. Time is the one luxury I can give sometimes.

A good friend, Wenchy McWench (obviously not her real name, but she answers to it!) was taken into hospital a few hours ago with breathing difficulties. She's just come back from a month's digging in Belize, so her concern is that it's something nasty. I'm putting together a waiting room package, as many issues of Vogue I can find, a pack of cards, a drawing pad for doodles (she's forever mocking my total lack of drawing skills, and requests doodles just to make her laugh), and a big bottle of water. That should do it, right?

Oh, and cash. Nothing worse than being stuck opposite a vending machine for hours on end with no change.

One year

One year ago today, I was counting down the minutes to drinks with a boy. We'd met at a party a couple of months before, and then again outside the museum, where we'd agreed to go for a drink in the near future.

I was at that horrible 'outwardly fine but really not at all over one very long relationship and a couple of flirtations' stage, and truth be told, I wasn't even sure it was a date. But I liked him, and he interested me, so off we went. Drinks turned into dinner and amazing hugs goodbye, followed some days later by cake, cricket watching and first kisses at Earls Court tube.

And still I dragged my feet, didn't take it seriously. I didn't want to be the girl who rushed headlong from one major relationship to the next. I spent months being unbelievably happy when I was with him, and plagued by doubt as soon as I was alone.

Unusually for me, I talked to him about these feelings. How he handled those conversations made me look at him again. So incredibly grounded, and honest, and... sane. Some of it can't have been easy to hear, and at no point would I have blamed him if he'd said "OK, enough of you, crazy wench. Shoo". But he didn't. More than once, he said "you are not going to screw this up, because I won't let you".

Finally, at some point in mid-January, I realised I was taking my relationship with him seriously. First of all, I was in relationship with him. I wasn't giddy, but I had a quiet certainty about him. He was what I wanted. I wasn't "in love", at least not how I always experienced it before, with anxiety and wanting to be perfect for him so that he'd never leave (yeah, I've got me some issues...). I just loved him, and how he made me feel about myself.

I'm not quite sure what happened after that. Within a fortnight, we'd said "I love you", I'd been taken home to meet his folks, and we were really quite serious about each other. Four months after that, I'd moved me, my cat and my books to his house.

Tonight, he'll cycle back from work to our home, and we'll have dinner together. Bangers and mash with wine, my favourite meal, and the first he ever cooked for me. And I'll tell him just how glad I am that those drinks were a date.

Clap your hands

As previously moaned about, I sometimes need help seeing the good things in life. Which is why I have this song on pretty heavy rotation this month:




I've loved Sia's voice since I first heard her sing "Taken for Granted" on TFI Friday (all the way back in the 90s, people!). I remember saying how much I love her voice to a former boyfriend and his father when we were watching footage of her perform at Glastonbury with Zero 7, and getting some very funny looks for it. Unbowed, I really wish I'd seen her at The Roundhouse in May:

Weekend bits and bobs

On Thursday, after a dinner conversation about my non-existent finances, the Boy asked if he could take me up to Birmingham to visit his folks for the weekend, to get me out of London. I happily agreed.

It was wonderful. I spent hours in the frankly enormous garden playing with his dog Suzy, spotting tadpoles with mini legs in the pond, running away from Suzy when she plunged into the water to cool off, admiring the Boy as he climbed up into his old treehouse, and swinging in a hammock (I'd never been in one before!).

On Saturday afternoon we snuck off to see Shrek Ever After, taking advantage of being able to buy two tickets, popcorn AND drink for less than the cost of two tickets in London. I loved it, especially the very short clip of the Gingerbread Man fighting Animal biscuits like a gladiator, but those gnashing skull heads on a chain were scary, and I'm 26! When the lights went up, the Boy pointed out we were the only people our age without children. I said the only proper way to respond to that situation is to look around wildly and cry "Where have the children gone?!" Nothing like deflecting attention...

Saturday evening was a curry with friends, the real reason the Boy was heading up to Brum (and why he was so unwilling to let me duck out of the trip). My food was sadly underwhelming, but I loved the walk home past the university lake in the dark.

Sunday morning was interesting, and I'm still trying to make sense of it. I went to church for the first time in years, and to an Anglican service for the first time ever (my folks are Catholic, my mum especially so). The Boy's mum, Janet, is a committed Christian and very active within her church. She had casually invited us at Saturday lunch to join her, and I decided to take her up on the offer out of curiosity. I wasn't prepared for how strongly I'd be affected by the service, which was a baptism, and found myself really close to tears at several points. I think the whole thing deserves its own post, once I've made a bit more sense of it.

After an amazing Sunday lunch, the Boy and I borrowed his parents' membership card for the Botanical Gardens, and spent the rest of the day lounging in the shade whilst listening to a jazz band play in the bandstand. Highlight was them launching into "I'm the King of the Swingers" from Jungle Book, I was so excited! We also saw an elderly couple who had their arms around each other, looking so sweet. When I spoke to them, it turned out they were celebrating their 53rd wedding anniversary that day! I'm in awe of relationships that last so long and remain so loving. I took some photos, and ran them through my new favourite toy, the Poladroid app:

After ice cream and picking up a dahlia for the garden, we hopped on the train (where I finally finished 100 Years of Solitude) and fell asleep pretty much straight away.

I am a bad blogger

I'm also pretty bad at finding the good in every day, lately. Living to a miniscule budget is hard, and a haircut and a night out (which cost a total of £50) appears to have completely effed my finances for the entire month. Think around £100 for the rest of the month. First world problems, I know, but it wears me down.

What I could also do without is being completely ignored by the new tenants of my previous property, who owe me money.

Money worries are dull.

(And my sewing machine blew up, 10 minutes into first use after having it serviced. Apparently this was caused by the transistor in the motor, which isn't checked at point of service, and so not covered by the service warranty. AND the Polaroid film I bought on eBay has got lost in the post. Seller has been great with a refund, but GAH, I say)

Wimbledon fever!

John_03
Originally uploaded by venneriteau
Sorry for the break in posts. No excuses, just redoubled effort from now on.

Are you watching Wimbledon? I'm currently watching the Mahut-Isner game, it's insane! It's currently 63 games all in the final set, they have to continue until one of them is two games clear. I'm cheering for Mahut, partly because I love an underdog (he's unseeded), and partly because he was so adorably incoherent when they suspended play yesterday. Whatever the outcome, I suspect the winner will go out in the next round, as a result of exhaustion. It's almost a shame that one of them has to lose.

Post edit: Isner took the fifth and final set 70 games to 68. Amazing.

Swim, little fish, be free!

Schwimmbad
Originally uploaded by duqueıros (away)

A confession: I'm not very good at swimming. I'm not desperately keen on putting my nose and mouth underwater as a matter of course, which makes the whole staying afloat thing that bit more tiring. Despite these limitations, I do enjoy pootling up and down lanes at the pool.

Imagine my delight, then, to find that my new borough offers three free swimming sessions a week for girls and women, on top of free swimming for all on Friday. All that's needed is a Pay and Play card, which costs around £3 a year. Woo!

(There is a risk that this scheme will be short-lived, as our not-so-fluffy-or-caring-now-we're-actually-in-power government axed the nationwide free swim scheme yesterday. Apparently most people questioned would have paid to go anyway. Rot, I say. This is where I give thanks for living in an area with an entirely Labour council, who will likely hold out against such cuts for as long as humanly possible)

So, today being Friday, I'm off to the pool! Have a good day!

*The title of this post is something my siblings and I would say to creatures we'd netted on rockpooling expeditions, as we tipped them back into their watery homes at the end of the day.

The people I love are the wonders of my world

free 'group' hugs
Originally uploaded by kalandrakas

I am so lucky to have the friends I do.

One of those wonderful people goes by the name 'Lovely Jo'. We met when we were doing our A-Levels, and she has been a constant source of delight since.

Some things you should know about Lovely Jo:
- When she was 16, she cooked a fish pie in the microwave for so long, that when she dropped it on taking it out, it bounced.
- She came down to London for my 21st birthday party, just to help me make brownies. And only told me that she is allergic to nuts after she'd stirred them into the mix, because it was "your cake".
- One afternoon, when she was having a rubbish time, she got the train down from Birmingham, and we walked round and round Leicester Square in the rain, scoring massive amounts of free chocolate from the teams promoting the second Bridget Jones film.

Today I learned that Lovely Jo marries her very own Boy next summer, the first of my secular friends to do so. Lovely Jo, I'm so very very happy for you.