Love

Strange how things connect with a common thread. I went to my Uncle George's funeral last Monday. He had a wonderful 100th birthday at the end of June, which was a joyful celebration and then, August, a full church of friends, colleagues and family. The vicar asked how we can judge what is a successful life: the amount of love around. There was lots of love and respect for Uncle George that day. I'm Auntie Joan's god-daughter, so was asked to read Chapter 13, 1 Corinthians. We all know it.
'I may be able to speak the languages of men and even of angels, but if I have no love, my speech is no more than a noisy gong or a clanging bell.....if I have no love, I am nothing...if I have no love, this does me no good.
Love is patient and kind; it is not jealous or conceited or proud; love is not ill-mannered or selfish or irritable; love does not keep a record of wrongs; love is not happy with evil, but is happy with the truth. Love never gives up; and its faith, hope and patience never fail.....' and it goes on.
I hadn't rehearsed this version and I hadn't planned on the entire chapter. It came as a shock when I opened the order of service and saw it all printed out. Thank goodness it was printed out. I read through it a few times to look for where to place emphasis. The vicar spoke of love. He gestured me to the podium and microphone. The family sat at the front. It was a privilege to read.

And the next morning, we drove down to Somerset to the Tribe of Doris Festival. And that emanated love and forgiveness and kindness echoing the sentiments of the funeral service.
I'm going to try and retain all that, remember it - live it.

Love

At the pub after Writers' Group last night, Daliso said that he'd read, heard, found out somewhere that there are five ways people usually show love. We all have our different ways.
1) Words. We tell someone we love them, talk about it.
2) Actions. We do things for the one we love. Do the food shop, wash up...
3) Gifts. Flowers and jewellry and clothes and kittens...
4)Time. We spend time with our loved one. We don't rush off, we don't find something else to do, we're not all the time at work.
5) Touch. We brush our hand over their hair, face, arm, leg, hold hands, cuddle,kiss.

What do I do? What do you do? Daliso said we should try using them all. At once? Is that overkill or complete love? Will think about this. And my characters. What does it show about Lizzy if she does none of these? If Jez is action led? Andrew wants to be touch but his wife hates that? I'm talking about Erosion. So good to be working on this fully now, but also right now, it's the summer holidays and the needs of the many...

Love - The Fact and the Fiction

Is it worth giving up all that you know and have for love? For something or someone you feel passionate about? Stepping off the cliff? Throwing yourself out of the airplane, exposing yourself to having the skin ripped off your bones and your heart yanked from its bed and dashed onto spikes.
Does that sound exciting or horrendous? Something you would do or run from doing? Does that sound a tad melodramatic?
It's what it would feel like if what you are stepping away from is comfortable and familiar and something you thought you could continue with for the rest of your life.
Tessa in Leaving Coty reaches this point. And thinking and talking about it and making lists of pros and cons of shoulds and shouldn'ts of rights and wrongs doesn't make any difference. When gut reaction and taking heed of what your body is physically crying out for, there seems to be no dilemma. In a world of rules, the body being emotionally sick or well is ignored. Increasingly, Tessa's body is telling her what to do. The thing is, in reality, not films or books, how many listen to that call? And in reality, not fiction, what happens to the other characters in the story? In a film, this, in real life, makes us see the consequences of our actions, looking on at devastation, we can see how this is reflected in our world. And does this help? Is this why A level questions ask how a Shakespeare text is relevent today? Is it relevent to make our decisions based on a play or a book or a film? Are our bodies, not our minds satisfied with that? Is one more important than the other to listen to?