Another month comes to an end, and with it a year. The first year on my own in the wide world. This time last year everything was new and fresh and daunting.
A lot of the time it's still daunting, actually. But gradually things become normal to some extent. Yesterday, for example, I went to a party at a very nice house in a good area, there were around eighty guests there, and I knew only one of them. That would have been a serious worry a while ago. As it is now, I am aware that most others are in a similar situation and so I can relax and enjoy it - talking to assorted people, moving on from those who don't appeal in one way or another and having a good time with the ones who do. That's life in a nutshell, I suppose. It was a good time.
Meanwhile, as is the way with the passing of time, things need money spent on them this month. A whole lot of renewals come round at the same time. Also, my main computer died while in the middle of two freelance jobs that relied on it, and I had to hastily bite the bullet and buy another. Fortunately I found an ex-demo unit not too far away, and having spent out now have the pleasure of a much faster machine and can watch the readout of eight processer cores barely budging whatever I do. And I changed mobile phone suppliers and was cut off for two days while they changed me over. I'm hoping nobody tried to get hold of me urgently during that time.
I had a little pang while driving home from work on Friday as I realised it was now more than a year since I gave any of my family a hug. That's sad, and not something I can do much about except maybe write a note to tell them it occurred to me.
And thinking about the brethren situation today, it is noticeable that things appear to have loosened quite considerably even in the time since I've been gone. It is possible, I suppose, that it may ease some more and I may find that family becomes accessible. Whatever, so many things have now become acceptable that were previously banned that I think it will be hard for them to put the technology genie back in the bottle, at least. And that new connectivity can surely only help break down barriers.
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Dwelling in Tents
Life needn't become boring just yet, as there are still fresh experiences to have, and some of them are very accessible. No need to book that trip into space while I can go camping for the first time.
I don't think camping is exactly forbidden among the brethren, but it's not very practical when combined with that lifestyle. When you need to be at a meeting every day if questions aren't to be asked, and need to arrange in advance if you expect to be at a meeting other than your own (in which case you will be offered a bed and hospitality), there isn't much call for a tent. Except in strictly metaphorical connections when talking about the early old testament.
But this last weekend was a holiday one, and on the agenda was a visit to some old folks in the country, so we decided to combine that with a night in a field - otherwise known as camping in the Cotswolds, which does sound better.
The setting was great and the weather was pretty good too. The field was beside a pub outside a village, and the village was small and pretty itself. We were by a stream and, apparently, a disused canal, and the rolling hills and surrounding trees meant that we felt quite as though we had a place of our own for a while. Well, we shared it with an odd assortment of fellow campers, a couple of whose tents were neatly set up across the entire width of some passing areas, but nature was more noticeable than the company.
All in all, it was a fun thing to do, and I look forward to trying it again. This wasn't a very fair test, because although we had lovely weather during the days, it actually rained almost all the night (I think - I did sleep as well as noticing the rain). Single skin tents are easy to manage, but tricky in a downpour. There is something quite pleasant about listening to rain while dry oneself. However, it doesn't make for restfulness if some part of one's mind is worrying that water may be getting to something it shouldn't.
I don't think camping is exactly forbidden among the brethren, but it's not very practical when combined with that lifestyle. When you need to be at a meeting every day if questions aren't to be asked, and need to arrange in advance if you expect to be at a meeting other than your own (in which case you will be offered a bed and hospitality), there isn't much call for a tent. Except in strictly metaphorical connections when talking about the early old testament.
But this last weekend was a holiday one, and on the agenda was a visit to some old folks in the country, so we decided to combine that with a night in a field - otherwise known as camping in the Cotswolds, which does sound better.
The setting was great and the weather was pretty good too. The field was beside a pub outside a village, and the village was small and pretty itself. We were by a stream and, apparently, a disused canal, and the rolling hills and surrounding trees meant that we felt quite as though we had a place of our own for a while. Well, we shared it with an odd assortment of fellow campers, a couple of whose tents were neatly set up across the entire width of some passing areas, but nature was more noticeable than the company.
All in all, it was a fun thing to do, and I look forward to trying it again. This wasn't a very fair test, because although we had lovely weather during the days, it actually rained almost all the night (I think - I did sleep as well as noticing the rain). Single skin tents are easy to manage, but tricky in a downpour. There is something quite pleasant about listening to rain while dry oneself. However, it doesn't make for restfulness if some part of one's mind is worrying that water may be getting to something it shouldn't.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Musicals
On Saturday evening I was transported back to a previous life. One that seems several lives ago already.
There was a short window of time among the brethren in which theatre suddenly blossomed. As usual with blossom, it was lovely while it lasted but didn’t last very long. It kind of grew out of the realisation that if the community was to educate its own children, then it had better take some teaching, at least, quite seriously, combined with a need for funds that was becoming quite daunting even for the wealthy brethren.
One of the first elements of education to be championed was literacy and being able to express oneself, and another was confidence and articulacy in speaking, because of the perceived need to be able to rely on all brethren members to say the right thing if called upon in the public arena. That led to plays within the classes, and it wasn’t long before those who were hands-on in the running of the Education Centres (as they were then before the centralised control) realised that a good many birds could be killed with one stone by performing plays as fund-raisers. It worked extremely well, too. The pupils loved it all, and got real experience of the pressures of an audience, while the rest of the brethren tore open the loophole in the ban on entertainment with great glee.
That glee was the reason it couldn’t last. Brethren tend to be quite single-minded in the few things they do pursue, and theatrical performances were no exception. It became fairly obvious that everybody was enjoying it far too much, beyond what could be excused as a useful necessity, and it was all shut down.
Not too long before that I had my own experience of why the stage is so seductive, when I was heavily involved in one of these productions. I foolishly volunteered to write the script and lyrics for a musical, and ended up deeply involved. It was fascinating fun, all the more so because everything was invented from scratch – few brethren had been to see a performance anywhere else, and so they had no idea how things should be done. The ingenuity that showed itself was quite amazing.
That’s all past for me, now, and already was before I left the brethren.
But going to see the Wizard of Oz on stage in London brought a lot of it back. The really odd thing was how much of it reminded me of our amateur efforts. OK, there was an orchestra where we had a few musicians in a side room, and computer controlled lighting where we had old-fashioned lights screwed and clamped where we could get them, and they had a large turntable as part of the stage ... but really it wasn’t so different. I could see why they were doing what they were doing at each point, and their solutions weren’t very far from ours except for the superior resources.
Admittedly we had a homegrown script and score instead of an all-time classic to perform. And part of the fun of our performance was that we had precisely the right number of students to be actors, and so had no chance of selecting for ability, whereas London has the cream to call on. Yet the Wizard of Oz is so stylised that the overall feeling was oddly similar, at least to me. There was no striving for realism. It was performed as a kind of moral fairy-tale, like life reproduced in poster colours. Real actors in a stylised drama reminded me strongly of amateurs attempting realism!
I haven’t seen the original film (I’m still in the early stages of catching up on classics I feel I’ve missed), but I got the impression the stage version is a pretty good effort at reproducing it, and it’s the kind of thing that reproduces well on a stage, where everything is an indication of real life rather than a copy. The critics haven’t been too kind to the show, and the audience must have been a bit thin because we were given a substantial upgrade to our seats, but it made for a great night out.
There was a short window of time among the brethren in which theatre suddenly blossomed. As usual with blossom, it was lovely while it lasted but didn’t last very long. It kind of grew out of the realisation that if the community was to educate its own children, then it had better take some teaching, at least, quite seriously, combined with a need for funds that was becoming quite daunting even for the wealthy brethren.
One of the first elements of education to be championed was literacy and being able to express oneself, and another was confidence and articulacy in speaking, because of the perceived need to be able to rely on all brethren members to say the right thing if called upon in the public arena. That led to plays within the classes, and it wasn’t long before those who were hands-on in the running of the Education Centres (as they were then before the centralised control) realised that a good many birds could be killed with one stone by performing plays as fund-raisers. It worked extremely well, too. The pupils loved it all, and got real experience of the pressures of an audience, while the rest of the brethren tore open the loophole in the ban on entertainment with great glee.
That glee was the reason it couldn’t last. Brethren tend to be quite single-minded in the few things they do pursue, and theatrical performances were no exception. It became fairly obvious that everybody was enjoying it far too much, beyond what could be excused as a useful necessity, and it was all shut down.
Not too long before that I had my own experience of why the stage is so seductive, when I was heavily involved in one of these productions. I foolishly volunteered to write the script and lyrics for a musical, and ended up deeply involved. It was fascinating fun, all the more so because everything was invented from scratch – few brethren had been to see a performance anywhere else, and so they had no idea how things should be done. The ingenuity that showed itself was quite amazing.
That’s all past for me, now, and already was before I left the brethren.
But going to see the Wizard of Oz on stage in London brought a lot of it back. The really odd thing was how much of it reminded me of our amateur efforts. OK, there was an orchestra where we had a few musicians in a side room, and computer controlled lighting where we had old-fashioned lights screwed and clamped where we could get them, and they had a large turntable as part of the stage ... but really it wasn’t so different. I could see why they were doing what they were doing at each point, and their solutions weren’t very far from ours except for the superior resources.
Admittedly we had a homegrown script and score instead of an all-time classic to perform. And part of the fun of our performance was that we had precisely the right number of students to be actors, and so had no chance of selecting for ability, whereas London has the cream to call on. Yet the Wizard of Oz is so stylised that the overall feeling was oddly similar, at least to me. There was no striving for realism. It was performed as a kind of moral fairy-tale, like life reproduced in poster colours. Real actors in a stylised drama reminded me strongly of amateurs attempting realism!
I haven’t seen the original film (I’m still in the early stages of catching up on classics I feel I’ve missed), but I got the impression the stage version is a pretty good effort at reproducing it, and it’s the kind of thing that reproduces well on a stage, where everything is an indication of real life rather than a copy. The critics haven’t been too kind to the show, and the audience must have been a bit thin because we were given a substantial upgrade to our seats, but it made for a great night out.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Too close to see
I often wonder how many of my reactions and emotions are a result, at least partially, of my brethren background, and how much is just me. Speaking to other ex-brethren sheds a little bit of light, but we do all vary quite a lot and I don't have a huge sample set so as to draw definitive conclusions.
The next question is, if a particular life problem can be traced back to a particular cause - in this case, the brethren - how much help is it to know that?
A good few years ago now, when I first got connected to the internet as a still naive brethren member (no active rebellion was intended at the time - I needed a connection to activate important software. And yes, I know I wasn't allowed any such thing) with no plans to do more than be a bit dissatisfied with brethren life, it only took a few days before it occurred to me that I was now in a position to see what the world of the web said about my community. Already at that stage brethren would whisper in shocked awe about the internet and how wicked people had seen to it that all the brethren's secrets were there and could never be removed. A quick check soon showed me that there was no massive online repository of ministry, and no conspiracy of all-knowing villains cooking up plots and misinformation against the brethren. Ironically, the brethren's own actions have since led to the reality coming a little closer to their dreads, but that's beside the point.
What I did discover was a semi-accidental meeting place for many who were starved of news about people who had been important to them and very short on connections to anyone in a similar position. Then, as now, emotions tended to run high and there was a lot of negativity due to the brethren-related troubles in everybody's lives. That shocked me at the time, and I felt compelled to ask why so many people were unable to leave the brethren behind them and get on with their lives. Why, I wondered, if anyone was miserable enough within the brethren to leave, would they stay miserable by obsessing over the past and remaining fascinated by current brethren affairs?
That question started a long and fruitful correspondence, but that's another and more private story.
Several times recently I've seen people with less intimate knowledge of what it's like to be ex-brethren clearly wondering much the same thing. Personally I have been losing the feeling of shock I had then, but I think it's helpful to stand back now and then and remember what it looked like. There are ways in which a less-informed viewpoint can be very useful indeed. I tend to wince whenever I hear a non-brethren person told that they can't understand because they were never part of it.
Having discussed this already this week, several thoughts crossed my mind. One is that some parts of having left the brethren are like an ache - it may not be a huge pain, but the fact that it's constant and can't be cured makes it harder to deal with than a brief agony in some ways. So anyone trying to understand the problem by looking at things as they are must necessarily miss the long grinding-down process that wears away the ability to look rationally at it. Another is that an outside view may be more accurate, but there are difficulties involved in being helpful and communicating that view. People suffering a trauma probably know, intellectually, that they would be better off if they could put it behind them, and hearing someone say so doesn't much help. Nor, actually, does it make it less true.
And one thing brings me round to the beginning again. If I decide that even one problem in my life is all the fault of the brethren, it's very tempting to conclude that as it isn't my fault it also isn't my responsibility. That's comforting, in that it lets me off the hook, but it doesn't fix anything and I'll still be stuck with the same problem years from now. It's better, I think, if harder, to take a good hard look and identify what aspects are down to me.
The next question is, if a particular life problem can be traced back to a particular cause - in this case, the brethren - how much help is it to know that?
A good few years ago now, when I first got connected to the internet as a still naive brethren member (no active rebellion was intended at the time - I needed a connection to activate important software. And yes, I know I wasn't allowed any such thing) with no plans to do more than be a bit dissatisfied with brethren life, it only took a few days before it occurred to me that I was now in a position to see what the world of the web said about my community. Already at that stage brethren would whisper in shocked awe about the internet and how wicked people had seen to it that all the brethren's secrets were there and could never be removed. A quick check soon showed me that there was no massive online repository of ministry, and no conspiracy of all-knowing villains cooking up plots and misinformation against the brethren. Ironically, the brethren's own actions have since led to the reality coming a little closer to their dreads, but that's beside the point.
What I did discover was a semi-accidental meeting place for many who were starved of news about people who had been important to them and very short on connections to anyone in a similar position. Then, as now, emotions tended to run high and there was a lot of negativity due to the brethren-related troubles in everybody's lives. That shocked me at the time, and I felt compelled to ask why so many people were unable to leave the brethren behind them and get on with their lives. Why, I wondered, if anyone was miserable enough within the brethren to leave, would they stay miserable by obsessing over the past and remaining fascinated by current brethren affairs?
That question started a long and fruitful correspondence, but that's another and more private story.
Several times recently I've seen people with less intimate knowledge of what it's like to be ex-brethren clearly wondering much the same thing. Personally I have been losing the feeling of shock I had then, but I think it's helpful to stand back now and then and remember what it looked like. There are ways in which a less-informed viewpoint can be very useful indeed. I tend to wince whenever I hear a non-brethren person told that they can't understand because they were never part of it.
Having discussed this already this week, several thoughts crossed my mind. One is that some parts of having left the brethren are like an ache - it may not be a huge pain, but the fact that it's constant and can't be cured makes it harder to deal with than a brief agony in some ways. So anyone trying to understand the problem by looking at things as they are must necessarily miss the long grinding-down process that wears away the ability to look rationally at it. Another is that an outside view may be more accurate, but there are difficulties involved in being helpful and communicating that view. People suffering a trauma probably know, intellectually, that they would be better off if they could put it behind them, and hearing someone say so doesn't much help. Nor, actually, does it make it less true.
And one thing brings me round to the beginning again. If I decide that even one problem in my life is all the fault of the brethren, it's very tempting to conclude that as it isn't my fault it also isn't my responsibility. That's comforting, in that it lets me off the hook, but it doesn't fix anything and I'll still be stuck with the same problem years from now. It's better, I think, if harder, to take a good hard look and identify what aspects are down to me.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Another Prom
It feels like it's been a very full week. Normally I find that work and the daily necessities of life take up most of my time and even more of my energy outside the weekend, but this week has been different.
On Tuesday I headed into London promptly after work for a long-scheduled meeting which turned out to be a pleasant meal and pleasanter chat. I am reminded often these days of the pleasures of intelligent conversation without the old consciousness of whole areas of my thoughts which were out of bounds.
The next night I caught a train for London again to get my second experience of a Prom. It felt a bit ambitious having two nights out in a row, but in this case, having been offered tickets free, I couldn't pass up the opportunity. That's a great benefit of having a friend in the management of an orchestra.
It all felt very different this time around, and I'm not really sure how much of that is because it was different, and how much because of changes in me over the last year. There was, on the whole, less of a sense of occasion. Partly because it is now something I've done before, and partly because this Prom was undersubscribed whereas the previous one was a hot ticket. They can't all be blockbusters. The orchestra is respected rather than legendary, and the programme was not the kind which brings audiences flocking, it seems. However, I enjoyed it very much and, in a way that doesn't happen too often, actually caught myself consciously enjoying it at the time. Typically, I find, happiness is retrospective, and asking whether a particular moment is a happy one is a good way of spoiling it, but this time was an exception. Last time I felt like something of an alien intruder, but this one felt very natural. That must be me, as I doubt the audience at the Royal Albert Hall has changed significantly apart from being a little thinner on the ground.
I was there for the Ravel, principally, although as it was a twentieth-century selection I was interested in the rest of it too. The music turned out to be all interesting, but variably enjoyable, with the first half of each half (I'm not sure of my terminology here) seeming more like soundscapes than music, a little like having a movie with no visuals. Reading the programme gave a good clue to what was intended in each piece, and they accomplished it in each case, but it was easier to admire that achievement than be transported by the process. At least I found the visual side less distracting this time. I rather enjoy watching the musicians, some cultivating a slightly bored look while others play the animated eccentric, throwing themselves around as they play. Again, like before, the conductor seemed to be in his own time frame compared to the orchestra, but this time the orchestra didn't actually seem to even take much notice. In the initial pieces (admittedly rather abstract in nature), I could barely detect any connection between his movements and the resulting music, and certainly there was no clue as to the beat or timing. Very odd. They paid more attention to the conductor during the performance of the piece he'd written himself, and gave as good an impression of a thunderstorm as people with musical instruments could.
During the interval we were allowed into the musicians' area beneath and behind the stage, and even ventured just onto the stage itself. That was a novel perspective, definitely. I like the way that the business area even of a big important event like a Prom is always slightly rough-and-ready, and particularly enjoyed the sheet of paper taped to one door saying in large letters "Do not open this door, it squeaks". As it led directly to the stage, I could see the problem.
After the interval, a few of the empty seats near us filled up, and the woman in front of me looked very familiar. After a few minutes I realised why. She was the violin soloist from the first half, looking a little less glamorous close up and a whole lot less animated. I couldn't help glancing at her from time to time, wondering what it could be like to be listening when she had been the focus of all the listening only a short while earlier. I can't say she gave much away.
The final part of the experience this time round was a trip into the bowels of the building down a fire escape to the car park, where a huge door that reminded me of a Bond movie or something let us out into the night. Hitching a ride with part of the orchestra also gave a fascinating light on the previous hours.
So I suppose this week has added a fair bit to my store of new experiences and I'm thankful for that. Although tired, as I say.
On Tuesday I headed into London promptly after work for a long-scheduled meeting which turned out to be a pleasant meal and pleasanter chat. I am reminded often these days of the pleasures of intelligent conversation without the old consciousness of whole areas of my thoughts which were out of bounds.
The next night I caught a train for London again to get my second experience of a Prom. It felt a bit ambitious having two nights out in a row, but in this case, having been offered tickets free, I couldn't pass up the opportunity. That's a great benefit of having a friend in the management of an orchestra.
It all felt very different this time around, and I'm not really sure how much of that is because it was different, and how much because of changes in me over the last year. There was, on the whole, less of a sense of occasion. Partly because it is now something I've done before, and partly because this Prom was undersubscribed whereas the previous one was a hot ticket. They can't all be blockbusters. The orchestra is respected rather than legendary, and the programme was not the kind which brings audiences flocking, it seems. However, I enjoyed it very much and, in a way that doesn't happen too often, actually caught myself consciously enjoying it at the time. Typically, I find, happiness is retrospective, and asking whether a particular moment is a happy one is a good way of spoiling it, but this time was an exception. Last time I felt like something of an alien intruder, but this one felt very natural. That must be me, as I doubt the audience at the Royal Albert Hall has changed significantly apart from being a little thinner on the ground.
I was there for the Ravel, principally, although as it was a twentieth-century selection I was interested in the rest of it too. The music turned out to be all interesting, but variably enjoyable, with the first half of each half (I'm not sure of my terminology here) seeming more like soundscapes than music, a little like having a movie with no visuals. Reading the programme gave a good clue to what was intended in each piece, and they accomplished it in each case, but it was easier to admire that achievement than be transported by the process. At least I found the visual side less distracting this time. I rather enjoy watching the musicians, some cultivating a slightly bored look while others play the animated eccentric, throwing themselves around as they play. Again, like before, the conductor seemed to be in his own time frame compared to the orchestra, but this time the orchestra didn't actually seem to even take much notice. In the initial pieces (admittedly rather abstract in nature), I could barely detect any connection between his movements and the resulting music, and certainly there was no clue as to the beat or timing. Very odd. They paid more attention to the conductor during the performance of the piece he'd written himself, and gave as good an impression of a thunderstorm as people with musical instruments could.
During the interval we were allowed into the musicians' area beneath and behind the stage, and even ventured just onto the stage itself. That was a novel perspective, definitely. I like the way that the business area even of a big important event like a Prom is always slightly rough-and-ready, and particularly enjoyed the sheet of paper taped to one door saying in large letters "Do not open this door, it squeaks". As it led directly to the stage, I could see the problem.
After the interval, a few of the empty seats near us filled up, and the woman in front of me looked very familiar. After a few minutes I realised why. She was the violin soloist from the first half, looking a little less glamorous close up and a whole lot less animated. I couldn't help glancing at her from time to time, wondering what it could be like to be listening when she had been the focus of all the listening only a short while earlier. I can't say she gave much away.
The final part of the experience this time round was a trip into the bowels of the building down a fire escape to the car park, where a huge door that reminded me of a Bond movie or something let us out into the night. Hitching a ride with part of the orchestra also gave a fascinating light on the previous hours.
So I suppose this week has added a fair bit to my store of new experiences and I'm thankful for that. Although tired, as I say.
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