New Next Nirvana

5am.

I wake up from a deep sleep  disorientated and disheveled not quite sure what day it is or what I am meant to be doing while the world is still enveloped in darkness. 

I uncoil from tangled covers and wipe old mascara from tired eyes.

2024 is passing by in a flash. January and February over in the blink of an eye; March through July racing through in the service of Father Time. Fully awake now, I disengage limbs and move to find a cold spot on warm white sheets. I wriggle making myself cosy and purr like Georgie when he is baking in his sunspot, his ginger coat aglow.

Arm stretching out I look and find fire, making the connection. I need to feel him when I sleep, his warmth envelopes me making any bed home.

Fully awake now I stumble to the bathroom. Lights flash on, blinding me. I look at myself in the mirror, for a second recoiling from the sight and run a hand through frizzy hair to tame it.

"Dayum, girl! When did 60 lay hands on you?"

I scoff as the crazy past few months flash before my eyes like a movie in slomo: the phone hacking, the deletion of Social Media accounts, the break in by a masked Marvel thief, robbed of every single card used to run my life, and the endless bureaucracy to reset. The "episode" with the mobile, and the months untethered from the matrix... and from losing friends and finding them...

And IsraHell!!! 

F*^ken IsraHell losing all humanity and robbing us of hope and belief in our societies and our social structures.

Have I mentioned, "F*^k Israhell for traumatising Palestine and the whole world!

And for making us lose all faith in our international bodies and us realising that Capitalism and Democracy is not IT! 

And yet...

Still the EXCESSIVELY rich are  giving us the finger by flaunting their wealth at ridiculous weddings ($600 000 000! GROTESQUE) and events in our dystopian reality. 

And meanwhile in Gaza, and Congo, and Sudan and other regions across the world murdered children and people are lining the streets, and people are starving.

And still...

Our celebrity culture is hard at work.

Celebrities are once again back at it full force, selling stuff to us we don't need and reinforcing our basest instincts so we can continue to consume endlessly, unthinkingly.

I feel weighed down.

I needed to regroup.

Needed to recharge.

To realign.

RISE UP!

RECLAIM!

RENEW!

Eyes curious now recognising the shift that had happened ever so slowly, ever so slightly.

Recognising that I had done the work, every day in making the choice to get up and show up despite daunting circumstances and disappointments.

Looking back over the past few months I see where I scratched the surface, then excavated, examined, reflected and resurfaced, stronger, kinder, and firm in the belief that the world needs to change and revolution is our right. And knowing unequivocally that change starts with the individual and cascades outward to the systems that govern us. 

Pillow-faced, I’m imprinted with lavender flowers etched deep on a newly blank canvas. I turn my gaze downward, studying my left hip revealing scars from my recent illness, stress a tough task master. Marks and raised welts are clinging to my skin like it was born there, refusing to be erased by the brief passage of time. 

I wear these scars as a reminder of how things unravel when living on automatic.

Numb is no longer an option.

I open my arms and the world rushes in. 

Inspiration strikes at odd hours, in unusual places.

I head back to my sanctuary on silent feet as the morning light filters in through summer curtains lighting my way along dark passageways.

His voice carries from the warm white bed:

"Come here!" he whispers, arms open wide, body hot granite, but the softest place in my world.

30 uninterrupted years:

A lifetime of love & lust.

Of rest and revolution.

Of peace and chaos.

Of HOPE.

And BELIEF.

We got this...It is time!