Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me...

Sifting through the week hasn’t been all bad, as the colour orange testifies. Also, as you know, on Monday I booked a life drawing class, then had a good yoga session. Tuesday, nothing much that I can remember but with my memory that's nothing new! Then Wednesday, a friend and I went to see a film called Fair Game. My friend loves her films more than anyone I know, and this year had made it her New Years Resolution to go to the cinema every week. At the time she asked me if I would like to go with her, and after some bending of my rubbery arm, and careful consideration on my part (all of one second) I said she could count me in!

I have to admit though that my motives were not completely altruistic. I feel very fortunate to have the friends that I have now, and love spending time with them, but I think it’s fair to say that I'm an introvert. I do though feel that this isn't just a personality trait from birth, that in some way, has been created from external forces, that my experiences may have helped to shape a part of my personality.

The title for this bit of jabbering is a play on words, something my mother used to say to me all the time when I was a kid. Total codswallop if you ask me, it all hurt including the names. I will concede though that words never have in themselves, if anything they've offered precious escape. I suppose I engage with the archetypal activities of an introvert, including a love of reading, as a good story can carry me away anywhere, off to different moods, times, places, and all from the luxury of my armchair. Drawing (another passion) can offer me something similar but when I was a kid, reading offered a glorious escape to whole new worlds, and what they had to offer. Every week, Saturday mornings would be spent at the library, returning what I had borrowed the previous week, then picking the next week’s selection. I’d race home, impatient to start again. Whole books would be ‘absorbed’, eagerly, too eagerly, so that by Sunday evening I’d have already used up my ‘weekly fix’. Finding me without a book in those weekend hours was about as likely as my giving up chocolate (no chance!) and in truth, stepping into those other ‘realities’ was essentially, a way of escaping my own reality.

This passion for books fostered others, drawing being one, and music being another. A life model once remarked after class that she struggled to keep a straight face if she saw me drawing because of the ‘funny faces’ I apparently pull whilst concentrating. I deny the charges. Discovering the joy of music as a young girl lead to a new love in my later teens, that of going to concerts – Simple Minds in ’89 is one that will never be forgotten, for more than just the music and it led to many more concerts/memories after. Yet reading still remains a number one passion for me and I’m not sure anything can really beat it for ‘losing one’s self’ completely. However, one of the cruelties of MS is the fatigue, a symptom that has really affected my ability for intensive reading. So, although it’s not quite the same, going to the cinema offers me stories to escape into, a similar absorption, but without the price of getting too fatigued.

True to my friend’s resolution, I think we’ve been every week. For a few hours a week we get to ‘escape to another reality’. We’ve been very lucky up to now that we haven’t seen anything bad (although Vantage Point will never be forgotten on that score, not a reality I’d ever want to be in…). Ok, some have been better than others, some not so, but nothing bad. Once again, this week we got lucky and I loved our choice. Not a new idea as such but a damning indictment on the American government! And the bonus of discovering a little appreciation for Sean Penn was most welcome, definitely an example of someone who has improved with age…

Thursday offered something similar, but with a twist. The National Theatre has been broadcasting live performances of plays around the world and the current run of Frankenstein was being shown at Lincoln on Thursday night. I was fortunate to get some tickets, very fortunate in fact as it sold out! Unfortunately H was unable to make it, though disappointed as she was at the clash of dates, at least on her part it was for an exceptional reason! Another friend that I had also asked was able to make it however, and I have to say that it was just brilliant. Dark and intense in parts, amusing in some, others were truly horrifying, whilst some were moving to the point of tears. It was another example, much like the cinema, of being able to escape elsewhere, whilst being being gripped to the edge of my seat! I think the same was true for my friend M, and what added to it was the fact we had both studied the book and surrounding concepts at university, having been on the same course.

Although it gave me an escape from reality in much the same way as books do, I can't say that my reality today is a bad one, but coping with my own health issues and dealing with my husband’s is undeniably stressful. So, for a few hours a week, whether it’s through film, theatre, concerts, yoga, drawing, or even music from my I-pod when I take the dog out, whatever I choose really, I get to lose myself and 'disappear' into another place. What's so special about this week then? I suppose this week, I got to 'escape' more than usual. Such things, with the aid of good friends, come to my rescue when my 'reality' is becoming a little too much, and all help me to smile, if not laugh, particularly when I’m ferreting around giant wheelie bins with my marigolds!