Have Pen, Will Travel

A Travelogue to celebrate the publication of my new book, and the launch of 

The Travelling Book Society! See below for details.

There is nothing to set my writer’s genes all a-quiver like a little travel. Not that I write much while travelling, I am generally too distracted and on sensory overload to put two words together sensibly. But I will jot down a few notes in my trusty leather journal with my favourite pen and I cannot help but wax poetic in my head as I trot up and down ancient cobbled streets, ride a bike along the sea, climb the Eiffel Tower on a night glistening with the rain of hours past and the promise of more to come.

Beech woods in Denmark.

        Every summer I pack my bags for a trip to my country of birth to see family and friends. I leave the incessant heat of Texas behind for the cool, balmy green of Danish forests and the bracing sea air full of the tantalizing scents of salt and seaweed. For years, that was as far as I went, but as I…matured, shall we say…I realized I was missing the opportunity to explore further. And one should never miss an opportunity to explore further, as someone once said. (That someone might have been me and I just said it.)

            Apart from the new experiences and impressions that abound, travelling lends space and perspective to the everyday life, and as busy as that gets, Lord knows perspective is a welcome thing. For several years now I’ve been slaving over my new book, Each Wind That Blows, writing and re-writing, surfing the waves of blissful inspiration only to wallow in the shallows of writer’s burn out, completely lost in the forest and shrubbery of my many, many words trying to describe a few simple things. I’m down to the final edits and it’s so close to done I can taste it. So near and yet so far. (Editors Note: it's done and available on Amazon. Yay!!)

            A little travel is just the thing. To be blessed with the opportunity to, thanks to conveniently placed friends and family, travel in Europe, even better. Because Each Wind That Blows takes place in Kenya, and when I need a break from reliving that story, Europe is just the thing. It’s not just the landscape and the people that are different and afford me a clean break from Kenya. It’s the ‘vibe’.

            Kenya grabs you by the throat and doesn’t let go. All of Africa does. And if it doesn’t, then…well, I don’t know what you are made of. Sterner stuff than me. I am helpless before Africa’s allure. The vibe of Africa is a deep growl rumbling in her cavernous furnaces miles underground, a passionate and primeval chant throbbing in the ochre earth that sucks you in and spits you out, all burned up, twisted around, and begging for more. Africa asks you questions to which you will have no answers but to which your bones will respond with an intense sense of longing, as if once you knew the answers and lived their meaning, as if those most ancient of peoples from whom we all descend, our global ancestors, live in those bones and are speaking to you. You yearn and hunger to meet that truth again. You go a little mad for a little while.

Beach in Denmark

Then, if you’re a writer, you start to write. You start with the little questions and follow them where they lead, into ever bigger and often, more painful, questions. Then you get lost and, if you’re lucky, take a trip to Europe to clear your head.

Enter the cool, spacious vibe of the age-old country of Denmark, a tiny country with a huge history. The beech and oak forests reaching for a blustering sky, bright blue with scuttling clouds of white and sudden iron, thunder threatening on an otherwise sunny day destined for the beach, the trees remaining calm and unflustered. I love these trees with a deep and abiding passion, trees whose own ancestors once covered this cluster of peninsula and islands since before the days of the Vikings. Beech and oak to calm me, silver birch and weeping willows to wake the poet in my soul. The sunwarmed scent of pine and fir mingling with the peculiarly clean smell of sand and sea to tease my senses. The rippling sea to hypnotize and remind me, all is not what it seems and much is hidden from my curious eyes. Patience, Grasshopper, patience.

            

Here a crumbling ruin, the mysterious remains of a fortress built by Vikings. Here a small patch of cobblestones alongside a forest trail, revealed to remind us of times gone by, ye olde road to the big city. Castles and churches with centuries to their name, quaint old houses with thatched roofs and leaning doorways, their brightly painted walls billowing and bulging under the weight of their hundreds of years and the many, many stories they could tell.

            The vibe of the earth of Denmark is cool and calm, knowing and wise, dispassionate, but ever so present, waiting, watching. I reach for her and I am instantly calmed, confidence in the unknown and my ability to face it, enhanced. Sometimes, I think I spot a Viking or two from the corner of my eye. They’ve got my back, these, my long gone, ever present, ancestors.

Versailles

         

   Thus restored, they wave me off to Paris, a city content and intent upon itself. Broad, imposing boulevards declaring still the ambitions of a genius general gone mad emperor. Narrow twisting streets whispering of a medieval past, mansions and castles and churches and monuments and palaces and gargoyles and statues and museums and parks and gardens and avenues lined with massive trees, all declaring their undying passion for and alliance to, the grandeur of the days gone by, to a country that spawned the first notions of liberty, equality, fraternity. It’s raining all the time but nobody cares. We are in Paris, after all, and the weather does not get to be a character of note when you are faced with the overwhelming character of Paris herself.

Little shops and cosy bistros, fancy dames and lads galore, the houses of Chanel, Yves St. Laurent, Dior. Marais, Montmartre, the Latin Quarter, the Tuileries. Notre Dame, Louvre, Sacre Coeur, Le Arc de Triomphe. The calm expanse of the Seine slicing through it all, a vein of serenity amongst the hectic flesh of a city that first drew breath in Roman times. It’s overwhelming, enchanting to the point of mind numbing. The view from the Eiffel Tower, caught after catching my breath after climbing the 669 steps to the second platform (elevator be damned, I’m working off another French delicacy) laying it all out in sudden clarity, the height lending perspective and order to what feels like a massive jumble on the ground and on my little folding map, already fraying at the seams. A city of lights spreading out before me in the glittering aftermath of all the rain, her history as much a part of her beauty as all the sights. Age before beauty. Perspective is everything.

Arc de Triomphe by night.

The author in London, photo by Sue Child.

            A little breathing room on a fast train dipping into darkness under the sea and I have barely caught up to myself before I reach London, all edgy and trembling with life. The East End, restored after decades recovering from the devastating bombings during World War II, bustling with fresh energy, flower markets and artisans, foods from around the world and the accompanying people in all manner of dress. A sunny day on and alongside the massive River Thames, feeling diminutive as I pass by the imposing Tower of London, under ponderous bridges and by the House of Parliament with all its spires and ornate detailing. These old cities remind me they just don’t build like that anymore, and more’s the pity.

The massive river is alive with boats, ferries and speedboats tearing up the calm waters, and this nature chick is about bursting at the seams after ten days in two of the most vibrant cities in the world, the impressions and experiences all blooming into one giant, milling chaos that leaves no handhold for Kenya’s grip, never mind time to worry about a book. Who the hell cares. What book?

            It’s just what the doctor ordered and so is the eight hour journey to Dublin aboard the train and ferry. Quiet and serene, the train bumbles up the north coast of England and Wales with blessed few stops, the scenery going from pastoral and kindly like a farmer’s wife’s cheeks to wild and ragged, the sea and mountains of North Wales vying for attention in an everlasting clash of the titans.

A few stops along a man sits down across from me, the table between us soon host to his laptop from which he reads aloud under his breath, sounding out the words. I look up from my book and startle to see a kindly Asian face smiling back. Fu Manchu beard, long blue-black pony tail, a beautiful red silk mandarin jacket with one stubborn loop that refuses to stay put around its corresponding button. His unlined face is open and friendly like that of a child, his questions likewise. His heavy accent is a little tricky to understand, but I soon gather he is from Nepal, a teacher of yoga and Buddhism, here to teach a summer course at a northern English University. He has opened centers for the teaching of yoga and Buddhism in major cities around the world. At least, that is what I think I gather.

I find myself on a train through the English countryside on my way to Ireland, discussing reincarnation, the Chinese invasion of Nepal and the finer points of religion versus faith. When he gets up to leave a few hours later, a stop or two before Holyhead, I am startled again when the rest of his outfit is revealed. Under his fine red silk jacket and above handsome slippers he is wearing khaki shorts revealing yoga chiselled calves. That’s travelling for you, in a nutshell. You just never know what you’ll find around the next corner and it’s often not what you’d expect.

The author enjoying the sunshine and sea breeze.

The fine ferry Ulysses leaves Holyhead for Dublin on a bright and sunny afternoon, the sea a placid, glistening mirror to the empty sky above. I am relieved, for sadly my ancestry has not afforded me the seafaring belly of a Viking. The wind is fresh and cool, but wrapped in my jacket and scarf I sit on the dark green deck in perfect happiness for the better part of three hours, soaking up the sun and the vast horizon, feeling the limitlessness of the open sea, the endless possibilities of a life lived boldly. Anything could happen. I might even write a deeply personal book. A book about Africa and a childhood there that left me with more questions than answers, a loss that left me reeling, a life coming apart and a return to Kenya after thirty years that started as a lark on horseback and ended up changing my life. Yes, it could happen. I might even finish it. If I ever leave Ireland, that is.

Lord, I love Ireland. She looms out of the mist and it is little wonder she inspires such myths and legends. The Emerald Isle indeed, she glows like a fine gem in the soft gleam of the setting sun as the ferry draws closer. I face into the wind, breathing deeply, all the way down to my toes. Seagulls circle way below the deck line, gleaming white and impossibly graceful. I am so ready for this. It is my second visit and I have been as eager to return here as I was to return to Kenya, which is saying a lot.

They are nothing alike and yet they have much in common. A penchant for strange, mysterious histories and a wild, thrilling edge to their wilderness that calls to me on a soul-deep level I cannot define, that makes me want to toss it all away and set off into the unknown with just a walking stick (or better yet, a horse AND a walking stick). Ireland’s great hills and deep lakes, sweeping shores and craggy cliffs, her air of mystery and deeply buried secrets echo softly in the parts of me I don’t know or understand, much like Kenya. It’s irresistible. It’s a different kind of call than Kenya, more magic than primeval, more mythical than ancestral, but it’s a call all the same, and the same parts of me answer.

Killorglin, Ireland

I am blessed with fine weather but even if it had rained every day of my sojourn there, I would barely have cared. The rugged Ring of Kerry and that of Dingle, the rolling beauty of Cork and the strange, distant view of the windswept Blasket Islands, (inhabited until the 1950’s), rousing, heart wrenching music at the local pub as some twenty local musicians came and went, all added up to one splendid thing – total escape, utter replenishment of the soul.

 On my last day in Killorglin, we go out on the lake in a small boat, the water glassy and black as polished obsidian. The little boat leaves smooth, serene ripples that turn to mercury in our wake, and takes us to visit waterfalls and crumbling old towers, monasteries and age old universities on deserted islands and the far shores of the lake. The clouds hang low over the deep green hilltops, a smattering of rain comes and goes leaving us moving through a fine mist that feels friendly and welcoming on my cheeks. I can breathe deeply and fully, all tension leeched from my spine. That is when I know.

Killorglin, Ireland

I almost feel ready for that final push. Ready to face Each Wind That Blows and see it through to the end, and on to new beginnnings.

Each Wind That Blows is available on Amazon and at www.EachWindThatBlows.com 

Remember to check out The Travelling Book Society at www.TheTravellingBookSociety.com !

All photos by Susannah Cord unless stated otherwise. Copyright 2015

I See Fire

 

 

The other day I was interviewed on a radio show, The Wicked Edge, and one subject that came up was the upcoming thirteenth anniversary of 9/11 and my blog, The Surrender, which I wrote some time after the Boston bombing. It made me want to write something now, for this day that brought such agony to the USA, for 9/11 and for all those terrible days that humanity has witnessed and lived through history, the terrible days when we inflict such pain and suffering on one another.

 

But words failed me. What can I possibly say that has not been said already? A picture is worth a thousands words and the photos of 9/11 are burned into my brain. But does anyone really need to be reminded of what it looked like? Does anyone need to be reminded what the tragedy that defined a moment in their time looked like? How can we possibly forget, we who woke from ignorant bliss and sweet slumber to such madness? So no, not a picture today. Instead I turned to music, for so often when words and pictures fail, music and well sung lyrics carry the day - and us - to that place of remembrance in a way words alone never can. 

 

I thought of this song, for when I hear it, I see not only the dwarves and dragon, the hobbit and elves for whom it was written. I see the burning towers of 9/11, I see the ovens of Auschwitz and the bodies on Normandy Beach. I see the trenches of No Man's Land smoking with chlorine gas, the burning ships of Pearl Harbor and the smoldering remains of Hiroshima. I see the genocide of Rwanda and countless other countries, the devastation of wildlife and plant life, forests and rivers, all over the world. I see the suffering of Jews, Christians and Muslims alike, innocents suffering for dogma turned fanaticism fed by the greed and hunger for power that starts wars and commits mass murder to the sound of insane promises.

 

I see determination burning in the hearts of those who would seek to turn the tide, and I see the desperate courage it takes to face such evil as it flies over the land seeking only to destroy that which it covets.

 

I hear the soaring voice of Ed Sheeran and the words he wrote and I, well........

I see fire. Fire that destroys but also, the fire that transforms, and ultimately, heals and builds again.

As we always do.

 

 

 

A Skilled Sailor Make

I don't know about you, but I can just about get seasick standing in a puddle. Ironic since I grew up in a seafaring nation and my father is an avid sailor, so most summer holidays were spent sailing for weeks on end. I won't get into the details of how I handled that......!

Still, I love the ocean and I love sailing on a fine day. A fine day means no waves but enough wind for the sails to fill and the boat to move briskly, cleaving the gentle water with barely a jiggle. Much more than that, and I acquire a not so gentle shade of green. It's pathetic really - I also don't last long on a swing, a merry go round or any kind of amusement park ride other than roller coasters. Planes smaller than jumbo jets also present a problem, as did the gentle rocking of the high speed Eurostar train as it all but flew from Paris to London. So, just not much of a traveler for someone who loves to travel.

A few years ago I went for a ride on someone else's horse, a few hours from home. The horse and I had a misunderstanding about the best manner in which to tackle a certain jump and I fell and fell hard, bruising my lower back considerably. I soldiered on, climbed back in the saddle and finished the ride, even had some fun, but to my shock I could barely walk when I got off the horse, never mind getting into my truck. Finally I managed to fold myself up enough to clamber in and I drove home, tears of pain rolling down my face.

Not far from home a great big sign blinked by the freeway and caught my attention. It was a new sign I had never seen before, one of those digital screens that changes constantly. Just as I looked up it changed from advertising cars to saying this :

"Smooth seas do not a skilled sailor make."

 

I won't tell you the stream of curse words that flew from my lips, but I will tell you I also managed to laugh, if painfully. It stayed with me, all through a recovery that took several months and beyond, on into life going forward. I still think of it whenever I hit rough water and feel my stomach start to roil, when I get stressed out, when life does not go my way and I go a little green with anxiety.

 

 

It reminds me to hang tough, to cleave to my peaceful center, that while I am a sensitive, thin skinned individual with an easily upset stomach that should not hold me back from engaging in life and all it entails. That learning is why I am here, and maybe one thing I have had to learn is how to strike that balance when things get tough so I may soldier on, live and let live, learn and move on. Roll with the punches, not just fall apart and hang over the railing. That the unsettling times are not here to torture but to teach, and it's up to me to keep my eye on the horizon and my mind in the game.

 

 

So while I may never make much of a sailor, or a flyer, or a rider of amusement park rides,  I do intend to make one heck of a life, regardless of what waves come my way.



The Fruit and Flower Blog

And yes, it is exactly what is sounds like. A blog about fruits and flowers. No worries, I am not much of a horticulturalist, so not a lot of words to this one, just photos from my recent travels through beautiful Ireland upon which I hope you will enjoy feasting your eyes. I enjoyed taking them. So without further ado, here we go, lassie. Or laddie, as the case may be.

Let's take the ferry from Holyhead to Dublin, shall we? It's a gorgeous, sunshiny day, and there is no getting seasick, thank the heavens, just a brisk breeze to ripple the water gently. Fortunately, nobody noticed my unaccompanied inner child on the loose (see sign) and they left me in peace for three heavenly hours, just sitting, soaking it all in. Then from Dublin we'll head out into the countryside and visit some lovely gardens....(and just click on a photo see them bigger).

 

 

 

Land, ahoy!!

 

The orchard at Ballyfin House....

 

Gotta eat your vegetables....

 

Without our bees, oh where would we beeee?!

 

Cannot for  the life of me remember what these are, other than pretty....

 

Agapanthas...? I think?

 

Daisies! Some kind of daisy...

 

Pretty in pink......

 

Nothing better than a freshpicked raspberry at the end of the day...

 

It's a.....seedpod.

 

It's a....?? But kind of cool, yes?

 

Nature doing her thing at the end of a beautiful day....

 

That's it for today, check back for more travel photos in the coming weeks! Mountains and lakes and beaches and landscapes and...well, beautiful stuff. It's happening, right here on....the blog.

When We Drop What We Love

We've all done it. Dropped something we love. Maybe it's a fine china cup. Maybe a Ming Vase. A plate, inherited from a long line of revered family members. A crystal glass, a ceramic bird, an enameled pin. A tender heart.

Maybe we're lucky. It's a short drop onto a soft carpet and all that happens is a little shard chips off, a shard that can be glued back in place like it was never gone, even for a second. No one would ever know it had been dropped. Maybe we vow to be more careful in the future, that never again will we be so careless in handling this precious object, the barely averted disaster reminding us all too clearly of just how treasured this item is. How worthy of our love and careful handling.

But time goes by. We forget, we do get careless. This time, it drops and lands hard, breaking into large jagged pieces that tear at our heart, lying at our feet and crying out in pain at our carelessness. We gather the pieces gently, carefully, glue them all together and it works, kind of, and while we don't quite understand how it even happened, we swear never again, and that it is as precious now as it ever was, and the scars that can barely be seen will remind us of our carelessness which will never come again. Must not come again.

But it does come again. And this time, it breaks in all the old places along with a few new ones, and the old places just won't be glued again and the new places don't glue tight, for they remember the pain of the scars that came before, scars of places healed only to be ripped once more. We try but are left with an odd mess we don't understand, can't fix and don't want to deal with.  If it's just a vase, a cup, a plate, we finally sweep it in the trash and wash our hands of it, though now we can never think of it without a little wistful sigh. Still, the guilt of dropping it persists.

And if it's a heart, well.......

We get angry, defensive. Why did that fall even break you? Are you so sensitive, so delicate, so pathetic? So bent upon being a victim? If that doesn't work, we wait. Time heals all things. Except, even time does not heal everything and if it matters enough, we must change again. Perhaps we begin to ponder our own reflection in that blank wall of quiet rejection. So we apologize, beg for forgiveness, mercy and feel that, surely, now all is well. Must be well. Just as before only different. After all, we've apologized. Doesn't that count for something? Forgive and forget.

Surely the dropped, broken thing understands it was never intentional.

That we have priorities. Demands on our time. Places to be and things to do. That sometimes, in the stress of it all, the cherished little things slip through our fingers and hit the floor, whether we intend it or not.

Surely the broken little thing will not hold that against us. Be that cruel and unforgiving. Hold our carelessness against us. Why can't things just be like they were before? We've apologized, for Pete's sake!!

And we just don't understand that it has nothing to do with forgiveness and everything to do with trust.

We are so busy feeling put upon that we can barely hear the broken thing as it says:

"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. There won't be a third time, for nothing can be as it was before. It is broken, gone, irrepairable. The part of my heart that grew from us, from you and me, will not be again as it was for it has withered and died, though in it's place may grow a new and lovely thing, given time. But it does not grow without trust, and trust takes a long time to rebuild when once it has crumbled to the ground. Longer than love to return, longer than forgiveness to release us both.

Because long after forgiveness is given, long after memory fades, trust still remembers, still questions. So it is not my love that I will not give, or my forgiveness, and I have no wish of punishing a suffering soul. It is my trust I cannot give as easily as once I did. Because you have taught me that only I can be responsible for me, that unlike a cup or a vase only I can prevent a painful fall, that I am no victim or little broken thing but the phoenix rising from the ashes and saying no more will I place myself into your hands and trust you to keep me safe in your company. Trust you not to drop me so carelessly onto a cold, hard floor.

You yourself have taught me to trust in myself and not in you, and that is all. How then, can things ever be the same as they were when I placed myself blindly in your care?

No, it has nothing to do with my love and forgiveness, for you have those. Understand only this, that I will no longer allow myself to suffer for the love that I bear you. That is all."

One day perhaps, we hear, we understand. When we drop what we love enough times, there are consequences. No matter how close, no matter how long, no matter if it's family or friend, blood or water.

When we drop what we love, sometimes, we're the ones left on that cold, hard floor.

Thirty years too early....

Usually, I think I was born a century or two too late. I wish myself back to the world before the industrial revolution, to a world more pristine if no gentler. A world before freeways and concrete blocks and monster trucks. Yes, I could live with some of the lack of modern day comforts if the trade off was a less paved planet.

 

I certainly never think I was born too early. A future of shiny steel and glass and machines and less and less land, forests, animals and birds holds no appeal for me. I hope I do not live to see it. My life is devoted to slowing down this so-called progress.

 

And yet, and yet. This boy gives me pause. If I went to his school of thought, how different might my life have been? My brain? My outlook? If children of the future go to his school of thought - Hacker School - might there not be hope for the future?

 

What do you think?

 

 

In The Fog

It's one of those fabulous, foggy mornings. Mornings that make me think of magic, of Merlin, of Celtic warriors bursting through the fog on horses dripping in dew and breathing dual plumes of steam. In slow motion, of course, with stirring music thundering in the background.

Truth is, of course, all that is really hidden in this fog outside my window is my dogs and my donkeys. The only sound I can expect is the blaring braying of a donkey lamenting the size of his hay portion. The horses are in the barn for their breakfast after a long night of dripping dew in the dark field. The dogs are busy exploring what came and went in the night while they slept in the mudroom. All is quiet, all is well, all is just as usual, only hidden in mist. But within the mist, the trees are just as solid, the grass just as yellow, the rock is still a rock. The truth of their being is still the truth, however shrouded it may be. That is the ongoing gift of Nature. The closest thing we come to real reality in our solid world.

 

Photo by Cindy Strate

Yes, the truth is still the truth, however shrouded in myth and mist it might be. That could be a slogan for the state of the world today. All the debating,  posturing,  justifying,  theorizing,  intellectualizing, politicizing and  rationalizing gather in one great whirlpool of gray at the very core of which lies one still, little grain of truth, all covered up in the swirling mess, all covered up and unspoken for. Call it what you will, wrap it in bubble wrap, wrap it in pretty paper and a big red bow, cover it in syrup and jam it down our collective throat, the truth is what it is, it never changes despite all that mental fog we keep dishing out in all directions. Everybody is right, and everybody is wrong, but how many of our talking heads are actually addressing the underlying truth of anything?

Photo by Cindy Strate

 

They are not. We are forgetting the most fundamental truths. We are being taken in by the pretty mist and the fabulous fog, drowning in the gray whirlpool of debate. We don't even look for that grain of truth anymore, the quiet center of clarity. Political correctness does not allow for that, nobody must be wrong, nobody can get their feelings hurt, everyone's claims must be met. Unless, of course, they don't fit your bill. Then you can call them every name in the book, ridicule, denigrate and bury them in your assessment of their own inferiority. And the crowd goes wild.

It's all smoke and mirrors. We are back in the Coliseum of Rome. It's us against them, them against the others, the others for themselves. And justice, ah, well. That is in the eye of the beholder. Why look for the driver of the machine when we can rage against the machine itself?

Because the truth is just too damn simple. The truth does not allow for everyone's little drama to be important, to matter, to be heard. The truth doesn't care about anyone, it doesn't take sides - the truth simply is. The truth is a bare bones debacle, where voices are raised only to fall silent, for all arguments fall away in the face of it's simplicity.

So what's true anymore? The same as it's always been. Hidden in the fog, mosying in the mist. Only this mist won't clear out by noon. If you want the truth, you're going to have to dig for it, and dig deep. Not out there, either. In there. In you.

Sucks, doesn't it?