Life goes on

My grandma died last Monday. I was angry, as well as upset, when Grandad died a few years ago everyone thought she'd be the one to go on and on and on and bounce back from everything. Then this summer we discovered she had cancer of the bladder, and it was only picked up cos she went to the docs cos she was weeing blood. And obviously by then it was too late to do anything cos it was so advanced.

But it's sad how quickly she went. She was in a nursing home, eating, happy, comfortable, then she wasn't eating cos it was painful, then she was in hospital on a drip, then she was barely conscious, then she was dead.

So I have one grandparent left, and it's hard to love her because despite the fact that she's not really who she was - it's almost like she's a different person. Her personality has been robbed off her by age and senility, and she gets irritated and grumpy because she knows that she's not who she was, and takes it out on us, without meaning to. It's so hard to love her.

I think my parents are amazing, coping with their parents. My mum's mum has being slowly getting old, and senile, and difficult to cope with, she'd been living with mum and dad for about a year and a half before mum finally realised she couldn't cope and now gran's in a home, and we hope that finally there's a permanent place for her in mum's home of choice. My dad's mum had been widowed for about 4 years, and seemed to be coping and bouncing back, and now all of a sudden she is no more and my dad's seen both his parents die within 5 years. In fact, I think it was around about this time 4 years ago that grandad died.

But life goes on.

Whirligig lights from my front room

Love Manchester

Yesterday I sung with the Halle, discovered where the Printworks are in Manchester, and have discovered Lucid (the nightclub) is a complete maze especially when you have a major headache and really just need to sleep!

But I enjoyed being there, I camped in the Champagne Lounge where my paintings were being exhibited, and enjoyed listening to Becky Higg among others.

These are the paintings that were on display:


"Musical Soul"



"Spikes"



"Spirit Hovers"

Go and see the rest of them! visit the purpledancer website!

Birthdays

Saturday was Emma and Katy's birthdays, the incentive to go was a cuddle of little Toby (about 3 weeks old).


Me and Toby Walker

But here's some other photos from Saturday night.


Doug and Az


Anna


Si and Katy


Emma Walker and Emma Champion

If it were a story...

Part 4

Feel His arms around you, holding you in His loving embrace, lifting you out of this troubled world, giving you shelter, sanctuary.

Stretch your arms and twirl in the wind. Dance with the Holy Spirit, with the Wondrous God that was, and is, and always will be.

more tomorrow...

Boing

Sigh.

How stress makes you not sing well.

I went for another singing lesson last night, straight from work, drove from Manchester City Centre to Wythenshawe to drop off hubby and friend, then on to Sale for my lesson. Set off from work 5pm, (this includes very fast walking to car,) arrived at lesson 6.45pm.

No wonder I was a bit tense. But how frustrating - I couldn't keep at straight face at the warm-ups we were doing, so my neck and shoulders just would not relax. Which meant that I wasn't able to produce the sound that I knew I could... which made it all the more frustrating.

And my audition is in a week and a half.

Well.

Another lesson next week, that will be £75 spent on singing lessons this month, I don't think I can afford that for much longer.

Sigh...

Debbie's leaving party is tomorrow. I think it will be hard to not be sad, I will miss her a lot. Who will make me cups of tea now? I will be making them instead...

She came round the other night for a last T&Chat. :) It was nice. We talked about lots of stuff, including church. Kat came round as well - she's moving in with us for the next 3 months, and we started painting the attic which is to be her bedroom. I'm excited about that - I don't know what it's like to live with anyone except my family, and my husband.

Kat left her job recently to join the Innervation Trust, how exciting! That means that after her 3 months training, she'll be put with a team and sent to a part of the country to do schools work in all the schools in the area, doing assemblies, RE and PSE lessons, afterschool and lunchtime clubs, gigs and concerts. She's well looking forward to it!

And me? Well, next week Steve sends off his applications for next year's year in industry placements. He also (as in, as well as me) wants to go to Denmark - so emails to Eben, and application to B&O I think in the pipeline: here's praying one of them says yes!

Enough for now, I want to eat and relax a bit. My cup of tea is going cold, again.

L8r! xx :o)

Yikes

I discovered last night that what I thought I was doing on Saturday (i.e. the Sing with the Halle day) is actually on the Sunday, which means that from 9.30am until probably 1am (yes, 1am, on Monday) I will be in Manchester getting very very tired!!

So if you're reading this, please pray for me that I will not collapse, and that I'll sing fine, and that I'll be able to get to the various places I need to be at on time and in time to not be stressed!

Well here's to Sunday then :o)

Other Stuff

Debbie's leaving in a week! This time next week she will be probably nearly in Australia, and I will already be missing her. :o(

But tonight we'll be having a cup of T and a chat, and it will be our last one for a long time. Hopefully, if my dream actually happens, by the time she comes back to the UK I will be living in Denmark (only for a year) - and she's said she doesn't think she'll be coming back to Manchester anyway....

So this is the end of an era.

If it were a story...

Part 3

You stand still.

Feel the wind supporting you.

Enjoy the simplicity and the rapture that is being with God.

more tomorrow...

If it were a story...

Part 2

The wind gusts behind you, urging you onward. You wrap your coat tighter around your body, but relish the feel of the wind over your head, ruffling your hair, making your cheeks glow with life.

Walk a little further. See the coloured shells strewn along the sand, and wonder at the awesome God who had time to create each and every one unique.

More tomorrow...

A Thought...

"The moment we take the law into our own hands, then we're no longer fit to pass judgement"

- Judge Dredd, Metro News, 17th Sept 04

If it were a story....

Part 1

If it were a story, it would be set by the sea on a very long beach.
A beach without beginning and without end.

The story of a person who walks along this shore and perhaps never meets anyone.
It stretches on forever, glistening and shimmering in the warm evening sun.

Your gaze lingers to observe some object or fragment borne by the sea,
drifting, catching on a rock, ... and pulled back into the water again.

A seagull whirls over your head, crying, calling... circling around and around,
borne by the wind, fighting and soaring as it circles. Calling, calling.

more tomorrow...

Nothing.

Today, I have nothing to write about.
I woke up 15 minutes before I was scheduled to catch my bus this morning, this is something that should not happen to a girl.
I have played solitaire most of the day, and told a photocopier saleslady to please please please I really don't want an appointment to see a sales rep.
I want to paint.
I am so full and tired I am amazed I am on the computer at all.
I have no web-builder software!! How will I cope... mywebsite becomes more and more out of date by the day.
On the other hand, underneath all the tiredness, I am excited - I have another exhibition next Sunday night of some of my paintings, it's at Lucid nightclub at the Printworks. I might have already mentioned this.
I think I'm going to go to bed now, good-night...

New Exhibition!

Wow, what an amazing week.

Wednesday night was the Redeeming the Arts prayer event, check out www.citylinks.org.uk.

My paintings were in the exhibition, and I've got another one now as a result of Wednesday night!

It'll be at Lucid nightclub in the Printworks (Manchester), on Sunday 26th September 2004, entry from 8pm. Check out www.massiveuk.org.uk! It's called Love Manchester.

Yay!

Sang my song too - go to the citylinks website, you'll find me on there somewhere. You can actually hear me singing - wobbly and all, I was shaking like a leaf.

Time to go!! Will actually try and take some pictures at the Love Manchester event.

Ta-ra, will blog again soon.

purpledancer

hmm. think I might go back through my purpledancer daybook and put some of that on here. woo - a permanent record of my day-to-day getting my business up and running.

or maybe not.

website stuff might be interesting though, to me, to read when I've lost my book.

yesterday my dreamweaver trial ran out. boo-hoo... i think that, now i've learnt how to use it, and know that i will need it in the near future, i might just have to buy it...

but yesterday also, my amazing hubby steve made me 3 easels (is that how it's spelt?) to display my work on, on wednesday! go and see www.citylinks.org.uk and look at the redeeming the arts section. I'm on there!

Yay!

I won!!

Wow!!!

On the spur of the moment last week I sent off a demo-CD with a few songs I've written and recorded on to a songwriting competition, and to my complete amazement yesterday I got an email saying I'd won!!!!!!

So much for my promise...!

Well I was supposed to write more often but hey... I've been busy!

My website's online, it's a business one so I'm not supposed to tell you what it is, but mu homepage is now www.purpledancer.com/stephenandjeni so you can let me know what you think about that anyway.

Well that's what I've been doing! Hurrah, I am very chuffed. My dream is finally becoming a reality to have my own business selling my paintings, and things like that. So exciting!

But that leaves little time to do things like this, so I'm afraid this is the end of today's entry.

More again, I promise!

Auditions

Thought I’d post an update on how the various auditions/preparations are going/have gone.

Halle

Well I’ve found some music for the audition I think! My old singing teacher has suggested Handel’s “Art thou troubled”, and I’ll hopefully be going back to her for lessons in September.

It’s still not actually September yet, so no more news on the Sing With The Halle day, except that it’s on 26th September!

Cabaret

Went for an audition for a Cabaret tonight. What fun! I was going to sing “Feeling good” but the pianist couldn’t play it, so instead I did “Music of the Night” from Phantom. He could play it, I knew it (sort of – had heard it a couple of times anyway) so I went for it.

It only has a high A-flat in it, further along in the score than you would read to check it for crazy high notes like that. And of course I didn’t remember that bit from seeing the musical what I was 15 or something!

But it went ok, seemed to impress them anyway!

Liverpool and Lost

Today we went to Liverpool! Me, Mum and Grandma. Our prime objectives were to find our way (by road) to Albert Docks, to then find the Liverpool Tate Gallery, then to see Antony Gormley’s “Field” (of little clay men). To then go and see one or both of the Cathedrals would be a bonus.

So off we set, armed with some cash, a couple of Multimap print-outs with directions to the Tate, an ancient AtoZ of Liverpool, and a more up-to-date map of Britain with large scale city centre maps; and trundled off across the M62 to Liverpool.

That was the easy bit.

Coming to the end of the M62 we were faced with a dilemma. Do we follow Multimap’s directions, or do we trust the Liverpudlians and follow the road signs – as Albert Dock seems quite prominent on them?

Mum’s instinct is to go with Multimap, but as I’m navigating and can read maps and road signs a bit better than tiny printed extremely exact directions (200m, turn left...) I opt for the road signs. They seem fairly easy, until we round a large sweeping bend having been told that apparently we should be in the right-hand lane, and discover that Albert Dock is the next exit on the left, and approaching extremely quickly. Mum is unable to get across three lanes of fairly heavy traffic and we find ourselves heading towards the Wallasey Tunnel...

Sigh.

£1.20 later we decide we really really need to stop. So, mum’s instincts take us up towards Wallasey, and beyond, to a small shopping centre which has all the facilities we need: café and toilets. (And, usefully, a stall which did watch repairs, which I took advantage of and got my watch working again! It’s not worked for 3 years now, I’ve just never got around to getting a new battery for it...)

Then we studied the map properly, and decided it would be easier to go through the Birkenhead Tunnel to get back closer to Albert Dock. Much stress later, we arrived at the Dock, all in one piece, very thankful, and ready to find the Tate.

And it was certainly worth it! If you ever get chance to see Field, go see it. It is very eerie... all those little eyes looking up at you from everywhere you look. The brochure says something along the lines of it makes you the subject, rather than them...

A cup of tea and a piece of cake later, courtesy of the Tate Café, we decided that there was still time to try and find at least one of the Cathedrals. Which we did! Hurrah for sunshine and beautiful things.

Finally, in much better spirits, we headed off home. A Grand Day Out.

The stained glass "crown" at Liverpool Cathedral