Ask the Priestess

I'm used to being strong and healthy. Sure, I have had issues over the years, but in general, I'd say I've enjoyed mostly health. I also used to do a relatively nice amount of exercise - not machines, more yoga, Pilates, swimming and walking. Then, a couple of years ago, that changed. I find that I have to take days off because I'm dizzy, so I cannot function comfortably. I also realise eating junk leaves me exhausted, moody, and that I 'have to pay' for it. Worse of all, the whole situation means I struggle to do any exercise, which in turn pushes me to feel less able to enjoy being in my own skin. Of course, I know that it is a reality, that it happens. One minor complaint left unattended led to another, seemingly unrelated, condition. On and on, until I am so far away from the initial point, that I appear lost in a maze of my own frustrations. Because, in all honesty, the worst thing of it all is the frustration. Sure, being unwell is painful and uncomf...

I love languages. I speak several, having been blessed with growing up in a multi-cultural family, as well as lived in a number of countries. Moreover, I used to work in language education, in addition to proof-reading, translating, editing. Languages, I find, are fabulously rich tools to understand culture. Languages have to be rich, since they have developed over thousands of years to explain all the experiences all the members of a community have lived through, everything they needed to convey, to teach, to share, to remember. There are families of words, of languages, of histories. Some languages have been nearly static for a long time, their isolated peoples unchanging as well. Others, have developed flexibility in order to accommodate invasions, empires, new cultures that intertwine into a new, greater community. Then, there are the languages used as mementos, whose social anchors have disappeared, e.g. Latin, or artificial creations for specific groups, like Esperanto, Klin...

Last week, I had an appointment to meet up with a friend after work. Once bitten, twice shy, I realised getting on a bus, any bus!, would mean time stuck in rush hour traffic jam. I checked my map, and found out I could be at our meeting place within 40 minutes if I were to go on foot - roughly as long as it would take me by bus, on a good day. I actually like walking, so I set off. The route, it turns out, is pretty much a straight line: leave work, turn right, over the bridge, a slight zig-zag, oh, look! The city Court building! I didn't know that was there. Even more, I didn't know there is a little area to sit around a pool. In the pool, which at that time had no-one around, there are water lilies (only pads, as it's winter). And, oh! wow! in between the pads, flashes of bright red, white and black - there are koi fish there! Looking even closer, there were other varieties of fish, tiny and dark, darting around. I had to continue, lest I be late! So, off I went, aga...

Do you love your job? I love my job. I do, why do so many people look at me questioningly? Some think I am just trying to keep up a positive vibe; others, that I am faking it; yet some believe that I am pushing their buttons. But nope, honest to goodness, I love my job. My job is not the kind I thought I would ever have. Actually, I knew nothing about this industry before getting the position. Added to that, I left my previous post, as a manager in the field I had experience, to a degree I'd even say mastery, without any need to do so. Just because I felt I needed to grow, to try new things. So I did, and I don't regret it. My job is not glamorous, it won't make me famous, and beyond the salary (which is good, but nothing outlandish) it is no crazy scheme to make me rich. I also cannot really talk about the details with other people, not because of matters of National Security or similar, but because of simple client confidentiality. By the way, I work in a lab that c...

I like silence, be it the kind that makes you hear ringing at night; the kind that spreads wide on a hill surrounded by space; or the kind one finds in libraries and similar locations. There is also the murmuring silence, where there is a group of people, sometimes even a large group, yet everyone speaks softly, shortly, secretly. This is the sort one finds at a centre of prayer such as churches or synagogues; the sort before a classical concert; the sort that populates the water, once we are totally submerged, or bathes in a crackling log fire on a cold winter night, cosy in fleecy socks. Yes, I like silence, with its comforting hush and pillow-like sense of emptiness, of potential. Living in a society plagued with noise, silence has always been a precious commodity. Particularly when one attempts to share its joy with other people. Most people, I'm sure you'll agree, claim to want 'peace and quiet'. Except, dictionaries to the contrary, their quiet does not mean...

Last week, it was my birthday, but I was away for a week, so when I came back to work today, I got all the best wishes. I thanked my coworkers, then went on with my life. I don't really get why people celebrate birthdays. Actually, I do, but only for people who've had a life-threatening scare or are fighting a life condition, which they have overcome (maybe just for now, but a day at a time). In these cases, the people have sort of 'earned' the understanding of what an amazing achievement completing another solar year really means. For the rest of us, who simply live by inertia, unconsciously grateful for modern medicine and a comfortable environment, it has no real meaning. So, why was I away last week, if not to celebrate my birthday? To celebrate life. In a few days, it will be my mother's 7th death anniversary, and my sister and I decided it was time to let her last remains go free, as she loved being. We decided to release her ashes, close that cycle. Mor...

There is a song by Spanish group Amaral , whose lyrics go something like 'without you, I am nothing / a drop of water wetting my face / my world is small and my heart is shards of ice'. I liked the music, thus I didn't pay much attention to the lyrics until Maite , a friend, called this a song by 'Amar mal' (to love badly, unwisely). It has been years since that quip, yet it still keeps me alert to my own conditioning. I am hardly the first person, let alone the most qualified, to point out how very unhealthy most 'romantic love stories' and 'romantic gestures' truly are. And no, I do not blame cinema or pulp fiction, since they are simply providing that which the consumer will buy. Love is another one of those marvelous elements of life, like food, dance, parenthood, even alcohol or adrenaline (to name but a few) that make us, humans, reach the highest peaks of joy and excitement for our mere existence. Love, like all of the others, has been basta...