Friday, April 29, 2005

Exams

There'll be no posts here for a couple of weeks (not that that's unusual!) as I am studying for exams. I'm not feeling especially confident about my ability to get through them, but I'm just going to have to do what I can...

My last one's on May 11, so I'll be back soon after that.

Tuesday, April 26, 2005

UK Election

I received a poll card in the mail the other day, which led to the rather surprising discovery that I am eligible to vote in the upcoming UK election. Even though I am not a UK citizen, I am a Commonwealth citizen resident in the UK, and thus entitled to vote! It feels very strange to be given a say in who runs this country even though I need a visa to live here.

Suddenly I feel the need to pay attention to all the media coverage that I've been happily ignoring...

Sunday, April 24, 2005

T.S. Eliot again

T.S. Eliot came alive for me last night.

Why?

Because I heard Eliot himself reading aloud from "The Wasteland" on "A Map of British Poetry" on BBC Radio 4.

It was so completely different to be listening rather than reading, and it helped to know that this was the author's own rendition and thus what he heard in his mind as he wrote it. It sounded like a conversation you might hear in a pub on a Saturday night - nothing special - no doubt there were millions just like it last night.

I suddenly understood that part of what the poem is about is glorying in the everyday conversations we hear around us. If we stop long enough to notice, even the most mundane things become beautiful. How amazing that we can communicate our thoughts with one another and how intriguing to wonder what might be behind the offhand comments we overhear! I have to remind myself of this often so that I don't slide through my days, merely skimming the surface of all that I see, hear, smell, taste, and touch. God has given us all this physical particularity (indeed, God became a particular physical human being); may God help me to notice it more often.

Friday, April 22, 2005

Bodies

I had a stressful day today.

I very nearly caused a horrible accident. No-one was hurt, thank God, but it was close, and I gave myself and several others an awful fright.

Then as I was walking home, I saw a collision between a car and a bike. Again, no-one was hurt, thank God, but the bike was wrecked.

I also have been studying neuro-oncology (i.e., brain tumours), and as I was reading this, I came across this rather shocking quote:
Cellular proliferation is under genetic control, and if somatic mutation creates a variant that proliferates faster, the mutant clone will tend to take over the organism. Thus people have a natural tendency to turn into tumours.
All of this has got me thinking about the fragility of these bodies of ours. I am stunned at how tenuous life is and how utterly dependent I am on the proper functioning and co-operation of billions of cells over which I have no control. I am reminded of how simply and quickly my life - and with it, this thing I call "myself" - could just vanish.