The fool who persists in his folly will become wise (William Blake)

The Fool embraces the unexpected delay as an unforeseen opportunity.

It didn't much feel that way earlier today though. I had readied myself to travel to Manchester for an interview with the Script Team at Shameless (shame on you if you haven't watched it - it has to be one of the most exciting, authentic programmes broadcast!) The preparation had been done, the outfit chosen, the spirit calmed and collected. Then I found out that infact we were meant to be there at 9.30, not 2.30 as we had been told - so interview postponed. As much as I accept all things as the flow of life, I must admit to growling down the telephone at the messenger of this news.

That is, until my fellow wild woman Ruth informed me that today was not an auspicious day anyway, especially for Fools, as this was the same day that Pope John XXII had ordered the inquisition at Carcassone to seize the property of witches, sorcerors , those who make wax images, and troubadours.

Follow the story if you will...

1) last night I had a dream and in the dream I was holding a piece of parchment, old and stained. On this I saw written in script the names of people and beside the names, titles such as God's Fool, Troubadour, Minstrel etc. The edges of this paper were burnt black;

2) when I was in the Convent, I met a Friar from New York who remarked that there was a link between the Troubadour and the Franciscan, with the poet being at the centre of this heart - a bolt shot through me as he said this. This I KNEW. Discovering and embracing my path as the Fool was the most profound experience;

3) the only thing I knew about St Francis when I entered the Convent was that he was called God's Fool (if you want to read more on him, try starting with The Journey and The Dream, by Murray Bodo);

4) 1 year ago, we were visited by the Troubadours of Divine Bliss from Kentucky - the result of me having emailed them a year before that, when stumbling on their site as I followed the scent of the Troubadour;

5) 2 years ago, I was offered the chance to stay in Carcassonne at a writing retreat - I was too ill to take the opportunity, but nevertheless...

6) 3 years ago, I declared one day, in the company of wild women, that I was a Troubadour, that I had been a Troubadour before...it came out the blue, but hit me with such clarity that I had to say it out loud;

7) at the same time, I was given a beautiful gift that now sits on my fireplace - a large silver spoon, and on it is engraved Troubadour - not his doing, but an old spoon, and an old engraving!

Part of the journey is recognising the scent and following it, wherever it goes. So, thanks Ruth for putting another piece in the puzzle. I don't quite know why the events of today happened, but I am renewed in my belief that there is a path unfolding that I must trust, even if I can't see it all clearly.

Templar Car

Oh Lord, won't you give me a

Templar Sportette...

every wondered how God gets around so quick? Well, now you know...a handy little sports number for all your pastoral needs. 0 - eternity in only 7 lifetimes.

This little gem was found on a fascinating website:

http://www.ordotempli.org/the_templars_motor_car.htm

Fragments of a heart on fire...

Day 22

I open the battered box.
In the dark, bright-eyed bats
circle the air, tangle notes
in the hair-strands of my thoughts;

these are the doubting times.
Nothing can be found, or good, in here.

A small light flickers,
glow-worm silk moth, firefly
against the night, bright wings
of sticky incandescence
beating, beating,
learning how to raise
its body from the ground.

I lift it up, hold it carefully
in the hole of my palm,
wait for the sun
to dry its wings,
help it fly.

(from Fragments - Victoria Bennett, Wild Women Press 2006)

FOOTNOTE: The poems collected in Fragments were written, one day at a time, during my stay of 40 days and nights at The Poor Clare Convent, Crossbush, UK. I joined 3 other female volunteers, the Sisters and the all-women crew from Tiger Aspect Productions. who documented our shared and individual experiences. The final cut of this journey was transmitted on BBC2 in June/July 2006. It was a unique adventure.

Thirteen Wild Ways

I thought I would share with you my personal, daily guide to living 'wild', developed over the years as I have trodden the Fool's path. At last writing, the list seemed to find itself at 13 (the magical number of the goddess) but I am sure it will keep growing...Number One: step off.

The Blissfool personal guide to having cake and eating it...

1. Be...foolish
the fool is the adventurer who steps off the ledge. Be willing to take that first step - it teaches you how to fly! And we all know...without the fool, the journey cannot begin!

2. Be...OK
just do what you can do and forgive yourself the messy bits in between.

3. Be...happy
doing more of what gives you pleasure and love really does make you happy! So give up postponing happiness 'til tomorrow, or putting on that martyred yoke and enjoy life. Live it with boldness and beauty.

4. Be...honest
with yourself, with others, with life.

5. Be...generous
love increases the more you give it. Try not to hoard it, hide it or harangue it - the bigger your heart, the more love it can receive - same goes for money, pleasure, anything (remember to give yourself the same big love!)

6. Be...courageous
in loving, living and creating.

7. Be...expressive
creative and spontaneous expression unlocks the spirit. It helps us to understand who we are and what our own experience is all about. Do not hide your voice - each individual voice makes up the collective heartbeat of the earth.

8. Be...playful
who said growing up means giving up? Try to maintain that idealism and enthusiasm of innocence. Ok, so life can hurt like bloody hell at times but soul suicide is not the answer. The more you remember to play, the more you will be able to live and learn through the hard times.

9. Be...sexy
in your body, mind and spirit. Celebrate your sex, your voice, your dreams. Enjoy your body, the world around you, the beauty and sensuality of living. Celebrate yourself!

10. Be...powerful
power comes from taking charge of your own destiny, your own day-to-day, your own place in the world. So, don't say you can't do something because someone/thing says it is impossible. If you have a dream, take action and if you think the world is unfair, unkind etc. then take creative steps to change it now. Anything is possible!

11. Be...responsible
not advocating a Christ-like burden here but simply saying that if each of us takes positive responsibility for our own lives, things change for the better. You can't live your life martyred to another person, thing or cause (well, you can but...) but you can be responsible for ensuring that at least in your life you act as much as possible from a place of love and respect - for each other, yourself and the earth you live on. This world can be a better place just by you being in it.

12. Be... you
that is the wildest thing you can do. Don't wait for someone else to give you the seal of approval - give it to yourself.

13. Be...well, just be
there are a lot of people and things in this world that tell us to hurry up, push on, keep going. We soak up rules and regulations until we are so restricted we can't move. Try giving it up for a moment. Most things that feel impossible start to feel a whole lot easier when you relax. So next time you are run ragged, fearing failure, or simply saying it can't be done - sit back, listen to the birds, watch the clouds roll by...

A Life Documented

"...for the artist, this sense that she is herself the text, means that there is little difference between her life and her art...the effect of a life experienced as an art or an art experienced as a kind of life..."

(Susan Gubar: The Blank Page and Female Creativity)

I have always documented my life - through journals, poetry, photography, film, music... Before I could document my own life, it was documented by my mother, through her visual art.

For the last year, I have collaborated with my partner in creating our own videoblog, thecommonpeople and now, I am creating this blog. More bizarrely, I was recently a participant in a television 'documentary' - an interesting, enlightening, challenging and not wholly pleasant experience. I did not take part in the TV programme for any stardom dreams. It was much more personal than that. I don't even own a TV - and never have! But it did present me with a fascinating experience as an artist. To engage in the process gave me an opportunity to be both aware of myself as observed and then to see that self edited, transformed in a creative process through film-making, and returned to me through the act of viewing a DVD. Thus becoming in that action, the observer and the mediated-observed.

In the initial contract, I had to agree to the 'reproduction of my physical likeness, in the known universe and unknown, in perpetuity' - (honestly - that was the wording!). In the documented life, this is exactly what it becomes - both me and not me. It is the creation of Me through art.

What is it to be both observer and observed? How does this connect with the 21st Century media obsession with 'reality television', the documentation of 'ordinary lives', or the increasing number of 'tv confessionals'? What about our obsession with documenting and sharing lives through this, the medium of Blogging?

I have a theory that in time, this exposure will eventually lead to a more connected, emotionally transparent world. That this reclaiming of media is infact a 'quiet revolution'. However, having recently just survived the weighty judgement of TV viewing folk, I can see that before we reach Utopia, we might just have to go through the increasing tendency to label, box and accept/reject with alarming speed that seems to also accompany such programmes.

Which takes me to an old favourite of mine, the bad-boy Byron (more on him later - he and I go way back!). This pretty boy made an artform of his life. He was, in effect, the first self-created celebrity, maintaining just enough haze of what was true and what was created as to intrigue the social gossips. Of course, he wrote his own downfall and received the all too familiar condemnation from his former fans. Not to be put down, he had a gilded coach made in a replica of Napoleon's, and left London on the day of his exile, in style and two-fingered glamour and went off to became a revolutionary hero, dying young and beautiful in some romantic location. On his death, his estate protectors burnt all his diaries, thus securing his fame for years to come. He created his 'observed image' to the extent that no-one knows the reality - and one is left wondering - did he?

What is the truth of a created life? What is the creation? The interior becomes exterior, the private is made public. By documenting our personal existence, we empower our self to be active in the creation of the past, the present, the future. Self-obsession becomes self-documented analysis becomes self-knowledge becomes recorded existence. In the end, I return to the belief I began with - that our greatest creative act is our lived experience.

"...Your life is the manifestation of your dream; it is an art. And you can change your life any time if you are not enjoying the dream. Dream masters create a masterpiece of life, they control the dream by making choices..."
(Don Miguel Ruiz)

A thousand forgotten nights

"...In one creative thought
a thousand forgotten nights of love revive..." (Rilke)

Lillium

Fingering pollen-dusted fronds
I think of the last time we met,

of how your body opened to mine
like this flower, unashamed,
abandoned to the heat of our night's sun.

Delicate,
such raging extravagance
is not meant to last the summer.

(from Fragile Bodies, Wild Women Press 2004)

...at night, I spin lines from my desire, heat-ribbons left out for you to find...

You too were for rapture strung

"...the only courage that is demanded of us: to have the courage for the most strange, the most singular and the most inexplicable that we may encounter..." (Rilke)

Dictionary interpretation of the Fool: from the latin follis translating as 'bellows, windbag or empty-headed person'; fools rush in where angels fear to tread - a person without good judgement will have no hesitation tackling a situation that even the wisest person would avoid...

STOP!

The Fool is:

the creative spark, the new beginning, the inspirational step.
the sponaneous heart, the innocent adventurer, the unconventional, ecstatic lover.
the first step to wild living, to Being.

According to Joseph Cambell, there are three terms or words in the ancient language of Sanskrit that refer to 'the jumping-off place to the ocean of transcendence'. These are:

Sat = being
Chit = consciousness
Ananda = rapture

(Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth, pp. 113, 120)

Creative living is the refusal to see any dream as beyond the envisioning and the willingness to always step out off the ledge. Even when the force of disapproval lands heavy in its blow...

Step out, step out!

'...Something to my heart replies
You too were for rapture strung.
Why else the dreams that rise
round you when the year is young.'
(Arnaut Daniel, 12thC Troubadour)

Speak of ecstasies beyond the telling

This body is for making love.
It burns, creates
heat-shimmer in my eyes;

leaves out mirages
so almost-real,
I can feel their touch.

(from Book of Days - a work in life-progress)