Under the Umbrella and microscope

La Nuit was last night- and what a night it was! Candles, music, dance and desserts for all who could bear to miss out on the football match..Last night was an evening filled with fun and laughter and many a pair of tired dancing feet! It was a real joy to have been a part of another musical night of fun and play with phenomenal musicians who loved every moment and worked through every rehearsal through the difficulties and pressure.  And I have to say that it was worth the no chocolate/coffee/dairy regiment over the last two months, just to keep the vocal chords well oiled for one night of singing and joy!

Thanks to all who came and to all who were a part of the art- whether video, dance, sound, advertising, dancing, singing, or just plain enjoying the night! Some still don’t know what ‘La Nuit’ is, if you feel the same, check out the facebook event, or just ask me!

It never ceases to amaze me how much life and laughter there is in music and how much the arts inspire community.  I have been inspired to take on another project (before the next La Nuit rehearsal schedule which I hope will be just around the corner) – this time I’ve got a little photography project underway with ‘under the umbrella’ which you can see on my Flickr account. It is a photography project I’m using to experiment with portraits of friends and one which I began today but which is still to be added to at a few other dates soon. If you would like to be take part, let me know, though I’m no expert in photography yet so I intend this invitation for models only I think!

photographs

Clearly from previous posts you will see that I, amongst others in this life surely, find it’s so easy to keep busy, but enjoy the time out to pause and spend creative time with friends looking for the beauty that’s clearly just waiting to be captured. I spent hours climbing trees, kneeling in fallen leaves and under bushes just to see if I couldn’t capture a little glimpse of ‘being’ when in the city that is always go go go – even the weather is always changing. It’s good to shelter from it all for a while.

… That’s what I love about the phrase ’spending time’.  Whether it’s hours taken up rehearsing songs for La nuit, clicking the camera and squinting into that tiny viewfinder or even just time to sit and enjoy the park of a Thursday afternoon; there is a return.  You spend your time, I guess you even can take your time, but in return there is a wealth of experience, growth, grace and thankfulness- though the very act of spending is an act, a choice, a cost, a loss.  I am going to be spending my time this week rescheduling work and rest time as well as creative days, and abide times with the Lord, so that how I spend my days in work and rest may hold an essence of balance, without my time being unwisely overspent in any area. Time from my calendar’s point of view is coming under the microscope.  It’s good to do this every few months, I heard today, so that you are aware of how you live and take steps to live well. This week at Re:hope Brian taught on living as we are intended- as a holy people.  God sees even the way I spend my minutes as of utmost importance in growing in holiness- he says take 6 days to work and keep one day a week as the holy one.  God made us to be holy, to be many things, I feel one thing he is calling me to sort out is a lifestyle of balance to grow in His holy timing.  This sense of balance is one I am seemingly always working on, but for this present season I am going to focus my efforts on working hard, living well, living free, getting creative, being thankful and being still and holding each hand in hand with lovely equilibrium.

check Flickr.com/mackirsty for the first round of shoots!

The Night

I love the light. I read today that initially, photos were called ’sun pictures’ because they literally grow from the imprint of sunlight.  They are the artist’s work but the sunlight’s creation.  I love this thought.  The sun with all it’s rainbows has really inspired me lately and given me a glow both superficially and on the inside.  A tan works wonders for the mood and of course vitamin D, but the way the sunlight makes you feel as it pours in your window of a morning is something quite irresistably indescribable.  I find myself happy to be awake and happy to have been woken up by the light at the actual break of dawn.  What is it breaking? It’s breaking the darkness.  I guess it breaks the silence too, but that darkness is one that only a time spent in the deep winters of Scotland can help explain!

The reason that darkness, the night, is considered beautiful and peaceful- i propose- is because it is a time of hope.  We wait like watchmen for the morning… we hope and hope that the night wil not lie to us, that the dawn is skipping across the sky to greet us and all.

Next week, I’m part of a band performing for one night of music and desserts, of vintage class to the rythym of rock and roll.  We called it ‘La Nuit’ the first time, so it made sense to call it ‘La Nuit Deux’ this time round.  The second time round, things are always more interesting.  You have the fear of not doing as well as you did before, but you have the hope of making something new and more wonderful, based on what has been.  The thing about this La Nuit, is that it will probably begin with the drops of sunset streaming into the church glass and it will ruin the romantic bulb lighting we’ll try to make. After sunset we’ll pull out some more songs so that folks really can dance the night away and usher in ‘a new dawn, a new day, a new life…. and feeling good!’

I’m looking forward to singing!

a retreat

Here I am in the middle of a two week break in my usual working routine.  Since renaming the blog ‘ReAwaken’ I have been on a journey to reawaken me.  Parts of my soul and heart were sleeping as parts of my mind and body were over busy lately and I was pulled into a slower rhythm as I realised the need for a break.  I have had a week of resting and a change in the routine of the norm and it’s been so good. I can hear my thoughts and answer the weird and crazy dreams I have.  I am getting to the stage where I don’t think in the morning ‘what do I need to do?’ before anything else.  I have reawakened my ability to just ‘be’ for a little while- all by the grace of God! If it wasn’t for his mercy I would have forgotten to waken those sleepy parts up by taking a rest and they may well have stayed away.  But I thank God for his enlivening words, ”the reality, however, is found in Christ”- that to trust in Him is real and lasting and better than anything or anyplace else.

It was so good and wisely advised for me to go away somewhere and spend time away from the regular. Although the weather was a wash out while I was there, it didn’t detract, at all, from the beauty of the countryside, or my ability to spend many a power-walk taking in the view alongside the incline of a hill doused in rain and sheep tracks to listen for God, clear my mind so that I may be clear minded, and filter out the voices of the world that war against us.  I walked loads and then came ‘home’ to the little B&B unwind.  I would stop in at the little church hall halfway up the hill to the B&B to take in the views at the back as they had a little sun house and garden, complete with photographic opportunity and inspiration, time to pray and read the word or dwell on certain passages from the day.  Here the birdsong was louder than most any other place I have sat and listened. It was a treat to have those songs as the soundtrack as I sat to just ‘be’ for a while or to make my own song with no-one ( i think) around to hear it but God.
Most of my experience of the Lakes this time was had under a grey sky, but the place still looked beautiful and the place I stayedin particularly, was surrounded by green trees and a beautiful landscape, snugly set in the hillside amidst the hush of the country that only birdsong and the bleating of lambs manages to interrupt.  I feel that these words capture my experience this week:

When through the woods and forest glades I wander
and hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees;
when I look down from lofty mountain grandeur,
and hear the brook, and feel the gentle breeze;

Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, how great Thou art!
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, how great Thou art!

And when I think that God his son not sparing,
Sent him to die – I scarce can take it in,
That on the cross my burden gladly bearing,
He bled and died to take away my sin

I was inspired and fed at every turn whilst I was away, even being given a quotation at the breakfast table everyday and a chocolate by my bed every afternoon.  The first of these quotations however really struck a chord: ‘I’m on my way to the future’, she said, and I said, ‘But you’re just sitting there and listening’ and she smiled and said, ‘It’s harder than you’d think with all the noise everyone else is making’. -that’s how I feel, on my way to the rest of my life but so easily trampled on by the sound, imposing thoughts or lives of others to the stage that it’s good to take time to listen and reflect and make sure you let the knowledge of who you are change how you live… what that means? know who you are, knowing my identity as a part of God’s family and not being blown about by every other breeze that is going.. to be carried on his wings through life.

The particular place I stayed in is almost the middle of nowhere compared to where I live most of the time, I could eaily imagine myself free from the city and quite abandoned in the wilderness as it was so quiet and completely dark after sunset and the number of people I passed out on my walks was so small compared to the crowds of sheep, trees and streams.

Here you get the feeling that everything could move a little slower if you let it, and that the urgency of your work and that daily grind could wait if you put it off just little longer.  So, I got in the habit of, if not walking slower than normal, at least tending to lift my eyes up to look around, breathe the good air of the Lakes and work off my breakfast in the country.

Another reason for and gift from this retreat was reigniting a lot of my creative flares which have recently gotten damp and crinkled in the back of some old cupboard under the overflowing sink… Writing songs, reading books, sewing, painting, blogging, even playing instruments has taken a back seat.  I did however, take my inspiration from God’s creativity and get the camera back out again after a long time.  This was a huge sign to me of my soul reawakening and my gaze being set higher than on the everyday.  I took deep and lingering breaths and didn’t rush this time.  It felt like that’s how it should be always.

In Genesis, Isaac goes out to a field to meditate and when he comes back, God has provided an amazing wife for him.  I was struck by the way that this small moment in the story revealed something massive to me which I am repeatedly needing to hold close to my heart:

‘’seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all else will be provided for you” …  Matthew 6:33