Little My has been away for 2 days with a work meeting retreat in a middle of the nowhere guest house place with no mobile phone signal and limited internet access. With 6 other knit your own yoghurt types. Oh dear. I hope that this is vague enough to not get me the sack, should someone stumble upon it. Then again, perhaps getting the sack would be a blessed relief!
So, the cast:
A- makes us say verses and mediatations before sessions. Brought her own goat's milk.
B- bossy and wants her own way and charges around has decided before she asks. Brought fartichokes to put in the soup so gets brownie points for that. Veggie, decaf, talks about 'astrality' a lot.
C- brought her own oat(yes, oat, not goat) milk. Doesn't do coffee, meat, sugar, wheat etc etc. Wants everyone to get on and it all to be lovely.as loopy as they come Does give nice hugs though.
D- My aussie mate you may remember from blogs from the summer any oldies around. Has made friends with F and hates my boss and is thus grumpy with me cos I agree with him. Complicated but she's in a grump and also likes her own way and disagrees with my view. Vegan, hearty walker.
E- the only man. He colour coordinates his clothes to the planets associated with the days of the week. Has 9 children and quotes books that he just 'happened to have with him by chance' hahaaaaar yeah right! He can navel gaze and ramble for Britain.
F- bossy, I WILL have my own way, and I don't like LM so will disagree with her on principle over everything and hector people into submission. Brought crayons and paper and made us sing.
LM- well, you know.
So, rather than a 50 page ramble, here are the highlights.
Monday night get there. 2 pairs have to share. F and B refuse and E is a boy (snigger) so
I had to share a room cos of too many 'Oh I don't mind sharing, but you really wouldn't want to share with me cos I snore/eat people/singing rousing Christian hymns/ in my sleep type comments. (clever buggers)
" I shit myself" didn't seem to put anyone off (or not C anyway who has shared with me before)
Dinner. Strategically placed myself next to more funner people or at least ones I don't want to stab with my fork.
F says The rule for this retreat is that you are not allowed to sit in the same place twice or next to the same person.
Is there a rule for the limit of forks one can stab someone with? Just asking...
Veggie dinner.
First meeting. Let’s say a verse first. Let’s arrange our sessions according to the planetary qualities and the Holy nights.
Is there a planet for shut the f*** up and get on with it? Just asking....
They go to bed at 10pm. I try to sneak on here but as I am opening up the laptop, A says Oh I don’t think so….! Leave that alone. This is a retreat. We need to take our thoughts into our sleep so we can come back tomorrow with them transformed. Not even a mobile signal so can't sneak on my phone under the bed clothes.
LM goes to bed and dreams of axes and murder.
Morning. I sneak up early and go downstairs to get on the computer and a bit of fun with you lot. B is there already making soup and singing and making tea. Luckily she goes back to bed and I get to sneak on and say Hi before C gets up and comes down.
Oh no, you can’t sit there this morning, you were there last night.
Lets say a verse and have a moments silence before we start and call on the angels to guide us.
Those angels never guided me out of that place like I asked them!
So what thoughts did the night bring?
best lie eh?
I think we should express our feelings about this question through the medium of colour says F.
Oh god, get me out of here please. No chance.
Poo coloured crayons and lots of sniggering later.
F says stop laughing, you have to listen to this cos E is talking about your picture. I did some squiggles and some bullshit about inspiration and joy and E starts saying oh you used mercurial colours how interesting… bblah. Thank god that’s over…
OH NO,that would be too simple and kind. We now have to deface eachothers with how things are now…. More poo coloured crayons. Try to look as if I am taking it seriously while writing my shopping list and wondering how many crayons up F’s nose would it take to stop her breathing….
Hearty walk after lunch. No thanks says LM. Oh I’ll walk slowly with you if you want says B. No, sniff, its fine, I need a rest, don’t let me hold you up etc…. my hips... you know...
They go off, I leap up and get computer and log on only to hear F outside the door. Its raining.She's shelter ing from the rain outside the door talking very loudly. arrgghhh Shut down computer and go upstairs and try up there. F goes away again switch on computer and then the others come back minus D and F.
Give up. More verses and metaphors and pictures and loss of will to live.
Dinner. Oh you can’t sit there….
After dinner F suggests we all sing a rousing song together... LM thinks of songs about murder and escape... and then laid on the sofa and pretended to be asleep and say I might not make it through this session, you know cancer and that.... . It was that or kill F and possibly a couple of others too. F started hectoring everyone into getting her own way which I hate when everyone else goes quiet and gives up so I ‘woke up’ and argued back. Got grumped at for arguing.
They went to the pub apart from B who went to bed. A had a half of real ale. The rest had juice. I feigned tiredness and went to bed. As soon as they were out the door and snuck on here and called for help. I also snuck back down at bedtime saying I was too tired to sleep and unwound with you lot and word games on FB.
Morning…. Argue, don’t sit there, verse, barley cup, lentils, I want a new job. I hate you all. Cancer is bad enough, what did I do to deserve this?
Oh and to top it all, a message that my lovely boss who paid me full wages rather than SSP as it was his discretion so the governors could damn well do as he says and ‘ understands’ if you know what I mean, anyway he’s leaving at the end of the year. Poo.
So I am home and back with you lot and back to school tomorrow so got to prepare some lessons.
And the moral of the story is…
If anyone invites you to knit your own yoghurt, or uses the words express, medium and colour in the same sentence, run my precious ones, run like the wind.
The bar is open for steak tartare, gin and coffee.
Little My x
