happy new year

It's always nice to say good bye to an old year,and hello to a new one, recharged, rebooted, re-gigged! ( I just broke my new phone btw...I'm writing this to stop myself from getting a hammer out of the shed...)
But the very end of the year, the last leg, is very stressful, very dark and very busy just when all you really want to do is hibernate...plus " 'tis the season to be jolly!" and there's nothing so certain to depress a depressive than being told to be in a good mood, is there? I think all this conflict usually leads to some sort of overload, followed by some inward collapse, and anything with anticipation attached, just takes longer...(I mean I know I don't even get Christmas presents any more and I'm still too excited to sleep on Christmas Eve.) What a strange time of year! I feel like I've been writing lists, and packing presents and shopping for an age....and I haven't got anything for anyone else yet.
Always there is good and bad, highs and lows, shit and sugar, but this is a particularly heightened time of highs and lows- and as such might make you feel like going off your head till it's all over.

So my year 2012, the year I was forty, the highlights and low lights.

1) Alfie turned four, and I have to say my life is a lot easier, and he finally admitted that, on occasion, he can be naughty. But on the flip-side, he also discovered attitude...so instead of just saying no to everything, he now says no to everything with swag, eg. "No, no, no cream, I not itchy, it's not necessary, Mum you're nagging."
2) Holiday at Porth Cariad with both boys, Mum, Dad and niece, and bezzie mate. Low- made to play scrabble, and watch Lord of the Rings Trilogy.
3) Turned forty, and very pleased about that. Started to hate things that never bothered me before such as buses, technology and radio four comedy...
4) Went on a weeks writing course with Carol Anne Duffy...stopped writing poetry.
5) Went to Poland, started drinking double espressos.... with sugar.
6) Started new job, miss friends at old job.
7) Elis turned 17, Elis will be 18 next...


You see where I'm going with this, you can't have the light without the grey, murky, slightly annoying, disappointing dark, darkness etc. Except...actually you can!! Did you ever get it when Jesus talks about the new wine and the old wine? Cos I know I didn't. (And if you hate me for this- I can't help it...) not until I read Ezekiel that is!!! O yes my favourite book! You see in Ezekiel, or rather just after, it occurred to me that when God gives you a new heart...though you do your best to bring it down, when God lifts you by his Spirit, though you do your best to dampen the flame...it's not a one stop shop my friend, not even a two stop... You know that saying, 'There is power...power, wonder working power,' you know that?...Usually what brings you down is something daft ....like the world. And we are in the world, but we ain't staying in it x I fixed my phone, btw, who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks...wotevs.



And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins.”
Mark 2:21-23


Neither do people pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved.”
Matthew 9:16-18




Ezekiel 1:25-28
New International Version (NIV)
25 Then there came a voice from above the vault over their heads as they stood with lowered wings. 26 Above the vault over their heads was what looked like a throne of lapis lazuli, and high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man. 27 I saw that from what appeared to be his waist up he looked like glowing metal, as if full of fire, and that from there down he looked like fire; and brilliant light surrounded him. 28 Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him.

This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. When I saw it, I fell facedown, and I heard the voice of one speaking.

Ezekiel 3:23-24

New International Version (NIV)
23 So I got up and went out to the plain. And the glory of the Lord was standing there, like the glory I had seen by the Kebar River, and I fell facedown.

24 Then the Spirit came into me and raised me to my feet.


Ezekiel 21:17
New International Version (NIV)
17 I too will strike my hands together,
    and my wrath will subside.
I the Lord have spoken.”