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Broken Nostalgia & Bloody Adele – Featured Blog

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Today’s posts from our featured Port Elizabeth Blogger:

Broken Nostalgia & Bloody Adele by Keep Passing the Open Windows:

* Kate Hudson having a bit of a sniffle after listening to the new Adele song* 

 

I have begun to notice lately that I seem to be void of nostalgia. As a person who is quite intense when it comes to “feelings” I must admit it strikes me as a little odd that I am incapable of tying present importance to the past. Whenever friends chat about music from our school days, or get all gooey-eyed because someone played Nirvana/Offspring/Smashing Pumpkins I must admit (with the exception of one single artist who is the only one who manages a sort of guilt driven nostalgia) it does almost nothing except remind me that I’m glad I don’t have to listen to that stuff anymore. Ooooh the blasphemy! Sorry folks….but they’re quite terrible…and noisy…I’m old now. I have no desire to listen to any of that music that we all used to sit around loving together anymore. I loved it as a kid but honestly find it quite not-something-I-want-to-listen-to-even-a-little today. Even music from the past that I do still like doesn’t quite work. I still love K’s Choice and Sheryl Crow and Tori and Fiona and and and….but they don’t bring back memories so much as just remind me that hey, I like this song. 

But every now and then a song like this one will come along and tumble me into a strange nostalgic-like funk that I can’t get out of, despite the fact that the song itself has no ties to the past at all. I can’t help but wonder why that is. I wonder if it isn’t like every now and then something comes along that resonates really hard with who I am as a whole. It’s like it tickles the entirety of it all. Past, present, future. It’s all there. And when it hits the whole then the feeling of nostalgia just kind of tumbles down. It’s incredible then to once again acknowledge the inarguable power of art in all of its forms to affect and change and inspire and revive our very souls.

This song here, which I ignored for days partly because I hardly care for music anymore and partly because I have been passionately occupied by the politics of our country, managed to be just such a song. I love it when you hear  or see or read something for the first time and you feel like you’ve always known it, even if what it means to you is something completely different to what it means to the artist. I reckon that’s pretty damn special.

Read more here: Keep Passing the Open Windows

Silver Lined Asshole by Keep Passing the Open Windows:

Photo on 2015-10-24 at 6.24 PM #2I’m home alone right now. The rest of South Africa is out watching the rugby. It’s not quite my thing. So I’m here, breathing steady after the emotional turmoil over the last few days, and just doing some quiet thinking.

The last few days have been a thing of magnificence for me. While I did go down and witness/join some of the #feesmustfall protests, they were not “mine” to claim, so I can’t say I “lived them” or anything quite so glamorous. What I can say is that I got  a lot out of them. So much that I cannot properly express my gratitude. Throughout these protests I got to open my eyes (and I love opening my eyes!) to the plight of our country. I was made to think a little further than I have in the past. I am quite socially aware of the kind of things that need to be fought for in this country, or I at least try to be, but of course this made me look at those things even harder. I also got to meet some magnificent people, in real life and on Facebook. I was reminded by so many of my friends about why I am so grateful to have them in my life. I got to watch some people start out spewing bile, and then humbly turn around and start considering things from a new perspective. This was an especially incredible thing to witness and experience because it serves as such a powerful reminder that we are all capable of the most beautiful change.

And then….*sigh*….there were the assholes. Now let me tell you I spend a lot of time cringing at something I’ve spotted on social media, and then relaxing because I already knew that the poster-of-the-assholishness was a bit of a dick (please don’t ask me why I allow them to stay on my timeline – for the most part it is out of familial or social obligation and because I tend to feel like the “unfollow” button is a tad bit disingenuous so I don’t use it). A lot of the mean and kind of blind stuff being said by people I know was not surprising. Like a real lot of it. So because that kind of fit in with the source I must admit it didn’t bother me. The part that did kind of sting, however, was when the the most vile things started coming from a couple of surprising people. In the last week I have witnessed viciousness spew from the mouthes of folks whom I used to hold in high regard and to be honest with you I don’t quite know how to handle it. Of course the feelings and opinions of others are possibly not my business, and for me to be “hurt” by them is quite unreasonable (not to mention that if they feel that way about these particular things then I must be a HUGE disappointment to them as well) and yet I sit here with a very strange feeling that dynamics have shifted in a lot of places and I am unsettled.

The thing is though, I can’t make people see what they don’t want to see. I can only speak my own truth and know that if in doing so it is possible that I will make at least one person think a little bit more about something important. In managing this, dealing with the backlash of those truths becomes not only worth it, but even more relevantly necessary. Still, I am saddened by the severe lack of conscientiousness on my timeline. I’m saddened by the refusal to try and understand the beginning of what could be the most incredible revolution for our country. I can’t help thinking that I feel so good right now. I wish you would let go of your prejudice and feel good too. Hope is such a powerful thing.

I probably can’t help those people. I can note them though. And in doing so I can ensure that the relationships closest to me remain as uplifting and edifying as possible. I can ensure that the people who I allow into my psyche are not the energy sucking naysayers, but those whose souls act as fodder for my own soul, and vice versa.

Because if I have learned one thing in this last week it is that we are good for each other. We need each other. We are each other. And dammit that feels bloody amazing.

Read more here: Keep Passing the Open Windows

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Port Elizabethan

This author is a 'catch-all' for occasional articles and letters written to MyPE. The Author of each article can be found in the signature at the bottom of each individual article.