Saturday 5 March 2011

A floating cosmic cloud of vagueness

‘Mum,’ said James, as we were driving along the valley road. ‘You know how I often know what’s coming? Which colour cars will come next, and how many?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, I think I could develop that. I think I could train it.’
‘Yes.’
‘Because we only use a tiny part of our brains, don’t we? And so much of this stuff that we think is spooky or weird or psychic is probably just stuff we haven’t figured out yet.’
‘YES!’
‘Yes?’
‘Sure. Well, it makes perfect sense to me. After all, what is time? It’s not necessarily linear. It could loop and you could just be seeing round the bend. And anyhow, time is just another dimension.’
That’s what I thought. And, Mum?
‘Yes.’
‘You know we see three dimensions? But what if there were, like, seven, eight or a hundred dimensions?’
‘OH YESSSSS.’
‘And then all this – is just the tiniest fraction of the whole. Like a three dimensional object appearing in a two-dimensional world.’
‘And, of course, none of this is as it appears anyhow. It’s all just energy moving at different frequencies.’

‘Okay, STOP it, you two,’ Adrian butted in irritably. ‘I don’t want to think about this kind of thing. It freaks me out.’
‘But it’s amazing. It’s wonderful.’
‘It’s frightening. This is a car – don't  you dare try to convince me it’s just a jumble of nothingness.’
‘But…’
‘No. It’s like when you say that you are always thinking about infinity. It’s no wonder you don’t sleep. See, I never do that. I don’t want to.’
‘Well that’s fine. It’s your choice.'
‘Mum?’
‘Mmm?’
‘Which is your favourite science? It’s physics, isn’t it?’
‘I guess. But I’m interested in all of them.’
‘You’re such a geek.’
‘I wish. I don’t understand it, not on an intellectual level. But I quite like not understanding it entirely as it’s changing all the time anyhow; so you can’t really know it anyway.’
‘What’s your favourite section of physics? It’s particle stuff, isn’t it?’
‘Yeah, I love the connections. The way you can shoot out into the depths of space and then come whooshing right in, smaller and smaller and tinier and tinier until you’re into quarks...’
‘And electrons, and neutrons...’
‘And photons.’

‘La la la…. I’ll stick to history.’ Guess who?
‘And then science and spirituality meet. I’ll have to show you this clip I found on YouTube. It’s unbelievably beautiful and really rather comforting.’

‘You’re changing,’ said Adrian. ‘Or rather you’re going back. When I met you, you were always talking about physics and magic; you listened to music all the time and you were spooky and more than a bit scary.’
‘I was?’
‘You were. And now you’re getting it back. You look younger too, about ten years younger.’
I do?

Actually, I think I do. I’ve stopped giving up. Instead I’ve given in. I’ve discovered life again. Maybe I’m finding me again, a real me (as real as any of us can get). Certainly not the me who tried to fit in. And, oh how hard I tried so hard to fit the labels – wife and mother, sensible journalist and author, grown up. But it never really worked. I often wondered why I couldn’t get things right – why I never really made a decent career out of my books, for example; why I could never squeeze this blog into a neat little slot.

Someone told me I was a ‘health writer’ and I tried to fit into that role, while getting bored sick of writing about health. Someone said I was a ‘mummy blogger’ (because I am a mother?) but that never rang true. And you know what? It’s because I can’t squeeze all of me into one role. I don’t seem capable of focussing on one aspect of life. I splurge all over the place. I have a flibberty-gibbet mind – it’s why I used to love journalism. It gave me permission to research loads of totally different subjects. I know little bits about loads of stuff – but don’t really know anything in depth. I’m amorphous, a floating cosmic cloud of utter vagueness.

The more I think about it, the more I think I need several different personae. I need a few more dimensions while I’m at it too.


Watch this....just please do...

10 comments:

F said...

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.


-Dear old Will

I have no problem at all with your and James' philosophy of the universe and all its infinite possibilities. It's much akin to my own.

Sandie said...

Wow, that film is amazing... going to show it to the kids now.

Interesting though in terms of people often viewing science and such Clinical Truths as somehow out of kilter with irrational beliefs such as God, ghosts, afterlife etc, and yet watching this as a film - seeing the vastness, the complexity - how could anyone be adamant against the existence of *anything* that cannot be easily and logically explained..??

If all that is possible (i.e. what we see in the film) and much of it so out of reach... then there could exist, somewhere, absolutely anything.

Exmoorjane said...

Frankie: dear old Will gets it right sometimes, don't he?

Sandie: Isn't it fabulous? And love the music too. I've never understood how people separated science and spiritulity... but hey, each to their own. Glad you like it too. :)

Alison Cross said...

Science and magic, yep, it's the same thing under different guises. Eventually we'll understand everything and life will be MORE magical, not less.

I have had similar conversations with Tertarus:

'Inside your head', he noted one day, 'is all like this' *he motions a sine wave with his hand*

I nod in agreement.

And inside your head, WHEN I'M TALKING is all like this. *I motion a flatline*. 'There is also exactly the same monotone that you used to get when the telly stopped broadcasting'.

He nodded in agreement *sigh*

Sometimes I think I'd be better off sharing life with a dog.

Fran Hill said...

You have really deep conversations in the car. We used to play the pub game (count how many legs mentioned in each pub sign) and that stopped any of the heavy stuff.

Miss Sadie said...

What an amazing conversation!

We are truly limited by only the boundaries we are willing to accept. In maybe a hundred or so dimensions of energy.

Couldn't get the bit at the end to work for me, but I'll try again.

Joanne said...

Sometimes I wonder why I found you again inside the internet, and then sometimes I *really don't*

Exmoorjane said...

Ali: *BIG grin* Love that...

Fran: not always...but it is a time that James and I often have the 'meaningful' ones...something about not making eye contact, mebbe. Having said that, he's still keen on the hideous roadkill game. We're even stevens at the moment.

Miss S: oh no, you have to see the clip... if it still won't work, email me and I'll send it to you.

Jo: we are inextricably linked by the very air...one day nubby blanket will reappear too...our photons are entangled, we're doomed!

Michele Brenton aka banana_the_poet said...

Fitting in. How I hate despise and reject that concept utterly and passionately. It isn't just dimensions that are infinite - it is our imaginations and our personalities.

I never understood how people thought a multiple personality was a disorder. To me a single personality is the biggest and saddest disorder anyone could possibly be cursed with.

We are all at least 6 different personalities fading in and out and sometimes blended into one harmonious choir - but who of any interest or excitement is just ONE?

Anonymous said...

V

I don't have a life:
I exist in the corners
Of the lives of others
Kind enough to lend me space.
No, don't shake your head,
Protest and frown,
Condemning me for self-pity.
It's true: the words say it all:
Wife, daughter, friend, mother.
They define me by my
Relationships with others.
My name: a jumble of sounds
Meaning nothing in themselves,
A label by which to identify,
Quantify, stratify and forget:
Put me in my box
And hope I stay there.
Me, I reduce my name
To a single initial.
It takes up less space, less attention.
And maybe, just maybe
Beyond all names
I may shine, alone.

The wv is nilions. I do love the wv thing
Viv