Mozambique, my love...

Music to watch my life by....

A collegue on the refugee network is in a band, Soulfire. They've just released a CD. And its really lovely. Of course, as always happens with new CDs, every other song feels like its speaking to me in the situation I'm in right now. Its a total cliche, but its true!

But in a way, something's missing as well, or at least it was. You see, much as I love the love song thing, it doesn't really apply to me. I mean, much as every girl wants to hear the line 'sleep tight, I think you're beautiful' once in a while, it's not my life. I'm single, I have been for a long time, and doubtless will be for some time to come. Don't think I'm fishing for sympathy here. We all know how notoriously picky I am!

The point is though, that what I do experience frequently, is that kind of contact with social injustice, sadness and worry that does not need love songs or freedom songs or angry songs, but quiet contemplative songs about the reality of life. Songs about relationships between people that aren't about sex, ultimately. Songs about frustration, tiredness, ineptitude. About the beauty of a disabled child, or the strength in women who live with terminal illness, or the comfort of spending time in the company of others when all feels desperate and lonely.

I can't write them, unfortunately. I would love to. I would love to be able to put poetry to music, to express this weird world in song and sound. But, well, I have neither the talent nor the time, what with a hectic job, B, a house, two gardens, three chickens, beadwork, tailoring, writing, photography...

Whilst writing this, however, my lovely friend J appeared online and asked me if I'd heard of pandora.com. As if by providence, he tells me of this amazing internet radio station that only plays music that you like. You type in an artist, and it finds lots of similar artists you might like. And I found this:

Overriding Volunteer - Finley Quaye

While bodies burn, the children learn
How the money's earned, with growing concern
In the gallery, three distinguished strangers
Who had found there way home.......
Ricochet and muzzle flash
Superfluous, luxurious,
Commodities, communities
Democracies, security

They don't want your money
Overriding volunteer
They don't think you're funny at all.
Overriding volunteer

Lindesfarne and Banochburn
Inadequacy, inaccuracies
Heritage, more discoveries
While the fishermen sail the seas
Chemicals, minerals, culture and war,
Is that all this place is good for
Hundreds of years, unsettled scores
Rivalry and bribery

They don't want your money
Overriding volunteer
They don't think you're funny at all.
Overriding volunteer

Initiative on the killing floor
Each man is there for the next man
That's the horror and the terror of war
And your overriding volunteer
Inter-unit strife, think about your wife
Another mission rehearsal, so you know the procedure.
The rotor wash, N.C.O., incursion and extraction.
Numbing the population, evacuees, contingency..

They don't want your money
Overriding volunteer
They don't think you're funny at all.
Overriding volunteer

Movie reels on a photo slide
In a mountainside where the warlords hide
Send them to the sky
Send them to the sea
Spread them all over the land
The slaves and the gold and the ivory
The artist cry, as the good ones die
Charities and the refugees
The monetary man with a momentary plan

They don't want your money
Overriding volunteer
They don't think you're funny at all.
Overriding volunteer

.....

I really like it.

Maybe I will find music that really 'speaks to me'. Though perhaps I also need to learn to accept that my life is just plain weird, so I'll always feel slightly left out!

warm days, even though its cold

A Treatment Action Campaign meeting and protest. Some kids I insisted I took their photos, the crowd looked beautiful, and Erica danced with the best of them. Afterwards we sat and warmed up with some hot chocolate.