Haha, I’ve actually started procrastinators’ blog, but guess what, IT’S EMPTY so far… Every time I want to start writing I, guess what, POSTPONE.
On Wednesday I am submitting the first draft of the dissertation. This means three days of very hard work, because today and yesterday no work at all was done: we went to the North-West, to Rishab’s friend Kat’s ‘bothy’ as she calls it. It’s a small cottage, which is partly 300 years old, partly reconstructed in the 70s of the previous century. It is in the middle of nowhere, so for about a mile you technically walk through swamps and other things, climbing up and sliding down the hills. But the view is definitely worth it. Yesterday evening the sunset was so beautiful, that I couldn’t believe it. I actually didn’t realise I saw what I saw. We walked, and stopped to stare at the sky, and the hills, and the lochs; it’s like in a book, or a film, or the most photoshop-like postcard of Scotland; only in reality the colours are much, much, much brighter. When you see something like this, it feels as if you’ve arrived somewhere you’ve been walking to your entire life, and it seems strange and unbelievable, that anything at all can matter; all those things that usually matter to you, how can they matter? But this beauty is remote, and untouchable, elusive; it’s like a thirst that can’t be satisfied; and you think, what shall I do with it? It’s so bigger than all you think about, and all your ambitions; it’s worth more than all the money in the world, yet you can’t pack it, seal it, bring it back to the city and sell. You can’t even describe it, can’t take a picture of it which would truly reflect it; it exists only there, for a few seconds, in your eyes, and then it changes, and changes again.
On our way back today we soaked through, and I was so happy to get on the bus to Glasgow (in Ballachulish about half a dozen of locals were involved in ensuring that we catch the right bus). I was happy to see the civilisation again; Glasgow polished by rain, looking oily and fresh, with enticing fragrance of food and coffee in the streets, and subtle waves of perfumes.
So now back to my draft. I ran what seems a thousand regressions, and now am going to describe the results. My regressions are of a very primitive type, but the results are actually ok; I anticipate a very painful and slow process though of selecting what’s relevant to my question and what’s not. Once I submit the (daft) draft, I will work on the literature review, and on getting the feedback from my supervisor I will be ready to work on the necessary changes. Sounds so simple. Haha. God, it’s technically three weeks left, I can’t believe it! Horrid.
Long time ago we borrowed Ratcatcher from the Library, a film by Lynne Ramsay. I haven’t written about it, because I haven’t been able to find a link to a good review on it. The more or less tolerable is here: http://film.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/Critic_Review/Guardian/0,4267,50976,00.html. Frankly, I was surprised by just how superficial all the reviews are. It is indeed a film which is only made ‘tolerable’ by ‘just enough warmth’ diluting the chill (I still have goosebumps). I feel that it’s a very expressive film about the supreme importance of the concept of DWELLING in our lives; how the place where we live shapes us, changes us, twists us according to its own will. I suddenly felt acutely that the house we’re living in is about a hundred years old, that it wasn’t one flat but one and a half, that the people who lived here relatively recently didn’t have a bathroom, that it was all so, so different then, but so much of it remains still, and we are the heirs of what it was like; the flat, the street, the area influences me, changes me, encourages certain thoughts, actions, a certain way of looking at myself and my life. I already dream of the next place I will live in, and these dreams shape my future, and prepare me for the change the new place will impose on me.
