Learning to Breathe Slowly

I'm not sure I can place my finger on why, exactly, but I've been thinking a lot about the ("Tragic") little flat I lived in before I moved here to Brockley. That strange, self-contained world will probably always be a memory I hold on to as a time when my horizons were the closest they've ever been. Today, I learned that Pygar, the angel from Barbarella died in LA, aged 70. I wonder what he looked like in his later years and whether the place he went to has see-through plastic boobs.

I've done very little indeed today and I think I'm to consider it quite an achievement, really. My hands feel a lot better for spending the day watching Quantum Leap and Tin Man and doing nothing more strenuous than changing channel.

The Blank Page

spring.jpg, originally uploaded by zombiecoterie.

Yep, along with Tennis Elbow and Golfer's Elbow, I've got writer's block. Block. Yep, not the condition where writers damage their testicles by shirking work in favour of perpetual masturbation until they accidentally jizz out their prostate like a little butter bean. No, I'm not in that dire a need of a Muse just yet, just of stuff to do.

It seems the world's not ended yet, none of my Deaf friends have died because I couldn't be there to interpret for them and everyone's been fine about me cancelling work, so my days have been filled with reading too much about Greek Mythology for a Year 6 group's tour next Tuesday (I might post some notes here) and trying to do chores. That's not really terribly busy, so I'm facing the writer's greatest fear - the blank page.

Not the blank of a computer screen waiting for me to talk to it or type in short bursts (like now) but the great white expanse that is my diary! Well, it's more a warzone of struck-through interpreting bookings that I have cancelled. I don't have much work for a while. Even assuming everything goes ok with the National Gallery, that'll take a few months to get started and longer still until it provides a living wage. I've got bits and pieces of consultancy, performance and the like coming up, and it looks like I've got an exhibition in July (woo! You're coming and buying stuff, yes?), but other than that, it's a whole empty ocean of possibility ahead of me.

I keep oscillating between being terrified and terrifically excited. I've got a reasonably sellable skill set, even without the sign language interpreting stuff. It's just a case of making sure the right people hear about it before I start wondering if I can get benefits for being a mentalist or start on the game. I think RSI might be a problem, so I can't really jerk off old men for cash. Lucky escape there.

I think tomorrow, I should update my CV. That'll be exciting!

Not At All Patronising.

Do you keep your Deaf Card with you at all times, just in case a police officer needs to communicate with you? If not, you may be breaking the law.

When the Body Speaks

Bronchioles in Dover, originally uploaded by zombiecoterie.

...the computers listen.

Am starting to get my head around the idea of not interpreting, but can still struggling with using the voice recognition software. It still doesn't quite understand me, so I'll have to go back through and edit this to correct the mistakes it's bound to have made. However, it's much easier on my hands.

It looks as so I will have another exhibition in July, which is very exciting and gives me something to look forward to. Not that I'm lacking in things to look forward to, just that it justifies me calling myself an artist, since I'm not sure I can call myself an interpreter any more.

I don't want to blame the repetitive strain injury for the decision that I've made; it's something that I wanted to do for awhile, so I'm really not justified in complaining. Then, however, don't see the GP tomorrow to see if there's anything I continued can do to help my hands get better more quickly. After all, I wouldn't be too much of an artist if I could not paint or draw.

Jonathan found a piece of software that lets us scan the bar codes of DVDs, so we scanned the bar codes of all the DVDs we don't think we need anymore. They will go on amazon unless someone else says they want them. Clearly, this is the best approach unemployment!

The shameful list is here.

Anyway, too much computer. I should go and make dinner like a good housewife!

Fear!

Fear!, originally uploaded by zombiecoterie.

Everything Changes.

Dover, originally uploaded by zombiecoterie.

So, on Friday, three things happened:

1: The GP told me I have many things wrong with my hands and that I should consider stopping interpreting if I can.

2: I found out I can't do the interpreting course I'd said I would do so I've always have interpreting as a back-up career.

3: I was assured I can get more lecturing and workshop leading work based on what I've done so far.

I think that it might have been a sign.

I still went to work on Saturday, only to find out I really have traded jazz-hands for spaz-hands and I couldn't pick up scissors by the end of the session, let alone use them. Luckily, a glass of wine and a handful of chocolates seemed to pick me up enough in time for my evening working with Timothy Winchester on his Smutty Puppet Peep Show that he was commissioned to do for a rather fancy party. He's brilliant, it was a real honour to be under a table with him nudging my knees while we pretend to have puppet sex for a baffled public.

I don't understand how RSI works if I can sort of manage that (albeit with lots of breaks and help from Mr Winchester), but interpreting hurts. I came home to talk to Jonotron and we came to the conclusion that enough is enough and that I really can't keep on doing this kind of thing to myself and that if I've wanted to make this change for so long, I should do it before my hands force my hand.

So, we spent today in Dover with Robin, Grief and Jamie. Not for a leap off the White Cliffs because of the end of my career as an interpreter, but to see the South Foreland Lighthouse and learn about lenses and light. Warnings of danger ahead seem to be a theme for the weekend. We threw stones into the channel for a while and didn't mention interpreting at all, apart from whenever I needed a bit of help because of my rubbish hands. Jonotron and I kind of made the decision I've been needing to make for a while.

So, back from the precipice and waving goodbye to a chapter of my life I didn't expect to see close so abruptly or so quietly. I've already talked to one friend who I work with and she told me off for not quitting sooner and I'd imagine that no-one's going to turn around and tell me off for this when really I should have done this a while ago.

I'm not an interpreter any more.

It's quite scary to see it written like that, but it's the right move. I'd best press send on this 'cause the ibuprofen's fading away and I should be resting my hands, but I wanted to see it written down for myself. I've got a few people to contact tomorrow, I guess, but that's tomorrow.

Hey. If you know of any jobs I could do, you'll keep me posted, yes?

Links:

A bit more on the smutty puppet peep show.


The lighthouse in Dover we visited.