Talking to Alice and Ally

As “in wonderland” and McBeal….

Magdalena

12/17/2023

Photo by Z Graphica on Unsplash

Hello Sunday reading friends,

Let’s have a tea first. As I might challenge a bit your imagination today.

For some of you might not have read yet the classic “Alice in Wonderland” and that is totally so totally fine. I miss it nowadays and could say my week prompted many scenes from it in a magical or “down the rabit hole” way…

And sure my other best friend Ally McBeal came to my rescue with a great act of imagination too. And for the generations that do not know Ally, try to find some episodes on youtube, some might be classics too. I remember there was a time, perhaps even another Christmas when I have purchased the entire DVD series. I was so proud of it. It does me laugh out loud that is. Is pure therapy … and just to touch base on a little nuance, classics are classics no mater what generations we are all part of. We connect with a part of us that was maybe not really expressed, don’t you think? And if you watch again few years or decades later- maybe you found another surprising piece of yourself in that.

This week’s story will be based more or less on real facts told in a subtle way “ full coverage “ mode getting inspired from my classics as you can see.Not masking anything at all. It is better this way. Sometimes journaling is too much or too soon..

To start off I will have to mention the few taxi encounters… a week full of anecdotes. Monday I felt I am getting on a chariot of some sort. The gentleman listened to the address in my perfect 50-words-Cantonese and he said” It will be my honour to drive you madame”. I had to ask him to repeat, pardon me and everyone, as it was quite a statement at 7.30am. Love it. He was a bit chatty, but he apologised profusely that he is “taking my time to talk instead of listening” to whatever it was, pointing at my headsets. Moving on to the Wednesday… the things got a bit spicy to say the least. A very nice driver again, funny and really chatty - hmmmm, I guess he saw I have no headsets at all and I was wearing a nice white dress( damn, what was I thinking!). By they time we were arriving at destination and after many many many compliments like” you know, the first time I saw you I thought you are a very distinguished English lady, a teacher, are you a teacher?” No and No. were my answers. I get to keep distinguished to myself- thanks. More compliments came about my perfect 50-words-Cantonese again (and I totally agree -I master saying” right, please” or” left, please” and I say them better than in Romanian (where I always say them the other way around” .

I leave the best part after this photo….. that to be so very honest - I had to make it the “mood of the week”.

So, you see, Mr. Charmer here told me also that he has only one wife but he does have many girlfriends ,especially foreigners ! (“But shhh, do not tell my wife please! “ ) ….and dared to accelerate to his last move before it was too late and he had to drop me off at my location. “Do you have many boyfriends? “ No- very very dry no.

“It was my honour indeed to meet you.I hope we can meet again! .Thank you madame was so nice talking to you today” ….

And here it when Ally McBeal kicks in. In my mind. In my imagination. I can make up a scene with few good cinematic effects where my face or may head comes out of my body and turn into a dragon with multiple tongues and pouring fire. No photo needed, I think you get my feeling. I was not roaring on the outside, I have even laughed really because this is the best medicine when absurdity take over. For me it was normal. For me it was also normal - to say “no”. To keep my cool. But to transform inside into some sort of a slaying dragon …… Well I like to keep my cool because I feel better this way. What else would you say? “ How dare you?”… I knew inside that I will never see him again.

Tell me it never happened to you…! And if so, I really do not believe you at moment in time.

Towards the end of the week, I managed to meet only professionals. Location known, silence mode on, firm driving and that is all. Thank you very much.My prayers have been well heard.

What is next? ……

As it happened, sometimes these encounters have been along a reflection of other stories in my life. The taxi story was not for nothing. It was a sort of a messenger.And I could only somehow made the link while reflecting for today’s sharing here.

I am not sure what words to chose here and to be honest I have no intention to turn this into anything heavy. On the contrast, the entire week was almost as a purge just before the year end( how appropriate).

I would ask rather few things. You know, there is so much talk around perspective right? Among other things is a really good practice to change your perspective from time to time- be in on purpose, or be it through some messengers or books or whatever inspires you. One way to do it sometimes can physical. My first class in uni the literature teacher has asked us to change seats. One minute after she said” good morning “and she has introduced herself , she added quite firmly too” Take a good look at where you are, your seat, what is in front of you, what is on your desk, look around and be aware of what you see . Ok, we are done- now stand up and move your seats. “We were into an auditorium with the scale architecture ,stairs and seats built vertically rather than horizontally and flat. As it happens I was sitting in the first row as I was almost late to the class. And I had to move way back up and last row, the highest row. I can tell you that much, it was like the best waking up exercise - everything changed. The teacher, whom I got really intimidated by at first, become smaller in size ( not speaking of teaching qualities as she was amazing). I could see all the colleagues and their differences ,and coats and hair colour and their pens, books, cigarettes dropping on the floor, lipsticks and what not- with the move, some of the things were also falling apart. I could see the entire class. I also could see the trees and the people passing by from the window. While in my first row ,ground level my perspective was very focused - on my teacher but also very limited at the same time.

I still practice this exercise sometimes. You may just sit on the floor sometimes and discover other things from laying on your back - mostly some lost pens under the sofa, or some level of dust I do not want to see. Yet, the most important effect that I wanted to bring here was that sometimes we see how a dimension changes. And also its effect on us changes too.

And we are now in “Alice in Wonderland” space so to speak. Hello Alice…. What a whirlwind we have been together with you.

Through a bit of a twisted few days so many things were somehow changed inside and I am so happy they have. Yes, sure I am speaking about people and their effect on me.

Maybe few years back some people were standing tall and were on some sort of a pedestal. In time with some practices like distancing, or making an effort and taking up other awareness methods altogether including listening to your body , I luckily happened to come back to a “cool”level and see the standing tall person very very small. Unchanged in his habits. Unchanged in his manipulatory tactics, unchanged in his charms. I kept the story on purpose to “his” and this particular gender for this week only. I had same revelations about many many people though in time.

The beauty of the discovery about myself today being that it takes less time to be affected now. It take lesser time to resize a situation and resolve it in my mind easier or to step away from one.Stepping away does not mean that we can change our circumstances totally. But we can change the delusion that someone had to be on a pedestal. For me it is related highly with trust as trust is a premise. It is how I welcome people in my life. Trusting in their goodness. Trusting their words are solid. Trusting they have some caliber and respect. And yes, in time, you just see them from different angles and on repeat over and over same approach that does not include trust, respect or calibration. They forget to reach out to their goodness. It does fascinate me though how people cannot change at all. It does perplexes me for a good minute on how entitlement works. How kindness is taken as a land to take from. Is a form of power that is equally a delusion.

And this does makes me sick sometimes I am truthfully admitting also. The recovery time is much faster now. wow- that makes such a difference. And really just call in Ally McBeal or Alice and they will work wonders for you. This time I did not call upon a dragon but I did become sort of invisible as in a tentative to hide perhaps or gradually turn into an observer only. Noticing that we can change and we can also protect our hearts. It is working.

Many twists this week…. My plans to cook for my friends were postponed as I had to be gentle with myself and take some time off. Temperature dropped a bit more than expected too, keeping the warm tea coming and turning the radiator on. A slight resembling of winters back home.

And hey hey…. I am almost finishing an amazing book. I would like very much, if you still have patience, to leave you with some quotes from it. Simply divine ,all I can say.

The creative act, a way of being