100 Days of Wonder – #22
Ah Pluto! The first time I went to Disney World it took me a minute to suspend reality enough to do the whole character thing. Now I look forward to the silliness of the interaction. But silliness isn’t really what this post is about. The first time I went, characters like Pluto and even Mickey Mouse didn’t really mean anything to me. I didn’t watch cartoons as a kid, not that I remember anyway and I definitely couldn’t have told you the difference between Goofy and Pluto or Chip and Dale and Donald Duck has nephews? Anyway, over the last 20 years I have watched a lot of the old shorts as well as Disney Classics like Snow White (but not Bambi, I saw Bambi at the cinema when I was little and I’m still traumatised) and somehow that has set everything else Disney in context. I didn’t know I wanted or needed context but knowing the old stuff has made me enjoy the new(er) stuff more. It has also made me think about going back to the foundations or basics in so many things: Running, yoga, work. Knowing and understanding the foundations means we can build from them, we can critique and challenge them and we can learn from them. Sometimes we need to go back to the foundations or starting points to correct our course or to go on a new adventure. Maybe the Disney classics, the seminal works in any given discipline, the Couch to 5k programme or simple sun salutations are a different kind of base camp to the one made up of the familiar that I mentioned before, but one that is just as important. (And in case you are wondering, Chip has a black nose and Dale has a red nose)
100 Days of Wonder – #21
Maleficent. In dragon form. She’s spectacular. The first time I saw her I just stared. I was actually speechless. The engineering, the steam punk beauty, the heat of her fire breath and the way she utterly and completely commands attention – awesome. Then, in 2016 and 2019, I got to run past her in a backlot on the marathon course and get even closer. Mind blown.
I was looking for a quote and there are loads saying something along the lines of ‘Evil Queens are just Princesses that weren’t rescued’ and that’s just nonsense. Princesses don’t need rescuing! They rescue themselves and they certainly don’t turn evil because Prince Charming didn’t arrive on time. I prefer the idea of villains just being heroes whose stories haven’t been told. That I get. Although I do think some villains in our stories are just villains. I’ve had a few in mine that however I try and position it and re-tell it from their perspective, I can’t see them anywhere near hero like. But I can also see that in their own stories, they’re probably not villains. In fact maybe I am. Because how we think of ourselves and others is shaped by our stories and how we choose to tell them. All we can do is try and tell them with empathy and kindness but also with a firmness that allows us to stay in control of our own narrative. We need to keep the power to tell our stories and allow others to tell theirs. Don’t let your wings be stolen from you!
100 Days of Wonder – #20
In 2023, Kath and I celebrated our 20th anniversary. You can just see our Happily Ever After badges in the photo. We have the cute couple photos from our celebrations too but I really like this one because it sort of captures a sense of fun and silliness and because in many ways it is very us. I can’t really describe why but the photo captures our sense of adventure, our togetherness that doesn’t depend on us physically being in the same time and space constantly and our joint willingness to not take anything, least of all ourselves, too seriously. I can do what I do and be who I am because of her. Once you find your human, anything becomes possible, the rough times are much more survivable, the highs so much sweeter and the mundane, every-day boring stuff of life become the things that you look forward to, crave and seek shelter in. So, not that long ago in a galaxy not that far away we celebrated 20 years of being each other’s biggest fans, of championing each other and of supporting each other in making the world a better place – hopefully at least a little bit for other people but most certainly for each other.
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