Still taking liberties
Oh for heaven's sake. Yes, we've said it before, but it is worth saying again. What the hell is going on? I am ashamed that I ever voted for these people. More ID lunacy as the whole ridiculous and insulting plan is outed as being doomed to failure in the Sunday Times, and gets another good kicking in the Guardian today from the indefatigable Henry Porter. Nice to see an issue uniting left, right and moderates.
I still mean it, everything I said : Give Me Liberty.
Let's not shut up about it, and don't forget to pop into the nice people at No2ID
And here's a thought...
(Can't think why I didn't sign up before. Hat Tip Justin for reminding me.)
Sorry to everyone who has popped in expecting more personal stuff and found instead, political stuff. It is just that, at the moment, in my life, the personal and the political seem to be inextricably intertwined.
Okay, personal update: I still feel very tired. Even though I am sleeping better. I walked to and from work in the West End to home near Finsbury Park yesterday. Today I got a cab in again as I was too late to walk, and because I was conviced that there would be an attack today for various reasons I won't go into here. I have been convinced about the 11th July for weeks. Seems to be passing okay so far, thank God.
(18.38: UPDATE: Oh shit. This was exactly what I had the premonitions of, multiple bombs in trains, hundreds of deaths. I kept dreaming it. I even said to two journalists, 'I am sure there will be bombs on 11th July' - (BBC Asian Network and ITN news). But it happened in India, not here. My thoughts and prayers to the people of Mumbai. My heart goes out to them, and to all victims of terror. Those poor, poor people. There was such a lot of fuss made out of 7/7, so much political capital made on the back of the first suicide bombings on Western soil, here, in my city, London.
Which is why I am trying to fight back; if there is to be such a fuss made, and voices of 7/7 given such prominence, then know this. I'm not going to roll over and be part of someone else's agenda. I haven't changed who I am and what I believe in, and if you give me a platform, I will say what I have always said. I will say I want to try to cherish civil liberties, to show that you can be almost killed by random strangers - and life still goes on. To ask for lessons to be shared so that it might be stopped one day in the future, or the response improved, or understanding shared - and so lives may be saved and suffering spared.
Oh God, oh hell. I thought when I kept dreaming of the bombs on the trains I was just having a flash-back to last year, I didn't want to think about it, and what good would it do, what could I do about it? )
There have been a a lot of very disconcerting deja vu flashbacks of last year, randomly discovering I am wearing the same clothes, picking up the same book, even smelling the smoke and feeling the exact same feelings - a detatched sense of exhaustion and euphoria and odd adrenaline spikes and crashes. This, I am assured, is normal and is ''the anniversary effect''. For a better description of how I feel and how others seem to be spookily feeling the same, go and see fellow-passengers Steve and Holly's blogs. KCU noticeboard tells a similar story. It freaks me out sometimes how I can go and look and there is my day, my feelings, already posted up by somebody else.
But it's just a blip, this haunting I feel of last summer's ghosts. It'll pass. So I am told and so I hope.
I am very angry indeed towards the bombers, the young man on my train who murdered and maimed. It has taken exactly one year for the numbness to fade, and now I am struggling with nausea, vertigo and hatred whenever I think of them. Apparently this is a ''very positive sign'' that I am ''making good progress''. Fine, whatever. It's a damn sight easier right now to write about politics than feelings, that's for sure.
(18.38: But right now, if I were to name my feelings, they would be anger, and frustration, and anxiety. And pity for the victims of the bombs, as I watch the news, with a heavy heart.)
I still mean it, everything I said : Give Me Liberty.
Let's not shut up about it, and don't forget to pop into the nice people at No2ID
And here's a thought...
(Can't think why I didn't sign up before. Hat Tip Justin for reminding me.)
Sorry to everyone who has popped in expecting more personal stuff and found instead, political stuff. It is just that, at the moment, in my life, the personal and the political seem to be inextricably intertwined.
Okay, personal update: I still feel very tired. Even though I am sleeping better. I walked to and from work in the West End to home near Finsbury Park yesterday. Today I got a cab in again as I was too late to walk, and because I was conviced that there would be an attack today for various reasons I won't go into here. I have been convinced about the 11th July for weeks. Seems to be passing okay so far, thank God.
(18.38: UPDATE: Oh shit. This was exactly what I had the premonitions of, multiple bombs in trains, hundreds of deaths. I kept dreaming it. I even said to two journalists, 'I am sure there will be bombs on 11th July' - (BBC Asian Network and ITN news). But it happened in India, not here. My thoughts and prayers to the people of Mumbai. My heart goes out to them, and to all victims of terror. Those poor, poor people. There was such a lot of fuss made out of 7/7, so much political capital made on the back of the first suicide bombings on Western soil, here, in my city, London.
Which is why I am trying to fight back; if there is to be such a fuss made, and voices of 7/7 given such prominence, then know this. I'm not going to roll over and be part of someone else's agenda. I haven't changed who I am and what I believe in, and if you give me a platform, I will say what I have always said. I will say I want to try to cherish civil liberties, to show that you can be almost killed by random strangers - and life still goes on. To ask for lessons to be shared so that it might be stopped one day in the future, or the response improved, or understanding shared - and so lives may be saved and suffering spared.
Oh God, oh hell. I thought when I kept dreaming of the bombs on the trains I was just having a flash-back to last year, I didn't want to think about it, and what good would it do, what could I do about it? )
There have been a a lot of very disconcerting deja vu flashbacks of last year, randomly discovering I am wearing the same clothes, picking up the same book, even smelling the smoke and feeling the exact same feelings - a detatched sense of exhaustion and euphoria and odd adrenaline spikes and crashes. This, I am assured, is normal and is ''the anniversary effect''. For a better description of how I feel and how others seem to be spookily feeling the same, go and see fellow-passengers Steve and Holly's blogs. KCU noticeboard tells a similar story. It freaks me out sometimes how I can go and look and there is my day, my feelings, already posted up by somebody else.
But it's just a blip, this haunting I feel of last summer's ghosts. It'll pass. So I am told and so I hope.
I am very angry indeed towards the bombers, the young man on my train who murdered and maimed. It has taken exactly one year for the numbness to fade, and now I am struggling with nausea, vertigo and hatred whenever I think of them. Apparently this is a ''very positive sign'' that I am ''making good progress''. Fine, whatever. It's a damn sight easier right now to write about politics than feelings, that's for sure.
(18.38: But right now, if I were to name my feelings, they would be anger, and frustration, and anxiety. And pity for the victims of the bombs, as I watch the news, with a heavy heart.)
posted by Rachel at 1:42 pm
