I write this in an empty hotel, windows flung open, the light streaming through the French windows and the sound of waves insistently rolling and swashing onto the sand below. It isn’t sunny – intermittent cloud cover is keeping the savage sun at bay, for which I am quite grateful: I can lounge late in bed and not feel guilty that I haven’t immediately risen to walk on the shore or bathe in the Ionian waters with the backdrop of Corfu and the mountains of Albania gleaming in the distance.....I am on Mathraki a small island off the coast of Kerkyra where my brother has bought an abandoned olive press in the hopes of making some living quarters in the ruins. My nephew Toby is a young architect and here to make some plans and suggestions. I am here simply to admire and make helpful comments, en route for my summer sojourn in Alonnisos.
My brother met us at the airport at 3 am on Tuesday mornings. He drove us to the bar at the port where we could drift off to sleep before waking to catch the 6.30 boat. Toby found somewhere to stretch out his long legs, whilst my brother and I sat talking over hot chocolate before I realised he wasn’t answering anymore....I went for a stroll round the large desolate bar space and wondered at my own wakefulness – remembering times like this in Athens airport waiting for the bus to Syntagma and the ensuing journey to Alonnisos. There’s something otherworldly about the early hours, the sort of space and time that Edward Hopper was good at capturing. I was careful to prop my head against the wall. If I sleep free-fall my head droops in front curling my spine downwards in the C bend of my habit which ends up with a stiff neck and painful back. Sleep is the last refuge for our habit, Walter Carrington (Important Alexander teacher) allegedly said.
When I eventually sucumbed Lethe-wards for an hour I actually woke with my head on my brother’s shoulder which was rather sweet. By 6 the weather had turned. The sky was green and grey and stormy. The wind was bending the palms and we waited with low expectations for the Alexandros, our small ferry to the island. It bobbed up and down in the harbour and I was glad when it was cancelled. A hotel and a day in Corfu instead.
I had visited Corfu last November to give a weekend workshop for young musicians studying at the Ionian University and had explored Corfu town – the streets so like the canals of Venice. After booking ourselves into a hotel and taking some more hours sleep, Toby decided he wanted to explore the south of the island which none of us knew. It is one of my delights to pour over a map, decide to take a route and then find out if it’s as I imagine. In other words having an intention and enjoying the journey, the unknown ‘means whereby’ which in this case took us through mountain passes and hairpins with stunning vistas of valleys and slopes peppered with sharp shaped Cyprus trees poking up into the sky....Toby was taking photos and doing the map reading hurrah! My brother doing the driving so I could just drink in the scenery.
We stopped at a 13th century fort we happened to pass by. In the centre a wooden platform had been erected with an abandoned coco cola fridge nearby – a spot for summer concerts maybe? It had a fabulous acoustic, so first my brother spoke lines from the Tempest and I joined in the Shakespeare fest with my Isabella from Measure for Measure, using my brother as my Angelo. O it was the best I have ever done it! Always when we are calm ,relaxed not trying, but enjoying, the poet is allowed to come out, unhampered by the doing of interpretation of the actor....Hamlet was FM’s favourite, but whichever, the bard is really extraordinary.
Toby didn’t spout, but looked handsome and took pictures.....until when we reached the Lake and beach we had intended and then sadly the wind was whipping fine sand up from the dunes and it got into his camera. Oh Poo! He watched his father walking, plodding along ahead of us and said ‘He always walks with his head and neck at right angles, doesn’t he?’ This is true. He also used to drop his neck to look at his laptop computer screen until recently he started getting pain and had an x ray to reveal bone spurs on his top vertebrae...Despite my entreaties for him to see an Alexander teacher regularly and my own session with him, he fixed the problem by having the screen higher, so he couldn’t droop down. Good for him. One of his pieces of luggage coming over this time was a large screen for his tiny travelling notebook that he can leave here, as he was beginning to have the same pain starting up again.
It’s a funny thing with my relatives and AT. Some teachers seem to have their whole family involved. I have given sessions to my father, mother, sister and two of my brothers, nieces and nephews, but none have taken it up. They enjoy the sessions, are intrigued by the philosophy, admire my work, my life, but that’s about it.
So I was very pleased when Toby last night, after we had eventually arrived on Mathraki here mid-day, asked me for a session some time before we go. I think he had seen his Dad, in his 60’s with the family habit of dropping neck and hips pushed forward (which makes his stomach look much fatter than he is ) and decided he didn’t want that for himself. Toby has a philosophical bent and as an architect understands the nature of design, structure and how a structure is used. I have great hopes here.
No comments:
Post a Comment