Fighting

We're all fighting. You can be a flower power peace loving hippie in every inch of your body, but we're still fighting. Fighting to make a living, no, to live. We have to find our own spot on the earth, and we have to make it count. It's been a while, a LONG while since I kept you informed about the happenings in my Mägíç Lând. But really, who was I to report? Sorrows had hit my Mägíç Lând... And everybody has their own sorrows to deal with, so why should I bother you with mine? But sorrows make you think, and think some more, and somehow all the thoughts need to get out. I need this blog for that, so expect a lot more from where this came.

Some of you might be students like me, some of you might be working a job you love, some of you might be trapped in a cubical that seems to have more than four walls, and some of you might be living your own happy lifestyle far away in your own little Mägíç Lând. I hope you are happy, all of you, but I know better than to expect this. If you are a student like me, you might just face the same things I face reguarly..I'm I doing the right study? Where is all my money going... Do I really like this...?
I can't work a fulltime job under a so called 'boss' in a so called 'office'.I don't look down on anyone who can do this while being happy, but I simply can't. So, what then will I do? Nothing? That's no fun, and not possible, since the big bosses that claim to run our lifes do want to see money... I want to be a musician, singing my stories wherever I go, dancing on my own tunes... But they won't let me. I have to pay for my happiness, or they'll take away all I love...
Oh, but then I'll just find a job I love! I like nature, music, dancing, writing, I like a lot of stuff! Oh... But you won't pay me to do that? But, what do I do then? Suck it up and take a 40 hour job I hate anyway? I'll have money to do fun things... Yeah but... I don't want a big house or an expensive car... I just want to be me, happy little May in her happy little Mägíç Lând with her happy little friends. What, you're saying that's just not how life goes, it is what it is? But, I want it to, why should I conform? I might only have one life to live, who are you, or anyone to tell me what to do with it?

A lot of questions, and honestly, as soon as I find the answer you'll be the first to know, because I simply do not have them right now. I merely have suggestions... So what can we do? Conform? I'm sorry, that is really not something I can do. It's the free pagan energy that pulses through my veins that make me run wild.
So what is there left to do but live day by day? It isn't always fun, it's actually really really hard, but it might just make you end up in exactly the place you're supposed to be. You have to fight to make yourself happy. I refuse to look in the mirror 60 years from now, and see that life has passed me by. I want to see the journey in my eyes, my map in the folds on my skin, the ink that marks times gone by. I want to see that I have lived, not merely existed.

So what do you do? Quit your studies, leave everything behind and simply go? You could. You could change studies to something you really like too, something you can be self-employed in, so you have more freedom. You could also go on, and on, and on, and die...

Really, you could do numerous of things, you just have to find out what works for you. But this is one of the hardest things. You don't know if you're decision is right, but all you want is to be happy... It's worth the try right?

Ask people for advice, people who have been there; Free souls doing what they love. Don't be ashamed to simply write e-mails to people you might not even know that well to ask for advice, or how they have come where they are now. They might have once been in your position; the feeling of despair and arms grabbing you to keep you down. They might want to offer you some advice.

Ask nature for help. Dance in the forest while rain or sunshine hits your body. Dance to the music the birds make, sing with the trees, swim in the air, feel what really matters. feel the energy that nature gives you. Hold that feeling, and put it into your daily life. The happy extatic feeling is there, so why wouldn't you be allowed to feel it every day? Fight for it, be happy.

Do things you love, and find a way to do that. Work as hard as you possibly can, and faith might turn in your favour. It won't be easy, it won't ever be easy! But it will be worth it.

Why am I writing this right now? It's something I think about a lot. I won't let my utter downs  be as extreme as my absurd ups. I want to be happy, and I am! I am one happy shining little faerie. But you know what it is? Other people aren't. And they want to take us with them in their downfall. They won't leave you alone! It's their job to make you do things for them. They need your money to have a fake feeling of impeding happiness, and they'll make you think the same. Don't fall for it. Be your free self, be happy.

I have amazing people around me to look up to, to take as an example. This weekend I had a weekend of non stop dancing in Enschede. It makes me so fully loaded with energy of pure and undeniable happiness. All the worries leave your bodies through the movements. You receive the energy of your dancepartner, of the music, of the people dancing around you, and together you make something happen. And then I think... Why should I ever settle for a feeling less than this? Of course, life will still throw it's nonsense, but with energy like this flowing through my veins, it will be neutralised and forgotten. It will be ok, as long as I work hard.

It's easier to lock yourself in a cage which is held wide open for you when outside of that cage there's nothing but pain as far as the eye can see. But beyond what the eye sees, is what the heart sees. And to reach that, you must walk past the cage and into the dark abyss, to look for the lands unknown by the eye. Folow your heart.

No matter what it is that makes you happy (it could very well BE your job!), do it.

Love, May

A piece of pure wisdom

I just want to share a beautiful piece of wisdom, found on the new Nightwish album Imaginaerum. So, it's not written by me, it's by the great composer Tuomas Holopainen. Noone will probably read it, but it has great great value to me. I will write about wisdom soon, what is it anyway?

[1. From A Dusty Bookshelf]

[2. All That Great Heart Lying Still]

The nightingale is still locked in the cage
The deep breath I took still poisons my lungs
An old oak sheltering me from the blue
Sun bathing on it's dead frozen leaves

A catnap in the ghost town of my heart
She dreams of storytime and the river ghosts
Of mermaids, of Whitman's and the rude
Raving harlequins, gigantic toys

A song of measong in need
Of a courageous symphony
A verse of mea verse in need
Of a ppure-heart singing me to peace

All that great heart lying still and slowly dying
All that great heart lying still on an angelwing

All that great heart lying still
In silent suffering
Smiling like a clown until the show has come to an end
What is left for encore
Is the same old dead boy's song
Sung in silence
All that great heart lying still and slowly dying
All that great heart lying still on an angelwing

A midnight flight into Covington Woods
A princess and a panther by m side
These are Territories I live for
I'd still give mt everything to love you more

[3. Piano Black]

A silent symphony
A hollow opus #1, 2, 3

Sometimes the sky is piano black
Piano black over cleansing waters

Resting pipes, verse of bore
Rusting keys without a door

Sometimes the within is piano black
Piano black over cleansing waters

All that great heart lying still and slowly dying
All that great heart lying still on an angelwing

[4. Love]
I see a slow, simple youngster by a busy street,
With a begging bowl in his shaking hand.
Trying to smile but hurting infinitely. Nobody notices.
I do, but walk by.

An old man gets naked and kisses a model-doll in his attic
It's half-light and he's in tears.
When he finally comes his eyes are cascading.

I see a beaten dog in a pungent alley. He tries to bite me.
All pride has left his wild eyes.
I wish I had my leg to spare.

A mother visits her son, smiles to him through the bars.
She's never loved him more.

An obese girl enters an elevator with me.
All dressed up fancy, a green butterfly on her neck.
Terribly sweeet perfume deafens me.
She's going to dinner alone.
That makes her even more beautiful.

I see a model's face on a brick wall.
A statue of porcelain perfection beside a violent city kill.
A city that worships flesh.
The first thing I ever heard was a wandering
Man telling his story
It was you, the grass under my bare feet
The campfire in the dead of night
The heavenly black of sky and sea

It was us
Roaming the rainy roads, combing the guilded beaches
Waking up to a new gallery of wonders every morn
Bathing in places no-one's seen before
Shipwrecked on some matt-painted island
Clad in nothing but the surf - beauty's finest robe

Beyond all mortality we are, swinging in the breath of nature
In early air of the dawn of life
A sight to silence the heavens

I want to travel where life travels,
Following it's permanent lead
Where the air tastes like snow music
Where grass smells like fresh-born Eden
I would pass no man, no stranger, no tragedy or rapture
I would bathe in a world of sensation
Love, goodness and simplicity
(While violated and imprisoned by technology)

The thought of my family's graves was the only moment
I used to experience true love
That love remains infintie,
As I'll never be the man my father is

How can you "just be yourself"
When you don't know who you are?
Stop saying "I know how you feel"
How could anyone know how another feels?

Who am I to judge a priest, beggar,
Whore, politician, wrongdoer?
I am, you are, all of them already

Dear child, stop working, go play
Forget every rule
There's no fear in a dream

"Is there a village inside this snowflake?"
- a child asked me
"What's the colour of our lullaby?"

I've never been so close to truth as then
I touched it's silver lining

Death is the winner in any war
Nothing noble in dying for your religion
For your country
For ideology, for faith
For another man, yes

Paper is dead without words
Ink idle without a poem
All the world dead without stories
Without love and disarming beauty

Careless realism costs souls

Ever seen the Lord smile?
Allt he care for the world made Beautiful a sad man?
Why do we still carry a device of torture around our necks?
Oh, how rotten your pre-apocalypse is
All you bible-black fools living over nightmare ground

I see all those empty cradles and wonder
If man will never change

I, too, wish to be a decent manboy but all I am
Is smoke and mirrors
Still given everything, may I be deserving

And there forever remains the change from G to E minor

Love and fantasy,
May

Dream on

It's been a while since I blogged. A lot happened, good stuff mostly. But in this blog, the past isn't important. Since this blog will be about the future. I live in the here and the now pretty much all the time. I do what I think is good for my life, and what will make me happy. I started studying archaelogy 10 weeks ago, and I am really enjoying myself a lot. Me and my love live together in Deventer, and we are very happy. But I can't help to think about the future. I can't help but thinking about the time I finish studying, and having to work a regular job...

No matter how much I love archaeology, I'm simply not made to work a 9 to 5 job, and have people telling me what to do. I do not do well with authority at all. I need to be my own boss. You might say: 'Get a grip, everyone has to work, everyone has to make money.' But I will not allow my life to be led by 'have to-s'. I need my freedom. And I will not forfeit it for anything. I like being my own boss, I'm simply not a follower, but a leader.

So what do I do. Quit my studies and live on the streets? Nah, that's not my plan. What I want for the future is doing what I love to do. Waking up in the morning and doing something I really want to do at that time. I want to leave my mark on this earth (In a not idiot-monkey-poluting-way) Art, music, happiness. I'm thinking as I'm writing, and writing as I'm thinking. Because I know my goal, now it's time to figure out how to get there.

And that is why I will not quit my studies and forfeit everything I have. I know my destination, I need to find my path. It's like a big maze. You run into dead ends, things that don't work out the way you want them to. And you'll see really pretty spots. A big oak in the middle of the maze, like someone who will watch over you and guide you through the maze. I think life is the exact same thing. You meet people who inspire you, and you'll meet people who will dissapoint you. But all lead to that one goal.

But what is that goal? It's leading a happy and free life. Doing what I want. And being my own boss. For me doesn't consist of one thing. You don't have just one thing you like either, do you? So what I want right now:
I would love to work with horses. My own stables with 5 horses or so, which I can use (I don't like that word here, because you don't 'use'animals, but you catch my drift) to help people connect to the earth again (Horses do that  you know...). You could say like, a therapeutic mini-thingy with horses.
Also, I love art. I don't mean the art you see in the common musea nowadays. But art as in, photos. Creating another world, showing beauty, fantasies... Making something that is completely up to you. For a long time I have been interested in how some make-up artists can paint models and make something that doesn't exist in this world. Something new, something from your dreams. But I would also like to model more often. Being the one giving expression to your surroundings and the clothes on your body, the paint on your face. I modelled with a professional big shoot for the first time yesterday, and I really enjoyed it, and decided it's something I want to do more often.
Of course there's all the amazing other art forms too, but this form just grabbed me.
Music, I love music. I don't care what happens, but this has always been in my life. I don't care if I'll ever become a 'professional' (what is a professional anyway?). I just want to keep making music, and I can. Unlike other things, there's nothing I have to do to achieve this goal.
Creativity. I want to make things. I don't know what exactly. I want to make clothes, but I don't know what else. I'll see what comes on my path, and I'll see what will inspire me.

Archaeology. I love it. I want to keep on doing it. But I'm unfit to work a normal scheme every day, and to have to listen to others. I'll see how things work out with this one as well...

For the next four years I will be studying archaelogy. And it will be great. It will be my path, it will be what I need to come to my goal. But eventually, I want to make my dreams come true. And I know they will. The next four years will not be a waste, and they will bring me new dreams, insights and possibilities. I will walk my path with pride and happiness, and I shall take every chance I get to get closer to my dreams. And who knows where that will bring me. I can't wait.

So this is my story for now, but I know everyone has one of their own. Remember what you said what they asked you all those years ago: "What you wanted to become when you grow up?" You would dream away about everything you wanted to do. Remember that! And dream like that! See what you want to do, and see no limitations. Because your dreams can take you anywhere. The world will try to hold you back, but that's ok. They will be the dead ends in your maze. But you'll find a way. Here in Mägíç Lând, dreams are reality. And reality is just a fog. In which I am not seen.

Love and freedom
May the fog(gy) faerie.

Paths

I don't really fully understand the buzz about birthdays. We celebrate each year getting closer to death with presents and too much food. But when we die, everyone is sad... Yet I guess birthdays could also be seen as the survival of another year... Growing up... Being an adult... It sometimes scares me to think about it. But then again, it's just a number. You are as young as you feel, and in my case that means I will never grow up. But whatever the buzz about birthdays is, it is still ncie to have your family and friend together to celebrate. It was my turn to add another year to my life-meter last sunday. It was a nice and calm day with family, friends, and my love. I got some nice presents and a nice addition to my harp-fund. My beautiful fullsicle harp is getting closer and closer.

I also got my dilpoma last friday. It was really weird and official. Going to your teacher, signing the damn paper you worked your ass off for 7 years. Going up on stage, having some words said about you, and then leaving like nothing ever happenend. Like those 7 years were just so you can walk out of that building for the last time. And now, with that piece of paper, you can go on and study to get more pieces of paper... It is weird...

It's like a maze with more paths then you could ever imagine, and everything you do decides which path you will take and where you are going. I like to think of the path in the maze I walk right now, as a barely visible path in the middle of a huge forest surrounded my fairies and things that live as soon as I think about them. I'm not alone on this path, there are more people. My love is there, great people I met along the way of this path are there. And we can here the rumours of the people that walk the main path, a concrete highway far away from the forest we roam. But we can still here them because there are so many people walking this concrete path, building it as they go. But as these people walk this concrete path, we will never stop breaking through the conrete and planting trees and flowers to regain this part of the maze. Before returning to our own little Mägíç lând, to live happy and free, dancing and loving, making music...
As we get older, we roam further and further into the maze. We still walk through the trees, dance, sing, do what we want. But some might be tempted to join the concrete-people. There path is easier to walk, because it's flat concrete in stead of leaves and branches. And you won't have to bother breaking through the concrete anymore to plant the trees and flowers. You won't have to be an outcast anymore and you can join the mass. Sure, you will have to give up some things, but eventually, you will grow old (sure, in a plastic bubble, but hey...). Our litle happy, free fairy group will lose some people to the concrete mass, and we will be sad about it. But really, are those beautiful leaves really that much harder to walk on then the concrete path? Are the beautiful arms of the trees, the branches, really that much of an obstacle? Doesn't it feel great to clear up the concrete after the mass has passed? And is being different, really bad?

I don't think so. I hope you can all keep up with my brain waves and overactive fantasy, but this is how I see it. Some people lose their free, happy, creative spirit as they grow older. They wander from their path to join the concrete mass.
I'm getting older, I'm supposed to be an adult, I am supposed to go earn money and be a good civilian, stop believing in fairies, stop hugging trees and be normal homo sapiens sapiens. I'm supposed to stop being me. But I won't ever do that. I sometimes worry about getting older, but as I said before, it's just a number. I will be a child forever, and stay free. Even if I end up all alone on my little forest path (which I higly doubt), I won't stop being me. And if you can identify with my little forest path, I hope you won't let the modern, grown up, serious world get to you. I hope you will stay with me on that path, and not wander of to the concrete. Be happy, be your crazy self, be free!

Leaves and sunbeams

Forest nymph May

Summer in Mägíç lând

Ahhhh, I got in somewhat of a writers block during the exams, studying all the time and working your ass off in a sweaty enviroment just to get that fucking piece of paper that allows you to escape the schoolprison. But after that, summertime! I've been spending most of my time doing creative stuff outside. Making music, making clothes, playing with my doggie, enjoying my love, reading. I really miss the festivals though, we couldn't make it to Keltfest because one day we were joining our friends from Bats in the Belfry to the lovely city of Monster, for their performance (not to mention the 16 km we walked in stead of 10 m, but when you are with great people, it's all good :)), and on sunday we went to the magical Omnia Poëtree <3 I missed Omnia a lot.

So yeah, no Keltfest, but Midsummerfair soon ^^ I hope a lot of people will be there.

All is well in Mägíç lând, I wish the whole world could be like my little faerie realm... I never watch the news on tv (I barely watch tv anyway), but I very sometimes read it. And to see that people still kill because of someones sexual preferences, or to see that romania wants to kill 3 milion streat dogs... It makes me sad. People take themselves way too seriously. So what if a man loves another man, or a woman loves another woman? Love is beautiful, live and let love. Who cares if a man is with a woman or with a man? It might just be me thinking freely... Or am I really that naïve? I don't think so.

In my Mägíç lând, things aren't that serious. We just love life and celebrate it our way. Hugging trees, talking to animals, dancing with leaves, and just playing with our toys. I love poiing for example! And in summer I love playing with my waterguns. Just the simple things in life~ Humans want to act all serious and complicated, maybe it makes them feel better about themselves or more important. Meanwhile, I'll just continue having fun the child way, the happy way, the free way!

Toys and sunbeams
Mayflower (that also flowers in june)

By the way, don't you just love the picture with this blog? I found it somewhere (not taken by me unfortunately) on the big scary internet.

Time to rest

At the end of one's life, the body can become a mere prison. The mind wants to go on but the body stops. This morning, with my dad by his side supporting him, my grandpa left this life to start his new journey. He left his body behind, and opened his mind to worlds beyond. I like to believe that these are better worlds. Realms of peace and happiness. Grandpa, we will miss you so much, and I hope the pain and the ghosts are gone now. We love you.

The wheel of time rolls on

So it's been a serious while again, but times have been a-changing. Mägíç lând has been invaded, my happy land has been invaded by the demons of misery, There's a lot of movement in life and death is passing by every now and then. Life and death coexisting like the paradox of the Schrödinger's cat. Exactly this is what kept me from writing all these time. School, family drama, studying, people.... it all just drained me of any form of natural energy. Of course it's not all drama, I also got to enjoy the pleassures of life in making music, sitting around fires, being creative with dreadlocks, enjoying life with friends. But sometimes the negatives are so overwhelming, that you fee like your life is being lived by it. And that is why I'm writing you a blog at this ridiculous time.

I'm not going to tell you everything that happened, it's just a long never ending tale of drama, and probably not interesting at all. But I'll tell the core to get to what I want to make clear.
My grandma had a severe stroke this november. My grandpa has a severe form of cancer, it's terminal. My grandma is one of the strongest women ever, and a great example to me. She never gives up, even though they didn't think that after het stroke she would wake up from het coma. But she did, and she in a carehome, fighting her way through all what's holding her back. She never fails to smile when anyone she knows comes to visit, and she is still the beautiful, smart and brave woman she always was. My grandpa is the most stubborn person I know. He was living at home as long as he possibly could, but last week disaster struck. He is in a lot of pain, got medicins, and started hallucinating. He sees things like cats, dogs, rabbits, paintings coming at him, knights, but also my little sister and me... So eventually, when he again called us so confused, not knowing where he was or where his wife (my grandma, of course) was, we decided it's time for him to go to the hospice, a place where only terminally ill people are.
But still, he calls us every morning at 6, mad at us, why did we put him there? This place is no good, he always says. But it is, it's the best that is out there for him...

To be honest, it's hard not to get mad at my grandpa, for the things he do. But of course I'm not, thinking about his situation. Sometimes your body is nothing more than something unwilling you have to drag around. So, is it any good that humans live this long, through all of their pains and deaths all around them. Is it really a positive thing, that we can extend lifes far beyond the age that's good for us. In the past, people didn't live to see 110, they lived until their bodies started to decline. They didn't have medic ins, and died without suffering a lot on beforehand and having to go to some kind of hospital or carehome, just to die there. But then, on the other hand, it still is your family. Of course you don't want them to die, you would miss them... But now more then ever, I see how selfish this is. You shouldn't keep people alive with medicins and such, making them into some kind of zombie, just so we can visited them and pretend like nothing happened. It would've been so much better if there was just no chance of people getting this old, and they would just die peacefully when the time si there.

But in this case, it just happened. They are still alive and we love our grandparents, and we want to take care of them until they can leave their flesh barriere behind them and rejoin in better places (I like to believe that what's beyond this life, is better than this world).

Life can ironically drain you of any lifepowers in you. In some cases, you can't help this from happening. So when it happens, be sure to take go care of yourself. Do things you like, in my case I go to the forest make music, and talk to the amazing friends I have, who are always there for me. New friends, old friends, and of course my love. Unfortunately, for me it's also final-exams time, which makes it harder to do this. But I found out that focussing on that goal of passing my exams so I can escape my school, is also a good way to take my mind of things. So if you are in a situation like this, or any situation in which you feel lived and drained, try to take your time to live your life, because it helps you to get on track again. Crying is good, but in the end, just crying gets you nowhere.

I'm going to clean up Mägíç lând now. Birds will sing, flowers will blossom, trees will grow, and we will live. Life is good, it just sometimes has its weird ways of testing you. The goal is to keep breathing, keep living, and to never stop dancing and singing.

Oh yeah, on a happier note, who will be at Castlefest this year? We will of course be there, and because of the great group of people I met last year on camping Vogelzang, we'll be sleeping there again (the Castlefest camping seems kind of lame, with all of those rules. We like to make music deep into the night, drink with friends, enjoy a variety of good stuff, and just have fun with friend you might not see that often). I'm really looking forward to it! I miss my home, besides Mägíç lând.

Thanks for reading this, it helped me a lot to write it off. And to know that all of you are out there, and together we make a world within this world. A world where people know that fairies exist, and where people live together, in perfect harmony.

Love and hugs
Mayflower