Big Swop, Cafe Concerto and being open

1. On Saturday I dropped in to the St Nicks Big Recycle and Junk Swap at the Environment Centre. This is an annual event, I went last year as well. People bring unwanted stuff, could be almost anything and can take away whatever they find that other have brought that they need for themselves. Its like a church jumble sale but without money. Its also obviously a good opportunity for the Centre to promote its services and aspirations and for people like me to meet other like-minded people. I'd guess there were quite a few from The Freecycle community there. It was a very interesting mix of local people from Tang Hall, the travellers folk from James Street and jolly middle-class eco-warriors. I took two bags of clothes recently liberated from the wardrobe, mostly things we should never have considered in the first place but which hopefully someone thought worthy of trying (the obvious items seemed to go pretty quickly) and a load of books. Jo Pullar from Space in Walmgate was there making a sculpture from bits of junk, it was lovely. I found an old rusty red lantern, the type that gets hung on the end of a skip to warm passers by that perhaps its best avoided. I didn't actually have to have it but I sort of wanted to be in the spirit of the Big Swap and so I took it home for the garden. I'm thinking though that this is how the whole materialism attitude is kept afloat. Even knowing I have enough I still take a little bit more, just to be a participant, like drinking to be sociable.

2. Later I went back into York and collected Allan from the university event he'd been at all afternoon. We decided to have an early supper and headed towards Petergate in search of sustenance. Cafe Concerto looked promising and as it was early we got a table right away. I've eaten at this place a lot over the past few years. The jolly giant waiter who always seems to be there did not serve us but twinkled attractively as he passed the table a few times. Perhaps I imagined that more in hope than reality. They have a bread basket which has a more than adequate selection of delicious bread. We shared a bottle of cheap (but actually ridiculously expensive) Australian Merlot. I say we shared, Allan had one glass and not wanting to be wasteful I finished off the rest with a fabulous cottage pie. Cafe Concerto has been the scene of a variety of emotionally charged moments in my life in York mostly charged with happiness and humour. I definitely would be failing in this little task if I didn't count it in as one of the beautiful things. This evening was no exception. My view of how to behave and live seems to be fluid and open at the moment. Allan and I spent the meal negotiating and discussing what happens next. I think he and I have had these conversations before in the same happy location. We left, me pretty squiffy, demanding pudding (which turned out to be a beer at City Screen, sat on the steps of the terrace watching the potential revellers drift by in the sunset).

3. As much as I enjoy chatting to people over the Internet with speedy type and cute symbols and abbreviations, nothing beats actually talking apart from obviously being there in person. One of the things I love about MSN type chatting is that sometimes complete strangers become friends, sometimes just very briefly, and sometimes apparently with absolute candor and alarming openness. Of course I am pathetically unable to hold back and trust pretty much anyone. I have come to accept that I have to take full responsibility for my naive attitude to sharing my feelings in this way. Recently this has been the source of cathartic explosions of emotion. Sounds a bit dramatic but its true. I spent Friday night in floods of tears after a series of interactions on the web. It was hideously self-indulgent but stimulating and charged with energy. I now feel grateful but a bit sore. I've spent a lot of energy this weekend having a question and answer sessions with myself, a dialectical discussion which seems to be about reviewing and reasoning my values, morals and behaviour. A beauty of this on-going dialogue is its lack of importance to anyone else but me.