Categories: annals-of-a-rock-nerd, rejoice-with-me
Tags: friends, Greenbelt, Bible notes, God speaking
Date: 02 September 2009 14:38:09
OK, so I didn't sew the buttons on or do the ironing - I watched TV with The Grouch and Genius Brat instead. How did you guess?
I did however manage to find enough clean clothes without buttons missing, to pack for the wonderful Greenbelt Festival which is where I spent the Bank Holiday weekend, wandering happily through crowds of people and stalls with gorgeous clothes and edible food, and stopping every few minutes to talk to someone I knew. As I remarked to Genius Brat, 'There are twenty thousand people at Greenbelt and I know all but six of them'. I even had a lovely cup of tea and chat with people I had been at university with, and another chat with the curate and his wife from my old church in Waterloo. I also saw two parents from GB's school and had a good talk with one about how bad the school now is on special needs! The Grouch says: 'There are three great Christian festivals in the church year: Christmas, Easter and Greenbelt'.
I also managed to take in a few talks, exhibitions and a fair amount of music, including a talk on my hero Thomas Traherne (they have discovered new manuscripts, woo-hoo!), a set by Royksopp who were amazing, the film Man on Wire and a concert of music by Taverner, beautifully played and sung. It was good to see some Wibloggers there as well - it's extraordinary how my different internet lives cross over.
Being on duty on the Mennonite church stand was fun as well, even though Health and Safety had cracked down on our usual gorgeous homebaked cookies, and so we had pipecleaners to make things out of instead (there was a secret stash of cookies for stand workers and close friends...)
Close shave of the weekend was when The Grouch drove to our Travel Inn (we don't camp) which he had booked on the last day of the festival last year, and they had lost our booking. Fortunately he hadn't left it till late at night, and they found us probably the last room in Gloucester, which wasn't too far away. Otherwise we might have found ourselves camping without a tent, which ought to be left to our gay friends...
Now shattered and shaky because of the sheer amount of walking and talking I did over the weekend, but I don't think I am going to go into another post-holiday depression. I actually thought the other day that God was speaking to me through Bible reading notes (a rare occurrence) and saying, as was said to Bartimaeus: 'Take heart, get up, he is calling you'. Might be a good verse to get me out of bed, actually...