Derry/Londonderry

Derry didn't feel like anywhere else. It felt  Derry and I bloody loved it. And that's how I knew I was properly on the Thread. I had the space in my head for the new. I couldn't remember what country I was in though. Invisible borders. As inspirational as Steak and Guiness Pie. I had walked around the city walls three times...I don't know if that's a superstition, it just felt like the right thing to do- reassured me like making the same rhythms with each hand does, but I also got amazing views as a bonus. 

I popped into the Donegal Shop. And met the wonderful Eileen. Revenge time- she took a pjcture of me in her shop. She thought my sausage hot dog shirt was hilarious and had to send it to her niece immediately. Lovely knitwear there. The next morning, the lovelt Martin (oops Michael?) at the bnb I stayed in was so excited I'd met Eileen. She used to look after him a bit as a kid. He turned out well. He only wears black. He works between a gallery and an arts centre. You would wouldn't you? Well I wouldn't of course. He teased me about my yellow shoes and my general colour overdose, and I pled innocent on the grounds that my name is Black, so I don't need to wear it.

In the morning, I went to the absolutely awesome Craft Shop (also cake decorating- I mean there is a heaven innit- I've been there) Aisles of yarn. Cake. YARN. CAKE.

I got two skeins of locally dyed yarn. Very locally dyed, by Eloise in the shop (Little Oak Yarns). I'm still on a purple tip in honour of Noraz and I got an earthy fade too. Can't wait to wind and hook. Eloise was proper (really good people if you aren't an Essex speaker), and her daughter Erin, a fabulous knitwear designer, wearing one of her own cardigans. Wesley didn't want to be in a photo (iktf!), he was lovely too. Derry lifted my spirits in general, and the Craft Shop in particular.

I liked Sandinos...the stained glass flags- wow! I liked the Centre for Contempary Art, and got a Queer print in Irish, which I want to learn more. When I hear it, I feel soothed. I felt safe enough here to enquire about embroidering Derry...Londonderry. I don't want to upset anyone. I'm lazy...what stitcher wouldn't choose 5 letters over 11? And my map could get overcrowded. Next trip am aiming for Antrim, Belfast, Larne ferry to Galloway. But I don't want to gloss over things eitber. The weight of history that's being felt and let go of by so many hearts around here, and also felt and held on to. I think we must remember that people are allowed to choose not to forgive.

'People are trapped in history, and history is trapped in them' in the words of James Baldwin. My great grandad William Black was a protestant who married a Catholic from Donegal. A mixed marriage, they called it. (Don't you think an unmixed marriage sounds genetically dangerous?) He was disowned, and they moved to Glasgow. Only slightly less sectarian but nobody knew them. And so in these parts  I have a very Protestant name, but my cultural background- it's Catholic.

Do you ever get astounded by the caucacity of discussions in the UK about troubles faraway? Why on earth would we know better? Because we've done such a great jon of things here? All the wasted energy, all the wasted talent, all the misery, pain and grief of the Troubles. You know when Leelu in the 5th element watches world history, you can't look at any of this without rending your heart. This isn't even anyone's backyard...with Game of Thrones and the film industry, Northern Ireland is increasingly the front garden of these islands. And it's so stunningly beautiful. And there's hope here. Look at the healing that's been done. Maybe there should be a UN committee for complex issues, and it should be composed of Ulsterfolk, Rwandafolk and Kosovars and so many more. 'Who will have won when the soldiers are gone?' We are the Human League. And we want peace.

I was talking to another London friend last year- one parent Northern Irish, one parent Nigerian. He was telling me about the sheer disbelief of his black friends at hearing about two groups of white people, living in the same place, living like it was a football match for generations. He told them it didn't all come out of thin air.

Plantations, settlements, "indentured servitude". Like the Canary Islands, like Lapland, like Breizh, like Wales...this was/is colonised land, divided land. Disposession, discrimination, erasure, violence bloody violence. Nobody alive today built any of this. I like when we connect horizontally. Every hierarchy...'race', 'gender', religion, class, power....Wastemen. The way things are is not the way they have to be.

I dunno though. I found Derry just right as it was.