While I really appreciate people contacting me through this site, I have noticed that many of your queries end up in my e-mails spam filter. Although I go through the spam intermittently, it is safer to contact me directly via email (jamie.elkon@gmail.com) or telephonically 082 550 0750.
Warmth,
Jamie.
The Harvey Weinstein debacle has left a seriously bad taste in my mouth. The words ‘vile’ and ‘venal’ vie for dominance although they’re both spot on. It’s neither the abuse of power, nor his predatory nature that bother me as much as the silence of other men that rankles most. Why the silence? Because in […]
Do any of you remember the ‘Secret Diary of Adrian Mole’? It first appeared in 1982 in the U.K- it’s the story of a young, relatively gentle, curious adolescent boy and his struggles with his loving but painfully English parents, a beautiful girl called Pandora Braithwaite and Adrian’s slightly odd experiment with a tube of superglue. […]
I’m awake in the thin hours again. I dreamt that I was flying through a furious storm with a choir of wounded Angels. So I lie here, thoughts drifting through my mind like falling feathers, some dark and threatening, others mere wisps, barely formed. The dark ones cast a pall over me- leaving tight, anxious […]
And now? Now that the crushing tide of work has abated briefly, just long enough to take small sips of life again. Now friend, what do you find? Being still floods me with a gentle anxiety, a deep sense of being alone in a vast universe, yet intricately, inexplicably connected to others through gossamer threads […]
Today’s selection — from When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi. In May 2013, at 36, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV metastatic lung cancer. At first, Paul prepared for death, then, he and his wife Lucy decided to have a child. ” Flush in the face of mortality, many decisions became compressed, urgent […]
Being a rescuer of others in emotional distress is a popular gig. As children, many of us learnt that fulfilling this role afforded us a modicum of immunity within our often volatile family ecosystems. Being the emotional support of a sick, depressed mother, or alcoholic personality disordered father may have brought a degree of proximity […]
It’s been a tough couple of months. Love and I have had some fierce skirmishes. I’ve retreated from the field, confused, battered. Now is time to examine my strategy, courageously, honestly. “Love is the hospital for our old wounds”- Hollis wrote. Love changes us, as it works on our painful personal histories (loss, abandonment, betrayal, […]
