Over the holidays I loved so many minutes, so many moments, things were just so much better on days when not so much was timed, when sleep was when I felt like it, and I could stay up until four and not care how tired I might be the next day. Deciding to just stay longer, or leave whenever was great.I tried to write two posts for thisfiveminutes, both in response to buskers. Listening to buskers came to mean holiday time for me. I just stopped and listened and listened to George in Bourke St Mall in Melbourne.Later in the holidays I stopped and listened to a young red-headed double bass player under the walkway of the Canberra Centre. Though the bass filled my body with its deep resonance, words were not there. Later a student described Bracque’s Violin and Pitcher in relation to feelings about the earth. I’ll think of this next time I listen to a double bass. It seems right.Writing in response to music is so difficult. I’ve done it once successfully (I think) and it took months of listening to a Chopin Nocturne again and again until it seemed to be embedded in my walls. Responding to music in writing remains an ambition for me, because I find the experience so elusive and evasive.

So sorry some of my December January posts, you slipped by with the holidays. Somewhat ironically this post has sat in my drafts for awhile, and I posted much later fragments earlier. This goes up with the full and hazy Easter moon, the time I always feel the year has really arrived.