Merry-Go-Rounds: The Silent Killer
I find them simultaneously alluring and disturbing. The 'alluring' part is understandable; they evoke a kind of Edwardian charm of fairgrounds and laughter and candyfloss and dodgems. (Yes I know candyfloss probably isn't Edwardian. Don't shatter the dream). Then of course there's Rosie, the Magical Mystical Merry-Go-Round from Playdays; she was neither alluring nor disturbing, but a necessary evil until Why-Bird graced our screens again. I think I can trace my discomfort with them back to my almost-daily viewings of Mary Poppins as a child. Not only did this film form the bedrock of my feminist principles with the classic song 'Sister Suffragette' and inspire the now half-fulfilled ambition to become a tapdancing chimney-sweep, it also had me 60% convinced that if I rode a Merry-Go-Round, the horses would come semi-alive, leave their stifling fairground structure and gallop/bob down a lane into untold danger/excitement. Possibly including some kind of racecourse. I'm not sure what it says about me that the threat of danger we might encounter on our fantastical journey far outweighed any potential excitement and has left me with an almost crippling phobia of Merry-Go-Rounds, and horses, that I am only now beginning to excavate. Perhaps that I have a fear of the unknown and am unwilling to take (equine) risks? One thing's for certain: after five months publishing books on counselling I am no closer to unravelling my own psychoses. Although I did find myself today uttering the phrase "I cannot believe we only have two books on groupwork!"...and genuinely meaning it.
