transition and fiddle music - expressing ourselves and serving others.

Autumn moves to winter and Edinburgh has again been witnessing four seasons in one day: dark, overcast on thursday, bright, warm spells on Friday; gusty rain Saturday; and driech and cold yesterday, the perfect time to visit friends and sit next to their woodburning stove, warmed by soup and tea and a glass of plum vodka.

The transition conference took place over this weekend - and my impressions of it were as fleeting and varied as of the weather. Some of the highlights - as ever - were the parts not included in the programme - the little child playing with my notebook and preventing me from writing, my fiddle lesson in the middle of the day - the chat with friends, the impromptu balkan tunes at the ceilidh on friday, the cycle ride up to pollock halls through holyrood park on friday morning, so near-blinded by the morning sunshine that i got off my bike to push it, dwarfed by salisbury crags to my left shoulder.

I enjoy transition as much for the connections it brings; the conversations both picking up old threads, and starting new and for the sense of community it provides by being with and meeting others with similar values...

And at the same time - it can feel like a bubble. Hence my need to dip in and out. Friday, in particular, I had been left inspired by a talk about the Bakery in Dunbar, set up by sustaining dunbar by a community share issue - but was left cold by a later discussion where Transition Support wanted to focus discussion on how to continue when their funding runs out next March.

"How do we involve more people", ran this particular discussion, the subtext being to my mind, "Why don't more people get the idea of transition?". Or another variant of the same discussion: "How do we make sure poor / deprived people and communities get involved."

It depends where you're starting from. Doesn't a question like this assume that transition has all the answers, and others do not? And how disappointing to go to workshops and discussions where there was no time for people to introduce themselves first. Although the transition thinking may be all about abundance, and creativity and fun, could it not be deeply patronising to assume that a project without the transition label is not a creative and interesting one that transition in turn could learn from... For every person who might find the ideas and language of transition inspiring, could there not be another one who finds it confusing, even alienating?

It makes me think of the aboriginal quote."If you have come here to help me, you can leave. But if you have come to help yourself, maybe we can work together."

Going back to my fiddle lesson on Friday, we played chords of two strings together. In Classical music this is called 'double stops'; in traditional Shetland playing it is called 'open strings' - as Morag, my teacher explained, the sound is open and free - like the tree-less Shetland landscape itself. For me, this kind of playing, and the community that it involves; because it involves a relationship between student and teacher, and all leads to playing with others, to the fine balance of solo tunes and group harmonies; leaves my heart uplifted and my spirit purposeful.

Luckily, two later transition talks also more than answered my misgivings, left me feeling recharged and optimistic by the end of the weekend.

Gehan McLeod, from Galgael, whose integrity shined through as she described the work based in Govan Glasgow of traditional wood-work and ship-building that has arisen out of a community of road-protests at Pollock Halls, filling a gap for 'work and for meaning' left by the demise of the ship-building industry in this area. This is a working class movement, and is about people re-claiming responsibility, not about being spoon-fed. "The antidote to consumerism", she said, "is production". And craft itself can build and repair neural pathways, even well after childhood.

Galgael, she explained, comes out of two words. Gal - the 'strange' Norse, embraced by the Gael - the 'heartland people'. The name GalGael breaks down the divisions between us and them - because it recognises that there is both a bit of the stranger and a bit of the native in us all.

And Alistair McIntosh, whose talk I missed, but got to read about through Mari Cruz's blog of the conference, gave a beautiful context and insight. His theme was 'the indigeous': that indigenous people can connect with their land, and that others can connect with their own sense of being indigenous.

Mari says, "Indigenous people are just human beings who feel in control of the place they live in. Indigenous people are those who keep in control of the plot of the land. Alistiar plays beautifully with the two meanings of plot in English: "scheme" and "piece of land". Indigenous people are just human beings who feel they belong to a community, who are connected to their communities."

In the video link, Alistair pointed out the need to respect what is already there, to root in the community, and above all to serve. "What are you serving", he asks. And says that the answer is most powerfully found when a sense of responsbility comes out of a sense of identity and a sense of values.

Transition is so good at inspiration, but what comes next is perhaps more difficult: the need to do the daily tasks that take care of the things and the people around us. But maybe this can be where we both build community, and find our common (physical and metaphorical) ground: more fully alive and expressed as ourselves.