More lazy days

The rain has continued, and summer seems an illusive dream right now, but I am still loving these lazy days. It is not freezing, so the garden is growing at least a foot a day, it seems, and my roses are all in bud.

It is early morning, and the house is quiet. I love the silence and the peace. I have my hot coffee next to me. My quilt is waiting on the couch, and I have decided that writing on the computer is finger therapy. It gets the creaking joints moving slowly in the mornings!

So here I am, letting my fingers write what they will today. My head is a swirl of thoughts, as usual, and instead of fighting to order them, the joy of the past week has been to let them arrange themselves how they wish. Being, instead of doing. There is a lot to be said for that.

I think about my friends, and how their lives are changing, with weddings, the advent of grandchildren, graduations, illness, separation, divorce, retirement and death touching their lives in so many ways. The common thread here is change. It is all changing. "It" being life. Nothing stays the same. What worries or pre-occupies one on a Monday is different on a Tuesday. Change is a constant, strange though it may sound. Fighting change is like trying to stop the world from turning.

My life too. Change and I are well acquainted. We tend to battle quite a bit too. A lot actually. For over 31 years I have been primarily a mother, and that intense, absorbing role is almost at an end now. Not the mother bit....that never ends, but the intense on the spot Mum bit. My third child is about to launch himself into the world, full of dreams and the nest will be empty. I actually don't have a problem with that kind of change, you know. I delight in watching my babes spread their wings. They do tend to fly a little further than I anticipated, but I can cope with that. Most of the time.

But it means change here too at home. Maybe it is time for me to relaunch myself into the world too. Old birds can learn to fly again. (Mind you, ostriches can't. Am I an ostrich? Forget them.) The temptation would be to stay here in this place and curl up on the couch. And watch the world from behind my windows. It would be safe. It would be familiar. There would be no hurt. No risk. No pain. I could just weave my memories into beautiful works of art. Safe.

But

Me? I don't think so. I have plenty of memories thankyouverymuch, but not nearly enough. Not yet. I am 54 and hear me roar. I will race out the door, and throw myself into something and yes, I am probably going to get hurt. Get bruised and battered. Dented. Maybe broken too. But that can be fixed. Just think of all those memories I could add in the process.

I do know that I have to look beyond this village, where everything is safe and sorted, and where I am part of a small close community. The illusive "something" is out there calling my name. And it is getting louder by the day. I can't ignore it much longer.

But right now, it is healing time, and that means it is just fine to head back to the quilt on the couch. Maybe by the time I have finished all 3, it will be time. The right time to pick up a few of those challenges, and embrace both the tears and the laughter as I learn once more to fly. I am reminded of the enormous older aeroplanes like giant transport planes. And the little jaunty fighter planes. One needs a short (if any) runway. The other needs half a country to lumber into the air in an ungainly fashion. I would be the latter. I need a long runway. But I will get up there in the end, and you know what? I can fly further. There is more in the tank. I may not be zippy or pretty, but boy, can I go far!

Watch this space.

Contentment

This week is racing by. Me? I am not doing much racing, I confess. I am being more like a slug. And oh, is it good.

However, slugs do not have much to report at the end of their rather slow days, and neither do I. I have had time with friends for coffee and chats. I have been quilting. I have been reading. I have been getting up later than usual some days, and I have been doing more of the "let's help our friend choose beds, linen, curtains, carpets" thing. Yes, the bathroom and kitchen are sorted, and now, so is the bedroom. It is good fun spending someone else's money, people. Really good fun!

It has been wet most of the time, so curling up on the couch with the quilting is perfect. I just don't want it to end. This is what I love doing.

When I am being creative, I have the most amazing feeling of contentment, as I watch something emerge from the movement of my hands, and ideas in my mind. Right-ness. This is why I like hand quilting. Because this is the time when I can think and reflect on who I am making the quilt for, and the significance of the bits and pieces I add. Sometimes, I know that only I will get that significance, but that is fine. There is a part of me in everything I make.

And the quiet is something I cherish.

Those of you who are regular readers know I am making a small quilt for each of my children from the shirts that their Dad wore. They were supposed to be ready for Christmas. Hmmmm. Maybe next Christmas is more realistic, given that there are 3 of them. And my daughter asked for some cushion covers too, so there are those on the go as well. And even though everything was washed, somehow there is that faint smell of their Dad as I work. So the memories are there all the time. That is what these are. Memory quilts.

I don't follow patterns. I am a non-conformist in every sense of the word. I just make things fit together in a way I like, and then I may do beading, embroidery, couching, whatever else seems to work. I love every second of it. You may have guessed that by now!

The hours whizz by, and my hands creak a little more. There is stuff I should be doing, I know. But right now I am taking this time as a gift, and a blessing.

And I am smiling.

The morning after .......

Well, that was fun! Thank you, everyone, for your lovely birthday messages and cards......I had a lovely day.

I had decided not to do anything special, just to potter about, and somehow the day ran away with me, starting with a visit from a friend on her way to work. At 7.15am. The doorbell rang and I looked down at myself, and decided, oh who cares, and marched to the door, dressed in my gown, wrapped in a blanket and with hair which looked as though I had had a close encouter with a tornado. She laughed as I said....and now you see the glamorous side of being 54! But I was delighted to see her, and she was not in the slightest bit phased by my stunning appearance. That is what good friends are for, after all.

Between answering phone calls, I decided to make a cake. Well, all I can say is that this was perhaps taking multi-tasking a step to far. The cake got made, but I could just have left something out. It looks a little odd. I certainly did get the order of mixing things wrong, but anyway, my son says it is edible. Strange, but edible. That is good enough.

So my day was great. Lots of visitors, and lots of calls, and in the middle I managed to re-pot the tomatoes, and just enjoy it all. The moments. Birthdays are fun.

I look at the photo Diana posted and wonder how it is that that same little girl having fun watering the plants can possibly be the woman I see in the mirror this morning. So many good things have happened in her life. So many adventures lay ahead of her when that photo was taken, and she didn't have a clue. She didn't worry about turning 4 or 24 or 54. She just enjoyed the moment. I should have re-created that photo yeterday while I was watering the tomatoes, perhaps. And then when I am 74, I could look back at it and say....so many good things have happened in her life, and she didn't have a clue back then what was lying ahead, couldn't I?

Good things, bad things. But when I look at that photo, all I see is the joy. I don't remember it all, just things from that period of my life, and you know what, from the distance of 51 years, they all seem to be good. Wonderful. Happy. Joy-filled moments. I am absolutely certain my mother could relate the dark side of me being 3. But she never photographed those moments for posterity, so they vanish into the ether, thank heavens. I mean, who really wants to have a photo of themselves in the middle of a temper tantrum??

I want to be like that little girl, just enjoying the moment. Maybe that will be my motto for this new year of my life. Enjoying each moment, without expending too much energy worrying about the "what ifs" of my life. I don't have a clue what kind of adventures there are lying ahead for me, but if I am excited about all the possibilities, that has to be a great start.

Happy Birthday Hijack!

Happy Birthday Mother Dearest!

Yes indeedy everyone, the lovely lady is a grand old *cough* 54 today! Not only doesn’t she look a day over 21, she’s the most fabulous mother anyone could ask for and a wonderful blessing to so many. Have a wonderful day mum, lots and lots of love from all of us xxxxxxxxx

Rain...Rain...and Rain again...

It has rained solidly for the past 2 days. Days when the country and I were all on the roads. Not pleasant. Slow, tedious, dangerous, and thoroughly exhausting. I cannot tell you how many lunatics there are on the motorways . I think I have seen them all in the past 2 days.

Anyway, we are home from out visit to Andrew and Ann, and we had a wonderful time. There was much playing of the PS3 and singing too.... remember Singstar? And we had raclette for dinner, which was wonderful.

Yesterday, we all went to Canterbury to see the university which David is hopefully going to go to in September. It was wonderful. It is a campus, as opposed to a city uni, and I had a chat with some students we met there who all rave about it, especially the science departments, and say they are so happy they made the choice to go there. David says it is even better than he had imagined, and he is so excited.

This was taken at the university... This is the view of Canterbury and the Cathedral from the hill, where the university is situated. How stunning. He will be so happy there, I think/hope, and now all he has to do is work and get the results he needs for admission. 2 weeks to go till he writes the rest of his finals.

Ann is very musical, and plays the trumpet, guitar and the piano, and now, the tuba as well! She showed me the 2 tubas she has, and so help me, they are almost as big as she is. She is having a wonderful time in the band she plays in, and I asked if she knew how to play this monster, and she said, she just worked it out. I did mention that she was very musical, didn't I??

This morning, we all went to a huge shopping mall close by, so the 3 of them could go to the new Indiana Jones movie, which they were less than impressed with. Apparently the plot left something to be desired. And me?? I walked around the shops. It was sensory overload. I never go shopping, because then I spend money. And today, half of England was in this shopping centre, because it is a Bank Holiday and it is raining. So the nation goes shopping.

It has been so long since I browsed, that I didn't know where to start, and I spent what money I had with me very rapidly. Little things. But so much fun. For a while. But after an hour, I had had enough, and the queues for every restaurant were miles long. So I sat and watched people instead.

Close to where they live, there is a road which is prone to flooding, and both yesterday and today, we had to drive through deep pools of water. It is amazing how the sight of large pools of water makes people very wary. After fording the flood 4 times in 2 days, I was beginning to wonder if I had terminally damaged my car, but even though it coughed and spluttered a little, it kept going. And we got home too.

So there you have our break away. Wet. Very wet. But with a house full of your own kids, life looks good, no matter what the weather does!

Time to choose...

There is something wonderful about the first day of the holidays, isn't there.... just the thought of all the possibilities and options there are to choose from. I was lying in bed this morning thinking of what I might do today and even though I continue to wake at 5am, it was such a lovely feeling to run through the things I love to do, and mentally take them out and savour them.

The greatest thing is having the opportunity to direct my own day, instead of being directed. This is something I have been giving a lot of thought to recently, and some things are beginning to fall into place neatly. I think I have found a way to be able to use my talents and to be able to spend time doing the things I believe I am meant to be doing. Everything I have learnt over the past couple of years is, in a way, preparing me for the next phase, and seeing it, and realising what I can learn, makes the waiting easier.

While a lot has been whirling about in my head, I have started talking to some people about it, and the response is wonderful, as are the perfectly timed calls from people like my old boss. People who know how things happen and what is needed. So watch this space......

So today I got on with my quilts, and crawling over the floor of the sewing room pinning things was a delight. Not the floor bit, the pinning. It means that my creation is slowly coming together at last. I love the hand work stage, and that comes next.

I have visited some friends, chatted to others on the phone, and also to my children, and have pottered about the garden doing some tidying and sweeping. Everything is growing so fast now, and around here, the labernum is in flower, and the trees are no longer sticks pointing to the sky. They are covered with new leaves and growth and colour is bursting out everywhere.

Tonight is the Eurovision song contest. This is something one has to see to believe. It is always a source of great mirth here in the UK, and we are all devastated that Ireland's entry of a singing turkey was eliminated in the last round. We always come bottom or 2nd bottom, as the rest of Europe does not like us. But that is fine. Voting is definitely political, and we roll with laughter as the countries name their choices.

I have the option of going to 2 different friends' homes to join them tonight for Eurovision parties, but you know, I may just stay here, curl up on the couch with my quilting, and relax.

That is the beauty of holidays. Time to choose.

Of sea and ships.....

First let me just say that this holiday is for a week only, people..... we still have till the 19th July to go before we break up for the summer. Heaven only knows why it is so late. I know Europe breaks up for their holidays round about the end of May or beginning of June. And our system means that our kids are writing their important public exams in the heat of the summer, sneezing away with hay fever and the like. Ideal.

However, a holiday is a holiday. Even when it is just for a week. And David and I are going to visit my son and daughter-in-law for a couple of days too, which will be wonderful.

While I was writing about the books I gathered to take to sea with me, I was remembering how amused the rest of the officers and crew were when I arrived to do a deep sea trip with Geoff, with Andrew and Diana in tow. The sight of the mountain of luggage certainly had them in stitches. But I am a mother, and I believed in being prepared.

Geoff was a senior officer in the merchant navy, and he travelled mostly on giant container ships. The accomodation was good, great even, and there was a swimming pool as well. I used to get the officer in charge to fill it with about a foot of water in the mornings, (it was about 15+ft deep I think) and we would climb down the ladder and play in the waves created by the ship's movement in the bottom, until the officers came to swim, and then it was filled completely.

But back to the mountain of luggage. I always took a huge box of paper, scissors, glue, sticky tape, pens, crayons etc, so that we could do craft things together. When you are at sea for a couple of weeks, you need to be creative. In more ways than one! We made the most wonderful collages. I usually let the children pick a theme, and covered one of the cabin walls with the background, of say, under the sea, and every day we would make more things to stick onto it. Diana loved making fish and mermaids, buried treasure etc. Andrew did the submarines, warships and divers. I did the fancy seaweed.

Well, the first time we took Diana deep sea, (she had to be 2 years old, and Andrew would have been 6) we had just been at sea for about 3 days when Geoff woke me one morning and said...I think you need to look at your daughter. (Please note the "your"....the children were mine if there was a problem!) She is covered with spots. Gee. Thanks. A great way to wake up. In the middle of the ocean with a child covered in spots. She had chicken pox. The captain got out his huge captain's guide to medicine, and came to the cabin door and asked me if I was sure it was not smallpox. I informed him that I could rule that out as it had been eradicated from the earth (this was 1983) and he was somewhat mollified. He did tell me, though, that according to his great book, Indian people ran a high risk of complications from chicken pox, and that as most of the stewards were Indian, we were confined to the cabin.

That mountain of luggage???? It saved my sanity.

We made paper chains long enough to decorate the entire ship. And it was a BIG ship. We glued and stuck things everywhere. We comandeered every toilet roll on the ship and made rockets, people, cars. You name it. When it was lunch, and everyone was having their meal, I was able to take the kids outside to get some fresh air, but not for long. The trip was over Christmas, so I knew I had a good few presents stashed away for Christmas day, and as they were the only children on board, on Christmas morning, everyone arrived in the cabin to watch them open their presents The Captain was the last to arrive. And promptly lifted the confinement order, because most of the ship's officers were scrunched in the cabin anyway.

So we were able to go and see all the decorations we had made all over the ship. It has to be the most festive one ever. And those men stopped laughing at my magic box of tricks. In fact, they used to tell their wives to bring similar stashes when they travelled. I must find time to scan in my old photos and then I can share some of them here.

One day I will write more about those days at sea....how we used to lie on our stomachs at the bow, watching the porpoises and dolphins dance in the bow wave.... how we saw whales and flying fish, how beautiful it is to get up at dawn and watch Table Mountain appear on the horizon, of storms and sunny days at sea, of wives doing aerobics in the lounge every morning, of near misses when a ship cut across our bow, of bbqs on deck, the challenges of keeping small children safe on giant ships. Of the constant sounds we learnt to identify, how we knew when we were going astern, how attuned we became to the movement of the sea under the ship....... of the day when no-one could find Geoff, and how they tried to keep me from realising how worried everyone was......

All the memories come back when I set off down a path of thought.

Maybe my life has not been so ordinary after all.

Books. Words. Imagination.

Long long ago, back in the olden days when I was very young, I fell in love with the written word. I can't remember a time when I did not love books, reading and all the worlds I could enter just because I turned a page. There is no possibility of boredom if you read. I cannot remember ever being bored. And reading fires the imagination and gives birth to dreams you just cannot imagine.

I grew up with the Enid Blyton books. I believed wishing chairs grew wings. I believed in the faraway tree, and I absolutely longed to go to Mallory Towers boarding school. I loved school stories so much that I remember designing the architectural plans for my own school in the Alps, and I even designed the uniform, timetables, rules, menus etc. A la Chalet School books. See what I mean about imagination? Mine was fired all right. I was going to be a champion rider like Jill, a nurse like Cherry Ames, a detective like Nancy Drew.

I remember going on special trips to an old fashioned bookshop in the city centre, which had books up to the ceiling, and those old library ladders to get them down. The smell of bookshops is special. I got to choose my own first grown-up version of the Bible there, and I still have it today, all written in and the holding so many memories.

My friend and I used to meet in the public library after school and we read everything in the children's section long before we were old enough to move on to the adult books. We were such regulars, that we were allowed to borrow books from the grown-up section which the librarian deemed suitable. And she made it quite clear which were out of bounds! Oh the excitement when we turned 12 and graduated to adult books and a whole new world!

Books were the one thing we could get on demand in my family. My parents never refused to buy books. Other things we had to wait for, but books? No. The only problem was limiting my choice. I never could just get one at a time. My father managed to acquire a library bookcase for my bedroom, and it took up an entire wall. And when I was older, I used to babysit in order to buy more books. I used to sit my mother down and say...... name a subject....and I could find something on my shelves which covered it. And I had read them all. I just needed to know things.

Books..... I have many. I am also given to understatement. I have MANY. I have had massive "culls" over the years, when I have been in danger of turning my home into a library with no room for the humans who live in it, and that is always such a difficult process. Books are so much more than bits of paper glued together. It is the words that are the magic.

It appalls me that the children I work with spend so little time reading. This is the generation of instant gratification. Reading is work, and why bother to read when you can see the movie? I overheard some kids talking about studying Shakespeare for exams, and the general consensus was to forget reading, just watch the movie version.

You will never walk around our school playgrounds in 2008 and find a child reading. Or a group reading books. In fact, it is highly unlikely you will find books that they want to read for pleasure in their backpacks. Magazines, maybe. Books? Not really. That is why the Harry Potters of this world have been so important.

To me, one of the greatest pleasures I can imagine, is curling up on the couch with a good book, and the time to lose myself in it. Be transported. Feel my imagination take flight. Move into another world. Escapism? Oh yes. But in a wonderful healthy way.

Words.

Words , whether mine or yours, have such power. For entertainment, for influence, for bearing the innermost reaches of our souls, for learning, for teaching, for sharing, for sweeping us up and carrying us into new places. The words are what make me come back here time and time again. Words tumbling about in my mind, and words spilling out, seemingly without my direction.

There are times I sit and stare at the screen and my mind can't focus on the next thing to write, but if I just let the words out, they sort of slip into a rhythmn of their own. Words are what link us all. Every one of us loves words, or we would not be here. We all love reading, and we all love playing with the words, and adding our unique imaginations to the mix we are privileged to share.

I have been known to cook an entire meal while reading a book at the same time. To go on long car journeys, reading all the way, yet still managing to see everything about me. I have also been known to pace the house when I have nothing to read. An Amazon delivery is one of my best things. Ripping open that cardboard to get to a new book is such a wonderful experience!

Hmmm. That sounds a little weird. But I know what I mean.

When I went to sea with Geoff, I had to make sure I had more than enough to read, because my worst nightmare was being in the middle of the ocean with no more books. Thousands of miles from any bookshop. It doesn't bear thinking about. The ship always had a library, but the content was not exactly exciting. I think the books all came from the Mission to Seamen charity shop. And science fiction was never really my best thing. Or books with gore dripping theatrically across the cover.

See what happens when I start to talk about books? I forget when to stop. That could also be because right now I am out of new books, and have not had the time to go and get any. So I will read some blogs instead. I have to read in bed. Or I cannot sleep.

Tomorrow is the last day of school, and I am looking forward to NOT falling asleep at 7.30pm every night from sheer exhaustion. One day to go.

Pushing a rock up a hill.....

This is proving to be a somewhat challenging week. Nothing new then. Work is tough, and everyone is as exhausted as I am, even if they are half my age. This is reassuring, as I was starting to wonder what was wrong with me. For heaven's sake, people, I was asleep on the couch last night at 7.30pm, and it was just Monday. I woke at 10.30 and was still wide awake at 2am. Ideal for optimum firing on all cylinders at dawn. Of course.

Today was more of the same, except I had the added delight of a chat with the powers that be at the hospital, who seem to think that rescheduling our meeting for the end of June is reasonable. I disagreed. In fact, I was just a little tetchy. Mad even. Yes. Definitely furious. I pointed out that I had been patience personified, and had been waiting since October. Making concessions, and compromises to suit them along the way. And that I was now clean out of conciliatory reserves. When the person I was talking to informed me that I had no option but to arrange to take time off from work (unpaid) in order to fit in with their busy schedule, I informed them that I was, at that point, too furious to continue with the conversation, and that we would continue it at a later date. And I put down the phone.

So I am all sweetness and light at the moment. Dancing a merry jig. Sometimes, I just wish it would all go away.

At times, our own hurdles seem to be the size of mountains. To someone on the outside, it may all seem so minor, but to the one in the middle? Maybe not. And as much as we may try to leave the stress factor aside, it rears its ugly head, and we are toast. I am mixing metaphors with abandon tonight. And that suits me fine.

Almost a year ago, I was talking about jumbled thoughts. Maybe it is a seasonal thing for me. My mind is not the calmest, most tranquil place at the moment. I am writing here, while the brain is composing letters at the same time. I am planning lessons in one corner of my mind, and computing timetables for airlines in another. The "to do" list is growing as fast as the weeds in my garden, and hibernation sounds like a good option.

In the end, though, the things that make life good, no matter what happens, are people. The smiles when I walk into the staffroom. The sounds of my son cleaning the patio again as I walk in the door. The phone call from a friend to see how my day has gone. Little things. Small insignificant things which make it all worthwhile. Never underestimate what a simple call or message could mean.

My sense of humour and I will resume normal service when I have the energy.

Weekends need to be longer

Weekends are too short. Have you noticed how fast they whizz by?? And then the week takes forever to pass. But we have just one week until the halfterm holidays, and I do believe I can survive 5 working days. Tomorrow it will be 4. See? I can count.

Today has been marked by many yawns. I woke yawning and have continued to punctuate my words with yawns all day. I need more sleep. I remember how my Grandpa used to have what he called "40 winks" in his chair in the afternoon. He seemed extremely old to me as a child. Now? Maybe he was not that old after all.

Or maybe I am just doing what I call "real living" at the weekends, and trying to cram everything into 2 days and I end up cmpletely wearing myself out. Not brilliant. But fun anyway!

Thanks for all your comments re my missing emails. I can report that things are slowly returning to normal around here. They are dribbling in slowly. I do like it when things work.

Like hot water. Remember my friend with the bad building experiences of a couple of days ago? When I asked how things were progressing , there was a long silence, and then a sigh. And I committed the cardinal sin of shrieking with laughter when I was informed that the toilet was now in place and functioning. The only problem was that it was flushing hot water. The plumber has crossed the pipes. Somewhere under the newly tiled walls and floor. Tiles which had to be collected from up north. A long way away. Expensive tiles I helped to choose.

My amusement was not appreciated. This puts a new spin on the words "flushing money down the drain" given the cost of energy at the moment. (Yes, I am back to that again!) I must admit that my own sense of humour would be awol if I were the one having to deal with this blunder.

Anyway. I need to get some sleep. Oh, and my hot water is not what it should be, by the way. It is luke warm. I am indeed going to have to get the plumber in after all. But absolutely NOT the one working at my friend's house.