Good times

Not much to write about this week. Been busy, happy, nothing to moan about, no angst to speak of. Here is an overview:

The latest I got to work this week: 9.45am.
The worst thing I ate this week: cold baked bean sandwich.
The best thing I ate this week: roast vegie and feta sandwich. What's with all the sandwiches?
Stupidest things I did this week: left the house for work and didn't close front door. Came home to House Wide Open and stealthed inside to do quick check of AV equipment, wine stash and laptop - all in place. Rapists, murderers and crackheads - nowhere to be seen. Thank you Karma bank, I owe you a massive deposit!
Worst conversation overheard this week: stupid workmates talking about kids wetting the bed. One bought their kid a "wee detector" that sets off an alarm in it's little ear if it starts to pee while sleeping. Wanted to fight them and made mental note to never be a mother for having to deal with this kind of shit.
Cutest thing I saw this week: 2 little kids walking to school, a boy and his bigger sister. She was reading him a story as they strolled. Made mental note to self that children are not all evil and to practise reading books while walking.
Biggest tool of the week: Me. See above re: possible home invasion.
Biggest hottie of the week: Hayslayer. Thank god am going to Melbourne tomorrow!

So that's about it. Life is good and I hope it is for my readership of 7 strong. You know who you are.

Seasons for Growth

August is the month when things thaw out. Suddenly the days are getting longer, the sun is shining warmer and something returns to the air which has been lying dormant. It’s a time of reflection, planning, dreaming and setting goals so you have something to aim for when the days don’t end till 8pm and you can’t sleep anyway for the heat.

September brings promise of renewal with its blossoms and blooms. “If they can do it why shouldn’t I too?” you think when you see a naked and empty tree become majestic in its beauty again. Everything is magnified in its splendor - grass becomes greener, colours start moving and you can smell something in the air that wasn’t there before. And this all rubs off on you every day until you realize you are part of a greater process and you need to get amongst it.

October is a waiting game: Summer’s just around the corner and she’s playing hard to get. Its jeans and tee-shirts with a jacket after dark but after all the months of being rugged up all you yearn for is to sleep naked under a fan.

November is time to flirt with the ocean. The sea breeze beckons you to it, daring you to get in and get wet, with a promise to wash away all the residue of the year gone by and leave you only with a thing film of crunchy salt that’ll rinse off under the trickle of a communal shower.

December. The end of another chapter, time to sweat, time to celebrate, lets knock off work early and drink beers in the sun. Its burnt skin and good times, sleepless nights and a cool breeze if you’re lucky enough to take the edge off.

The seasons still run like clockwork and bring with them certain predictability. In January I thought that all that lay in front of me was a question mark. Funnily enough it doesn’t scare me anymore and only brings with it possibility. I’m a third of the way through my life and for the first time feel like the choices I have made are about to give me the right kind of foundation for the next bit….however long that might be….with whatever it might bring with it…

A little Love Song

My favourite vegetable is broccoli
It’s the only way that I get by
I like it steamed with a squeeze of lemon
With tofu and soy sauce it is heaven

I like it baked in cheesy pies
Or tossed through colourful stir fries
It’s full of iron and Vitamin C
Which we all know is very good for you and me

You can even have it raw in salad
Which is why I wrote this vegie love ballad
But I must admit I tell a lie
I don’t pronounce it Brock-o-lye
Although it’s the only vegetable for me
I actually say it Brock-o-lee

Word O'Clock

I really like my boss. He buys me coffees in the morning, compliments me on my “wild 80’s hair”, tells me I light up the room and swears a lot but never at anything. He owns lots of cool cufflinks - one set is a bottle opener and beer bottle top. He looks like John Boy Walton and loves his kids, brings a lunchbox to work with celery sticks in it as he is watching his weight and lets me buy cases of beer for the office on the work credit card. He is rad.

In my previous jobs I have hated my bosses with a passion. One complete mad man called me a “Fucking Dumb Head” in front of the entire office. I laughed out loud at his ridiculous choice of insults and when he turned around and stormed into his office I called him a “Fucking Cock Smack” just as the door slammed so only my colleagues heard. We giggled and I got mad props. Then there was the Crazy Evil ‘Ranga Lesbian who used to corner me in the stationery closet and close the door and threaten me by pointing her index finger in my face. She would read my emails if I left my computer unlocked and ended up stealing $100 000 from the business. Poor lady. Imagine being a lesbian with red hair and Fanta pants. It wouldn’t be easy.

Sometimes I wonder why feminists fought so hard for women to be able to develop high powered careers. Not that I have one currently, but I have dabbled and they are abnormal and completely overrated. I reckon it would be way easier to have 3 choices of jobs like when my mum was young. You could be a teacher, a nurse, or a secretary if you even wanted a job at all. Cooking dinners, hanging with the kids and pottering around the house sounds way better than sitting at a desk, going to meetings and talking about reaching targets and key performance indicators with stakeholders all day.

I’m just having a “Grass is Greener” moment. Mostly it’s not you know.

Friends, Enemies, Lovers, Family...

Being human means somehow trying to navigate your way through a series of interractions with those you love, those you like, those you are related to and those you don't care about. They will all drive you crazy at one stage in your life and your challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to keep the ones you love close and set the others free.

I forgot I had enemies until a few nights ago. It was a bit of shock really since I have this opinion of my self that I am a very nice and good person. In fact, I haven't always been nice, or good, or behaved with integrity and grace. I try, but mostly I'm just a normal person who is capable of fucking up. We all have our shadow side and if you don't know yours you've got problems cause you'll never be able to keep it in check.

I read somewhere that the opposite of love is not hate but indifference, so what does that say for your enemies who can look at you with daggers of hatred? If they were true enemies, surely they wouldn't care anymore? I may be the enemy in some people's daggerloaded eyes but I am happy to say, I don't think of anyone like that. Takes up too much energy that I would prefer to use to love someone instead.

Martin Luther King said "We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies".

So there bitches!

People Watching

Just when I thought it was Spring, the cold and grey is back with a vengeance. Feel great today despite the cloud cover and chill in the air and observed some interesting stuff this morning on the bus to work.

As you will have read in my previous post on PT, taking the bus in Newie is risky in many ways but it always fascinates the hell out of me. This morning there were 2 guys about 17 with Downs sitting across from me, both with pods in ears, one belting out some tuneless song with so much passion, he even had his eyes closed and was doing hand gestures. Everyone on the bus was kind of mildy awkward and I just wanted to slap this dude high five cause he was awesome.

Then a bunch of girls got on, all about 18, dressed in cheap suits and carrying briefcases. They must have been on their way to some kind of Business College where they were being farmed into future PA's so that one day they could move to Sydney to work in some souless corporatation to manage diaries and book travel. It was kind of sad in a way but hey, if it gets them out of Our Town then maybe it's a good thing.

The last thing I saw was kind of heartbreaking. A young family climbed on, 2 young and semi hessian type parents in their early 30's with their son who was about 7. The kid had a very cruel and uncool bowl cut and wore some second hand tracksuit but the three of them were having the best time together. They were laughing and being super affectionate and the parents were totally in love with each other and their kid. On the seat across the aisle from them was a girl about 13 who was in her school uniform and was sitting by herself just staring at this little family scene being played out before her with the most yearning eyes I have seen in a long time. She kept looking at the dad and the way he interracted with his son and I could tell she was a kid with no dad. She stared at them and I stared at her they stared at each other. And then the family got off the bus and she went back to looking at the ground.

I love people watching. I could go anywhere and just sit there and watch people all day. One could say it is quite a creepy pasttime but it's free and you can do it anywhere without any equipment.

More Freaky Current Affairs

The first one I noticed this morning was the story of a woman who jumped off a building naked after taking part in a "rigorous" self-development course.

"She climbed out of the second-floor window of her workplace building, stepped off the ledge and fell onto the pavement below, and then she died half an hour later," Mr Bromwich said. "She was a modest girl but took her clothes off twice and was naked at the time of her death."

What is wrong with us that we constantly think we are not good enough or need to be more in order to be happy? This poor woman probably paid heaps of cash to go to this course and the end result was it ended up sending her bonkers to the point she either wanted to take her own life or suffered from so much grandiose thought she probably was trying to fly. (This photo is actually from the website of the organisation that ran the course.) This quote was taken from the course website:

"Imagine being comfortable with your emotions, allowing yourself to be sad, angry, or happy, knowing you can appropriately manage and express your feelings and have a satisfying relationship with yourself and other people .... Feeling profoundly connected to your heart, nature, society, and in contact with your soul - that part of yourself that is the essence of fulfilment, providing meaning, purpose and a sense of wholeness in your life."

Imagine. How fucked are we as a society and as a community if we need to do a self-help course in order to be sad or happy, express emotion, have satisfying relationships and feel connected to nature, society etc etc as stated above. Have we come so far that the most basic laws of humanity - emotion/expression/connection/purpose have completely eluded us and left us naked and broken at the bottom of an office building in Sydney's CBD?

It makes me yearn for another era and romanticise some of the stories mum has told me of what it was like in the 60's and 70's. She told me that when her and Dad were just married, they lived above a shop in Sydney, two hippies with no money, a new baby and they would sit around listening to records and playing cards for hours on end. They didn't have a TV, they didn't have any cash or assets or any real idea what they were doing either as young adults or parents - but they were just in love with each other and the moment.

This story really illustrates to me the fragility of our mental health in a modern age. We are the product of technology, consumerism, terrorism, globalisation, pop-culture, fast food, disposability, celebrity, genetic modification, built-in obsolescence and so many other false and fucked up concepts that interferes with what's real, what matters and essentially who were are that unless we are rock solid in our mental health, we can easily lose our grip.