DAY 35: Lighthouses

I have had a fascination with lighthouses which really started in 1997. I've spent a fair amount of time visiting and photographing them as a consequence. In 1997, I had the chance to be at Land's End, the tippiest southern tip of England - it was a very emotionally raw and charged time for me. I stayed in Marazion for a couple of nights and I have to say, all other things aside, that it is such a pretty quaint seaside town, filled to the brim with salty piratey romance and a taste of a bygone era where sailors pulled in and spent the night at The Ferry Boat Inn, perhaps.

Sadly, I didn't get to see the Lands End Lighthouse - didn't even know it was there. Funny, I flew thousands of miles and missed it and it IS a gorgeous one to boot.

Anyway, this love of lighthouses was born from that trip to the UK. It was given life because of my need to be alone, to stand on the edge of my cliff and face the rugged storms and lashing winds that my life was weathering at that very moment. Dramatic? I know.

Lighthouses came to symbolise to me, that no matter what my choices are in life, right or wrong, I can face the consequences alone. I am strong and resilient as a lighthouse is. I can stand on my own two feet and weather all that life can thrash at my feet. I can provide shelter and solace not only to others in need but also to myself as well.

They also remind me that I am very comfortable in my own company, when I can skate around the cornices of my mind and explore all the thoughts and inquisitions that blow in and out of the windows of my soul.

Over the years, the affiliation I have with lighthouses has grown and, for some inexplicable reason, I am most calm and centred around them.

Grant proposed to me at a very romantic lighthouse - Cape Otway Lighthouse - and I still find that so romantic and charming. It is tucked away on a cliff, far away from the madding crowds, a beacon of safety.....and it was there, when we were tucked away, just the two of us that he asked me to make a life with him.

Prior to that and since that, we've made it a 'thing' to visit as many lighthouses as we can. I suspect they have come to mean something to Grant as much as they mean to me.

I am happiest near or in a lighthouse. One of my heart's desires is to own one so that I can have my own private retreat. I know a few have come up for private sale around Australia and although it's never been the right time and place for me to consider it, that day will come to fruition. 

Even writing about this has left me with an unwitting smile on my face. Lighthouses are my peace and serenity.

The rocky ledge runs far into the sea,
and on its outer point, some miles away,
the lighthouse lifts its massive masonry,
A pillar of fire by night, of cloud by day.

Even at this distance I can see the tides,
Upheaving, break unheard along its base,
A speechless wrath, that rises and subsides
in the white tip and tremor of the face.

And as the evening darkens, lo! how bright,
through the deep purple of the twilight air,
Beams forth the sudden radiance of its light,
with strange, unearthly splendor in the glare!

Excerpt from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - The Lighthouse 

DAY 34: My Neighbours

I chuckle to myself as I say this but today, for the first time in 11 years, I met most of my neighbours!! 11 years?!?!?!

Sue, Stew and Chloe put an invitation in our mailbox for a lunch BBQ, declaring that they'd lived in that house for 12 months and hadn't had the opportunity to meet the neighbours. I didn't want to RSVP and say I've lived here for 11 years and SAME!

Thing is, we live in a beautiful part of Melbourne that is hilly, to say the least, and most of us live on undulating blocks of land. We don't get the opportunity to bump into each other while walking the dog. Who the h3ll (oh gimme a break....this censorship is really tragic!) would walk dogs around our hills without an ambulance following closely behind albeit at a safe distance?

We don't wave to each other as we mow lawns on Saturday mornings because we don't HAVE front lawns. We have slopes. We don't say "Hi" as we wash our cars in our driveways because of previous water restrictions (and my aversion to any type of unecessary housework of any kind) so.....all things considered, we've just never had the opportunity to make friends.

BUT...................

They knew a helluva lot about OUR household! THAT surprised me a fair bit. To be more precise, they knew Alex and Adam. Adam came with me to the BBQ and was greeted by most of the neighbours with familiarity whereas I had to introduce myself as Adam's Mum. Conversation was punctuated with GPS precise positioning as to where everyone lived in relation to where Adam lived (??).

I have to say they are a lovely, lovely bunch of people. Eclectic in the mix which is how I like it. For 11 years I've lived in this house and I really LOVE where we live. However, it's been a very 'keep-to-yourself' kind of neighbourhood - my experience of it anyway and so today felt really really nice. It gave me a sense of belonging and....safety.

I hope we see more of our lovely neighbours and that I don't scare them off and they move away. Hehehe.

DAY 33: Shagging Muppets

You know what floats my boat? Trying new things. New experiences.

We went to see Avenue Q with Dave and Sheri (and their friends, Kim and George, too) tonight and I LOVED it!! It was inappropriate (of course) but it was a type of theatre that I have never seen before. I like expanding my experiences so this was such a good night.

It is based on a musical Sesame Street-type of background where multicultural muppets live in a street called Avenue Q. However, this version of Avenue Q is definitely purely for grown ups!!

Excellent night, if you get the chance to see it. It puts a smile on your dial!

DAY 32: The Magic of Momentum

How wonderful is it when things move, progress, go forward and leave the pier of stagnancy? How wonderful is it when you put sand in the funnel, give a little push and you get those figure eights that Professor Julius Sumner Miller managed in the late 70's?

I am happy today because something I've started has gathered momentum. Still can't say what it is but the day is drawing nigh when I unveil my brainchild.

It started with one small idea moons ago and serendipitously has grown into something beautiful, something larger than I expected. All shall be revealed soon but, for now, let's depart the stage of mystery and move on to the mysteries of motivation.

I'm gonna share with you some of my genuinely favourite quotes that have become mantras to me over the last few months:

·         A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others. Ayn Rand

·         If you can dream it, you can do it. Walt Disney

·         If you want to conquer fear, don't sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy. Dale Carnegie

·         Perseverance is not a long race; it is many short races one after the other. Walter Elliot 

·         You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream. C. S. Lewis

·         What you get by achieving your goals is to as important as what you become by achieving your goals. Henry David Thoreau

If you're sitting there and thinking, "I should"....or..."I wish I did".....or..."What if" then my advice to you is DO IT! I don't ever want to look in the rear view mirror of my life, wishing I gave it a shot. Don't you do the same anymore.

I'm grateful for all the magical things that have guided me to this point, to the beautiful supportive people in my life who have whispered "You CAN" in my ear. You don't know how addictive faith and confidence is.

  

DAY 31: Exploding Thermos

Today my sister's Facebook status read "I just hid behind the door to scare a co-worker... ' cept it was a patient who walked out...." and I haven't stopped laughing at this since I read it. Which reminds me why I am grateful for alll the funny things that have happened not only to me but my family, my friends, in fact just about everybody I know.  Now I don't know if they're actually funny occurrences (one 'r' or two??) or whether I find them funny but either way, they make me laugh and that's what's important.

DISCLAIMER: There is EVERY possibility that you have been the victim of my laughter and in no way would I have intentionally wanted to hurt you because you did something so stupid that it made me laugh long after the incident happened.

My family has a habit of attracting 'stuff'....situations that always happen to us that are very very funny. I haven't pondered whether, if these things happened to other people,  they'd be just as funny or whether my family, being the quintessential Addams family of slapstick dysfunctionality, make it funny.

You've read the blog about Happy Birthday Julie. That's nothing. Let me give you some examples:

THIS WEEK: The Exploding Thermos:

I was being very (re)creative and made potato and cauliflower soup after tasting it at the Gown of the Year Awards night in Melbourne. After having tried my culinary skills and impressing myself, I thought I'd take some to share with my friends from work. I filled my trusty thermos right to the top with my deliciously hot yummy scrummy soup. At around lunchtime, I thought to myself "Shaz, whack the thermos out on the desk to remind you to serve it up for lunch"....and so I positioned said thermos on my boss's desk, trying to earn some brownie points. He was out seeing clients and would return to some hot home-made soup and that would take care of my bonus for this year. Up here for thinking....

I started to hear a squeaky high-pitched noise eminating from my thermos and didn't think of it. Should I say right now it was around the time of the Bali bombing and people were nervous being in and around banks. I decided to ring my boyfriend (now my husband) and was chatting away to Gee when suddenly there was this massively loud explosion. I swung my swivel chair around long enough to see a huge mass of my soup being propelled into the air, lose momentum and then plummet back to the ground, hitting it with an almighty thwuck!

In what was a slo-mo action shot, soup was flung up all the walls, all over the furniture, the computers, my bosses gorgeously upholstered chair, in between the keyboards. My eyes just bulged and I sat there, amidst an horrific Exorcist-like display of potato and cauliflower soup artistically flung like a Pro Hart canvas all over our very swish offices.

It was a thick soup - not a watery soup - so it stuck to every surface like glue. I don't like referring to my soup in glue-ish terms but there you have it.

I immediately rang my boss and urged him not to come back to the office. He knew better than to ask why and so he didn't. BUT.....the Executive Director was still in and he HEARD the explosion and came running.

Picture sheepish Shaz, still sitting, hands tucked between my knees, looking up at the roof which now had a hole in it from the lid of the thermos, looking left at the artwork on the walls that were now displaying large chunks of pureed cauliflower and then, quietly to the right, where soup was still steaming off the wall (and I was biting my lip right about now a la Norman Wisdom style).

The short end of it is that the professional cleaners were called in to undo my artwork and they recommended that the industrial boys be hired for THIS job. $3,000 it cost to clean up my mess....... and the only thing I could say to the Head Honcho was that he should have been relieved that I didn't make curry for everyone.

I shan't regale you with the special version of how the soup actually got into the airvents in the ceiling and, as it had fresh parmesan cheese in it, went right through the heating in the building. In an attempt to neutralise the stench of warming parmesan that was permeating through to the seconf dloor, I raced out to get some NilOdor, stood on the deska nd liberally splashed it int the vents. Needless to say that the building stuck like a male toilet trough lolly for days and days and that became my nickname thereafter. I shan't mention that at all.

I DID win the Tool of the Week Award - a very prestigious award for the halfwits that work for a large national bank and I would have carried it forward another week had it not have been for Lucky Greg who thought that warming a BBQ chicken, still wrapped in foil, in the microwave was a great idea and set the microwave on fire which set the sprinklers off and we all had to be evacuated.

DAY 30: My Home Town - Melbourne

Glorious Melbourne! She is a fickle woman with multiple personalities, multiple moods, multiple smiles for her multiple lovers. Turn a corner and you're in a new world, new culture - even the weather seems different and, being a Melburnian, we give, we change along with her, knowingly.

I work on Spring Street at the top Eastern end of Melbourne. The 'Paris' end of Melbourne, as it's known as. Here, the shops are spaced out and seems less congested or are the streets just wider?

Parliament House looks authoritatively down Bourke Street and sideways on Spring Street, laying out before it like a smorgasbord platter. The trams come and go, unknowingly and unaware of the people, the traffic - it has it's course and it comes and goes and rarely looks up to see if anything has changed.

At the top end of Bourke Street are two famous restaurants that are famous gathering places and haunts of the Melbourne Mafia or Underworld - "top notch posh" restaurants coincidentally also frequented by politicians, celebrities, who's who. One world trying to slink in and out in anonymity, the other sitting on tables on the sidewalk, hoping they'll be recognised and their egos inflated for yet another day.

As you walk by, the tone moves from public service to a more cosmopolitan al fresco air, where you know you can get anything if you knew who to ask. A part of you wonders if today's the day you'll hear the rat-a-tat-tat of a machinegun firing off from the rear window of a black Mercedes as it drives by, taking the target and you, unpreparedly, to a darker place where there's silence. As you walk by and hear the swish of a breeze ruffling through the oak trees lining Bourke Street, you realise that you'll live another day and that, probably somewhere down Lygon Street in Carlton, the reverie is being lived out for real and you'll watch it in horror on the 6 o'clock news tonight, safe at home.

You walk past the construction workers, packing up for the day. They briefly look up, hoping you're a taut secretary with the highest heels that tighten your calf muscles and, sadly, look back down again because you're wearing your sneakers with your corporate suit and haven't delivered one of the few special treats for them, working in the city.

You straighten up your backpack and walk briskly past them, towards JB HiFi, denying the temptation to meander in and just see. Nobody just meanders into JB to just see.... you know that the minute you're within coo-ee of the big distinctive yellow doors, you know you're walking back out with a CD or DVD you're not sure you really wanted but was too cheap to leave languishing amongst all the other outdated CDs and DVDs. But not today.

Today, Melbourne's warm summer has got you magnetised to the pavement because that's where the most sunshine is right now. You turn into Swanston Street, heading towards Flinders Street Station, and into a row of cheap Asian clothes stores. The type of stores that young teenagers with their first pay packet race into, to buy copies of originals from Myer and David Jones that they can't afford just yet. You smell the acrid odour of the horse and carriages sweat and pooh, waiting for tourists to buy a clip-clop trip around the CBD. you know why they call it the 'Paris end' where you've just come from....because this doesn't smell like the parts of Paris you've visited. This smells of the toil and sweat of hard-working people, cracking nails and breaking backs to make a living to pay for that little plot of soil and bricks and mortar they call home.

In the distance, you see the famous 'M' of MacDonalds, Macca's and Hungry Jacks looming in the distance and, a smirk of pride that you are not one bit tempted because this is not your kind of food. They don't sell vegetarian sushi and wholemeal tandoori wraps or spicy lentil soup with coriander and fresh crusty bread rolls. They don't sell rich hazelnut and dark Italian chocolate tarts in delicate yet rich buttery pastry shells. No, this isn't where you buy Vietnamese salads or Teri Yaki rice paper rolls or, God forbid, organic Sri Lankan chicken curry with rice and Fijian water so it's with pure safety that you walk on by.


St. Paul's stands in all it's newly scrubbed and renovated majesty. Then you see the worst thing - drug dealers and homeboys, sprawling on the lawns of St. Paul's with their hooded jackets, headbands and sunglasses, gesturing fingers flailing their own language to each other. It's hard to say if they're going to stab someone or whether they're going to hug them....or both. The steps of St. Paul's is defiled with the city's seedier side, tarnished with the reality of life while a solitary figure in the background, waves a Bible in his hand and preaches to no-one in particular. No-one's listening andhe knows it. Yet this is his message or maybe his penance and he progresses unwavingly...........and there is Flinders Street Station.

The iconic ambience of the station is temporarily set aside for now because it is has to perform its daily duty of shuttling commuters to and fro......train in.......train out....train in......train out.....train cancelled.....train in.....train out.....train cancelled.....train late.....to their homes, where they flop on their couches and exhale.

DAY 29: Bibliophile: Not An Obsession With Bibles, Okay???

I have always, as far as I can remembe, and will continue to have an addictive relationship with books . I love books! They represent so much more to me - another dimension, another world, a chance to reinvent myself and take the role of the main protagonist and go somewhere for the duration of the page count. It's a chance to live, learn and travel to new places, even if it's only in your mind.

In all my time of discovery, I have introduced myself to thousands of books and they have either become my new best friend or they've been piffed on the hard rubbish of my life.

I try to make friends with every book I open - each book has an unique personality, much like a fingerprint and I try not to pass judgement by purely looking at it's cover and creating my own perception of what it really is about on the inside - a bit like people, really. Sometimes I'm really good and my book surprises me, pleasantly and then I pat myself on the back for having the depth of perception to choose it, not for what it looked like but for what it was, inside - oh, clever little me...

Other times, I justify the 'bad pick' because (wait for it) it was a wolf in sheep's clothing - it certainly wasn't ME choosing it purely on the basis that it said "erotic"....or...."sexual tension" on the back cover, certainly I wouldn't be as superficial as that. It certainly wasn't the Rubinesque Renaissance beauty on the cover, draped in burgundy and gold with voluptuous thighs and pert breasts.....would I choose a book purely because of the promise of romance and deviance? I think not.

Which is why I choose biographies, for the most part. What type of biographies? Oh, the ones about people's lives - duh.

At the top end of Bourke Street there sits an old iconic bookshop with the most delectable and inviting titles in the window. The Hill of Content has a history in Melbourne that I have only just discovered and in keeping with it's quaint title, has a certain 'olde worlde' charm once you step over it's threshhold. It has an ambience of antique paper and pipe smoking, an immediate relaxed and peaceful feeling overcomes you once you trail the shelves for titles not always found in your Borders, Angus and Robertson, Collins-type bookstore. Ironically, the Hill of Content was bought by Angus & Robertson in 1951, after the owner no longer wished to run it because his son died.

As you quietly ascend the crimson-lined albeit worn out carpet and the dark carved timber stairs with it's Victorian-style balustrading to the first floor, a sense of anticipation creeps in - you just don't know what's waiting for you upstairs and......with a sense of relief, it doesn't disappoint. Bound copies of the classics, one-off editions of artists catalogues, beautifully bound classic literature for the discerning reader.....my heart stepped up a notch, pounding. It was like finding the most precious treasure, right here, in my own backyard.

Eyes devour titles delicately stacked sideways - the nose takes in the beautiful, comforting smell of "oldness" - like being at Grandma's house after she's baked a home-made apple pie and the heart takes flight. For here, in this little bookshop, which has it's own history, there are new friends - yet to be made. New acquaintances to get to know and new souls to take back home with you, knowing that this new friendship .......is a keeper.

I have found a peaceful oasis where I know I will revisit and visit again. This place has beckoned for weeks and months and today I gave in and was rewarded handsomely.

DAY 28: Crossing Bridges

So.......I've dropped Adam off at the airport and done the predictable crying session. I'm emotional and I know it. One of my rituals when leaving people at the airport is to stay until I see the plane take off and it is a mere dot in the sky. It gives me closure. I once left Grant at the airport and didn't stay to see his plane leave and I can't begin to tell you how disjointed I felt until he returned so I need to see this little ritual through everytime and I understand that.

BUT.....Adam's plane reversed and meandered down the runway and I waited to see it taxi off and take half my beating heart away from me (the other half was trying to make her targets at work). And I waited.......and I waited......and it turned left and I never saw it again. For all I know, it's still there!!

At this point, you need to refer to the previous paragraph about having closure and my heart started beating faster. WHAT was I going to do if his plane took off in the opposite direction and I didn't get closure. So I ran to another window? Nothing! No plane.....fast forward 15 minutes and the realisation that his plane had taken off without me witnessing it.....so I adapted the situation and manifested my OCD to the Air NZ flight that was taking off. How stoopid is that? The tears came for a flight that DIDN'T contain my son and wasn't even going in the same direction that HIS plane was....*shakes head and shrugs with confusion*... but my eyes needed to see A PLANE taking off to consolidate with my brain and heart that a big steel bird was taking one of my children away.

Anyway, I was meeting Cres and Chelle at Highpoint Shopping Centre (story's too long to explain why but it involves Borders collapse and a gift voucher...*waves hand*...it's not important) but I've never been there before so I trusted my not-to-be-trusted iPhone Maps application in the silly notion that it would lead me to Consumer Mecca.

So I followed the purple line on my phone and at no stage did it occur to me that the route was getting a little scenic for, what was meant to be a 15 minute drive from the airport. I ended up on The Boulevard near Maribyrnong River (Afton Street, to be exact) and the phone came to a bridge - coincidentally name The Afton Street Bridge (genius!!) -  and told me to cross it. Cross the bridge??? I need you to picture me, in Gee's little Mazda MX5, parked on the side of the road staring and blinking back and forth to my phone, to the bridge, to my phone, to the bridge, back to the phone.....because I was looking at a WALKING BRIDGE people.....

Enter Other Shaz. She whispers in my ear "I reckon, if you reverse and do a run-up, you can clear it, you know"

I was emotional because the passenger seat which HAD contained my son was now glaringly empty and now????...I was staring at a pedestrian bridge when I was IN A CAR....FFS!! and I was supposed to be meeting people in ....err....10 minutes ago????

WHAT WAS wrong with this stoopid iPhone??? Why did it mislead me when it KNEW I was deranged with heartache???? And then, the answer.

I had accidentally hit the 'pedestrian' instructions on the iPhone instead of the 'car' instructions.....DOH! You know when you have that moment of realisation?? OMG?? I'm not stupid? Despite second guessing the likelihood that I COULD possibly take the bridge a la Bond style and make it in time?

So now you're thinking "How is this related to Gratitude and/or Happiness?".....Yeah, well it isn't. But that was my day today and I'm taking literary licence of my blog and having a revolutionary moment by digressing from the theme and writing about what I WANNA WRITE ABOUT, OKAAAAAAY??

DAY 27: 20 Things I'm Grateful That I've Learned

I HAVE posted this in another blog I've previously attempted called 525600 minutes but I think it's still relevant and would like to take literary licence to post it in this blog too:

I KNOW THAT:

1. What you put out comes back all the time, no matter what. Including the garbage on a windy day.
2. Hot cauliflower and zucchini soup should not be filled to the brim in a thermos (or else it explodes and makes a BIG mess alllllll over your boss's desk....oooops! It did earn me the Tool of the Week award so there was achievement). 
3. Failure is a signpost to turn you in another direction. 
4. Trust your instincts. Intuition doesn't lie. 
5. There is a lesson to be learned with everything in life, if you look hard enough.
6. Being creative is one thing but dates and bean shoots are revolting in an omelette. 
7. Doubt means don't. Don't move. Don't answer. Don't rush forward. 
8. Trouble don't last always. 
9. This, too, shall pass. 
10. Don't be scared to try the road less travelled. It IS less jarring to the spine in a 4WD drive, however. 
11. Bacon IS food of the gods. 
12. The moment between the time that you press your lips to a much-anticipated cup of coffee and the realisation that someone replaced the sugar with salt........is heaven and h3ll (censors? what the?) all rolled into one. 
13. That the geeky, nerdy IT role-playing Star-Wars-loving guy will actually become your husband and, ultimately, the love of your life. 
14. Answering the work phone with "1-800-SPANK-ME" will not guarantee you job security. 
15. When the going gets tough, the rocks come to the surface while the wood sinks to the bottom. (I KNOW this one really well, too!) 
16. The only true biological relationship that exists in family begins with the heart.  
17. If you KNOW coconut doesn't agree with you, constantly challenging it doesn't change the outcome. 
18. Banging a door repeatedly and swearing at it will NOT make it suddenly fit (kudos to Kaz for trying this one though).
19. A true friend will tell you when your skirt has accidentally been wedged into the back of your underwear before you have walked down the street a fair bit.
20. When life serves you lemons, learn to make lemonade.

DAY 26: Other Shaz

Okay, comes the time to introduce you to "Other Shaz"....I did mention her in a previous post - she's not here today but she'll show up and I'd like you to know a little about her before you meet her.

I have this alterego that lives inside my shell - I call her Other Shaz - and she talks to me regularly. I suspect she could be my conscience but I didn't think consciences would be sarcastic and Other Shaz is very sarcastic.

We actually have conversations together which can be very funny. Other times, she's there to soothe and comfort and, most times, she is a hedon and buggers off if she thinks I am going to rely on her to cheer me up. She has been known to disappear if she gets a better offer.

I've spoken to her many times, while I'm driving alone, and she helps me navigate. We've even ended up in fights like the time I was driving through St. Kilda looking for Fitzroy Street and it seemed to disappear? She says to me "Whaddya mean it's disappeared??? A street can't just disappear. You haven't looked hard enough" to which I reply "Whaddya mean I haven't looked hard enough???? Did you think I just like driving around blindly?" She says "So where is it? Where is Fitzroy Street?" I say, I DON'T KNOW, SMARTARSE!!! You seem to know everything - YOU tell me where it went!"

I don't have a profile for Other Shaz - I don't know what she looks like and I don't know when she will show up and when she'll disappear. She just comes whenever she feels like it.

It's not like a multiple personality disorder because I'm still here when she comes. Other Shaz made me jump off the top deck of a three masted schooner in Greece KNOWING that I can't swim. She just kept on at me and at me and at me...."Gwan, ya chicken....Jump!! Jump!! Jump!! JUMP!!" and then, to stop the nagging, I did what she asks.

Other Shaz sometimes sits on my shoulder, like a comical devil, and files her nails while passing judgement/comment and, on occasion I've been known to respond to her sarcasm outloud. She finds this hysterically funny and I've found it socially homicidal.

Other Shaz also saves me sometimes. She injects humanity into me some days and she reminds me what it's like to be human and make mistakes......she's so unpredictable and I never know whose side she's on, on any given appearance. I just have to go with her flow.

She makes life a whole heap more exciting and I wouldn't be rid of her because she's adventurous and exciting.....and she's very very funny.

 

I know this sounds strange but I really do love her and appreciate her presence in my being.

 

With her, I'm never lonely. "YES YOU ARE"........Who said that????

DAY 25: Ask And You Shall Receive

My cousin Baz and his wife, Yolette, bought me The Secret moons ago as a present and I was a bit "self help" booked out at the time so I put it in my library (okay, it's my pretentious way of saying bookshelf....sue me) to read on another day. That was a couple of years ago.

If I had to explain all the little things that led me back to this book, you'd either get bored or you'd think I'm a nutbag. I am one of the BIGGEST guffawers and skeptics of anything too ookie-spookie and new age-ish. HOWEVER suffice to say, the Universe presented things to me that I couldn't ignore anymore and one thing led to another and I picked the book up, cynically eyed the cover and quietly whispered to it "So, you think you can enlighten me, can ya? Pffffft."

Let me say that my beautiful sister Karen ignited that flame and then, serendipitously enough, Megan Castran gave it fuel. My rocket was being launched whether I wanted it to be or not so I could either choose to go for the ride or watch from a distance and........ I chose to strap myself in the front seat, go for the ride AND take control of the steering wheel. Hope that makes sense.

So I started reading The Secret and I had ....well, not so much lightbulb moments but more torchlight moments....and Other Shaz (I REALLY should blog about her soon because I think I've referred to her once or twice without a decent explanation) kinda nudged me with her shoulder and said "Why don't you give it a go? if nothing else, you'll have something substantial to guffaw at and you KNOW how you LOVE a good GUFFAW and FNEH".

So I threw myself into it. I ate the apple. Have to admit that it started to feel really good. Out with the negative, in with the positive. I set myself up, rather wankily (it's a word..!!) with positive affirmations on the fridge right next to the fridge magnets that say "You've got a choice of two things for dinner: Take it or leave it", "Good Mothers have sticky floors, filthy ovens and Happy Kids" and a magnet with a picture of a guy chatting up a girl with a text bubble from her saying "No thanks! I already have one asshole in my pants".

I have been at this for over a month and I can't begin to tell you the changes that have occurred. "Like attracts like", apparently and like, good stuff has been coming, like, my way, man. Peace out.

I've decided to step up to the plate and take the biggest swing of my life, to do the things I WANT to do and ACHIEVE out of this life of mine. Hence the new haircut.... the new car...the holiday to Bali in May....and there's more....*twitching eyebrows*...

So, cryptically, I asked The Universe for some help. I won't be too specific because I need to keep something to myself and all will be revealed in good time anyway. I quietly sat on my decking late one night just after Christmas and had this marvellous conversation with the stars in the sky and the very lovely summer breeze rustling through the gumtrees around my house (and probably my unwitting neighbours who said "She's talking to the carport roof again, Jase).

I said "Dear Universe, I REALLY REALLY want this to happen. THIS would make me genuinely and serenely happy, satisfied, fulfilled and content. It would add the MOST important dimension to me and give life to something that I've pushed down and kept dormant for years. I'd REALLY like your help to give it life and make of it what is meant to be. In turn, I hope it will give others the same kind of happiness, if not more".

No..... it wasn't the largest cake in the world to be delivered to my door.

So, yesterday, The Universe proved it was listening and it gave me another rung on this ladder to step up to. I've knocked on similar doors before and never, ever had a positive response.

Yet yesterday, I got a YES. Not just a YES but a big FAT OVERSTUFFED OH-DEAR-I-REALLY-SHOULDN'T-HAVE-EATEN-ANOTHER-STEAMED-PORK-AND-PRAWN DUMPLING YES!

DAY 24: Family Bonds...or is that bondage?

I had the loveliest phonecall from my ex-brother-in-law, Steve, this evening. He keeps in touch because he has a big ole kind and generous heart and we share a gorgeous bond which primarily consists of a lot of laughter and amusement. He keeps in touch with my kids and loves and understands their many moods and whims and goes with their flows. Good ole Uncle Stevie, as he's known to them.

When Carl and I divorced, part of the division of property and chattels contained our friends and family, sadly. Yet one thing has remained and stood the test and trials of time and that has been my lovely connection with the Baileys. We don't see each other as often as we'd like because our lives have drifted into different corners. Yet birthday cards and phonecalls and text messages and Christmas cards? They never miss a beat! And I look forward to receiving them every year.

It's very unfortunate that, in most cases, when a marriage breaks down, it affects the entire families involved. I guess that's how to has to be sometimes. Yet somehow ours has maintained an unspoken bond, a connection, if you like that exists regardless of the direction that our respective lives have taken.

I'm a very fortunate girl. I have been blessed with two wonderfully loving and caring mothers-in-law (yeah I know how to pick 'em) and two warped albeit funny, funny brothers-in-law. I have a beautiful set of in-laws - like bookends - couldn'a picked a better bunch (can someone forward this to all of them please? No use singing their praises without them being aware of it. What a bloody waste that would be).

Anyway, back to Steve. Steve and I have always been the 'naughty' ones in the family. I'm surprised we never ended up in jail because when we get together, it's usually mayhem. He is a very funny man... one of the few people who can make me laugh uncontrollably. He mimics everyone else in the family and I have no doubt that he's mimicked me over the years. It's a funny, funny thing to see and hear.

The past has to be left exactly there, in the past. Yet every now and then, like a photo album, it's delightful to bring it into the present, reminisce and relive happy times. Thats what Steve and I do. We recall and reminisce. We take the mickey out of each other over past decisions, mistakes, his past girlfriends (ahem), our misadventures, his past girlfriends (coughs), my past crushes but mainly HIS past girlfriends..... and it's an enriching experience to have someone to recall all those moments with. We've known each other 29 years and that's a LONG LONG time.

I'll try and find a photo of him and whack it up here.

I'm now left with a warm reminiscent memory of a camping trip with Buster (his late Rottweiler) and Ian, Steve's mate. Ian was snoring so loud that Stevie stormed out of his tent, sleeping bag zipped up to Pvssy's Bow (I HAD to spell it that way because the censors thought I was being naughty. See, even mentioning Steve get me into trouble) and slept by the fire. The visual of him walking still in his sleeping bag, one corner at a time like a human beanbag, still makes me laugh.

I also remember the time he accidentally saw my sister naked (another camping trip - we need to go camping again, me thinks), slapped his nether regions and said "Nothing! No reaction....it knowwwwws!"

And finally, to top off my inner giggles, the way he used to take off my ex-father-in-law, Jack (his Dad) after Jack had imbibed a few beers and, as usual, would trip over invisible turtles and in that gorgeously quaint Mancunian accent, Jack would say "Flippin' 'eck, what the fock was that?". THAT, in itself was a funny thing to see, but Stevie's re-enactment was bladder-control challenging.

Jack will get a page all of his own because he is a legend, is my ex-father-in-law.

DAY 23: Happy Birthday Jules?

Today is Julie's birthday so my sister, Karen, thought it would be really funny if she sent Julie's mobile number to all her friends to pass on to their friend and their friends to SMS Jules a Happy Birthday! Great idea?? I thought so too............UNTIL............ Please keep in mind that Julie doesn't have my number so she has no idea it's me.

Here is an exact transcript of my message to Jules:

Shaz:               Happy Birthday Jules!! Hope you have a fantastic day and that you feel very loved, as you are!! Glad to hear the rash cleared as well!! Imagine having to explain THAT!! (Julie doesn't HAVE a rash, BTW).

Response:       Check ur number wrong send.

Shaz:               It's your birthday today, innit?

Karen:             Julie just SMS'd me saying "I've just received all these messages from f*ck knows wishing me a Happy Birthday). Too funny!!

Shaz (to Julie):  I'm NOT F*ck Knows Who....still hope you have a triffic bday Monkey Butt.  

Response:         Who r u?

Shaz:               Who is anybody really Jules? An atom in the Universe? Should you be philosophizing on your birthday?

Response:       I'm not Jules, sori.

Shaz (to Kaz):   She's saying it ain't Jules!!! Gimme her number again!!! Have I been  texting the WRONG person?????? AAAAAAAAARGH!!!!

Shaz (to Kaz):   F*cker!!!! You gave me the wrong number!!!!

Karen:             OMG I'm hyperventilating

Shaz to stranger:         Sorry. My dipstick sister gave me the wrong number. You're not Julie. Aren't you relieved to know that? Happy Birthday anyway for whenever it is. I hope you're laughing!

Karen:             I can't drive I'm laffing so hard.

Shaz:               Blink blink....

DAY 22: Musically Moody

Music has always played a huge part of my life. Not that I play anything - piano lessons were sadly wasted on a pathetically melancholy homesick 7 year old in boarding school. What a pity I spent more time hiding from Mrs Baldwin under the staircase than actually learning something that I would have enoyed later  on in my life.

I LOVE listening to music that mirrors my many and ever-changing moods. My taste ranges from classical stuff (not CLASSICALLY classical stuff - that's just too high brow for me) but I enjoy Filippa Giordano in the bath (not HER in the bath - her music playing while I bathe) to Guns 'N' Roses and everything in between.

Of course I have my staples like the Foo Fighters and John Butler and Sarah Maclachlan - I can listen to those without it governing or chaning my moods.

My beautiful Dad sent me a YouTube clip last week of a sweet little blonde 10 year old from American Idol. She sang Pie Jesu and, let me say, she sang it to the point where I was sitting watching it with tears streaming down my face. See, Pie Jesu is a hymn that, to me, is my Dad. Every Easter, I join him in church on Good Friday (it's been 'our' thing for years) and we sit, side by side, and listen to this hymn and life is most complete for me when this is done.

Now it may not be your thing but I'd love it if you listened to this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ar0r02FZng&feature=related

Today, I am in a quiet reflective mood so I've been listening to Adele's 21 album, which was a gift from my sister. Magical!! Quite a difference to the other day when I Had Aerosmith blasting from my car....yes, I know, that's so 80s'....but play "Dude Looks Like A Lady" LOUD and I dare you not to be happy. Well....to be honest, the happiness was more from singing it to my fellow commuters than anything because some songs are just worth serenading to the general public. The YouTube's worth a look as well....


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nf0oXY4nDxE&feature=artistob&playnext=1&list=TLy3MEfpEI1i0

DAY 21: Childhood

I had the distinct pleasure of photographing other people's children this weekend and I have to say, it has been one of the most enjoyable things I have done in a long, long, long, long, time.

On Saturday, I held a newborn in my arms and he was just BEAUTIFUL. His name is Cooper and he is just a delightful bundle of freshly-made flesh and bones. He is only 9 days old. Cooper fit into the crook of my arms perfectly and that old familiar swaying rock came back to me. The best thing about Cooper was that I didn't have to wake up to him at ungodly hours in the morning and I didn't have to change his nappy and I didn't have to do anything more than marvel (yet again) how we can create a brand new pumping heart that beats outside of our own bodies. And Cooper reminded me of exactly that. Yummy yummy yummy newborned baby!!!

On Sunday morning, I met the perfectly charming Emily and Luke, children of Marelle (her husband, Craig had something to do with it too but who's going to really give him any credit for that). They were pocketfuls of utter bliss and happiness. Being with them reminded me how carefree and worry-free childhood really is. Where the worst thing you have to be concerned about is getting 'frog-kissed' by your older sister (that's a globular lick up the side of the face, for those who don't know).

Childhood: Where Superman's main worry is how to get his cape to look dramatically flowing and where Batman's only niggle was the massive wedgie he got from wearing that suit and not being able to adjust himself.

Babyhood: Where filling your nappy is an absolutely warming and gooey pleasure and the only worry is when you are going to get changed so you can fill a new one again.

My babies are all growed up but being with other people's children seems to have taken on a new meaning to me. It's just beautiful to be in the same company of carefree giggles and laughter and then hand them back when the tears start.....hehehehe.

DAY 20: If I Had A Penis

If I had a penis, even just for one day, the top 3 things I'd do is:

1. Paint it so that it looked like a green caterpillar. That way, whenever it had one of those crazy impromptu movements, it would look like my caterpillar was crawling.
2. Bury myself in the forest and leave it out so it looked like a wild mushroom and see if anyone would try to pick it.
3. Wee while trying to whizz it around in circles. I'd recommend not standing too near by when I attempt this.

DAY 19: Feeling Good

I received several calls last night from Adam, who is still in Queensland, and, sadly, I couldn't take his calls because I was in the middle of rudey nudey culture at Ripponlea. I received an SMS first thing this morning, " Mum, I have some exciting news to tell you. I want you to tell Gee as well. I did something special today."

So....I rang him the first chance I got today and I could hear that tinge of excitement and contentment in his voice. Let me say what a luxury it is to be able to read your children by the tone of their voice, the slight intonations, the timbre in their voice? It always thrills me when this happens because I feel the safe cocoon of familiarity and love that surrounds my children and me. I know them so well. *grin*.

Anyway, his news was that he went fishing with his boss (yeah, I know, he's doing it tough by the sounds of things) and he was taught by some strangers on a pier how to use a casting net to catch live bait. Apparently there's a real knack to doing this and Adam got the gist of this straight off the bat and all he could think of was to share the news with me and Gee. He caught 20 fish!! He then went on to tell me about all the things he's learning and conquering with his building and construction job. It's a shiney, gleaning happy feeling to hear that pride in your child's voice.

It's the sound of self-worth and ability and ambition....

So, I'm driving in a serene, fluffy cloud of goodness after that phonecall and my thoughts wander to some of the little things that remind me of Adam that make me feel good. Once I've gone past the "Dance of the Dickheads" that only Gee and Alex have been privy to, so far, I move on to his favourite feel-good thing. 

When he's feeling unconquerable and King of All he Surveys, he likes to  play Michael Buble's Feeling Good REALLY LOUD!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Edwsf-8F3sI

Now, whenever I am on top of the world, I play this song as LOUD as is audibly bearable and it transports me to a happy happy high!

I love that he gets so much pleasure from the small things in life.