Life's opportunities and challenges!

Hi everyone!

I have not had a chance to blog for ages, so I decided this morning that in spite of work pressures I felt like blogging! I don't even know if anyone reads them actually, not that it matters I suppose, but if you do, will you leave a comment or two so that I know? I think I blog more for my good really, than for anyone else to read!

I have had an extremely challenging year from many angles, and I thought it would be nice to explore them a bit and see how I have fared. I have literally built bridges, travelled to adventurous places, steered my career to new levels, coped with incredible emotional ups and many downs, had killer work pressures and deadlines to meet, had fun and some special romance, passed some crucial exams and so much more. There is NEVER a dull moment in my life.

Firstly, family wise: my children all moved out at various times over the last two years, and I had to adjust to the vast emptiness that leaves behind with it. Not that I was sad that they are able to leave and go ahead with their own lives, it is more an adjustment to arranging suppers or times together with them and the challenge of keeping in touch as they forge their new lives, and get busy. We still love to do things together so it is great when we do get together. I would like to do it more often in the new year.

The other huge challenge for me was that Kevin's parents aged considerably virtually overnight and it has been very difficult balancing family commitments, running a home, career and meeting their endless needs compassionately. We are alone in this with no help from any other family members so it means we need to be on 24 hour standby, and drop everything if they need shopping, or doctors visits or medicine or if they fall or are ill or lonely and cook them meals etc. We do it with love, but it can wear you down to the bone, and is exhausting and back breaking to spend a great deal of the night up with an ailing parent and then to be ready for a full days work on your feet that same morning.

My career has been taking huge amounts of time as it just blossomed out this year. No money yet, sadly - we still live from month to month, but I am hoping to put some meat on the ribs this year coming. I have been laying the foundations and lots of amazing opportunities have presented themselves! But with these opportunities came LOADS and LOADS of work and stress because it was new and mostly unknown. I met deadlines that would make your hair curl, and achieved instant 'knowledge' of stuff i had never heard of the day before, and I had to learn everything from scratch and then be good enough at it to 'train' it the next day. Nearly everything had to be created from scratch. HOURS and hours of work. I didn't know I had it me! :)

Financially - we are hoping that with all kiddywinkles out of university, and working at last, we will be able to get on our feet a bit. It is always a struggle, but not any different to what we are used to. I just wish the amount of income = the amount of work!! that would be nice.

Kevin is as patient as he can be, and tries to understand. He always supports me fantastically but I think there were times when he felt the stresses and the neglect of family time that I had to forfeit often due to work load. He is more than wonderful with helping when it is needed.

I hope next year is still full of challenges, but I would like it to be a little easier, less busy and more money maybe? I want more family time and more fun definitely. I will drive the landy more. We'll see - as my one friend would say - que sera sera!

Upington!

I have just come back from a lovely walk along the banks of the Orange River, aka the Gariep Rivier. It is beautiful, a perfect oasis, winding through a desert landscape. A long necked water-bird swooped down right into the water and caught a fish almost as big as he was!

The early morning flight I was on gave a full picture of the vast expanse of the landscape around here, very harsh, dry, broken only by the huge winding river.

I am staying in a lovely place called Africa River lodge. Very comfortable. I still have some last minute preparations to do tonight, but tomorrow my training venue is less than 2 minutes away! What luxury. :)

hospital and tiny creatures!!

I am lying here with an excruciating headache. that's not an unusual symptom of tick bite fever. (tbf) Yes, can you believe it, I went for a walk with my daughter in our local park, and found tick firmly attached between my toes when i bathed that night. I kinda expected the TBF, but not the complications I got too which landed me in hospital.

You see to put it in non-medical terms: what i got was:

tbf + mental + physical exhaustion + too much emotional STRESS = happy holiday for nasty virus buggy things, which kick you when you're down - nice hey!? which = doctor sending you off to hospital = £$R = more stress!!

Anyways, here i am back at home with an excruciating headache! :)

They say:

"Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, but I choose to be from the Heavenly gang, and angels hath no fury!" - by me, in one of my contemplative moments

Building bridges on woman's day!

Watch this space! more details to follow


START....Finish....

Not sleeping at night!

Night time is for sleeping - that is what I have always said to people who tell me that they pace the floor or count sheep all night or lie awake for endless hours thinking things through! Well, guess what! I have joined the wakeful night society now too. It is subtle, and it is not every night, because sometimes I am so exhausted I fall asleep into a deep coma!

But lately I have been lying on my bed, eyes wide open for hours, just thinking. Churning thoughts and emotions over and over in my head. I feel as if I am churning up an ulcer! It is awful! Your body is tired, you want sleep so desperately and you crave a respite from the endless thoughts and unreasonable fears that then crop up - those irrational fears that only the dead of night can bring, and then the sunshine in the morning makes those very things you were afraid of seem silly.

Someone told me that our irrational fears are real and need to be treated as real, silly things like hating it if you are in a room and the door is closed or locked, (causing panic rising up in you) or like crying in front of people - (Panic that you feel your tears gives 'other' people the right to make decisions for you and takes away your control)- those kind of 'silly' fears! But I didn't get to ask what next, what do you do about them? How do you deal with them? Do you need to deal with them? I wonder? Who knows, anyone out there know?

I miss my peaceful sleep, miss the good night's rest, and I am starting to pay the price for it physically and emotionally a bit. Maybe I need a good decent long holiday! :)

Space space space.........

Boy, do i have space now! All the kiddy winkles have moved out, and although Kirk still has a load of stuff to fetch, we have a home that has loads of space! Life is completely the wrong way round, for example: we have space when we don't need it anymore, and money when its not as vital, and can afford a large car when a small one will do, and wisdom when its not valued, we have freedom when we're too old to enjoy it!! I think I want to grow up to be a kid!

I am enjoying myself - rearranging everything, finding a place for all the camping gear, making the flat nice - . the new tiles in the bathroom worked out so nicely! I will take a piccy or two once finished and post it here -> ....

I also learned that to love those people who we should care about, is the way life is meant to be, even if they are difficult, obnoxious, ungrateful or fussy. When you show love, and are kind and gentle, you feel good about yourself, and pass on love to the other soul! Not always easy, but always necessary. So, just love! :)

Headless chickens!!

I often dream about getting it all together one day. you know, eating well, sleeping for at least 8 hours, pacing the stress into bite sized chunks instead of huge helpings all the time, going regularly to the gym, drinking all those glasses of water we're supposed to, all that sort of thing. Lately i am not even getting one of those things right. Pace of work, too much on my plate, all these things driving me - no time to relax. My head knows this is not a good balance, I teach about balance, I should be an expert at it, but I cannot seem to get off the hamster wheel long enough to take a breath, and gain my composure.

I was thinking in the bath the other day that dead people no longer have a responsibility or have a care in the world. they do not have to get up early on cold winter mornings anymore, and they have no more of those stressful big decisions to make, about heaven or hell, or anything, but anyway, before I cause any panic about my doleful thoughts, let me reassure you that this is not a death wish, but more the thoughts of a humorous idea of the advantages of being dead - quite a few I could think of!! :) (it's my dad's fault, I think I inherited his dry sense of humour!!)_ its like the joke about the tick bird and the cow in the field - the tick bird is relishing some fat ticks and the cow says, "how can you eat those yukky things?" And the tick bird says, " Try one, you'll like it - just try it!" "you won't know if you like it until you've tried it!"

On that cheerful note, let me say I have come through another CHALLENGING week! What learning experiences I have had - growth and stretching, and working with great people!

A busy weekend!

We have had a really lovely outdoor weekend! Hardly been home and its been great!
yesterday was Nikita's birthday and she is now 8 years old! Maureen says she is now really growing up.

Today we did a 3 hour hike up a a very steep hill at the back of the botanical gardens, the weather was great and sunny, (except for a chilly wind that blew cold every now and again) and we actually got quite a bit sunburnt despite some sun block cream smeared all over. You can see for miles up there and we had fun. Kevin actually got us lost!!!! (this is unbelievable) we took quite a scenic adventurous detour.

When we eventually, after fighting our way through thick thorny ouchy brambles, got back down we grabbed our picnic basket, flask of tea, and blankets, sat near the stage on the lawn and listened to a live jazz band play some great stuff, and just simply relaxed.

My son moved out today to his own place - scary because he is the last child to leave home, and we shall miss him - but our children must move on in their lives and they must move out! We all helped with some of the moving and luckily being only one person he did not have a lot of stuff to carry up those stairs. His new place is lovely and he can make it very comfortable! I am not going to know what to do with all the space and all the quiet now!! As parents you know the time has to come for your children to leave but it is always a sad time and yet a happy time, and sometimes - ABOUT TIME!! :)

Shirley Loves Landy!

I love our landy. It is old, steers like an old dodgem car at Gold Reef City, brakes skew - pulls to the left, and is very slow at responding, but i love it!







I drove the truck again today, and managed to get there and back without any mishaps!! It is scary, but I am gaining confidence every time. Double de-clutching is still a major co-ord challenge for me, but I am getting there!

Last weekend we took it to De Wildt out at Ga-Rankuwa way, to a deserted place and drove it through the most amazing places - it was cooool fun. We got jammed against the embankment in one spot where the angle was quite challenging. Kevin hates angles, but we thought we could do this one and it landed up being worse than we thought and scraped the side quite tightly - no harm done though, minor scratch that's all.



It was surprisingly warm and we had a picnic on the top of tennis ball hill -a very loose rocky slippery climb to the top. I had to get out and move one offending rock! Super woman watch out for my muscles!!

One of my favourite photos taken by Kevin!

Hauntingly beautiful!
This photo was taken by Kevin at the lake near our home when it snowed the other morning.