Arabic Sweet

Learning to be more serene...

Thursday, May 26, 2005

Sweet tea and sympathy

I had to move my car from accross the street this morning, becuase the council have decided to disallow parking on that side of the road until the building project that is happening in the next street is completed. It was 8am but it was a glorious sunny day! So warm that I thought I'd go for a bike ride. By the time I'd walked back to the house, (all of ten seconds) I realised that I'd locked myself out! Not wanting to wake my housemate, I walked over to T & A's where I know a spare key is kept and also that they are an early rising kind of household...

Cue bike ride along the river. Lovely. Deserted. Blissfully sunny and warm. Dirt track. well worn groove in the path. As big as a curb. Crash! Bang! Feel sick, help me God! So I hobbled back to civilisation where the nice people at the hotel gave me an ice pack, a cup of hot sweet tea and my statutory one telephone call. 45 minutes and a dripping ice pack later my housemate and T came to pick me up.

Cue sympathy pleeeeese! Although in good spirits, especially that I rang in sick. I'm walking, but it looks a little funny. It makes me thankful for my joints that work normally. But I may be convinced that losing weight would be a good idea if only for the health and wellbeing of said joints... mmmm makes a girl think.

Monday, May 23, 2005

On Being Sparkly

Even sparkly busy people get lonely. Even being sparkly can not always be an antidote for those feelings of melancholy you get from time to time. The problem is that I'm finding myself more and more at a loose end. It could be becuase I haven't got a television and my dvd player is on the blink? Or is it just that someone is trying to tell me something?

Last night I found myself with an impeccably tidy room, no projects or deadlines to meet and a good hour or two before bedtime. I didn't have any good novels lined up, (Woody Allen's Complete Prose is something you have to be in a certain mood for and can hardly be considered a novel!) certainly nothing I wanted to read, and all the other books I had were either 'get your life organised!' books or deeply spiritual and biblically based heavy going stuff that reminds you you are supposed to be reading the bible and being the best you can be. I neither wanted to practice my Arabic nor pretty much do any work what so ever. I didn't want to designs any outfits, make miniature teddy bears, do any stretching exercises nor pluck my eyebrows (they do not currently need plucking...)

I think I need to develop a good bed-time routine that will leave me relaxed and does not include staying up on msn bugging people who should not be on the internet at that time of night, nor playing freecell until I start dreaming of the Jack of Spades...

So what is there to do? Any suggestions?

Friday, May 20, 2005

d'oh!

AM locked herself out again!

I recruited E to help with a sewing deadline that I didn't even quite make - why do things always take twice as long as you think they're going to?

And I get the feeling I'm on a dangerously slippery slope regarding my levels of moral behaviour.

Damn.

Thursday, May 19, 2005

Doing the rounds and Arabic

Well, yesterday afternoon I got a phone call from a friend saying she had locked herself out and would I be able to pick up some spare keys from one property in order to get into another property in order to find the keys to her property. Confused yet?

AM locked herself out.
The keys to E's are at M's.
I picked up E's keys and got into E's house
Where the keys to AM's house were there.

I also dropped off some home made banana cake to T's property whilst in the middle of my rounds. Excitement.

Also, I've been so bored at work recently that today I've brought in my 'Beginner's Arabic Script' - with a mind to improving my skills so that I can investigate taking an intermediate course at the local college that starts in September.

Just thought you might like to know!

The Point

Anyway, I think the main point of all that blurb yesterday was to say that sometimes we find ourselves doing stuff and behaving a way that we wouldn't do if we were still children or teenagers. And a logical conclusion to behving in this new and growed up way is to realise that we aren't children any more. And this newfound discovery, knowing that we can possess our thoughts, feelings and behaviours is actually quite liberating. It is almost as if there is this invisible doorway that when we pass through it, we are incapable of returning to an immature way of thinking. Ok, so some of our behaviour might not exactly be mature all the time, but the thing is that we know the difference, and indeed posess the will and capacity to choose.

I think it is exciting. I think that this new discovery that in fact I'm a grown up and can move forward with the knowledge of both my freedom of choice and responsibility is empowering. Instead of being fearful of this unknown authority figure that means you act out of fear - instead now you act out of choice. Nothing can control you becuase you don't let it. The more you are aware of your reactions, the more you can control your responses. It really is quite - ahem, again, liberating is the only word I can think of. Like the next layer of chains have just fallen off... that's the only thing I can think of to describe it!

Well hey, thats it for now.

Wednesday, May 18, 2005

Being all growed up

Well, its official. I am finally growing up. How do I know this, I hear you ask? Well, firstly not being an ordinary girl by any means, I have more than one element to contend with: being human, and being a christian.

In human terms, growing up in itself is an interesting, painful and confusing process. In particular when you start realising that life is more complicated than you thought. You find yourself acting in certain ways, and having certain conversations which lead you to believe that you're no longer a child. You're more confrontative, able to understand and express your emotions more easily. You even find that the situational experiences you find yourself in are not the ones a child/teen would find themselves in. The ordinary grind of life begins to take over (you find yourself in a grown up job with mortgage, tescos, leadership in different areas, you no longer relate to teens, and certainly have no idea why they have such problems controlling themselves) and you increasingly wonder where you are going to find time to achieve a good work/life balance. When are you going to lose that extra couple of stone you've been meaning to for the last ten years? When are you finally going to buy that motorcycle or enrol in a course to learn business Japanese?

Your whole environment begins to look different and suddenly you realise that the challenges you are facing are more to do with the grey areas of life. You find yourself in relationships with the opposite sex that are no longer straight forward. And being a Christian doesn't help. We're supposed to hold ourselves to a higher standard of moral choices. We aren't supposed to engage in confusing or ambiguous behaviour. We should know where the boundaries are and concentrate on either getting married or enjoying being single and devoted to being the best you can be, instead of getting distracted and engaged in relationships that are leadings us in the wrong direction. But you do it anyway, and feel like the longer you've been a Christian, the more you're getting wrong. (In reality, it is like the advanced driving test: once you get told all the things you should be doing, it feels like you're driving has got worse - but its only your perception, you're not actually doing anything differently!)

Well, anyway, the rest of this post got erased when I was uploading it and I've forgotten what I was going on about!

Wednesday, May 04, 2005

How can you be flying when you're also crying?

Well, my mood swings are unbelieveable at the moment. Of course, could be that I'm a woman and prone to emotional outbursts, but also, could be that I'm an artist, and prone to emotional outbursts. Sometimes I think being open to experiencing and engaging with the world also opens you up to the pain and the suffering of it all. Not actual pain and suffering, just the subjective kind. The kind that we shy away from. For some reason others' pain and suffering is much easier to handle, isnt' it?

I had a great Bank Holiday weekend catching up with friends.... Big up to my main gal Jo! We had an awesome and exhausting time - at some point having to endure some subjective pain of being around some people who were less than interesting... shame. Anyway, on Monday I went on a low-key 'date' if you could call it that to meet an absolutely lovely and wonderful man... stay tuned. I'm not head over heels, but I think that is a good sign. Looking forward to him being a really good friend, though... hands up for summer fun!!!!

In other news, am gathering together a nice selection of young men to entertain and teach me about many different aspects of life - and love - and sexuality - and crushes - and being a woman. I like boys. Boys like me. YAY! Hopefully with the insight gained, I can teach young women all over how to accept and love themselves.

Well, that's all for now... will catch you up soon, peeps