You can pick your friends…..

I have been struggling with a notion for months now as it continues to cycle through my head and I try to grapple with my thought process and unravel the threads to make some kind of sense from the muddle…..and what has been causing me so much confusion?? Friendship!  Friends are fantastic….no doubt about it.  And you have different friends for different reasons.  There are friends to confide in, friends to have fun with, friends to shop with or you could have a friend that encompasses all of these….friends for a reason, friends for a season, friends for a lifetime…..simple.…or is it?

The thing I am struggling with is when a friend does something or says something that disappoints you.  Your friend may be perfectly fine with what they have done or said..…they may well be within their own moral boundaries….but their actions may have left you feeling disappointed, disillusioned and sometimes completely gobsmacked.  The issue though is that the disappointment is your reaction, the way the situation has affected you and not something that should be blamed on someone else….they have acted how they wish and it is your issue if you do not agree.  But how does this affect the friendship??

I am guessing that people’s reactions would be wide and varied and it would depend on the individuals and the situation.  Of course, most people have a line and once it is crossed, there is no forgiving and there is no longer a friendship.  That line would be different for everyone and would have to be fairly major in my books…..like murder or drug running or sleeping with your partner.  But it’s the other little things that sometimes wear you down…..maybe the way they act when they get tipsy, or that it is always you that pays for coffee or you that always has to ring them.   The niggling thought that has been bothering me is that friendships are broken over our reactions….our feelings…our boundaries.  Shouldn’t everyone be free to make their own decisions….to have their own opinions…..make their own mistakes?? And if they have made the decision, the opinion, the mistake, then shouldn’t we accept that because it is a part of that person….that friend??  How hard…or easy…. is it to overlook the annoying little things??

I am sure this has been the cause of many friendship breakdowns and I can understand why…because sometimes it is very hard to leave your own expectations on the sidelines when it comes to how you think things should be done.  Therefore, do we pick friends that we think will have the same moral ethics that we do or because they make us laugh or because they are good in a crisis?  What attracts us to our friends??  And do we forgive one friend for something that another would not get away with??  And on the flip side……what kind of friend are we to others???

You can pick your friends,

You can pick your nose,

But you can’t pick your friend’s nose!

 

Trash and treasure……

Today I did something that I haven’t done for a long time….I visited the ocean.  Not very exciting you may comment, but for me it was an exceptional visit. 

It was two days ago when I shockingly realised that I had not been to the beach, not even sighted the ocean for over a year.  Something that is very unusual for me.  I grew up in a seaside town and so was constantly surrounded by the ocean and ocean activities.  Summers were spent on the seaweed strewn beach getting increasingly browned by the summer sun.  We also had a shack about 45 minutes’ drive away and many weekends, both summer and winter, were spent here….swimming, fishing, crabbing, catching worms, watching out for snakes and just being free to be kids immersed in nature.

As I grew older and moved to the city, which was still situated on the coast, my seaside visits became less and less as other mundane and necessary events of life filled my hours.  We still visited the beach during summer, mostly on hot balmy nights to gain some relief from the relentless heat waves and more often drove the seaside route from where we lived to Glenelg and back, the equivalent of a “Mainy” back home where cars filled with teenagers would drive from the round-a-bout at one end of town, down the “main” street…often admiring the reflection of their cars in shop windows…. along the beach, and then back to the round-a-bout…over and over……sometimes parking along the beach car park to catch up with friends, or have quiet time with girlfriends….and often honking and beeping to other friends in cars as they passed along the Mainy going in different directions.

Once children arrived, visits to the beach were still enjoyed but there wasn’t much time for peaceful solitude as I constantly counted heads, made sure sunscreen was topped up, struggled to keep sand out of food and drinks and always seeming to carry half the beach back in the car, boot and bathers.

I love visiting the beach by myself.  The first deep breath as the pungent smell of sea salt assaults my nose and I breathe deeply, closing my eyes…face to the wind as it whips my hair back and flattens my clothes against my body.  I walk eagerly down to the sand, slipping my shoes off, and stand on the wet sand as the waves roll in and the sound of the ocean breathing shuts out all other sounds and intrusions.  I breathe deeply and feel the waves rolling backwards and forwards.  Their salty brine washing out any negative feelings and the fresh, salty air carries away all my worries and troubles.  My toes work with a mind of their own as they dig down into the soft sand, anchoring me against the tides pull.

As I walk slowly along the beach, I can’t help but look for rubbish.  Growing up on the beach my mother passed on to me her passion of keeping beaches clean.  I have always had a love of beachcombing because as you look for trash…..papers, fishing line, broken bottles, you can also find the most amazing treasures…..beautiful shells, faded pieces of driftwood, not to mention man made treasures….I once found $10, wet and soggy as it was paper money then, but $10 none the less. 

My walk along the beach today yielded only a little trash, a lolly wrapper, a McDonalds straw and two beer bottle bottoms which pleased me immensely.  It was wonderful not to be confronted with a beach littered with rubbish or debris.  I reflected on what a wonderful country I lived in, and how grateful I was for the opportunities and choices I was free to make. 

The night before had been a high tide and there were not too many treasures to be found.  The sand was washed smooth and yielded only what I could fathom to be pieces of seaweed but more pod like and bright green.  They covered the beach in looping patterns like Christmas lights where the tide had risen up and left them.  There weren’t too many shells to be found….this particular beach was usually a popular one and treasures such as shells are always coveted by the chubby fingers of young children and invariably taken home to be proudly displayed.  I did manage to find one shell, half buried in the sand and a small feather, plucked from a seabird of which I had no idea what kind.

There were few people on the beach as I slowly strolled, lost in my thoughts but it was a wonderful time to be on the sand.   It wasn’t hot, but neither was it cool. The water was warm, but the pull of the waves was strong…I only witnessed one person brave enough to venture out…but only to his waist before he returned.  The wind was strong but I embraced it….almost challenging….to blow out my cobwebs, renew my verve and ready me for the year ahead.  The visit to the sea was a gift to myself to help me embrace the year that was beginning to unfold, and to strengthen me to face whatever it holds.  I promised myself I would not let another year go by before I returned…perhaps to a different beach…but I promised myself I would because the calm and serenity I feel when I leave, is always well worth the trip…..and I even managed to leave the sand where it was supposed to be…and not in my car.

 

 

Fat bottomed girls……

On the weekend I saw something that disturbed me.  And the more I thought about it, the more disturbed I became.  I was visiting a nationwide chain department store and my daughter and I were browsing through the ladies section when we came across a rack of clothes that made me do a second take.  As usual, you scan the rack of clothes to look for material, patterns or styles of clothes that catch your eye but when I looked at the small, coloured, sizing clips on the top of the hanger, I received a surprise.  The sizes on the rack went 4,6,8,12 etc.  I looked again, checked which section we were in, then pulled out one of the “4”s.  The design could have been adult but could well have been a tween design also…shoestring straps, midriff cut, frill around the bottom, the material was nice and after checking the size of the item, it was clearly marked 4.  I checked some other racks in the same area and found more hanger sizing that started with 4,6,8.

My first thought was a puzzled “What the??” My next thought was “Has the world gone mad?”  My thoughts since then have been “Why?”  Any women shopper knows that sizing is definitely not universal.  What could be a size 12 in one brand could be a size 10 or 14 in another brand…and don’t get me started on the whole S, M, L sizing! Also sizing changes from country to country…you only have to pick up a fashion mag to see skin and bone models wearing size 0’s.  Is this where we are heading??  Is this the message we want to give to Australian women?  Have some of the brands in this nationwide chain store started reducing their sizes to accommodate to the increasingly skinny sized frames of women – Definitely not if you believe the national consensus that obesity is on the increase.  Or is it just another way that the so called importance of image is being shoved down our throats just to make us even more subconscious and guilty about the way we look?

I have a teenage daughter and I hope that I am succeeding in teaching her how to be confident and to have self-worth without having to starve herself to be stick thin.  Skinny models are everywhere you look, and in every magazine or paper you look at and in every ad and program on TV.  When is enough going to be enough?  I thought that the sizing in women’s clothes were adequate enough……obviously, I was wrong!

Fat bottomed girls you make the rockin’world go round….

 

 

I believe the children are the future….

It seems poignant that I was thinking of Nelson Mandela only weeks before his death…..but let me start at the beginning…..

I have seen several TV programs recently that started to make me think about children and how we influence them.   The first program I saw was about the skinhead movement in America.  It shadowed a well-known speaker as he moved within the skinhead society, speaking at rallies and promoting the white nation notion.  This program disturbed me deeply as it showed instances where children were subjected to their parents ideas and prejudices pertaining to anyone that was not white….ie coloureds, Jews, Hispanics…and when they discovered that the interviewee was possibly a Jew, they were visibly upset and disgusted that they had been so “violated”.  I couldn’t believe that people still thought this way, that they were teaching their children to think this way.  That they could hold such hate for a people that they knew nothing about….and that they were passing this hatred to their children.

And it showed in their children….and that is what I found so sad….and so disturbing.  They had been raised to believe that coloured people and Jews, in particular, were races of people that needed to be wiped out completely and that they had nothing to offer to society….that they were dirty, stupid, incompetent and should be wiped out.  The hate that the children showed was so sad to me, and something so obviously taught to them by their parents.

The second program I saw was about the Amish society which is a way of life that has fascinated me.  The program showed an Amish family and the daily life that they followed.  The program was filmed in secret because if their church found out that they were speaking to a TV program and being filmed, they would be shunned by their society and they would be forced to become outsiders.  A big risk to take when their views and beliefs were on the line. 

This family lived without electricity, TV, telephones or computers as were the rules of their religion but in some ways they were trying to introduce some elements into their family life to make it a little easier.  Once again I was struck by how the parent’s lifestyle and beliefs were ingrained in their children from an early age and how much influence this was having on their children’s psyche.  These children were being bought up with good ideals, but their ideals were restrained within their restricted community.

A third program I saw was about the most hated family in the USA.  This family followed the religious ideals of the patriarch of the family and they shunned anyone that did not embrace their religion.  They were happy when people got ill, when natural disasters happened and when 911 happened.  They believe that if something bad happened to you, then you must have sinned and deserved to die.  That they live the ultimately perfect life and that they are the only people going to heaven.  Once again I was saddened by the children caught up in this religion.  Children forced to believe what they were told until it became the truth to them.

Children are like sponges.  They absorb everything around them.  They will suck in and believe what they are exposed to…...whether it is good or bad.  Parents need to understand that they do not own their children. They are only custodians of their health and wellbeing until they are old enough to make their own decisions. Children are their own people and circumstances that affect their growing up…linger long into their adulthood….and affect them in so many ways.  Is it not our duty to show the children of the world as much of the world that we can?  We need to expose them to as many of the different lifestyles, religions and ways of life that fill our world so that they can then make their own unbiased decisions once they reach adulthood…without prejudice.  I came across this quote from Nelson Mandela…and it summed up everything for me….

“No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin, or his background, or his religion.  People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.”

It is so simple as a concept, but so mind boggling as a world ideal of peace, tolerance and acceptance.  So easy, and yet so difficult.  Like Mandela, I dream of a world where people are accepted no matter how they look, how they live, how they talk or what they believe.  And I believe that the key to this dream….is in our children.  Teach them to accept…and the dream with become reality.  Nelson Mandela was an amazing person.  May his dreams and hopes for a better world become a reality.

I believe the children are the future,

Teach them well and let them lead the way…..

 

 

 

There is nothing as simple, nor more precious....

I am a single parent.  I have five wonderful children whose ages range from 14-19 and whom I have shared custody of for a week at a time.  This arrangement has been working for the past eight years and as much as it tears me up not to have them for that week, I cherish every moment I do get to spend with them.  The week that I do have them, I don’t attend any social functions unless they are really important or they are also invited and I think I have been out by myself on only two occasions in those eight years - once to a work function I organised that wasn’t far away and finished early evening and once on a late night out with a friend that was going overseas. My close friends know how I feel and understand if we want to arrange a get together, we work around my off dates so I can go – no biggie.  But I am becoming increasingly irritated by people who don’t seem to understand or accept my decision.

I have had to turn down invitations to many occasions over the years and most people are understanding but now that my children are teenagers, they seem to think that things have changed and that I have now become available. For me, nothing has changed.  Yes, my kids are more than able to look after themselves.  Yes, I can go out by myself if I wanted to.  Yes, my kids encourage me to attend invitations I receive on “their” week.  But do I want to? No!  I have spent half of the time in the past eight years with my kids.  I have literally missed 4 years of their lives.  I hate to think of the things I have missed...the hugs, the kisses, the smiles and the tears...looking after them when they were sick, being there when they needed or wanted me, the fights and the laughter. So much I have already missed.   And I have also had 4 years to myself, to do what I want, when I want and how I want.  Being a mother for a week, and then being single for a week certainly was strange at times.

I was hassled by a work colleague the other day about why I was not attending the work Christmas dinner.  I had helped organise the dinner but the date chosen fell on my kid’s week so I will not be attending.  This also happened last year.  My colleague bailed me up for ten minutes trying to convince me to attend.  “They are old enough to be by themselves”, “Can’t the older one’s drive if they need to get somewhere?”, “Surely you can come!”, “It’s only one night!” My attending is not going to make any difference to anyone on the night so I don’t see why it is so important that I go and I don’t see why I have to justify myself to them, or anyone else, about my choice.  My kids are everything to me, and they always come first.  They are my first priority and they always will be.

Yes, I deserve to have a life and to follow my own pursuits...but I already can, on the week I don’t get to spend with them.  Why is that so hard for some people to understand?  Why do some people try to argue the fact that I “should” go somewhere?   Why do some people believe that I am going to enjoy myself when all I am thinking about is what is happening at home?  It is my decision to make....and my decision will always be to spend time with and to be available for....my children.  It doesn’t get any simpler....for me.

There is nothing as simple, nor more precious, than your child’s hug.

Ask not what your country can do for you....

It has been 50 years today since JFK was assassinated.  It was four years before I was born.  Yet somehow his spirit resonates with me. 

JFK seemed such a charismatic person.  He was a young, dynamic and much liked President.  Everyone who was of an age to remember, remembered what they were doing when they heard that Kennedy had been assassinated.  It sent a shock wave throughout the world.  People in foreign countries and of all different cultures wept at the news.  JFK was almost like a symbol of a new, progressive USA.  Of a time and place that times were changing, that things were being done, that a new country was emerging.  I sometimes wonder what would be different now, if JFK had been allowed to live.  How much change he would have bought about.  If life would be any different now. 

He left behind a strong, confident widow....Jackie Kennedy...and his young family Caroline and John– who could forget those poignant pictures of a young John-John saluting his father’s coffin – and just the memory of two other children, Arabella who was still-born and Patrick who passed from respiratory distress at only 2 days old.  JFK seemed to be very much a person’s president, having seemed to have suffered heartache and had to endure the hardships of life like many of those that supported him...perhaps that is why he seemed so popular.

JFK seems to embody much of what the USA means to me...it’s loud, patriotic, confident, positive and fun.  They haven’t had another President that comes even close since.  And I only wish that we had such a candidate to choose from when election time comes around in Australia.  They would win hands down in my opinion. 

JFK was from a time long passed, but his legacy lives on in the hope for a time and a place where everyone can be truly free.....in body and in mind.  I may not have been alive when he died, but I sure hope I am alive to see his dream come true.

Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.......

 

 

She works hard for the money....

I used to love my work.  I loved the work I was doing...I loved where I worked...I loved the people I worked with...I loved the company I worked for.  Now, I dread each morning I have to go to work...and can’t wait for each working day to be over.  The people I work with are still the same...and I still love them, but everything else has changed.  The company I worked for merged with a bigger sister company.  And since then everything has changed.  The work I have to do is similar and the actual work place hasn’t changed at all....but everything else has.  It wasn’t so much of a merge...as a takeover.

What used to be a very functional, profitable, smooth running machine...has been absorbed...almost amoeba like...by its larger sister.  What used to work is now infused with problems.  The smooth running management is now over ridden by micro management and no one knows who is in charge.   The things that we used to pride ourselves on have been trampled on and squashed in the unfathomable need to appear “unified”.  The new business and operation systems have made it twice the work at the basic levels...but twice as easy at the highest management level...go figure!  And the praise and appreciation for the work you do....is almost non existent...especially for the work that is expected.  What used to be a company I was proud to work for...has become a loathsome job that I need to go to so I can pay the bills.  What happened???

What happened was the refusal of management to understand the impact of the merger on the smaller company...and the way it was handled.  What happened was the way procedures and processes were changed without consulting the people that knew the impact those changes would make.  What happened was that a company that people loved to work for became something completely different with no rhyme or reason.  What happened was the company I used to work for became extinct, and I either did what was asked of me...or I looked for another job.

The latter is now what I am doing.  We spend so much time at work.  So much of our daily lives are taken up with working for someone else.  Even working for yourself, you can sometimes be caught up in the “business before everything” thought process...I know...I have been in that situation too.  But that hasn’t put me off wanting to start something for myself again.  In the past, many things were out of my control, but I still gave as much as I could to my children, before I gave to the business...my marriage wasn’t so lucky.

I would dearly love to start up a business of my own again.  Something I could control...something I had a say in...something that would allow me the precious time I have left with my family before they fly the nest...something I could be proud of.  Oh, I have many ideas....many flights of fancy, and a couple that could actually work.  The thing I am missing is a small nest egg to sustain me while I pursue financial stability. So many times I feel like throwing in the towel... just jumping into the unknown....with the trust that a bridge of safety would appear.  That the confidence I have in myself, will allow the universe to supply the way.  But when you have a family reliant on you...it makes you falter...it makes you think twice.

I wish I could spend as much time with my family...as I do at work.  They are the most important factor in my life...why shouldn’t I be able to spend my time with them?  One day maybe...hopefully...before it is too late....