A new beginning

The beginning of a new year always feels like the start of something new. Its quite strange actually. I mean, if you really think about it, its just time. Its a measurement that we put in place all those many moons ago. A way of measuring. Measuring what exactly? A womans cycle? The amount of time travels took? The distance between two places, between two people?

My theory is that time became apparent because of relationships. Seriously – why do you want to know how long it took to get from A to B? Who, or what is at A vs B? For example – the lions, that will eat us if they get a chance are 2 darknesses away, and the buffalo that we can eat are normally 3 darknesses away. The plants we can eat are just over that hill, to the “this side” of that big tree.

And then there’s the whole Love thing – love of family, friends, lovers. You would want to know how long, what the “distance” will be between seeing those that you love.  A walk in the forest could have taken literally forever – with no direction in mind – they walked “that way” and just carried on. Not, they walked “that way” for 3 darknesses and then back the same way to come across their family.

Oh to be so primitive. To have that space and time – the knowledge that most of us have lost! I can’t tell what plants you can and can’t eat – I have to go to the fruit and veggie shop for that! But our ancestors long gone, they knew all of those things. Yes, I know things now that they didn’t even realise that they needed to know, things like “Come and join my tribe, it dresses better, or wears the most expensive shoes”.

Ah to be that way again. Where the food doesn’t have to be bought, where money doesn’t have to be made, where we can stay up all night and dance all day. Where there was no running water, no electricity, no cellphones… but it was ok, because we never knew we needed them.

It has been so nice not having a computer in front of me. To be able to put away my cellphone, or leave it somewhere and not worry about it for days – although I use it as a watch because I don’t wear a watch…

I am reminded of the books “Clan of the cavebear” and that whole series (the author is Jean M Auel). I loved those books… and I think, I think its time to take me back to that fantasy land… To the primitive time…

And also, just to leave you with a thought…  What would you do if we did run out of coal, oil, electricity (in SA, this is a real possibility here). What if we went backwards. How on earth would we survive? I think the farmers would be the only one to live – but they’d probably all be murdered for “knowing and growing”. People would try and take over their lands, so that they could survive. I mean, what would money be able to buy when you can’t transport anything?

And on a lighter note… I really am glad to be here. Year 2 in my new Cape Town journey. A year where my man and I live together in a strange and distant town. Where it takes 1 whole day drive to reach his family. Where it would take weeks and weeks and even months to reach some of my closest family… but these days,  all we need to do is hop on a plane and we can be whereever we need to be within 24 hours. Wow. We’ve come far.

Sleep time

I’m not sure about you, but I get very grumpy and irrational if I don’t get enough sleep. This weekend was lovely. It started as a long weekend for me, with a Thurdsay evening full of laughs and friendship… moving into an ordered Friday, where I needed to do some things… and then a lazy Saturday and lazy Sunday.

Our little pup came into our house on Saturday, and between this little guy and my hay fever, I am feeling knackered! He was so good on Saturday afternoon and night. He even let me have a nap in the afternoon and then waking up only at 5.50am on Sunday morning – which is about the time I normally wake up during the week, so it wasn’t to early. And then yesterday was a busy day for the little tyke. We took him to visit his cousin… and I had 1 or 2 people coming to visit! So he was very excitable! And just wouldn’t settle down. Eventually, at about 10.30pm my partner and I were sitting on the kitchen floor, just next to his box, so he would know that we were there… and after about 20 minutes he finally went to sleep… snuggling his little teddy bear…

He woke again at about 3am – my fault, I woke up and walked around a bit and he heard me. So… back to the kitchen I went. Sat with him a little, and he went back to sleep… Then my other half woke up at 4.30 to get himself ready for work etc, went into the kitchen and woke Pup up… and left at 5, with an awake puppy who just knew that mom was there… So up I got again… after only 5 hours sleep… and walked around outside and inside with the pup.

And… well, I can’t complain… even though I am tired, I know that this is just a process, and between my partner and I we will get the little guy trained and sorted… he just needs a routine. He is just like a baby… when all he does is eat, sleep, fart, play and wee – the only difference being that he will never start talking to us… But for any faults that he may have now, or later… he is an adorable guy. So happy to see me or my man… so excitable at the little things… He jumps into our garden with abandon, going into the places where the vines are bigger than him… getting lost in the plants! He LOVES it!

I wrote a while back that I was a bit nervous about getting a dog… and now, after 2 nights in our home. He is part of the family. I wouldn’t have it any other way. How are the cats doing you ask? Well… my boy is a bit pissed off (understatement), but we’re giving him love still – in front of the pup, and without the pup being around, and my girl is interested, but uninterested… as cats can be. She knows there’s a new member, but she’s not yet gone up and sniffed him to see how or who or what he is… And the pup is just shit scared of them both! The boy cat swiped him a few times – drew blood the third time… and pup hasn’t gone near either of them again…

I know that in time all the creatures in the household will adapt to the new edition… I just hope, that in the process, they’ll let me get a little bit of sleep before I become unmanageable… The nice thing is… my partner is off for most of the week – so he can be on night duty! Yahay!!!

Quiet time

Today is a quiet day. I have been really busy and yet felt like I have achieved nothing. I am feeling incredibly flat… my brain is fried and all I want to do is sleep.

I think this may have something to do with the fact that my partner and I spent the entire weekend cleaning out our garage… We made good work of it, but I didn’t get to sit and contemplate my existence once this weekend. Some people may say that’s a good thing.

I am glad that we finally got around to cleaning it up! Now we can actually use it! But I find that I need time to recharge on a regular basis, and when I don’t get recharged, I fall flat. But I know that this, with time, will pass. I just need to listen to myself and take a time out.

So today… I’m going to go home, put up my feet and just relax at home. Eyes shut, early to bed… where I can perhaps put on my meditation cd that I’ve had for 8 months and not yet listened to.

My thoughts are with my friends today that aren’t having fun at the moment, and I’m sending them lots of love and hugs and only good wishes.

Time passes…sometimes… in amazing ways…

So, yesterday’s post was a bit sad for me to write. I felt really flat the whole day after writing it… and who would have thought that that took me about an hour to write!

So today, is going to be a bit lighter… After feeling crap yesterday, and a bit emotional and all those good things, I got home. And my sister was there, just smiling. It was really good to see her. And my partner was there, and he wrapped his arms around me “Hello Angel, how was your day?” And I was calmed.

All the anxiety and raw emotion I had been feeling just vanished when I was folded into his arms. And that is just the best feeling in the world. To have someone there, who, no matter what’s going on, when they hug you, the world just goes silent for a moment and you get to just be. Just exist. Everything else fades into the background… and it just can’t be picked up again, because the truth is… its over… what ever happened is past… and now we can move forward.

One day I’ll tell you how I met him… and you might say I fell for him because of the adrenalin rush going through my veins…. Maybe I did… but I grew to love him because of so many more different reasons…

And today I just want to be grateful for him. Technically (I think) today is our 3 year anniversary – well, it will actually be in the early hours of tomorrow morning… but it was the 1st (actually 3rd, but we’ll get to that another day as well) time we kissed…. and carried on kissing each other on a regular basis, and so here we are…

I hope that I never stop appreciating him for who he is, and that he continues to love and support me in the so many ways that he does. This relationship is so different to anything else I’ve ever had in my life… And I am blessed to have him here with me. Lucky isn’t the right word… Luck isn’t the game here… blessed, a wish was granted… and he appeared… from right out of a fairy tale…

Let me tell you some of the many reasons why I appreciate him (in no particular order):

1. He loves me unconditionally
2. He does not test me, or push my buttons just because he can
3. He supports any of the crazy decisions I make, and when he doesn’t agree with them, he will tell me why… and he always makes sense
4. He has never ever looked down at me for not knowing or understanding something
5. He listens
6. He pays attention
7. He still opens my car door for me
8. He holds my hand whenever we are anywhere
9. He closes his eyes when he kisses me
10. Every night as we fall asleep, I find myself in his arms, snuggled tight
11. He thinks about me and speaks to me about things before making any big(ish) decisions
12. He phones me to tell me the strangest and arbest things sometimes
13. He washes my car
14. He does ALL our dishes
15. He knows how to cook
16. He knows mostly what I do and don’t eat
17. He does not do drugs or drink copious amounts of alcohol
18. He is ALWAYS right
19. He lets me love him
20. He understands me in a way that no-one else has ever tried to
21. He makes me laugh – often. At myself, at him, at everything
22. He is gorgeous
23. His smile
24. The way he looks at me
25. He moved towns to be with me – he gave up everything he knows for me – not something that’s easily done
26. He can always make a dull day seem bright and a bright day even brighter
27. The sun is always shining around him
28. He does not have a mean bone in his body
29. He is always calm… when I sometimes act like a chicken with her head cut off, he is my rock. My centre
30. He puts me in my place when I need it
31. He loves me unconditionally

He is my Angel. My knight in shining armour… and there are many more reasons why I appreciate him…. but there’s a good start… so… I propose a toast… to him… to all the men like him… who do what they say and say what they do. To all those with integrity, honour and loyalty. To all those with respect and love and only good things for your partners… You guys are few and far between! May you always exist in real life!!!

Bounce time

Don’t you wish it were that easy? To just bounce back? I quite enjoy these Cyanide and Happiness comics. Some of them are a bit crude, but others are great. They remind me of how simple things can be.

For example – I saw this comic, and I remembered something I read on another blog about “in the spirit of Ubuntu – the Bounce“. This post talks about picking up on others feelings and emotions, the fact that we all pick up on each others stuff. We reflect it. We absorb it. We sometimes become what we feel they need us to be. Or what we think they want us to be.

In my life, I have found this to be very true. I give you an example of something I haven’t thought about for years. My very first boyfriend. I dated him for nearly 3 years… and he was always so possessive of me, he just had to know what I was doing when and of course with who. He was also always accusing me of cheating on him – which, when you’re in school, with no transport and no-one home to take you anywhere, was a bit difficult for me to fathom.

I found out about a year after we broke up that he had cheated on me on at least two different occasions. Now, I did actually confront him about it, and to this day he denies it. But it is something that I believe to be true. I believe he was cheating on me. Why? Firstly, when I had just turned 17, he broke up with me because he kissed someone else… about a month later we got back together (silly me, I know… but I was lonely, I hadn’t really made any good friends in the 6 months I had been staying in my then new town, and I missed him… hey, come on, I was only 17). So I took him back, and I guess I set a precedent. So the next time he kissed someone else, I guess he just didn’t tell me, I mean, what was the point, clearly I didn’t mind. I didn’t realise it at the time, but later on I came to believe this to be true, and the puzzle pieces in my head just seemed to fit . Everything fell into place in my mind. How could it not be true?

I was a lot less jaded at this age, and I could read people really well (if they weren’t to close that is)… I’ve always been able to put myself into someone else’s shoes and really feel what they felt. Really understand that part of them. People send off vibes even when they don’t know they’re doing it.  The insecurities they share with you or “blame on you” are often insecurities they have within themselves i.e. if a partner is worried that you may cheat on them, are they reflecting this back through you (meaning, are they thinking about doing this themself? Have they done it?) or are they reflecting past experience – where they have been hurt before?

Everyone is different… but if you listen long and hard enough, you really do get a feel for what they’re about. You really can understand the inner workings… the why of their behaviour.

Past experiences bring around a lot of different reactions in people. If you put, for example, myself and my sister in the exact same situation, I guarantee you we will respond in two very different ways. Yes, we’re sisters. but we’re very different. She is 10 years younger than I am, we have 1 common parent – my mother is very different to hers. My mother was, and is still amazing (not that hers is any less amazing – but its how we see our mothers that I’m talking about here…). I have the utmost respect for my mother and the lessons she taught me – and still tries to teach me , and my sister and her mother? Well, my sister has no respect for her mother. Hasn’t had since she was about 10. My sister also has very little respect for herself – because she didn’t have the same kind of unconditional love – the same kind of “I’m here for you no matter what” kind of love, the same kind of “I believe in you” kind of love. Her mother wasn’t there in the ways that mine was.

She was left to her own devices. I was given guidance. I moved out of my mothers house at 16. But I took with me the lessons of self respect, honesty, trust, loyalty, integrity. Yes, I also took self criticism, low self esteem, low self confidence, bad with finances, all those things to… I’m not perfect. And neither is my mother…

But she has truly helped define who I am today. I wouldn’t be the person I am today if my father hadn’t left when I was 5 or 6. If my brother hadn’t been the brother he was. If my step father hadn’t been a part of my life. To all the people who have crossed my path, they have made me who I am.

And my sister’s life experiences have also made her who she is. We all react differently to different situations. My brother and I were brought up in the same house, with the same rules, and sometimes we see things very differently. But most of the time, whether we agree with each other or not, we can understand where the other is coming from. We can see how the other can come to that conclusion. This, I think, is the Bounce at its best. It allows you to see something from another’s point of view. To feel them in a very real way. To feel their soul.  To feel who they are as a person and how they got there. You really can understand people a lot better if you take the time to listen. Not to what their mouth is saying. Not by listening to their voice. But by listening to their soul. This is something I am slowly learning to do again. Listen with the core of me.

To often we do to much talking and not enough listening – of course there’s a time and place for everything… But if I am because you are, then we are all one – but how can we be one if I am separate from you? That’s the point – we need to understand ourselves, and with that understanding of ourselves, we realise that there are others – others like you, the same, but different. Every person has their different lessons to learn…. but we all come from one Source. And we will all return there at the end of our time on earth. This therefore makes us one. I am because you are. I exist because you do. I am here because you are. We chose this path together. We chose this time. We chose this place. All we need to do is listen.

Finding time

Tomorrow I have officially been blogging on TimeRemains for 1 whole week. Every opportunity I get, I start thinking about what I’m going to write next. What is on my mind, and what do I want to share? I guess that as I get more and more used to writing and posting, it’ll come more naturally, the process will be easier. I’ve mentioned before, I’m not the type to really share what I’m thinking or feeling. I keep mostly to myself in that.

And yet, here I am… writing. Online. Scary stuff this. You hear all sorts of horror stories about the blog world and what to do and what not to do… and then I see that some are doing it anyway. You know the stuff, things that you should or shouldn’t say on your blog.

But my question is this… if you should or shouldn’t say things, then isn’t your blog stilted? Aren’t the words that your soul wants you to write jaded? No-one knows me, know one knows who I am. Sure, if I make a comment, my email address comes up – but is that a true reflection of who I am? Or just an email address I use? One I may or may not have set up strictly for blogging purposes.

So… along with the “do’s” and “don’ts”, there’s the scary thought of… what do I write? What is it that makes you come and read what I have to say? What is that makes you resonate with what I’m writing? Like I said, I’m new to this world. I’m still learning, about blogging, about other bloggers… before I started my blog I didn’t realise how many of us (yes, I’d like to call myself one… even after only such a short time…) there are. How many different stories we have to tell. It is incredible. Amazing. And it makes me smile.

I have been looking for something that will make write something everyday. even if its only 10 minutes. Something that will get me to put pen to paper (hand to keyboard). And so far, this seems to be working. Granted, its only been 1 week… But the excitement, and the small milestones of each and every day…. like a recovering alcoholic, just for today, not taking that drink. Well, just for today, I write.

I write because it calms me. I write because I enjoy it. I write because I have something to say. This may not be apparent at first… but as I get more used to sharing in this way, as I get used to sharing, and talking I know that it will get easier, and that what I have to say will get more and more focused. This may take a few days, a few weeks or even a few years. But I know that the lessons I’ve learned are not unique to me. That in one way or another I share these learnings and I know that at least one of the things I’ve learned, you will smile at, and say “oh boy, I remember that one”.

I know that I am not alone in this world, even though some days I feel like I’m the only one on the planet feeling how I do, or why I do… I know deep down at the very core of my being that there are others like me. And I also know that we have our Angels looking down on us, looking out for us. Looking after us. And I appreciate them and what they do for me constantly. They are my guides, my instinct. Everything I am they love, every wrong I’ve done has been forgiven, every good deed remembered.

I may not share my name. I may not share my daily life. But here I share my soul. My writing is my gift. It may sound egotistical to say that it is my gift to you… but its not just to you that I’m giving it. I’m giving it to me. To all around me. As I grow, so will those around me, as I reflect that which I know. That which I feel to be true. True to me. As I write I find myself. And that is my gift to me. My journey through writing to be shared.

I have read quite a few pages from many blogs after the last 2 or 3 weeks, and the feeling, emotion and journeys I read about have ben amazing. That people still have hope after what is going on in their lives is incredible. It leaves me feeling good about not only myself, but those around me. That there are so many hopes and dreams being followed and being lived… even when they get stuck, they turn inwards and write… and through writing comes understanding and through understanding comes action.

Not one person is sitting back and letting their life pass them by. Not one person is just existing. They are all fighting back. All giving back to the earth, to mother nature. And again, I’ll say it. Its incredible. Thank-you all for every word you’ve written. For all the hopes, dreams, and even despair that you have written about. Its your lessons that I enjoy reading… because, as each day goes by, and as time passes… we remain. The same but different. Growing. The very nature of who we are all gets revealed. In time. The change in time is constant. And the knowledge that we evolve over time becomes more and more clear. That feelings, emotions, life, all change over time.

We move on. We move forward. And time. Time Remains.

Dream time

I’ve been dreaming a lot lately of my partner. Now I often dream… but of arbitrary things… things that make no sense during the waking hours, for example, the other night I dreamt we were running away from turkeys, hiding from 3 of them that were just running around the garden. Or of travelling, of things that may have happened, or may still happen.

But lately, the dreams of my partner are of trying to get hold of him. And not being able to. He’s just moved in with me, after living in separate towns for 8 months, we’re now living together. So he’s right here, with me. What on earth would make me dream that I can’t find him. That I want to talk to him, but I just can’t get to him.

In my dreams I’ve ended up calling ex-boyfriends trying to find him. I’ve called people that wouldn’t even know who he was… I have this one mindedness in that I have to find him. I have to speak to him. He’s just gone and I am frantic trying to get hold of him.

Is this a fear? A fear that I’m going to lose him? An insecurity that he may one day move on? Or is it just the fact that he leaves the bed at stupid o’clock… and its his departure that I feel in my sub conscious state, and as I roll over in bed and find his side empty… my body being used to the connection with him, the closeness of him… that when he leaves I feel it physically as though he is leaving me… which he really is, but my dreams make it a much bigger departure… In my dreams it feels as though he’s gone. Left for good.

His withdrawal from me in our dream space is taken personally… I guess it makes sense, there has even been a time when we were speaking to each other in our dreams… but we were having very different dreams, and I was asking him a question in my dream, and his answer wasn’t one that I was wanting (I was asking a brown or red question, and he was answering blue… which really wasn’t an option, I mean seriously, blue leather cowboy boots just weren’t for me), and I woke up because I was confused… and I woke up to him talking to me, telling me that blue was best…

So we had connected in the dream world in such an amusing way (well, I was giggling to myself about it… and when I woke him from his dream he was groggy and confused as well…). Is it possible that two people connect like that? That it is possible that even though I’m not awake to feel his departure, I feel it on another level… In my dreams. And don’t dreams over dramatise things anyway?  In my dream I feel his distance as a physical ache… when in reality, he’s in the shower, or the kitchen…. he never leaves without a kiss goodbye… Is that really possible? That my heart is so connected to his that after a night together it stresses when he’s gone…

Perhaps its the remnants of us living in different city’s? The fact that he hasn’t been so close over the last few months… that its so nice to have him near, and then… when we part, my heart remembers the agony of leaving him at the airport… and it takes me to this place… this place where I just have to find him. To speak to him. To hold him. To be held by him.

But I know, that at the end of each day, I get to see him. To speak to him. To hold him. To be held by him. And I am grateful of that opportunity. Even when I’m grumpy. Or when he is. He is my home. And when I go to him at the end of the day I breathe a sigh of relief. Knowing that I am where I am meant to be. He brings me home.