fake horrors

I'm not sure what the equivalent to "bah humbug" is for Halloween. This year has seemed to have had an entire month of celebrating it rather than the day I recall of my own childhood. I don't object to it on theological grounds, tho I've never been comfortable with the implicit threat of trick or treating. My way of dealing with it all is to have a tub of sweets and chocs by the door all year round and offering any callers a lolly etc. A spirit of welcome and generosity throughout the year, including tonight when yes I will hand out goodies to anyone who calls.
I also don't object to people coming together to party, facebook has been awash with such gatherings, and its great to have events that bring people together. I think my objection is to the commercial profit making out of so much plastic tat that gets used for a few days then often ends up in landfill. Unable to enter into the spirit of it, I feel uneasy to see fake limbs and gravestones used as decorations, when elsewhere in my news feed I see actual blood and gore that it feels aren't being given the same attention. I know we need to have fun, I don't want to be a killjoy. I can't help feel tho that maybe we're being seduced into a fake horror as a way of distracting us from the real horrors.

I wasn't the only one to have environmental concerns:
http://www.edie.net/news/5/Halloween--The-living-nightmare-for-the-waste-management-industry/?utm_source=dailynewsletter%2C+edie+daily+newsletter&utm_medium=email%2C+email&utm_content=news&utm_campaign=dailynewsletter%2C+610136fbe4-dailynewsletter#.WBiQiq-sxIE.facebook

adult baptism

I don't think I've been to an adult baptism before. I have all kinds of feelings about attending my daughter's today. I've wasted my extra hour of the day in fretting about it. As it's half term lots of people are away who otherwise would have been there to support her. I wish I'd invited people to come. She's just finished icing about 60 cupcakes for after the service, but what if there's only about 10 people there? I can't eat 6 cakes now I'm watching my sugar.

There were too many cupcakes, but it was as she wanted it to be (no fuss) so it was ok. Interestingly, whilst I'm proud and delighted in her, I'm currently equally proud of my boy who is on chapter 43 of the Da Vinci code. I'm not feeling too shabby on the parenting front right now.

obscured

I tried to focus on how lovely the fog was but mainly I regretted not being able to see the colours at the side of the motorway. By the time we had got to dufton tho it had cleared and so we saw lots of lovely leaves whilst walking the ghyll.
Looking after my nephews was full on. I realise how much I like teenage parenting.

pitch imperfect (but good enough)

It's funny how at 4.30 am time ticked away very slowly, but once my alarm went off those minutes in between hitting the snooze button passed in the blink of an eye. Today might need to be a gentle one.

I don't know what led me to volunteer to lead warm up at choir last night when our musical director was held up in traffic. Some confidence welled up from somewhere that nearly rapidly disappeared whilst actually engaged in the task. I think I thought it's only going to be a few minutes, far better we sit here warming up than sit here chatting. I grabbed the person next to me to accompany me rather than do it on my own, a great move. And of course I got everyone massaging each other's shoulders as part of it, might as well take advantage of the situation. I hadn't fully comprehended the enormity of the traffic as it was actually half way through our 2 hour rehearsal before the lovely man arrived. In the meantime we had a go at a fair few songs but it turns out there's lots more than just standing up front. I am not so great on finding the right pitch so that seemed to take a bit of effort/organising, but we did ok. Someone said after that enthusiasm can go a long way, and I have to say that's pretty much my experience of anything.

I was also aware of just how much garlic I was breathing over the 50 singers. The homemade garlic bread we had for tea was delicious but contained surely an entire veg portion's worth of the stuff. I'm off to clean my teeth again.

a spoonful

There was a scary news bulletin yesterday about the rise of diabetes. I'm aware I eat too much sugar so did well today to cut down. Its hard tho and I find it tricky to make the call. Is it worth living a life of denying myself what i most enjoy if I then end up being run over by a bus or we all get wiped out by some nuclear war? Conversely, if I don't act now will I be rueing on my untimely deathbed not getting longer with my grandchildren? I guess the trick would be to try and alter what I want so that I don't feel like in denying myself.

it's not all about making money

I love my local hardware shop for may reasons. Because I can walk to it. Because they will sell me a single teensy item like a screw or hook from a mini drawer full of them rather than insist I purchase a plastic wrapped packet leaving many unused. But mainly I love the kind people there.

We still haven't deterred our nighttime mouse visitor and so went to look for another solution. Principled-me has strong feelings about what methods are not ok and we're running short on ok ones. And so I started to cry in the shop with sadness and frustration at how to move forwards. The lovely lady in the shop suggested we could always get a cat. What a top idea! This would be lovely (and yet impractical) on so many levels and I was delighted that she would suggest something that didn't involve her making any profit whatsoever.

We plumped for a humane trap whereby we catch it alive and then take it miles away (which still might mean separation from it's family which I'm distraught about). However, so far the mouse is presumably delighted that we are now giving it extra to eat, whilst it evades being caught...

sipping vs gulping

Something unusual happened last Wednesday evening. I drank a hot cup of tea. I was sat with my book group chums and drank the tea pretty much all in one sitting rather than put it down. It was such a novelty that I really noticed how that hot tea felt on my throat, and I enjoyed it am going to try and do this more often. I think the truth is I'm a sipper of drinks. I'm a cheap date cos going out for a drink, or staying at home with something alcoholic or not, that one drink lasts me the entire night. I just don't guzzle, unless I accidentally get really thirsty when I might then down half a glass of water all at once. My revelation is tho that I'm not actually a fan of tepid tea. So sipping from time to time doesn't really work for me despite me doing that every day of my life. My plan is to get more aware and only plump for a brew if i will drink it there and then. If I'm just going to sip I'd be better off with a glass of water.
Is there anything you do automatically that on reflection doesn't work well for you?

Getting to know you, getting to know all about you

I've had such a good day!
Lots of opportunities to get to know people a bit better. Whether that be my besties through long catch up phone conversations or deep theological discussions. Or strangers I will never talk to again in a volunteering session. New people who may or may not stick around, and family who have been with me since the beginning. Singing and cake. Does it get any better than that?
:-)

worry vs concern

It's been a long week. Rather than paraphrase, I'm simply copying below some interesting words from Elizabeth Gilbert. I worry about lots of people dear to me - it would be better if I showed my concern :-)

Dear Ones -

I want to offer you something today, which I hope might make you feel a little better, if you happen to be worrying about anything. (And who isn't?) 

It's about the difference between the word "worry", and the word "concern". 

The word "worry" comes to us from the Old English verb "wyrgan", which means "to strangle". The word "worry", therefore, shares a similar root to the word "wring". Both words mean to seize something by the throat, and choke the living breath out of it. 

How's that working for you? 

You already know that this is what worry feels like, right? Like choking? Like the life is being wrung out of you? 

But here's the thing I've been thinking about lately: I believe that when we worry about other people, we also choke the life out of THEM.  Have you ever had somebody say to you, "I love you, and that's why I'm really worried about you"? And did you ever feel smothered by their worry, and you couldn't figure out why? I mean, it should feel warm and nice to have somebody care about you, right? So why, when people say that they are worried about you, do you want to change your name and run for the hills? 

It's because you're trying not to suffocate. It's because worry is not the same experience as love. Love breathes life into everything it touches; worry, on the other hand, just goes around wringing everyone's necks. 

For that reason, I'm trying not to learn how to NOT WORRY so much about people anymore — or even about situations, or even about myself. This is not easy for me. I'm a natural-born worrier. I'm a highly anxious neck-wringer from way back. But I don't want to cut off the air supply anymore — not to myself, not to anyone, not to anything.

Here's the trick, though: I also don't want to become indifferent. In fact, I'm INCAPABLE of being indifferent; I care too much about everything. So, what is a healthier emotion to foster in myself, than worry?

This is where CONCERN comes in. 

Concern is a beautiful word. It has nothing to do with anybody getting strangled. The word "concern" comes to us from from the Middle French verb "concerner", which means "to touch, or "to belong to," and THAT word, in turn, came to us, from Late Latin verb "concernere", which means "to sift" or "to perceive". 

Do you see how much more lightness and grace there is in concern, than in worry? When you're concerned about somebody, it's because you feel that they belong to you, and you want to reach out and touch them, and (most importantly) you are ready to SIFT through the situation carefully. Through the act of sifting, you will be able to find healthy and essential truths about how much control you have over this person, or whether your involvement in their life is actually helping, or what about their situation can be changed or not changed. (See how the word "concern" is related to the word "discern", which is another kind of careful sifting?)

To sift requires patience, wisdom, and a light touch. 

Sifting takes more work than strangling, but I believe it's worth the careful effort. 

And sifting is also how you tell the difference between yourself and someone else — rather than tying a rope around both of your throats and steadily choking each other to death.

So...this is what I've been asking myself lately, whenever I get upset about myself, about another person, or about a situation in the world: Am I choked with worry? Or am I ready to take a deep breath and become, instead, concerned? Am I going in for the stranglehold, or am I ready to touch the situation lightly, and sift through it all carefully? 

All I want, in the end, is to care about everyone and everything I love, while still being able to breathe. 

ONWARD,
LG

part timer

I'm struggling not to be hard on myself at the moment. I'm working the most paid hours I have ever done  but am still not up to full time hours- I have always worked alongside other things such as studying or parenting. And I get pulled to compare and find myself lacking for not managing to Do Everything Simultaneously.
My girly needed me to bring something to school the other day and I took it even tho I was juggling other work tasks. Mostly I'm really clear that parenting is my main job, the thing I want to do best of all. My other relationships matter too. My friend kindly helped me notice today that I'm a people person not a house person and so it's fine that I don't pay my house so much attention:-)
We all get to live our own lives according to our own priorities, and nobody else's priorities are better than anyone else's :-)

Fewer meetings, more eatings

Both meetings I've been at today were long. I feel like I've spent more of the day in a meeting than out of one. Both were productive and I'm glad i attended, but they felt epic. Someone once said the church should have fewer meetings and more eatings and I'm inclined to suggest that is a sound principle for all areas of life,  not just the church. To meet to discuss over a shared meal,  rather than hurriedly scoffing in our separate houses before or after.
Tomorrow I'm hosting a meeting. My girly will be making us cupcakes :-)

seeing wood for trees

There's a section of road I occasionally use that frequently struggles with flooding. Presumably to counter this, a whole swathe of trees have been chopped down, perhaps to enable access to dredge the adjacent stream. I'm really surprised by the new vista opened now I can see it, formerly obscured by the trees. I like trees tho and miss them. But the views are lovely too. And those trees are not coming back.
So I guess whatever we have, whether it's trees or views, we can appreciate it.

plan

So, we just need to club together to raise 1.95 million, and them we can get ourselves this island. How awesome would that be?????

http://www.homesandproperty.co.uk/luxury/selfsufficient-scottish-island-for-sale-completely-off-the-grid-tanera-mor-comes-with-24hour-a105361.html#commentsDiv

hare today

I'm not sure why I was so taken with a modern day testing of the hare and the tortoise, but I really was. A little clip showing a real life tortoise moving towards the finish line, and a capricious bunny rabbit. Slow and steady wins the race, the fluffier animal was cute but not at all focussed. I think it appeals because I tend to be tenacious and keep moving forward, my boyfriend would say it's cos I was born in the year of the ox.
This afternoon we're off to see my friend's art exhibition on the hare. Hopefully pics to follow. In the meantime her pics are on the menu on this page
http://www.thecartfordinn.co.uk/eat/
These were my favourites

worth crossing oceans for

"Don't cross oceans for people who wouldn't cross a puddle for you.

No, do it. Do cross oceans for people. Love people, all people. No conditions attached, no wondering whether or not they're worthy. Cross oceans, climb mountains. Life and love isn't about what you gain, it's about what you give."

I really liked this when I saw it earlier this week, tho I hope I don't offend anyone who might have shared the original quote about not crossing oceans/puddles. It fits really well with the book group book I've just finished, A man called Ove by Fredrik Bachman. I think to say anything about the book would potentially spoil it, so I will just urge you to read it if you can.

What next?

I don't have much time for news, but I gather I'm not the only one to link recent orders from the government to similarly scary actions at the start of WW2. I'm horrified that schools and employers are having to list those who are "not British". What comes next?

And I won't bow down to fear. The trees are still beautiful as are my friends.

excruciating

I think it's probably not just me who feels this way about themselves. But sometimes I find being me excruciating.
Last night when I was supposed to be going to sleep my brain continually fed me an unending flow of all the ways I am failing. It was really really hard to try and interrupt it. In the end I managed to quieten it by using the technique of asking what I would say to me if I was a friend who came saying this is all I could hear. Sometimes it's not easy being a friend to yourself. Today I'm going to try tho. I'm taking myself singing tonight cos I know that's good for my soul. And I will keep trying to focus on where I can see I'm doing well instead of being pulled back to where I can see I'm not.

I got chills, they're multiplying

I think the reason I'm so tired is I'm fighting off the start of a cold. It's another busy week so am going to read my book under a blanket this evening whilst I can.

Lots of good info out there this week around mental health. What are you doing to look after yours?

not what it says on the box

I'm clearly not thinking straight despite 11 hours sleep. Counting has not gone well today.
I have some kids 100 piece jigsaws that have been grown out of but didn't want to give them away incomplete. A quick count of the first box revealed 104 pieces ( second more careful count did too) so I completed it so I could remove the spares, but all 104 pieces were used. I'm tempted to write "approx" on the box.
Another 100 piece needed all its 108, and the third I didn't even count but just did it anyway. The great news is 2 pieces were missing but I had them stashed from a previous tidy. So I can give them away safe in the knowledge that they are whole.

seeing the world as we are not how it is

Brilliant day, the charity I work and volunteer for put on some cracking speakers for the annual conference and AGM. Lots on the significance of language, how we don't always reflect on the culture we are in, on laughter and reason and so much more.
We often imagine we laugh most at jokes and humour, but actually we laugh most in conversation, especially with those we know well and love. So laughter, hugs and cakes a plenty. I just still need to pace myself better as now I just want to sleep.

a wimbaway

Enjoyed the singing tonight, I do love a rolling bass line :-)
I have to be up early tomorrow and I've stopped making sense.

Sunday will hopefully be a day of rest (can't think that far ahead, hope there's not much in the diary for that day...)

dismay

Intense working day, another scheduled tomorrow and then a full day at my work agm on Sat too. So it was good to gather a stash of conkers :-) one of my friends told the children she works with how they are the first to see the Conker when they break it from its outer covering. That's pretty awesome when you think about it, so I broke this one open to marvel at it.

I need to keep reminding myself of the beauty to counter my dismay that the local decision to not allow fracking has been overturned by central government.

because I'm happy

It's bring a conker to work week.*
The conker I took was lovely, although no-one really understood what I meant about it having a new conker smell. Maybe that's just me. I don't really care, I was in a happy place with my conker. I'd been asked the brilliant question as to if I was happy and that helped me focus on how happy I am. It's often much easier to focus on what is challenging/not as I'd like. Fundamentally I am deeply happy and there is much to find happiness in.
I had already spent quite a few moments stroking my hand with my daughter's blusher brush. It is so soft! And feels much softer on my hand than on my cheek I notice - I would be surprised if my hand skin is thinner/more sensitive than my cheek skin, but it looks like that is the case.
Happiness is something I value highly, but we are not all the same and it might not be the bees knees for you. Nonetheless I still wish you happiness today. What makes you happy? How can you have more of that in your life??

* I just instigated this week. No-one else knows about it yet, it may take a while to catch on so you may be the only one if you take one into your work place.

short cut around a big zoo?

Next time I will park at the hospital rather than try and save myself the three quid or whatever it would have cost. I ended up miles away and thought I'd try and cut through to where I wanted to be. I forgot that the zoo might be rather large, and a golf course isn't small either. At least the weather was lovely.

crossroads

I found the Shack brilliant, so am very pleased to be reading Crossroads by the same author. I'm nearly a third of the way through and so far so good. I thought I'd do more reading this weekend, but it's not really been a weekend where anything has gone to plan. Hopefully there will be reading time in the longer, colder evenings of this coming week.

The next chapter begins with an ace quote from C S Lewis
"What one regards as interruptions are precisely one's life"

heat resistant

We're in October now and it is feeling chillier but so far i've resisted putting the heating on. I'm using one of my preferred avoidance strategies of lighting many candles. Pretty.

Today's been a day full of changing plans, every hour has had a different conclusion proffered, but it looks like we're ending the day with my dad still staying and he doesn't feel the cold so still no excuse for turning on those radiators!