These old hands

                                                                                     

 

The hands were folded together, loosely linked, resting in her lap. Her eyes were lightly closed, in a head perched at an uncomfortable angle. I thought to gently hold her narrow shoulders and straighten her posture in the chair, but if I woke her, the consequences could not be predicted.

The woman dosing in the high backed green chair is my mum, and I am visiting with her in the nursing home where she has lived for the past 2 and a half years.

Dementia, that foul thief of memory and independence, spread its pestilence some years ago. Still, she is a fighter, my mumma. Refusing to accept the inevitable decline into a void where people, places, emotions and memories cannot exist. With all the courage and determination she can muster, mum strives to remember, and bullies that failing mind of hers to reach within itself and claim a fading memory or name

The struggle is exhausting. A constant battle to either accept her plight and in that decision, to surrender and submit to her new life in a nursing home, or to rail against the injustice of her sentence and get angry, sometimes really angry.

Sleep is her companion, and with fatigue, can come her emotional unpredictability. Like now, I am caught between an act of kindness to adjust her head and make her more comfortable, and perhaps risk waking her. That decision may result in me being subjected to a tirade of abuse, so perhaps I will leave her to sleep and deal with a crick neck or shoulder later

I sit on the side of the bed, considering these options and possible outcomes. Like the slight movement of a curtain on an otherwise still day, I feel the stare of her blue eyes, observing me

“Who are you?” comes the accusatory query

I’m Cherrie, your daughter”

Í didn’t have daughters”, her emphatic response

 

A ripple in my emotional pond. I dare not feel the pain that reaches up and pulls at my heart strings. I know better than to let that tug infiltrate my emotions.

I tell my string pulling foe, for the umpteenth time” it’s her disease that makes her confused”

“You had 3 daughters mum, Di, Cherrie and Katie, and I am Cherrie “I offer this information guardedly.

“I HAD SONS” her terse reply

There is no point in trying to convince her otherwise, so I sit and stare at those hands that have now unfolded themselves, slowly, and are in the process of brushing a collection of silver streaked brunette hairs behind her dainty ears.

“What are you staring at?” again, the accusatory tone

“Your hands”

‘WHY?

“I was thinking that they have many stories to tell. You’re 86 now. I wonder how these hands have served you and others in all those years. What they have they experienced, what they have been witness to””

“What a load of nonsense that is,”she says, “Why would it be interesting to know about my hands? You are a nut!”

But even as she admonishes me, a stirring of a smile breaks her lips apart.

“Well I know one thing they did; they slapped your naughty bum!”

And with those words uttered, she tossed her head back to allow the laugh to rise up from her belly, and then came the transformation. It was instantaneous. In that change of thought and mindset, there she was, sitting on front of me, my mum. The woman I knew, now knew me!

 

I needed desperately to keep the connection, so encouraged the conversation further

“Was I really a naughty kid mum? Really?

Oh Cherrie, you were stubborn and strong willed. You used to say as a small child, when I wanted to help you...”No, I will myself!”and stick out that determined little chin of yours”

She reached over to place her hand on mine. A moment to share, to capture, to cherish

Her mood was playful and her eyes clear and alert. Mum was present and I pounced on that opportunity to exercise her failing memory and in that process have some quality time with her

 

“So mum” I began, “shall we make a list of some of the things those hands have done, and see what we end up with?”

She stalled. Seemed unconvinced that this was an activity worth pursuing, but graciously indulged me and said

“Cooked”

From that humble beginning, the words flowed fast and fluid. It was like a lock had been opened and the words and memories come flooding forward, faster than I could absorb them. I reached for a pen, and the serviette on her tray from lunch, and began to record her memories

 

In no particular order she mentioned things like cooking lemon meringue pie, or salmon fish cakes, washing clothes in the old twin tub Hoover washing machine, then wringing them out on the wringer attachment on the laundry tubs. Years before such luxury, she had to wash using the copper tub over a fire.  How her red and always chaffed hands ached from wringing out the washing using only her hands!

 Her words flew about us, drawing images above our heads. Mum on her hands and knees on the back verandah at 17 Fennell Street, waxing and polishing the lino by hand. Brooms grasped, beating mats draped over the Hills Hoist for a thrashing. Beds made, lunches packed, shopping carried in string bags that dug into the palms of her hands.

These hands baited hooks and caught fish, erected tents on our holidays to Ulladulla and other beach locations over the Christmas holidays. They built sand castles and collected shells. Explored rock pools, with one hand, while holding a tiny daughters hand in the other. Paid bills, learned to drive a car, played tennis, made the family Christmas pudding using the Keighran recipe, wrote out Christmas and birthday cards. Gardened.

She took a moment to reflect. I watch her examining her own hands and saw the cloud of confusion begin to pass over her.

“Why do my hands look so old” she asked

“Because your 86 mum”

“86! I can’t be. I don’t feel 86, I feel like I’m 40. Am I really 86?” she said, with a look of fear on her face.

Yes”

“God, I’ll be dead soon”

I was fearful that she was lost to me again, or would become melancholy.

We sat quietly, listening to fear tip-toeing around us.  Shallow breathing, eyes downcast. Waiting. Would she disappear to the place that I cannot follow, or would she stay with me.  We waited

It seemed like the longest wait. Like waiting for the first bloom to herald spring after a long, cold winter.  Her head was dropped forward and her crepe paper eyelids fluttered almost closed.

I waited, careful not to disturb her.

“Babies”she exclaimed. I nearly leaped of the bed with surprise

“’I cuddled my babies, my 3 daughters!”she announced triumphantly

The ripple in my emotional pond became a tsunami of joy!

”Diane was premature and small. Like a doll. Cherrie, you were chubby with black hair and looked like a Chinaman, (giggle) and Katie was blonde and blue eyed. I held and cuddled and rocked you all to sleep with these hands”

Yes” tell me more Mumma

 

“Your father joined the Merchant Navy after we were married and was away for months and months at a time. He would write to me describing the ship, the crew, and the sights of the far off exotic places he sailed to. I held all those letters and read them and re read them. I loved receiving his letters and I loved writing back to him. Diane was a small baby when he left, so I wrote of her antics and enclosed photos.  It was the only way of communicating in those days, not like now. But I think is was more romantic”.

Her face looks relaxed, happy to have this memory come to visit, albeit briefly.

We chat a bit more.

“Mum you used to sew beautifully! I  can remember a beautiful pink chiffon dress with a long matching Isadora Duncan styled scarf that you make for Di for her Teachers College ball. Do you remember that?

“Remember it!”Of course I do, it was a bugger of a fabric to sew, slippery and fine textured. It nearly ended up in the garbage bin!

That triggered my own memory of my mum’s sewing days. She was self taught and did a remarkable job. Her Singer Sewing machine would be hauled onto the kitchen table after the breakfast dishes had been cleared, and the tablecloth shaken outside and folded away in the kitchen draw. Dad would have left for work hours earlier and we girls gone to school. She would sew at that table til about 3.30 when the first of us arrived in the door off the bus or train. Depending who the item was for, we would have to quickly get out of our school uniform and slip into the dress/shirt/jacket/ pants/poncho, whatever it was, never complaining about the pins sticking into our skin.

We girls have all at some time, stood on the kitchen table to have a hemline levelled, or darts adjusted.  Modifications noted, the whole lot was packed away, to make room for afternoon tea, and then school books for homework, before the tablecloth was pulled on again and the table set for dinner.

 

Mum had little patience, so I am still in awe of the dresses and gowns she managed to create on our little kitchen table. She was creative. One dress may eventually be re incarnated for another daughter’s school ball or social with a re cut, the addition or removal of sleeves, or adding a belt or jacket.  Her hands were busy and tired, but made sure we girls had beautiful dresses whatever the occasion.

I was surprised to learn that her hands as a young woman had held cigarettes. My mum smoked? Hhmm news to me.

She wasn’t much of a drinker, but in her youth drank Pimms, or a shandy on a hot day, parked outside the pub in the car with us kids, next to the other women in cars, whilst their men drank in the bar! Extraordinary! But her favourite drink was crème de menthe, soda and ice.  Young bar staff these days look blankly at this order, when dad and I take mum out for lunch sometimes. It is a green concoction rarely known. Occasionally an older bar tender will nod knowingly and reach under the bar and put a dusty VOK bottle on the bar and say, haven’t been asked for this for years! She and I talk about the drink nicknamed the Green Lizard

“Mark has strong hands”, she murmurs sleepily

I see sleep beginning to invade. I am selfish. I want more time with her, more opportunities to be with my mother. I am jealous of my competition for her attention. Dementia is always there waiting to reclaim her, pulling her away from me

Her eyes begin to glaze over. A distant look appears on her face, and then I know I have lost for now when she says:

“Who are you?”

I am holding her hand. Her brown, fine, veined hand. I don’t want to let go, but she pulls back and places them once again in her lap. She is asleep and I am alone, but grateful for the stroll we took together down memory lane, thanks to those old hands.

 

 

 

                                                                                                                                               

Shantung Silk Messages

 Shantung Silk Messages

 

Psalm 90 Verse 10 In the Kings James Bible tells me that we are allocated 3 score and ten years in this life. But clearly that is a furphy. Maybe that was the perceived maximum thousands of years ago, but if it is the case I have 107 days from today to disprove that assertion.

 

GULP!

 

As a child I was immune to the concept of life ending. I had 1 set of grandparents, parents, siblings, aunts, uncles and cousins. I didn’t think about Death or the greater existential question of

“What comes after the last breath?”

 

I was busy with Life! There was bike riding far and wide with friends, school, sport, and learning the eccentricities of the living, rather than the question marks that surrounded the dead.

 

However, when I was 11, Death sauntered into Sutton Street Blacktown, where I lived with my family. We lived in a white weatherboard 3 x 1 modest home, with an outside loo for many years. We were at #26.

 

Diagonal to us, at # 21 lived Mr and Mrs Raynor. I never presumed to know their names. They were adults, so Mr and Mrs Raynor they remained to me even to this day.

Mr Raynor used to catch to bus to the railways station on occasions, the same one I caught to begin my 1 hour bus, train, walk commute to my school.

Sometimes we sat together. Quietly or chatting. He would try to read his paper. Mum said Mr Raynor would only ever read the Sydney Morning Herald ( a decent paper) not like that rag the Daily Mirror!, she would say , nose wrinkled in disgust. I didn’t know why then, but as I got older I noted the scantily clad Page 3 girls!

I don’t remember what month it was, but it felt like Autumn. When the weather begins to shift, the wind blows to a different beat and there is a restlessness looming.

Sometimes, after school, I would get off the bus and go to Mr and Mrs Raynors for afternoon tea. It was a quiet and welcomed sanctuary. My own home was a home that comprised of a devoted and nurturing mother, and older and a younger sister, a couple of cats and a father who ruled the household. A man who worked very hard, but never achieved the financial stability he craved. Who sought solace in amber liquid and who, inadvertently, taught the rest of us how to be professional eggshell walkers.

So my very occasional respite at the Raynors, where it smelt of talcum powder, lilly of the valley perfume, Old Spice cologne and Mrs Raynors magnificently fragrant roses, was a sanctuary to a young girl who was yet to understand the wounds of her parents.

I recall that Mr Raynor had not been on the bus for a couple  weeks and I  said to Mum that I might pop over to see them. She looked at me with a curious expression and then said, ‘No love. Mr Raynor has been sick with the flu. Perhaps you should wait a while.”

The days rolled by and the wind and the leaves whispered to one another. I didn’t speak their language; I knew they were keeping secrets from me.

One Thursday as I was getting off the bus I saw Mum on the porch at the Raynors. I raised a hand to wave and began to walk in that direction. But Mum headed me off and I saw Mrs Raynor step back into her fragrant home and close the front door. It sighed in resignation.

That afternoon, with the wind howling and rattling our too loose front screen door, Mum sat me in the lounge room, and taking my hand said “ Cherrie , Mr Raynor’s flu got worse and 2 weeks ago he was admitted into Blacktown Hospital. He didn’t recover sweetheart and died 3 days ago. I am so sad to tell you this, I know how close you two were.”

As Mum was speaking the unspeakable I tried not to imagine the unimaginable. Mr Rayne was gone. As mum spoke I had been staring intently at our lounge room curtains. Cream shantung silk drops with a whimsical, abstract  scattered pattern of orange and black lanterns!

My mum had fallen in love with the fabric when she had seen it in David Jones. It was awfully expensive but for just ONCE in her life she was determined to have something special. She lay-byed meters of it and religiously paid her weekly instalments .

She worked part-time as a cleaner at Blacktown Hospital, 3 hours a day 5 days a week. I imagine it was a meagre wage, but she loved the staff and the patients and it gave her some respite from her home duties….and some small financial independence.

Once paid off, the fabric was carefully wrapped and carried home on train and bus from Parramatta . She spend hours crafting those metres of fabric into beautiful curtains that covered the front west facing windows of our home and the east facing back windows. I don’t image Dad ever knew how expensive they truly were, but Mum loved them.

I do  recall however, the look of abject despair on my mother’s face when a few years later, in a pique of drunken rage, my Dad threw his dinner plate, full of his food at the wall in the lounge room. Steak, potato mash, peas, carrots and gravy  rained down the fabric and the shattered plate tore it.

He had no idea. Just continued to rage. He didn’t see the light in my mother’s eye dim. He couldn’t hear her heart breaking.

But for now those beautiful curtains are intact and I am staring at the lanterns on the silk. The westerly sun is hitting the glass of the front window.  Its glow appears to lighting up the lanterns. I have never noticed that before. I am fascinated!

‘Cherrie, Cherrie” my mother’s voice interrupts my musings. “ Did you hear me love? Mr Raynor has passed away.

‘Ah ha” I manage to mumble. No tears, no sadness, just the twinkling of the lanterns.

We didn’t go the funeral. Not a place for children was the consensus, but Mum  thought I might like to make Mrs Raynor a card.

I tried to draw some of her beautiful roses, but I was hopeless at drawing. Not like my two sisters who both had the knack! I thought I was better with words, so I penned what I hoped was ok.

About a month later a FOR SALE sign was outside Mr and Mrs Raynors house. Then a SOLD sticker, then a few weeks later a van packed up the house when I was at school and I thought it must have packed up Mrs Raynor too, because I never saw her again.

Mum told me they didn’t  have children so Mrs Raynor had moved into a nursing home. I didn’t know what that was , but when mum  described it I figured that Mrs Raynor had died too, just differently.

My perception of Death then, as an 11 year old , was like this

 

·       Someone you like and can laugh with and talk to or sit quietly with leaves without saying goodbye

·       No one knows where they go. My Catholic school said there is a place called Heaven and good people go there. Mr Raynor would DEFINITELY go there, but where is THERE?

·       Don’t ask too many questions because its impolite and might make other people feel uncomfortable

·       Death is not ONE  thing. Mr Raynor had a physical Death. Mrs Raynor had a different death. She had to leave her sanctuary, where she made her memories with Mr Raynor and her rose garden

·       Death meant I didn’t get to tell Mr Raynor that our netball team won the Grand Final or that I was in the school choir or so many things!

·       I didn’t get to see him smile when he read something funny in the Sydney Morning Herald or frown and mumble….” Blasted pollies”

·       Death means there are thousands of words left hanging that never touch our tongue or our lips. They remain suspended like stalactites in our mind.

But for me, the overwhelming experience was the twinkling of light in those lovingly created shantung silk curtain lanterns, blinking and shimmering and maybe Morse coding me a message from my friend.

 

 ❤️

 

 

                                                           LET'S  GET REAL

You know all the childhood emotional stuff you carry around like an anchor? Why?

You know all the past hurt you store like a badge of honour? Why?

You know all the resentment, envy and comparisons you store? Why?


Is it possible that you are living as an adult child?

How is that working out for you?

Might I offer that your relationships are broken, you find yourself in conflict with loved ones and others and are often saying ' Sorry' or in denial about your role?

Is this a comfortable place to be?


It's  time to break the attachment to the child wound and be your adult self. Your child self needs you to take charge, to fill the void and protect them.

Whatever parenting, rolemodelling,  was absent needs to be addressed. This is not about blame for the lack of parental perfection, but about finding a way to view it with compassion, and then do more.

Be your own child self champion! Who is better qualified to know what inner you needs?

I encourage you to ask your child self what he / she needs, and to listen, then act...

Your action, from a place of transparency,  offers healing.

Ask your child self what they need, then be that adult! Go on...get real!

gang of seven

Gang of Seven

The mobile phone in my hand suddenly felt too heavy to grasp, like the information being conveyed in a matter of fact way down that very same phone. The words, whilst just 7 of them, seem innocuous enough individually, but as a team were powerful. There were of course many, many other words, but that gang of seven packed the heaviest punch!

I was standing outside the Hydro Majestic Hotel in the Blue Mountains in Sydney. It was a cloudless, blue kissed day. Together with my husband, sister and nephew, we had sort respite from Blacktown hospital, in the suburbs, where my dad had been diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. He was dying. Our strong and seemingly invincible dad.  The man who at 89 would still climb onto the roof of his modest home in 32 degree heat to replace an errant tile, or fix the guttering. No safety gear, just his shorts, t shirt, bandy legs and thongs. He was stubborn, as was the generation from which he was born. He had a job at 6 years of age, after school on the back of the fruiter’s truck. Life was challenging and he learned early about responsibility and hardship.

Now he was in a hospital gown, in a sterile hospital room.  A cannula in the back of his large hand for pain relief and a bevy of health professionals all telling him the same thing. Life was going to abandon him, soon, and they could not halt its withdrawal. He didn’t look surprised. But something else. Resignation, tinged with fear perhaps.

We waited until the sedation they offered, journeyed him to blissful unconsciousness and then headed for the car park.

‘Should we get a coffee, or something to eat?’

‘Yeah, I guess’, came a lack lustre response.

‘Let’s drive up to the Blue Mountains and get some fresh air to clear our heads,’ my husband suggested.

It was an hour’s drive. Plenty of time to repeat in our minds, and with our words, the news we had just received from the doctors. Was it unexpected? I guess not. He had been unwell on and off for the last 12 months, but now there was an unwelcomed intruder knocking at his door. We had been told two days before that the prognosis didn’t look too hopeful, but still...

Now reality was here. Clear and clinical. Keep him on medication to make him comfortable, transfer him to a nursing home and get his affairs in order. Let the rest of the family know. Feelings swirled around ill fitting and persistent.  There was a flock of them all jostling for our attention. Fear, denial, anger, sadness, grief and more. It was impossible to feel them all at once, so one stepped forward to stake its claim. Its name was Fear and it had a job to do.

We stopped at the famous Three Sisters’ rock formation, teasing Blair that it was his mum and his 2 aunts! We felt small and invisible in the open spaces of the mountains, witnessing the vastness of the nonstop sky, misted slightly by the blue hue caused by the eucalyptus from the trees. It was awesome and majestic.

Perhaps a bite to eat at the appropriately named Hydro Majestic Hotel, someone offered.

The Hotel had been a grand old dame built in 1904. She was perched dramatically on an escarpment of the mountains and commanded unsurpassed views. The “Jewel in the Mountains.”  She was iconic, elegant and timeless.

We felt the chill as soon as we exited the protection of the car. The wind was now cold and calling. It had the feel of anticipation or was it foreboding?

‘Let’s have a look around the front at the view first, before heading inside’, Katie suggested.

At the front of the building overlooking the ancient valleys beneath, the wind was stronger, more urgent, tugging at my coat and unsettling me further.

My phone vibrated in the pocket of my jeans. I was tempted not to answer it, but then wondered if it might be the hospital.

Looking at the screen, I saw it was from our youngest son Christopher, whom we affectionately nicked named Critter.

 Was I ready to convey the latest information about his Pop just yet? He was at home in Adelaide and might the news not best be delivered face to face? I baulked. I thought ‘I’ll let it go to the message bank, and deal with it later’, but the radar in my subconscious was ON and I felt compelled to take the call.

‘Hi Critter,’ I said as breezily as I could muster.

‘Hi mum,’ he responded, ‘how are things with Pop?’

I felt my jaw tighten. Definitely not the conversation I wanted to have over the phone. “Well love, they are doing some more tests, but it may not be good news. We will know more in a few days”

 He held the silence longer than I expected. “I am sorry to hear that mum, but Pop is strong, He will be OK” came his voice, small, hesitant.

“Are you OK love? I know it’s sad news but Pop is comfortable and we will have more information in a day or so.”

I felt dreadful minimising the situation. “Tell him when you get home,” my mind spoke to me.

The swirling wind howled, calling me to alertness, focussing me on the words my son was now speaking.

“Ah, look mum, I just wanted you to know that I’ve been to see a Dr about the nausea and headaches I’ve been having.  They did some tests and, Mum, I don’t want you to worry but...”

And then those 7 words!

“I have something growing in my brain”

There it was. A trifecta of Fear circling, full and forceful in the wind, licking at my mind, clawing at my heart.

The fear an old man faced leaving the woman who he had married 66 years ago. He knew there would not be any words of goodbye, because she had all but forgotten him.

The fear of a 25 year old man who was yet to know the full implications of  those 7 words and the outcome that was written somewhere in the Book of Life (and Death) far beyond his comprehension.

The fear of families, loves ones, friends and work colleagues. Each trying to process the concept of mortality and its finite form.

It’s easy for Fear to take hold. It requires almost no effort on its part. The word strikes at our human core, accelerating the heartbeat, flooding the body with adrenalin and crushing our serenity. It is the thief of peace.

On the heels of Fear however, entered another player.

Courage.

It’s the antithesis of Fear. It does not take you hostage. Courage holds out its strong hand and offers its warm heart. Courage speaks calmly and with compassion. Asking “How can I help you” and ‘Shall we walk this path together”

There is no grandiosity in being courageous. No Ego. It trusts you to be the person you are, beyond the disease. It asks you not be defined and possibly remembered by your illness, but rather to be emboldened to live the Life you were born to navigate.

For the bystanders and the loved one watcher, Courage may ask different questions. It might be to allow the patient to have their own experience, without the weight of expectations of recovery or wellness. You may be asked to be courageous enough to allow them to leave, and to respect their courage to release and surrender.

The courage of my Dad was to draw a ragged breath and whisper,

 “Enough, I am ready!”

The courage of my son was to face his horror with honour and to be present to his mantra

    “Strong enough to live.......”

.........Until he had the Courage to die.

YESTERDAY, TODAY, TOMORROW

To be in the NOW is such a catchcry. We hear it at seminars and at our Yoga practice, we read about the importance of mindfulness and being “present”. It seems as though we have forgotten what it feels like to BE IN THE NOW.  Why is it seemingly so elusive?

Is today, so unappealing? Have we become like moths to a flame, always chasing the bright lights and looking for what’s next, whilst ignoring the beauty of what is right in front of us.

When we are not in the NOW we are potentially in chaos, or at best, not embracing the possibilities being presented today.

What if you were TODAY? How would you feel?  To be TODAY, in our busy, often unconscious lives, is possibly viewed as not enough.

TODAY gets a really raw deal!

Imagine if you will, that YESTERDAY, TODAY AND TOMORROW meet in a coffee shop.

YESTERDAY............arrives really early

TODAY...................arrives on time

TOMORROW.........arrives really late

But eventually all 3 are together.

They exchange mundane pleasantries, commenting firstly on the weather

YESTERDAY says :         ..........the weather WAS  windy, blustery, and cool

TODAY says:                   .........the weather IS mild and still

TOMORROW says         .........the weather WILL be sunny and balmy

The conversation appears disjointed. Yet all of them are correct based on their view, their perception. It depends on where they are in their NOW.

It’s the same with self awareness. We may see ourselves in one light, but is that how we are received by others?

YESTERDAY clears its throat and announces with  passion:

“I am the memories of peoples past. They can be clear and accurate or distorted and lament filled. The unfulfilled longings and yet, in the same breath, the illustrious triumphs. I am the shame of the unguarded tongue, and the guardian of the loving whisper. I can be the master of deception and illusion and the also the mistress of the precious gems of Life. I can be the “if only” and the “I wish I had”. I am what cannot be undone, only redone.

TOMORROW jumped in immediately, shouldering TODAY to one side.

“I am the dreams yet to be realised, the fantasy yet to be unveiled. I am the harbinger of possibility and the illusionist of immortality. I offer hope and dreams.  I am mystical and mysterious. I am the visionary with limitless imagination and the nagging night time thought of “what if” and “imagine when”.

TODAY sat quietly. Shrinking slightly. What grandiosity could it inject into its forgettable self?  The proof of its unworthiness was there for all to see. Plainly and transparently. People didn’t want to be in TODAY, they were always revisiting YESTERDAY or dreaming of TOMORROW.

The other two were waiting for TODAY to extol its virtues. Waiting, waiting....

TODAY sat still.  It became present to itself. Gradually, thoughts began to form and then the words followed.

“I am the breath you are sucking up into your throat this very moment. I am your moving self and your resting self. I am every feeling and emotion that is running through your body now, every image that your eyes capture in millisecond flashes in 24 hours. I can be incomplete and wasted. Or full and productive. I am ALL you have right now, right here. From my platform you can leap into tomorrow or slide back to yesterday but all you find there are wishes or memories.

What you FEEL TODAY is honest, spontaneous and if permitted, healing. It’s the suppression of feelings, relegating them to a past memory or event or projecting them into some fanciful scenario into tomorrow that distorts them"

TODAY paused. Breathless with the joy that it had found its voice.

There followed a silence. Each day sitting in contemplation.

It was apparent that one could not exist without the other. Each had a role to play. They were jointly and severally important, one not greater than the other.

Life asks much of us. Challenges in health, career, finances, relationships, etc. All of it at times overwhelming and seemingly insurmountable. What to do?

Perhaps just by honouring TODAY you will find the space you need to navigate the memories of yesterday and the illusions of tomorrow with clarity.

Perhaps just doing TODAY as well as you can, is enough.

Be gentle with TODAY

 

Fabric Feelings

 

I had a busy day today.

I began the de cluttering of my wardrobe. Of course, it was meant to be a swift and merciless cull! Out with the sizes/styles/colours that have hung forlornly on bent wire hangers, misshapen and twisted due to multiple garments all vying for a place to wait for their fate to be decided.

I was determined to remove nostalgia from the equation. What was the Equation?     Simple:

Fit + functionality + fashion freedom = KEEP

I figured 30 minutes was enough time to decide on what was KEEP and what was GO.



TWO hours later..........


I am sitting on the floor of my modestly proportioned walk in robe, cocooned in cotton, linen, chiffon, sequence, polyester, leather, silk and materials of dubious descriptions! My clothing Tower of Babel is leaning and lurching towards the door, but I don’t seem to have relegated one item to the GO pile that currently resides nonexistent outside the door.

Who knew that clothes and shoes could speak so eloquently? They are the fashion whisperers, drawing me into nostalgia and memory of people and places, events and celebrations.

The dress I wore when I held my eldest grandson for the first time, a little black number that I wore to a dear friends 60th birthday dinner, the holiday easy fold and pack shirts and pants, and "throws" for cooler tropical nights, the “sisterhood of writing" trousers, the corporate attire, the lazy Sunday lunching outfits, the “I have to have it, it’s a bargain skirt, (a size too small, but one day”!)

There were dresses, blouses, shirts, jackets and pants of every length and design. They paid homage to the eclectic, each a statement about some aspect of me. The boho, the casual, the traveller, the glamour, the varying sizes of my life. Colour features heavily, but I now see a sea of black invading the nooks and crannies of my wardrobe. I am stunned at some of my choices! What was I thinking, (or NOT thinking).

I am shocked how the sight, touch and smell of some of them evoke such massive emotions.  The gorgeous silk and crystal dress I wore to my first born's wedding, the after five gown I wore to my middle sons  Air Force "wings " ceremony, the colourful caftan I wore to my youngest sons funeral.  Fabric feelings. Full and fertile.

 

As the clothes share their stories and memories and jostle in that small space to get my attention, pleading, "not me, not me, I am still worthwhile, valuable", I ponder on this phenomenon.

Why have I clung to some of these items? What did they bring into my life, albeit fleetingly, that now weighs so heavily in my decision-making? KEEP or GO?

The answer  comes to me eventually and it  seems so obvious.

 

They are my emotional diary, in a closet.

They are the physical manifestations of my emotional rollercoaster and I am OK with that......

 

I managed to allocate two Ikea blue bags to go to the OP Shop tomorrow. These were mainly shoes. Seems shoes and I are less nostalgic!

As for the rest, I have called an armistice.

I will re assess in the New Year, give myself time to see what’s at the post Xmas sales!