Comfortably Sad

Stevie Nicks -  Beauty and the Beast

You're not a stranger to me,
And you, well you're something to see.
You don't even know how to please.
You say a lot but you're unaware how to leave.

My darling lives in a world that is not mine.
An old child, misunderstood. Out of time.
Timeless is the creature who is wise
And timeless is the prisoner in disguise.

Who is the beauty, who the beast?
Would you die of grieving when I leave?
Two children, too blind to see . . .
I would fall in your shadow, I believe.

My love is a man who's not been tamed.
My love lives in a world of false pleasure and pain.
We come from different worlds; we are the same.

I never doubted your beauty, I've changed.
I never doubted your beauty, I've changed.

Who is the beauty?
Where is my beast?
There is no beauty without my beast.
Who is the beauty; who the beast.

For Hamper G's Dad on Fathers Day much love from . . . The Daddio

He's counting the remainder of his sentence in months now, rather than years and months . . . Counting the months to freedom. Freedom from one prison . . . back to the life sentence.Will he ever be free? I know he dreams of freedom; of running over hills and mountains, laughing in deerskin breeches or maybe they are actual deer's hind legs . . . he's never sure and always says he'll look properly next time. It's a recurring dream. He's nearly died so many times; I can only assume God wants him alive. Alive and living. All these lives that could be lived, that should be lived and loved. Why does hindsight come too late . . . I have no problem thinking what I might say on the brink of death . . . All these years. What I might do if I could have them again. Live life next time. I know what I'd say so why can't I feel what I'd feel. Feel that desperation to have another chance. Starting now. This is it . . . this is the another chance. Now and here. Why can't I grasp this. I'm stood on the brink of life, almost ready . . . but frightened to take the chance. To risk choosing life !? . . . If I wasn't me, I would shake myself, proper and slap myself . . . "Wake up" I'd shout "And feel it ALL. NOW!! . . . Before it's too late" But I am me so I won't.

I'm thinking aloud here really. I don't know where I'm going, other than to bed I suppose.
Monday tomorrow and all that jazz . . That's OK, I need a bit of jazz. Jazz is distracting. I've been solid busy all weekend yet somehow I've still been locked in my thoughts. Busy but sad and pensive.

I must say I'm not used to feeling sad. It's weird to feel like this and not be able to reason with it. To know and deal with the cause . . . It's just a very general sadness. Not depression. Not fear or anxiety. Not even tearful. So why sad?
I'd quite like to sit here and write for a while but I know I need to sleep soon to wake up . . . happy? No, to wake up not too tired. I might wake up happy, that would be a surprise. I'm sort of settling into this sad thing; getting comfortable.

This was going to be one of four short "Musical dedication plus a few Happy Fathers Day words of kindness" to each of the four fathers in my life; mine and the three Dads . . . But I got distracted and now it's too late. Not that they read here . . . I can do it late. Who's gonna know. But not tonight, I'm tired. Once again, I'm not going back to read over this; just a quick spellcheck and that'll do.

And then Goodnight to anyone reading this. Thanks for reading. Writing is definitely helping me to think further, to try and work through feelings and resolve issues. I know some folk say they would still write if there were no readers, but I wouldn't . Well I don't think I would . . . But anyway, I'm really pleased you're here reading and I do mean, thank you. You are appreciated. Really. I'm gone . . .

Ps . . . It's past 2am and I only just noticed there are comments on my last post (Save the night) . . . I will reply to them (of course) tomorrow. Thanks again x

Save the night

O boy . . . I was writing a post to celebrate Stropster's seventeen years and other things . . . then I decided to add a few photos to the post, of Stropster's early life . . . I started to look for the photos.

So many true loves and smiles. I suddenly felt so alone. Ouch. This is unexpected and uncomfortable. I think I'll go to sleep and hope it's a fleeting . . . ? I don't know, a fleeting something, brought on by photographic memories. It's certainly a first . . . Shit maybe I was just too numb before. Sometimes I get scared by all the feelings I will feel when it all wears off. Sometimes I wonder . . .

It's late. It's not like me to feel sad. It's like my soul is crying. I'm not, but I could be if I'm not careful.
I'll come back in the morning and scan those photos in and then post the thing I was writing earlier before this happened.

I don't want to cry, I know it's OK to cry and might even be more than OK . . . Might even do me some good. But truth be told, I don't want to cry . . . Not tonight. I wouldn't usually mind but I suddenly feel alone; I don't want to cry and feel alone . Fuck, this is not like me. I'm tempted to delete this . . . but I wont because it's new. I suspect it could be a new part of me, I could be wrong; it may well be a one off, but I doubt it. It's caught me by surprise that's for sure.

All that love. Given and taken. Discovered and discarded. Treasured and trashed. I'm off to sleep. All those hopes of forever. Promises I couldn't keep.

. . . If I, if I have been unkind; I hope that you can just let it go by.
If I, if I have been untrue; I hope that you know, it was never to you.
Like a baby stillborn, like a beast with his horn; I have torn everyone who reached out to me.
But I swear by this song and by all that I have done wrong; I will make it all up to thee.

Bird a on a wire Leonard Cohen.



Save the Night . . . Melanie.

Save the night, if I could find a feeling I could save the light
that lit our nights before,
before we knew the reason saving nights were for.
Save the light, the light that made us sure
we'd never find that light at any other door.

 . . . Sometimes I'll slip away; I'll pretend life and dream that I can save the day.

Right, I really am off to bed now; having listened to some, what might well be considered "depressing", music has cheered me up no end. No, really it has. In fact I'm not even gonna scroll up to check what I've written;  I'll want to delete it, immediately. I'll be like shit, who was that, what was all that about?

So . . . That was last night.

Today is a new day. I'll scan in the photos and do the Stropster (belated) Birthday post. First I have to do some cleaning, washing, cooking . . . Happy Father's Day to all you Fathers, take it easy ;-)

Itty, Bitty and all good gifts.

OK, I literally have an hour to spare as I need to get to bed by eleven.

The final half term of this school year began today and we had a few tears . . . quite a lot of tears really. The teacher had said this might happen and it was gut-wrenching to prise her fingers from around my thumb and walk away . . . but I had no choice. When I went to pick her up at 3.15 she was happy and skipping; she told me "I threw my tear tissue in the bin after you had gone Mummy" . . . Later, she remembered "We said the Serenity prayer in assembly this morning"!! I wasn't aware that she knew what the Serenity prayer was. She certainly did, she also knew it was something that I said. Amazing.

Gledwood and her daughter, Faith (the father!?) have two pups, we've called them Itty and Bitty; taken from  Elsie's comment "How itty bitty" to the first photos of the pups. I couldn't resist just getting a few last shots of them together this evening while they're still pups . . . and before the camera novelty wears off.

Stropster will be Seventeen on Friday, my Brother and Mother have booked him a block of driving lessons, his first one being at 8.15  on Friday morning. He can't wait to have his driving license. I'm giving him money for clothes  . . . but having watched him practise "Redemption Song" all week on an old 3/4 size classical, nylon string guitar which quite frankly sounds awful; I thought how good it would be if we found a semi-acoustic, second hand folk guitar for his birthday . . . . we did! It's perfect. It's all black, it's semi acoustic and it has a beautiful "silvery" sound. I can't remember what make it is, it's hiding at Bro's house, but I know he will love it. A total surprise.

We have a prison visit booked for Thursday, I'm hoping it will be dry enough to enjoy another visit to the prison park. I heard on the news this evening that this rain is set to last for a month! A month!? It has caused some horrendous floods and there are many more flood warnings in place for tonight.

I had some extremely vivid realistic dreams last night. I kept on waking up to have a little re-cap of events, then returning to the same dream again. It was almost like a psychic connection with someone. I also had a very clear vision of a girl jumping from a bridge . . . It was disturbing; as she jumped I felt someone tap me on the shoulder from behind. Bizarre.

OK, twenty minutes left to post the last few photos. It's going to be a busy week. A good week . . . Another clean week. I'm starting aqua-aerobics on Wednesday . . . well, I'll try it. If it's not strenuous enough, I'll just swim instead . . . if it's too strenuous, I'll just swim instead.

Last week I had a leaflet through the door advertising yoga and meditation sessions at a nearby Buddhist centre; I did consider it but they were quite expensive  . . . The next day, tough guy at N/A offered to take a few of us there on Fridays. The sessions are free to us addicts . . . How good is that. It has to be worth a try.

Rightio, photos and bed! goodnight all and thanks, as always, for being here x

See how they've changed colour from gingery to grey/gingery in two days?

Yeah right, you get the picture, I know. Itty and Bitty eventually became so relaxed and warm and comfortable in Hamper G's paws that they fell asleep . . . She wanted to take them to bed with her. We compromised with their cage next to her bed . . . Ahhhh

Smile! "Click" . . . O wait, I mean now! Smile! "Click"

I need to get used to this camera/phone thing . . . This one of Hamper G is one of fifteen pictures of her in the tea-cups, the other fourteen being the back of her head, the back of someone elses head or just a blurred head. It seems when I click to take a picture, it takes a couple of seconds to get it. Hmmmm. Well you can just imagine the carnival floats at the beginning of the day! really not worth seeing; I mean the photos, not the floats . . . They were all very good, but whizzing past, too close, too noisy and I was confused. By the time we got to the fairground I was almost getting the hang of it . . .

 

Almost . . . Once again, this is one of many; many pictures of the chair swings with NO Hamper G! At least she's on this one. These kids are from the Dickens float . . . We are slightly behind the times here, but not that far.

Geekster decided to join the queue of five year olds to get his face painted . . . He really don't give a damn that tiger. And why should he. It's a strange age, thirteen (for a lad I might add) they are hitting puberty but can also be very childlike. I mean, I know they are children, of course, but sometimes he seems so grown up . . .

Hamper G obeying orders. Having held everyone up on her first descent of the Helter Skelter by holding onto the sides, and hotching her way down . . . The man in charge told her to keep her hands on her knees for her second descent . . . And she Did! All the way. I think she may have kept her eyes on them all the way down to make sure they stayed there . . . She was obviously just as surprised at herself as I was! I think her right hand might even be pinching her knee to check she's not dreaming.

This is Geekster's best friend, our next door neighbour, Marley. They've  been friends since they were three years old. He is so kind to Hamper G and went on all the rides with her. She loves him. We all love him. Geekster's Dad always takes them both when he goes to France. This year Geekster is going to Spain with Marley and his family.

It's half past midnight and they're all at school or work tomorrow . . . And they are all relying on me to get them up, and ready and on their way. So, I'm on my way now, to bed. I'll finish off and post in the morning. O sod finishing off, I'll just post now . . . there might be some more tomorrow from today's "picnic in the park" complete with the town's brass band! So much excitement, I'm utterly exhausted . . . Goodnight and thanks for being here x

Because I said I would

This really is just a quickie.
It's carnival weekend here so we've been out all day and evening having fun! there are some more events tomorrow if we can bear the excitement. I'll post photos and an up-date tomorrow. I will just say, all is well and good.

After posting the photos of Hamper G yesterday, Gledwood requested some hamster shots; he too, used to keep dwarf Roborovskis. I promised him I would put a few on here today, I  haven't forgotten. So, between getting Hamper G settled down, sending Geekster off to his Dad's for Saturday night and 20 zillion other things, I thought I best take a couple of hamster pics before transferring all of today's photos onto the laptop. As they were promised to Gledwood I decided to take the photos of our "Gledwood" hamster. She, yes she, was asleep so I rattled her cage, she shares her cage with two of her daughters (?) from last year's litter . . . They came sniffing out of their bedroom to see what was going on  . . . followed by these little blighters . . . Cute, yes . . But totally unexpected! Ahh well, I'll think about it all tomorrow . . . Enjoy and goodnight to all . . . Congratulations Gledwood, again!

I, yes I, have the technology!

YEAH!! . . . Now here's some more good news. I can, finally, independently take my own photos and transfer them from camera to Blog all by myself! Yes, I do realise, to most people, this is quite the norm . . . but I'm not.

The other day I saw an old phone in the drawer that the kids had found a couple of  years ago. It was blocked (properly blocked, not un-blockeable by the market man for a tena) but within the phone is an 8.1 mega pixel Sony cyber-shot camera . . . They told me the battery was no good (not chargeable) and we had no charger anyway. Yes, I think they told me all this before; every time I came across the phone and asked why I couldn't use it for a camera . . . BUT this time I was going to do something about it . . . E-Bay. One new battery, one charger, one USB lead ordered, paid for . . . And delivered this morning!

Now the best bit . . . before Geekster was even out of bed this morning, I took a few trial shots and saved them right here on my laptop! I will prove it in a minute . . . I am so damn pleased with myself.

I also ordered a beautiful Nepalese bracelet on E-Bay, then realised when I went to check on it's whereabouts yesterday . . . that it was travelling here from China; I might have to wait a while for that.

I've learnt some more about the cunning, baffling ways of addiction. I'll try and post later as I need to eat now and get on with the day. I've missed my walking this week, the kids are off school for half term and it has rained all week. Geekster has asked me to teach him how to play the piano; he did learn the violin for a year so has a head start being able to read music. Meanwhile Stropster is still persevering with Redemption song on the guitar . . . All good stuff. Excellent. I intend to stay clean just for today . . . I'll be back later x

Hamper G's hair had almost grown long enough to tie in a top knot  (after she'd cut it from waist length to ear length) . . . Until Monday when she found the nail scissors in the bathroom and chopped out the middle of her fringe . . . Seems it must be genetic  . . . As is looking either serious or dopey ;-) . . . In a beautiful way of course.

Love to all, have a good day x

Half way to . . . Paradise? or redemption.

When I started this Blog I was sixteen months away from my 50th Birthday; it seemed like far enough away, at the time, for some sort of target date . . . Now it's eight months away. The target is half the distance away. Question is, do I feel that I've made half the amount of changes I intended . . .  Putting it another way . . . If as many changes were to occur in the second eight months as those that have occured in the first eight months, would I be satisfied? Hmmm. Well, No . . .  OK, Yes and No . . . OK, No.  Alright, I'm not sure. Let's see.

Weight wise, yes I would be happy. Five kilos have gone, another five would be just fine; another ten would be twice as fine but five would get me to target. I'm still only eating the foods on my list, with one treat a week. This week I got a meringue nest, filled it with chopped strawberries and cherries and covered it in whipped cream. I could eat one now. Or two.

Gear wise, it's hard to say really. Yes, there has been progress. Back at the beginning of this Blog, I couldn't bear the thought of one day without using gear. . . now I can go for 5 or 6 days. It seems I have to learn to deal with the bigger "trials and tribulations" that inevitably come my way, being a single parent of three kids (with as many different Dads as Anon is want to remind me), without running back to my comfort blanket . . . Grow up? Maybe. So yes, another eight months might get me there. I am trying, some days harder than others, some days I don't even have to try. I'll keep going back to N/A as I can see it works for some. I've booked Stropster in for "Hamper-sitting" tomorrow so I can make it to this week's gathering; AKA eat all you can, as loudly as you can, in one and a half hours.

Health wise. Tonnes better. I can breath, I can walk four miles a day, I can skip (jump rope) three hundred+ a day, lift weights and do sit ups again. I'm still working on the press ups  . . . well no, I'm not really but I will be. I will be able to do them by the time I'm 50. Won't I.

The garden has improved, the house not so much but Hamper G has only been in school for three weeks (and now it's half term) so during the next eight months with Hamper in school, I think the decorating could begin.

I've started playing the piano again, I will draw again. I have my first half-portrait lined up.
I guess I'm saying hoping the next eight months will be more productive than the first eight months, as I now have Hamper G in school, have improved health and have finally started the ball rolling in the right direction. Like the first half was preparation or something. Something.

I've written, deleted, re-written, and now have four drafts of Professor Higgins part three. Too much detail just sounds terribly sordid, too little doesn't capture the atmosphere . . .  I might just fast forward to my escape and then flash back later. I suppose having never spoken about "those days", other than with Higgins, it's a tricky one. I don't want to get all hung up on it, as there are so many "eras" that I do want to write about. We'll see.

So, on reflection, I'd say I'm in a better place than I was last October and by my reckoning, progressing this way for the next eight months could lead me to the results that I set out to achieve. Of course, we never know what's round the corner. The best laid plans and all that . . . Full moons and all that . . . Now, this was a surprise; a nice surprise.
Stropster came home early this evening having spent a few nights at his Dad's house (keep up Anon, there are 720 Dads! one in prison, two in heaven) . . . he was carrying a guitar, said his Dad had been teaching him some chords and a few tunes . . .  said his Dad told him that I'd taught him how to play . .  . and that I was pretty good. And could I teach him some redemption song?  . . And how come he didn't know that I played so well . . .  How come? I'd forgotten, that's how. Not forgotten how to play, I was straight to it; even Hamper G listened and she never shuts up . . .  I'd forgotten that I knew how to play. Yeah well that just about fucking sums it up, doesn't it?

I'd forgotten that I knew how to play. And I'm not just talking guitar here, but you knew that. We had a good three hours with me showing him some redemption and, more importantly, him showing me some redemption. Yeah Man.
It's the best evening that I've had with Stropster in years. Totally unexpected and amazing.
I  have to be up at seven am, as Stropster is back to work tomorrow. Imagine if I missed the alarm, perish the thought . . . I'm off to bed. Goodnight and thanks for eight months of progress. If you weren't reading, I doubt it would have happened. It would not have happened.