Friends, Amigas, freunden, Ami

John Lennon et al once asked

“What would you do if I sang out of tune would you get up and walk out on me….?”

A good friend would. A bad friend would tell you it was in tune.

There are many laments, ballads, songs, poems etc about lovers but what about the people that outnumber that lover, in my case that need only be one but let’s sidestep that and focus on those that outnumber the lover… or lovers, if you’re a play-ah. Friends. Not only is this the name of my absolute favourite tv show, that I happen to have on in the background as I type, I probably don't need to describe it, surely everyone is familiar with this show I mean it is repeated on E4 daily every hour (it would seem) I however have the DVDs so have it on tap. Anyway… as usual I am getting off topic; you can see why I was constantly editing essays at school.

Friends, true friends… there are many emails and such, I am sure that talk about true friends and how you can know them. I feel I am old enough to recognise and appreciate those friends that are there through thick or thin, fair-weather or not so fair-weather, hell or high water, river deep mountain high and all other oft-quoted comparisons.

By now I am assuming you have passed the ‘fickle, you’re my friend, you're not my friend, you can’t come to my party anymore, such and such and such a blah is my best friend, not you’ phase, I, for one, know it is an area I am working on but still feel I’m in a position to talk about candidly. I have had friends and lost them (what? They just fell down the manhole). I know what it is to have only 2 people come to your birthday party (your parents do count!), I was 23 at the time and, luckily, years later I know far more people would come now, if I was ever in the same country as my friends for my birthday and if I, say, put out some sandwiches, chocolate and lemonade, or something.

I have friends that have been there through loads of things, dished out sound advice, been a shoulder to cry on and totally been there when I needed them. Heck one of my best friends stayed on the phone while a psycho ex-friend smashed the front window of my house (apparently this wasn't impolite in Essex) and stayed on the phone whilst I used the house phone to call the police! I believe that many of the friends I have made over the years have blessed me and have been to make up for those awful frenemies (those enemies masquerading as friends) I had. This ‘psycho’ smashing friend I had was also the reason I lost my other frenemies. A hard lesson to learn at the time- but there is nothing like sorting the wheat from the chaff.

So how do we know our true friends? True friends do not use you as a taxi service (stop sitting in the fricking back of the car and ordering me around alright!) They do not use your house as some kind of holiday home (I did not say it was near the beach!) They wouldn't answer the phone at 3 and tell you what time it is (of course I know what time it is!) They don’t tell you that you look better without make-up when you have ready access to both daylight and a mirror, they don’t tell you muffin-tops are in this season, they don’t buy the exact same clothes as you and not at least have written permission from you, a rabbi and a priest, they do not concede that ‘you’re photogenic’ with their teeth firmly clenched, they do not send you harassing texts telling you they’re going to ‘f*** you up’ (I won't speak to you about this one again Aunty Mabel) No, a true friend has the mark of a true friend, unfortunately it isn’t as distinctive as I’d like (Is an ear piercing siren and a neon sign too much to ask for??) but as you get older and wise wisedy wiser you start to recognise true friend qualities. Basically those kinda friends that put up with you almost as willingly as your family have to.

My good/gooder/goodest friends encourage me, are honest with me, compliment me without clenched teeth, sometimes compliment my friends in the bargain (and unwittingly themselves) I won’t name names but a friend of mine once asked, genuinely (oh bless you Isabel Crofton-Martin) while looking at photos of my friends “are ALL your friends good looking?” “Yes” I replied. That is always how I comforted a friend who was feeling like they were ugly “Oh sweetie, you’re not!.... I don’t hang out with ugly people” well not for long anyway. Jokes! Now I am not saying if they didn’t do the above that we wouldn’t be friends, it just sweetens the bargain. Friends are the ones that are genuinely happy for you when something good happens etc, anyways, you're not stoopid, you get the idea.

John Lennon continued in his song, that I started with:
“Oooo I get by with a little help from my friends--” now I love Johnn-o but one thing that struck me was I don’t feel I just ‘get by’ I feel people say ‘get by’ like it is a sub-standard condition to the feeling of satisfaction. For example, my ex-housemate used to say it, I’ll set the scene: Me coming home from (a hard day at) work “Hi!! How are you?” My ex housemate (big exhalation of breath-visible chest up and down dramatics) “Oh... Getting by” or, let’s not forget the equally jolly, “plodding along” (kill me, kill me now) I, personally, thrive from a lot of help from my friends however John would have struggled to sing that as it would have thrown the whole chord sequence off and didn’t work syllabically.

I am far away from all my friends, but I get so much from their friendship no matter the distance. My mum has a theory that I keep friends who live in other countries so I have places to visit, it just happens that not long after meeting me people book flights, emigrate, take menial jobs on farms if they have to, cut forces tours short, pretty much anything to put a few thousand miles and a couple of eastern block countries with stringent visa programs, between us. Bless me though, I am a dedicated penpal and constantly write to my friend in Kyrgyzstan at 10 Kyrgyzstan road, Kyrgyzstan. Haven’t heard anything back as yet but he did warn me that their postal system was predominantly camel and pacca based… still fingers crossed.. (Sings to herself, Oh yes, wait a minute Mister Postman Hey, hey, hey, hey Mr. Postman...)

My friends support nigh on every whim of mine (it is practically compulsory if you commit to a friendship with me, by commitment I am talking about that checklist y’all filled in) they laugh at my jokes, proof read stories I write like ‘Tarquin the hairy backed spider takes a trip to the park’ (can I have that back now please Isabel?), they put up with my constant ‘friends’ quoting and accept the fact that I am barely in one place for very long and that I will not be able to see them very often (this could be seen as a blessing rather than a curse, though) I know people often curse facebook for not giving them enough news about their ex boyfriend’s new lover or whatever in their news feed or complain about msn messenger but these two mediums are what keeps me in touch with my friends that are as far away as Canada, Australia, Austria, Japan, America and that guy I asked out recently, Kyrgyzstan.
But you know friendship is friendship wherever we are. What I lurve about my friends is we pick up where we left off, no matter how many months or years. I also relish how I gravitate towards people who love the things I love, friends that are willing to sing any songs in the style of Nancy from ‘Oliver’, friends who, not only know, but love films like ‘Teenwitch’ and are willing to quote ‘Anchorman’ till we have exhausted just about every line from it. What I love is the pure (dog faced lying and pretence of) acceptance they have for me, particularly in regards to my faith, my music taste, my movie taste, the stories I write, the 'friends' quotes, the 'jokes'.

Most of all I feel that my friendships reflect my life, where I have been, the friends I have made along the way, places as far flung as Prague, Austria, Hemel Hempstead, RAF Brüggen and, you know, Volvo.

So this was my little homage to my friends that and, well I realised I hadn’t blogged in a long while!

Stop the world I want to get off.....

I’m going to risk sounding like an old lady in these blogs, harking for simpler times, asking for less complication, for bicycles to be the only form of transport and for teenagers to stop hanging around on street corners. Okay I’m joking about bikes.

It seems to me, as I observe the world from my pious watchtower, that things they are a-changing and not always for the better. I read an article about 100 things that are actually getting better, and although I didn’t get a personal mention, I persevered with my reading. It did include polyester and floral arrangements, Wal-mart and office chairs but I thought there must be something in there worth inspiring me, I couldn’t agree with the Beatles getting better (half of them have passed on from this world) it did mention being single, comforting after my 17 year old hairdresser saying that being 31 and single can be fun too, quite a concession. The one I liked the most was number 100. You. It said, and I quote, “You’ve just got this glow about you—some combination of wisdom and inner peace, plus a lovely self awareness. You’re not sweating the small stuff; you know what feels good, feels right and you simply don’t muck around with the rest. You’re not a kid anymore, and we mean that as a high compliment. There’s a new kind of lightness about you. And your hair has never looked better” It was like it was written for me; to me and about me ;) the last one is purely because I was at the hairdressers this very morn.

Anyway. I wanted to talk about things that haven’t got better. Harking to simpler times comes mainly because I think an influx of products has made us as consumers, perplexed. Don’t leave me now; this is not an economic essay.

This is mainly because I keep witnessing a few things, first of all when someone wants to lose weight they don’t just research healthy food and benefits of exercise, they search the internet for the easiest weight loss plan with the quickest desired results. Then everyone has become, thanks to the all-dancing interweb (that never lies) all nutritionists in training/practice, some people can tell you the very last calorific content of a dustmite (it's zero by the way) Others ‘know’ that in order to shed x amount you have to burn x amount through exercise, other diets tell you to cut major food groups like carbs, others to survive on protein and eat air, others purely cabbage, others chocolate ice-cream whilst sitting on the sofa. Is it any wonder the world’s combined waistline is getting bigger? We live off old information especially information on chicken that convinced us it was lean meat, um thanks Fat Fighters—maybe so, that was until they started pumping the chooks with lots of growth hormones in order to keep up with the demand, but this is not about the chickies.

My sister wanted to buy a pushchair; she already had a toddler and wanted to be able to have them both in, or at least in the vicinity of, the pushchair. The information was overwhelming, added to that we are all bonafide critics as well as part time nutritionists and our own GPs. She was besieged with information, she asked a few people (the pope suggested maxi-cosi) and conducted a national survey. Did she want her baby to hang low? Did she want to tie him in a knot, or tie him in a bow? Did she want one hanging off her back or clinging to the other for dear life? Or side-by-side within regulatory kicking distance of the new sibling, unable to get through any normal sized door and unable to fold into a car? Decisions, decisions…. I wondered if everything had been simpler how would she have felt if she only still had one or two choices and all 2009 mothers chose the exact same one. Maybe when nursery finished you just put your child in any chair and stroll away… simples. My mum was given (I know, like for free) a pram when I was born, a large silver cross pram with a hood, she put me in lying down and my older sister sitting towards the front of it chatting to her (this eased the situation of people walking past looking at my mum strangely for having a full blown conversation/sing-song with a comatose baby)

The same goes for supermarkets; there are so many different varieties of everything. So do you get the more expensive one with more colours on the tin (oooh, aaah), the one that says 'value'/El cheapo/savers or the one still made by the exact same company with more (flashy, bright, colourful, mesmerising) colours on the shiny tin and a 5p increase in price? Ah, those companies must be laughing when they are working in the same baked bean factory putting the same product in different tins at different hours of the day!

What gets worse is that we have so much information that we get into what I will call 'pick and mix' territory. I have a friend who reads so much about diets (in the hope that is enough for the fat to just slide off her body) Although the placebo effect of the books has yet to kick in, she takes a little bite from every diet, she doesn’t just follow the one and wonders why she sees zilcho resulto… ohhh noooo, she chooses to follow a diet that cuts carbs and then eats pizza or loads up on chicken, as it is ‘lean’! She tells us how much we should exercise (though we do and she doesn’t) and cuts out caffeine one week because one book says you should and wine the next (“it’s full of sugar dontcha know?” “Uh yuh, I told you that”). She is a prime example of things becoming too complicated. Companies quickly realised that the dietary industry was ginormous business (ah the irony) and it has resulted in people wanting a share of the multi-billion pound industry and, for us mere consumers (Sheep), to be confuseated (confused and nauseated- see what I did there?) with a deluge of information.

Then there are trends and fads that are just that because something will come out that says you should drink x amount of water a day (“but Evian said I should”) then someone else says that isn’t actually necessary (“Carling said so”) Do you walk with weights strapped to your arms and legs? Yes? Have you been doing that for a good few years now? Great, because someone wants to tell you that actually it doesn’t make any difference, whatsoever. We are all waiting for current information to be contradicted. With that in mind- is it any wonder some people do sweet FA and that the fence actually seems like a very comfortable place to perch?

Then we have things that work for some people and not for others, instead of ‘one size fits all’. It seems almost everyone is now a reviewer of everything. These people want to tell you what worked for them and what didn't, we don't question that we are not actually the exact same person. Recently Amazon (foolishly) allowed people to review everything from a ballpen to a bed and the amount of entries were astonishing. One such reviewer wrote of the ballpen: “worked perfectly with one hand but completely crap with the other”….

So, although I can concede that one thing can work well for one person and not another, in our pursuit of happiness (and everything in between) hasn’t the market been flooded with too much choice? That’s what I mean by a simpler time, when you went to a shop and could buy one brand of baked bean, one type of cauliflower, one brand of toothpaste, people just didn’t know any different. Hasn’t a little stress been added with trying to get good value for a good product, aswell as something that makes our teeth whiter, our hair blonder, our potential wrinkles avoidable (as long as you use it for 30 years prior), our stomachs flatter or our cholesterol lower….?! Then some may wonder, did I make the right choice? In those simpler times there could be no comparison with what someone else had bought. We could rest assured we bought the right monkey back scratcher, because it was the only one.

With Sky and digital tv we now have about a 1000 channels (and Bruce Springsteen thought he was making a point when he sang '57 channels and nothin on'!) I actually feel less stressed when I have five channels; I don’t take too long to choose between a programme about a pygmy elephant boy in Outer Mongolia or Under Siege. Don’t misunderstand me, I like to have things at my fingertips too, but I still think it needs to be tailored just a little.

So as for me, I’ll eat healthily, exercise the way I want, choose the one (unless he’s a blind deranged ex-asylum mental patient) that asks me to marry him, eat only Heinz baked beans, carry my (for now imaginary) children over my shoulders, watch only channel 4 and eat only Haagen Dazs ice-cream and I will wear my hair the way I like it because, not only are trends fleeting but I'd rather skip looking like Victoria Beckham/ the population of Essex --thanking you muchly! I am pro-choice (as long as it’s mine).

It seems to me that Woolworth’s has gone but pick and mix still remains.

Simplicomplicacity

I may be the worst person to read a murder mystery novel, I am quite content to let the narrative transport me rather than actively engage. This can be particularly frustrating at a murder mystery party as I suspect no one and my apathetic side muffles my competitive side. I read murder mystery novels in quite a laissez-faire fashion, truth be told many characters merge for me (which may explain why I never know quite who to suspect) If a television adaptation is too long, I may get confused as to who was who in the first place and realise I should just stick to what I know. I could never really work out the ghoul in Scooby Doo either, even if they were the only other secondary character apart from the ‘pesky kids’ and Scooby himself.

I loved that my Grandad always said if he arrived at a hotel and Jessica Fletcher from ‘Murder she wrote’ checked in at the same time, he’d turn around, get back in the car and drive to another hotel. I mean why would you risk it? Poor lady, everywhere she goes, there is a murder (maybe she orchestrated it, I mean she needed something to write, the woman had deadlines, didn’t she? just a thought). I digress.

So basically things need to be far simpler for me, think I’ll stick to reading ‘Peter and Jane go to the shops’. I think the type of people who read murder mysteries, crave the complexity of those books. Can we not make things complicated enough on our own?

I wonder, like the ghouls in Scooby Doo, are the answers to our problems hidden in plain sight?

The world has helped us to make everything simpler, we don’t have to use gears we have automatic cars, need food cooking quickly? There are microwaves. You don’t need to put a record on or a tape in or even a CD on anymore because, thanks to a man called Ian, we have the ‘ipod’. We have drive-through restaurants; in America you can go to a drive-through ATM for Pete’s sake, sometimes you don’t have to leave your car for anything. This is a world where we have machines that can exercise for us. Want to diet? You can get a diet plan and a shopping list printed for you, lest you have to utilise your poor little hand to write ‘a packet of Ryvita and a pot of cottage cheese’. Want to find love? you need never leave the house. We call for pizza or a chinese meal and it's delivered to the door. We can order books, films and clothes off the Internet. Hate fighting miserable kerfuffling people at Christmas time? That’s what the magic wonderful wonder web is for. The world has used all its power to make things simpler for us, so why are we still complicating every-little-thing?

When I have a problem my mind seems to clog up, if I could visualise it I think it would look similar to spaghetti with thick sauce. Confiding it to a friend and asking for advice seems to untangle it slightly; their 20/20-blurfree-problem-vision versus my complete-problem-induced-cataracts seems to start the unravelling process.

Why is it, then, that when we look at someone else’s problem the answer seems to slap us in the face? What I propose is that when I have a problem, someone should present my problem to me, as their own, and when I have offered a solution they should then say “you know what? (Slaps their head) Silly me, that wasn’t my problem atall, that was yours!” Problemo solved!

I also think the biggest boulder that prevents us from solving our own problems is us, we place soooo many obstacles in the way, when someone offers a solution how many of us say, “I can’t because…” how many of those obstacles are our perceptions? How many of those roadblocks do we place in the way? Hmmm?

Believe me I am not talking about this as if I haven’t got any problems of my own, it has taken a few years to realise that we put some of those obstacles in the way ourselves. If the solution seems simple sometimes we think… hmmm that is way too easy, there must be a more complicated way, surely. While scratching our heads we decide (holds hand triumphantly in air and envisages a large audience for this speech) "Come hell or high water, even if it takes my whole life, all my energy, a large team of volunteers, a well publicised facebook group, a charity organisation, heck, if I have to dedicate my entire being to it I will, yes will, make it my mission to make this way more complicated than is humanly necessary." (A loud cheer erupts in the auditorium)

Why make it more difficult for yourself? I am not asking you to evaluate your entire life and pick the easiest answer, crap job? Leave. Unhappy marriage? Divorce. Those are not the simple answers. What I am asking is that you don’t make it more complicated for yourself; see if any of those roadblocks are your own reinforced slabs of concrete.

I am certainly no psychologist, nor am I presuming all problems are simple. I am suggesting if they are not deeply ethical or world changing stop minding the ‘what ifs’ and seek the simpler route. If you have good friends you can trust, talk about it. Or go with the impartial route, if my friend came to me with the same problem what would I advise? We don’t need to make it more complicated than it is. I have spent years studying subjects where as an audience or reader we were made to search for sub-texts and hidden things, we had to look for symbolism and some suggestions, I fear, were pulled off the home page of tenuouslinks.com. My friend had an English teacher who said that the reason the lady was called ‘Mrs Haversham’ in Great Expectations was a play on ‘have a sham’ ummm… think you are searching much deeper than the author anticipated there, love. I once had to endure a Science Fiction class one semester at university (in my defence it was the best of a bad bunch). In it, the *ahem*, geeks, debated an entire lesson on the intricacies and subtext of ‘Bladerunner’ that’s right, I said ‘Bladerunner’ (kill me, kill me now) some of their theories were extremely questionable and well, let's face it, a little over my head. I do, however, remember wondering (whilst fighting my boredom induced coma) if that was indeed the author and filmmaker’s original convoluted intention.

When you are young your parents break everything down, take it step by step, word by word, they don’t present you with ‘War and Peace’ as your first book, no we have ‘At the Zoo’ and ‘The very hungry caterpillar’ (still bedside favourites of mine) Why make it complicated and difficult?
Granted, “well then you can’t come to my birthday party” isn’t an acceptable solution to friendship differences, and “I’m on their side, not yours” won’t hold much sway in a peace negotiation.
But do we really need to look for more complexity and make matters harder all the time? Why yes, I think we feel we need to. Sometimes I want to look at the world through a child’s eyes, appreciate things for what they are, accept some of the things I am told, question things yes and yearn to know more, but not get ahead of myself and not make things harder than they already are.

For some things a back-to-basics approach would be the more desirable route, that and a simple answer to a simple problem.

Who Am I?

“Who am I to tell you I'll always catch you when you fall?
Well I, I wouldn't be myself at all. I wouldn't be myself at all, at all”.
sang the great philosopher Will Young, pop idol 2002.

Who am I? We have all asked ourselves that very question at one time or another. Who do you say I am? I have many nicknames, Gussie Winkle (long story) Louisianna, Liesl, Loulabelle, LouLou, Neese (ok that from my almost two year old niece) Lou, Lola… the list goes on. I like these nicknames. I feel it reflects who I am to different people, I don’t morph into a different person with different friends (although that’d be a great superpower), but I think my friends see different sides to me.

Like most people, I have worried what others think of me, I still do sometimes, and then I catch myself and think “why do I care”? If they are not someone close to me why should I be bothered? (…“because they are people, people with eyes!”) I care most about what my friends and family think and their opinions do matter to me. I have enough good friends and an amazing family to challenge me if they feel I have done something wrong.

I dislike parties or meeting people for a couple of reasons… first, the dreaded question: What do you do? I used to make jobs up such as a diamond miner, or a sexer of oranges- cutting them in half to determine if they were male or female, someone who takes words we no longer use out of the dictionary (someone believed this and asked what words I had taken out lately, so I said ‘gullible’ he answered “really?”- walked into that one) I can now proudly say I am an English teacher, thankfully (wipes brow).
Second there is the “where are you from?” question. I always take a deep breath before I answer that one. I can’t say Germany because I am barely here, I am also not German nor am I fluent in the language (unless we are counting pigeon German) so I say it is difficult, I was a military child and have lived in sooo many places, it is difficult to pinpoint. Plus no one is ever content with just ‘England’ as an answer, ‘but whereabouts?’ Who are you, the ‘specific hometown answer regulator’, hmmm? Next time I should spill my drink on them, better still their drink and detract from the question, altogether (don’t say you weren’t warned).
I know why it is, we all want a common ground, and we want to be able to identify each other by that. I am like Jessica Rabbit; this is the way I was drawn. I am actually amazingly thankful for the fact I have moved around, I am not afraid of it (only the question about it).It also means I am hard to pin down. We are used to putting people in neat little categories and boxes, we don’t mean to, but we do. What if I don’t fit your box, who am I then?

I worry about where to say I am from, I don’t want to lie but find myself justifying it, I bluster answers like “ummm I live in Germany but I don’t speak the language (truth is I never speak to anyone) plus I shop in Holland and Dutch is, like, really hard.” Heck, I am tired of my own answers, my own justifications. I may make the name of a country up and then act offended when they don’t know where it is and shocked that they don’t know that English is their common language, whilst rolling my eyes. I now have visions of people googling it, or looking in an atlas for my fictitious country! (Cue evil plan laugh).

I was recently told that I looked German (by a Spanish teenager who didn't know I lived in Germany) then he concluded I may be Swedish (I suspect he had never seen anyone from either of these cultures or countries). My A-level English teacher once guessed I was either Norwegian or Irish, there is Celtic in there somewhere, it’s the fair skin and freckles. There is also a chance my family from Yorkshire originated from Vikings, but could have equally been from the Normans. My friend once introduced me as her friend from the Czech Republic (we met in Prague), I did have dark hair at the time- the girl leaned in and annunciating she asked “and –where- are- you -from?” to which I smiled and replied “Watford”. People often try and pin it down to where I was born. I was born near Manchester (and then spent 2 weeks there) although I spent lots of holidays there I don’t have a northern accent –but can mimic one if it helps. I lived for 9 years in the south of England but don’t feel as if it gave me any particular identity, I just joined the countless others who emigrated there.

I once was a part of a large church, I spent 5 years there and not just Sundays, it was my community, my social life, when I chose to ‘tear’ myself away I was left wondering who I was, I realised my identity was that tied up in it-scary but true. Since leaving almost three years ago, worry ye not. I know who I am now.

If we transcend the traditional methods of identification, what can we identify ourselves by? When I left that church I remember asking myself, who does God say I am?

My friend Isabel reminded me that first of all God says: “You are my daughter.”

This is an extract from 'the father's love letter', that I think answers the above question.

My Child, you may not know me, 
but I know everything about you. 
Psalm 139:1
I know when you sit down and when you rise up. 
Psalm 139:2
I am familiar with all your ways. 
Psalm 139:3
Even the very hairs on your head are numbered. 
Matthew 10:29-31
For you were made in my image. 
Genesis 1:27
In me you live and move and have your being. Acts 17:28
For you are my offspring. 
Acts 17:28
I knew you even before you were conceived. 
Jeremiah 1:4-5
I chose you when I planned creation. 
Ephesians 1:11-12
You were not a mistake, 
for all your days are written in my book. 
Psalm 139:15-16
I determined the exact time of your birth 
and where you would live. 
Acts 17:26
You are fearfully and wonderfully made. 
Psalm 139:14
I knit you together in your mother's womb. 
Psalm 139:13



So it is fair to say I am me and if God knows who I am, well then that is good for me.

Next time we're at a party together, ask me who I am at your own peril.

Scatterlike Navigation

I attempted to write a story this evening. I had a fiction square, for every roll of the dice you got a character, a conflict, a weather condition, a setting and an object. I rolled 6, 2, 3, 6 and 3 so this gave me: a checkout operator, inability to make a commitment, sunny, racecourse, a lost cat. In true Baldrick style I wrote,

It was a sunny day when Trudy, a checkout operator and a woman unable to commit to her boyfriend, Ian, went to a racecourse to look for her lost cat, Zuzu. She found her. Rejoicement. The End.© This is only copyrighted because I am in talks with Bloomsbury presently.

I do, however, need to be challenged more and really ought to stop using the fiction squares from the Cbeebies magazine.

Onto more pressing details. I wonder what most people got for Christmas, other than the obligatory toiletries and socks. I wonder what the most sought after present, after anything with ‘i’ at the beginning, was? Can we establish that it wasn’t itoiletries, isocks, ipyjamas or iperfume? I think for many people it was a device for satellite navigation, well I am making sweeping-like assumptions for the sake of this blog, I do know that my brother in law received one and that’s good enough for me.

So anyway, I don’t blame anyone for getting a satnav, as far as I am concerned it is invaluable, I have a Tomtom™ and think that it is wonderful, ok wonderful is a strong adjective, useful perhaps. I can read a map well, well a treasure map, that I drew myself, but I just choose not to, why plan when Tomtom™ will take you the long way round, probably past the destination twice and round the roundabouts a few extra times, where would the fun be? I feel it makes it easier if you choose a soft lilt-like accent for your tomtom™ that way when they tell you to turn left, you feel they are gently guiding you rather than ordering you as the harsh tones of the woman, my parents affectionately call ‘bossy Betty’, seem to do and, as an aside, who I also think says ‘roundabout’ like one of the Beatles (I do appear to be alone in this supposition though). In Galway I found my satnav's Irish voice, Sean (nicknamed Sexy Sean, by myself and Isabel) far more accommodating and friendly than many of the gracious, welcoming (read hostile) locals we encountered. We found his voice a sweet comfort on unfamiliar roads, the fact he didn’t have any idea where the little cottage we were staying in was, was by the by -he failed to recognise the postcode (Oh, Sean) He also lost signal a few times on bleak country roads, but that wasn’t his fault.

I have been a bit bad in the past, when it came to driving I used to get flustered and forget my left from my right. My driving instructor once took me to a housing estate, to practise driving him round the bend, and asked me at one point to turn right and park up. I turned left and parked up (perfectly, I hasten to add). We sat there, he marked something on his clipboard, (probably finished the doodle of a topless woman or whatever he had just fashioned on his paper). He turned to me and congratulated me on my exceptional turning skills (exaggeration added) and then said, nicely, “however [dramatic pause] I did ask you to turn right”. Dang it! It was going to be essential that I figure that one out. (I have now, so you know)

A year, or three, into having passed my test my parents visited me in Wimbledon, near where I lived at the time, and they wanted to get to a supermarket and, luckily for them they had me to act as their satnav (this was before tomtom's time). This was fine, except I hadn’t quite smoothed out the problem with lefty and righty. I didn’t actually drive round that area, so was only familiar with bus routes… and proceeded to drive my parents round the bus route, calling out at one point “left...nooo, the other left!”. Surprisingly my Dad, after gauging a rough idea of where to go, took over navigational duties.

So if they’d wanted Scatterlike navigation™ then I would have been perfect. I often feel my satnav has the same problem, every so often he malfunctions, usually on the motorway, and usually when I have a slight inkling of where I am going, thankfully. He often blurts out random things that could cause a few interesting accidents, not to mention hilarious insurance claims. Thankfully Sean and I have a relationship whereby he wilfully bosses me about and I wilfully ignore him. It is at these times that I laugh that the Spanish word for stupid is ‘tonto’ and said in Spanish sounds hauntingly like ‘Tomtom™’ satellite navigation naming committees were onto something when they came up with that gem. Should have gone with isatnav.

So my charming satnav has got me a few places, got me lost a few times and tempted me to turn left into a hedge by saying ‘turn’ left when he meant ‘bear’ left. He’s not perfect but then neither am I. I can get lost just fine on my own, thank you very much. I once drove up and down a road looking for a house that I missed because the gate with the house name on was open, thus hiding the front name plaque (that one had me crying with sheer frustration). Once an AA guide, printed off their site, had me turn the wrong way on the M40, resulting in me battling with London traffic and pointing politely to get a lorry driver to let me in his lane. That was fun for the first day in a new car driving to visit my sister, Lynsey.

But I couldn’t get through life without guidance, I am not completely tonto without it but we all need guidance. I had great guidance that has altered my life, namely my parental guidance. I almost gave up my degree and walked away because a jealous girl was making my life difficult, shall we say, but my Dad, who quit officer training 3 weeks before qualifying and regretted it, cautioned me to learn from his experience. So I did and now have a BA (Hons).

Anyone who is not religious may want to look away now… but in my experience I have the ultimate satellite navigator in the sky, God. He guides me in everything, through all my life I have felt that guidance and I continue to seek his voice, he, like Sean™, has a soft lilt, he does often has to repeat himself and I often wilfully ignore him and sometimes think I know the way better. He doesn’t chastise me for taking the wrong turn, just gently tells me how to get back on the right road. He knows the destination and how long it will take for me to get there, teaches me patience when I try and get there too quickly (thankfully not by a loud beep emitting out) and I can press the ‘help’ button at any time.

I particularly like the John Cleese voice on Tomtom™, at the end he blows his own trumpet and congratulates himself on having got you to your destination (it is your job, John) but is quick to point out that he won’t take your luggage in for you, well what did we expect for £99.99?

Inspired by it's a wonderful life

How many of us have ever contemplated the contribution we feel we do or don't make to the world. In the wonderful Christmas tale of George Bailey and Clarence the angel in 'It's a wonderful life' the viewer watches as George Bailey contemplates his contribution, and after losing $8000 from his business, he considers ending it all. Having been rescued from that attempt he then wishes he had never been born. At one time or another we may have all come to a place in our lives and either wished we could just end it all.... or wished we had never existed in the first place.

Recently I have been thinking about gifts. I read an article (that I cannot find right now) about honing the gifts we are given, many of us have read the parable of the talents and how people use their talents for the best and how one person buries his talent and achieves nothing. We all think about learning something new, sometimes instead of improving the talents we already have. I love to listen to people playing music, I have many musically talented friends. I know their talents took practice but I believe that they have been gifted to begin with. I listen and have sometimes envied them for their gift. I have other gifts and have decided to start focussing on those gifts and improving in them. I may still try and learn to cook better and be more creative, but I will also work on improving the things I know I can do and make those a priority.

Anyway, back to George Bailey and a little nod to the wonderful actor James Stewart who bought that character to life...
George is a wonderful man, he cared about his community so much, he, like all of us had dreams and aspirations but due to his father's death his life took a very different turn to the one he'd imagined for himself. He rose to those challenges, faced with a takeover from a powerful man, Henry Potter, who had monopolised George's hometown, Bedford Falls, he used his wedding money to help tide his customers over till a bank crisis had subsided. Years passed, and due to an childhood injury, he couldn't fight in the war (though he did his bit for the homefront) but his younger brother returned to the town a war hero. All these things took their emotional toll and his self confidence took a hit. George Bailey took in a subliminal message that he wasn't essential, that it wouldn't matter if he hadn't been born. He just could not see what his life had bought to others and it took for a wish to be granted, for him to have a glimpse into what would have happened had he not been born. Now I won't ruin the end if you haven't seen it, but would highly recommend it. On that subject I then found an article that I thought tied in perfectly, a wonderful extract from an an author called Stanley Kunitz.

"When you look back on a lifetime
and think of what has been given to
the world by your presence, your
fugitive presence, inevitably you think
of your art, whatever it may be, as
the gift you have made to the world in
acknowledgement of the gift you have
been given, which is the life itself.....
That work is not the expression of the
desire for praise or recognition, or
prizes, but the deepest manifestation
of your gratitude for the gift of life."


I would encourage you to think about your contribution to other people's lives, your contribution to the world. I don't want you to be downhearted or negative and reply 'nothing'. Think about your gifts, I cannot play the piano wonderfully like my friend Isabel, or cook like my friend Helen, I cannot run like my friend Louise but I can take great photographs and I can write a mean story. I want you to focus on what you can do and what you want to improve on in 2010. I also want you to consider the impact you have on others' lives, I have many friends who send me daily encouragement that maybe don't realise when I am feeling downhearted or discouraged.

I think you do far more than you realise.

New Year Rest-Solutions

This is my first blog (even though I have secretly had this blog for a fair few months now) ready to start the brand spanking new year. There is something so fresh about the new year, it is like a blank page, a blank canvas, the year is still unwritten. We all get pretty tired of resolutions, impossible ideals we set ourselves, and if we are honest, which I am going to safely assume we all are, then we will not be too scared to admit that we never keep our new year resolutions, apart from the resolution we will 'give up giving up' or the resolution to 'make no resolutions'. Those kind of resolutions may aswell be written on cling film for how clearly we see through them or how easily they fold in on themselves or break. Instead of making a resolution this year I want you to make a rest-solution... some kind of solution to rest a little, I am not saying become a lazy, good for nothing lay about, I mean put time aside and truly rest. Take the burden off those shoulders, release some of that stress, be anxious for nothing and slow down a little. Take some time to just 'be'.

As an English teacher I have had the fortunate position of being able to travel a little aswell as fund some extra curricular travel, friends of mine reading this will identify with not knowing where I am most of the time! As fun as this travel is and as exciting and interesting as it can be it can be a little unnerving not knowing where you are going to be, whether the place will have internet access, laundry facilities, a shop open past 2pm, running water etc... and this can cause some anxiety add to that, not knowing who you will work with, whether the students will speak more than three words of English or whether the contact teachers will supply coffee or bring in homemade cakes and you, my friend, have a recipe for stress. After working under these conditions for a few months it is fair to say I actually need a rest, I do have weekends free but they are spent travelling somewhere I can stay for cheap and somewhere that may have a laundry facility. I have decided to forego the magical mystery tour that is teaching English in Austria and opt for a rest, a rest from work travelling (workelling, if you will) a rest from eating copious amounts of ham, cheese and bread/ Schnitzel and a rest from the no vegetable ban that seems to have been imposed on most Austrian restaurants. I have decided to stay at home. This doesn't mean lounging around on the sofa for hours on end catching up on Coronation street (well only on a Saturday) or watching reruns on G.O.L.D. No sirree this is not an advocation of laziness, rather a 'stop and smell the roses' piece of advice.

Earlier this year mum and I visited New York, on a pilgrimage to the much visited Magnolia Bakery of Sex and the city fame, I trekked my poor mother up and down Bleeker street (mainly because I felt to turn right off a side street, to discover that had I turned left we were 5 minutes away) Mum, happily looking at the scenery was fine walking up the long street that is Bleeker, however she was not content to walk at my unnecessarily hasty pace, she urged me to slow the heck down and just enjoy it, look at the houses, observe. So I did and I realised all the interesting things I would have missed maintaining my blinkered 'must get to Magnolia lest their be a rush on cupcakes' pace.
Which made me think: how many of us race around, tunnel visioned, toward a certain goal? I urge you, no order you, to rest a little, slow down, smell the roses, the coffee, the cupcakes and just BE.

I am making rest-solutions. Are you?

May I suggest you take a tip from my cat, Lily (the Lilmeister), seen taking a rest from mouse chasing. (photo top right)