Are YOU a poor old dear...?

A handsome guy called Eric served me at the service station yesterday.

Instead of getting out of my car to pump my own petrol (or gas as some of you call it), Eric came and did it for me.

He cleaned my car's windscreen and checked the oil. He even asked if I wanted the tyres checked.

It's a shame I only get to visit this garage every now and then given it's so far out of my way. It's so quaint and unique and offers that old fashioned customer service that disappeared from service stations decades ago.

Every time I've been there Eric has been working. And while I knew that he was much older than your average attendant, he finally told me yesterday that he was 97 (and 3/4) years old.

Nearly 98.

I was floored. 

He proudly said that he had been opening and closing the garage (which he owns) for 60 plus years. His only concession to his age is that he now goes home for lunch and has a power nap before he comes back to work.

He does this six days a week and he has no plans to quit or retire unless health forces him to do so.

While waiting, I heard him talking to another customer, a woman who looked to be in her 60s. When he wandered back to speak with me he referred to this lady as a "poor old dear".

Poor old dear.

He reminded me so much of my Nanna (grandmother Elizabeth). She was in her 90s and used to play cards once a week at a community centre. She would refer to some of the other ladies as "poor old dears" too. For a while there I thought there must be a lot of centenarians at her card games but when I finally met them I realised they were all a good 20-30 years younger than she was. She absolutely did not see herself as old. At all.

That may have had something to do with her attitude to life or due to the fact that her eyesight was so poor that she literally just never got to 'see' herself as old. (As an aside, she was given a cancer death sentence when she was in her early 40s. She did not listen to that either.).

When I got back home and checked my emails there was one from a PR agency reminding me that October 1 was the UN International Day of Older Persons. Never heard of it.

Reading about it made me wonder what an 'older person' is exactly? How old are you when you become 'an older person'?

Should 'old' be determined by a certain age? Because I know some 40 year olds who would not be able to keep up with Eric.

Given nearly every country across the World is grappling with an ageing population and people are being forced to retire later, perhaps we need to redefine who an 'older person' is.

Perhaps we need to reframe what older people are capable of doing. And are doing. Perhaps we need to see more people like Eric out there owning businesses and pumping petrol.

Personally, I think about ageing a lot even though retirement is more than a decade away. And for some reason it worries me. 

When I spoke to Eric about this he said, "I never worry. Every day is just another day. Whatever happens, roll with the punches. Worrying never did anyone any good."

Before my Dad passed away he said exactly the same thing. He told me that the best advice he would give anyone is to stop wasting time worrying because most of it never happens anyway.

Is there a pill you can take to cure that affliction or are some people just born 'chilled'?

I need to worry less and laugh more. And keep working forever at something or other if that's what it does for you.

As it happens I didn't have to wait long to laugh more because when I drove off from the garage, I could hear Eric yell out, "See you again OLD GIRL", followed by loud, raucous laughter.

I laughed out loud. What a bloody cheeky young man that Eric is....


So how old is an 'older person' these days?  Do you think of yourself as old?

Dear Pope Francis

 

I know you are a busy man without much time to spare but I am writing to alert you to the existence of a MIRACLE that you most definitely would not be aware of.

To expedite this matter, I have researched the miracle authentication process your organisation uses and I believe that this miracle will indeed stand up to your stringent processes.

It is without a doubt ‘mouth gapingly’ unbelievable.

I  first came across it while I was perusing the Daily Mail newspaper.

I know, please......, please hear me out.

I can understand that right about now you have an overwhelming desire to stop reading and throw this in your wastepaper basket.

Please don't.

I know this tabloid newspaper is a highly unusual and questionable source. However, I keep remembering what I learnt in Bible classes - God is everywhere and in everything. Could that also mean even possibly the Daily Mail?

Since my discovery I have been diligently carrying out my own authentication process. First, I asked a cross section of the public for their honest views about “my find”. And even though people initially took a quick look and then fobbed me off because of my so called “willingness to see the common in an uncommon way”, I persevered.

In order to ensure against any self deception, I then asked ten extremely vain people with a great deal of scientific and practical knowledge in this area, to repeatedly look at this miracle from all angles to see if they saw the same phenomenon I did. (Please note that being the professional I am I did not just rely on the impaired vision of my middleaged friends. I had the foresight to borrow my neighbour's magnifying glass to give this exercise the kind of accuracy and precision it warranted.)

I am delighted to report that every single person agreed with me. Without exception.

I have therefore come to the conclusion that what I see is definitely no illusion. It is indeed a miracle. A miracle that cannot be ascribed to the laws of nature or even human powers.  In this particular case, there has definitely been a supernatural intervention by a MIRACLE WORKER.

So, well ....  

The bottom line Frank is that once you look at this wonder I need the miracle worker’s name and contact details. Pronto.

I am not just asking for purely selfish reasons because hell, as we all know,  vanity is one of the seven deadly sins isn't it? I am actually asking for the benefit of all the millions of aging people across the world who look in the mirror every morning and want to know who that stranger is staring back at them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Here it is.

The Miracle unveiled.

 

 

Can you please tell me how Christie Brinkley looks like this at 60 years old? I am sure you will agree it is a Miracle. Problem is,  she ain’t sayin’ nothin’.

 

Kind Regards

Lilly

(PS. This letter is not designed to make fun of the Pope. He is an absolute breath of fresh air who would probably have a laugh too).

24 hours and 17 seconds

Plane window photos...can never get enough  of  Mother Nature....

Last Wednesday I went overseas for 24 hours and I have to tell you that I  thought I was pretty clever trying to fit everything into 86,400 seconds.

Well, that was my thinking until I landed anyway. 

And then the smugness was pretty much wiped off my face when I saw first hand how much Mother Nature can pack into 17 seconds.

As I left the Airport Arrivals Hall I was relieved to find there was one last cab on the rank.  The driver opened the door and in that unmistakable Kiwi accent, said, “Welcome to Christchurch love, where are you off to then?”

“Bealey Avenue", I said as I fastened my seat belt.

As we manoeuvred through the congested airport traffic, I looked for his ID on the dashboard. It's a habit I've gotten into since getting into an unauthorised cab in NYC once but that's a story for another time.

This cab driver's name was Hohepa. "It's a Maori version for the name Joseph" he later told me.  

He asked me what had bought me to Christchurch.  “Work, just work.” I said.

Of course what I didn't tell him was that I was also very curious about how the City was recovering from the big Earthquakes, the last one back in 2011.

As I looked out the window at the passing urban landscape it was not hard to see the impact that a 6.3 magnitude earthquake can have. The scars were still fresh. There were empty blocks of land where houses once proudly stood, intricate scaffolding holding up homes and kilometers of high wire fences displaying danger signs to keep nosey visitors out.

As we passed the shell of this Church, I asked Hohepa how everyone was doing two years on.

 

“We’re getting there”, he said, “but it's so ridiculously slow and frustrating. The CBD is like a ghost town. It is eerie. We have lost our heart and soul."

Hohepa told me that the CBD is fenced off and all the remaining buildings are  being slowly demolished. He said that this damage was nothing compared to the hundreds of uninhabitable homes to the east of the City which are on land which can never be built on again.

He looked at me in his rear vision mirror and said, “You know it only lasted 17 seconds don’t you? 17 horrific seconds.”

I asked him what he was doing when the quake hit and he told me that he was driving a passenger from the Airport and the car started rocking violently from side to side. 

"In seconds, the roads were ripped open with all this thick silty sludge seeping through", he said, shaking his head from side to side.  "Buildings had fallen on buses and cars and you could see bodies under the rubble. It was a war zone and the noise was unbelievable."

We travelled in silence for a couple of minutes and, not wanting to cause any distress, I changed the subject and asked about the unusually warm, balmy weather.

However, it seemed Hohepa was having none of that. He wanted to stay on topic and tell me about the darkest day of his life.

He told me that he waited in his car for what seemed like hours and eventually made it home. The house was so badly damaged he sat outside on the footpath waiting for his wife to come home.  She had texted him earlier in the day to say that she would be home around 6pm.

Six o’clock came, nothing. Seven o’clock came, nothing.

I started to move uncomfortably in my seat hoping like hell that he was going to say she made it home at 8 o’clock.

He didn’t, because she didn't.

She died in the CCTV building in the CBD along with over 100 other people.

As we circled the city centre, he pointed out the empty block of land where her office building once stood. And where she lost her life.

All gone, no sign of life or a building that once was

 

 “I am so sorry, I really am.” I said. Somehow, there were no right words. 

I wondered, perhaps out loud, how he managed to drive visitors around every day when questions about the earthquakes were never far from anyone's lips.  

He said he was used to it as his passengers talk about 'it'.  Even the locals. He told me about a conversation he had had with a passenger two weeks earlier. He picked up a guy from the Airport and, as expected, the conversation quickly turned to the earthquake and its aftermath. The passenger asked him if he knew anyone who died in the city building collapses. He said, yes he did and the passenger asked him their name. He gave him the name without revealing it was his wife. The passenger said, “Oh yes, she was the sixth last body I identified in that building”.

Confronting stuff.

Hohepa dropped me off at my Hotel and I wished him well. I really hoped our conversation had not caused him yet another restless night. 

Later that night, as I sat relaxing on a couch watching the news, I felt a slight rumble and the building move. I held my breath. I read that Christchurch has had more than 11,200 aftershocks since the earthquake 2 years ago. I am guessing that figure is now 11,201. 

The next day I got the chance to walk around the high wire fences surrounding the CBD. It is a shock. I tried to imagine what the city centre looked like when I visited 12 years ago - something like this picture below. I remember the iconic Cathedral in the heart of the city very well.

 

Now the CBD looks like one large demolition site. It is deserted apart from unstable buildings, rubble, large pieces of machinery and a myriad of workers in orange jackets and hard hats. 

And that iconic Cathedral? It's not so grand anymore without its steeple. 

Click on the image to make it larger

When disasters hit, we see the live images on TV, we feel for the people involved, we donate money to appeals and then we somehow... forget. One disaster is replaced by another. And Life goes on.

Except, of course, for those who still live with the destruction day in day out.

BUT, and its a BIG BEAUTIFUL BUT, against that grey dusty rubble stained backdrop the signposts of renewal are emerging too. 

There are brightly coloured pots with blooming flowers strategically placed along the edge of the wire framed CBD. They make you smile. And more incredibly, there is a temporary mall called RE:START at the edge of the city centre with 40 stores housed in old shipping containers (there is a picture of these containers in the previous mosaic photo stacked up outside a building). The containers have been painted bright colours and configured in architecturally interesting ways. So very, very clever.

It's hard to imagine these temporary buildings are made out of old shipping containers...clever!

And while it must be hard for locals to look for, let alone see any silver lining quite yet, I am sure that every visitor to the City clearly sees the sprouting seeds of hope. 

I am also sure that on those return taxi rides to the Airport the conversation is all about the fantastic progress being made. I certainly know that was the conversation I had with my taxi driver.

I just really, really hoped that the taxi driver I was having the conversation with had been Hohepa.

I salute you Christchurch and all that call you home. You are incredibly brave and resilient. Better days will return.

And next time, I will stay longer than one day. Time has no meaning after all unless we choose to give it significance.
 

Food for Thought

Every Friday, I walked past the trestle tables of bakery goods, drinks and a large pot of soup and didn't pay much attention.

It was all part of the scenery in the busy city Centre, which over time becomes a blur.

One day I noticed through the crowds of people milling around the tables, a tiny woman ladling soup into cups. You could barely see her over the extremely large pot of soup.

Who was she, I wondered.
I became very curious and I started to pay more attention when I would walk by, deliberately slowing down to catch sight of her. She was there every Friday and seemed very feisty and opinionated.

One day I decided to stop and speak to her.

I soon realised that if you hang round this lady for even a few seconds she will either put you to work or make you try her soup.

Stasia Dabrowski doesn’t think there is anything special about what she does. She is 84 years old and for the last 28 years she has been feeding the hungry and disadvantaged every Friday in the city centre.

She helped her son start the Soup Kitchen after he beat his heroin addiction and then after he went to Europe to live she just kept it going.

She gets up at 4am on Fridays to chop and peel 150kg of vegetables to make the “best soup in the world”. She uses a lot of her own money to do so.

“It’s just veges, veges, veges”, she said “because meat is poison. Go to Europe and you will find out, animals eat grass for their own energy and you eat what is left of it”.

This lady is one of life's characters.

Stasia was born in the southern mountains of Poland in 1926. During the occupation of Poland in WWII her family's lives were devastated — she lost everything and was driven into forced labour. After WWII she worked as a nurse and matron before moving to Australia with her husband and young family.

As her qualifications were not recognised in Australia she did voluntary house cleaning and emergency services for the Red Cross, looking after the bedridden and needy. She started cooking and providing essentials for the needy in the late 1970s, the start of the Soup Kitchen.

When I asked her why she does it, week after week, she said, “You don’t do it because you enjoy it, it’s because it’s your responsibility. You are doing what is right. Enjoyment is not enough”.

“People have forgotten their responsibility that’s why we have so many problems today,” she said gesturing around.

“They don’t understand, death, caring and compassion.

“You must love one another, help one another, never judging. If you know right from wrong, put it into practice.”

It’s simple, isn’t it?

Sometimes it’s worth opening your eyes to the lessons that are right there in front of you.

But like I did for years, so often we just walk on by.
Have a beautiful Wednesday everyone. And A BIG HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my baby sister Anne-Maree!

There's a time and a place

for everything ....



There are no two ways of looking at it. I had my big opportunity last week and I blew it.

After my recent disparaging comments about garage sales, my sister happened to ask me to take her to a huge second hand book sale last Friday. I felt like showing her my blog post but given she is visiting from another State, I couldn't really refuse.

She loves reading, was more than likely born with War & Peace in her hands and calculates that she has read at least 2,000 books.

Personally, I wanted to tell her that I think anything in excess, no matter if it broadens the mind or the behind, is a bad thing. I like books, don't get me wrong, but I'm a strictly no more than one in each hand at any one time kind of girl.
Besides, as I told you in another post, my parents sent me to speed readings classes at 11 (who knows why?) and ever since then I have been a little chaotic in my reading style - I read the ending first. Yes, yes, shake your head because it is indeed a cringe worthy thing.

Anyway, given she is an extremely lovely sister (one of three) who I share lots of deep and meaningful conversations with, I gladly went with her to the book sale(and it had nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that she promised to make me her ‘out of this world’ champagne and fruit cocktails).

Except, this was not just a book sale. Or even a huge book sale. This was a MEGA book sale.

When we walked through the doors I could tell by the look on her face that she thought she had died and gone to book heaven.


I sat and browsed the people while she browsed the books, one by one by one.........

Out of the corner of my eye I saw this elderly man with a long grey pony tail, cap, a leather vest, colourful tie, bright bag over his shoulder and blue jeans. Mmmm, I thought, he looks familiar. I just could not work out where I had seen him before.

So I watched him for a while.

Then, I got up and followed him around (yes, I was technically stalking but don't think badly of me). I tried not to be too obvious about it and kept a respectful distance.

Then it finally hit me. This man was just no random book lover. This was Richard Larter. My favourite Aussie artist of all time. How completely unexpected.

Now I felt like I had died and gone to heaven. I may have done a little dance of joy.

I have seen famous faces before but somehow this random sighting of my favourite artist at a second hand book sale was way more exciting. I had just recently seen his exhibition at the National Gallery and I had bought one of his art books (I cannot afford his paintings). And now here he was buying someone else’s book. Someone else’s second hand book.

I ran to find my sister to tell her. She didn't have a clue who I was talking about. She just shrugged and kept browsing.

I then knew I had to get a photo. For my blog if nothing else.

I felt like a member of the paparazzi and wondered if I should approach him or call out to him in the same way they do to the stars, Hey Richard, what designer are you wearing? Richard, who is the woman with you? Richard, have you had plastic surgery? Richard, who does your ponytail?
Oh no, I didn't have it in me to be that forward. I took the coward's way out.

I just followed him, pointed the camera, clicked, then ran and hoped he wouldn't notice the flash going off.

And what did I end up with? This priceless piece of artwork. A blur to end all blurs.

Well this is art ok, and beauty is in the eye of the beholder. If you happen to be one of those people who cannot see the artist in this picture then you clearly need to have your eyes tested.
I know who it is even if the rest of the world doesn't. The sad thing is the poor man had his hand up to his face as well. I later read on the Internet that he shuns any kind of media attention (and that includes no doubt some crazed woman stalking him with a camera at a second hand book sale). I mean he is 79 years old after all, has been painting all his life and he only became famous in the last 20 years.
My career as a paparazzi started and ended that day. Well, for obvious reasons.

But my love for his work burns bright. Next time Richard, next time!

Oh and have I told you that I now love second hand sales of any kind and description?

Simply because you just never know who you might get to stalk.

What about you, have you ever seen anyone you idolised and how did you handle it?



Top Image - varied artwork by Richard Larter.

True Love

An Australian by the name of John Rendall is about to release a new book (his first was published in 1972) about the time he and his friend Ace Bourke shared their lives with a lion called Christian.

John and Ace bought the lion cub from Harrods Department store in London in 1969 (in the days it sold exotic animals....and obviously before the animal rights movement was born). Christian's parents belonged to a zoo in England. While living with John and Ace he travelled by Bentley, ate in fine London restaurants and spent his days lounging in a furniture shop.

Christian was beautifully behaved but he grew from 35lbs to 185 lbs within a year. He was fast becoming a problem which was growing every day. It was clear he could not stay with his owners forever.

His future was decided by a chance encounter - when the actors Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna (remember they starred in Born Free?) walked into the shop to buy a pine desk. They immediately suggested that George Adamson, the African conservationist might be able to help. John and Ace took Christian to Africa in 1970 even though George had warned them that Christian may not be able to be rehabilitated back into the wild because of his lavish urban lifestyle.

John Rendall and Ace Bourke continued to make sporadic visits to Kenya, but mostly they followed Christian's adventures from afar. Finally, in 1974, George Adamson wrote to say that Christian's pride was self-sufficient. Christian was defending it. There was a litter of cubs. They were feeding themselves and they rarely returned to camp.

John and Ace decided to travel to Africa one last time, in the hope of being able to say goodbye, although Adamson warned them that it would almost certainly be a wasted mission.

Christian hadn't been near the camp for nine moths and George didn't know if he was alive or dead. John and Ace decided to make the trip anyway. Strangely, Christian turned up at the camp the night before they were due to arrive. That visit was to be their last and Christian has never been seen again.

The following is a video of John and Ace's reunion with Christian a year after they left him with George in Africa.



If you would like to read a 2007 press story about Christian click here or if you would like to see a recent interview (1.8.08) with John and Ace click here and here . A truly heartwarming story.

The Fringe Benefits of Failure

and the Importance of Imagination



I don't often get inspired by speeches but I was really taken in by the recent Commencement Address given by J.K. Rowling, author of the best-selling Harry Potter book series, to graduates of Harvard University. Rowling spoke about the fringe benefits of failure and the importance of imagination.

Rowling knows about both, having lived the proverbial rags to riches story. She was, at one point in her life, a single parent living on the breadline in the UK. Faced with a sense of personal failure, and the need to do something about her situation, she used her vivid imagination and her love of writing to pen her beloved Harry Potter books. The rest, as they say, is history.

Here is part of her speech and you can read or listen to the full speech here.

Ultimately, we all have to decide for ourselves what constitutes failure, but the world is quite eager to give you a set of criteria if you let it. So I think it fair to say that by any conventional measure, a mere seven years after my graduation day, I had failed on an epic scale. An exceptionally short-lived marriage had imploded, and I was jobless, a lone parent, and as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain, without being homeless. The fears my parents had had for me, and that I had had for myself, had both come to pass, and by every usual standard, I was the biggest failure I knew.

Now, I am not going to stand here and tell you that failure is fun. That period of my life was a dark one, and I had no idea that there was going to be what the press has since represented as a kind of fairy tale resolution. I had no idea how far the tunnel extended, and for a long time, any light at the end of it was a hope rather than a reality. So why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me. Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one arena I believed I truly belonged. I was set free, because my greatest fear had already been realised, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.

You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable. It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all - in which case, you fail by default. Failure gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations. Failure taught me things about myself that I could have learned no other way. I discovered that I had a strong will, and more discipline than I had suspected; I also found out that I had friends whose value was truly above rubies.

The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive. You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity. Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more to me than any qualification I ever earned.

Given a time machine or a Time Turner, I would tell my 21-year-old self that personal happiness lies in knowing that life is not a check-list of acquisition or achievement. Your qualifications, your CV, are not your life, though you will meet many people of my age and older who confuse the two. Life is difficult, and complicated, and beyond anyone’s total control, and the humility to know that will enable you to survive its vicissitudes.

You might think that I chose my second theme, the importance of imagination, because of the part it played in rebuilding my life, but that is not wholly so. Though I will defend the value of bedtime stories to my last gasp, I have learned to value imagination in a much broader sense. Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation. In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathise with humans whose experiences we have never shared.

If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice; if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless; if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped transform for the better. We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better. "

"And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life."
That sure is a powerful line to remember when riding the rollercoaster called LIFE!

Lessons

of the sisterly kind

Every weekend I visit my sister and help her with her housework and other errands because she has Parkinson's Disease and her energies are better spent doing more important things.

This is my sister's third major illness, all diagnosed before she was 45. It has filled me with a lot of guilt wondering why she has had to face all of this when the rest of us are all healthy (sisters and brother). It's a question she never asks though, no matter how tough it seems to get. Not out loud anyway.

She just puts everything in perspective somehow and takes what comes in her stride. She fights each set back in ernest. I often wish I had her strength and faith. I know that each of us has our own crosses to bear and none of us is immune to suffering but I wonder long and hard why really 'bad stuff' happens to good people. Why? Does anyone have the answer on that? Because I really would like to know.

Whenever I visit she is always so calm about everything. I am the total opposite. She always calms me down and teaches me something each and every time, without fail. I love her lessons and I get more out of my visits then I could possibly give in return.

Today the lessons were simple. Really love the people you love, keep your heart open, never harm anyone, stay away from anyone who sucks the life out of you, ditch the things that are just taking up space in your life and enjoy the ordinary pleasures that we always take for granted. Simply because you never know when you may not be able to do them anymore.

Today, on the first day of winter, we shared some time in the sunshine. We had a long talk about how we needed to bring back a few tried and true pleasures for her from the brink of extinction, just for the hell of it you understand.

Now possibly three hour martini lunches are never going to cut it particularly as she said she is already unsteady on her feet, but there are a few others we decided we are going to embrace a little more frequently.
1. Sleeping in
2. Foot Massages
3. Sitting in silence
4. Walking in the rain
5. Afternoon cocktails
6. Floating in the ocean
7. Reading in a hammock
8. Uncontrollable laughter
9. Music so loud to shake the walls, and
10. Dancing, of any kind no matter how stupid we may look

Thanks Meg. Somehow, even on the first day of winter, you make the sun shine brighter than ever.

UPDATE: The very talented Vikki, from Red Chair Gallery has given me another essential to add to the list. So here is No 11.
"At least once a week …Make a really fattening and delicious midnight snack with chocolate and ice cream and whipping cream and those little crunchy things and maybe some fruit...and...! Hmmmm!”

The Word from The Man

With the presence of Tibetan monks yesterday at the Olympic Torch relay, it got me thinking about the Dalai Lama, the fourteenth spiritual leader of the Tibetan people and his book The Art of Happiness. I thought I would reacquaint myself with its soothing messages which I have read and reread a lot over the years.

Now I've got to be honest, I didn't buy this book for any higher purpose such as delving into eastern philosophies. The real reason I bought the book was because I had a huge crush on Richard Gere for many years and, as everyone knows, the Dalai Lama and Rich are close....and that is where my thinking on the subject started and finished.

For those who want to know more about Tibet, its struggles with China and the Dalai Lama, watch this. Richard explains it so well.



Anyway, as it happens, I found the book full of good vibes and positive messages. His Holiness transcends cultural bias easily, which is perhaps what makes him such a powerful figure in our age.

This very eloquent man has some very simple answers to life's complex problems. And to be honest, if you are going to take advice from anyone then who better then a man decked out in bright orange robes and sandles.

So, while my crush on Richard eventually disappeared, my interest in the Dalai Lama, his books and his messages stayed strong. You don't have to be a Buddhist to appreciate his wisdom.

According to His Holiness "if you desire happiness you should seek the causes that give rise to it, and if you don't desire suffering, then what you should do is to ensure that the causes and conditions that give rise to it no longer arise."
Told you it was simple. In other words, life goes by too quickly so a wise soul should not walk in uncomfortable shoes. Basically we don't have to deny ourselves the more pleasurable of life's adventures. So, on that note, I am going for a ride in a hot air balloon on the weekend and have promised not to jump up and down...and turn happiness into suffering.

PS I just watched that video of Richard Gere (ok, maybe 3 times) and it appears that crush has come back again. The man has still got it going on........big time....

Little lumps of coal can be diamonds

Every morning, after I have my coffee and oats, I always do a quick check of the news online. Some days, like today, I find it all too overwhelming. I know we need to know what's going on. And I also know that we only get to hear the sanitised versions of everything, but it would be great if there was more 'good news' to share. Some days we need it.

Thank goodness, there is always one light on the horizon when it comes to getting my news fix - whether it be news of the good, bad or indifferent kind. It's a site I stumbled upon a couple of weeks ago - Current.com. I like it because the news is reported by the readers as well and it is incredibly diverse. You will read and see things on this site that you may not find elsewhere.

Also in my web travels this morning, I found two inspirational videos about a couple of guys, one from Australia and one from Wales, who got 'discovered' because of their incredible talents. One is an opera singer who sold phones for a living and the other is a shadow magician who was a photocopier repairman. I had tears in my eyes watching both of these. There is something humbling when you see ordinary folk doing something extraordinary, often in complete unawareness of their incredible talents.

The first is a video that 23 million people have seen (while I was obviously sleeping). It shows Paul Potts' first appearance on the UK talent show, You've Got Talent. Paul doesn't look like your average superstar. When he comes out on stage you can see, from the judges' expressions, that they weren't expecting much either. Particularly when he said he was going to sing opera. He then opened his mouth and the rest is history. I could watch this again and again......and cry. Regardless of whether you like opera or not, I don't think there would be a human being out there who would not be moved by this clip. I love this song - it truly gives me goosebumps and inspires me no end. Little lumps of coal can indeed turn into diamonds, never lose sight of that.



The second video is of Aussie, Raymond Crowe. He had a hobby of making shadows on the wall with his hands, also known as shadow puppetry. He was asked to go on some awards show and he improvised his puppetry to the music, What a Wonderful World. So very clever. This YouTube clip got the attention of the Ellen show and various other talk shows and the rest is history. What a Wonderful World indeed.



Have a great day everyone and let's remember that each of us has something special to offer and we should never judge anyone too quickly (well, before they open their mouths at least).

Cinderella stories do come true and frogs do turn into princes.....just ask Paul and Raymond.

Keep your dreams alive everyone, no matter how big or small they are!

Somewhere over the Rainbow

Today I was walking along near the lake thinking about a very special friend who is going through a very tough time. She lives many thousands of miles away and I was wondering what I could say to let her know how much I care.

Then I saw this beautiful rainbow appear to the right of the water fountain. It made me think of the song Somewhere over the Rainbow first made famous by Judy Garland.

Finally, I realised that sometimes there are no words we can offer to someone who is going through a difficult time. Sometimes, a song can say it far better than we ever could.

This song is for a very special young woman who means the world to me.

I love the late Eva Cassidy's version of this song. Listen to it with your eyes closed or while looking at the picture of our beautiful lake. I will guarantee your troubles will seem to melt away like lemon drops.....even for just a little while.



Somewhere over the rainbow

skies are blue

and the dreams

that you dare to dream

really do come true ...

Bits 'n' Pieces

Three different bits n pieces to share

1. I love Rick Mercer. Every so often he has a Photo Challenge where readers download a photo he posts and they turn it into something, um, special. Here is a photo he posted of Clinton and Obama and here are some people's creative efforts. In times like these you have got to laugh......as well as do the right thing...

2. I found the link to a video called Food Fight on the fabulous Roseanne Barr's website. It is very much in tune with my last post about Junk Food for our Minds. It is an abridged history of American-centric warfare, from WWII to present day, told through the foods of the countries in conflict. Very, very clever.

3. This video is one you may have already come across. It is of Randy Pausch, a university Professor, reprising the 'last lecture' he gave to his students. His 'last lecture' has had millions of hits on YouTube. Randy has pancreatic cancer and in September 07 was told he had six months to live. I love his statement that you can't control the cards you're dealt, just how you play the hands! I checked Randy's blog today and, despite being in and out of hospital, he continues to have fun each and every day.

What would your last lecture be? It's an interesting thought.

Mine would be simply this. Tell the truth.

Junk Food for our Minds

Yesterday I saw an article in a newspaper about a 19 year old Texas teenager who will become only the second female soldier since World War II to receive the Silver Star, the nation's third-highest medal for valor. She saved the lives of fellow soldiers after a roadside bomb tore through a convoy of trucks. After the explosion, which wounded five soldiers in her unit, she ran through insurgent gunfire and used her body to shield wounded comrades as mortars fell less than 100 yards away.

That's brave I thought before my eyes quickly glanced at the next headline about whether 26 year old Britney had split from her latest paparazzi boyfriend or how 48 year old Spitzer's downfall was creating a music career upswing for the call girl involved. All of it disposable news. All replaced by some other headlines in a few hours time. None of it I am sad to say meant a great deal to me. I feel numb to any news reports as though I am somehow removed from it all.

Late last night I thought some more about that young girl laying her body over wounded soldiers to protect them from gun fire. She is 19. That is heroic indeed. Not long finished high school. I thought about what I was doing when I was 19. The worst part of my day may have been that a finger nail broke, I had to study for a college exam or I didn't have a thing to wear out. Life was pretty carefree. This soldier is younger than my daughter.

Why do we become immune to the bad stuff? I know I have. Why aren't we marching in the streets given we know there was no valid reason to go to war and the world was lied to? A US military study has just officially acknowledged for the first time yesterday that Saddam Hussein had no direct ties to al-Qaida, undercutting the Bush administration's central case for war with Iraq. Why do we accept thousands of human beings with beating hearts just like ours are being used as cannon fodder, five years on? Are we just so over it all that familiarity breeds contempt?

I also just saw an email from a soldier in Iraq (although the internet has just been cut off so things can't be good there at the moment...),who cannot believe the range of food on offer in the camps. This is a war where soldiers get to eat Burger King, Pizza Hut and Kentucky Fried Chicken. Many soldiers gain more than 15 pounds on a deployment apparently. They are also seeing soldiers return from Iraq with higher cholesterol, mostly due to their eating habits. This is aside from any emotional issues they may have to deal with. How awfully civilised and well planned for the long haul it all seems. Seems like we are caring for them in every way we can. It is surreal. If the bullets don't kill them the junk food may. How disposable life is.

We live, to a large extent cocooned within our own worlds where all the hard facts are obscured, outsourced, offshored, prettied up or hidden away and locked down. Think about it. We fight all our wars over the horizon. We even tow our prisoners or even our refugees offshore. We outsource the care of our aged, frail and mentally ill. We do death and bereavement at a distance. We dispose of our waste where it's out of sight and hopefully out of mind. Then we get told what those in power want us to hear. And we believe it because we don't feel we have any options.

Then, when the truth is staring us in the face, we choose to make comfortable abstractions about all these tough facts of life, so they never really touch us. Well it's not ok to be comfortable and to rewrite history to help us sleep better at night. As my friend says, if you bury your head in the sand all others will see is an arse. We need to feel uncomfortable about what is going on around us. We need to clean up the junk we see, hear and taste.

This 19 year old teenager has really given me food for thought. Perhaps we all need to be just that much braver. It reminds me of a song I used to like in the 80s, I was only 19 by Aussie band Redgum. It's about the Vietnam War. No winners, ever.

What were you doing when you were 19? What are you going to do now?

Having a bad day? Read this.

This is one of those inspirational stories that immediately stops any nagging thoughts you might have about how tough it is to get older. Life doesn't have to stop or even slow down.

Buster Martin is Britain's oldest employee at 101. Yes, 101. Buster works three days a week at a plumbing company.

He retired when he was 99. However, after two years, he got bored so he went back to work. He also trains for marathons in his spare time. He has already successfully run a half marathon in five hours 13 minutes and now plans on running in the London Marathon on April 13. He doesn't know if he is going to be able to complete it but he is going to try.

Buster, the father of 17 children, used to be a former Army physical training instructor so you can assume he has always been fairly fit. He aims to celebrate the race with a pint of beer and a cigarette.

"If I finish, I'll do what I always do and have a pint and a fag," he told the BBC. "People ask what is my secret but I haven't got one. They say fags and booze are bad for you -- but I'm still here, aren't I?"

Note: OK off you go, the secret is obviously easy ......... have lots of children, run every day for a very long way, keep working, never retire and a have a pint and a fag every now and then.....easy! Or in simplified form, have a Purpose in your life and Move it.....good on you Buster....

Ideas..Inspiration..Imagination

Here is a fantastic website called Ted.com for those of you wanting something a bit different in your lives. Gotta love the internet!

TED stands for Technology, Entertainment and Design. It has been holding an annual conference since 1984 which brings together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes).

Take a look. There are 200 talks available, plus more are loaded every day.

What does your car say about you?

Well, after today, I am not so sure.

My mother, bought herself a bright red sporty looking car with a rear spoiler, mag wheels and the works. I went for a test drive and I was amazed to see the number of young males who turned their heads to admire her new set of wheels. I haven't had that kind of attention for a while ( ok, ok, a long, long while, if you must know). Even if they were only looking at the car.

I was shocked with her purchase to be honest. Simply because I couldn't imagine a woman of her more mature years buying a car like this. It just seemed so out of character.

After thinking about it some more, I think I have worked out why she bought this particular car.

Society often deems women, of a certain age, to be past it. It's as if, once the muu muu years hit, women should give up on life, stay home, take up knitting, bake cookies for the grand kids and basically just disappear into old age waiting for death to knock on their door. Look at Hillary Clinton after all. She's only 60 but apparently she's too old and has too many crows feet to take on the biggest job in the world (despite how geriatric some of the male candidates are).

According to the popular media, she is a woman first, of a certain age second, a wife third and an accomplished candidate fourth. Why is it we have certain tapes running through our head, perpetuated by the media, that tell us how we should compartmentalise people depending on their age, race and sex. It's wrong. We need to stop those tapes from playing, permanently.

Why do we assume people should act or even look a certain way when they are 20, 40, 60 or 80? How does one feel a number exactly? The answer is that of course you can't. We may look older but we don't necessarily feel any older.

Like Hillary, my Mum just didn't get the memo about what she should be doing at this time in her life except living it in the best way she knows how. That is, living life on her terms. My mother is certainly making a statement with this car. I think she is saying loud and clear that she is full of zest, energy, ambition, life, drive and bravery. And, better still, full of surprises.

In fact, the person she has always been despite the grey hair and the number on her last birthday cake!

Way to go Mum! I think its the perfect car for you, afterall.

On a side note, any women feeling depressed and down should hire a red sports car just for the weekend. I promise you it will do great things for your self confidence and morale! A fabulous investment wouldn't you say?

You really inspire me .........

Mildred Muhammad

Every so often you come across a person who stands out from the maddening crowd. Mildred is one such person.

Mildred is an advocate for eradicating violence against women. She started a foundation called After the Trauma Inc. after her own horrific abusive relationship. Not many people will know her by name but they will recognise her ex husband, the man who was dubbed by the press as The Washington DC Sniper. As often is the case behind the attention grabbing headlines, the real story goes untold. Not palatable nor fit for public consumption. But horrifically real and happening to many people across the world.

Mildred's personal story and her drive to do something to help others in domestic violence situations is inspirational indeed. Her book, Scared Silent, will be in bookstores in October 2009.

After the Trauma's purpose is to assist victims of domestic violence by providing them with the resources to make the transition from existing to living. And, because TRAUMA is a REAL factor for survivors and their children, counselling is also arranged. Sign up for the newsletter and help yourself or someone you know!

Mildred is there to give people a hand up to rebuild their lives. I know. I put my hands together for you Mildred. An inspiration for many people.

"The world can only be grasped by action, not by contemplations. The hand is the cutting edge of the mind."

Too small to have an impact?

If you think that you, as one person among billions, can't have an impact on improving the world we live in or helping the people around you, think about the wise words of Anita Roddick, founder of the Body Shop.

If you think you're too small to have an impact, try going to bed with a one tiny mosquito........