February 12, 2013 by judyfairbairns

Island Blog 29 – Elephants and Crossroads

Just before I meet a cross in the roads, I get what feels like indigestion. A friend of mine once called this state ‘The Churny Pits’, and it’s a pretty good description of the upsy-downsy state of my inner woman. Things I did up to this point seemed ok, if a little samey and ordinary, and I got on with them, in the main, with a positive attitude and a spring in my step, I waved my usual wave, bought my usual coffee at my usual place, arrived at my usual time, said the usual things, got on with my usual routine. But something is different. Each of these usual things feel empty – empty of life, as if I am acting out a role, one I have played for years and know off by heart.

For a while I ignore the unrest, gathering in the ‘usual’ closer to my chest, to keep it with me, for without it I might be nobody and, having been a nobody once before, I don’t plan on being one again. But it doesn’t work and soon those things that gave me my place in my own world, abandon me completely.

And then I stand at a crossroads I never asked for, never even considered was there in the first place. I can’t avoid it, not this time. It’s like finding a herd of elephants in the Fairy Woods, which, to be honest, has never even thrown up a fairy.

I know what all this means by now, although it has been no less uncomfortable in the gestation period, much like the onset of flu. This herd of elephants is here to tell me it is time to change direction, that Life has something in store for me, something up her sleeve and I can’t see it until I let go of the old and turn towards the new. It could be old thinking, old habits, old responses or it could be something bigger. The good news is that I won’t be asked for more than I can give, although my idea of what I am capable of is not necessarily all I am capable off, as has been clearly demonstrated to me more than once.

Sounds like a stretching opportunity cometh my way.

Again.

Well, I whine, from where I sit on the old couch in my old slippers with my usual cup of tea at the usual time……I would turn toward the new if someone would just show me where it is. I could waste weeks pounding up the wrong path, whether my boots were right for the task or not. Someone needs to tell me. I need hard facts, a good argument for this whole airy-fairy change thing. After all, how will the household bills be met, and what will the coffee vendor think and what will my children/husband/mother say?

Besides, I know nothing about this daft dream that’s been floating in my head for weeks now, months perhaps. What if it’s just a mini crisis, a temporary loss of balance, or even just indigestion?

Well, says Life to me, there is only one way to find out.

January 30, 2013 by judyfairbairns

Island Blog 22 – Colour me Purple

A young friend, half my age and still scampering through her life, arrived the other day with perfectly painted toenails, a crisp bright red and not a single mistake. I had to put my specs on to be sure. Not only was the polish perfect (she had painted them herself, whilst her children ate their coco-pops), but so were her toes. I looked down at my own unpainted, bent battered toes and had a little sigh to myself, but only a little one. I remembered carrying all those babies, those half hundredweight sacks of potatoes, and all that marching up and down the hill, all that stomping around in various stages of outraged indignation and I thanked my bent battered toes for their unquestioning loyalty to the rest of me. She, of the perfect toes, is careless with her youthful vitality, just as I was. I never thought, for one minute, I would cascade into a heap of wrinkles, because it just seemed impossible. It seemed so unlike me.

Well here I am, and it’s hilarious most of the time. What I have found, in these purple years, is the wonderful humour of women. More precious than any jewels, we are born with it and we can always access it when faced with challenges. We can rise, as we always have, to the occasion, joshing with each other, encouraging and teasing, propping each other up, accentuating the positive. Even when this ageing process brings us up short and sharp and sore, there is a woman near to hand to help us laugh at ourselves, in a gentle and sensitive way, because she knows exactly how we feel about our five stomachs and the cold in our bones, and our rheumatic fingers that used to play Rachmaninov and now have trouble peeling an orange.

Well I say this to all of you fabulous women.

Firstly, you really are fabulous, every single one of you, and younger women need to see us plucky old girls with a smile on our faces. It takes longer, I agree, to elevate the wrinkles, but it’s still possible, and, besides, we can smile with our eyes, our humour, our experience of life. Getting older is getting better, if we decide it is so, and what about this childlike sense of devil-may-care? That desire to jump on sandcastles and run a stick along someone’s railings, or pinch an apple from their tree. Where did that come from? I think it arrived when I turned 50 and I believe it to be the Great Consolation.

So, I’m going to make the very most of this delicious ageing process, and, when I am really old, which is a very long way off, I don’t want to be a sweet old lady. I want everyone to be saying……….oh glory, what IS she up to now?

Dance as though no-one is watching….

January 22, 2013 by judyfairbairns

Island Blog 15 – Red Wax, White Water

Last night, during dinner, I kicked over a long-stemmed candle holder sitting on the floor. It was, agreed, a daft place to leave it, down there on the ground, but the red candle sent pretty colours onto the white wall and, besides, nobody was expecting an idiot to walk into it. I must have been in purposeful forward motion, for the whole thing flew into the air and slammed against the wall.

White wall, red candle, you can imagine the mess.

Apart from feeling awful at the breakage of the glass holder (one of a set of 3), I was horrified at the red dots that seemed to cover most of the room. Perhaps I should take up football.

This morning I set too with a plastic spatula on my hands and knees, lifting each dot, some the size of a fifty pence, some pinheads and they were not just on the floor. The wall, the music speaker, the wooden chest; nothing escaped my powerful right kick. Now all is as it was, amazingly, apart from the speaker which, hopefully, doesn’t affect its performance…..and me. I still feel awful about it.

Why is that? You may ask.

I think it’s that I don’t like to make such mistakes, to break or damage someone else’s something-or-other. I think I should have learned by now to move slowly, be careful, THINK before I act or speak. Rooted deep in childhood are our responses to life as an adult. I know this, because I know this. The process of self-forgiveness, at any level, is one big task, at least, it is for me.

So I want to be what……perfect? As if all those years behind me make a solid and permanent change?

It’s not possible. But what is possible, is my response to making mistakes, and that, my friends, is one of my biggest challenges. Knowing that theory is one thing. Living it out, quite another.

This morning, coming in from the showy garden, having put red meat scraps out for the kites, (I missed the photo opportunity again!), I saw the white water stains on the wooden floor boards where I leave my boots. I know it’s me, for nobody else does this food-putting-out thing. My heart sank and I rushed to Google a cure. Mayonnaise, it seems is the answer. I am on it, or will be after I finish writing this.

Please don’t tell me that everything comes in threes…………