A year of firsts

Ben and I are currently experiencing a year of firsts. My lovely Dad passed away on May 31st 2019 and since that day we’ve had to cope with the first Father’s day, birthdays, Christmas and very soon first holiday without him. We’re now having to learn to enjoy all these celebrations without either Grandma or Grandad and I have to admit, its hard.

Grandma and Grandad may not be with us physically but they are most certainly not forgotten, wherever we go, whatever we do Ben is quick to remind me that we took Grandad here, or we went there with Grandma and Grandad. Even if we go somewhere new we think about how much they would have enjoyed it. This year is a year of fairly landmark celebrations, Dad would have been 90, Ben will be 30 in August and even I have a reasonably special birthday as I hit 65 in March.

To mark Grandad’s 90th birthday Ben and I are going away to a beautiful bungalow/cottage on Anglesey, we travel on March 21st which would have been his big day. I’m sure we’re going to have a wonderful time and we are looking forward to it but it brings a shadow of sadness as it will be the first holiday planned and undertaken on our own.

Our loved ones may no longer be with us in the real world but there is no doubt that they are still very much part of our daily lives. When you have been blessed to have loving parents, family and friends they remain very present in your hearts, memories, photographs, souvenirs all help to keep them alive and  valued.

Ben and I are so fortunate to have so many happy, beautiful memories of his Grandma and Grandad, their generosity, love, support and encouragement throughout the years, even in the midst of their personal battles with chronic ill health is forever imprinted on our hearts. We take them with us everywhere we go (not literally!) and we like to imagine them reunited and enjoying watching us now.

We miss them both desperately and sometimes the sadness can be overwhelming but we are so fortunate to have had them as our Mum, Dad,Grandma, Grandad.

Finding my get up and go

It’s been a long time since I’ve properly put pen to paper or indeed finger(s) to a keyboard. My good intentions and my plans to get myself back into the writing swing haven’t somehow managed to move from meaningless promises to actuality. However, today (note the date, 1/3/2020) I have actually succeeded in finding my blogspot page and far more noteworthy (see what I did there!) managed to find the correct password to allow me to access it. So far so good.

I do enjoy writing and not so many months (years) ago would happily sit down to a notebook with my fountain pen (biros just don’t cut it) or in front of my laptop but after the disappointment of my brief sojourn in the land of being a published author (not all publishers are good ones!) I found myself wordless, unmotivated, frustrated and more than a little sorry for myself. Instead of writing for the pleasure of playing with words I found myself stopping off in the little village called “What’s the point?) My get up and go as a lover of language had got up and gone.

Having been fortunate enough to benefit (just a small amount) from a PPI refund I splashed out on a super-duper mountain bike trike for my son Ben to help him exercise more and as of yesterday I became the proud (actually incredibly irritated and frustrated) owner of a new iPad Pro, Let  me just say technology is not high on my skill set list, I’m good at what I can do and I’m ok with things I’m used to but I’m really not good with new technology and updates. Many are the  battles I’ve  had with young, enthusiastic assistants in Curry’s PC World when I’ve wearily tried to tell them I don’t want the newest all singing and  dancing version because I’m happy with what I have, and can actually use! I’m proud and somewhat shocked that I now seem to have my tablet up and running, I have accessed my blog, I’ve got Word and a printer installed and my Bluetooth keyboard has connected and is working (thank you Gary Lacey!) the only possible blip on my so far cloudless horizon is that even with the help of the technologically savvy Gary Lacey we have been unable to break down the impregnable barrier that is installing Facebook. I have it on my phone so I’m trusting that when I attempt to post this on Facebook  it will work. (If it doesn’t there may well be a toddler standard temper tantrum happening in my vicinity.)

To cut a rather circuitous story short, I am hoping I have found my wandering get up and go. I will again do something that I enjoy and that helps me focus my mind (which has an alarming propensity for wandering off into the wilderness) I may be the only person who reads my ramblings but if any of you out there do decide to join me, thank you!

Now, fingers and toes crossed, here comes the save  and post bit, I hope to see you on the other side!

Dont miss the wood for the trees.

I'm sure you've all heard the saying "Don't miss the wood for the trees" and  I'm guessing I'm not the only who has been guilty of doing exactly that. It is so easy to do, and there are so many ways we can do it!

Sometimes it can be from a cup half empty perspective, we're so busy looking at the rain, moaning about what we haven't got, focussing on the negative aspects of our current situation, we fail to spot the glorious rainbow, the many things we do have, the fact that we do have a cup! Not to mention the fact that a cup can always be refilled!

At other times it can be our inability to see the beauty in the midst of our daily lives. Like walking over a pebbly beach grumbling about how difficult it is and failing to see the brilliant colours, shapes and sizes of those very pebbles. Our senses become blocked so that we don't recognise the joy of hearing a baby laugh, the smell of freshly baked bread or brewed coffee in the morning, the wonderful feeling of crisp, clean sheets when we fall into bed, or the smile on someone's face when they see us. 

We can allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by the dark mornings and dark nights of winter or we can be blessed by the stunningly beautiful sunrises and sunsets that accompany the season.

I'm not for one moment suggesting that life is always peachy, most of us will at some point in our lives go through periods of struggle, hardship, pain, loss, worry and fear but we can make a choice to see only the darkness or to see the light of a sunrise or sunset.

My son Ben achieves this by constantly worrying, talking, anticipating about what's next. no matter what we're doing, where we are he often misses out on the joy of the moment because he's so busy looking ahead. My only regret as Ben's mum is that when he was a baby and young child I was so worried about helping him meet milestones, making sure that I gave him every opportunity to develop the skills we take for granted in "ordinary" children that I often didn't allow myself time to simply enjoy him, love him, hold him close.

We need to make a conscious, intentional decision to seize the moment, stop and smell the roses, look up at the trees! Enjoy the little mundane things that form our daily lives because tomorrow isn't guaranteed.

I think I may be guilty of mixing several metaphors if not reinterpreting them altogether, and I've definitely meandered off the track, (got lost in the woods!) forgive me!  

  

I'll procrastinate...later

What can I say? If there were Olympic medals for procrastinating I'd have multiple gold medals. If there was an Oscar for "putting off" I'd have the lifetime's achievement award. Nobel prize for making excuses and delaying tactics? mine!

I am a master of "why do today what you can put off till tomorrow?" The more critical the task, the more I delay; its not that I'm unaware of the need to get it done, its not that I'm immune to stress, far from it, but it seems that I, for some reason, seem to function best when I'm up against a deadline, when the eleventh hour isn't simply approaching, we're talking two minutes and counting!

Only then do I seem to be able to focus, put aside all the distractions and excuses that stop me from simply getting on with it, and usually, ridiculously quickly find the task accomplished. Every time I emerge from another "by the skin of my teeth" moment I promise myself that next time I will do what ever needs doing as soon as it comes to my attention. I'll set a day (still not the same day) when I have a free day or a good amount of free time and write a note on my planner, on my calendar, in my diary, "Paperwork" appears regularly. In fact, today is one of those "paperwork" days, I've written it  in all the places mentioned, steeled myself to do it, and here I sit, writing a blog!   

It's a bit like sitting down to do a jigsaw, I've got all the pieces there in front of me, I just can't start because I can't find all the outside edges, and who does a jigsaw without doing the frame first? I may get a substantial amount of it joined together but I get stuck on looking for the last few missing bits instead of moving on, not wasting time, building slowly. I get frustrated, put it to one side, and give up.

The ridiculous thing is that my tendency to put things off doesn't help me, it just builds my stress, my anxiety, my worry up more and more so that I can't sleep at night because the task goes round and round in my head relentlessly, growing as the realisation of what the fall out will be if I don't get it done begins to fester.

I'm a numpty, first class, with honours! I know what I should do, I know that I should just do it (I hate the Nike advertisement!) but somehow I just can't seem to break this lifelong habit. I think I need an overseer; cracking the whip, badgering me, hectoring me, motivating me relentlessly and refusing to allow me to waste a second in fulfilling my task.

I still have my paperwork to do today, well actually my Dad's to be exact, I'm going to get it done...tomorrow! One thing I do know is that I'm more likely to succeed if I get up early and launch myself into my tasks, any delay seems to ignite my well developed procrastinatory skills (I'm not sure if that's a real word, but I think it should be!) Today, after a largely sleepless night (worrying about todays tasks) I woke up late, my umph duly fizzled and here I am writing a blog. Tonight I'm going to have an early night, a good read, as much sleep as I can manage and tomorrow morning I'm going to leap out of bed and launch into the dreaded paperwork. I'll let you now if I get it all done (but maybe next week!)

Note to friends, if you need me to do something for you it may be a good idea to give me a deadline, a very short deadline, then my dilly dally delaying muscles won't have time to flex.    

    

Can journaling be a ministry?

This is a photograph of the craft room in the apartment complex where my son, Ben and I live. We'd never used it until a couple of weeks ago when the lovely Sarah Anderson came over for our habitual holiday play date! In the past we've managed in our apartment but after a recent furniture shuffle and declutter we no longer have a suitably sized table or desk to  spread out all our crafty bits and bobs, especially the gelli plates and stamping paraphernalia. On an impulse I asked at the reception desk whether it was possible for me to use the craft room if it wasn't in use by a group or outside activity. Yes! So, Tuesday morning found the three of us able to spread out and enjoy this lovely bright room for our crafty/arty get together.

We left the door wide open so that anyone passing by could drop in to see what we were doing. After not too long an elderly lady popped her head in and asked me what we were doing, she's quite a lonely lady and doesn't chat to very many people, she rarely gets out so the days can be long and tedious at times. We invited her in and Sarah and I showed her the patterned papers we were making, I also showed her my Journaling Bible which I said she was free to look through. She did, for quite some time and was very interested in what we were doing. Ben was busy colouring in one of his (many) Christian Colouring Books, she spent some time watching him and then said "I can do colouring."

She went on her way and our pile of deli papers grew, half an hour later she returned, she handed me a ten pound note which she absolutely refused to take back and insisted I was to use it to by some things for our crafting. I asked her whether she'd be interested in a Christian colouring book like Ben's and she said she would, she couldn't do art or craft but she thought she could colour. A little later the lady who runs the events and activities in our complex came in, she too asked what we were doing, we explained that we were just getting together before the holidays finished but that we meet together as a bigger group once a month at the Salvation Army.

The result? We have been asked to run the group here instead, we can have the room free on the understanding that any residents who want to can drop in, join in, have a go, have a cup of tea or just have a chat. We assured her that they can take any art they create home with them and that they will be made welcome. The group will still be DEN and will still be advertised as Bible Journaling though in the poster I will explain that any art that they attempt can be used for different purposes.

As for our lovely friend who visited, I took up the Colouring the Psalms book and a box of new crayons, she was delighted and again said she could colour but couldn't do "art" I told her we were going to meet regularly and she's going to come along (she hoped it was every week!) and she's even said she might even have a little go at some of the activities if she's well enough. Her ten pounds has bought four packs of crayons and felt tips to start us off when we meet here in three weeks time.

Weekends can be very long, isolating and lonely for people who don't have family or friends to visit them or take them out. DEN can now still be the wonderful opportunity for us to share our faith and enjoy our journaling and love of the Word, but now it can be a witness and a ministry, reaching out and welcoming new people, a listening ear, a hand to hold, a cup of tea and a biscuit, and hopefully, gradually, an opportunity to pray for people. Please pray for our group as we test the waters, we're trialling this till Christmas, and we'll share photos and our thoughts as we go.                                                                                   

To list or not to list!

Lists, are you a lover or a hater? Are you a fully paid up member of the bullet point journal sisterhood with meticulously planned pages covering every aspect of your daily life, or are you at best a scribble on the back of an old envelope type of lister.

Do you start every day with a list of things to do; celebrating those days (do they ever happen?) when you can fall into bed having ticked every box or berating yourself roundly on those days when you seem to have more unchecked boxes left than you started with.

Are you one of those highly organised shoppers who has a list, takes it with them to the shop (rather than leaving it on the kitchen table) and actually buys everything on the list, and nothing extra? if you are kudos! I rarely write a list, if I do I even more rarely remember to take it with me, and if I've accomplished all of the above then the likelihood of my buying everything on the list and not buying a dozen unlisted items as well is virtually nill!

I've downloaded these sort of lists, bought the wire bound notebooks of these lists, designed my own beautiful lists, I've even filled them out, colour coding responses, laboriously drawing little boxes for my ticks, which never come!

I've even tried planning my day's to do lists using my iPad, my phone, my computer, with trusty note book beside it. the end result is the same, failure, abject frustrating failure.

Now don't get me wrong, I am not advocating launching into each day without any plans, without any idea about what you need/hope to achieve. I'm not saying don't make lists, indeed at my age the senior moments are leading me more and more to the need for lists, especially for doing things for others, remembering appointments. I've realised however, that my list making skills are more developed in the recording of events, achievements, and answers to prayer.

This is more my sort of journal, this comes from a list of the most unusual lists, I'm really not sure what the motivation is but I love the battered every day use appearance. It reminds me of Sarah Anderson's beautiful journal which is filled with incredible art work and recordings of special days and events.

There is no doubt that there is a place for list making, just look at the Bible with its lists of genealogies, laws, offerings and duties. There are definitely things which we need to remember, people, events, feelings, relationships.  My favourite lists are the ones we often see on Facebook, the attitude of gratitude sort of list, recording something, no matter how small or insignificant that has blessed us. I love looking back over prayer lists particularly noticing those prayer requests that have been answered.

So, I will continue to be a fully paid up member of the society of listers! My listing may be mainly retrospective and I may never become adept at writing lists as a way of organising myself but, I will take delight in revisiting my lists of blessings, memorable days with family and friends, memorable places I have visited, answers to prayer and words of encouragement.

I wonder, if you share lists online, are you a "BLister"?
    

Tradition

Tradition; this word always reminds me of that wonderful song from Fiddler on the Roof. Poor Tevye railing against the abandonment of tradition, clinging on to the old customs, battling new ideas, new ways of thinking, new ways of behaving. 

The picture of the wax crayons reminds me of a family tradition, a cardboard carton of new Crayola crayons (only 12 when I was little) coupled with a new colouring book and a magic paint book in our Christmas stockings. (I'm not quite old enough for the piece of coal and the satsuma!) the joy of opening the new box, smelling them, colouring carefully until they became blunt and we had to tear the paper to continue using them. They were the first crayons we used at school, pristine and pretty for the first few days but then gradually broken, tattered and much less appealing.

Painting  time, big chunky brushes, pots of bright red, yellow and blue paint, but only if you got to have the first turn! If your go was later on in the session you were left with three pots of indeterminate mucky brown colours. These were and I trust still are traditional rites of passage in reception classes up and down the country.

The glorious, traditional fountain pen (still my favourite writing implement) Another rite of passage in the final year of junior school, putting the pencil to one side and graduating to the school dip pen and browny red coloured ink. (Remind me to tell you a story about my deferred transition to writing in ink!) Blots and drips, scratchy nibs and the joy of blotting paper before finally receiving your first proper fountain pen, with cartridges if you were really posh! I think I had a new fountain pen every Christmas from the age of eleven till I left home to go to college.

The war horse which was the type writer; I remember passing by the Commercial Class (as it was called) and being stunned by the noise of the dozens of fingers stabbing away at the keys. I didn't do typing at school (or domestic science, but that's another story!) but I was allowed to use a typewriter at home, with a grandfather, father and mother who had been or were journalists there were several in the house. 

Our technology was very definitely not high tech, but very low techy techy! We couldn't print off several (hundred!) copies in an instant, though you could do two or three with sheets of copy paper which was blue, very flimsy and very mucky to handle.

Even with all the limitations there were some advantages. Advantages that I miss, once you'd written your pages be it on lined paper with a fountain pen or plain paper on a typewriter you couldn't lose the whole lot by an accidental slip of your pinkie brushing a seemingly innocent key. Transforming your hours of work into a blank screen leaving you broken and traumatised. (I'm speaking form personal experience)

I am I must confess a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to writing, a bit of a dinosaur. I accept the need for technological development and the advantages of laptops, tablets, iPads and the like. I even enjoy some of the benefits and the clever gadgets and gizmos that can improve the look of my writing but at heart I'm a cursive, pen on paper scribe.

When Ben and  I were visiting schools with our creative writing workshops I always told the children that they should take a pencil, biro and paper with them when they had to go to appointments or on car journeys, then, should the unimaginable happen, no wifi, a flat battery and no charger they would still have the means to entertain themselves  and keep themselves busy and amused; even if they only played noughts and crosses!

We cannot deny that we live in a rapidly changing world. Technology moves on and upgrades on a seemingly daily basis. We can't bury our heads in the sand, but neither should we throw the baby out with the bath water.  Churches too must balance the traditional with the fast changing way of 21st century life. As Christians we have to find a way to be still, to be quiet in the midst of perpetual electronic stimulation and constant availability.

There is a place for the trusty pen and paper, to be unplugged from all the demands and intrusions of modern technology, to give ourselves time to think.

What about a traditional family Sunday  from time to time,. listen to some music, sing round the piano, play board games, , paper and pencil games. We must move with the times, but like Tevye we must be ready to defend and fight for those traditions worth keeping.