tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30093407489396738902024-03-13T19:27:14.990+00:00Spring to MindA humorous look at all things Spring.
A fresh take on the seasons and hues of urban life.Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.comBlogger62125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-41201602258781631402014-01-08T20:52:00.002+00:002014-01-08T20:52:43.762+00:00New Year, No Fear<div style="background-color: white; color: #444444; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; line-height: 21.299999237060547px;">
Sorry I have not been in touch (in 140 characters or other), for almost a year. Where does the time go?</div>
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I will answer that in my next post - promise!</div>
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But Christmas and New Year<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 22.719999313354492px;"> is always a poignant time. Amidst the hubbub and excitement, looking back on the year gone by, one contemplates the distances between friends and families and the absence of departed loved ones.</span></div>
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While it is a hackneyed old cliché, this year has flown by. I wish I had been more in touch in the past months, and hope to be in the ones ahead. I hope you have a wonderful and happy Christmas, full of joy and love and the promise of a peaceful and fulfilling year ahead.</div>
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This time of year Mr Springgirl invariably asks me what my resolutions are for the new year.</div>
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I invariably answer that I have none. I never want to disappoint anyone.</div>
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"Be a better person", "eat better", "be more patient". Who cares about such vague and unattainable aspirations> </div>
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I dare not tell him my true ideals. To sleep 8 hours a day, catch a daily fix of my favourites programmes, spend excellent quality time with my lovely friends and family and learn something new every day, while having my book published and my novel sold to a Hollywood studio...</div>
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So I tend to hold back.</div>
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But last year amidst the 5000 pieces of never to be completed jigsaw puzzle that arrived on Christmas day, feeling like an enormous failure (hate not finishing a jigsaw), I decided to shake things up. I resolved that I would try new things and seek out adventure in 2013. Looking back, in a small way I managed this. I started a new job, took up acting (they call me Puck in some circles), made friends with literally scores of new people (mostly estate agents but they are terribly nice young people all the same), and embarked on the acquisition of new skills - scooting (life-changing, efficient and freeing and very youthful), kayaking (admittedly I only tried it twice, over the summer, but more will follow if I can find a strap to hold my glasses on my head, means of keeping my head out of water and wetsuit that will complement my short hair-do) and driving (though this was not so much new, as dormant). </div>
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Now as 2013 has drawn to a close and I contemplate that question so deftly dodged last week, I turn to 2014 - now a week old!</div>
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Happily we will be moving house in the new year (needed more space for my scooter and acting awards). We will be closer to the kayak club too. Though the new sewerage pumping station will also be quite close, so perhaps dry ground rowing at the gym may have to suffice. The Off-Spring need more room to store their Harry Potter wands. And Mr Springgirl relishes the prospect of a refurbishment project around the corner from a tennis club. In sum, we are all delighted at the idea of each having a room of our own with no loud smoking neighbours banging around overhead, creaking the floor boards, throwing cigarettes on our window sills and slamming their front door.</div>
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So with these happy and exciting prospects before me, I resolve in the coming year to mix things up some more, while at the same time, slowing things down somewhat (n<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 22.719999313354492px;">ew slow cooker already taking up half my bench space in soon to be old kitchen).</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 22.719999313354492px;">So that's it - to be more, but do less. And to be thankful. And to walk in the country more. And take up bridge. And singing in a group (very good for one, they say). I also resolve to breathe deeper and laugh longer.</span></div>
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Tell me what your resolutions will be - I promise I won't hold you to them. Nothing worse than being reminded of something you once said...</div>
Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-57482771413890490192013-02-08T20:06:00.001+00:002013-02-08T20:06:09.839+00:00Drama, acting and performing<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the interests of mixing it up - as one does every now and then in order to make life more interesting, meet new people and to gain a fresh perspective - I've taken up acting. Or at least, I attend an acting class. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To be honest, there hasn't been much acting, to speak of, so far...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">However, I do know more about the art of acting than I did before I started. I've also learned a little about myself too. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But perhaps best of all, some of the learning has had application in my work as a coach. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In particular, I've been reminded that in class, as well as in coaching (and life), there's a distinction between <i>acting</i>, <i>drama</i> and <i>performance</i>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Let me explain.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;">In class we have been exploring the way we move. To do this, we have observed movement in others, we have experimented with expressing an idea without words, we have tried </span><span style="line-height: 17px;">out</span><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;"> different ways of walking and considered what movement does for our energy levels.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This week our task was to come to class prepared to act out a scene of our devising based on the movement we had observed of another person - a friend, stranger, someone on a bus. Anyone we had observed over the previous week.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #2a2a2a;">When the task was set, one of the group </span><span style="color: #2a2a2a; line-height: 12.75pt;">- a sort of Midsomer Murders character with some experience in amateur operatics -</span><span style="color: #2a2a2a; line-height: 12.75pt;"> was anxious that her act might be satirical and unkind to her subject. Frankly, I should have hoped so. The teacher - let's call him Ted - a little patronisingly, explained that without an
intention to ridicule, it would not be satirical or unmind. In the end, June, the anxious one, "did" her
overweight food loving friend cooking dinner and watching tv. Seven interminable minutes of tv watching. No satire at all. Ted gave her a huge clap.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;">Meanwhile, Rebekka, who really fancies herself as the next Marion or Charlize, and constantly dominates class
discussion with a series of sounds that are words but actually say nothing - though perhaps epitomising the learning task as well as any of us might - with "I think
that well, kind of, like, well, sort of, I mean, it did , rather, I mean , like
what I </span><span style="line-height: 17px;">should</span><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;"> say is that yes, well, it was quite nice and meaningful, if
you know what I mean..." did a woman on a train. She gets on. Sits
there. Gets off.<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We had another tv watching act - but with lots of facial expression and hand ringing.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Gordon, who thinks he's the next Ashton Kutcher, is the best of them. He could hold his own in any millieu in fact. He did an efficient and effective rendition of working through lunch in a miserable job.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We also had a beggar, a fat old lady in the shops
resting her legs and an old man waiting for a train.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">Finally, it was my turn. I was getting edgy after watching 9 of these
things. So I did a woman in a gym class who comes expecting yoga and ends
up doing high impact aerobics and nearly passes out from exhaustion. The woman is young and attractive but not as fit as she thinks she is. She is annoyingly attention seeking and likes to have the mirror to herself. Even so, she barely keeps up with the rest of the class. It was slightly facetious, but very "realistic". Believe me - I am expert in gym class personalities!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;">So we all did our acts. We all tried to be "truthful" (N.B. this means </span></span><i style="color: #2a2a2a; line-height: 12.75pt;">realistic </i><span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;">but in acting we don't say</span></span><i style="color: #2a2a2a; line-height: 12.75pt;"> </i><span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="line-height: 17px;"><i>realistic </i>(!)</span><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;">).</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At the end of the class, Ted dismissed us with our homework. He took a moment to point out that one or two of the acts strayed into "performances".<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Silly me! I used to think that acting <i>was</i> performing. Now, not so much...</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Clearly, he was referring to me. My act was a "performance" - ie - not a good thing. </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ironically, it was funny, enjoyable, "truthful", easy to relate to and understand.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ok. I admit it strayed into the area of parody. Possibly ridiculing the twenty somethings who think they own the gym but lack the stamina or grit to punch through the pain...</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But, despite its flaws, it had some flair and panache. Compared to watching paint dry, anyway. </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Well, a</span></span><span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">t least I </span><i style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">moved</i><span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">...</span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So what's the point?</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;">The point is that in working with coaching clients, coaches don't tend to tell the client they are "</span><span style="line-height: 17px;">performing</span><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;">". We don't say they are "dramatising" things. Even though sometimes we might think saying so </span><span style="line-height: 17px;">would</span><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;"> create a "</span><span style="line-height: 17px;">light-bulb</span><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;">" moment...</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;">But we do help them to find this out for themselves. </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span style="line-height: 12.75pt;">Equally, we appreciate, or should, that there is a reason the client is performing as they are, acting as they do. There is a reason why they play the roles they play. There is meaning in their dramas. And we let the client give us a role in that play. We aren't the director or the producer of their lives. We're mere players, facilitating the story telling, enabling the journey of the character.</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 17px;">Who said the world is a stage and we the players?</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 17px;">A truer word?</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So yes, sometimes we act. Sometimes we perform. Sometimes we bore. But as long as we "star" in our own dramas, who is to judge? And your drama isn't mine. For mine may be a tragi-comedic tale of a hero overcoming evil. Yours - a romantic drama full of pathos and yearning. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">In my acting class there is an incongruity. We beginners are being held to a standard. A standard that isn't written or spoken. Not even hinted at. None of us have been initiated into the secret expert world of acting, in which we would never be caught "<i>performing</i>". </span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">Thankfully, in life - the standards are more <i>realistic</i>. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">The key is merely to be truthful. For your drama may be your truth. Your melodrama may be your reality. Your boring monologue may be the essence of who you are.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">Just do this - in acting out your drama - give a <i>performance</i> that is engaging, communicative and entertaining. Don't worry about whether you're acting well, so much as whether you're taking </span><span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">part.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">Hold your head high when asked to </span><span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">walk around the room in different
ways. Be brash and brave when everyone else is self-conscious and fearful. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">Oh, and </span><span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">don't be deterred when after walking the boards</span><span style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 12.75pt;">, someone tells you not to do
"ministry of silly walks".</span></div>
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<br />Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-28149226497460568812013-01-30T19:31:00.001+00:002013-01-30T19:31:36.320+00:00Habits of a LifetimeAs a coach I work with clients to "manage change" and to "facilitate transitions".<br />
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In theory this is a great space to work in. After all, it's universally accepted that coping with change can be challenging. Yet, we live in volatile and fast moving times where the old ways of doing things often no longer obtain. It is increasingly important then that we develop skills for embracing and managing change in order to remain effective, productive and competitive. Adapt or be left behind. A good coach should be very happy operating in this millieu!</div>
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Paradoxically, we (and I don't mean only coaches) need change to be challenging.</div>
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Many people (my dear mother among them), say: "people don't change". After much thought, I think this is correct in most cases. Fundamentally, people don't really change. Nevertheless, people can change how they react, behave or feel about a goal, person or situation. In other words, while we stay basically the same person, we evolve and develop and sometimes, we<i> feel</i> transformed.</div>
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This is where a coach can help - in this journey towards new ways of seeing or doing things. Indeed, given our propensity to resist change, to stick with what we know or to take the safe route, coaching can be invaluable.</div>
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Indeed, today I had a realisation that despite my best intentions and excellent coaching skills, I may in fact be a difficult client to self-coach.</div>
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I was in a driving lesson when this dawned on me...</div>
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Yes - I know - driving lessons at my time of life!</div>
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The thing is that I have been driving for 20 years but for the past 13 I haven't driven often, apart from 4 months in 2009 when I was living in Australia.</div>
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So, I'm out of practice, a little nervous and unfortunately, not qualified to drive in the UK.</div>
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But I can drive. So the challenge is not that I have no ability or competence. The challenge is to change bad habits and re-learn the skills properly.</div>
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No big deal, right?</div>
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Well, let me just say that I have new found respect for teachers of adults. How do they stay calm and patient with students who think they know what they are doing? How do they not guffaw at the silly, unforced errors repeated over and over again? How do they not just lose it entirely with people who refuse to follow basic instructions?</div>
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At one point my instructor - South African thirty-something - told me:</div>
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"You have to listen," in a tone of carefully masked frustration. Hand on heart - no one has ever had to tell me to listen before! </div>
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The whole situation was ludicrous. I'm an experienced driver. I know the rules of the road. But I would have failed a driving test today. For a series of small mistakes - giving way when I could have gone through the junction, moving into the empty right lane without checking my right mirror, approaching a roundabout at 15 miles an hour, stopping over a white line at a red light, crossing my hands on the steering wheel. </div>
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It was very humbling. And I was reminded that changing how we do things, breaking a habit, is not easy. In confronting the fact that change is hard, one becomes disillusioned, disheartened; one wonders why one is bothering.</div>
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There was a moment this morning when with aching knee and ankle joint from all that slow speed gear changing, I suggested we end the lesson and have a coffee; perhaps refer me on an automatic vehicle instructor? ie give up.</div>
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I mean, it's not as though we have a car or need to drive anywhere, really. I don't need to have a licence. don't really miss driving. One can manage on foot or public transport. Plenty of people can't drive...</div>
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But my instructor - coach - talked me through it, as good coaches do. </div>
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"Don't be put off. Most new students feel some discomfort using muscles not usually used. It will get easier. You are doing well. Let's persevere."</div>
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"Ok," I said, compliantly. Mostly to save face. I wasn't completely convinced...</div>
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There came a powerful realisation. A few well chosen words of encouragement can go a long way. </div>
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So I punched through the pain barrier - like I do at the gym without ever complaining. I even saw the humour in the situation and was thus open to the idea that I was not giving of my best, but being defensive or resistant to letting the learning happen. I was so wrapped up in the fact that I could drive already that I wasn't open to the idea that I had some learning to do. </div>
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Thus, there came the next realisation. The instructor asked me (for the fourth time) if I noticed the car shuddering and could I tell him what I was doing that was causing that. I knew it had something to do with clutching and accelerating and pace and timing but I wasn't sure. Like when I have to reverse, I don't remember which way to turn the wheel (scary?).</div>
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So I said: "No. I don't know."</div>
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He said: "I've only told you three times."</div>
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I said: "I wasn't listening."</div>
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He said: "I know."</div>
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And there followed the third realisation. I can't learn to do something differently if I don't engage with the process openly and willingly. When the Offspring say they don't know after I have explained something to them, it's not because they're stupid or lack focus or have a poor attitude to their work. Rather, they are probably not interested enough to listen attentively. </div>
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And in admitting I was not listening, the ear muffs came off and I finally heard him!</div>
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Thought provoking stuff.</div>
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So - next time you find yourself resisting a change you think you have embraced, pause for a moment and ask yourself, what are you resisting? Are you truly ready, willing and able? Are you listening? Do you need some encouragement? </div>
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Or quite simply - is this a change you actually want to make?</div>
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Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-63159286878174185582013-01-17T21:16:00.000+00:002013-01-17T21:16:37.316+00:00Mixing it upThis week I decided to mix it up a bit.<br />
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After all, what is the use of coaching clients about managing transitions if one is not also prepared to embrace change? Let me just preface what follows by saying - I love routine. Love it. I love the tried and true methods that work well. I often tell people about how fantastic routine can be. I extol the virtues of boundaries.<br />
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Yet, I was not always such a person, was I? While never exactly intrepid, I was once a little adventurous, wasn't I?<br />
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Well, suffice to say, a breath of fresh air was long overdue so I conducted three experiments. By definition a cautious approach I dare say. But anyway...<br />
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First, I altered my fitness routine. I did the same circuit of exercises in the gym, but I changed the order in which I do them. I wanted to see how I would feel after and what impact the change would have on my workout. I expected to be muddled, do fewer exercises and barely break a sweat.<br />
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The surprising result was that I worked harder and finished sooner. I expended more energy in a more efficient way.<br />
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Secondly, I tried a different route on a walk I make every day. This change was forced upon me by an unforeseen hitch in the school run. But in the spirit of making the best of things and avoiding recriminations, I went with the challenge of taking a different route.The astonishing result was that the new route was quicker.<br />
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Thirdly, I enrolled in and began two new courses. One I had been considering for a while. The other was a crazy whim based on a long dormant, or perhaps suppressed, desire to stop "keeping my light under a bushel". At best, I thought I might gain ideas for my book, make a new contact or two and perhaps gather some new conversational gambits. In actual fact; I met new people, had loads of fresh ideas and most gratifyingly and satisfyingly, confirmed my long held suspicion that there is an Oscar in my future.<br />
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But perhaps best of all I unlocked a treasure trove of new creative energy.<br />
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Sorry? The Oscar? Oh, that old thing. We can discuss that some other time.<br />
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I want to focus on the other discoveries and benefits of making some small changes.<br />
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The fact is, after just four days, I feel quite transformed. While I've slept less than usual, I feel more energetic. I'm sleeping better and I've watched no tv. Well, perhaps I should say: I've watched very <i>little</i> tv.<br />
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Moreover, making some changes led to even more unexpected openness to change. Without a thought, I tried a different cafe for my morning coffee and ate a huge plate of waffles. Something I've not done in years. And no - I'm not getting in character for a role as a larger lady. I was mixing it up.<br />
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And today, while walking home I burst into song and managed to stay in tune through a wonderful rendition of "On My Own" from "Les Miserables" (until the Off-Spring shushed me most harshly - talk about repressive and rigid!).<br />
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I challenge you all to do something different tomorrow. Not something irrelevant like changing your toothpaste, though. Do something a little bit bold. Smile at a stranger. Eat lunch in a new place. Read a new book. Try a different newspaper. Take the stairs. Stop and chat instead of rushing past the acquaintance you usually avoid.<br />
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See what you notice.<br />
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Let me know what happens?Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-70275743668161383612013-01-15T18:10:00.001+00:002013-01-15T18:10:13.777+00:00A change is as good as a holidayIt's been some time since I posted here. Suffice to say I was doing other things. Clichéd as it sounds, the past 13 months flew by and while I seem to remember being occupied, unfortunately I feel a little cheated. Why? Because I have nothing<i> tangible</i> to show for all that time passing.<br />
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So what was I doing? I was busy with coaching and charity work up til mid July. The summer was quiet, filled with cricket with the Off-Spring, walks on beaches in Wales and lots of reading. Now, while the memories remain, I struggle to find tangible evidence that I contributed anything at all to the world. The final quarter of the year saw a change of gear and a focus on education - both that of the Off-Spring (number 1 is awaiting news of his secondary school place for this September), as well as other people's children with whom I work on communication skills, confidence and resilience. I hope some difference was made in that domain at least; time will tell.<br />
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On the "fun" side of things, I drank a lot of coffee, developed a keen interest in kettle bells, enjoyed some of London's finest museums. And became a little OCD about jigsaws...<br />
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But there remains a sense of dis-ease, that in spite of all that activity, I have very little to show for it (note to self: mount and frame current jigsaw when completed).<br />
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Consequently, over the Christmas and new year lull, I had ample opportunity to pause and reflect on achievement and contribution; productivity and engagement. These musings took place against the backdrop of my work as a coach.<br />
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...<br />
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At its heart, coaching is about managing change. Much of the time I work with clients to develop specific skills - often it will be communication skills; pitch and presentation work, interview technique, improving delegation processes and managing feedback. Sometimes we're focussed on time or stress management (or what I prefer to call - "wellbeing"), and sometimes the challenge we're managing is change itself - transitions at work, redundancy, retirement, starting a family or a business.<br />
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Sometimes a lot can be achieved quickly and without too much pain. A bit like losing weight quickly and easily when a more active way of life is embraced.<br />
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But what happens when the weather turns? When party season arrives or when the stress of the new job erodes the gains?<br />
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In order for real and lasting change to occur, there is usually a need to delve below the surface and explore the subtle and intricate issues that lurk there. Invariably in the corporate milieu, depending on who is buying the services, one tends to highlight the commercial benefits that the coaching brings about; the improved processes, the bids won, the greater levels of productivity, the enhanced satisfaction of the employees. One doesn't tend to highlight the breakthroughs made in understanding the subtleties and intricacies that underpin the issue.<br />
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At the end of the day though, without addressing those deeper issues, meaningful change is not sustainable. In other words, without understanding and addressing the "<a href="http://spring-to-mind.blogspot.co.uk/2010/05/circle-of-life.html">why</a>" and the "why not", that transcend the "how" and "what, there cannot be true transformation.<br />
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For example, why is it that Mr X cannot get his subordinates to step up - what prevents him from empowering his team? Why does Johnny struggle to sell himself in interviews? Why is Ms Y unable to quit smoking and lose weight?<br />
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None of Mr X, Ms Y or Johnny lack verbal or cognitive skills. And if they don't know what to do they can soon learn. Despite this, nothing changes.<br />
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The fact is that the issue is rarely what it purports to be. And it's almost never about ability. To use the weight loss example again - Ms Y knows how to walk and run. She knows the location of a gym and has friends that swear by Zumba. And yet...<br />
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The key to change is not skills and training. It is the alchemy that comes about where there is congruence between motivation, volition, energy and action.<br />
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So what does that have to do with achievement or productivity? Or my need to have something to show for all my efforts.<br />
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I have some ideas, but now that I have your attention I will save them for my next post...<br />
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<br />Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-46111775365551617962011-12-01T23:20:00.000+00:002011-12-01T23:20:06.789+00:00We're not in Kansas anymore...<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My apologies for such a long absence. My summer in Ghana culminated in a serious bout of food poisoning which saw me hospitalised due to dehydration and low blood pressure. In hindsight it was all a very relaxing blur - a detox, complete rest and being very well looked after by family. In another post I will share the virtues of developing-world hospitals, as well as some of the reasons why brown, taupe and dirty chartreuse are particularly well chosen colour schemes in locales where foreigners are prone to picking up stomach bugs. I will also regale you with the fantastic storylines that abound in daytime soap operas emanating from Ghana and Nigeria (initially sceptical, 48 hours in ward 3b and I was hooked!). </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Suffice to say, returning to Normal Life in London - school, work and routine - was not as difficult for me as it might have been, especially since I was so relaxed and slim. Alas, Normal Life takes a toll and I can no longer boast of such heights of relaxation or indeed such a svelte and tanned silhouette... Nevertheless, the past three months have raced by, full of school, work and routine. And the myriad highs and lows that accompany them; fatigue, homework, leaking pens, mean girls, new friends, horrible food... And that's just my set of problems. What must the off-Spring be going through? </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">With the Autumn has come global anxiety too: floods and devastation, the Eurozone crisis, challenging job markets, increasing prices. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Though it's not all terrible. The glut of good new tv shows is a silver lining this time of year (and the real reason for my long silence). I wish I could comment on things like X factors and dancing and celebrities in forests, but I can't. What could I possibly add? I do want to recognise though, the profile and publicity that celebrities lend to causes that are important to them, such as bullying. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I came across a very interesting <a href="http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/psychological-solution-bullying/201111/what-the-wizard-oz-can-teach-us-about-bullying">article</a> recently when researching bullying. I would recommend you read it if you or someone dear to you has faced bullying. Indeed read it in any case. As a parent, bullying looms large in the lexicon, if not the experience, of many. Yet, despite a theoretical understanding of the causes and myriad manifestations of bullying, there is nothing quite like the gut-wrenching, eye-watering sense of dis-empowerment and heartache that a parent feels when first learning that their child is a victim.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To be clear, I am not talking about playground tussles, squabbles over toys or friendly, mutual teasing. Anyone with a sibling is toughened up at home at the hands of brothers and sisters and prepared well for shenanigans such as these.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But sustained, systematic, mean and persistent victimisation is something altogether different. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The fact that such can occur in "nice" schools, under the noses of teachers who genuinely care, is staggering. At risk of sounding like someone's elderly mother, in <i>my</i> day (ie when I was a child) such things did not seem to go on to this extent, with this sort of frequency or in such a prolonged and damaging way. Perhaps one forgets. I will not stray into the world of cyber bullying for now. Even a cursory glance at comments left on some of the broadsheet's web pages would indicate that common courtesy in a scarcer commodity in the electronic world than face to face. While the language and abuse I witnessed in several discussion on a writer's forum I once logged on to were so vile, intimidating and aggressive as to leave me scared to post a comment at all, let alone defend the person or point of view that was being attacked.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But returning to schoolyard and classroom bullying, it seems to me that that as Izzy Kalman suggests in his article above, there is no actual "solution". There will always be bullies and anti-social behaviour. There will always be people who enjoy excluding and oppressing others. There will always be fear and suspicion of anyone different or who stands apart. There will always be naive and seemingly innocent jokes that cut to the quick. There will always be troubled children lacking in empathy and sensitivity, desperate to fit in, to be seen as powerful or cool or a force to be reckoned with.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Worrying, there will also always be "normal" children from "good" homes who bully others, who think it's "cool" to treat others badly; to ridicule or poke fun, to put someone else down and thereby make themselves feel better. And there will be adults who tacitly encourage such by their acts or their omissions. The pages of literature are strewn with heroes and heroines who faced far worse!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, yes, I agree, making it stop is neither a realistic nor an achievable goal.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But that is not to say one should give up.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Perhaps we can find ways of helping adults see how their behaviour, language and tone contribute to and condone bullying. Perhaps we can learn that in a pressure pot, steam must eventually escape. In other words, in hot-housing and pressuring, living through, and failing to listen to our children, we may be part, or a source, of the problem.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Sure, everyone can be mean or self-centred. We all have days when we don't want to share. There is always someone who is not really "our cup of tea", who we'd rather not have to play with. Who of us has not stood by and said or done nothing when someone nearby was being hurt, left out, teased or worse? This is the human condition, afterall.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But it also seems to be incumbent on us as humans, let alone as parents, to help and guide young people to find within themselves the courage, wisdom, heart and intelligence, not only to forgive, deal with, learn and grow, from bullying, but just as importantly, never to become a bully either.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">.... </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As an aside, when I was a child, back in<i> my </i>day, I watched the opening moments of "The Wizard of Oz". Captivated by all musicals made before 1970 (and "Enchanted") I was very keen to find out about the yellow brick road and to where it led. The psychologists amongst you can let me know what it means that I was terrified of the red shoes and those legs poking out from under the house. I fled in tears to my room, imploring my parents to "turn it down". Such was my fear that I never ever watched the film. Indeed, I would have to rank "Oz" as among my "top 5 scariest movies of all time" (along with Psycho, Nightmare on Elm Street and Dirty Dancing). Accordingly, until reading Mr Kalman's article last week I had no idea that "The Wizard of Oz" is at heart a simple tale about dealing with bullying. I did not realise the significance of the characters' quest. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Luckily, (despite what you may think of me, given my penchant for US TV shows) there are other sources of </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">information</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> and character formation at one's disposal... We don't need an Emerald City, a Wizard or a broomstick to guide us to the c</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">ourage, heart, wisdom and way home.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But I will be watching "Oz" asap!</span><br />
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</span>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-10077182659884585392011-08-22T23:24:00.002+01:002011-08-22T23:31:51.363+01:00Grass is greenerTen days ago, the Off-Spring and I fled the London Riots, travelling to join Mr Springgirl in Accra, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_of_Ghana">Ghana</a>. A typically warm and friendly welcome awaited us as we landed at 4am in a deserted airport and a silent city. For the first time in the 13 years I have been visiting Ghana, the streets were empty, traffic was light and not a single person approached the car to offer wares for sale. It was disconcerting to be out and about and not have the opportunity to buy ones staples - toilet paper, chocolate, razors, car mats, peanuts, batteries, belts or DVDs - from the comfort of the vehicle... Thankfully the respite was shortlived and the teeming hustle and bustle of an African city was soon to be ours to explore.<br />
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And so began a wonderful and relaxing vacation.<br />
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This trip has offered, as it never fails to do, a fresh perspective on modern life. Ghana is a democratic and modern nation, rich in natural resources such as cocoa, gold, fruit, oil and natural gas. And yet despite the plenty that abounds and which ensures that the famine of East Africa is at most only the remotest of possibilities here, there is abject poverty too. This creates for me - an Australian - a confronting conundrum. For I come from a nation rich in natural resources too. My home is also hot and dry and teeming with friendly and welcoming souls. Yet, the similarities stop there.<br />
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Smarter and better informed minds than mine will no doubt have answers to my questions and solutions to the problems. All I can do is paint a picture with my words and convey, I hope, a sense of the richness of culture, the depth of community and the spirit of hospitality and humour that transcends daily life.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-5ATpXolAing/TlLW4MmB5fI/AAAAAAAAADY/9D-mBO8cL-g/s1600/IMG_2713.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-5ATpXolAing/TlLW4MmB5fI/AAAAAAAAADY/9D-mBO8cL-g/s320/IMG_2713.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>Imagine a place where everyone who greets you does so with a smiling: "You are welcome". Imagine reading psalms and theological wisdom on the back windows of dusty 20 year old vans (tro-tros) packed full of people, luggage, supplies for market and livestock. Contemplate a high street choked with honking taxis and hawkers all roasting together under an equatorial sun burnished with the aroma of fried fish and boiling palm oil melded with the heady scents of diesel oil, raw sewerage and salt air. This is Accra.<br />
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Five minutes from the melee is a tranquil oasis of green and bougainvillea blossoms where behind high walls, lush lawns are tended and German cars are polished, satellite tv is watched and the latest in modern convenience and comfort is enjoyed. This is Accra.<br />
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Meanwhile, in a village less than 50 miles from here, we were welcomed by the incumbent King and his Queen Mother and court. The Chief in his palace accepted our visit, arranged by our friend his cousin and explained the role of the chief. He described the ceremonial as well as day to day meaning of his post. Negotiator and lobbyist, philanthropist and judge, arbiter and father to his people. It was poignant for us used to a diet of Grazia and Tatler, The Telegraph and Hello, to see real royalty at work. The Off-Spring were a little concerned at the absence of chandeliers in the palace - a simple house and courtyard set back from the street. But the King sat on a carved wooden throne, wearing special cloth and surrounded by his advisors - his linguists, his philosopher, his wife. The warmth of their welcome and their interest and delight in meeting the visitors from Australia and London was unforgettable. The value placed on family, ancestors and tradition is clear. So too, the ties with the land, the ceremonies and key events of life (naming events, engagements, funerals, memorials). While all around there seems a hustle and bustle, a clog of cars and a thronging of people, there is also order and structure, process and protocol, purpose and productivity.<br />
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Against this backdrop of unwritten rules and modes of conduct, expats (and I too, now) joke about "Ghana time". This means come late, stay long, take your time. But it also means - in good time, in God's time and in a word - "chill".<br />
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Leaving a city torn apart by looting and rampaging thieves and muggers - albeit only briefly and in disparate areas - to come here, is a journey filled with irony. For here, living on a few dollars a day, dollars made through hard and hot labour, thousands still smile and hope for more. Not rioting for trainers and TVs. yet who would blame them if they turned to violence to secure running water, a toilet or a pension, or to protest for basic healthcare, immunisations or electricity. Church, family, prayer and the belief that "By God's Grace" all is well, seems, miraculously, to be enough. Which is not to suggest a simplicity or lack of sophistication. Ghana is a safe haven in West Africa and as such a beacon, an example and a destination in its own right.<br />
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.....<br />
<br />
But how is this of interest to you? Perhaps it is not...<br />
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Perhaps as a mere travelogue? If so, I will continue.<br />
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Mr Springgirl. on our arrival, typically likes to take us for a drive with the windows down to help us acclimatise to the smells and the humidity. The senses are assaulted all day in a way that they rarely are elsewhere. From the rooster crowing and the wind in the leaves to the burnt out and obsolete mufflers roaring on the dusty and potholed roads beneath the roar of departing planes flying over the house, we are confronted by noise. Bats squeak in the mango trees. I awaken to the sounds of switch brooms at work and the gardener clearing his throat - with vigour. While English is the official language, hundreds of dialects are spoken proficiently and fluently. The language is musical but to me, unlearnable, with idiomatic expressions that leave me staggered. For example, at Christmas the locals in what sounds like five words proffer a wish "that the year will go out and come back to greet you".<br />
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And that is just the sense of hearing.<br />
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Visually the strong contrast between the red dust and the dark green of the trees and the steely blue grey of the ocean is dramatic. There are no rolling patchwork hills here, nor azure seas or cornflower skies. Yet the haze belies lush plantations of bananas and palms, seaside coconuts and hills of cocoa. And the local tie dyed fabrics and woven <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kente_cloth">kente</a> cloth offer the fullest of spectrum for the eye to savour. Choosing a table cloth can take all morning such is the choice of pattern and colour.<br />
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Meanwhile the olfactory sense is taking its own beating. Not one to miss a day's exercise I was keen this trip to take to the streets to maintain my fitness (such as it is) - the weather being milder and more permissive. However, even if I could manage the absence of pavement and the constant beeping of taxis alerting me to their presence in the strongest of terms (white lady should not be running around the streets like this - here take a ride), I could not endure any real distance in the humidity. Even in the cool weeks it takes one's breath away. The sweat literally pours off one if attempting outdoor exercise in daylight! And the smells? Well, given one's own sweat production levels (ditch the Dukan diet and come here to detox, I say) and the more than occasional pedestrian relieving himself roadside, the freely grazing sheep and goats, the oozing gutters and scant supply of rubbish bins, one is assured of a very rich and "ripe" running (let's be honest, strolling) experience.<br />
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But it's not always so. Picking a pathway across a nearby field, over a small stream in which goodness knows what flows to the Atlantic, to watch a local sharecropper tend his rocket and spring onions, I enjoyed a brief diversion. Under a tree off the track was a small soiree of locals enjoying their own crop - one they could smoke. The citronella lanterns and candles offer a sweet respite and the ripe mangoes, pineapples and bananas at the Fruit Lady's stall never smell this good in Tesco (or Waitrose!).<br />
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The senses of taste and touch also get a good going over in Ghana. Tantalising tropical fruit, seafood galore and tomato and nut based stews abound. Anything savoury - from beans to rice - is laced with pepper. Though the newly arrived KFC chain may provide an alternative for the western palate... As an aside, the eldest Off-Spring is convinced all the chicken shops (the only non-local form of "fast food" here) portray the chooks looking terrifically, and indeed, unnaturally, happy as they march to the counter to be eaten.<br />
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I should also note that my skin has never looked better. The humidity seems to remove all trace of wrinkles and fine lines (my Ghanaian mother-in-law looked younger at 70 then I did when I first got off that plane all those years ago to meet her). The tropical formula DEET (mozzy cream) is working wonders on my limbs - very moisturising. Indeed, who would bother bringing cosmetics here at all, given one is covered in repellent all day for fear of malaria, even with the daily dose of anti-malarial. The mosquitoes are prolific and bite anything not covered, despite screens, nets and sprays.<br />
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My only complaint would be the dearth of book stores. Hardly a problem in this era of e-books though, as I discovered to my delight - the new Andrea Camilleri Montalbano Mystery is waiting for me on this very laptop at a fraction of what I would pay in Waterstones! And it took me coming to Ghana to give up the so-coveted tactile experience of reading an "actual" book.<br />
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Speaking of which, I have made good headway on my new novel. There is something about holidays in Ghana, but one always finds the time and space to think here. Could be the large garden full of hammocks and balls entertaining the Off-Spring, the charming husband and staff tending to the chores (freeing one from all domestic responsibility), or maybe there is something in the (non-potable) water...<br />
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I swear this is the only place to holiday. If only one could provide sanitation, health care and a basic wage for the population by doing so...<br />
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Failing that you might enjoy some of what Ghana has to showcase...<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.trashybags.org/">Trashy Bags</a><br />
<a href="http://www.globalmamas.org/">Global Mamas</a><br />
<a href="http://www.touringghana.com/">http://www.touringghana.com/</a><br />
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Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-50133045567126160362011-07-07T18:15:00.001+01:002011-07-07T18:20:33.002+01:00Giving voice to the "Inner child"<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Earlier this year I published a novel - "The Inner Child Journal of a Neurotic Parent" - a hilarious antidote to self-help overload and a seminal work for women everywhere who struggle to keep up with the domestic goddesses at the school gate and the perfect parents at the princess parties. Thankfully, some objective readers have read and enjoyed the book now, so pushing it again seems to be a reasonable thing to do - loathe as I am to hide my light under a bushel. </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 150%;">The Inner Child Journal is an ideal holiday read. It will entertain and amuse, </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 19px;">enthral</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 150%;"> and delight. And live long in your memory afterwards. Here is an extract to whet your apetite:</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 150%;"> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"> </span></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 10pt; line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 150%;">This week my inner child has been feeling rather despondent. It’s my week to staff the Montessori Tuck Shop and I’m dreading having to go there tomorrow. The nutritional content of the foodstuffs sold is appalling. I decided last year after a bitter argument with the then president of the Parents’ Association – Jeff - to stop upsetting the applecart – pie cart in this case – and simply ban Gracie from buying anything apart from fruit at Tuck Shop. I then went silly and volunteered to work there every few weeks hoping to influence the children to buy the healthier offerings. I was overcompensating for being so critical and convinced myself it was in Gracie’s interests for me to meet new people, curry favour with the movers and shakers in the upper classes and get to know her playmates. It’s been disappointing in every respect. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 150%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 150%;">First, I’m rostered to work by myself – a frightful bore that leaves me run off my feet – and a punishment for speaking out, I suspect. Second, none of Gracie’s classmates have Tuck Shop, so just exactly who I think I’m cultivating is still unclear – fat kids with parents who can’t make sandwiches? Finally, try as I do, I can’t ignore the saturated fat, salt, preservatives and emulsifiers, not to mention E numbers and carcinogenic additive values in the meat pies, baked goods and hash-browns. The only almost health giving option is artificially coloured and flavoured pink milk. What sort of parent sends their children to school with money to buy this toxic rubbish? It’s worse than feeding them supermarket own brand pet food. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 150%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 150%;">Freddie calls it Duck Shop and George has a less kind work for it. I want out! George’s sister, Sophie, was actually the person who got me thinking about the ethics of school canteens. Living in the UK where school dinners have been “revolutionised” in the interests of improving the health of school children and reducing the incidence of childhood obesity, Sophie is an expert on school dinners. She’s an expert, per se, actually. Her children are anything but obese and she’s a health nut and a know-it-all, so I can take some of her remarks with a grain of salt, but even so, a salad sandwich or a tub of yoghurt wouldn’t go astray.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 150%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 150%;">I offered to swap my Tuesdays at Tuck Shop for Helen’s Thursdays in the library. Helen’s an earth mother. She gardens, grows her own fruit, herbs and veggies and embraces moderation in all things. Accordingly, she sees the merits of a little junk food from time to time. She’s expecting her fifth child and has an insatiable appetite for carbs at the moment. Since she can’t eat while on library duty, she’s very amenable to a swap with me. I love seeing at her at school and hearing her views. Time spent with Helen is a wonderfully refreshing experience. She’s outspoken, yet loveable. She’s brave and warm and emotional and getting to know her has been one of the highlights of Montessori. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 150%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 150%;">Helen was single-handedly responsible for affecting the anti car-bullying campaign last term. Three Year 2 girls (daughters of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">dentists</i>) were making life hard for some children who had joined the school mid-term. One family relocated from California and the mother rode to school on a scooter – a large green one. The girls teased the son of this woman venomously about his mother who “only had a scooter”. This was the tip of the iceberg. After all, Scooter Mom <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">was</i> leaving her children open to some comment with that sort of behaviour. The bigger problem was that a number of girls were picking on children whose parents drove small, older model cars from Japan or Korea. The mean girls didn’t actually know the brands of the cars, they just knew they were old and small and not very prestigious (no doubt hearing their mothers comment from the luxurious leather seats of their air-conditioned behemoths). The taunting and ridiculing transcended the car prejudices of course, with taunts directed also at girls with healthy appetites and shy boys, but it was the car taunting that opened the huge can of worms – far more serious than mere teasing about size and smell ever could - as it seemed to constitute an attack on the parents, as well as the child. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 150%;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">In response, Helen initiated a campaign to get more children walking, scooting or cycling to school. The opportunities to compare cars became few and far between as many parents jumped on the bandwagon in the hopes of being environmentally friendly – or being seen as such. Hey, I drive an SUV too, but I’m not a hypocrite. It’s a hybrid. I personally don’t think I need to green up my school run, even though I applaud Helen’s ingenuity in overcoming the bullying by driving forward an eco-friendly agenda. My own approach is to park a long way from school and walk in to collect Gracie, rather than drive up to the gate and wait there ostentatiously with my engine running and carbon emissions mounting up in my notional balance sheet of carbon crime. A number of parents now follow my example rather than face the car-bully backlash. I’m not sure what I think of all of this. I got swept up in the momentum, at the time, and supported Helen, but I think the girls in question are a product of their homes and it’s their parents and their attitudes that really ought to be chastised not the rest of us who drive German or Italian cars. There endeth the lesson.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Lucida Bright', serif; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Lucida Bright', serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 150%;"><br />
</span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rivetted?</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Go on - buy the book. Find out what happens! And h<iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=spring0f-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=1446600408&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe>ave a great holiday.</span></span></div>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-10250324851076207772011-06-16T22:40:00.000+01:002011-06-16T22:40:43.527+01:00Piggy in the middle<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The past few weeks have been very full. And yet compared to this time last year I feel as though I have been doing very little apart from chasing my tail and turning in circles. Last year I was engaged in enthralling conversations with myself about "voom" and motivation.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">This year - my PTA chairmanship has me contemplating lucky dips or face painting at the school fair.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">It's just not the same somehow.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Mindful of these altered preoccupations and ambitions, and the attendant alteration in my energy levels and sense of personal "voom", it is with a mixture of pride and resigned regret that I announce my stepping off the line and over it. </div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">What line? You ask.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Oh - just a notional line really, not a real line. More a metaphorical construct. The line dividing the young people from the middle aged.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">As those of you who stop by and read my musings would recall, I entered a new decade last year. Late last year. At that time I lamented the passing of youth. One feels one ought to doesn't one, even though one feels in most respects much as one did at 23 or 28, anyway, or maybe 34. One looks back over the years - the blur of time - and wonders where it all went and why the trip to Antarctica got overlooked, where that nice fellow from Law School is now and whether those girls from school who post their pictures on Facebook realise they look 40. But all the time, for several years in fact as the thirties trickled, or perhaps gushed, too quickly past, one was filled with incredulity. How can one be 40? In cosmic terms it is barely the blink of an eye - and yet in real terms one feels so young and vital. One feels as if one's whole life is before one. One wonders what on earth one has been doing with one's time.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">And then gradually the inner deeper recesses of the soul begin to make peace with and accept the reality - not that there is anything new to accept. There is just a slow and steady dawning of awareness. The denial subsides. One is no longer really young.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Despite a little too much conscious thought on the matter (most of which I attribute to a morbid preoccupation with mortality that has afflicted me for many years), the actual acceptance phase has come along quite quickly and calmly.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Indeed if this is like the stages of grief we hear about, then I am not sure that I really went through the anger or bargaining...</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Nevertheless, the acceptance phase has been a walk in the park - so far.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Shall I tell you what happened?</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Nothing cataclysmic mind you - this was a slow dawning - remember.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">1. I cut off a lot of hair and looked and felt younger even though I suspect I looked less attractive. The youthful carefree nature of the "do" trumped the need to look attractive.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">2. The youngest "Off-Spring" turned five and finally gave up his pushchair. He now scoots to school leaving me gasping and panting in his wake as I try valiantly to keep up with him and his brothers.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">3. In interviewing for jobs I found myself apologising for my age.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">4. The glossy weekly and monthly magazines one scans in the queue at the supermarket - and the online versions thereof have never been so appealing - everyone worth photographing is my age (apart from Wills and Kate).</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">5. My knees hurt.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">6. The charming and gregarious caretaker at the Off-Spring's school told me he that he guessed he and I were the same age. (I guessed, wrongly, that he was older than me!)</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">6. The idea of camping is no longer anathema to me.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">7. Yet, I love nothing more than being at home.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">8. I worry more about avoiding dementia than wrinkles.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">9. The mere mention of the word "club" (of the night variety, not the fitness or health sorts) gives me palpitations.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">10. I bought a wheel along shopping trolley thing to carry my stuff around in (a chic one!) despite the remonstrations of the Off-Spring before I bought it that I was never to buy one on the grounds that only old ladies use them.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The truth is that even though middle age is the new "second youth" and 40 is the new 30, it is called <i>middle</i> for a reason - and not the obvious and depressing one about the actual middle of one's life. </div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">No the middle I refer to is more about how one feels. Caught in the middle of friends and relationships. Interrupted in the middle of a conversation (all the bloody time). Between a rock and a hard place far too often. Too far along to turn back. Not far enough along to cruise. Far enough in to know what's going on. But also stopping, treading water and gasping for air now and then...</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">And according to at least one US newpaper full of photos of happy, botoxed, silver foxes, middle age lasts until well into the 60s. By the time we reach that milestone the names will have changed though.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">So in order to be ready for all of that, I am preplanning my knee and hip replacements, signing up for bridge and bowls now and spending a lot of my gym time on balance exercises. I am doing all I can to keep the synapses firing and the system working efficiently.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Don't worry - most of the time I still feel 23. Just a grumpy, tired, wise and a little haggard, 23.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Moreover, I don't mean to suggest that interesting conversations with oneself are not the domain of the mature. Quite the contrary. Rather, it is with the wisdom that comes with middle age that I realise that lucky dips are wasted on the young, and the enthralling conversations are only going to get better.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Or - to be blunt - chairing the PTA ages one terribly!</div>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-66948406093462803192011-05-24T22:12:00.000+01:002011-05-24T22:12:31.342+01:00Of maelstroms, tides and harvestsHere in the UK, volcanic ash once again disrupts air travel as the <a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/pictures-grimsvotn-volcano-erupts-in-iceland-20110523">Grimsvotn volcano in Iceland </a>erupts for the first time since 2004. The notion of an ash cloud slowly billowing across the planet at an invisibly high altitude wreaking havoc on air travel so far below and so far away is quite surreal; poetic almost. One does not wish to make light of natural disasters - of floods, tsunamis, landslides or tornadoes. Nor would volcanic eruptions seem poetic in Iceland now. But from a distance or from the perspective given from an arm chair in a safe, dry, sunny place far away, the workings of nature are breathtaking. Like the best music, art, or literature.<br />
<br />
Perhaps it's the metaphor that resonates most with me. Words describing nature at work best describe states of mind, emotional and interpersonal interactions; best conjure the image of what we mean or feel.<br />
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Floods of tears<br />
Depths of despair<br />
Heights of emotion<br />
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We stand on precipices and brinks, fall into abysses and jump off cliffs, we scale pinnacles, weather storms, overcome maelstroms, fight the tide, go with the flow, paddle upstream, tread water, have the wind at our back - all without leaving our offices or homes.<br />
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Some days seem like uphill battles. Or the quiet before the storm. Some days we feel as if we are caught in a rip and no one can hear our cries for help over the sound of the waves pounding on the shores of our lives.<br />
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And some days there is a life preserver right there if only we could see it through the salt and sand, the spray and even the volcanic ash in our eyes. On those days we feel our way to safe harbours, trust our instincts and somehow know where we can turn for the buoys we seek.<br />
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And on those days, despite the exhaustion and the heartache, when we sense or find the solace we need, the relief and the gratitude that follows is so deep, so palpable, so real, that it makes so much that we concern ourselves with seem small and trivial.<br />
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By and large, in its simplest terms, the road we hoe is essentially a solitary one. We surround ourselves with others, with noise and distraction, clutter, stuff, experiences. But basically, we're all just hoeing a bit of dirt, more or less alone. Sure, we're all out there seemingly together, tending our crops in one way or another, hopefully reaping what we have sown, or not, in some cases. Some of us have our noses down, some have our ear to the ground to hear what is coming. For some it is the zephyr that will herald the news we seek. For others the clouds. For we are all tending different crops. For some it's wheat, potatoes or rice - nourishment for many, for others sweet fruit and pretty flowers will bring joy and beauty. Still others will give their life to rare cacti or allow noxious weeds to take over their patch. And others will cultivate great forests and provide shelter and protection. And some will seem to reap it all.<br />
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And yet others will throw down their tools and wander off to some other man's field to steal some manure perhaps, to break a shovel or perhaps to help out after a drought.<br />
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There may be tough times out in those fields, but ultimately if we know what we are sowing, can the harvest be a surprise?<br />
<br />
.....<br />
<br />
The youngest Off-Spring once said - "Some days (walking) feels like just pushing the world back."<br />
<br />
At three, he was describing a physical sensation (I hope).<br />
<br />
But his simple metaphor was profound and memorable, for some days that is exactly how it feels.Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-20653289196344707052011-05-22T11:08:00.002+01:002011-05-22T21:39:54.249+01:00The Impossibility of FailureWe all have a recurring dream - or two or three - which no doubt represents a fear, a state of mind or a phase in our journeys. One of mine is that I am due to sit a final year law exam in something tricky like Restitution or Conflicts of Law. In the dream I am unprepared; chronically and desperately unprepared. The remarkable thing is that even with the semi-conscious awareness that the sleeping brain always has that this is a dire situation, my dreaming persona is never as panicked as my awake mind would expect. In my dreams I never feel the desperation that seems to be almost a necessity in cases of not being ready to go on, to step, to speak. It's as though a part of my sleeping mind knows it's only a dream and that in the end I will wake up and all will be alright. Perhaps my sleeping brain remembers that I passed that exam 18 years ago. And even rudimentary dream analysis would tell me that the dream is a way of processing a fear or anxiety about being unprepared for something important.<br />
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What is fascinating too, is the degree to which the unconscious mind believes it can overcome the hardship or the challenge in each case. In the dream I am committed to getting to that exam, to working, rushing, pushing on, striving to overcome the obstacles, never so deeply perturbed or worried that I give up. The dream usually ends before the exam is sat or the results handed out, but in those moments when one can cram, choose whether to attend the exam, consult the campus map or not (so as to find the right room), pack the pens, one does all of those things. Is this a reflection of a persevering personality or something else? Is it true of all of us - that we <i>dream</i> of possibilities, even if our <i>conscious</i> self would drop out of the race, give up, cry off? The dreaming self is so optimistic and confident, unsullied by all those gremlins and limiting self-beliefs that the awake self has to deal with.<br />
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Or is it that a some level we know it isn' real - that it is only a dream and no matter what happens we cannot fail?<br />
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Imagine living that way? Imagine believing you could never fail?<br />
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There are fleeting glimpses of this fearlessness in conscious life. Last night was the Off-Spring's school Dinner Dance and Auction fundraising event. Together with a wonderful committee of mothers, I and my co-chair arranged the event. Safe in the knowledge born from experience that the night could not be an unmitigated disaster but rather, some version of a success, I was quietly confident that it would all go well. I hoped we could match previous years' funds raised. If we could just create a nice atmosphere and a convivial evening of socialising and merriment, then we would have something to be proud of.<br />
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Well we did all of that. And we raised a lot of money - almost three times more than I hoped we might raise (pitching expectations low being a great source of gleeful surprise and smiling in so many things one does). The school now has an even lovelier fund on which to draw for various initiatives for the children as well as much needed building restoration work. We were blessed to have received 30 donated items that were both sought after and valuable. Strong interest, good ticket sales, delicious food, generous and supportive parents and an inspiring and dedicated staff and headteacher contributed to the rest. It was a great event. Every person who contributed to it in any way should feel proud to have been part of it's success.<br />
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Running a PTA is voluntary work, charitable giving, community work, if you like. Many of us do it or something like it at some point in our lives. But why? Some say that acts of giving make us happy. Some say that we do such things for recognition, or out of guilt or a sense of obligation. For some it is a way of giving back. For others it is to use skills that we might otherwise not have a chance to use during years of parenting or retirement or when we are not engaged in paid work. It may be to please someone, to impress or to persuade, to gain leverage or to buy good will, to learn something, or to teach something.<br />
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Whatever the reason, and there are a probably several in combination on any given day, we do it. Perhaps the why is not so important, in the final analysis, but it weighs on my mind, for there is the question as to whether to stay on for another year as Chair person. In order to decide, understanding my rationale or purpose is important - at least to me.<br />
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Part of that means one has to work out why failure on the part of some to acknowledge a success holds a sting. One has to know one's limits, one's priorities, one's values. One has to be candid and authentic about how best one can play a role and the potential conflicts that the roles one plays can create in one'e wider life and circle. One has to understand that whether one is motivated intrinsically or extrinsically, or perhaps both, one would not do it if one thought in terms of merely success and failure.<br />
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Which leads one to value perhaps the best part of any challenge; the overcoming of an obstacele and the learning that goes hand in hand - particularly about oneself, but also about others. And the knowledge that there really is no such thing as failure, just opportunities to learn, to grow, to give (and to take) and above all, to wear a pretty dress now and then!Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-14272474985329200372011-05-02T21:58:00.001+01:002011-05-02T23:06:11.304+01:00Ordinary PeopleI promised that my next post would cover the Royal Wedding. Rather than disappoint you, I will deliver on my promise.<br />
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Here in London the magic was palpable that day. For the first time in several days the air was clear and cool. There was a cloudy sky, the first in weeks that morning, and the high pollen count had abated somewhat. Consequently for the thousands who descended on central London to catch a glimpse of the wedding party the atmosphere was very British - very Wimbledon - very amenable.<br />
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For me, a hayfever sufferer, the day could not have been more pleasant. Watching the wedding from home and then the gym, enjoying the company of my neighbours at the Royal Wedding garden party, feeling united with my English brethren in a proud and historic celebration of love, community, majesty and family.<br />
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But in hindsight I think the truly amazing thing about the event - and indeed - perhaps the reason for my malaise over the next three days - was the almost story book quality of perfection around the occasion (not unlike my own wedding day...). Everything was just lovely.<br />
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For me, the fact that someone really quite ordinary snared the future king of England is though, one of the most profound aspects of this happy tale. And by "ordinary" I do not mean "common" as the British press and establishment love to call her. Nor do I mean to be disparaging - for <i>ordinary</i> is truly what most of us are.<br />
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No - the really wonderful thing is that unlike so many elements of monarchy, this wedding seemed charmingly democratic and accessible. Kate, by all accounts, is a sensible and poised woman. Unlike some pundits and posters who have comments to make about make-up and social climbing, her weight and her hair, I really can find nothing to criticise her for. Isn't she the sort of girl one would have been friends with? The sort of girl one would like one's daughter to be? A nice, ordinary, straight forward, committed, dedicated, sweet person?<br />
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Ok, so those qualities may not be entirely "ordinary", after all, but I can't help wishing and hoping that they were or could be.<br />
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But the magic lies in the fact that this young couple are so discreet and polite and measured. Unlike the B and C grade celebrities (and A as well, let's be honest) that festoon the headlines most weeks, there is no controversy, no tawdry gossip, no drugs or indiscretions.<br />
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While they may be royalty the very fact that she shops on the high streets and does her own make-up and that he plays a little bit of football in the public park on the eve of his wedding, makes this couple, this very famous duo, breathtakingly regular and indeed - ordinary. She has worn the same thing more than once for the cameras!<br />
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This is not to say that their lives are ordinary, by any means. Nor is it to suggest that any ordinary Joe or Jane could or would swap places with them and assume their roles with even an iota of the dignity and aplomb with which they seem to carry off every public appearance.<br />
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All I mean is that it is refreshing and a little bit magical to witness a commitment and love outside one's circle of <i>ordinary</i> people that is just so nice and normal (despite the guest list and the budget for the wedding, the helicopter pickup the next day and the titles...).<br />
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The other thing that is so lovely and fresh, in this age where everyone has a website, a blog, a point of view, and in which so many mediocre and extraordinarily damaged and strange people harbour a yearning for fame and fortune, notoriety or celebrity, is that this couple to date has really said very little.<br />
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So yes, less is more. Silence is golden.Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-12393931824437166332011-04-22T20:09:00.000+01:002011-04-22T20:09:59.812+01:00Easter's majestyIn case you were curious as to the sort of company you keep, my blog has 17 official followers. An average number of 15 "friends" on facebook read the facebook links to my blog each time I post one. My blog visitor counter stats say that between 35 and 45 people visit my blog most weeks - an average of 5-7 each day. That would lead me to think that around 30 people (in the world) read each of my posts. These people may differ, from post to post, of course.<br />
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Meanwhile about 78 people/organisations follow me on Twitter. I cannot seem to break through the 80 people milestone and stay there. I pass it every few days, only to find that a day later 2 or 3 followers have de-followed me. I wonder if this is a reflection on the quality of my tweets, my politics as reflected thereby or my failing to follow them back.<br />
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It's a fickle old world.<br />
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And if those amazing stats were not enough, did you know that an estimated1 billion people around the world will watch the coverage of the Royal Wedding next Friday (superbly timed as a morning event to allow for all the Anglophiles in the far flung reaches of the Commonwealth to tune in).<br />
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Of course, if I start tweeting about the Royal Wedding things may begin to look up for me...<br />
<br />
.....<br />
<br />
Instead, given today is Good Friday, I will post a few thoughts about this day.<br />
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Today is my favourite day of the year. Good Friday is a holiday here in England - from work anyway - if not shopping. The great thing about Good Friday - in most places I should think, is that the weather is good. None of the forced jollity under grey skies that is the English Christmas. Nor the stinking hot humidity of summer Christmases. April (or March) is generally mild and pleasant. But that is not why I love this holiday.<br />
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No the clincher is the reason for which we have this nice quiet long weekend - the weekend that never ends (especially when followed by the once in a generation treat of a Royal Wedding so soon after). Aside from the fact that I enjoy a holiday bereft of commercial pressure, I revel in the reminder of my humanity, the reminder that this weekend we remember that we are united in the pain and suffering of all people across the world and through the ages. Like Jesus, dying on the cross to complete his life on earth as a man, we all suffer. Today we remember the indignity, the shame, the humiliation, the self-sacrifice and the isolation that Jesus was subjected to, as a man. Most of us will face less than this, hopefully, in our lives. And yet, the fortitude and love with which Jesus faced this event, his passion and death, gives us all pause for thought - whether we believe in Him or not.<br />
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So I love this day. It is quiet, sombre, imbued with meaning. It helps me to be grateful for my good fortune. It helps me to pause and give thanks, to reflect on the suffering and hardship in the world around me. To contemplate those who suffer. To contemplate my own challenges and hardships with renewed courage and perspective.<br />
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And to look forward to a brighter day too and the triumph it will bring over evil, over pain and affliction.<br />
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.....<br />
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That was Easter Sunday by the way - not the Royal Wedding day...<br />
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However, on a brighter note, the Royal Wedding is certainly exciting us all here in London. Union Jacks adorn the pubs walls and windows of many proprietors. The news reports tragic events abroad, smog levels that are dangerously high in the city, and great April weather that is breaking all records. Best of all is the <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/royal-wedding/8462988/Searching-for-the-royal-wedding-what-the-world-wants-to-know-about-Prince-William-and-Kate-Middletons-wedding.html">wedding news</a> though.<br />
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I think my next post will analyse the event, if not from a pole position on the Mall or Whitehall (where I once worked) then from a community of pleasant Londoners sharing a Kensington garden square and throwing their own Royal Wedding Garden party next Friday.<br />
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Call me an opportunist if you like. I bet my blog's popularity surges!Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-29274759442716443422011-04-14T21:06:00.001+01:002011-04-14T21:07:26.206+01:00Holiday entertainment? It's child's play.<div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 115%;">Now that the holidays are upon us it is with joy and excitement that I read all the postings for parents about how to entertain the kids on vacation (since a book, a bike or the odd colouring session will not be enough).<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This reminded me of a chapter in <i><a href="http://www.troubador.co.uk/book_info.asp?bookid=877">Spring to Mind</a></i> in which I mused over the diversity and extent of kid-oriented activities and classes on offer these days. Rather than recast those thoughts here, I thought I would just extract them for you – whet your appetite as it were (mindful that sooner or later the whole book will be republished here for the 17 of you who bother to read this...).</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 115%;"><o:p><br />
</o:p></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">“...I guess the current generation of under 10s is more driven and scheduled than we ever were. I remember pestering Mrs Off-Spring until I was blue in the face to be allowed to do ballet. Every time she said “next year”, knowing I would outgrow the interest. No doubt also knowing it would not be one of my gifts. All those fat little girls in their tutus and slippers feeling so princessy and demure...</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And I wound up with three sons...<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Speaking of children’s activities, I had occasion to wonder again whether I am raising backward neophytes, heralding form the 1970s rather than the 2000’s. I overheard some mothers at the gym last week discussing their children’s schedules. I mean, who under 25, who is not at least a management consultant, even has a schedule. These children have judo and swimming, French and art, ballet and chess, Spanish and music and cycling proficiency, drama and gymnastics. One child of our acquaintance has such a full week on school days that he has to do his Italian, pilates, rugby, mandarin and science on the weekend, between mass, swimming, lunch and 23.5 minutes free play. Something will have to give when the homework really starts, not to mention the boy scouts, altar serving and volunteerism.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I was really fascinated by the cycle proficiency class. I think I borrowed a bike from a kid up the road and rode around the cul-de-sac over two Sundays and became proficient that way in those heady, sepia days in the seventies. I was 8 and clearly under achieving since I was not at Cantonese or Pottery at the time, but actually had Sundays available...<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Having said all of that, I am not scoffing at the desire to enrich and broaden and expose one’s offspring. Goodness, no. There are clearly a few holes in the market though, which is where I need to step in. Just imagine if we could enhance skills in negotiation, face-to-face communications, street smarts, rapping, tidying up, pocket money budgeting and for the younger ones, bottom wiping. There is no doubt demand for maximising the effectiveness of the tantrum - a session on style, another on timing and another where we really hone in on more sophisticated manipulation. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Maybe I could offer sibling packages and cover all the age groups as well as the nitty gritty of sibling rivalry. I could really make a difference in the holiday camp market place.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And for the mums? And dads! Well I need to be pretty strategic about catching the interest in that discerning sector, but couples classes could work, or coffee mornings with a twist, where we workshop some issues of concern. Maybe a series of classes, free latte included in the fees. Topics could include:<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">How to say “no” and mean it.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I know my child is average and that’s ok.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">How to dress you child for their body shape.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Restaurant voices.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Boundaries are cool.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm; margin-left: 36.0pt; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Play doesn’t have to be hard work.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I could have fridge magnets made with little thoughts printed on them, so that whenever the parents glance at the activities schedule for the term or the good behaviour star chart upon which they would magnetically reside, they would be reminded of something useful, such as “if it walks and talks like a child, it must be a child”.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 115%;">My one-time nanny, Helga, was a big fan of the star chart. She was struggling to get the boys to do as she wanted so we decided the chart might incentivise better behaviour. It really needed to go in a spreadsheet – there was so much detail. There were at least 10 categories for each child, based on their age (then just 2, 4 and 6) and abilities. And it was a bugger to administer. For example, walking home from nursery, rather than riding on the buggy board, warranted a star. Eating with </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;">implements</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 115%;"> was rewarded with a star. And "please" and "thank you"? Yes - a star. Half the hoped for actions were already mastered and long since acquired habits; the other half were not desirable from any one’s point of view; for example, chopping with Mummy’s scissors.<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">One day Helga took me aside to say that she was very concerned about Off-Spring Number 1’s maths skills? He was apparently unable – at age 5 - to do subtraction sums such as 15 takeaway 23 or 9 minus 17. I had to explain that the negative integers were possibly a little beyond the year ones just yet, maybe in second term. Fearful that we in the UK were backward and all of the ex-soviet Eastern European children are racing ahead (explains things like arms wars, if they can master the old trigonometry and trajectories early), I did explain that there are numbers less than zero and that they are useful for measuring things like temperatures. Also handy if you go under the sea and you want to work out your depth in relation to the surface of the water. He was able to then extrapolate the concept and suggest – “or like if someone is really naughty, they get a negative star on the chart”. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Maybe Helga is on to something after all. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The learning for me, is that the real world context really aids with knowledge retention and learning. To that end, I was telling the Off-Spring about a time when I was about 9 and a strip of purple flowered wall paper was ripped off the toilet wall and Mrs Off-Spring had to employ strong arm tactics to break us down and force a confession out of us; culminating in my brother confessing in order to get our TV privileges restored. </span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">This was by way of explaining the meaning of criminal investigation to the Off-Spring.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="ecmsonormal" style="background: white; line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="color: #444444; line-height: 115%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Anyway, the star chart was a little unwieldy. There were so many stars on that chart by the end of the first day that I started to fear that local stationery shops would be unable to keep up with demand. While well-intended, the chart was not capable of operating as an incentivisation programme at all. Maybe in communist regimes star charts operated differently. Certainly, the purpose behind Helga’s was never clear. It did excite them as they begged for more and more multicoloured stars though, every evening. I still find one or two in the washing machine every now and then. And I think Helga probably enjoyed ruling all the lines and writing in all the boxes and sitting as judge and jury all afternoon. Star charts are generally baffling I find. The year one class chart a few years ago may have confused me. Miss Finucane explained it well though – Off-Spring Number 1 had very few stars because he was a quiet student who was no trouble and got on with his work beautifully. It seems then that I have had it all wrong. Maybe I need one myself.”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p>.....</o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p><br />
</o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now it was a couple of years ago, that I wrote that..</span></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Things have changed in many ways since. For a start all of the Off-Spring developed cycle proficiency without lessons - in the old fashioned way - spurred on by each other and the neighbourhood children. I run classes for adults and children now. Communication and negotiation being just two skills we work on (listening and resilience and tolerance prove to be more urgent needs, actually). We have also abandoned star charts some time in the past two years in favour of a points system that allows for demerits as well as merits and which allows for the accumulation of points for behaviour going above and beyond the expected. It works very well. I am currently top of the leader board....</span></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Should anyone like further particulars do drop me a line. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Best of all, developing, designing and implementing points systems and having the kids describe and present arguments in favour of their preferred one, is a great source of holiday amusement and entertainment. So too is Scrabble, my own favourite, "Writeathon" (to raise money for your school. favourite charity or cause or mother), or just taking it easy for the first time since New Year (the joys of which we will explore in the next post).</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
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</span></o:p></div>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-52174811250022629562011-04-13T19:15:00.004+01:002011-04-13T19:25:08.648+01:00Love is in the air...<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They say in Spring that love is in the air. I haven't seen much of it this year, I have to say, but I suppose the hoopla and excitement surrounding the imminent Royal Wedding is so grand and all-encompassing as to be sufficient for all of us. Thankfully.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I read with interest a headline in a tabloid yesterday concerning a "new slimline Kate". I was not sure to whom the article referred at first. Kate was once Kate Winslett. Or God forbid, Katie Price. Say no more. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Imagine my surprise to discover that they were referring to none other than Kate Middleton. Seriously, was she ever anything but slim? Guess what - a "femail" journalist wrote the article and managed to find an 8 year old picture of Kate looking slightly more puffy in the face - ie glowing with teenage good health. A page was thus filled with pathetic drivel about brides and nerves and weightloss and slimness generally. Poor Kate. As if she did not have enough on her very royal and gilt-edged plate.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What could be worse than being compared for ever to the mother-in-law you never knew? Having your clothes, body and hair commented on for the rest of your life, I should imagine. Still, married to a prince, there may be some compensations. Well I should hope so.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Meanwhile the Telegraph, inspired by Wills' and Kate's example, extols the virtues of inviting some "exes" to your nuptials. How many exes can a couple of twenty somethings who met in college have? I ask. But I am a tad old fashioned, I grant you. Westminster Abbey is a bloody big church. I'd have found a few exes too if I had been tying the knot there with an unlimited budget and a public holiday for the nation as well. And let's not forget that the All Black Captain graciously declined an invite - being too busy winning world cups or some such macho nonsense...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The things is, they are a lovely young couple. They are lifting all our spirits. Kate's outfits are super. Who cares whether she has the style of Moss or the panache of Blanchett. One day she will be queen and clothes will not be her only claim to fame.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mind you, my dear friend Mara, in Australia, has asked for as much Royal Wedding Memorabilia as I can get my hands on. Tea towels especially. Goodness, where does one shop for that sort of thing. The online business ideas are almost overwhelming... I have visions of myself queuing alongside various women of a certain age in Home Counties towns. And those coffee/tea cups that are too hot to hold, and some of those layered cake plates. No doubt a very big hit at the next charity morning tea in suburban Brisbane.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Despite the general excitement - street parties (or in our case a garden party, with scones, tea cake, sandwiches and bunting) and lining the route of royal carriages aside - I have to admit that explaining the idea of a monarchy to the Off-Spring was not easy. The idea that nice, normal people more or less like us, are <i>born</i> into the role of king, or queen, was not easy to justify. It was particularly difficult to explain why Prince Philip is not a King. The relevant rules reflecting an attitude so antiquated and sexist as to be almost anachronistic in today's society - or so I tell myself, until I read that outfits, weight and hair styles trump intellect, ideas and gravitas, anyway, as far as women are concerned. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And yet, I read that Bridget Jones and Carrie Bradshaw have no place in the lives of twenty somethings, whose ambitions run to <i>intellectual</i> self-improvement, rather than securing husbands. Elsewhere that same group classes parenting as more important than the relationship they might have with a romantic partner. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Isn't slimline Kate in that group?</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's very confusing. I can think of many women over 35 who share these views, to a person, and yet... </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So I can only think that it's all posturing, no?</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Love is a timeless commodity. We'll take what we can get, within reason. But, we'll fight for a career as well. Til biology gets in the way and the good old employer can't manage the whole part-time equation...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At the end of the day, people are people. This generation will have different challenges and opportunities from those that came before, but at a fundamental level, we are still the same - keen to hear about happy endings, hoping for the best, wondering "what if", dreaming and aspiring, and in the Spring - overjoyed to know that for some - Love is in the air.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And that is just as well, for the pollen count is high. </span><br />
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</span>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-7444945491444078092011-04-10T15:56:00.001+01:002011-04-10T19:13:00.231+01:00Well BeingsThere was a time when one would pick up a newspaper or magazine and be inundated with stories, gossip and news about celebrities and diets, romance and shoes. These topics are still of great moment, of course, but they are buried now. Not in the women's glossies, I grant you. After all, that stuff sells. It's timeless, riveting and very important. But, in the mainstream press the trend has shifted subtly in these recession and budget cutting days to focus less on the acquisition of stuff, luxury holidays and the wanton consumption and disposal of more, towards other issues; war, tsunamis and economic strife. And on the ubiquitous "Lifestyle" pages, the emphasis is shifting from diets to domesticity, from hedonism to happiness, from making more money to making more out of less.<br />
<br />
There is even a trend that suggests that well-being is more than just having good hair, heels and handbags.<br />
<br />
This is great. The Zeitgeist is for once simpatico with my own interests and beliefs. The last time that happened I was perhaps 8 and my interests were the Brady Bunch, Gilligan's Island, Holly Hobby and tennis...<br />
<br />
Anyway, perhaps in terms of column space and words printed nothing is very different, but they say one notices what one is noticing - and on that basis it seems every man, woman and their dog is jumping on the happiness bandwagon.<br />
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Google it and see.<br />
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Three years ago when I began running workshops for professionals in transition aimed at helping them identify and play to their strengths, align their values and interests with their work and hopefully achieve a greater sense of purpose and happiness, I coined the phrase "Spring to Mind Spa". Thinking I was onto something I even bandied the word around in the City. Then I waited for the in-house bookings to overwhelm me.<br />
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I admit, I am still waiting.<br />
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You see, the key selling point of coaching or learning interventions had to be geared around success and helping clients to meet their potential. Senior, successful and respected coaches advised me not to use words like <i>well-being</i> or <i>happiness</i> in pitching to law firms or corporate clients - to be sure to leave such concepts strictly to the new age<i> life </i>coaches working in the suburbs or the communes, the retreats or the workshops for crystal loving pottery and bead types. Wake up Springgirl, executives and their employers do not need, want or care about happiness and well-being! You will not win business if you even mention the word "spa" at work!<br />
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Now, not so much. Times are changing. This is the era of pay freezes, unemployment, price rises and middle class families who thought three holidays a year and private school was their entitlement, forced to move house to access state schools. Over the long, usually not very hot summer we now learn the tedium/beauty of the "staycation". Just as well we have a government that propounds a "Big Society", eh? Though just who will wind up footing the bill for housing, illness and education is anyone's guess.<br />
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So there was never a better time to champion the virtues of simple living, a sense of community, altruism, spending less. It's just as well money cannot buy happiness, 'cos there isn't any money to spend.<br />
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Employee wellness is not a strange idea. Indeed in the US tax incentives help to bring the idea to the threshholds of many small and medium size businesses. The US?!<br />
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One day the weird and crazy notion that a happy and engaged person is also a productive person may take root.<br />
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That day is coming. Watch this space!<br />
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Check out these resources if happiness and well-being are of interest to you:<br />
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<a href="http://www.psychologytoday.com/basics/happiness">http://www.psychologytoday.com/basics/happiness</a><br />
<a href="http://www.happiness.com/">http://www.happiness.com/</a><br />
<a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/happiness_formula/default.stm">http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/happiness_formula/default.stm</a><br />
<a href="http://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/Default.aspx">http://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/Default.aspx</a><br />
<a href="http://www.happiness-project.com/">http://www.happiness-project.com/</a>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-13511880429705482542011-04-06T22:45:00.000+01:002011-04-06T22:45:29.068+01:00Stocktake and samples<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">I recently came across a discussion in a Linked In Group that I belong to, about marketing one's books, and the importance of blogging and social media for generating a followership and book sales. The accepted wisdom is that authors need to tempt readers with snippets of their work, samples of their style and tidbits of wisdom and perspective. I've been doing that for a year now - sales are steady - but I need to put more out there, clearly.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">A bit like those little plastic trays and faux forks set up in the supermarket to lure us into making different and unexpectedly satisfying purchasing decisions. I was in my local Waitrose just yesterday and I witnessed the very savvy and well-engineered process of determining what to offer for sample and tasting that afternoon. Setting - toilet paper aisle as three members of staff chatted about the weather and the display. The discussion went as follows:</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 200%;">Slim </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;">Attractive</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 200%;"> Female in Management Role (Manager): "Oh and we should do a tasting today. What do you think?"</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Young Partner (this means shop boy in other stores): "Yes, let's do one. What will we be sampling?"</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Older Partner (another young man): "Fruit, maybe. Or crisps?" (Obviously someone was a bit peckish...)</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Manager: "Yes, there are some fruits out the back near the bins that taste a bit weird. We could chop them up and put them out."</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Young Partner: "Yes. I know the ones you mean. They taste sort of sweet and also a bit bitter."</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Older Partner: Grinning, snickers. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Manager: "Seriously. Sweet and bitter at the same time?"</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Young Partner: "Yes, exactly. People should taste it."</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Manager: "Maybe something else."</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Older Partner: "Ice-cream? The weather is good today."</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">They walk to fridge area. I follow.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Manager: "I know - the Creme Egg ice-cream. Put some of that out. It's a new line. Looks disgusting."</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Young Partner and Older Partner: Grimacing. "Maybe not...".</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">I grimace too.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Why don't they put out some exquisite chocolate truffles, I thought? Some organic biscotti? Some ripe and juicy berries? Some gourmet cheese (not yet past it's use by date)?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 200%;">Truth is - the episode burst my bubble. And it is </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;">strange</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 200%;"> that I have a bubble with regards retail. I worked for a retail chain at one time. My skills were diverse - I mastered the cash registers, the photo development suite/lab, the kitchenware and lighting departments and even (due to my close friend being a fixture in DIY) paint mixing and gardening. And you only need read a few of my posts to see how much I love dealing with the general public. I know about waste, shrinkage, theft and bag checks, ugly uniforms and the tension between the full time day staff and the casual student staff. Nevertheless the idea that only the disgusting, hard to sell stuff would be displayed for taste testing and sampling never occurred to me...</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 200%;">Suffice to say I will never try another orange kiwi fruit dipped in soya something or other in Tesco again!</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 200%;">I'm losing my touch.</span></span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><br />
</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;">Nevertheless, I think the book publishing forum had other things in mind. In tempting readers to buy my books I can see that it is self-defeating to only reveal my disgusting or less delectable prose. By the same token, I don't want to reward the cheapskates who don't want to buy a book with my best work either...</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;">Though, I can admit to having written plenty of things that are bitter and sweet...</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;">It's tricky. I can see the conundrum. One can hardly ask shoppers to try the toilet paper before buying it, but French Champagne may be overdoing it. Hence the 10 minute discussion in Waitrose. I pictured similar dialogues across the globe, each day. It was sobering.</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;">So in order to tempt you to buy my books, contact me for some coaching or just mention me in casual conversation at the water cooler, the gym or your next supper club gathering, I give you an except from Spring to Mind's Self Coaching Toolkit. This is one of three stocktake exercises to help you assess where you are in your life. Don't worry, it's not too confronting, won't take long and won't necessitate any change, commitments or expenditure on your part. You may need a scrap of paper though.</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;">I will tell you now that I have taken this exercise myself. I drew a cloud. And my film is "Chocolat".</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 32px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">Stocktake - Exercise 2 (Extracted from <i><a href="http://www.troubador.co.uk/book_info.asp?bookid=877">Spring to Mind </a>- Self Coaching Toolkit</i>)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">If you:<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="line-height: 200%; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">a)<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span><!--[endif]-->Hate questionnaires and quizzes;<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 200%; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">b)<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span><!--[endif]-->Refuse to write down your feelings and thoughts;<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 200%; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">c)<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span><!--[endif]-->Resent being held accountable; <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 200%; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">d)<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span><!--[endif]-->Got nothing out of Exercise 1; or<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="line-height: 200%; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">e)<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span><!--[endif]-->Tend to buck the system, pooh-pooh authority and disdain order and structure;<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">then this exercise may be useful for you.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Describe in as few words as possible how you feel about your life.</i><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>List at least two things you enjoy or like about your life right now. What do you have or what do you do that gives you happiness?</i><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>List at least two things you enjoy or like least right now.</i><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>List at least two things you would like more of or to do more often.</i><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">I<i>f the writing is getting you down, why don’t you try to draw the feeling you have about your life right now. If you could, what would the picture show?<o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Pictures paint a thousand words... come on.</i><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">Ok, fine. Can you describe this feeling in terms of a film (or a book) you are familiar with?<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">Here are some ideas to help you:<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Forrest Gump </i>(you never know what you will get)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>The Godfather (</i>your family runs your life and you feel death is imminent)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>27 Dresses </i>(always the bridesmaid never the bride)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Wall Street </i>(greed is good)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>The Man who Knew too Much </i>(busybody gets comeuppance)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Fight Club </i>(weird hobbies keeping you away from real world)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Clueless </i>(at any level)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Gladiator </i>(warrior, hero, fighter, death defying maverick – to a point)<i> <o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Knocked up </i>(say no more)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Unforgiven </i>(speaks for itself)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>The Great Escape </i>(so now what?)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>The Mirror Cracked </i>(time for a new look)<i> <o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Enemy of the State </i>(on the run, alone)<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Sex and the City</i> (it’s all about the shopping and the men)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>The Good Girl </i>(no fun)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Alice in Wonderland</i> (no idea where you are)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Le Divorce</i> (it sounds better in French)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Liar Liar </i>(you or someone you know)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>The Mummy</i> (not yet dead)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>An Inconvenient Truth</i> (so what are your options)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>A Bug’s Life</i> (oohhhh...)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Hair</i> (really?)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>Friends with Money</i> (must you keep up)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">So? Name a film or book:<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">Ok. Hopefully you now have a better handle on how you feel. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">List anything good, satisfying or positive in your sense of where you are. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small;">List what you would like to change? </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p><br />
</o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p>.....</o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p><br />
</o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p>Anything? Sweet? Bitter? Disgusting? Sickening? Tasteless? Pointless?</o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p><br />
</o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p><br />
</o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><o:p>Well, it was your life so ....</o:p></span></div>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-82232295995346804092011-03-31T22:55:00.003+01:002011-03-31T23:06:47.056+01:00Happy Mothers Day<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This weekend in the UK we recognise ("celebrate" may be over-stating things a little) Mother's Day.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mothers can put their feet up for a day while Dad and the kids take care of them - bringing them breakfast in bed and little pink trinkets, flowers, a restaurant lunch perhaps. So lovely.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I'm really looking forward to it. Especially since Saturday will be so busy - preparing. I will have to organise the Off-Spring to make their cards for me while I clean the house for Sunday's guests, then bake some tea-time treats, replace the broken vase in case anyone buys flowers for me and best of all, guide the Off-Spring away from the kiddie soaps and towards the chocolate/wine or books, in the local Waitrose as they search, my money in hand, for the perfect treat for Mummy. Then after long deliberations and purchases, which will serve to fray the nerves and delay the exit from the store, we will all grow more tired and more fretful (after a big week at school) and enjoy one of <i>those </i>walks home, replete with bickering and whining along the lines of "his gift is better" and "he always copies me" and "can we open it now and have some?" and "I can't walk another step" and "it's not fair, why are you so mean Mummy?".</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What's there not to love about Mother's Day?</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Maybe I'm building it up too much. After all, last year's passed without event. I have absolutely no recollection of what happened...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No - none at all.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I <i>do</i> remember the <i>Australian</i> Mother's Day last year which is observed in May. What a morbid and lonely day. I spent it with the delightful Off-Spring contemplating my dear mother (Mrs Springgirl) who died just three days after Mother's Day in 2009. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Poignant and sorrowful is about all I can say for it. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">....</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The truth is that I personally derive minimal pleasure from these socially appointed celebrations. Perhaps I'm a miserable kill-joy or a cynic. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No - I definitely </span><i style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">am</i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> a miserable kill-joy <i>and</i> a cynic, but nevertheless, the pink trinkets and the crumbs in the bed really don't mean that much to me. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Admittedly, the special displays at the supermarket are very pretty and quite irresistible. Pastel marshmallows and Turkish Delight so temptingly offered to us (as if we would ever buy this for ourselves or our mothers on any day of the year), to tantalise us as we queue with our too-heavy baskets and to tug at our consciences as we finally reach the cashier and remember amidst all the other detritus cluttering our weary brains, that our mothers-in-law do like rosewater, don't they, and hadn't we better get a box just in case, ooh and a card, since Fred/Hank/Jim/Ian never remembers these things...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And where would we be without those displays, the full-page ads in the paper and the catchy jingles on the radio? We could hardly be expected to come up with a gift idea without them, given our mothers are such strange and unfamiliar creatures whose actual tastes and preferences are so mysterious and hidden. The safe (and sage) option <i>is</i> to buy pink and purple cards, sickly sweets and flowered coffee cups, little floral tea towels and bouquets of flowers for these most strange, yet cherished of people. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Any excuse to spend a little money eh?</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Some of you may wonder why I am so ambivalent - even negative - about Mother's Day. Let me assure you that I know all the tried and tested rationales for these special days.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They just don't resonate with me. Here is why:</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1. I am tired of being told what to think, buy and feel by the stores, the media and the pundits. I am weary of being guided in all of my choices by what B-list Celebrity-So-and-So will be doing, wearing or eating this Sunday.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">2. I rail against commercially motivated contrivances conceived to remind us not to take our loved one's for granted. The truth is that no matter what we say or spend once or twice a year, we do, and always will, take our mothers for granted. It's human nature to take the good things for granted. Not wilfully or maliciously; it's just how we are. Mothers, fathers too, our friends, our health, our good fortune, good weather, employment, safety, clean water. One day devoted to mothers/fathers will not change that.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">3. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What about all the others whose </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">contributions go unacknowledged? Those who do not have a "Day"? The unsung heroes? Mothers are just the tip of an immense iceberg made up of all those who carry the community - fathers (they have a day and various other perks, admittedly), teachers (despite great holidays), soldiers (some travel hardly makes up for death, mutilation and poor sanitation), nurses, scientists, rubbish collectors, cleaners and those lorry drivers tirelessly bringing all the pink treats to the high street for us? </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Where is the day for all of these people?</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">4. To spoil us one day a year is ultimately, unkind, inhumane. Like the last meal for the condemned man? For those mothers who do get a treat or a spoiling - some time out, a chance to relax or to be freed from the chores or the responsibility - the fall back down to earth the next day, week, month can be harsh. While it keeps the day itself special, of course, a thing to be longed for or savoured, it is not a kindness, in the long run.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">5. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Despite point 2 above, despite the fact that we feel we are not acknowledged enough, feel neglected sometimes, long for peace, uninterrupted sleep or quality alone time, a day for mothers is unnecessary. Because every day is mother's day. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Every day that they smile back, say thank you nicely and go to bed on time, is mother's day. Every day that they offer to help around the house, beg us to come to school and see their play, read them a story or play a game with them, is mother's day. Every day that they rush to greet us, ask our advice, roll their eyes at said advice or tell us dinner was disgusting - is mother's day. Every time we wave them goodbye and sigh with relief when they come back, is mother's day. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Amidst the joy, frustration, pain, worry, heartache and despair that goes with motherhood, n</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">ot a day goes by without a reminder of the love that they feel for us, of the love we feel for our own mothers, and perhaps most meaningfully, of the love we feel for our children. A virtuous circle.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So - Mother's Day is not my cup of tea (-in-bed-with-toast).</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Thankfully, it's only one day. I'll survive.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">.....</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">On a lighter note I am congratulating myself on being a very good mother this week.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For this week I learnt that:</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">a) <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/8408503/Working-mothers-spend-81-minutes-a-day-looking-after-their-children.html">Working mothers in the UK spend 81 minutes a day looking after their children</a> and</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">b) Non-working mothers in the UK average 2 hours 35 minutes directly caring for their children each day. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the world of competitive mothering we all know that any information that validates or vindicates choices to work or not to work are like manna from Heaven, so thanks to the OECD for commissioning this important survey.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But the results seem flawed. Is it just me or are these figures very low? F</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">or working and non-working women alike! Where on earth are the kids the other 21- 22 hours of the day? </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Of course I have done a back of the envelope calculation. I think it only right to aggregate my totals (i.e. times by 3) in relation to each of the Off-Spring. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now I should preface my comments by saying that I was (and at heart remain) a tax lawyer, so pedantically allocating time to activities is my bread and butter. Accordingly, I have reached a somewhat higher figure of 48.38 hours/day which reflects what I consider to be "directly caring" for my children - namely:</span><br />
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<ul><li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">shopping for their meals, </span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">cooking,</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">washing, </span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">ironing, </span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">cleaning, </span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">tidying, </span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">arranging their social and extra-curricular activities, </span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">attending meetings at school, </span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Googling their foibles, </span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">leafing through Mini-Boden Catalogues, </span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">listening to other mothers talk about their kids,</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">scraping uneaten food slops off the floor,</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">running the PTA (this is a quiet period which may skew my final tally and does not take into account extraordinary events such as bake sales, fundraisers or big school gate gossip sessions...),</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">planning what to wear on the school run,</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">going on the school run,</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">talking to, bathing, feeding, playing and reading with the children,</span></li>
<li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">thinking/worrying about some aspect of their lives or development (lawyers customarily bill for thinking time).</span></li>
</ul><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But all of that is beside the real point - which was the third Big Thing I learnt this week.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">According to the FAST programme of parenting - <a href="http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/parenting/want-quality-time-with-the-kids-15-minutes-should-do-it-2568296.html">15 quality minutes a day</a> for each child should just about do it (after a few weeks one can build up to more, apparently).</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So reconciling the data - it seems that most of the guilt and angst mothers feel is unnecessary provided 15 minutes of the 81 (or 48 hours) is "quality" time. </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I am so happy because let me assure you that my tidying, Googling, worrying and <i>direct</i> play are all <i>very high quality</i>! In fact this blog post has taken almost 115 minutes...</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So where am I now?</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Celebrating motherhood, of course!</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Just don't get me started </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">on Valentine's Day or Halloween.</span></div>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-88672554455063641472011-03-27T21:44:00.003+01:002011-03-27T21:56:49.053+01:00Short and sweet<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I began Spring to Ming Blog exactly a year ago, in a cynical ploy to gain readers and followers and hopefully sell some books. But, it wasn't long before I discovered the joys of blogging for its own sake. Like chatting with an old friend. The discipline required to craft a post helped me with my writing and my work. Searching for a topic, framing my thoughts, plotting the tale, as it were, were invaluable in developing my sense of ease with blogging, as well as my interests and niche as a writer and a coach. The truth is, as I came to discover during this past year, wanting to write is like managing a dull thirst - one is not really sated until one has the drink. And I don't mean alcohol or managing an addiction. No it's more basic than that, more instinctual and imperative, like quenching one's thirst with water alone. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Writing has become a necessity. One is not settled or at ease until the thoughts are outside of one - whether on a page, in a post or stored on some USB stick (in case of viruses and theft and what have you). The fact that at the same time as expressing a thought one can reach strangers and have one's words read almost immediately, is perhaps the greatest miracle of the digital age (discuss!).</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So at this juncture - as Spring to Mind Blog turns 1 I feel many things, like a parent whose child reaches its first birthday. Well not as tired, perhaps, but with similar feelings of pride and wonder.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Seriously, though. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Back in the real world I have been giving thought to ways of getting my work "out there". </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Accordingly, I gave away several copies of "<a href="http://www.troubador.co.uk/book_info.asp?bookid=877">Spring to Mind</a>" to poor sweaty, unsuspecting exercise class attendees at my gym. Many thanks to Barrie - the super cool and super funny instructor, who like me was once a lawyer until something better came along - who supportively announced that there were "books to be had" if anyone wanted one. I was very relieved to find that I ran out of books the first week. My fear and shyness at the thought that all those women would run away from the crazy wannabe who brought her stupid book to Total Body Conditioning (TBC) to give away (Desp-er-ate!), proved to be Totally Unfounded. My visions of having to find a new gym or face Barrie forcing me to do 2000 one legged squats the following week as retribution for driving his class away with my blatant self promotion, evaporated (faster than my sweat after back-to-back Step and TBC). I chided myself on my self-limiting thoughts and began to plan the next Give-Away Assault.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Kicking myself that I did not get out to the march in London yesterday - thousands of people milling in Hyde Park and Parliament Square - and where was I? Not in amongst them with a pushchair full of books, but at the gym!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At the risk of boring you with my troubles (again) - I did a search of writing competitions in the UK last week only to discover a dearth of contests for anyone writing lengthy prose. Instead there are many places to showcase one's skills as a short story or indeed "micro-fiction" writer.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I had one of those "aha" moments that I so love, then. All of sudden I realised that the daunting prospect of another edit, another read-through and another tome to have to give away - would not be problematic at all if one were writing micro-fiction (anything from 50 to 250 words). Hooray!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, desperate to win a prize or two at some stage in the span of this writing phase I got out the notebook and jotted down some ideas for <i>very</i> short stories. I had quite a lot of inspiration during the sermon at mass, it has to be said...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So I though I would share a couple with you here. I would love your feedback - micro-feedback preferably.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c;"><i><b>Beat Butter and Sugar to a Cream</b></i><br />
And they all begin that way – as if it could be any different. Beat butter and sugar to a cream. Add wet ingredients, add dry ingredients. So simple. Yet it doesn’t always rise. Or it comes out dry and crusty or tasteless and soggy. Though soggy at least reminds one of cooking as a child, which is sort of fun, in the sad way nostalgia is. The sepia tones of cakes long gone. </span></span><br />
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</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I barely taste it anyway. And they don’t care. Take it out. Cut it up. Shovel it down. Wipe up the crumbs. Wash it all down with tepid tea. Exchange remarks, as Gran would say. Pass the time. Comment on the weather, the news, the score. Plates back to the kitchen, washed up, put away. All done. For an hour or two. Then to sit with nothing to say, nothing to do; the silence oppressive. Why can I think of nothing to say? Nothing at all. So I sit and wait and smile a little, to seem relaxed. Pick up a book. Ponder. Put it down. <br />
<br />
Oh, is that the time? Relief floods in. "Better start dinner, how the time goes." Retreat to the kitchen. Peace again. The next round begins in the grey war of attrition. Feed them, clean up. Feed them, clean up. All week. All year.<br />
<br />
But Sundays, at least, are sepia days – beating butter and sugar to a cream.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
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</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What do you think?</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I have another I prepared earlier:</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b><i>Worker Bees</i></b></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">He drones. Literally. Like a worker bee.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And he smells. Not of charm. Nor success, nor desirability. Not even of man. Or of a man’s lunch. Meat, gravy, Coke. No - just noxious cologne sprayed too long on stale clothes, and of arrogance. And last night’s scotch. And cheap machine coffee. Reeks of that.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">He talks of tax and accounting, but what does he mean when he says “above the Line”? What Line? The line on the wall behind his shining, pale, ridiculously high forehead? The line on the flipchart under his name? All slanty and uneven, like a child slipped in over lunch and wrote it for him. Then fell asleep in the corner, when the droning began. Or is it some other Line, only he can see?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">He looks at me now. Does he sense it? Can he hear my thoughts? Does he know I can smell his breath across the room? Has he any idea that the Line plagues me night and day? His squinty,dead eyes on me should be unnerving. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But he doesn’t see me. For what is there to see? Pregnant woman, greying hair. Old yet young.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">A hand goes up. The droning stops, at last. He seems calm. But it’s an act; he hates interruption. He’s locked in an inner battle. The grey men in their poorly made suits wait, glance at the clock, their phones.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Yes?” Convention prevails. He’ll answer the question. Appear normal. He caresses his ear with a finger. Then picks it.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What if “above the Line” is “across the Line”?” I pause. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It’s your baby.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #134f5c; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So short <i>can</i> be fun - like hairstyles, skirts, coffee...</span></div></div>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-68898447182606491422011-03-23T22:00:00.002+00:002011-03-23T22:09:12.498+00:00Comfort food<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's been too long! I almost couldn't remember the password for my blog! I cannot claim to have been really busy this past 6 weeks. I've been writing and coaching and marketing both endeavours. I finished my novel - not in time to enter the Amazon Breakthrough Novel competition - but in time to allow me to focus on whether to self-publish it or find an agent. Keen on seeing it in print (sooner rather than never), I opted to self-publish. Rather than read it a 387th time (even I am weary of the font and the characters now), I hit the "make public" button and it is now <a href="http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/the-inner-child-journal-of-a-neurotic-parent/15168434?productTrackingContext=search_results/search_shelf/center/8">available</a>. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Much as I would love to extol its virtues here, I will save my rantings for another post. Suffice to say - I think it will amuse and entertain. Anyone who would like to review it - you would be more objective after all - I would be delighted to hear your views. Anything favourable can be posted to <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/">www.amazon.co.uk</a>, <a href="http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/the-inner-child-journal-of-a-neurotic-parent/15168434?productTrackingContext=search_results/search_shelf/center/8#reviewSection">www.lulu.com</a> or emailed to me at <a href="mailto:zoe@writethen.co.uk">zoe@writethen.co.uk</a>. If in the unlikely case that you read it and take issue with it or have negative comments, I suggest you give it away to someone else. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As a little aside, a good friend told me that she leant my first book "Spring to Mind" to a work colleague who was in fits of laughter and floods of tears as she read it at her desk at work. It was very gratifying. Right up there with the views of my neighbour who told me I was "ballsy" to write such a novel...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So where to start and what to say on other matters. I would love to comment on Libya, the tsunami in Japan, or nuclear reactors (or "nuke-ular" ones - depending from where you hail), but I am not qualified to venture a view. My heart goes out to all who have lost loved ones, homes or livelihoods and who face that loss and the eternal "why?" that accompanies it and the long and perhaps never-ending road to recovery. The devastation is incomprehensible.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rather than confront that misery and the huge imponderables that natural disasters and armed conflict give rise to, I will focus on more pedestrian things - for which I am grateful. You see, for now, all is well. No chicken pox blights us as yet this Spring, there is no ghastly news from family abroad. We are well and safe and basically happy. We have merely the pedestrian concerns of the ordinary urban household (that pays over the odds for good chocolate and is fed up with the chewed up gum left on every spare surface in the city). </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But we are thankful nevertheless for only having such worries. I will not labour the point about <a href="http://spring-to-mind.blogspot.com/2010/05/walk-walk.html">perspective </a>and <a href="http://spring-to-mind.blogspot.com/2010/07/pondering-lifes-little-pleasures.html">gratitude</a> yet again - been done to death. If you are new to me - read these earlier posts.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No - for today the topic is - Limits and Ambiguity.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I read some research today that said that people eat <a href="http://www.metro.co.uk/news/858844-chips-and-chocolates-stop-people-feeling-lonely">chips and chocolate because these foods give them comfort</a> and alleviate feelings of loneliness - like a social connection might. Indeed the report stated that comfort eating is similar to the way people connect and bond with their favourite tv show. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Well obviously! This is not news (so little is these days - but that's another post).</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Suffice to say that favourite tv shows provide a rich seam of social connectedness. The cast of "Friends" are almost as dear to me as any real life friend. For a time my constant companions were Don and Betty Draper ("Mad Men") and the casts of "NCIS" and "The West Wing" are more than a de facto family. I care about Josh Lyman as I would a brother.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And yes - it will come as no surprise to any reader of Spring to Mind to learn that Green and Black's dark chocolate praline mini eggs are the greatest source of comfort in my life.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Read my blog and most trends in lifestyle research will eventually be analysed and revealed - and more cheaply and without nearly the same hoopla and publicity. Hey ho...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, where was I? Limits and Ambiguity?</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Yes - relax - there is a link to the topic. Given that tv provides us with rich social bonds - I refer you to "Damages". This show is a real find. In the legal, crime drama milieu this show is unique in that every villain is likeable and capable of garnering our sympathy. "The Good Wife" does this to some extent - but one feels this is deliberate - a moral lesson, if you will. In contrast Damages seems real - less contrived. Every hero is flawed and corruptible too. The cast is superb, the acting consistent and likeable and even in their darkest moments we somehow relate to the actions of the characters. They are very human and vulnerable - like us. Not mere goodies and baddies through and through. And their behaviour is not attributable to some deep, dark, lurking, yet buried childhood tragedy, the revelation of which we eagerly await season after season. Rather, it would appear that people are complex and ambiguous and even "good" people make bad choices. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We, the audience, are credited with the capacity to wonder and think and reflect - albeit in a different way to that required of devotees of "Mad Men" *(which draws on a time in history and the personal struggles of the characters with issues of authenticity and identity within that context) or "The West Wing" (which was as much about a system and the working of bureaucracy as it was about individuals within it). But it is very flattering to be treated as capable of reflection and thought. Perhaps I am naive or easily manipulated - but watching gripping drama in which the villain is likeable at some level is compelling, even addictive. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Every day in ordinary social interactions we meet people who may also struggle with internal conflicts, moral grey areas and huge decisions that are plagued with ambiguity and uncertainty. Indeed, perhaps we face such situations as well. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We raise our children hopefully to know and choose right from wrong, to have an internal moral compass to guide them through the trickier times. Yet, even in the playground, in primary school, they face dilemmas that are ambiguous. They grapple with choices every day - to tell or not to </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">tell, to forgive, to trust, to be vulnerable. And they face them alone. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And they survive.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">.....</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Which is where "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brady_Bunch">The Brady Bunch</a>" comes in. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">How many times does one think back to childhood days when memories of what Marcia or Jan would have done guided us through a tough period at school. Children today need more of that! Once a week I coach two boys whose primary source of entertainment is "The Simpsons". I have no issue with this - though 17 hours a week (as they claim) may be excessive... But, the fact is - I am no stranger to sitcoms and tv drama, movies and books, and in all that I have watched, read and sampled over some 30 years - nothing much beats "The Brady Bunch" for good, sensible, family oriented entertainment. Yes, it's dated, But Marcia is still cute, Greg is still annoying, Peter is still compelling and Mike and Carol, still "real". While we know that everything will end up basically alright, in each episode the characters face a challenge or an opportunity and must make choices which have consequences. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A timeless lesson.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">....</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A new film is released in the UK this week - "Limitless". I hope to see it. I know nothing about it apart from what is revealed in the trailer. The premise - what would you do it you were offered a pill that would make you super human - to see connections, understand the mysteries of the world, make shedloads of money... and so on.</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A fictional romp... and yet...</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What would one do?</span><br />
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</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">.....</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Truth is, I quite like limits. I like knowing that if I run too fast I will fall down panting, at least based on recent evidence. I like learning from my mistakes and finding new ways of doing things. Yet, I also like not knowing something and trying to find out. I like ambiguity and the opportunities it provides for challenge and self-discovery. But I also like chocolate, writing and good tv. I like knowing where my pineapple comes from and knowing what might happen tomorrow. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So there is a fine line between control and limits; between uncertainty and ambiguity; between comfort and loneliness.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Perhaps that's why the makers of "Damages" give the viewer a glimpse of the end of the season in the first episode. We already care and are bought into what happens. We have 12 weeks to come to terms with the how and the why. Not to say this is the only formula for TV success - the tension and suspense in "The Brady Bunch", when we only discovered at the last minute whether Cindy would conquer her fear of magic tricks and be Peter's assistant or whether Mike would keep his job after Carol insulted his boss - is second to none.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But these are not our real lives. These shows are our escape, our fantasy land where time can stand still for 39 minutes. So is it any wonder we turn to chips and chocolate? In the face of tsunamis and dictators and air strikes, random and chance events that steal families of loved ones, what else do we have to provide us with solace and a small, fleeting and illusory sense that we are in control and are safe.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Frankly - those praline eggs are not comfort food - but survival rations!</span><br />
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</span>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-80295848133591819032011-02-12T21:52:00.000+00:002011-02-12T21:52:16.520+00:00Silence is Golden<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">After a couple of tries (and fails) to write a blog this past week I felt sure I was onto a winner when I came across the above title stored away in the lists of posts I had "prepared earlier". I was only thinking today when the Off-Spring were masquerading as marauding tigers and gazelles, just how true the adage is - Silence <i>is</i> Golden. And as rare...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Imagine my disappointment to find that all I had done previously with said draft blog was type the title - there was nothing in the body of the post at all. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No doubt - knowing only too well my own sense of humour and terrible memory for certain details - I would have left it blank like that to amuse my future self when she, as I did tonight, retrieved the draft and sought to update it. Or perhaps in a more relaxed and perhaps sardonic moment, back in October 2010, I intended to post only the title and let the empty blog speak for itself. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I have some sympathy with that.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There is too much being said these days. Too much opinion and too much editorial. And all of it is too widely accessible. While wordy, I am also a "less is more" sort of person in many ways. So I do find myself pulled hither and thither in this age of tell all, say all, speak all and share all. I'm not great at tweeting my latest banal thought, or sharing or "liking" my latest meal - how interesting can fruit with Special K get, after all? But the world has moved on and my pre 1995 sensitivities really have no place in the digital age.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And searching for topics to write about, it's always tempting to descend into the banal and obvious, so many columnists (earning great salaries) do. I could go on at length about my sore throat, bickering children, the weather, TV (check out Hawaii 5-0), some new film (Rabbit Hole is on my list), the cost of petrol and groceries (every item I buy at Waitrose has increased in price since 1 January by an average of 15 p with the exception of Agave Syrup which they studiously match to Tesco and bananas and a couple of other fruits. There seems to be a view that anything slightly pleasant or indulgent should be charged at extortionate boutique luxury prices - <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/dark-chocolate-better-than-fruit-juice-2211507.html">dark chocolate is not a Luxury</a> Mr W. Rose!). While I'm on the topic I should just let you know that a certain retailer will sell you 100grams of crystallised violet petals for the very affordable £14.99. Thankfully one needs only one such petal to feel truly ill, but there you are. Even feeling sick is an expensive pursuit these days. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So where were we going with all of this? Oh yes - silence.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I blogged a little while ago about having a rural idyll to which One might escape, to write and muse and take stock. I still feel a "room of one's own" at home ought to do the trick but ideally it needs to be soundproofed and lockable.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I manage to create a virtual "room of my own" in the later hours of the evening when Off-Spring slumber and Mr Spring-Girl is abroad. It was here in tranquil yet studious concentration that I finished my second novel last week. It's a doozy!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's all about a woman called Verity - once a high flying ad exec - who struggles with parenting - a bit of perfectionist, desperate to keep up with the other mothers, she throws everything into creating the ideal home and ideal children, all the time neglecting husband and self, but convinced - most of the time - she is onto an amazing and sustaining life calling. Until one day the wheels fall off and a Betty Draper ("Mad Men") look alike threatens to lure her husband away to goodness knows what or where and all those hours in yoga classes and on the PTA amount to nothing. It's a very funny tale - obviously I amuse myself with my writing but I'll give you a little flavour so you can see for yourself. Here is a precis:</span><br />
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<blockquote><blockquote><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #073763; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 200%;">Between yoga and the gym, charity morning teas and book club, night classes and helping out at school, Verity is stretched. Jumping (or wearily clambering) on the self-help bandwagons and struggling to keep abreast of the latest trends in parenting has left her lost, alone and confused. To find a fresh perspective, Verity starts an “Inner Child Journal”. But what use is a diary, Chicken Soup or the Secret if your child is average, potty training doesn’t work, your mother thinks you’re a sell-out and your husband goes AWOL to find himself.</span><span style="line-height: 200%;"></span></span></blockquote></blockquote><br />
<blockquote><blockquote><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #073763; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 200%;">Distracted, desperate and deeply in denial, Verity is forced to confront her own demons – loss of control, ballet mums and bad coffee – with nothing to call upon but instincts (oh and pride, a gruelling fitness regime and a killer sense of humour).</span></span></blockquote></blockquote><br />
<blockquote><blockquote><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #073763; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 200%;"></span><span style="line-height: 200%;">While her husband searches for meaning in the soup kitchens of Asia, Verity makes a few discoveries of her own. Like, pride <i>does</i> go before a fall, there <i>is</i> such a thing as being too thin and too rich and playing to one’s strengths beats playing around. Lone parenting has never been this much fun.</span></span></blockquote></blockquote><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Tempted?</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In this extract Verity is moaning about the school PTA president:</span><br />
<blockquote><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #38761d; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><blockquote><span style="line-height: 200%;">"<i>Her latest ploy was to set up a Facebook page for the Mortimer Montessori Parents’ Association (PAMM). Now she only communicates to parents through this medium. This is perverse. First, not everyone uses Facebook so it excludes and marginalises people. Second, she posts meaningless self-serving drivel about herself and her daughters and almost nothing about school or the Association or its events. Generally, anything we need to know is printed in the school newsletter and handed out each week by Mrs Blythe, in any case. It’s obvious the Facebook thing is another self promotion tactic. I finally signed up with a false name in order to “Like” the bloody PAMM when Helen kept talking about the fantastic recipes her chums were posting there. I refuse to use Facebook legitimately because I know Kate and several women from the gym and yoga have all “Friended” each other and would find me to friend too. It’s bad enough running into some of them socially or at the shops, without having to see pictures of them all over my laptop and hear about their kids’ first day at school/swimming/karate/juvenile lock up ad nauseum. Anyway, I had to laugh when Wendy accepted my friend request under the alias “Loosy Lude”. In fact Loosy has over 47 friends, no profile, nor photos and no personal info. But she likes PAMM and “The Good Wife”. Go figure.</i></span></blockquote></span></blockquote><blockquote><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #38761d; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><blockquote><span style="line-height: 200%;"><i>I’ll admit that I enjoy certain elements of getting involved at school, like meeting new people and rolling my sleeves up to help, but it seems contrived, if not desperate, to see the school as a complete occupation. Admittedly, I don’t have a role of the gravitas and responsibility that Wendy holds (voluntarily, mind you, since no one wanted to do it when Jeff stepped down), but I wonder if I lack the perseverance, tenacity and political will to do it well, in the first place.</i></span><span style="line-height: 200%;"><i>Note to self: sign up at Gracie’s next school for important political role before alienating any parents</i>."</span></blockquote></span></blockquote><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, there are 75,000 words in a similar vein.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Not convinced that silence is golden when promoting a novel, I joined a writers' forum last week and uploaded some blogs for review. So far I have 10 messages begging me to review other people's work and one (more intelligent and subtle) message endorsing mine. Thanks "Liz" whoever you are - you get my vote right back!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You see - what one doesn't know until one writes a book and purports to have it published, is that there are very few books that actually get published in any year, unless the author is a celebrity, a chef or a previous best-selling writer. I guess I knew it would be hard, but the statistics are anything but encouraging. My first book was a personal story and one that I was committed to seeing into print under my own stream as I believed it encapsulated some humour and wisdom that needed to be shared. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Verity's tale, however, is pure fiction, and thus far more commercial and marketable. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is pretty much coincidental, only occasionally accidental and in one case very much deliberate (she begged to be in there under her own name and I couldn't turn down the promise of one reader, could I?). Best of all I discovered a capacity I didn't know I had. Writing fiction was an absolute delight. One that I had convinced myself was not in my repertoire. Original ideas - a story? No, I told myself - my domain was more the social commentary, self-effacing-critique-of-everyone-else-style. Until one day out came this character who had to be given life. She and her quest for answers had to be shared - just in a longer form than all those people on Twitter seem to like. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But in terms of getting it "out there"? Well, I sometimes think I would have more luck making a screenplay about Verity - or even getting fly on the wall mockumentary made about middle class women and their angst and worries - than I will have of getting my novel into the hands of any serious publisher.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Not that that is a bad thing - self-publishing is a great option - and in a couple of months you can all buy it or download it and tell all your friends about it. And "Like" it on Facebook too... Oh and retweet this on Twitter.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">BTW - don't any of you steal that mockumentary idea! I said it first!</span>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-78695489489162603322011-01-20T21:19:00.000+00:002011-01-20T21:19:46.732+00:00Hair today...<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They say a change is as good as a holiday. I always remind myself of this when contemplating a haircut. Let me just say, for the avoidance of doubt, that high maintenance is not my style. A trim once a year is about my speed. But, today I had 5 inches of hair cut off and and new style crafted by Trina from Perth. This has been coming on for some time. I had Googled celebrities with short cropped locks for a few hours last week and felt relatively convinced that it was time for a change. I have often mused about doing a Sharon Stone or Ginnifer what's her name, but without the make-up, jewellery or facial structure to carry those off, I had doubts. I noted that style journalists think Kate Middleton needs a new look. Luckily and serendipitously, I am now up to series 4 in the Friends Series Rewatch of Winter 2010-11 (where Monica sports several short "dos"). So, while it seemed spur of the moment, it was actually a long time brewing, this decision, and not such a big deal to secure a walk-in appointment and announce proudly that I wanted them to "take it all off".</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In hindsight, as I recalling the wet tresses tumbling laconically to the floor, I should have collected that hair and sold it like Jo of "Little Women". I suppose at a deep unconscious level, given the clients marching in for their weekly wash and blow-dry sessions, I knew it would be ridiculous to do so - to reveal a morbid self-love or worse, display my current state of penury.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Which is more or less where the haircut gets its inspiration from. Not morbid self-love. But given my struggle to find purposeful employment that plays to my strengths and an outlet for my myriad talents, I have been suffering a sort of malaise, an energy low, if you will. When one feels like that a new haircut is often the answer. Its benefits are three-fold. First, it distracts. For a few days one enjoys the new look, playing around with the style and popping pins and bows in here and there, trying on hats and coats and seeing oneself afresh. Second, it sparks conversation. It is in some ways a cry for attention and validation - one feels pampered, one gets noticed by people who never normally acknowledge one, friends are curious - What were you thinking? they say, innocently - secretly miffed that something deeply personal was going on that one did not share with them. Third, inevitably, as all that weighty old dead stuff is removed, one feels lighter, purer and fresher. One recovers some zest for life. If for no other reason than the thrill of facing a stranger in the mirror through the fogs of sleep on a dark January morning, it has to be worth doing.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A lot of bang for the buck, you see!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now in most cases, two days later after a gruelling workout and a rushed shampoo, the cute and glossy style is long gone and the hair looks shabby and frizzy, asserting its own mind once more and one is left frustrated and sorrowful, lamenting the loss of the option of throwing it up in a pony tail and knowing all would be fine...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But no. This time I am mindfully intent on having no regrets.Life is too short. There is still good coffee and great books to enjoy.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Also, even if I do not look like Katie Holmes strolling out of Starbucks with my toddler bedecked in patent high heels beside me, the cut is a good one and has taken years off me (or so I have convinced myself by putting that ladybird clip in!).</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is not easy to navigate the "hair ways" of life. You see we are a product of our home lives. My late mother was always of the view that women of a certain age look better with shorter hair. Indeed this seems to be the prevailing opinion in Australia where long hair on anyone over 45 who is not in showbiz is a rarity. But here in London and across the northern hemisphere as a whole, this is not the case. Indeed in a concerted effort to prove my commitment to fundraising for the Off-Spring's school at the PTA Christmas Fair late last year, I offered to auction snips of my long locks, only to be met with gasps of horror and exclamations of "No - you must not!" from the assembled committee. Indeed given the overwhelming lack of response to most of my ideas and initiatives as chair of the PTA, it was a startling reminder that people <i>do</i> express emotion and can form an opinion when the subject matter is important to them (nb women with short hair and cooking with children seem to be matters that invite a spirited response).</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In a similar vein, I was met with absolute horror at school pick-up today when I collected the Off-Spring. Number 3 was home ill - not that ill really, just tired - and accompanied me to the salon. where the fun of sitting in high chairs, spraying water on wigs and being consulted on matters of style and appearance rendered him supportive and thoroughly engaged. Number 2 smiled at me with delight from afar but told me I looked <i>hideous</i>. Number 1 could barely look at me such was his devastation, saying I was ugly and disgusting.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Thankfully Number 1 resiled from this viewpoint after an hour when a clip with a flower on it was pulled through the side of the hair and also I suspect after some introspective musings about the true nature of love and acceptance. Number 2 is a pushover. A pure aesthete - for him the issue was the change rather than the style.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At the end of the evening no one was too bothered. I explained to them that (unlike Sampson whose strength lay in his long locks) I would be a more fun and laid back person with my new hip, cool and funky do and if they gave it a chance they might find things were better under the new regime. I certainly inspired them to new heights of homework concentration and energy, so who knows....</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">.......</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Does one's hair really matter that much? Apparently, yes! </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I could make all sorts of statements about the relative value of appearance and haircare as opposed to curing cancer and diabetes and eradicating poverty, but seriously, who would listen?</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I know now, only too well, the value of a nice fresh style; of letting go of old ways of being. (Imagine, some people look and feel great all the time!) And to top it off, as I saw with the Off-Spring, haircuts help people to adapt to change and accept differences in each other. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Hair as a concept, as a form of self-expression, as a symbol of our identity or lack thereof and as a reflection of our values and beliefs is crucial to our personal growth and development and the evolution of the species as a whole. We have but to consider <a href="http://www.ukhairdressers.com/history%20of%20hair.asp">hair through the ages</a> to see how important it is as a barometer of societal stability, prosperity and cultural progress. I am not qualified, nor wish, to analyse the significance of hair and style and all that it means to people. Suffice to say, it is a big business for a reason. It is after all, (body art, clothes and plastic surgery aside) the only thing we have about our person that we can affect or influence. It is the sole physical canvas upon which to create something truly representative of our inner self. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Sure, I like seeing what people are doing with their hair. Good style is always attractive. Glossy, shiny, healthy tresses are beautiful. But I have denied the obvious for too long. I hate to admit it after years of wanton maltreatment of my hair; I have missed the boat! What messages have I been sending about myself? What opportunities have I missed to show the world who I am! Expensive hats? Inner work? Intellectual pursuits? To what end, I ask you?</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Hair is a phenomenological and semiotic minefield.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But it is never too late! </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If Justin Bieber can do it... </span><br />
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</span>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-4855598987544252922011-01-04T22:30:00.000+00:002011-01-04T22:30:44.388+00:00How to write a best seller. Or Not - depending...<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is with not a little churlishness (or should that just be "churl"?) that I note the best selling books here in the UK this Christmas (as listed and updated hourly on Amazon). Predictably, recipe books abound - at one end of the specutrum devotees of 30 minute meals have bought more books than those who were given a slow cooker for Christmas - but only by a whisker. As always, crime novels and thrillers are well represented, as are diet books and the ubiquitous "Girl with..", "Girl who.." trilogy. None of which constitutes grounds for sniping, admittedly.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">However, I am a <i>little</i> miffed that guides on how to be a Jedi rank higher than good fiction. But most of all I am amazed that books purporting to make people happy rank as highly as they do (though not as high as how to be a Jedi and how to cook a delicious thirty minute meal, which says something about the priorities of modern Brits).</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Anyway, I just think that given the market is clearly there for happiness guides it really is time for me to get mine out there. I recognise now that "<a href="http://www.troubador.co.uk/book_info.asp?bookid=877">Spring to Mind</a>" was too subtle for many. While ostensibly a novel it was at heart a guide to happiness and how to get it, dressed up as a coaching self-help book. The error was all mine. You see, I thought, naively, that people would baulk at being told how to get happy, at the preposterous notion that another person has the answers to their unasked, even unthought questions. I did not trust the notion that we all want to be happy. One sees so much evidence to the contrary after all...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I was so wrong.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">People's wants and desires are not so complex Springgirl. You do them a disservice assuming they will find their own way and that the answers they seek lie within them. Wake up, Springgirl before another million self help books written by someone else are sold!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jump on this wagon before it well and truly departs the station, mix your metaphors and stand still at your peril!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So here goes:</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I am not going to beat around the bush anymore. I am going to draw on 40 years of experience, learning and cynicism to give you the definitive guide to happiness. I am not going to tell you "I can make you happy" or that "you can be happy". No. There is no "can" about it. You WILL be happy. Not only that, you WILL be fitter and you WILL be a domestic goddess capable of winning "The Apprentice" and cooking without a recipe book. I am here to kill all the birds with one stone and so I give you the "The Happy Person's Guide to Modern Life - The Essential Handbook".</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If you buy one new book this year - make it this one!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I give you here a brief overview of the main themes.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1. Happiness is subjective. Trust your gut not what advertisers, your mother or you partner tell you. No product, holiday, person, car, team, drink, hand bag or shoe will give you sustained happiness. Yes they can dull the pain and distract you for a while but they are only band-aids, not cures. Step 1 is to stop relying on them to solve your problems.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">2. Fit people are happier and live longer - unless they are killed in pursuit of their fitness or sport - but at least they die happy. So get off the sofa, put the biscuits in the cupboard and go for a walk. Then sustain it - join a gym or a running club.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">3. Music lifts your spirits - sing as you work. As you clean the house, wash the dishes or walk, pretend you are in en episode of "The Partridge Family", on stage with Kylie or singing back up for Katy Perry. Get humming as you get moving. Also listen to the lyrics of these fine pop tunes. many wise words to mull over...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">4. Spend time every day doing something you love - apart from eating, smoking or drinking to excess. Keep it simple. Perhaps it is browsing in a book store for great self help books like this, or sipping coffee and watching the world go by. Perhaps it is playing golf or watching documentaries about space travel, seeing friends or reading peacefully like you did before you took on the cares of the world and became the sole provider for 287 little mouths.... Just do it.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">5. Spend time every day doing something you are good at - people who play to their strengths are happier than people who keep doing things badly. Focus on what you know you can do well - yoga, sewing, baking, building stuff, brewing your own beer. If it makes you happy it will be worth the fights with the family. Be true to yourself. Do what you are good at - win - enjoy it - do it more- get better - win more.... A virtuous circle.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">6. Friends and community lift our spirits - social people are happier. But heed this advisedly. Don't socialise at the expense of sleep, fitness, health or engagement with meaningful and fun things you would enjoy more. But if you are doing what you love and do well, then surely you will find people to share the fun with (provided you are not a crazy aggressive lunatic who has to destroy all opponents at the bridge club or on the squash court).</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">7. Be grateful for what is good in your life - and keep it simple. Watching your child sleep, the morning coffee, a sunny day, a seat on the train, everyone at Christmas lunch believing that you made the dessert, no new pimples...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">8. Get real. Keep your expectations within safe bounds. You will not be happy dreaming of being a supermodel or getting discovered as you hum in the dairy aisles at Waitrose (especially if you are 44, frumpy and look as sad as you do in those saggy track pants). But you might get some great 3 for 2 offers on fruit or stumble onto a new thriller by your favourite author or run into an old mate keen to catch up over a low-fat croissant. Realistic goals and expectations also pertain to your hopes for loved ones. Stop living vicariously and projecting disappointed longings, ego and preoccupations with status onto your partner and children.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">9. Forget about what other people think. Define yourself in terms that makes sense to you. If that means you don't return certain calls, so be it. More time for the things you really want to do. You will have met loads of new people following steps 1-8 above anyway - many of whom will have no preconceived notions about you!</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">10. Take yourself with a grain of salt. Lighten up. Keep things in perspective. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Finally, above all else, eat only good chocolate and don't expect to be happy all the time. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Oh and remember that through the tough times comes growth and learning, resilience and humour, maybe new found strengths and friends and the knowledge gained first hand that shoes and football teams don't really matter when the chips are really down...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So that is what I can offer. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As I re-read this though I feel a little bit doubtful. Does anyone really wants this sort of advice? It is all very well to dole out the answers but what happens when the reader just can't be "bovvered" to join the gym or focus on the simple and good things in her life while her partner spends every night making home brew in the garden shed, texting his mates? What good is the above list if the reader cannot even work out a reasonable expectation from a crazy delusional pipe dream? </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Maybe there is a reason that cook books sell so well. Perhaps I need to pen "Navigating the Terrain between Slow and Quick Cooking: The Ultimate Guide for Wannabe Domestic Deities" or all those who would kill to look as good as Nigella (or Jamie for that matter). </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But what do I know about cooking? Pesto, salad, roasting things?</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Perhaps I should pen a thriller? A follow up to the Millennium trilogy in which Lisbeth meets "The Girl with the Bad Advice" and has to single-handedly take on the entire self-help movement, slow cooking establishment, Jedi Revivalist cult speaking Swedish and winning over apprentice domestic goddesses starved almost to death on the Skittles diet favoured by slim girls everywhere...</span>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-86555808817506520672010-12-20T21:39:00.000+00:002010-12-20T21:39:35.749+00:00A room of her own...<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #505050; font-family: Arial, Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"></span><br />
<div style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 18px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-rendering: auto;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">I was </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">scanning</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"> the on-line news today in search of a </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">reliable</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"> update on the travel chaos in Europe caused by the cold snap. Internet news is so difficult to follow - one clicks on links and follows little distracting stories about hair and sales and weather updates and movie reviews and what so-and-so thinks about the coalition's comments on such and such and before long amidst solving problems on the </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">domestic</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"> front </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">because</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"> someone has </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">someone</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"> else's felt tip and the phone is ringing and the kettle is boiling and there is a buzz at the door and no, thank goodness it is only the postman delivering Grand-dad's presents, not a Tiger coming for Tea - again - and then </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">realising</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"> that it is colder than one thought and one had better put socks on and goodness what was I looking for in the first place - oh yes I must google headache on right side of head and see whether it is indeed an aneurysm (hate those "sm" words that are hard to spell) or just a pinched nerve in my taut and uptight shoulders due to 48 hours gym deprivation and what was it again that I was on-line looking for.. </span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">Right - H</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;">eathrow, havoc and such. So the paper describes in terms of peril and woe how the UK has ground to a halt. And yet in my little haven, it is anything but at a standstill... Indeed I can barely gulp down the Nespressos fast enough to keep pace with the rumpus, dressing up and general melee in the second bedroom (just the Offspring at play, I assure you), while colouring the increasingly grey locks and writing the list for the store. You see if the country is at a standstill then the shelves will soon be bare as we all rush out and do our panic buying. And it occurs to me that one cannot really be embracing a "panic buying" opportunity if one is carrying a list and has time to browse for those books the supermarkets sell which are perfect holiday reading - the Lee Childs and the Tami Hoag's and the like (though I did buy two packs of Special K and two Agave Syrup squeezy dispenser things and another dozen eggs and 1.5 kgs of frozen fat oven chips - so a hefty shop by my standards).</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">And after all of that it was time for lunch and I could suddenly relate to people who say that sometimes they seem to get nothing done... </span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">I am not so interested in the misery at Heathrow as I seem, I should add. It is merely that Mr Springgirl may not get back for Christmas given that flights from Accra are cancelled for the third day and there must be a lot of passengers to accommodate when they do resume... Now I should say that Mr Springgirl is not one to let the grass grow under his feet and if there is a seat on a flight he will get it. This tenacity, while admirable in many ways, can be disconcerting to the likes of me who tends to stand back to let others in first and hates crowds and so on and would really just like to board at the last minute.... so again, I realise how lucky and blessed I am - despite the whole stuck in doors due to the cold, feeling just a little bit like a caged animal - because I do not have to jostle for a flight, queue with hundreds of desperate travellers and worry anxiously whether I will be home for Christmas. I am reminded of that carol about being home for Christmas - Bing Cosby sings it on "White Christmas" - which informed me as a girl as to what Christmas really meant - being Australian and sweating over roast turkey and Christmas pudding and praying for a storm to come after lunch to cool things down while we finished the washing up, I really had no idea that Christmas could be cold and dark and full of fear that snow might prevent one from reaching one's loved ones.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">Be careful what you wish for - as Mum would say.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">And amidst all of that mayhem, and thoughts of "well I really should make the most of the time at home this week and finish the novel", I came across the following (before the Offspring hijacked the computer and watched two straight hours of BBC's <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Planet-Earth-Complete-David-Attenborough/dp/B000MR9D5E">Planet Earth</a></i>):</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">"<a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12021519">Imagine a small cottage in an idyllic country village</a>. It is a very small cottage - 15ft square - probably medieval and rebuilt about 1700. In 2001 it exchanged hands for £50,000 and restored for a further £25,000: what was once garden privy is now a washhouse.</span></span></div><div style="clear: left; color: #333333; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 18px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-rendering: auto;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">It was bought at the instigation of a single person, who had in mind a single purpose - to make such a space available, rent and running costs free, to a woman over 40 who has need of seclusion and financial security to get on with her written work.</span></div><div style="clear: left; color: #333333; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 18px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-rendering: auto;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">The charity - for such it is - takes its inspiration from Virginia Woolf's famous remark in her essay A Room of One's Own - "A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction."</span></div><div style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 18px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-rendering: auto;"><div style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">The woman who takes up residence in the cottage need not be writing novels but must offer some evidence that she can produce written work. She is given £750 a month for living expenses, and most of all, freedom from worry."</span></div><div style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
</span></div><div style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Well, one does come across the most astounding things on-line, no?</span></div><div style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The mind boggles - a quiet idyll away from worry and responsibility, with living expenses of £750/month, for a year. Mmmm.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I have drafted an application but see a few potential issues.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">1. I like my family, friends, colleagues and neighbours and would miss them if away for a year.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">2. Heretofore, I have found that two-three hours solitude (say at a movie, or gym and reflexology) are ample for providing a fresh perspective and recharging my energy and motivation. I admit to being lucky enough to have had as many as two weeks away from my family in recent times. Every moment seems a lifetime (in the words of Michael Buble), - but in a very <i>good</i> way - and immensely restful. Much longer and I start to feel cast adrift, anchorless, selfish.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">3. If one was to be paid for the privilege of writing - even just expenses of £750/month (nothing to sneeze at) - one would be a lazy cow to not be able to get on with it in one's own house, surrounded by the familiar and well loved.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">4. If one could take a year out of life, would one not prefer to have a life changing experience like walking to a Pole or two or learning a new skill, helping someone who otherwise might perish or suffer?</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">5. I do like a good chat - is one allowed to take a phone?</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">6. Given I wrote a book over five months sitting on my bed between 8 and 10 pm every night, the pressure to deliver something truly amazing if blessed with a room of one's own for a year would be almost crippling, I suspect.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">7. What does one do for inspiration and ideas if one is stuck in isolation? Solitary confinement if you will?</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">8. Surely the true value of a room of one's own is that it lies within the heart of one's life and existence - at the epicentre of all that one is and does and enjoys, such that one can access it easily and readily (if one can quiet the demons urging one to do and be more all the time). Is this not what holidays and nations grinding to a halt are for after all?</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">9. I need a gym and decent coffee more than space and time alone.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">10. No one is their right mind would expect to win such a prize and return to their old life happy. In my case, the credit that would be owed to Mr Offspring if a year on my own were to be accommodated would be so massive and debilitating as to make the entire project utterly untenable.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">I may not know my Virginia Wolf, but isn't the point really to help people - indeed, women - create a "room of their own" within their lives and within their minds? To help them carve out the space and time amidst the responsibility, the striving, the worry, the exams, the rows at school and in the office, the disappointed longings, the doctor's appointments, the pounds gained and the shopping and washing not done (reminds me - put the load on tonight!), to know and express something of themselves? For it is in how we cope with the bad times that we show our mettle and worth? Don't we wish to celebrate the works of fiction, achievement, humour and success that rise from the ashes of real felt life with all of its chaos and pain, rather than spend thousands so that one woman can go and be a hermit?</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">A room of her own? Hardly - more a cell, a sentence, or a vocation perhaps.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">While I won't tell the Offspring, I quite like the crumbs underfoot and the "pictures for you Mummy" piled on the shelf and the fact that I cannot find my purse beneath the half used tissues. I quite like switching key and refocussing, even if only for a second as I gaze upon the sleeping head of my child or a photo of a loved one or the view from my shared room.</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">I quite like the idea of a room of my own where the door is always open and the real world can enter any time it likes.</span></span></div><div class="story-feature wide " style="clear: right; display: inline; float: right; margin-bottom: 16px; margin-left: 16px; margin-right: -160px; margin-top: 0px; overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; position: relative; width: 304px;"><div style="color: #505050; line-height: 16px;"><a class="hidden" href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12021519#story_continues_3" style="color: #1f4f82; font-weight: bold; left: -5000px; line-height: 16px; position: absolute; text-decoration: none; top: -5000px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Continue reading the main story</span></a><a class="hidden" href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12021519#story_continues_3" style="color: #1f4f82; font-weight: bold; left: -5000px; line-height: 16px; position: absolute; text-decoration: none; top: -5000px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
</span></a></div></div>Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3009340748939673890.post-88386525162918886712010-12-19T22:01:00.000+00:002010-12-19T22:01:55.973+00:00Baby it's cold outside...<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As I write this, snuggled under my duvet/doona/eiderdown, the mercury plummeting (the whole "mercury" metaphor being this season's most hackneyed phrase in weather obsessed Britain, as "Arctic" weather systems wreak "havoc" on Christmas shopping and travel plans), as the "big freeze" continues and forecasters speculate on the "record lows" ahead, it seems opportune to reflect on this chill season and lament the suffering of those stranded, cold and disheartened in airports, on motorways and in train stations, unable to move due to the impact of the ice and the continuous subzero temperatures.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mr Springgirl is due to travel to the UK from warm and sunny Africa on Tuesday. He may be delayed, like so many. I daresay the Offspring will recover from the disappointment as long as Santa finds a way through next Saturday morning. Thankfully, beans on toast and scrambled eggs would not disappoint my three, in the event that supermarket shelves are cleaned out and we miss out on the typical festive fare this year. Though, having said that, the freezing weather ought to ensure nothing actually rots this week - if left on the back step - so I really had better dash (slip and slide) to the stores tomorrow for some meat and vegies... just in case.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is difficult when one is really cold to imagine being really hot. This time last year, in west Africa, we were really hot. It seems like no time ago despite the old clichés about so much happening since etc etc.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There we were in the humid scorching sun (not in it, actually), sweat beading on the brow over breakfast, make-up dripping off, red-faced children begging for water, lathering on the mosquito repellent. While I know that it is a bit of a cheat - reusing old material in a blog - I am going to post the reflections I shared this time last year from Ghana when I wrote home.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Goodness knows it is more interesting than snowball fights, "brush your teeth, no story if you take too long" and pesto pasta for dinner (again)...</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">From Accra - December 2009 - email from Springgirl to her sister</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: 'Segoe UI', Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">"Today t</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-size: x-small;">he Off-Spring were given a big bag of glitter, cardboard, glue and decorating stuff and are having a great time making cards and xmas decorations, some of which now adorn the besser brick wall near the front door of the house. So creative to make something more of the lovely besser. They are being helped by Effe's (maid) son, Elvis, who is 11, but seems younger. Elvis is in Heaven with all this stuff to play with. I just checked on them - they have used up all the glue sticking said decorations to house walls and front door, ie a big old mess for me and Effe to clean off. All the years of "don't draw on walls; never stick things on walls" goes out the window when a couple of local kids think it will look nice. After all, it's not like they ever had the chance to do it before; stick stuff on besser - that is (and by "they" I mean the Offspring as well as Elvis and Ama). Now Effe is out there scrubbing the colour out of the white walls. The colour from the paper has bled into the paint leaving rectangular "frames". Hope Mr Springgirl doesn't lose it when he sees it. Five minutes wiping at it and I was a lather of sweat. The youngest Offspring (3) is now telling Elvis and Ama not to "carry him up". Ghanaian kids are very affectionate and demonstrative and they always try to pick up little kids. The youngest Offspring is trying to explain it so patiently: "I am using words to tell you that I do not want anyone to carry me up."</span><br style="line-height: 17px;" /><br style="line-height: 17px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-size: x-small;">We drove west along the coast to Cape Coast (formerly a massive centre for the slave trade) yesterday. We stopped on the way at a very nice beach for a swim and some lunch. A friend of Mr Offspring has bought into a beach club: pseudo mud huts and lots of palm and coconut trees down to the water. One can camp or stay in the chalets/huts. Some of the new ones look pretty comfy - air con and tv for a start - and new bathrooms, though I saw several cockroaches crawling around outside one. We might go back overnight next week (with insect spray) and use it as a base for more exploring. There is an eco-tourism award winning attraction an hour or two on from there called Kakum which is a forest with a canopy walk. Apparently high up in the trees there are rope and suspension walkways; say 6 storeys up. I would like to see it but the kids may be too small for the adventure just yet. Long way to climb down if they change their minds, though great for the legs after eating one to many fried plantains this week...</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-size: x-small;">Anyway the beach was pretty clean for Ghana, where shortage of bins and cultural insensitivities means that the beach is often polluted with rubbish and the assorted debris of village life; can lids - with serrated and jagged edges, of course - faecal matter, string, assorted fruit skins, cigarettes, papers, plastic bags. The beach club have built a breezy timber restaurant on stilts under which the waves lapping at high tide. The food was ok, all local and fresh, but the views and the breeze were really worth paying for. T</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">he sand of the beach is brownish, so the water is pretty murky, but is is covered in lovely little spiral shells which the Offspring collected by the handful before lunch. I suggested we send some to you. The club has more or less banned the locals from coming inside its perimeter so the club's beach was empty apart from us and a handful of holiday makers staying there. The drama was outside - by the nearby village. We wandered up the beach to watch the village people pulling in their catch of fish in massive nets cast out past the breakers. There were more than 50 people of all ages, singing and pulling up the catch which took a good half an hour. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">The Offspring were captivated. In the end, t</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">here was a pretty good haul - but all small fish -15 cms or less. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> The big international trawlers take the big fish - out on the horizon. But the daily catch would feed the village - and beach club - nicely. And they are all well fed - not fat (although some of the women are definitely plump, perhaps due to too much palm nut oil in the cooking) - but there is no shortage of food here. A little girl of about three picked up shells to add to my handful while we watched the fish dying in the nets. A teenager asked me my age - 27 - and told me my "babies" were "handsome".</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">We loved the beach and our time there so much that we returned after visiting Great Grandma in Cape Coast, for another swim. The water was warm - perhaps 25 degrees, but still refreshing. There was good but gentle surf. We watched the sun set over some hills along the coastline. It is strange to see the sun settling at that angle, but as the coast runs east to west, virtually along the Equator, there is no sun over the water to witness. However, due to the haze and the salt air it was a huge orange disc slowly sinking, while we splashed in the waves one last time; stealing the last safe moments before the mozzies descended at nightfall. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br style="line-height: 17px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-size: x-small;">While driving to the beach we made a list of all the natural resources of Ghana; for the children's benefit mainly (being keen on educating them about the place), but between cocoa, pineapples, rice, yam, fish, goat, cows, chicken, paw paw, citrus fruits, corn, wheat, sugar, coffee, oil, gold and natural gas, not to mention sand for cement (besser!) and rocks for gravel, there is really no reason for anyone to be hungry or poor, and yet they are very poor. It is both humbling and depressing to see how life is still as it was 100 or more years ago for many. No sanitation or running water. They have tvs and phones and Nike shoes but the Government cannot seem to lay roads or run pipes. It is really harsh. The first president - Nkruma - a visionary and nation builder -built the dam that provides most of the electric power, on the Volta River, built roads and universities, got the gold mining tribes organised into companies etc, but while his legacy lives on, much of the infrastructure remains as it was when first established in the 60s. The signs and building at the Dam feel like something out of a 1960's James Bond film. I don't know where the tax and export money is spent. Also there are many people who do very little. A lot of sitting around in the village, waiting for the catch or the next meal or game of football. They are not miserable, by any stretch, but the thing that one sees, coming from the west, is that there is not a sense of initiative or energy. A few small boys could clean up rubbish, even just put a bin out! The men could dig sewers or repair the roads. But why would you bother? It functions ok, after all. They have food, family, faith. Admittedly the road to the beach club is pretty good - I suspect that the owner pays local youths to regravel it every few weeks - but organising work teams to do this on a massive scale seems to be a bridge too far. The wheels of bureacracy turn slowly. The well to do and the returning expats love talking things over. Every conversation involves strategies for change. And with all that besser and cement they could really clean things up. </span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-size: x-small;">I suppose to say so is naive and insensitive. I daresay to impose western mores is just another form of tyranny. Yet, even in the towns there is still a lack of basic amenity. Great Grandma has no toilet. The Offspring used her chamber pot, but as they kept threatening to need to do more than ideally accommodated therin, one's visit is never very long. I have never really asked whether Mr Offspring or his siblings could perhaps have a bathroom installed in the old colonial house for her. I daresay it is moot if there is no actual pipeline infrastructure to attach it to beyond the front door. Another quandry is the use of straw switch brooms. Even here at the family house in Accra, Effe uses a little brush thing to sweep up. It is effective enough, especially with all the dust that accumulates in the dry season, but one has to bend down double. I waltz in from the developed world expecting to use a chux and a broom; all of which are sold up the road at a roadside stall (open 24 hours by candlelight), but the old ways seems to prevail, nevertheless. Sadly the Offspring used the wrong end of the broom to sweep up spilt glitter - or at least move it around some more - such that most of the straw is now lying around the courtyard...</span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-size: x-small;">Reading the history of the place is very interesting. Independence from Britain came in 1957 and yet they really just left a mess behind, in material terms. I think cultuarlly and spiritually the place is very intact and highly functioning, a heady blend of timeless Ghanaian traditions and legacies from colonial times mixed together with modern globalisation. Also like in India the local language and commitment to education, is rich and prized. But is is clear that trade was the key - gold and cocoa and slaves made the Dutch, French, Portuguese and British very wealthy. Indeed, Ghanaian soldiers sent to the East Indies by the Dutch settlers brought back Indonesian craft and batik - a common print now on local cloth. A rich and harsh history.</span></span><br />
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Mr Offspring has gone to the cemetery to attend a memorial for his cousin's mum - they are unveiling the tombstone for close family. On Saturday we will attend a church service and reception at the house for all who knew her - ad in the paper announced it. In Ghana, like much of the developing world, funerals and memorials are a huge to-do. Friday and Saturday are funeral days and anyone who has known you will come. In the villages everyone wears balck and white apart from members of the chief's family. The cheiftancy is noted by the wearing of some sort of red. It is quite spectacular to behold the cloth and the people all walking through the streets dressed up. The men wear toga style cloths over one shoulder. Coffin making is a huge industry, and recession proof. They make very elaborate designs - like sharks, boats and animals - carved into the wood - all local of course. Funerals are very social. A man from up the road died two weeks ago and we could barely pass the house due to the cars clogging the street for the week up to the funeral. I suppose if it keeps the bereaved from thinking too much for a while it is a blessing, but it seemed a little much to expect the widow and kids to be sitting up receiving visitors day and night up to the funeral. But that is how it is done and they expect and are used to it.</span><br style="line-height: 17px;" /><br style="line-height: 17px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-size: x-small;">Today we will drop in on a few friends to say merry xmas and leave some little gifts for the kids. It is so humid that one just wants to jump in a pool most of the day so I will take swimmers in the hope we can do so at some point. Mind you Ghanaian ladies tend not to swim - messes up the hair. </span><br style="line-height: 17px;" /><br style="line-height: 17px;" /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-size: x-small;">I will have to stop for some coffee somewhere as well. Thinking it would be economical and good for the country for me to buy local I bought some ground coffee for the plunger last week at the nearby Lebanese supermarket which is basically a rip off. Anything imported is marked up astronomically. Special K costs $10 for a 350gm box. Pampers (small pack) are $36 - thank Heavens the Offspring are past that stage. The coffee I bought is called "Daniel" and was only $7 as opposed to $24 charged for something recognisable from Italy (expired use by date). But "Daniel" had either gone off for being on the shelf too long or it is just gross, as it tasted like dirt mixed with tanin, flavoured with cordite and dried in a tannery - or as I imagine that would taste. Needless to say I went and bought the american brand next time we were at the store. It's the little things that get you down...</span></span><br />
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Hark, a year on. My Nespresso coffee maker will whir reliably for me tomorrow morning as I look upon sparkling, white, snowy garden outside my window. The Offspring will shiver delightedly in their parkas and wellington boots as we crunch through the snow to the communal garden igloo. Will they remember the glitter, the fishing nets and the chamber pot of Christmas 2009? I hope so.<br />
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So while we have so much and are surrounded by so many who even in the midst of freezing conditions and austerity, will be warm and well-fed next Saturday, it is timely as the year draws to an end, to think of those with very little. While our pipes may threaten to freeze, they will still take the dirty water away and bring fresh to us, reliably, and every day we will fill not only our tummies, but our hearts and minds with riches and plenty.<br />
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But it's cold outside for many.Springgirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15378472317841485642noreply@blogger.com0