Waving

not drowning, although sometimes to be honest, it feels like it!

Apologies, this is going to be one of those posts that some of my readers don't like me writing. Today has not been a good day. The good news, however, is that it's better than last night was. And this evening is definitely better than this morning was.

So, what's wrong I hear you ask? Everything and nothing, I guess. I've been very busy at work and that's made me very tired. The things I've been dealing with have been complex and far from straightforward. At times it's been really hard to see if I'm making any progress at all, or even if what I'm doing has any point.

And life at home hasn't been much easier. Because I've been so busy at work, things have mounted up in the flat. There's been a load of washing winking at me for a few days now, muffled only by the cries of the dirty dishes in the sink to be washed and the pile of clothes that need to be put away. And let's just not go there with the hoovering that needs done!!

On top of all of that I've been feeling the loneliness of being on my own. I realised at the weekend that I don't often just stop and do nothing, and I know why. When I do stop and do nothing I tend to think too much, and that's when I think about being on my own. So being busy keeps my mind distracted, but also leaves me tired, which leaves me low, which gets me to thinking again - vicious circle!

Last night when I was at my lowest ebb I decided what I needed was to break things, throw things, do some damage. And then I remember I'm staying in a rented place with someone else's property. I don't think the landlord would really be very pleased if I broke his crockery and upset his neighbours. Softer options are called for therefore. One of my friends used to have pillow fights to make herself feel better. But pillow fights on your own just don't cut the mustard I've found. So I was back to square one.

Instead I resorted to a good night's sleep, some moping at work and then a busy work schedule to take my mind off things. On the whole I think it's worked - a phone call with a good friend and a visit from another really helped too. It reminds me how lucky I am to have people who care for me, and even if I don't have someone special, I still have people who make me feel special, cared for and loved.

But I still think I should probably start taking my Evening Primrose Oil pills again!

thanks for listening xx

A bit of colour

On a grey and rainy day, it's nice to get a bit of colour into your life.

Homemade greek salad. Several of my 5 a day and pretty too!

Computer says...

As regular readers of this self obsessed little blog will know, today was the day of my first ever organised race. I had been saying 'competitive race' but I stopped doing that because it implied that I thought I had a chance of competing - as in doing something more adventurous than just finishing! Well, it turns out that I did not too badly at all (she says modestly!) While we thought my time was around 57:20 for the 10k based on the finishing time on the clock, the official race time has been posted as 56:44. Of which, as I'm sure you'll guess, I am mightily proud. Apparently that places me 671 out of 779 runners, or 77th out of the 110 other women in my age category. And when you take the age-graded results into account (they were beginning to lose me at this point but I think it's a bit like a golf handicap!), my result was actually in the upper half - although the upper half of what I'm not sure since the winner got 92%.

But maths aside, it was a good result and one I'm very proud of. Also one that I wouldn't have believed myself capable of just a few months ago. I started running when the gym I was a member of closed down. Rather than join another gym that I probably wouldn't go to (the one I was a member of was chosen because it was convenient and it was ladies only), I decided to try my hand - or should that be foot? - at running instead. I started off at 2 miles and with encouragement from a number of friends at work slowly built up from there. The challenge was then laid down to try today's race - the City of Stirling 10k - and to aim for a sub 60 finish time. Both of which I achieved today.

That then got me thinking of the other new things I've achieved this year - of which, as it turns out, there are actually quite a few! So far this year, I've:

- run a 10k in less than an hour
- climbed 7 munros
- learned to tango
- adventured in a foreign country on my own for 2 weeks, including travelling by train across Europe to do it
- relearned how to speak Spanish
- learned a couple of words of Russian
- made new friends
- successfully grown my own crop of cherry tomatoes
- long distance walked on my own
- started writing my first 'book'

And it's only September!

But for now, I'm going to take the rest of today easy, put my feet up, rifle through my DVD collection and find something mindlessly entertaining to watch and perhaps even have a snooze. There's a bottle of bubbles in the fridge for later and a small tuna steak to sear if I can get the energy up. And if I get bored with all of that, I can always watch the men digging up and relaying the street outside the flat. Good on them, hard work in this drizzly wet!

T minus 1 ...

... and counting.

Tomorrow is my first ever 10k race and so I spent today resting and preparing.

I started my preparations with a visit to the beautician for a very relaxing treatment. Followed by coffee, brunch and some gentle shopping. Then it was back home for some internet surfing - with a brief interlude making some soup with what's left in the fridge - before carb loading with homemade vegetable lasagne from the freezer tonight.

The evening has been spent watching my latest addiction, Law & Order and making progress with my current crochet project. I've also been watching the Stephen Hawking documentary on Channel 4. All I can say is, I hope no aliens were watching. Far too many ideas on how to colonise the Earth!

In terms of proper preparation, I did my last training run on Wednesday and managed to crack the 10 minute mile for the first time.

So anyway, off to bed for an early night now. Wish me luck for tomorrow!

Inspired

Well, it's been a long hard week and I'm glad it's the weekend. But the week was definitely lightened by starting my online silliness course on Wednesday. And it has helped me to realise a few things.

I realised that I was so disorganised that I hadn't got any of the supplies in that I needed.
I realised that being silly is both hard and easy.
I realised that letting go is fun.
I realised that I don't have to try to be good at everything.
I realised that the less I try the more I can achieve sometimes.
I realised that I can be creative when I let myself be.
I realised that I should really buy a printer.
I realised that although my mobile phone takes pretty good pictures, a camera is better for detail and colour.
I realised that being silly frees the mind.

And I realised that finding joy (for me) is my responsibility and no-one else's is. I have a pretty good life. My crises aren't (crises). I am exceptionally lucky. I should smile and laugh more.

I'm looking forward to my month of silliness - I'll not bore you with all the details, but every now and again, I'll share my silliness. And if you want to keep up, log on to my Flickr page and check out the Silliness set!

Learning to be silly again

Who'd have thought it would be so hard?

I started my online Silliness course today and these are the results of my first attempt. Not only did I find it really hard to do the exercise - both the upside down bird drawing and colouring, and the word generation - I have also struggled to get the photo to view the right way up! But I guess that actually just adds to the silliness...

I'm not sure I'm very good at being silly - at least not this way. Being such a perfectionist, I struggle and strain to make sure I do the best in everything I do. A friend once asked if there was anything I wasn't good at, having just seen me push myself through hoops to do well at a particular task at work. Well, I guess, this is it!! The harder I tried to get the upside down bird shape right, the worse it got. The more I tried to be delicate and 'artistic' in my colouring, the more clumsy it looked.

But then I stopped and thought. Maybe I was trying too hard. I certainly wasn't having fun, I was stressing out about getting it 'wrong'. And you know what, that really made me laugh! What a twit I can be at times - this is about being silly not being spectacular. There is no right or wrong. There's just fun and, to quote an inspirational friend, finding joy.

So then I just decided to relax and enjoy myself. And as I was colouring in the sky, I found myself thinking about how much I love that light you get just at sunset, when the sky is such a strange mix of colours from fiery red to duck egg blue. I've never been able to capture it in a photograph, and I sure as hell haven't caught it in my colouring on my worksheet today - but in my head and in my heart I have - and that's what counts!

Roll on tomorrow's challenge (well, today's but it will be tomorrow before I get to it) - and definitely roll on the silliness. It's been a long hard day at work, but I've still found something to smile at. Thanks Carla, $25 very well spent already.

Magpie

One for sorrow, two for joy the rhyme tells us. And although I'm not hugely superstitious, until very recently I would get really upsetif I ever saw just one magpie. I would look round desperately for a second one, worrying that if I didn't see another one, that would be mean I was going to have a bad day. And quite often, when a second one didn't appear, my day would suck - of course, reinforcing my superstition about the damn magpies!

I know it's not rational. I know that a cat crossing my path or only seeing one magpie isn't what controls what happens in my day. But I also know, that how you feel about your day has a lot to do with how you will experience it. I'm sure I heard some research reported on the radio just recently about that.

I have an amazing online friend who never fails to impress me by her ability to be happy and to find joy in the tiniest things - even those that most of the rest of us would see as a pain. Her Facebook status today, for example, reads "Taking out the trash and surrounding myself with fun oomph and gusto!! ♥ Happy Wednesday guys! ♥". She always makes me smile, and every time I read something she's written, it challenges me to be happier about what is after all, the pretty straightforward, comfortable, un-angst ridden life I lead. (Another friends tells me I worry way too much, and I think he's probably right!).


So, one thing I've done is sign up for a Silliness course. It starts today and having had a look at today's exercise I'm itching to get started. I think I'm going to have to store the first few up to do over the weekend since I haven't been organised enough to get the supplies in that I need, but I promise to blog some of my silly outputs over the coming few weeks as I work my way through finding fun and laughter on a daily basis.


The other thing I've done is change my mindset about being 'one'. I blogged while I was on holiday about how hard it can sometimes be in a world that seems designed for two, and there's no denying that it can be hard at times. But it's also true that being 'one' isn't in anyway a deficit. 

Being one is being strong. It's being independent. It's being self reliant. It's experiencing more and pushing out of your comfort zone. It's empowering, scarey, thrilling, rewarding. It's liberating too. I can do what I want to do, eat what I want to eat, watch what I want to watch, listen to what I want to listen to, go to bed and get up when I want (well, work notwithstanding!). Yes, I do have to cope with more of the crap by myself, but I also know that I can. And if I want it done a particular way, I don't have to hope that it happens like that, even if it does mean I have to do it myself. 


Don't get me wrong. I would dearly love to have someone special to share stuff with, to help make the good times better and the bad times easier. But I don't need it. I am not 'less than' without someone else. I'd like to be a little bit 'more than' every once in a while too. But for now, I think I'm doing ok. Now, when I see a magpie on its own I don't panic and look for another. I just smile, say hello and think how amazing life as 'one' can be. 

And in truth, although I may not have a special someone around just now - I do have lots of special people in my life who make me feel exceptionally loved. To them I say, thank you from the bottom of my heart. Know that you have helped me find the strength to see the world in this way xx