life stuff – sea.ess.em.jay

Wedding Dreams

No, not like that. I’ve never been the girl who obsessively daydreamed about the perfect white dress, or the exact flowers she wants to see as she prances down the aisle. I’m far more keen on the marriage part of this deal, so let’s put this all aside for now.

But, one thing that has been happening as we talk about and begin to plan the very thing I never thought was for me, is that I am dreaming about it a lot. Here’s what has invaded my slumbering thoughts:

A long, intense dream about having let Reddit users vote for our first dance song. They chose “wiggle wiggle“.
Noticing, as I am signing the register with my now-husband, that he has changed his name, and will from thereon be known as “Master Good Time” and that my surname will become “Good Time”.
Annie Lennox busts out of her chair during the ceremony to sing Thorn in My Side, and ends it off by telling everyone how Dave Stewart is, and always has been, actually a hologram.
I’m getting dressed, all the right people are in the room, we’re chatting, things are great and then I look into the mirror and realise that I’ve shaved my eyebrows off.
I get stuck in traffic on the way back from the wedding, except I am on my own, on a bicycle with one wheel (not a unicycle, an actual wheel is missing), wearing an insane dress, that is NOT the dress I will be wearing, and I’m using my hand to steer, not handlebars.
I turn around during the most important part of the ceremony and everyone is staring at a TV screen, watching a rugby game.
The man I’m marrying takes up calling me “boet” while we’re saying our vows.
I develop chronic ezcema the day before, and all of our photos include me scratching my face.
We post our wedding album to Facebook, as you’re supposed to do in these times, I guess, and Facebook automatically tags our exes in the photos. We are unable to remove the tags, and our pictures are used in a case study in a conference I am attending, three months later.
Instead of wedding programmes, the printing house delivers copies of my teenage diaries to the ceremony, and these are handed out to the gathered friends and family. I don’t know this, until afterwards, when it’s mentioned during speeches.

This is normal anxiety, hey? Hey, at least some of it is funny.

things getting me through this week.

Let’s just pretend that this week is a challenge. And I have not trained, because there is no acceptable training routine for it and no helpful survival tips except “survive it”.

So I’ve turned to a few usual sources to get me through this, head down and propelling myself towards the weekend.

124631_7779 — not exactly this. but hey.

The weekend – why? Usually, my weekends are work time. But this time, not. (and I’m forcing it not to be)> Because we’re doing homely, family stuff this weekend and this makes me happy. Because in the inner recesses of my brain, there’s still a girl who used to do all this stuff alone, and who hadn’t truly shared a home with someone else in a relationship manner, looking forward to a future together, for many, many years. And that girl gets excited when we sit together as a family and plan how we’re going to mix things up a little at home, change some things and recreate our little lovespace. Happiness is a new lounge, or something. I didn’t know this would happen. This is still a surprise to me.

My kid. Because she sets herself life goals and then goes on to achieve them. She ignores obstacles and just carries on, quietly determined. And then she attains her goal and modestly comes to tell me, like an afterthought. She is sometimes anxious, sometimes worries a lot. She is like me. But she has zero doubt in her abilities. She wobbles (we all do), but she has a strong heart and believes that she CAN do the things she sets her heart on. So she does. She teaches me. So much. I had no idea I’d be a mama once. This is still the most exhilarating surprise of my life.

718409_91663976 — I just love this image. Had to use it.

Support. I am not the type to lean, easily. In fact, there are very few people who truly know what’s going on in my head. But I have someone I can just collapse over onto. I can lean. It takes me a long time to lean, but when I do get there, I can lean. Hard. I never knew that I would ever be able to lean. And now when I do lean, it is strong. I never knew I would be able to, one day, lean.

The things I never thought I would never have the opportunity or ability to do, I am doing right now as I type this post. That, right there, reminds me of my purpose. And hells, knowing my purpose, and living it? I did not believe, for the longest time, that I would be able to do this. This is still exciting to me. I am overwhelmed with glee over this.

Learning to say yes. I am on a mission to say yes to things. Last year, I learnt to say no to the things which drained me, which demanded my attention and refused to let me focus. And this year, I am saying yes to new things. I am saying yes to doing stuff that thrills me, inspires me and challenges me. Grateful I can say yes. I just need to teach myself to yes to the right things.

it’s my blog and i’ll ramble if i want to.

Something happened yesterday which led my sister and i to say things along the line of “I don’t want to be a grown up anymore”.

What happened was, someone from my parents’ past, found me online and well, they didn’t know about either of them passing on. It was hard to be the bearer of bad news, especially to someone who admits that my folks were inspirational to him. It’s akin to bearing the burden of having to tell a kid that Santa isn’t real, except way more serious.

I’ve had two reminders of my folks this week. In the swarm and scurry of day-to-day life, it’s hard to always give them a thought but, I do. And in weird and wonderful ways, I am always reminded of my parents on an almost-daily basis. Most of all, I see them in my daughter.

She laughs like my dad did. Heartily, and with all her being. We’ve been having quite a serious discussion, her and I, about genetics and how it comes to be that children inherit some of their features from their parents and other family members. It stems from my remark to her that she bears a startling resemblance, in a number of ways, to my sister. In fact, my daughter looks more like my sister than she does me. Her toes, though, she inherited directly from my dad. The second toe, next to the big one, in our family, is always long, sometimes longer than the big toe itself. She has that, and she gets that from my dad. After our long talk the other night, she quipped:

“You got your daddy’s toes and so did I. And we both got your mommy’s eyes. I wonder who got their fingers?”

She makes me laugh with her little quips and her five-year old logic.

In more of our long discussion about genetics and DNA, and all-sorts, I realised something pretty ginormous. My daughter is growing up. Throwing around words like genetics with ease. And last night, just as I was putting her to bed and we were discussing whether or not she had her dad’s bum or mine, I realised how much my parents would have revelled in this time of her life. How they would have talked, and laughed, and learnt from each other. It made me thankful for the grandparents she does have, who love her, completely, and it made me sad that my folks never truly got the chance to see her as she is now – growing, learning, and so courageous. My mother would absolutely swoon if she could see my daughter ballet dancing across the lounge.

The truth is that I miss them. At a time in my life where I finally feel like I am being the person I always wanted to be, and who they knew I was underneath all the rubbish I spouted as a teenager, I wish they were here to witness it. I wish they were here to witness how Shmooshy is with Cam. I wish wish wish they could see it, for themselves. I wish I could just email them or laugh with them on the telephone. Have lunch and analyse all the world’s problems over dessert.

And then, because I am thoroughly determined to always try to focus on what I have, rather than what I don’t…I remind myself that I have so many things in my life now that I mostly thought were impossible. Love, honesty and a sharpened sense of self. A sense of self-worth that had abandoned me circa 1985 onwards.

Life changes, and with it comes a sea of uncertainties that wash over us like cool water. But, change is good. Change keeps things fresh and it stops us from becoming stagnant. Stagnancy is something to be avoided, at all times.

There’s a definite difference, between stagnating and taking a moment, though. Taking a moment to just enjoy a little moment of life. I’m working on doing more of that this year. Those little moments. Like the ones where my gorgeous child and I play “where did you get your hair from?” or laugh out loud at a Perfect Strangers rerun.

Weirdly, some people view this slower approach to life as laziness. My obstinate refusal to give up taking those moments has led to a little bristling among people I know. My commitment to slowing down, in comparison to gettingeverythingdonerightnowinarush, has shocked a few people.

So I say, to them, this is my caring face. 🙂

(this post turned into a bit of a ramble. apologies)

there’s

there’s something i want to blog about today but, won’t. some of you reading this will have received my texts this morning. thanks for your love in return.

a friend of mine responded with news of a distraction.

it made me think, think about a distraction.

when life gets a little tough and you realise a few things. hard things. big, ugly, heart-falls-out-through-your-arse stuff…

things you can do nothing about…

it’s best to distract yourself.

So. I am today.

With Cameron’s favourite lullaby.

For true.

From Big Bang Theory….

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-Z5wQHGn5g]

and then, weirdly, I found this too (also one of Cam’s favourite lullabies):

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGN3C0758sA&feature=related]