#178
Yesterday's Nice Thing: Meeting up with Janet!
Yesterday was busy - first I ran, then I watched a very boring film... Tinker Tailor... hoenstly it was sooooo boring. I met Janet and we had a nice long walk. Then I cleaned the house. Hoovered and got all the laundry done. Then I went to see Emma and we had a nice long walk.
The holidays are panning out nicely.
It took me an hour to hoover the house - that's how awful it was. The dirt had gone into the carpets and had to be hoovered out with some lethal force. Of course I had to do the usual thing which was empty the bag. Must order more bags now. Am down to the last packet. Then I did the laundry. Well I did that while hoovering. So it was a very super busy day.
After that we went to the Dirty Duck and chilled out there for a very short while. My dearest love and life... honestly, my dearest love and life...
Cleaning the house was also good. It felt like I had finally licked the whole thing. This weekend - from tomorrow onwards, I'll be in the school sorting through things. It is not easy, it really isn't.
And then SINGAPORE!!!!
Our annual trips back are now times when the boys, having done this now, certainly Ghin for the best part of his life, have just become so used to. Singapore is no longer a foreign place. It is our second home. It is also now my second home... which is the reversal for me. However, sometimes when I hear them talk about Singapore, I think it is just as much a home for them as Ireland is a home. In as much as anywhere could be a home because they - I do really think they see the world as their home. Because they have lived so long in another place, because they have friends who come from all over, because - because they embrace change - and I suppose even here we are slightly nomadic, and people come and go all the time from our lives, life is a movable feast. Travelling for them is like air and water - they just do it, there are no questions asked.
We don't go for 'holidays' we go to be in a place. And then if go anywhere else after that - it is an adventure. They are never separated from the people who live there. They eat in the same places, they shop in the same places, they live in the same places, they take public transport. They aren't carted around in a bus... or airconditioned taxi.
It is an incredible time to be alive. Yesterday I thought that - I don't know if life is supposed to get any better... for a small minority of us. Well, the larger minority. People who have access to anything they could possibly need to live and thrive. We always talk about the lack, but really, the true lack is our ability not to see what we have before us. to be filled with vanity and boastfulness and to obtain your identity from ephemera - that is the true lack. But to see past the maya, to what we have, to give thanks for that brief moment in our lives, and to let it go...
It is always so inspiring to speak to Janet - we talked about colleagues and I mentioned how I was going to see Anthony today. And how I had kept in touch with Kevin, and how I have photos of Eddie always popping up at this time of the year... and we swapped news on the people we had kept in touch with and talked about the future. I mentioned my realisation that I would be 70 in twenty years time and she was gobsmacked she would be 70 in nine... we laughed at that. I said to her that everything is just meant to be. It is just meant to be. Good or bad, it was meant to be. Joy and suffering... all meant to be. How are we supposed to be human if we never allow ourselves to be human? If we constantly shield ourselves from the reality of life? If we never rise to a challenge? Life always finds a way you know. If you do not do what you agreed to do with yourself before you were born, then, well - what then? Life will keep on bringing back that lesson to you.
Last night I walked with Emma by the lough. We stopped in Hide 2 then went to see the terns by the side of the Lough. It was a clear, silent evening. Not a breeze. I was even perspiring. We watched the sun slip into the twilight and then the lights come over the waters, sprinkling their reflection over the surface. The ferries pushing in and out of the harbour, leaving the white tops of the waves in their wake. The grassy verges now left to become hay and wildflowers, the ox-eyed daisies and ground elder gleaming like fairy folk in the blue dark. Moths, flitting - coming out to play. Even a rat made an appearance. To Emma's horror. My god, Belfast Lough. Never had I realised how beautiful it was, until now. This is now home.
We sat at the Dirty Duck, just chatting once again. About films and children and travelling. It is good to have good friends, non? To love and support each other, to know that someone has your back. It is a really good feeling.
Today the blackbirds have decided they can no longer wait for the cherries to be ripe and are now eating them in a half cooked state. It can't be good.
I will miss this house. But then, I think that I get older, I miss things less and less. Perhaps the biggest letting go I have already done with my sons, as I watch them remove themselves more and more from my sphere of influence. My moons are becoming planets in their own right. "Show Me Going," they say to me, as they head out. And in many many ways, for the best part of two decades, I have prepared for this moment. This moment when I get to say, I did everything I could for them, everything I could. I did my absolute best and spent as much time as I could. And now - now - well... now they are ready to leave and I have used all time as best I could - spending it well in the currency of love.
So, yes, I miss things less and less because the biggest missing, I have prepared carefully for. I have given them everything, every part of myself, and they will not miss me because I will always be there with them.
Right, time for that run. It is great running - back running. Nothing can ever replace it as an exercise. Being outdoors, listening to the sounds around me, pushing harder or lighter, whatever suits. Then when I return, complete the tidying, sort my art box, draw a bird - yes, you hear me right, draw a bird - a fulmar - Anthony sent me these stunning pictures of birds and it has been so long since I have drawn any birds - my first bird in my bird book - a fulmar. Then after tidying up and drawing, heading to the Dirty Duck again.
What a morning, what a sunrise. What a life.
Yesterday was busy - first I ran, then I watched a very boring film... Tinker Tailor... hoenstly it was sooooo boring. I met Janet and we had a nice long walk. Then I cleaned the house. Hoovered and got all the laundry done. Then I went to see Emma and we had a nice long walk.
The holidays are panning out nicely.
It took me an hour to hoover the house - that's how awful it was. The dirt had gone into the carpets and had to be hoovered out with some lethal force. Of course I had to do the usual thing which was empty the bag. Must order more bags now. Am down to the last packet. Then I did the laundry. Well I did that while hoovering. So it was a very super busy day.
After that we went to the Dirty Duck and chilled out there for a very short while. My dearest love and life... honestly, my dearest love and life...
Cleaning the house was also good. It felt like I had finally licked the whole thing. This weekend - from tomorrow onwards, I'll be in the school sorting through things. It is not easy, it really isn't.
And then SINGAPORE!!!!
Our annual trips back are now times when the boys, having done this now, certainly Ghin for the best part of his life, have just become so used to. Singapore is no longer a foreign place. It is our second home. It is also now my second home... which is the reversal for me. However, sometimes when I hear them talk about Singapore, I think it is just as much a home for them as Ireland is a home. In as much as anywhere could be a home because they - I do really think they see the world as their home. Because they have lived so long in another place, because they have friends who come from all over, because - because they embrace change - and I suppose even here we are slightly nomadic, and people come and go all the time from our lives, life is a movable feast. Travelling for them is like air and water - they just do it, there are no questions asked.
We don't go for 'holidays' we go to be in a place. And then if go anywhere else after that - it is an adventure. They are never separated from the people who live there. They eat in the same places, they shop in the same places, they live in the same places, they take public transport. They aren't carted around in a bus... or airconditioned taxi.
It is an incredible time to be alive. Yesterday I thought that - I don't know if life is supposed to get any better... for a small minority of us. Well, the larger minority. People who have access to anything they could possibly need to live and thrive. We always talk about the lack, but really, the true lack is our ability not to see what we have before us. to be filled with vanity and boastfulness and to obtain your identity from ephemera - that is the true lack. But to see past the maya, to what we have, to give thanks for that brief moment in our lives, and to let it go...
It is always so inspiring to speak to Janet - we talked about colleagues and I mentioned how I was going to see Anthony today. And how I had kept in touch with Kevin, and how I have photos of Eddie always popping up at this time of the year... and we swapped news on the people we had kept in touch with and talked about the future. I mentioned my realisation that I would be 70 in twenty years time and she was gobsmacked she would be 70 in nine... we laughed at that. I said to her that everything is just meant to be. It is just meant to be. Good or bad, it was meant to be. Joy and suffering... all meant to be. How are we supposed to be human if we never allow ourselves to be human? If we constantly shield ourselves from the reality of life? If we never rise to a challenge? Life always finds a way you know. If you do not do what you agreed to do with yourself before you were born, then, well - what then? Life will keep on bringing back that lesson to you.
Last night I walked with Emma by the lough. We stopped in Hide 2 then went to see the terns by the side of the Lough. It was a clear, silent evening. Not a breeze. I was even perspiring. We watched the sun slip into the twilight and then the lights come over the waters, sprinkling their reflection over the surface. The ferries pushing in and out of the harbour, leaving the white tops of the waves in their wake. The grassy verges now left to become hay and wildflowers, the ox-eyed daisies and ground elder gleaming like fairy folk in the blue dark. Moths, flitting - coming out to play. Even a rat made an appearance. To Emma's horror. My god, Belfast Lough. Never had I realised how beautiful it was, until now. This is now home.
We sat at the Dirty Duck, just chatting once again. About films and children and travelling. It is good to have good friends, non? To love and support each other, to know that someone has your back. It is a really good feeling.
Today the blackbirds have decided they can no longer wait for the cherries to be ripe and are now eating them in a half cooked state. It can't be good.
I will miss this house. But then, I think that I get older, I miss things less and less. Perhaps the biggest letting go I have already done with my sons, as I watch them remove themselves more and more from my sphere of influence. My moons are becoming planets in their own right. "Show Me Going," they say to me, as they head out. And in many many ways, for the best part of two decades, I have prepared for this moment. This moment when I get to say, I did everything I could for them, everything I could. I did my absolute best and spent as much time as I could. And now - now - well... now they are ready to leave and I have used all time as best I could - spending it well in the currency of love.
So, yes, I miss things less and less because the biggest missing, I have prepared carefully for. I have given them everything, every part of myself, and they will not miss me because I will always be there with them.
Right, time for that run. It is great running - back running. Nothing can ever replace it as an exercise. Being outdoors, listening to the sounds around me, pushing harder or lighter, whatever suits. Then when I return, complete the tidying, sort my art box, draw a bird - yes, you hear me right, draw a bird - a fulmar - Anthony sent me these stunning pictures of birds and it has been so long since I have drawn any birds - my first bird in my bird book - a fulmar. Then after tidying up and drawing, heading to the Dirty Duck again.
What a morning, what a sunrise. What a life.
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