Weekend Coffee Share 10th January, 2022.

Welcome to Another Weekend Coffee Share!

Well, I am going to launch off the New Year with a huge philosophical question: why do I always leave writing my coffee share posts down to the last second where I’m racing the clock and nearly missing out by a hair’s breadth?

This sums up 2022 so far and may look familiar to friends of Max the Dog.

I don’t know. Indeed, now more than ever, I have no excuse. The air is covid soup out there, and so I’m either at home or walking around in nature, although I must confess I went to the opportunity shop last week albeit wearing a mask and avoiding all human contact because right now we know EVERYONE has the plague, even if they haven’t fully appreciated it themselves. I guess that also includes me, and my cough, but I always have that so it would be hard to know. Although I’m triple vaccinated and take my daily dose of 1000mg vitamin C, I fully expect to KNOW if and when I get covid on account of my crappy lungs.

Anyway, I’ve become so distracted that I’m distracted from my distractions, and even spent two days entering my family history stuff into Wikitree like a woman possessed. To be honest, I can’t really explain it, but there I was populating cyberspace with all these people who were strangely represented by little Lego people in my head and their little Lego city started out as Surry Hills and Paddington in urban Sydney, and spread out over the Blue Mountains to a place called Rylstone near Orange. It’s a place I’ve never heard of before but it was interesting reading the little newspaper clippings I came across about their life out on the farm there, especially after they’d come out from Ireland.

In a sense it’s not surprising that my need for people interaction, family and friends has become rather warped when I’m an extrovert living underground. We just had Christmas at home with the four of us and were even counting the three dogs this year. Yes, that means there were actually seven of us for lunch and almost enough to constitute a “party”. My parents decided not to attend the big family Christmas to be on the safe side, and by the end of me trying to convinced them to go, Dad won out and we stayed away too. I couldn’t be sure our kids didn’t have it, and I didn’t want Dad’s siblings who are mostly over 70 catching it and going down badly.

However, we made our own day, and we razzled things up a bit with a genuine German Gingerbread House from our local German bakery, and we went driving around looking at the Christmas lights. These were people’s houses so mostly they weren’t as spectacular as what Natalie had to share from Toronto, but there were a few houses that really made a valiant effort. Indeed, they were completely over the top in a way that had to be be seen close up to be fully appreciated.

Not only did we cancel attending the big family Christmas, we also cancelled our annual family holiday to Byron Bay to see Geoff’s sister at Nureybar two doors down from Liam Hemsworth btw. We couldn’t be sure that we wouldn’t be taking covid with us and that area is heavily anti-vax and into natural therapies and it really didn’t feel like it was going to be a true holiday. That we’d be having to be so vigilant, we were better off at home. However, we will take a rain check.

So what with going without the big family Christmas and the holiday to Byron Bay, it sounds like we’ll soon be wearing hessian sackcloth and truly going without. Some would say there’s growth and something strangely cleansing about all of this. You know, leading the simple life and all that. I’m not so sure. I get onto that devil of envy Facebook and see friends smiling away and having real holidays. Am I smiling back at them? What you you reckon? I haven’t stayed away from Facebook completely but it’s definitely not my friend right now.

Meanwhile, outside beckons. Not in a pleasant way though. It’s telling me to go for a walk. Exercise. That’s wonderful when I get there. However, it’s rather cosy at home in the air-conditioning and it’s muggy out. You can almost see the steam rising off the lawn. There’s good reason to go into a sort of comatosed limbo right now and wake up in March when it’s not so hot, muggy, and this covid peak they’re promising is gone. I can go into a crowded room of friends again with a mask and smile, hug and drink champagne without keeling over dead.

So, I’m probably not the best entertainment right now. However, I can recommend a good book. I loved reading Amanda Lohrey’s: The Labyrinth, and I’ve started reading Kay Warren’s: Choose Joy. I really should’ve been delving into that, because I’m been choosing to grumble instead. Well, grumble might be understating things a little but you get my drift.

Anyway, Geoff and I have been going on quite a few walks and even a trip to the Mt Penang Parklands, although the photos are still on my phone and in the pipeline, as the saying goes.

Well, I have to admit I’m proud of myself. I’ve been typing like crazy against the clock and thought that my hour was up but I still have 45 minutes to go. Well, of course, I still need to add a few photos and pretty it up a bit. I’ll even add a few links. Gee, you’re going to get all the bells and whistles now when I thought I might need to cut it short and come back later to finish it up.

This means I can now share my top ten songs for transitioning from 2021 to 2022:

Ten Songs To Farewell 2022 & Bring Hope for 2022.

I also shared a few insights into what Christmas 1921 was like after such a strange and challenging couple of years. Of course, we think we’re badly off and the world’s never known anything like this before, even though we’ve all heard of the Spanish Flu Pandemic of 1919 and there was something about two world wars as well. However, why let truth get in the way of a good story? Anyway, I shared a letter English-Australian author Ethel Turner, wrote to Australian children in 1921 and a fundraising drive she organised, while also writing a post setting the political and cultural context. Our 2021 wasn’t so bad after all.

Christmas 1921 with Ethel Turner and the Sunbeamers

Christmas 1921

Anyway, I have vowed to be more organised next week. Actually do my Weekend Coffee Share on the weekend instead of Monday afternoon Sydney time.

Meanwhile, you might like to join us over at the Weekend Coffee Share, which is hosted by Natalie the Explorer https://natalietheexplorer.home.blog/

Best wishes,

Rowena

T – Time Management: Quotes A-Z Challenge.

“The common man is not concerned about the passage

of time, the man of talent is driven by it.”

Schopenhauer

Welcome back to my series of Motivational Quotes for writers and creatives.

I’m currently immersed in researching and writing a collection of biographical short stories ranging along the continuum between fiction and non-fiction. I thought this series of motivational quotes could be a great help to myself and other writers in the same boat who are busting a gut to get that book project done and dusted. However, contrary to my expectations, I’ve been going gang busters on the book and have needed more of a motivational cattle prod to get through the A to Z Challenge…even though I’m finding working on these quotes very informative.

Today, we’re catching up a little and finally reaching the letter T. For today’s quote, I’ve decided to go with time and in particular my dreaded nemesis… Time Management.

I’m addressing time management because so much of what it takes to get that 80,000 word book into print has nothing to do with sticking your head in the clouds and having your feet anywhere but planted on the earth. Yet, for those of us who are creative and very right-brained, dealing with the so-called business side of writing can be a struggle and something we avoid like the plague. Yet, when so many writers are having to juggle paid work, family commitments and the realities of survival, time management is particularly important. It’s the closest we can get to squeezing more hours into a day.

Dealing with distractions is a huge challenge for me. I’m married with two teenage kids, three dogs and we all live life to the full what with work, Church, school. My husband and son are both full on into sailing and our daughter dances upwards of 10 hours per week and has eisteddfods, performances and will be in the school production of Grease. Our son is now a Venturer in Scouts and will be performing in their Gang Show production. Yet, I’ve hunkered down researching and writing this book trying to understand what it’s like to live in any other era but my own. When I put it like this, writing my book seems madness, but most dreams do until they become reality. I need to get this book under my belt. Become a real writer instead of just a gunna-be.

“Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of.”

Benjamin Franklin

However, that all comes at a cost. After all, how on earth do you get those 80,000 plus words into print and manage to do it all? Be more than a face staring at a screen and all your family ever sees is the top of your head? Don’t even talk about friends! What are they? That’s the downside of being 100% focused on what truly is a massive goal.

Speaking of distractions, a mangled tennis ball has just been deposited on my keyboard and Miss Rosie Border Collie x Kelpie dog and her brother, Zac, are waiting. Two pairs of eyes, ears cocked waiting and occasionally editing as the ball strikes the keys.

It’s hard to concentrate.

It’s hard to know if anything is making sense anymore. I’ve been working on the book all day. Managed to walk the dog but still have a ballet shoe to sew up for tomorrow’s dance eisteddfod. I’m needing to divide myself up into such small portions that I’m not sure what’s left when the book demands so much. Can’t the dog just throw the ball to herself?

Are these questions you have also asked yourself somewhere along the way?

How do you find juggling writing your book with the demands of everyday life? Do you have any tips for success or simply surviving til the end? I’d love to hear from you and I’m sure there are many more like me. Please leave your thoughts and links in the comments below.

Best wishes & Good luck,

Rowena

 

Back to the Real World…a new school year.

It was the massive jolt that had to happen. The kids went back to school this week and the dreaded inevitable hit me like a Mac truck, as we switched from Holiday Mode to School Time looking and feeling like the zombie apocalyse.

Waking up at 7.00AM again was brutal. We’ve mastered the sleep-in over the break and while the kids went off on a few camps, I stayed put often staggering out of bed at lunch time, making the most of an empty diary.

While I’m sounding like a human sloth, I’ve actually spent much of the holidays trying to get the kids, house, bedrooms ready for the new school year. In keeping with my belief that we are reborn on January 1st each year, I knew it was entirely possible that we could pull off the seemingly miraculous. That can all be encapsulated in one simple word…ORGANIZED.

Unfortunately, being organized for school isn’t as easy as it seems. It’s not as simple as making sure they have their uniforms, shoes and socks all set out. Of course, they also need the laptop, pen, paper, books, backpack. But that’s not the end of the list either.

“Wait. There’s more!” Since we’re going back to school, I can’t throw in a set of steak knives. That said, school wouldn’t be school without a metaphorical knife in the back, more likely from a friend you’ve loved and trusted, rather than the proverbial bully. Most of us are also pretty good at shooting ourselves in the foot too.

Going back to school is also about a place for everything and everything in it’s place, which means a clean, neat and tidy bedroom…and kitchen table for many of us and some way of making sure the dog doesn’t eat the kids’ homework as well.

That’s just the stuff you need to get sorted before the kids have walked through the gate.

It’s only been a couple of days and all the gumph hasn’t come home yet. This has given me the chance to do what I fully intended to do two years ago when our son started high school. That is, draw up a grid showing the weeks of term on one side and the subjects on the other side. When I’d finished, I printed it out and suddenly my mind went blank. What was I supposed to do with it now? How were the kids supposed to use it? I had no idea. My mind went blank…an empty whiteboard with all of it’s circuits removed.

It was time to phone a friend.

I don’t know about you but how often to you come up with these wizz bang systems but don’t know how to implement them? How to convert dreams/plans into action?

I’m the master. A frequent visitor to organizing stationery shop Kiki K, I have all the tools to plan my week, menu, set goals, and even fly to the moon. Well, that is, if only I could ever get started.

Anyway, the subject grid is now sorted and we’ll write the big assignments and tests in there so we can trouble shoot and plan ahead instead of falling in a screaming heap, which has been our usual modus operandi. With both the kids in high school now, this planning will also help us identify times when they’re both going to be hitting the panic button and we can hopefully prevent a monumental meltdown x 2. After all, each of the kids isn’t living in isolation, but as part of a family and by getting the family machine well greased and in peak fitness, hopefully it will support them. Bring out their best. I feel it’s been holding them back in the past with four individuals coming and going and all sorts of unexpected hazards side swiping us while absorbed in something else.

This brings me onto what is a bit of a swear word around here…time management. How do you help them complete tasks in a timely manner? This has been a real struggle for me and this is what inevitable takes me into Kiki K.

 

Recently, I was put onto a time management system called the Pomodoro Technique. This uses a tomato-shaped timer which you set for 22 minutes and then you focus on one task during this time. If you have an idea about soemthing else during this time, you jot it down on a post it note and keep going on the original task. When the time’s up, you can take a 5 minutes break. After four consecutive sessions, you can take a 20 minutes break. I spoke to my son’s teacher and she said that they basically do this and they call these 5 minutes breaks: “Brain breaks”. I also use a device called a Time Timer, which is a visual clock and shows how much time you have left in red and you can immediately see how much time you have left and can plan accordingly.

Yet, along with all this organization and the home study machine, we still need to have fun. We still need chaos, antics, laughter because we’re not machines.

For better or worse, our dogs are very good distractors, comedy and stress relief while also adding fuel to the fire. Today, Rosie one of our 6 month of Border Collie x Kelpie pups, helped herself to a fluoro pink highlighter out of the pen jar on the kitchen table and chewed the thing to death. There was literally a pool of pink ink on the kitchen floor and splashes of ink on her paws. She was a very naughty girl, but she looked so funny that I had to laugh and photograph the proof.

I also went for a swim at the beach this week and it was so therapeutic just to feel the stress fall off my shoulders and drift far out to sea. Phew! What a relief.

A relief and a reminder that it’s all too easy to get too wound up and perfectionistic about all of this. Being organized is good, but it needs to serve a purpose and there comes a point where you have done enough and it’s time to let go. Step back. How far back, I guess depends on how the kids respond. However, experience to date, has shown the need to keep checking back in and knowing when those deadlines are coming up, even if it;s only to prevent a serious bout of gastro, asthma or the like leading to extended absences and avoidance.

It could also be helpful to reflect on our own less than perfect school days and give the kids a breather. They’re not 40 or 50 something and tackling their high school days for the second time. Rather, they’re teenagers on their first way through who also need to learn from their mistaks and find their own way through. By doing everything for them, it removes responsibility, and doesn’t allow them to think for themselves, which could well have greater long term consequences than a few late assignments.

So, as you can see navigating your way through the whole parent teen study thing is riddled with contradictions, but defintiely worth thinking about and not simply going with the flow to give your children the best chance of doing their best.

I would love to hear any tips you might have as either a parent, teacher or student which may be beneficial.

xx Rowena

 

What It Means To Be Human.

G’Day Humans!

This is Rosie-Roo, Rowena’s adorable and geniously smart puppy dog. I’ve jumped onto her blog to end her interminal screen-gazing. Put her out of her misery. I know she’s always teaching me stuff, and thinks she knows it all, but her brain’s now gone into park, and won’t budge. So, seeing that I’ve now worked out how to pull the string on my toy mouse and make it run all by myself, I figure I’m now ready to step into Bilbo’s paws and  be the brains trust around here. After all, that goes with the territory when you’re the Philosopher’s Dog.

That’s me on the left.

So, here I am paws to the keyboard.

Rewinding to last night, you might’ve already read all Mum’s philosophical, new year ramblings about turning Chaos Central and it’ s inhabitants, into clockwork robots. Have a place for everyting and everything in its place.

Of course, we who know Mum better than she knows herself, know better. We know she drank too much pear cider over the holidays. Was dazzled by the fireworks. It’s all gone to her head, and now she thinks a  new year makes her a new person. That her DNA myseriously changed overnight.

I might only be six months old, but I’m a great observer. Not only that, I’m smart. Scary smart. Only this morning, I learned how to pull the string on my toy mouse, but I’ve been pulled mum’s string a lot longer. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with being creative. However, I’m a working dog, and that means getting on with the task at hand and not writing about it instead.

Anyway, we working dogs are adaptable. I can herd humans, and I can philosophise like a human as well. After all, as you’ve always suspected but have never been able to verify, we dogs can read your minds. Well, at least, that is the more astute of us canines.

Moving forward, I’m going to pick up from Mum’s last post where she concluded: “I am going to be a human being.” Shortly, after signing off there, she quickly typed “What It Means to Be Human” into a new post and went off to bed.

Who did she think she was? Professor Stephen Hawking? Why couldn’t she just be happy with 42 like everyone else, and leave it at that? Why did she feel the need to tackle a question whose answers spread the full length and breadth of the World Wide Web. How did she think she was going to reduce all of that verbosity into 500 words, or even a 1000?

It didn’t take me long to work out Mum was a dreamer, and nothing like a working dog.

 

Anyway, this leaves me to explain what it means to be human.

Firstly, humans are always telling us dogs to “sit”, while I figure all humans do is sit. They need to get out of their chairs. Switch off the TV. Turn off their laptops and mobile phones and walk, Run. Go outside. Smell the roses.

Secondly, humans seriously over-complicate things. We dogs keep it simple. We wear the one coat for life, and we’re always ready to go out. Adventure awaits. None of this hair, makeup, clothes, can’t find my shoes, wallet, phone. I don’t even need a lead, but I did get in trouble last week for what turned out to be a pre-emptive run.

But, while I can be a little critical of the humans and would like to give them some really thorough training, my humans have loved my brother and I unconditionally. We were homeless and had been taken away from our Mum, Dad and sisters and didn’t know what would become of us. Then, Mum and Miss turned up there in the middle of the night to pick us up and gave us a home. We had so much to learn, leaving puddles and piles all over the house and even chewed on the furniture, but they still loved us. Humans have big hearts.

A big heart is mum’s biggest trouble. Of course, she’d like to be uber-organized and have everything running like clockwork, but her heart gets in the way. She cares too much. I also understand that she can’t move around as easily as the other humans and then lets the other humans and us dogs get away with things we shouldn’t. Please don’t tell her that. That can be our little secret.

Well, I don’t know if I’ve answered the question, but I’d appreciate a bit of understanding. This is my first dog, I mean, blog post, and I’m still only a pup.

What do you think makes humans human? Perhaps, you could enlighten Mum!

Love,

Rosie-Roo

PS: In case you’re wondering why I’m called “Rosie-Roo, it’s because the humans reckon I look like a kangaroo. I don’t know why they’d think a dog looks like a kangaroo. Perhaps, poor eyesight and confusion are further aspects of what it means to be human.

The featured image was drawn by my teenaged son many, many moons ago.

G-Gordon River Cruise, Tasmania.

Welcome to Day Seven of the A-Z April Challenge.

Today, we we’re leaving Ferndene in Penguin on Tasmania’s North Coast, and heading South-West to go on a scenic Gordon River Cruise, which will be departing from Strahan on the West Coast.  Strahan is 197.5 KM from Penguin and a 2.3 hour drive.

“THE mighty Gordon River flows pure and clear from its source in Lake Richmond, a deep glacial basin way up on the precipitous eastern slopes of the brooding Mt King William.

It plunges down from the high country in a brawling, tumbling torrent, scouring dark tannins from the boggy buttongrass plains to emerge as black as billy tea.

It plummets in foaming cataracts through limestone gorges so impenetrably deep and dark that the river was once thought to vanish into an abyss of underground tunnels and ferocious chasms no man had ever seen.

In its 172km length, the Gordon is swollen by 25 tributary creeks and rivers as it descends almost 600m through a magnificent uninhabited wilderness of towering forests, ferns and emerald mosses.

On the gently sloping lower ground it becomes a sinuous serpent of a river, broad and ponderous yet powerful enough to carry enormous loads of honey-blonde shingle downstream to form the shallow beds of roaring rapids.

The Gordon has a higher catchment yield than any other Tasmanian river and by the time it reaches the sea at Macquarie Harbour it has drained an area of about 5000 sq km.

Unlike lesser rivers that take the course of least resistance and flow around the massive mountain ranges that block their path, the Gordon rips its way through the Permian rocks of the King William Range, literally splitting them apart.

After torrential rain, its awesome power develops a daunting deepthroated roar that reverberates like the thunder of great guns booming through the mist-muffled silence of the wilderness.

The World Heritage-listed South West Wilderness National Park is one of the wettest regions on earth, with an average annual rainfall in excess of 250cm.

On our journey upstream, though, during a dry spell, the river was as placid as a millpond.

Moving as if asleep, the cold, dark water slid past in majestic silence, its mirror surface broken only by the occasional splash of a startled platypus or the rippled rise of a rainbow trout.

From the moment we entered the river’s broad brown mouth, I confess I was in a state of transcendental bliss…”

– http://www.themercury.com.au/lifestyle/tasweekend-ride-of-a-lifetime-on-the-magnificent-gordon-river/news-story/52011232f20952f6733bbaab0c5bcb56

My apologies.

Before you start getting too comfortable, I have a small confession to make.

We didn’t actually make it to the Gordon River Cruise, even though it was at the top of our Must See List.

Now that we’re back home, that seems like such a travesty. What went wrong? How could we possible miss it? After all, Tasmania isn’t such a big place and even if we didn’t have an itinerary as such, surely we’d at least make sure we crossed off all of the “must-sees”…prioritized.

Apparently not.

Moreover, while I’m on the subject of travel planning, I should mention that my father who is a seasoned, independent global traveller, draws his itinerary up on an excel spreadsheet and almost has the trip planned out down to the second. He has all his accommodation booked ahead…the works. He’s got it all sorted.

On the other hand, we fly by the seat of our pants.

Yet, you could also say that we “travel by feel”. That we sensed where we wanted to go, and if we wanted to linger longer, we could without being held hostage by the plan. Since we were in Tasmania for three weeks, it seemed like we had plenty of time to linger without having to rush and cram everything in. As it turned out, I don’t think you could ever spend enough time in Tassie. It might seem small but its layers run deep.

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Above: Some of the places we DID experience in Tasmania.

Our plans were also governed by our budget and the fact that we could base ourselves with friends in  Devonport for the entire three weeks without paying for accommodation.  We  had packed our tents and fully intended to go camping, which also didn’t happen. With Geoff coming from Scottsdale in the North-East, we were always going to be focused on the North and East coasts and by the time we’d caught up with multiple lots of family and eaten our way as we went, we didn’t get anywhere near the West Coast.

So, I guess we’ll be spending a chunk of time exploring the West Coast the next time we go to Tassie.

Take it from us, Tasmania is never “done”.

What type of traveller are you? A planner or a pantser?

I’d love to find out more about your philosophies on how to travel.

xx Rowena

The featured image was sourced Gordon River Cruises and you can check out their website for further information: http://www.gordonrivercruises.com.au/

 

 

 

Keep Breathing…Friday Fictioneers.

“All my life,” Melissa sighed to her therapist. “I’ve been peering through the keyhole too afraid to live.”

Phillippa was trying hard not to yawn. Dumping clients was hard. Never mentioned the “F” word.  It was all about “finding a better fit”.  Being a “therapy drop out” wasn’t good for their self-esteem.

“Anyway…”

Suddenly, Melissa became strangely animated, even possessed. “I finally attended a writer’s group this week and read one of my poems. Thought I was gunna die. Then, I heard you counting and this other voice saying: “Breathe, Melissa. Breathe. You can do it.”

“It was actually me.”

This has been another contribution to Friday Fictioneers hosted by Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. This week’s image was provided by © Shaktiki Sharma.

This week, I’ve spent a bit of time researching my grandmother who was a concert pianist and I’ve been thinking about that experience I had as a child of almost looking through the keyhole into her adult world. There was definitely a “them” and “us” policy and children should be not seen AND not heard. That suited us and we’d round up change for lollies from the adults and disappear with our stash.

Yet, there were those times I distinctly remember peering into this adult world and watching through that metaphorical keyhole. Nothing quite like being a spy!

By the way, I’d also encourage comments about when therapy doesn’t work and what that was like. Personally, I’m a lousy one for taking action but I’m currently working through that with my physio. Or, should I say, I’m “walking” it out.

Hope you’ve had a great week!

xx Rowena

 

 

Lazarus Returns: Back to School.

We did it!

1. Hair cuts.
2. Uniforms ironed and labelled.
3. New shoes.
4. Lunches made.
5. On time!!!

What an absolute miracle!

How the Day Went…

6.30 AM Alarm.

6.45 AM Out of Bed.

7.45 AM Deposit No. 1 son at High School and take photos.

8.00 AM Start Driving Miss to School.

8.45 AM Arrive at my daughter’s school.

9.30 -11.30 AM Print Photos…just the tip of an enormous ice berg!

12.00 Noon – Had lunch at Gloria Jeans. Writing beat reading. Wrote in journal.

2.00 PM Headed back to school. Traffic not the best.

2.15 PM explore shops next to the school and buy an Apple Crumble Cake for afternoon tea.

3.00 PM School Pick Up.

We successfully made it through their first day of school for 2016.

 

However, it still remains to be seen whether we can keep it up. At the same time, I see myself as a new creation.

New School Year = Clean Slate.

For better or worse, my watch is back on my wrist and I’m back to living to the beat of tick-tock time, instead of meandering well and truly off the grid, which is the real beauty of holidays. Not having to be someone, be somewhere stuck on the proverbial train track. If you have ever read a gorgeous Little Golden Book called Tootle The Train, you’ll now know what I mean.

So, our journey continues…

Tomorrow is another day!

Train Trip: Surry Hills to Gore Hill, Sydney.

A train trip there, requires a train trip home.

To read about the journey there, click here: https://beyondtheflow.wordpress.com/2015/08/19/me-myself-i-writing-a-complex-character-profile/

However, I’m not returning home quite yet. I am yet to get to my doctor’s appointment at Royal North Shore Hospital, which was actually the reason for my trip. Despite star billing, Surry Hills was a detour, not the destination. So typical of me that I get so caught up in the detour, that I almost forget the main event.

There I was wandering along Crown Street, camera round my neck practically photographing anything at all, as though I had somehow transcended time. Meandering in and out of shops and still fully intending to stop off at the Vegan Mary Cafe for my much anticipated Coconut Chai Latte. Popping into the Salvo Store buying a bride doll for my daughter, huge turquoise, chenille bedspread (only $3.00…what a bargain!) and a recipe book from the 1st Series of Masterchef.

Turning into Albion Street, I’m now lugging a huge Ikea bag in addition to my bulky camera gear and writing journals. I look like I’ve been away for a week, not simply on a day trip. That said, how many middle-aged women go away for a week with a bride doll? Not many but I can sort of get away with that. After all, she’s a gift for my daughter.

I knew the sands had been flowing through the hour glass. That it was time for a much needed reality check.

What’s the time Mr Wolf?

Checked my diary. Checked my watch. Yikes!! 3.00 had become 2.30 and suddenly I had 45 minutes to walk to Central, catch a train and lug myself up Gore Hill to the hospital. As much as I love that John Lennon quote: “Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans,” somehow I don’t think the Gastro Specialist would appreciate that. He’d much rather:

“I’m late, I’m late. For a very important date. No time to say “Hello.” Goodbye. I’m late, I’m late, I’m late.”
– Alice in wonderland

Not for the first time, I wished I was Superwoman and could leap tall buildings in a single bound and suddenly get from Surry Hills to Gore Hill as the crow flies, instead of relying on the vagaries of public transport.

Moreover, although Gore Hill mightn’t be Everest, it must be close. I’ve had several near-death experiences tackling that hill heading to appointments and you’ve really got to wonder who decided sick people needed to become mountain climbers to access treatment?!

It wasn’t me.

Gum trees in Albion Street.

So there I am running incredibly late for an appointment, which I’ve had to reschedule 3 times and I really need to get the results of the endoscopy I had a few months ago and yet I’m still in Surry Hills. I still have my camera and there is just too much temptation to ignore. I’m pulling and tugging at the zipper on my camera bag almost ripping the damn thing open to prise out the camera in my desperate haste. I’ve spotted what must be some kind of Supermodel gum tree with incredible white branches soaring upwards into the deep azure sky. The branches almost appeared to be dancing and I was captivated. Mesmerised. Photo opportunity!!! It was like a siren in my head eeeore eeore.

Time stood still for those few precious moments. At least, it did for me!

“I’m late, I’m late. For a very important date. No time to say “Hello.” Goodbye. I’m late, I’m late, I’m late.”
– Alice in wonderland

Humph! I did mention in my previous post that I am both the protagonist and antagonist in my story and as this case in point illustrates so well, I have a brilliant aim when it comes to shooting myself in the foot!

Anyway, my justification for such apparent procrastination was that the doctor kept me waiting for 1.5 hours for my last appointment and is more than likely going to be late again. Being quite the egalitarian, I also feel that if the doctor can run late, so can I. The door swings both ways.

The Clock Tower at Central Station, viewed from Surry Hills.

Fortunately, I manage to get to Central Station in record time and see that a train arrives in 4 minutes but I’ve still got to get down the concourse, up the stairs and somehow still be breathing. I don’t know how I managed to pull it off but I make it with a minute to spare and as I collapse into my seat feeling my heart about to burst through my chest, I notice an elderly lady peering into my bag…the doll. She’s not the only one looking either. There are at least 8 sets of eyes staring in there. Her golden hair is flowing over the edge of the bag and her eyes are closed. She’s so life-like and with her eyes shut, she almost looks dead. Like I’m carrying a small, dead bride in my bag. Call the cops.

The bride doll on the train.

“She’s for my daughter,” I explain.

That seems to satisfy the curious glances. I’m not some crazed mad woman, after all.

Well, I am but they just don’t know it yet.

The Doll Bride.

Anyway, not that I’m on the homeward journey, I need to get back to thinking about character development and getting back to the “book project”. Time to put my ruminations about Surry Hills on hold, as we return to working on character…the protagonist, antagonist….myself.

Soon the train is clattering over the Sydney Harbour Bridge, not that I notice. My heart’s still racing!

I arrive at St Leonard’s Station with just ten minutes to spare. That’s almost possible but I’m not the world’s fastest walker. Indeed, I have a walking stick and it’s more likely to take half an hour. I’m starting to think about catching a taxi but there isn’t a taxi in sight. I’m heading up the hill and spot what could be a shortcut and in my desperation, decide to give it a go. This path doesn’t seem quite so steep and might just save me from a heart attack and a quadruple bypass.

However, this shortcut takes me via a building and if you know anything about how they design hospital buildings, it’s to maximise confusion. They’re always such a maze. Fortunately I see a hospital volunteer I know and she kindly points me to the lift and I’m out. A lift strikes me as a great alternative to climbing Everest. Perhaps this detour wasn’t such a bad idea after all. I was lost but now I’m found but already late.

Onwards and upwards.

Phew! I arrived and there’s a queue at reception.

That’s why I’m late.

xx Rowena

Sunday…A Procrastinator’s Paradise!

If Monday is a day of miraculous change, then Sunday must be the last hurrah…a day of pure, evil self-indulgence and utter procrastination. After all, even if our bad habits have swallowed us up like quick sand, somehow come Monday morning we are supposed to be a new creation, cleansed from all our previous sins…a clean slate. Out with the old and in with the new, even our very DNA changes as fat comes thin, lazy becomes industrious and that book project is miraculously finished.

At least, it will be!

Of course, it all starts off with a bang Monday morning and we’re off and running.

So, with Sunday being our last day of freedom, does that give us some kind of all-day indulgence pass allowing us to have that final, last big fling? To blob out, eat as much chocolate as we can possibly stuff in our gob, carpe vice or simply bask in some procrastinator’s paradise?

This is my idea of a perfect Sunday!

Humph, I’d like to think so but I’m not so sure. Something tells me that if I want tomorrow to go off without a hitch, at least some of the hard work, needs to begin today…especially cleaning up my desk.

However, being Sunday, I’ll turn procrastination into an art form.

That means writing about tomorrow. In other words, Monday.

Mondays are weird. While Sundays are ripe with opportunity and our best intentions including the planning and detailed required to pull our best intentions off (i.e time tables, schedules, lists etc etc etc!!!) Monday becomes something of a “catastrophe”!

Instead of being fueled by Sunday’s zealous enthusiasm, when my alarm goes off Monday morning, I have something akin to a killer hangover. Completely immobile, I keep pressing the snooze button, praying that the kids have dressed and fed themselves and won’t put up a fight. Who am I kidding? Hearing the usual screams, I stagger out into the kitchen feeling like the Grim Reaper possessed me during the night and all that’s left is a ghostly shell.

Every cell in my body aches and I don’t know whether hangover cures work for Mondayitis but anything is worth a shot. Having just enough strength to power up the blender, I throw in the mandatory raw eggs, steak and spinach and even a few nails for added strength and while that’s whirling around I down a glass of Berocca. I’m hoping all that “B-B bounce” will somehow catapult us out the door.

No such luck! The kids aren’t moving. The boot up the backside, cattle prod and even putting Minecraft into time out for eternity aren’t working. Desperate times mean desperate meaures, so I threaten to drop them at the Juvenile Justice Centre just up the hill. Juvenile Justice is not very far from the local pound either. So, if the dog keeps barking at 5.30AM (thank you very much, Lady!), I can drop her off on the way.

Peace and quiet but, of course, I jest!

My goodness! I’m sure all of this strife wasn’t part of the new script?

After all, isn’t this a repeat from last week’s episode?

This Monday was supposed to be different!

“Cut! Didn’t you read the script?”

We definitely need to cut and find a new script every single Monday morning.

Apparently not!

You see, the trouble is that even though this particular Monday morning might be new, the cast of characters and the set are still the same. This being the case, why would I, or indeed any of us, expect this Monday to be any different from any other Monday and have things miraculously work like clockwork?

“It’s just Another Manic Monday”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAZgLcK5LzI

A detour on the way to school on my birthday a few weeks ago.

Unfortunately, real life isn’t a motivational book turned real just in the same way that fairy tales are exactly that…fairy tales. We know fairies are pure fantasy, imagination and wishful thinking. We’d never expect them to come to life. Yet, for some reason we expect the kids to empty the dishwasher unprompted, the chocoholic to become sugar-free, the Minecraft addict to read a book and the house to clean itself just because it’s Monday morning.

Hello!!

Welcome to the real world!

The instant fix just isn’t going to happen.

There is no magic wand. Just persistence, being consistent, putting in the hard yards while having the faith that you can get there.

It apparently takes 6 weeks to break or forge a habit.

That might not be very long if you’re the sort of person who thrives on routine and methodical order but being creative, impulsive and haphazard, six weeks is an eternity.

This means that for any of this to change, I’ll need to be extremely determined.

Not only that.

I’ll need to draw up something of a road map of how I’m going to get there and stick to it. No detours!

So, starting from tomorrow, I will be setting myself a daily schedule. Living by the clock, the “panster” is going to have to become a “planner” or I am never going to get my books written. Finished. Something I know could really work will never happen and while the blog is going well, I’ll just end up being a “wanna be”.

Writing in my journal at Perisher in 2012 while the rest of the family was skiing.

I have never been a wanna be. I’ve mostly gone and done it but I’ve taken too many blows over the last couple of years. I needed a breather. I need to rethink the direction of the book after life events radically changed the plot and sabotaged the entire philosophical thread.

But…

That was a year ago. I’ve had time to rethink. Re-evaluate and create a different, probably more authentic and realistic way of looking at how we handle life’s setbacks. That it isn’t always just onward and upward. That indeed, just when we taste success, the whole mountain can come crumbling down and we’re seemingly back at the start again, buried in a snow and rubble but we still need to pick ourselves up and start over and that is my specialty.

Now, it’s time to become my own coach and motivator. Encourage myself to keep going in the same way that I encourage others and tell them that they “can do it”. That I am good enough.

Also, that I can somehow juggle all the stuff with the family, house etc and get this book done. That there will always be pressing priorities but they can be juggled and pushed aside to pursue what I know is my personal quest. I need to get that book out the door and I need to do it now

.

I need to do that or I know that I am but a bonsai of who I was always meant to be. That this isn’t about dreams or visions but who I am almost as a physical being. Not only writing but being read and getting my journey into a published format is as much a part of each and every cell in my body as my DNA and yet, I freeze.

Paralysis through analysis?

If I just start writing, or indeed, gather up all the writing I’ve already done and compile it, will it all suddenly come together and somehow knit together like a scarf? Become something of a tapestry?

I have to believe that it will.

That I can do this.

I know this isn’t going to be easy but I’m NOT going to analyze things anymore. That would only cause further procrastination.

I need to become who and what I was always intended to be.

Not only a writer but also an author.

A person with that cherished book in their hand with their name on the front page on the cover and and the spine.

No longer a “gunna do” but a “Done it”.

For this reason, tomorrow can’t wait.

Tomorrow begins today…even if it is a Sunday!

How do you manage procrastination and crippling self-doubt on the writing front? What has got you through?

xx Rowena

PS: I let Bilbo have the last word…”I am NOT procrastinating!”



Bilbo with his ball. Actually, that’s another dog’s ball. Humph! Just call him obsessed!

Dong! Dong! Dong! We’re back to the real world.

Getting the kids off to school for the start of another year, is tricky at the best of times. However, when your life is complicated for whatever reason, trying to get your little peoples to school on time with all their paraphernalia on the first day becomes, or at least appears to be, Mt Everest…particularly if “catastrophise” is your middle name.

Of course, to make matters worse there’s always that parent who has literally licked ever hair on their preciously child’s perfect little head in place just to ensure your child looks completely and utterly neglected like some raggamuffin orphan out of Oliver or Annie.

At times like this it’s easy to feel that no one understands that your children, your family and even your precious dogs have indeed been through the spin cycle and haven’t exactly emerged with all the right bits in all the right places and that you’re just thanking your lucky stars that they even got there at all.

Well, actually, things went a lot better than that but that was my concern. After all, this house is where Murphy’s Law, Mrs Murphy’s Law and Rafferty’s Rules all fight it out to the death.

However, it could be worse.

This time last year, I was undergoing chemotherapy to treat my auto-immune disease, dermatomyositis. I can’t even remember how the kids went to and from school on their first day last year but I do know that they soon found their way into before and after school car, which later cut back to after school care and when funding magically cut out after 3 months because, as we all know, parents only get sick for 3 months and then magically resurrect from near-death. Well, that’s how it is in Australia anyway.

Thank goodness for friends because a friend was giving my kids lifts at least two mornings a week all of last year.

Even though the broken foot is still healing and I’m only just back to driving locally, I’ve decided to tackle the new school year head on like a bull charging at a gate and have decided to take responsibility for getting our kids to and from school even though my mobility is far from ideal. I’m walking with my foot in a boot and my mobility is problematic anyway due to muscle weakness. While I am perfectly justified in getting assistance, I wanted to get involved with school again so we can stay with the program.

The kids all dressed and ready for school. It was raining outside so we didn’t get our usual shot at the front door.

The other problem I have when it comes to getting out the door is that the kids almost always ignore me. LIke so many kids, for some reason they completely ignore Mum and resolutely do their own thing, which makes getting them anywhere on time difficult. While you might say that I need to take control and be the parent, I often have trouble with my voice so it can be a struggle to speak. I struggle to move and so it doesn’t take much for the kids to completely out manoevre me and get away with blue murder. This was where having my friend taking them to school was particularly handy because they didn’t want their friends seeing them in their PJs. The Deputy Principal has also told me that she is quite happy to accept the kids in PJs and they know that. They may think they can run rings around me but they know they don’t stand a chance with her and they quickly shape up.

While it is one thing to make all these decisions, which really do fall under the same heading as New Year’s resolutions. They are doomed to fail without any corresponding plan of action and a fairly detailed one at that. The irony with most of these supposedly difficult changes which we struggle to make is that we already know what we need to do. We probably also know how to do it. We just lack the discipline and commitment to see it through. Stick with it. I understand that it takes 6 weeks to change a habit but day one or at least the start of day 1 has exceeded all my expectations.

I have drawn up a daily check list for the kids which is laminated. Every day, they tick off their jobs as they do them and only once they’ve done everything on the last, will they get access to electronic devices. Devices go off at 8.20 and we are in the car and driving off at 8.30 AM. School starts at 8.55AM and school is only a five minute drive and so they get in plenty of play time with their friends before school.

The funny thing about the check list is that the same kids who were protesting to do the dishwasher, never make their beds and forget to brush their teeth in the mornings did all of these tasks without nagging or complaint. It’s a miracle worker and I’ve known the check list is a miracle worker and yet I keep forgetting to update it. This means it’s been about 2 years since we last used it and believe me, there has been a lot of angst and heartache in between.

Quite simply, I do a list up of everything the kids need to do before school and their afternoon/evening routines and then have a tick column for each day of the week. In the past, I’ve printed a list our for each week and pasted it in a book but laminating the list means they can tick it with a whiteboard marker and you can wipe it clean each week and start over. I have used a bit of colour, highlighting important times like leaving for school and I have also included a row for after school activities so they know what they have on as well. They are about to turn 11 and 9 so should be fairly self-reliant and not be needing constant reminders from Mum and Dad anymore.I am particularly conscious that our son starts high school next year and really needs to get organised now in advance.

Just because Mum’s the papparazzi, that’s no reason the kids have to pose like supermodels. I was very lucky to squeeze a second shot out of my son and they refused to interact, relax and insisted on this kangaroo stunned by the headlights look.

I am quite thrilled that everything went almost too smoothly and that we pulled out of the driveway right on 8.30 as planned and I was back here sitting at my desk at by 9.00 AM armed with my special cup of tea and home made Banana Macadamia & Blueberry Muffin.

A relaxing cup of tea and home-made banana muffin after dropping the kids at school early.

“You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me”.

-C.S. Lewis

However, to be perfectly honest, the early morning start has been a bit of a doozy so I think I might just nip back to bed for a little Nanna Nap. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned before that I’ve somehow ended up on Western Australian time, which is 3 hours behind Sydney and what with the holidays and all, have been staying up way too late and sleeping in and I’m pretty sure Geoff has been hanging out for this morning when the night owl was needing to surface at 6.30AM and get back to the human race.

Dogs sleeping under my desk. While the rest of us have had to get back to the real world, the dogs are on a perpetual holiday.

As we all know, Rome wasn’t built in a day.

Please wish us luck and for anybody experiencing the terrible snow storms, we are thinking of you and praying that you are safe and sound.

xx Rowena