If A is for Average, then I apply

Average Intelligence, actual size

Always in the middle,

A little bit little

A part of the adage

of less is more

Abstemious, accountable

agreeable, affable

An A is an A,

First in the Alphabet,

A good way to start

and a good place to stay...

Amazing....

I realised yesterday that I had a special anniversary - I joined Oprah Community two years ago. I have not been able to blog at all for over a month due to a health problem that required acupuncture, and the episode has left me unable to sit still or lie down for long. It puts a perspective on one's life, to be reliant on a weekly physiotherapy session which leaves one more sore after treatment. Thankfully I am getting a good night's sleep and my privileges back. I was still able to go to work, and thus the discomfort only put paid to my more sedentary activities. The pain of a pinched nerve is overwhelming and any little pinched reminder now puts my mind in a spin that it may return, thus my blog tonight will be brief.

My family at home has been reduced to the menfolk, a husband, son and father. They are great, and I am fortunate to enjoy their company. We do have the dogs and the cat in my Avatar to make us less than smug. They are childlike and for this I am thankful. I am needed. I am of course needy because my daughter is away from home. It it not easy to describe, because like the book says, we all need our space and must not cling to one another. I do cling to my imaginings. I am not needy, I am not needed, but one thing I do know is about needles.

They are gently invasive and if used correctly they can heal, and soothe. Incorrectly used, they cause dependency, pain and deep internal suffering.

Needless to say, this too shall pass.

Take care, love from Eve

I enjoy being a woman, and especially the nurturing achieving kind. Mostly I am a "stick in the mud doing my duty" kind of person, because when I am being useful I can keep the lid on my darker thoughts. I know that depression is not a word to over use, and it should only apply when there is a treatable condition. I suffer with the more common condition of depression where a devastatingly sad piece of news or a life wrenching movie will throw me off the wire.

It is a delicate balancing act, to be the kind of person we think we should be. I try to go to bed at night with a clear mind with all the "i's" dotted and the "t's" crossed. I have been my own counsellor, because of wise words my mother left me, almost cliched now. Her wise words now are shrugged off by the new generation of "do whatever you want, it is your life". "Let go of the children, they are on loan."

My mother was not entirely right in her wisdom, things she wanted for herself and was denied through lack of opportunities I tried to give my daughter. I am the one in the middle, nobody listens to what I want. If I had been offered the higher education, where would I be now.I feel deserted by both my late mother and my daughter. My mother said a daughter never leaves you, yeah right. I must have been an exceptional daughter (well nobody really knows me, so at least I can give me that pat on the back without being too immodest). My better half and I are family oriented, but for all that there is not much family left to nuture. Hopefully it is only a phase and we will stop working so hard and have some fun ourselves.

I am a sensitive person so this empty nest syndrome is not going down well. I thought my busy life would not let me fall into the trap of feeling lonely and deserted when a child of mine left home. All my frugal training and self denial of the frivolous shopping for me has done me no good. I have spent so much time and energy on a child with poor coping skills that I would have thought her healing would have brought a sense of satisfaction and a readiness to send her to a new life with her partner. The change of life for me could not have come at a worse time....

Dear Diary, this is not a good time for me. I am not behaving admirably. She has gone too soon. There was no period of courting, just the four months and goodbye, see you at Christmas. Now it seems that may not be possible. After all, a new life, love and career needs a lot of work. She does not send me messages and I have to initiate the calls and the emails. She is okay, and I must get a life or counselling according to her. She is lovingly reassuring but very distant.

For me it is should now be the time of slowing down. After so many jump-starts and delays in her life, she seems to have got it right this time. As I pick up the pieces of the life I used to have, it is like an old jersey full of holes. I have lost a part of it and I don't feel like wearing it again. I do not want to repair it or even wash it. I have lost the will to do the things that mattered so much.

We have been through a long winter, and the economy is rattlng everyone. I am not happy for losing the one job that at least made the most sense to me.

Being a mother is not easy, not being needed as a mother is far worse.

I am going to take a few days leave and take some photos of the signs of Spring around me. I hope that my role in life becomes a bit more newly defined soon as this is a transition period I am not enjoying at all. I do not like my mood swings and my grieving for a little bird who has flown the nest.

She deserves every happiness and I am not helping one bit. I am going to grow up now. I still have a houseful of people who are loving, funny and reliable. The sun is going to come out tomorrow and there is always hope of a visit.

Take care,

Love from Eve

Picture a child's first drawing of her home

and marvel at the sense of belonging.

Her little hearts and trees and birds

and the family with animals included.

Those tentative lines and squiggles showed

All that was important on a small straight road

My mother always said these would be the best days of my life?

With the broken sleep, the irregular hours and the disruption

The constant demands for undivided attention

and the fretting for lack of financial retention

In all of the struggles these still were the best of days

with lots of loving and hugging

of security and angst served with a breath of heaven...

Nothing to replace a child's enquiring mind

and those nights shared under the stars

of giggling at sillies relieving the tension

of a future unfolding with questioned apprehension.

When the news was bad we closed the circle

and took refuge in the family bond

that was as strong as iron forged on a fire of love

The beauty of innocence can be destroyed with disappoinment

But from each setback a valuable lesson is learned

Until we can teach the children no more

Then suddenly it is time for them to take a step on the road

further than their parents ever travelled

And thus it is time to let go

All that is taught we now must remember

as they blow a kiss to the folks at home

It is a job well done to accept the leaving

They are not ours, just on loan

The traces of their presence are imprinted on my heart

Gone in the flesh but never truly apart

How could I ever forget such a wonderful start......

Eve

I had a very interesting discussion with a muslim friend the other day. The fact we even have discussions is amazing, as I am a westernized female, married and financially enabled (I work for a living lol). He is an amazingly interesting person and his arguments about the problems in the world at large are incredibly perceptive. We have mulled over why a debt should be repaid with interest, why we cannot learn from the mistakes of history, why there is a need for wars and how information in his holy book is repeated in the book I follow and this information already made known sometimes borders on plaigiarism in some student's theses.

I am old enough to be his mother and his discussions are sometimes dictative, sometimes questioning. I admire his need to know what makes our minds tick. He borders on fanaticism for his beliefs and yet somehow doesn't mind if I chide or tease him gently for being almost overly zealous about things we cannot change.

What we do most agree on is the world needs a leader who can overcome the natural greed of man that cannot ever see how this is destroying lives and making no sense to those who wish to live in peace. If we could reach some form of commonality in our beliefs, then we would go a long way to solving some of the incredibly destructive lifestyles of those in power. We could share out all the bountiful gifts of the earth in an ethnic and compassionate, selfless manner, spreading love instead of hate.

Wars start through misinformation. We are so fortunate to live in the age of communication and instant news that spreads around the world like wildfire. One of my interests noted on Facebook is "breaking news", something I inherited from my dear late mother. How she would enjoy the media and the quick access to all corners of the world. She firmly believed all evils and illnesses in the world came from man and mostly from laboratories. Although in a sense she was God -fearing, she did believe however that a lot of the information age was witheld from us until we as a species became more able to understand and utilise such information. It seems as if into each generation a more cleverer or enabled youth is born.

I have mulled this over before, is it because our DNA is programmed to release more intelligence with each generation born. Is that why we roamed the earth in our infancy as cavemen with our only source of power the fire we could burn for protection not so many thousand years ago. How far I wonder are we in the quest to find the answers.

All of this is incredibly fascinating, especially as my muslim friend reassures me that the information we are now discovering was already noted by the muslims centuries ago.

I think that our teens are a very laid back bunch, sleeping in after a long night out and not showing any real urgency about discovering the world and the history that reveals itself if we are prepared to study the subject. Yet if we had a long discussion with them or spent an hour in their company we could find they have much more knowledge of where they are going than we can ever imagine. They have the information age at their fingertips thanks to the internet and the news centres in strategic places around the world.

What we both wondered however is how much time could be saved if we learned from the mistakes that history shows is continually repeated and then how we could move forward so much faster into a period of lasting peace.

It is possible, just as I am able to speak to someone of another culture and we find how much we actually have in common. A deep love for humanity and an incredible sadness when it all goes wrong.

Take care,

love from Eve

So sad in my little part of Paradise. The news is not good. A young woman of 19 lost her life yesterday whilst walking her dog. A taxi swerved onto the pavement after colliding with a car and knocked her over. The driver of the car is 15, and his victim was only 19. I am so disturbed that I feel completely irritated and out of sorts with the daily grind. In addition to this tradegy, we heard of another fatality to the swine flu, this time very close to home, also a young person.

What is happening to the world, when young people succumb without living their lives fully. My own dear daughter is leaving home again.

I wrote her a letter that I will not give to her. I am so worried about her as she is not fully functional due to her ongoing problem with a major depressive disorder. The letter detailed all the things that make me believe she is not ready to leave home and cope in the real world.

What is the real world? Plenty of work, responsibility, time-tables and the constant round of eating, deciding what to wear, and self assessment of whether or not we got it right. The vicious cycle of needing money and skills in order to survive.

She is back to basics of course. Without love nothing makes any sense, even getting out of bed in the morning is a heavy task. As I reflected on the events of the past week, I cannot deny her the right to be happy. Life is too short.

I want her to accomplish so much for her own self worth. She believes she can do all of this when she leaves home. I could not find a thread on this board to write down my questions about my child leaving home when she appears to be so unprepared.

How do I let go again?? Will she be okay...... She has a devoted partner who is willing to take her away with him to his family and a new job. They are both so young and have very little money. Just the stars in each others eyes and the will to succeed together. I have no right to hold her back.

I am going to pay for all her medical costs while she once again takes a big step into the real world. It is so very hard to know what is right.

I wlll let go again with grace. My own life will not be better for it, but there is the hope she will return, at least I have that.

Take good care, love from Eve

I was taught many years ago about undying love not separating us from things below nor things above. I was also taught that we must do unto others as we would be done by as strict religious mantra. What we are taught therefore is if we do something that does not match up to someone else's expectations we will be dammed into a pit for the rest of our lives. This pit is a euphemism for ostacism and condemnation.

This is a constant source of angst, when we feel beholden to other people's opinions and reactions to our own actions. So often we are misunderstood, rightly or most often, wrongly.

The ghosts and demons we are taught to fear are usually other people and the words they can use to discredit us with and sew complete mischief into the tapestry of our lives.

Why I am on this topic is because of the misery caused in our lives by a person who should have been a pinnacle of society. His very actions condemmed my daughter into a shadow of herself, shunned and ostracised by her peers and the community and not least of all the school where this man was a teacher.

Not everybody who know the full story took this action. The people with compassionate hearts who too had perhaps witnessed human fallibility or used the lessons of a truly ethical faith, which took nothing and gave all, understood how she had been abused and broken.

Years have passed and we have been cautiously optimistic that the therapy and medication are helping her to mend. She sleeps better than when she was at the university where even after four years, the flashbacks came back and tormented her with a vengeance. She smiles more, and every day even though sleeping for the best part, when awake she would partake in family activities.

No matter that the year started badly, she reassures me she learnt how to socialise with people and make new friends in the three months away from home. Notwithstanding the tablet episode at the unniversity, we believe she is making progress.

Healing is in the form of a new love, a young man who is devoted to her. She quietly explained her ordeal to him and the cause of her pain and loss of standing in the community. If one can truly believe, he is the next best to an Angel, for he takes no pleasure in condemming her ordeal, nor the barbs of his "friends" who can dredge up this story that was played down as much as possible in the early years whilst she was in the recovery phase. Why would one want to carry on the story if not to cause unhappiness to this entire family who have so willingly forgiven the perpetrator and his family and those who do not understand the cirumstances. Do we not deserve to move forward?

I am on the Neighbourhood Watch team, sending out warnings of criminals lurking in the vicinity and caring for the wellbeing of folks who would enjoy spreading gossip about my child and ruining her life further. I am confused with those who would pull up their noses at the "sins" of others that they do not bother to understand nor take action to prevent it happening again. We had a personal attack on our family in what was supposed to be the safest place for her, and yet the recogniseable criminals are the only demons we can fight? People do need to take the plank out of their own eyes before they comment on alleged splinters in others eyes.

Yes, she wrote a book. We have a web-page dedicated to her ordeal. I campaign constantly like a small thistle in the wind for a change in laws to prevent this type of abuse happening to our girls at school and in all walks of life.

This August is Women's Month in my country. My very fearless premier has spoken out against the abuse these girls endure before the age of 20. There is so much more awareness of the huge problem that has largely gone undetected in the bigger picture of a young democracy.

I do not agree with a gender campaign. I do however believe that the demons that walk amongst us are real people, alive and well and with agendas to cause as much mischief as possible. They are not always dressed a vagabonds, they are respectable and intelligent. We need to be vigilant and not take everything at face-value. They can be our leaders, role-models and teachers. Family members can also betray our values.

If I had been taught that in Church, a lot of what happened to my daughter could have been avoided.

There are Angels alive and among us too. We are blessed to have met one. The Healing will continue.

Take care, love from Eve

Wise words, those. I always favour a happy ending. In fact I pray all the time for the corners to match and the flowers to bloom. No doubt about it, after Winter follows Spring.

We are thankfully enjoying a beautiful winter's day, Saturday 25th July 2009.

We are five months away from Christmas. We have signs of Spring all around us, even if there is a chilly wind blowing from the southern ocean. The Hadeda Ibis's are pairing off and feeding in our rain soaked gardens. This is a piece of heaven, until these loud birds wake us up with their shrill cries of "go awaaaa". One of these birds feeds in our garden with our bemused cat watching. The bird is bigger than her. I suspect the visitor to the garden this year is last year's fledgling who was taught to feed in the soft soil before being abandoned to find it's own way home. Exciting times loom with all the new births pending in nature around us. Even the whales will be giving birth in the sanctuary of our Bay soon.

As for the curveball, wow, it seems as if Michael Jackson has a 25 year old son, for whom he was paying maintenance. Somehow that puts a new perspective on everything. For his younger siblings that is fantastic news. They have an older brother to shield them and lead them on into the new life without Michael. I am thrilled at the news. Let the healing from his passing begin.

Have a lovely weekend.

Eve