In the planning and memory making business…..

Life sometimes seems like it’s got two sides ‘feeling entirely blessed’ and ‘first world problems’. Not a bad place to be if you can get the balance right.

What am I talking about you may think my invisible reader (if you exist). As I am convinced only those who are with me on any of these memories ever read this ( and then only if forced), they do it mostly to check that I didn’t include anything cringe worthy in our episodes. Plus those fellow bloggers who are growing their audiences (although I don’t think they read it, just automatically like to increase their return followers – now don’t shoot me bloggers I think that’s entirely fine, it’s just my memory blog and I am definitely a novice blogger).

But as usual I digress, back to the life thingy.

For context I am sitting on this sunny (unusual for up North) Sunday morning thinking, after everything that is (C-19) these days, you have to stop and reflect on what you have today rather than what you expect out of life.

Each year I hope I am growing in my understanding of me, which is based on experience (good & bad) and self reflection. For instance I know how much I enjoy planning even if the event or task never happens. Also the reliving moments/memories (as I do here on the novice blog) is almost as important as the event itself.

While some of my life tribe are more reserved about being on camera, (they know who they are. – not that they read this blog) others don’t take much interest and just go with it. After all what would the memories be without them and I love them for it.

Afternoon get together….

At this point I find that the ‘feeling blessed’ is sitting in our ‘she shed’ Sunday morning with ‘Girl Cat’ and Hound’ snoozing. I am organising the days and weeks ahead, looking over the recent weeks photos, contemplating how blessed. At this moment I am watching a Whats App conversation with some of the Thursday Girls talking excitedly about our lovely lady JZ who will be marrying her beloved fella next week.

Unfortunately I will not be there as I am going away but love that life is joyful among the mess. Lady JZ is inspirational to me, the way she sees life. Demonstrating it through her wisdom, humour, love and view of life she is truly a blessing to the world. Lady JZ never had relationships she had/has love affairs. Next week she marries her true love affair Lord L and I will be praying for special memories on the day and their life ahead.

Coy and beautiful lady, social distance memory

Some of the Thursday Girls Club hat display at the garden Hen Doo

Before my invisible reader thinks my life is untroubled, they should be aware, there are always valleys /troubles in everyone’s worlds and they do eat away my happy thoughts (when I let them – a moment by moment battle some days). My Work, my family that is affected abroad and at home by Lockdown all means we are waiting for answers to prayers, who isn’t?

Jason Mraz says it like this…..have a look and importantly listen to this song.

So while my troubles are difficult they could be called ‘first world problems’ or so Number Two Son explained to me.

Funny when stuff happens to others perspectives are easy to see, but when it’s our own, troubles seem insurmountable, unless that is, you can balance them with your blessings and right side thinking.

So I am counting my blessings today using my grateful list compiled below of today …. (Not everything but you get the gist)

@Memories from recent weeks

@Booking a van trip with Lady D to explore the Cotswold

@Getting to say goodbye yesterday, at a garden gathering to two of the loviest people my Pastor and his wife, off on a new venture of their own

.

Forever grateful to P & W for their support during some very sad times. God Bless them both.

@Organised a possible project in the house….. (well maybe)

@Had Lord S call on for his lunch and test out a leisure battery on the van in readiness for our up and coming trip.

@being Relaxed in the She Shed, with the house team.

@And to finish off the day I will be going back to church tonight to welcome our new Pastor and his wife.

As I reflect that ‘life goes on’ no matter what, and that blessed are those who have hope for tomorrow and live in the gifts of today. I have got to say I am trying my best.

Sometimes you got just remind yourself of what is important. Pity I can be a bad student some days.

Thanks to Pinterest.

Fire pits, Strawberry Daiquiri and Pimms (including cucumber?)…..

Never trust any complicated cocktail that remains perfectly clear until the last ingredient goes in, and then immediately clouds.
Terry Prachett

I have 3 friends who are blessed with the same name as myself (well technically one is a real Jill, but that only confuses everyone). Like all my friends they are completely different from each other but amazingly the same in the things that matter to friendships. One of the same things is that no matter how long, how far away from each other we have been, or what has happened to us in the intervening time we still get together as if only one day has gone by.

Friday night was a catch up with two Ladies Gs, who love to party and entertain. So an invite to Lady G’s house included the promise of cocktails and a sit around her newly purchased fire pit. Lady G is no wilderness girl she likes her comfort but the fire pit offers a nice feel to the end of a warm summers day and protects against the coldness of the northern nights, perfectly. Lady G had been busy making cocktails and unusually for her she has followed the recipe for Pimms to the letter, which meant including cucumber!!! Which we all agreed was…….now what was the word we had ??? Ah yes ……. YUK! So lessons learnt stick to “no veg in the drink rule” (is cucumber a veg?).

Between the giggles, drinks and funny photo taking (which can never be seen in public) we caught up on our lives, hopes, fears and dreams. If ever you need to remember why friends are important you just need a catch up time with them but (as we learnt) minus the cucumber!………

Graduating in life….

A graduation ceremony is an event where the commencement speaker tells thousands of students dressed in identical caps and gowns that ‘individuality’ is the key to success.
Robert Orben

Turning 50 last year changed very little, in fact it just legitimised some of the behaviours I couldn’t blame on being blonde, instead I got to put it down to age too.

I think the age thing didn’t matter to me, because unlike much older people in society I am still seen, by both my community and world. Because there comes a time when I will not be, old age tends to be seen as getting in the way, respect is hard earned and easily lost in a young persons world – if you don’t think so ask a pensioner.

For now I fend of that time by appreciating my life. And I am doing OK too, yesterday I graduated and got a MBA at Newcastle University, a old well respected university, full of history (including Martin L King!).

Not going to university never bothered me, other than I had fancied being a irresponsible student, so I never hankered over graduating, so here I was actually not looking forward to the ceremony. I felt too old for what I considered a experience meant for a younger person. But as I had been lucky enough to get a scholarship and I had enjoyed every minute of the two year course, including the moaning of assignment and deadlines, I was always going to be there, even it was just to say thank you and goodbye to some of the pretty awesome people I met along the way. From the course director who offered me the scholarship giving me a day to say yes! The good Lecturers, some very supportive (and some not so much), my very interesting mentor Peter Shaw who writes great spiritual leadership books and finally, but very importantly, my fabulous class mates. All younger than me, some by a year, most by 7/8yrs and more, but all clever, fun and generous people.

Sitting in the regal Kings Hall I glanced up and spotted a portrait of my Chairwoman Lady O watching over me (having recently resigned from being Chair of the Uni herself)this made me smile as I remembered how worried I was about who would come with me to this ceremony. Both my sons would be away, could I coax friends into sitting in a place which is usually occupied by proud parents? There were people I would love to have been there, including my own parents but couldn’t be, but I am blessed by having incredible friends and son number 2 is now back. So in the end I was wonderfully supported by Lady L and BB who made sure I got spoilt, and the New York Boys who sampled the free Cava several times a hour!!

The day turned out to be a graduation in more ways for me, not because I got the certificate (no t-shirts, which I think is a mistake in this modern world), or the chance to add 3 extra letters after my name but because I remembered what I had been taught about being a real person (the stuff you don’t get certificates for).
My parents were proud of me even without a degree, they knew that pride in others is for other things, such as treating people with respect and compassion, seeing needs and helping them fulfil them, making them feel special, showing you love them for who they are and not expecting them to change to suit you, knowing my own worth and ultimately being honest with myself and others even if at the time it hurts.

So as I appreciated the happy times of being with my classmates, the hours spent learning topics and sharing tales of their lives, their pitfall and triumphs, all different and hopeful, I vowed I would practice the things my first educators ( my mum and dad) taught me.

I know real education doesn’t begin and end in school, it starts when we first learn to breathe and ends when our body takes its last breath. What happens in between is the real education and it only works if we listen and apply what we think at the time is the right learning. Unfortunately with these lessons we can never be sure whether it’s a pass or fail, we just have to wait to get the final graduation. No guarantees, in fact the only thing for sure is that it will sometimes feel like a hard slog, and there will be scars gained to prove you were in attendance and that you tried your best even if your best wasn’t good enough…….

God will not look you over for medals, degrees or diplomas, but for scars.
Elbert Hubbard

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What do you do about disappointment?….

disappointed

Adjective
1) (of a person) Sad or displeased because someone or something has failed to fulfill one’s hopes or expectations.
2) (of hopes or expectations) Prevented from being realized.
(Source online dictionary)

Growing up/old never seems to get easier and all too often I find that disappointment (or as I see it, Mr Disappointment – as in my imagination I see disappointment as man, a dour looking bloke in a shabby trench coat) who arrives just when you are getting used to thinking things are settled in your life.

Mr Disappointment hadn’t been so pushy when I was little. Back then he was just a fleeting shadow, whenever I missed a favourite TV programme or a friend couldn’t come out to play, he never stayed with me for any length of time. As I grew into my teens I found he made more appearances but again just for short periods.

Then as I grew older I found I could bring him into my life very simply by expecting too much of anything or anyone including myself, at times he seemed like a constant companion. I have qualify my disappointments tended focus inwardly more as I got older on how I disappointed myself by failing to do things right. I started to learn people and things that I attached too much to was futile. The measure (my measure) on what I thought should happen or who someone should be was just a big neon sign saying to Mr Disappointment “come on in”. In truth not setting this measure is hard but harder when you try to not apply it to yourself. Other people I can come to my senses and realise I expected too much. But me and my inabilities to manage me or situations well thats another story, disappointment in myself well there’s a battle that rages more than I would like to admit.

Having talked to a young lady this week about the challenges young people face, we spoke a lot about how the young men in her circle often talked about how they don’t want to fail, but of course we all do. I had jumped initialy to the assumption it was more in her generation, (because they are a achievement driven culture – they all want to be the best and quickly). But then I came to realise fear of failure and disappointment is everywhere – age doesn’t always help.

It wouldn’t be so bad but most of what doesn’t go right in our life is not within our gift to avoid or fix, eg the recession, jobs, loco bosses, our health.

On a day when I can say I seen Mr Disappointment up close and personal, for me and others. I wonder just how long he plans to stay this time. And what is my strategy to give him the slip. This I strategise is managed by finding perspective, my disappointment at a flight cancelled was minimum, seeing my friend lose out the chance of a break might not be entirely fixable but we could still spend time on a adventure. Listening to another friend who has family concerns is a wake up call that Mr Disappointment needs to be educated that he can only stay as long as I will allow. My response to him matters and if I get busy and consider whether I can be any help to someone else (usually I miss this but I try) he fades away.

Mr Disappointment can mess up everything and take away time better spent elsewhere. Surely Life wasn’t meant to allow him free reign so why should I. Maybe he can be kept as a fleeting shadow, if I keep my expectations reasonable but flexible, I keep my perspective right and I get on with life. Accepting life is a series of ups and downs is harder to do than say. But I am going to try hard as Mr Disappointment smells too, quicker he goes the better….

Nice place, how long you been here?……Er Before Christ!

Days out come in all sort of shapes and sizes, relaxed, cultured, rain or shine, but they all need company. I usually keep a list of days out I want to do (in my head) so I am never stuck if I talk one of my friends into having a mini adventure. There is of course a criteria to whether my friends come – 1) they have to leave their watches at home (I am not good at sticking to time) 2) they don’t mind listening to my ramblings 3) they don’t mind gambling my classic (old banger) car will make the trip. So Instead of ‘Great Expectations’ my friends need ‘No Expectations’ on these days out. They just have to say “what the hell Gillian, I will come with you wherever”. Got to love them.

Today Lady L agreed to come out with me, she has just come back from visiting her relatives in sunny Oz, so as she was at a low ebb she was easy to coax out. After wrestling with Kangaroos and long distant cousins she was ready for some homemade culture.

I suggested a visit to a castle, not any castle, a castle I had never realised was there, Chillingham Castle near Alnwick, such is my lack of local history. As it turned out It’s a really impressive castle including dungeon and torture chamber, that would impress anyone (well it did us, but then again we are women of a certain age!!). Lady L enjoyed operating the Rack and having her head in the Stocks, but was a little more spooked than we expected, jumping when she thought one of the bodies (dummies) moved, admitting it hadn’t – she had!! The Castle was formed on top of a cave which has apparently been there long before Christ (or so the information said, yes I am no history buff) and fortified by the Romans around 2 thousand years ago!

There are wild cattle that still protect the outside. The Castle housed so many famous people from history it was hard to keep up. The current owner Sir Humphry Wakefield and his wife Lady Grey have opened it to the public allowing people to sleep over and experience a ghost tour. Lady L and I spent 3 hours wandering the Castle, gardens and lake feeling very much at home, although Sir Humphry didn’t appear to say Hi to us.

The drive there was just as much fun, as the road there was mostly a series of long narrow lanes, which must be great to drive along in blackberry picking season, as you could stay in the car and pick the fruit, as the bushes are so close (if you are as lazy as us). With the sun shining we meandered along the lanes till we came to a river with no road across! It was impossible to turn around and from the car it looked like we couldn’t drive through it but after careful consideration I sent Lady L out to investigate. Which on reflection wasn’t so clever, her being small, unable to swim with a tendency to put her foot in any puddle she is near. However after peering at this fast moving stream she verified it was just a Ford and we should put our foot down and get the car across fast. So we went for it, until we realised that going too fast would mean we couldn’t get a photo of the experience so we stopped half way across to get the necessary shots. Luckily, the car moved again and our brakes didn’t pack in once we were out of the water. On reflection stopping might not have been such a good idea but hindsight etc etc is not for us.

Luckily the tea room beside the dungeon offers a splendid high tea so before the torture and culture tour we tried one. With prehistoric Elk anglers on the wall from what looks like a mutant animal they were so giant. They are believed to be between 10,000 and 45,000 years old – that’s older than I thought we counted back!!!

We ended the day with a walk around the lake, well not quite around the lake as we got halfway and the path stopped. I made a mental note to suggest to Sir Humphry he get a path all the way around as we agreed it would have been very pretty. So as usual we got stuck in the mud, tried to retrace our steps and got lost!! How, we managed to do it we had no idea, after all it was only one lake, but we did.

Lady L told me over in Oz that lanes off the motorway have signs on for those people who get confused/lost and take the wrong road the sign says ” Wrong Way – Go back!”. We considered that those signs should be put along our lives after all it would be good to have help these days. Unfortunately like our days out, our ability to get lost in life is just as easy and even if these signs did exist we would probably not notice them anyway. But then again we sometimes get to enjoy some of the wrong roads together…..