Tag: postaday2011

Changes · freedom

On The Brink….

JoanneLeave a comment

My son starts at his new school tomorrow. And whilst saddened by the end of his summer school holidays, as he is every year, he is also excited.

Such is his anticipation and joy at starting his new school, he told me that he can’t describe how happy he is. The words escape him!

My son isn’t the only one trying to contain his anticipation of the events about to unfold.

The latter months of last year brought about many changes in my life also. With the groundwork begun and the foundation stones set in place, this next week is my time to continue on with my plans, which have been temporarily put on hold due to the Christmas and New Year break.

It isn’t all about making changes, though. It’s also about learning; and reading. It’s about new knowledge, knowledge which has always been there, but I just wasn’t ready to hear.

Reading, research, action, planning, working….

Listening with my heart, following my instincts, new beginnings….

Working towards finding answers; at times momentarily revisiting the past to make further progress into the future….

Travelling, making memories….

Taking stock, discarding that which is no longer required, simplifying my mind, my life….

Just as Pocahontas did, I will listen to and follow the wind.

The feelings of freedom are already there. The Universe has plans, and my heart is open to listening to the messages I receive as the days, months and the year unfolds.

Are you listening with your heart wide open to the plans The Universe has awaiting you?

When you are looking for change, and want the change, and feeling the change you are wanting, it will begin to happen.

Events will unfold before your eyes, showing you the correct path to follow to bring about the changes you are wanting.

Begin each day with your eyes wide open. You won’t miss a thing.

Australia

The Colours of Light

Joanne5 Comments

The 26th January is a day of celebration for Australia, a day which we simply call “Australia Day”.

In honour of Australia Day, I would like to share a beautiful poem by the famous Australian, Dorothea Mackellar.

The Colours of Light ~ Dorothea Mackellar (1885 – 1968)

This is not easy to understand
For you that come from a distant land
Where all the colours are low in pitch –
Deep purples, emeralds deep and rich,
Where autumn’s flaming and summer’s green –
Here is a beauty you have not seen.

All is pitched in a higher key,
Lilac, topaz, and ivory,
Palest jade-green and pale clear blue
Like aquamarines that the sun shines through,
Golds and silvers, we have at will –
Silver and gold on each plain and hill,
Silver-green of the myall leaves,
Tawny gold of the garnered sheaves,
Silver rivers that silent slide,
Golden sands by the water-side,

Golden wattle, and golden broom,
Silver stars of the rosewood bloom;
Amber sunshine, and smoke-blue shade:
Opal colours that glow and fade;
On the gold of the upland grass
Blue cloud-shadows that swiftly pass;
Wood-smoke blown in an azure mist;
Hills of tenuous amethyst. . .

Oft the colours are pitched so high
The deepest note is the cobalt sky;
We have to wait till the sunset comes
For shades that feel like the beat of drums –
Or like organ notes in their rise and fall –
Purple and orange and cardinal,
Or the peacock-green that turns soft and slow
To peacock-blue as the great stars show . . .

Sugar-gum boles flushed to peach-blow pink;
Blue-gums, tall at the clearing’s brink;
Ivory pillars, their smooth fine slope
Dappled with delicate heliotrope;
Grey of the twisted mulga-roots;
Golden-bronze of the budding shoots;
Tints of the lichens that cling and spread,
Nile-green, primrose, and palest red . . .

Sheen of the bronze-wing; blue of the crane;
Fawn and pearl of the lyrebird’s train;
Cream of the plover; grey of the dove –
These are the hues of the land I love.

(Photo from Google Images)

friends

Perfectly Imperfect

Joanne2 Comments

An incident which took place in my life a number of years ago, leaving lasting repercussions, began a conscious effort for me to define the word “perfect”.

Before the incident took place, I hadn’t questioned the word at all, believing I knew exactly what it meant.

Perfect for me was the right amount of salt on my chips to suit my taste or the right position for my chair to be arranged so I could read clearly from the light coming through the window when I sat there.

They were the times when I may well declare that it was “perfect”, meaning perfect for me.

Maybe not so perfect for someone else, but I could accept that. “Different strokes for different folks”, as the saying goes. The word perfect had not been an issue to me.

Until the day I lost a friend, after my use of the word.

An old school friend and I had kept in touch through letter writing for some years. After the birth of my fourth child I wrote to her with my good news, knowing she would be happy to share my excitement.

Not so. I had explained to my old friend the joy that my three other children had shown in welcoming their new baby brother, telling her how he was the perfect addition to our family.

My friend had one son, an adorable little boy, regardless of having been born with many disabilities. His personality shone through his health problems and the look of love lit up his huge brown eyes.

Her letter of reply after my announcement of my child’s birth stunned me. She no longer wished to continue our friendship as she felt the word “perfect” to be a slur at her son.

I questioned myself. Had I been insensitive to my friend’s feelings? She had always been happy to hear stories I had told her of my children, just as I enjoyed hearing about her son.

Or had she?

Eventually, after many months of soul-searching and many conversations with another friend who has an autistic child, I sadly concluded that my lost friend felt so much grief over her child that it was too much for her to cope with.

There was nothing I could say to her to console her; her mind was made up.

Call me strange if you like, but to me, imperfections make perfection!

Dictionary definition, adjective, perfect ~ “of or marked by supreme moral excellence; holy; immaculate, free from any flaw or defect of quality”.

To be honest, classic perfection makes me nervous!

These are some of my definitions of perfection ~

The knots in a piece of wood, showing the flaws of nature.

The comfort and softness of sitting in a well loved chair.

The ruggedness of the stonework used to construct old buildings.

The bite marks in my furniture, still evident from the days when my eldest son was teething.

The curls in my daughter’s hair, which she claims “sit funny”.

The irregular textures in a ball of natural wool when I’m knitting.

The wrinkles around an old person’s eyes, showing they have really enjoyed living their life.

The gnarled branches of a tree, twisting up to the sky.

The scar on my daughter’s knee, a reminder of her clumsiness, the day she went away on year six school camp.

The jagged rock-face beside the ocean, formed through years of crashing ocean waves.

My list of perfections would be endless!

Perhaps I could sum up my own definition of perfect this way ~

“Distinct irregularities on an object or person, each flaw telling a story all of its own”.

My definition of the word perfect will never make it to the “Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, Volume II”, and I can live with that.

It’s time for the world to embrace the perfect imperfections of everyone, and everything. 🙂

friends · music

Memories of My First Love

JoanneLeave a comment

The power of the human mind fascinates me.

In many of my writings here, I find myself contemplating our abilities as human beings to shape our lives, moulding them to become what we would like them to be, by utilising the energies of an unseen being, a being with which we have total control over ~ our own minds.

However, our minds can be fickle little creatures, wandering off to parts unknown, if we let our guard down.

And most times our thoughts wander off into familiar territory. Our memories.

Some time ago I started another blog, one in which I would have a place to record my memories; a place where I could vent my thoughts and unmuddle my brain.

Once written, those thoughts and memories take their rightful place, in the back of my mind, leaving a void in which new memories can enter.

It’s almost like a therapy session!

The perfect conditions must prevail for me to write down my significant memories most of the time. Sometimes, a memory will rattle and clank around in my mind for many years, before I can finally put the ghosts to rest, in words.

The planets aligned perfectly for me just recently. Memories began a lifetime ago reached their conclusion for me.

I have no explanation for my feelings; they just are what they are.

Here is my most recently dismissed ghost, buried within the words of my mind, at “Memoirs of my Life”.

Australia · Changes

Typically January

Joanne3 Comments
New Uniforms

Well, who would have thought? It was exactly twenty years ago his month that I made my first January school dash!

Although back then, it was all about my five year old baby boy, my first child to start school.

He arrived at school on his first day, all bright eyed and ambitious, looking forward to this brand new adventure he was just beginning.

I was a cot case!!

As the year went by, momentum kicked in, I gained control over my apprehension and fears and I grew up somewhat.

Really, I had no choice. Who was I to worry myself stupid, when my children were going off to school filled with anticipation? I had to face the facts…

My babies loved having new adventures, thrived on learning new things, couldn’t wait to make new friends and appreciated their newly forming independence.

Was it really only seven years ago this month that the baby of my four children started school? In 2004 I had all four of my children attending school; the eldest in his final year, the youngest starting his first.

So, my baby arrived home yesterday from his surfing carnival, suntanned and tired, realising he is heading into the final days of his summer school holidays.

He’s starting a new school this year filled, yet again, with eager anticipation.

Enrolment into school ran smoothly. He’s beginning an Academic Excellence program this year, hence the change of schools.

With the enrolment completed by 11.30am and uniforms tried on and purchased by 12.30am, we were off to the shops for the final leg of our annual January dash.

Shoes and socks were purchased without incident at a local sports store. He’s a very happy chappie, knowing he will be wearing sports shoes every day, from this day forward, (well, Monday, actually!) as the school uniform requirement!

Lastly, we headed off to a nearby chain store to join another dozen or so mums, also accompanied by their overly suntanned children, in the rummage for stationary items.

By 1.15pm we were famished. What’s a January school dash without junk food? We found sausage rolls (I had a spinach roll!) and chocolate thick shakes to tide us over for the trip home. It’s been another hot, typically January day, yet another day when drinks are as necessary as breathing!

For the grand finale of this most typically January day, the weather has provided us with a thunderstorm, usual in these parts of the country after the heat of the day.

As the thunder fades away into the distance, our pretty bright green garden frogs will begin their croaking chorus to entertain me, as I patiently hand sew name labels onto my boy’s new school uniforms.

How typically January! 🙂

January Rain