My Twitter Month - December's Tweet Cloud...

I only tweet occasionally on Twitter - more of a twit than a Tweeter LOL. So here's my tweet cloud - rather random but a bit of fun :) xx

Under the weather

I wanted to do a review of my year, but I'm feeling a bit under the weather - had a panic attack this morning and am still a bit uneasy. So I'll leave that for another time and wish you a New Year - different from the last. The only way is up...

Julie xx

My Facebook Year

A Christmas Thought

T'was the day before Christmas

When all through the town
There were battles for turkeys
And sprouts, green or brown
For that last must-have present
All shiny and new
That in a day or so's
Discarded or broken in two
For boxes and paper
For boats to set sail
To fight imaginary dragons
On swords to impale,
And mince pie mountains
And gravies for lakes
We'll eat and eat
Until everything aches
But this Xmas doesn't happen
For some, it is sad
With memories of good times
Dissolving away into bad
So I wish you a Christmas
As good as can be
And a New Year, from this one
With much positivity.





xx

Just by Chance

I have a gadget on my laptop that randomly produces a selection of my photos on the righthand side of my screen so periodically I see a photo I've not seen for a while and it reminds me of holidays, serenity or better days. The photo is one that appeared on my laptop a few moments ago and I thought I'd share it with you - just by chance - as a photo I took of a butterfly that landed on my son's hand in a butterfly room last summer :) xx

Snow Day

We've only had a little snow so far but I spotted this leaf on our drive and was drawn to take a picture. Such clarity, such peace - but I hope that the conditions don't get too bad, as Eth and I are travelling to my Mum's on Sunday - sarnies, hot drinks, blankets, coats and chocolate will be packed - purely precautionary ;) xx

Open by degree

Yesterday, I got the news that I passed my Open University Level 3 Art History course - Renaissance Art Reconsidered - and that I had a Grade 2 pass. I was/am so happy - I got 80% in my final extended essay which brought my average of 69.3% on the assessed assignments up to a Grade 2 overall. I had found the reading for the assignments difficult to keep up with, but had always put an assignment in, hoping that the final essay would achieve well, as we could set our own question. Luckily it worked out. Apparently my arguments were weak in my final essay but the presentation and clarity of the essay was excellent... I'm thinking it's a bloody miracle as a week from the finishing the essay, I had such a major crisis in confidence - was my thinking, approach everything about the final essay right? - that I am doubly proud I got 80%.

Today I've had email confirmation that I'm now eligible to accept a BA (Open) degree - do I want to? Too bloody right. About 18 months ago I gave up the level 2 course I was doing through Open University, Reading Classical Latin, as I was falling so far behind and I very nearly gave up doing my studying completely, as I was disillusioned with the work I would have to do. However, I re-assessed my situation and found that if I did an Open degree rather than a named degree, I only had to pass one Level 3 course, rather at least two. I had to think. Was I doing a degree for job opportunities? Yes, initially, but not now as people see the mental health issues and sod what qualifications/experiences/soft fuzzy qualities I might bring to a job. So was it for the achievement of getting a degree and would any degree do? and to these, I thought yes. You only (?ONLY) need to achieve 300 points to be awarded it: I had 210 points transferred from previous professional studies as I'm a part-qualified accountant (previous life, I did not know what I was doing, and I'm sure you'll forgive me ;)). I had at that point already studied 130 points worth of OU courses, but I had to have 60 points at Level 3 course, which I didn't have, until now :) . So now I have a total of 400 points and all of those 190 points from OU study were hard-fought for, over a total of 5 years.

So I'm booking my degree ceremony for June, next summer. I can hire the gown (navy) and hood (light blue with gold) but OU don't do the mortar-board hats for their ceremonies, and I'm setting my sights on the ceremony to lose some weight for it so that I'll look better in my photos, as I'll only have that day, those hours, to wear the gown. I'm so excited and so proud of the achievement, I keep catching myself in smiles. So it's now a jewel shining through BA (Open), if you please ;) LOL, but you can still call me jewel or Julie :) xx

Who am I?

[How cute was I as a bridesmaid, aged 3?]

A lover, not a fighter
An artist - don't know -
Creative, that's a definite,
But my past has held me back.
A watcher of beauty;
A photographer of life;
A writer, good or bad,
It pours out and yet holds back
Without choice or will
So I keep a notebook near
Inspired, but things conspire
To keep it all in, unformed.
"Not good enough," I was told
And that often echoes in the quiet
But ideas should be limitless
And I shall try not to listen

New glasses

I’m seeing my life through new glasses
I’m seeing all things anew
They’re purple and bigger than I’m used to
But I think that they’re very me
My prescription hadn’t changed much
But I needed some for close work
So I’ve treated myself to some new ones
For distance, to drive in the clear
But they made me think as I wear them
That I get new perspective on life.

xxx

Remember me? Friends Reunited

I joined "Friends Reunited" several years ago, partly out of curiousity. For those who don't know it's a website where you can list the schools, workplaces, houses etc you went to or lived in and re-connect as friends with names from your past. I used to send a note to people I recognised, but rarely got replies back and if I did, the school friendships never got re-started again. It got me thinking why join and say would love to hear from anyone who remembers me, when you don't really want to reply? Or is it like sitting in a window front in a long line with a sign "Remember Me?" round your neck, waiting for someone to point and say yes? However it did allow me to say thank you to an ex-teacher of mine for teaching me to look for the adventure in things - he was an ex-A Level Maths teacher of mine. Some thoughts on perhaps how you might remember someone from school:

Remember me?

I was the one next to thingy,

Had chickenpox in the spring

I was new, sat opposite you

But you never spoke to me.

Your name is familar

But your face I can't see

I joined, filled in my details

And waited, but do you remember me?

xx

Weaving a rainbow

A year ago we went to Ireland and one of our trips was to see the weavers at Avoca. They still use flying shuttles to weave blankets and scarves on looms, but it was the colours they used and the way that they selected the yarns to use that fascinated me, with rows and rows of yarn reels.

Each extruded the requisite thread, looking like they were putting together a reel of rainbows. I'm posting this to bring colour as I am feeling the pre-Christmas blues, and wanted to remember these better days.

xx

It's raining again

In the Inuit language apparently there's 40 odd words to describe different types of snowfall and as it's raining again here today, it got me thinking. It rains a lot here - we're on the watershed for various rivers here, the main one being the Trent, which starts only 10 or so miles from us. The Midlands is a network of rivers and canals, so although we may be the furtherest from the sea, we still get seagulls crying around here.

Anyway it got me thinking - snow and rain words, not seagulls. I call it "liquid sunshine" to make it sound more positive, but when it rains, it can: "lash it down", "rain like cats and dogs", "spit a little", "*iss it down". We can have "a few drops" or it can "bucket it down": the showers may be "scattered" or "more frequent". Poshly it's precipation and there are ranges from Very Light (less than 0.25 mm/hour) to Extreme rain (where it falls at greater than 50.0 mm/hour, as Cumbria found out a few weeks ago). It can rain in torrents, or the black clouds can merely threaten. And then we can have thunderstorms, too. But when hubby and I were honeymooning in Yorkshire 14 1/2 years ago (the weather actually wasn't too wet that week), I came across a postcard with this poem that just about summed it up:

Rain

It rained and it rained and rained and rained

The average fall was well maintained

And when the tracks were simply bogs

It started raining cats and dogs.

After a drought of half an hour

We had a most refreshing shower

And then the most curious thing of all

A gentle rain began to fall.

Next day was also fairly dry

Save for the deluge from the sky

Which wetted the party to the skin

And after that the rain set in.

It reminds me of an Outward Bound course my then first husband enrolled me onto - Learning to Sail a boat in Scotland in the last week of August (around 20 years ago). It threw it down most of the week and I have never been as wet in the whole of my life as that week. It only stopped raining long enough for you to dry out for it to rain again, and to keep warm you went to bed in wet clothes as they dryed during the night. I hated the sailing, particularly when we were zooming along having to move from one side to the other of the boat to avoid capsizing with the water just an inch from the side not weightened down, but I learnt a lot of other things from the course principally one of the sayings close to my heart: "A ship in harbour is safe, but that's not what ships were built for." We also need rain otherwise there would be no rainbows, no promises anew. So I aim to count rainbows, not thunderstorms, and often go out without a hood up in the rain, to remind me I'm alive. So it's liquid sunshining here. The photo's from an afternoon walk I took last May around a lake by JCB in Rocester, which started sunny but ended raining. The goose was just standing like that in a puddle as it threw it down all around. Hope the weather's kind with you. More rain's forecast for the weekend here.

xx

Paralysis of Analysis

As you probably know, I’ve been feeling pretty empty for the last few weeks, like a husk, so I started reading a book “Zen and the Art of Happiness” by Chris Prentiss and it has given me some food for thought. I often feel empty around now, as the run-up to Christmas emphasises family and whilst hubby, me and son are a strong unit, the time highlights the absence of my other family members.

The book’s main message is that “Every event that befalls me is absolutely the best possible event that could occur”. This doesn’t mean that all the bad things that happen are good, but it is about how we approach the “next moment”. I’ve always been a thinker. I don’t remember being told that I was loved or that I was beautiful as a child. I used to go over and over the things said to me to try and find the loving messages in the words. Being told off was better than nothing. But being called stupid for so long, where is the loving message there? I feel paralysed at times from starting things because of the negative past messages, that I won’t amount to much, that I would fail, but I am still here.

The book contains many sayings from Buddhism and one particularly resonated with me from The Dhammapada:

“Your worst enemy cannot harm you
As much as your own thoughts, unguarded.
But once mastered,
No one can help you as much.”

When people would say that the answer was within me for my depression, I found that advice so unhelpful as I was unable to find those answers. I now think that the answers will be there intuitively once I learn more about myself, as I began to piece together who I am. Analysis is a bit of a two-edged sword – you can gaze too deeply into that belly button, but I need to think, to learn, to develop who I am, to fill the hole in my soul. I am still thinking, but I'm trying to re-focus on my present, rather than too much of my past.

xx