Solo

So 90% of the time, I feel perfectly fine, happy and content with being single, with having no significant other in my life. Yet it is that other 10%, that threatens to turn my world upside down. It’s the time in the early evening, when I get home from work, feeling like I want to unload a burden, or vent, or just summarize the days events out loud to somebody, and nobody is there. I guess using flatmates as a convenient sounding board has always been what worked for me. But at the moment she is in a serious relationship, and super busy at work on top of that, we pass like ships in the night on a regular basis. Tonight I got home from a nice musical evening to a quiet house, no lights on, no tv blaring, no music playing and sat on the couch with my herbal tea and it all hit me at once. The solitude. The quiet. The aloneness. Not even birds chirping or feral cats squabbling outside to distract me from the humm of the refrigerator and the otherwise complete loneliness of my evening. I feel as though each time I develop a great travelling friendship with someone, where we hang out all the time and go on weekend road trips, and generally have a blast, they are always gradually swallowed up by that large monster known as dating, courtship and marriage. Would I like to be swallowed up by such a monster? Hard to say, having heard so many horror stories about becoming so engaged to members of the opposite sex. My last two solo girl mates are currently in somewhat serious dating relationships, and although I am very happy for both of them, I find it hard to be happy for me. Some people love and crave solitude, I only like it during the day, then I can get things done. But when you don’t even have a fat cat nudging your ankles to distract you from the silence, from what currently feels like an empty existence, the internal tears come crashing down, making me want to wallow in depression, and eat ice cream. Tomorrow the sun will rise, and all will feel perfectly right with the world, and I will embrace the day with a light heart. But for tonight, this is how I feel – as though everyone else is venturing off to far distant shores, and I am here, by myself, the last one, alone.

Plant based Diets

I've been thinking about changing my eating habits for ages now, my problem is just doing it. Its not that I lack motivation, its that I lack discipline. I realized the other day is that one of my biggest hurdles to changing is worrying about what other people think. Its not something that I should worry about - after all, my own health is my own responsibility, but I hate getting lectured. Whenever I've mentioned to anyone in my family or friends circle that I'm thinking about moving to a plant based diet (no meat, no dairy, no eggs) I tend to get shouted down by people who think they are right. I'm not saying everyone should move to a plant based diet, but even people who I thought would support me, don't. Its an interesting conundrum. Do I listen to the masses telling me I shouldn't do it? Or should I follow my own gut instinct that I should? I really want to do it in secret and not tell anyone, but eventually it would come out, when I was at someones house saying no to eating what they offer me. I thought I would start today and try it for two months - I think thats adequate time to see if it works for me. But we'll see.

Puppy Size

Cute story that was emailed to me 'Danielle keeps repeating it over and over again. We've been back to this animal shelter at least five times. It has been weeks now since we started all of this,' the mother told the volunteer. 'What is it she keeps asking for?' the volunteer asked. 'Puppy size!' replied the mother 'Well, we have plenty of puppies, if that's what she's looking for..' 'I know.... We have seen most of them,' the mom said in frustration... Just then Danielle came walking into the office 'Well, did you find one?' asked her mom. 'No, not this time,' Danielle said with sadness in her voice. 'Can we come back on the weekend?' The two women looked at each other, shook their heads and laughed 'You never know when we will get more dogs. Unfortunately, there's always a supply,' the volunteer said. Danielle took her mother by the hand and headed to the door. 'Don't worry, I'll find one this weekend,' she said. Over the next few days both Mom and Dad had long conversations with her. They both felt she was being too particular. 'It's this weekend or we're not looking any more,' Dad finally said in frustration. 'We don't want to hear anything more about puppy size, either,' Mom added. Sure enough, they were the first ones in the shelter on Saturday morning . By now Danielle knew her way around, so she ran right for the section that housed the smaller dogs. Tired of the routine, mom sat in the small waiting room at the end of the first row of cages. There was an observation window so you could see the animals during times when visitors weren't permitted. Danielle walked slowly from cage to cage, kneeling periodically to take a closer look.. One by one the dogs were brought out and she held each one. One by one she said, 'Sorry, but you're not the one.' It was the last cage on this last day in search of the perfect pup. The volunteer opened the cage door and the child carefully picked up the dog and held it closely. This time she took a little longer. 'Mom, that's it! I found the right puppy! He's the one! I know it!' She screamed with joy. 'It's the puppy size!' 'But it's the same size as all the other puppies you held over the last few weeks,' Mom said. 'No not size... The sighs. When I held him in my arms, he sighed,' she said. 'Don't you remember? When I asked you one day what love is, you told me love depends on the sighs of your heart. The more you love, the bigger the sigh!' The two women looked at each other for a moment. Mom didn't know whether to laugh or cry. As she stooped down to hug the child, she did a little of both. 'Mom, every time you hold me, I sigh. When you and Daddy come home from work and hug each other, you both sigh. I knew I would find the right puppy if it sighed when I held it in my arms,' she said. Then, holding the puppy up close to her face, she said, 'Mom, he loves me. I heard the sighs of his heart!' Close your eyes for a moment and think about the love that makes you sigh. I not only find it in the arms of my loved ones, but in the caress of a sunset, the kiss of the moonlight and the gentle brush of cool air on a hot day… They are the sighs of God. Take the time to stop and listen; you will be surprised at what you hear. 'Life is not measured by the breaths we take, but by the moments that take Our breath away.' I hope your life is filled with Sighs!!! Appreciate every single thing you have, especially your friends! Life is too short and friends are too few. Love the people who treat you right and forget about the ones who don't. I Appreciate You!!

Feeling grotty

Have had a cold/flu for the last few days. I hate feeling like rubbish, headache, fever, sore throat, cough, runny nose. It has given me a lot more thinking time, while sitting around at home, since I can't go to work or anywhere else for that matter. I did have a crazy cleaning spree yesterday in my room, since I was completely bored at home. So at least my room is looking better for it. Today I had nose bleeds, and my drivers side wing mirror came off on top of everything else, I was feeling even worse. Plus I feel overheated even though I've been told my forehead feels cold. My brain is quite foggy on top of everything else. I really want to go do the Lake Waikaremoana Great walk this year, but I don't want to go by myself, and I haven't managed to find someone to go with me. My aunty said she might, but she hurt her ankle when we did the Tongariro Crossing earlier this year so that might not be a goer. Speaking of which, I'm so glad I already did that walk, given that its now closed due to volcanic activity earlier this month. My main goal at the moment is to improve my fitness - once I get over this cold that is.

Road trip

I've been on holiday this week, which has been a much needed break. Shift work is draining, some time out is really needful to recuperate. According to my workmates I don't have enough of a life to actually merit needing to rest but whatever, my life is my own. Why should I feel guilty because you have children and I don't? Getting to catch up with friends and travel round the north island has been massively draining, but awesome. So grateful to dad for fixing up some issues with my car so I could be on my way. I love road trips. I would love them better if I had some friends to keep me company, but most of my single friends are now dating, good on them. So i took the next best option and road tripped to visit friends that I hadn't caught up with in a while. Home tomorrow. I'm sad my holiday is nearly over, but glad while it lasted.

Remembering

Well, its been ages since I wrote anything on here, and I can't even claim lack of internet access as an excuse. Go through phases of not feeling like writing, and feeling like writing. Last week I was horribly sick. The several weeks before that I've been going through a very reflective remembering phase. I was creating some digital photo books online of the last 7 or so years of my life, and in order to remember what I had actually been doing during that time I went back through and read a bunch of my old journals. Strange to find out the different ways that I had been thinking about life in general and the way that it differs to how I feel now. Even stranger is reading about people I interacted with, who I can barely remember now. Just goes to show that we don't always remember the things we think we're going to remember later on. What i have realized, is that the years that are easier to remember are the years when i had emotional upheavals, such as falling for someone, or getting my heart broken, my best friends leaving me to go get married and so on. Reading back on how I felt at that time & having all those emotions come back has been quite heart wrenching. It has put me in a mood to not write very much. I also am gutted about all the photos I lost when my hard drive crashed last year. The better part of 3yrs photos, all gone, just like that. I went on facebook to see if i could retrieve some, discovering very quickly that of all my friends, I am the recorder of information. Half the photos on their facebook pages, are ones that I put there. So pretty much, if I don't have it, nobody does. I'm just going to have to not worry about it.

Sugar Free

Today is my 9th day without sugar. It has been the hardest most tempting thing to break my resolution, especially with people at work handing me chocolate and lollies, but surprisingly the benefits of not eating sugar are so far outweighing the deliciousness of what I could be enjoying.

The first night it was like my body was going through withdrawals, I felt sick and nauseous like I was going to pass out, ended up sleeping at Mums coz I didn’t feel like I could drive home safely. The next day I felt so much better. I had more energy and I had a really good sleep (compared to the insomnia I had been experiencing for the last month or so). The good sleeps continued, until the fourth night when I had a couple of bread rolls just before bed. Kept waking up through the night and was exhausted at work the next day.

On the fifth day I tried some sushi. Within twenty minutes of having it I felt like I was going to crash out at the wheel. Not a good sign. I guess white rice is going to be added to my no go list. So my plan was to cut out sugar the first week, bread/pasta/rice the second week and potatoes the third week. Not sure about potatoes though, I had some last night and they didn’t make me tired at all. But maybe I should cut everything out, temporarily at least, so then I can experiment with them later and see what affects me in a negative sense.

I am amazed at the negative impact sugar has had on me. I wasn’t aware of all the highs and lows I was going through on a daily basis until they stopped. I would have something, feel good, the sugar would leave my system, I would feel tired and need more and crave more sugar, and so the cycle continued. Feeling really good right now though.