I decided to join Denyse Whelan’s blogging link-up today and the theme is… What is love?
I’m tempted to say… fucked if I know. But I guess that’s not true. I may not have been ‘in’ romantic love (which is kinda depressing given I’m 51 years old!). But I know love when I see it and I’ve certainly felt it (even though I rarely, if ever, say it!).
I wrote a while ago about the TV documentary series 7-up (14-up, 21-up…. etc) and commented that I liked the idea of looking at life in summary format. It makes the negatives less dire, and allows me to focus on the positives. But more recently I’ve been pondering about how differently those years can pan out. They can reflect periods of consolidation or of significant change.
I was struggling a little on the weekend. There was nothing major, just a few things colliding Bermuda Triangle-style making me edgy and irritable. The ongoing unemployment thing is obviously ever-present… as it’s almost a year since I finished my contract. Interestingly a similar position has come up with the same government agency but my confidence isn’t quite what it was, and I continue to ponder on how I was perceived.
I know I’ve moaned in the past about those who go on and on about some issue or life crisis. Those who can’t get past it and lets it define them. I’ve certainly been like that about a few things in my life, including my eating disorder.
I saw my father – for some years after his heart transplant – allowing it to become ‘who’ he was (ie. man who’d had a heart transplant)… in some ways, his previous 60 years on earth disregarded because of this life-altering event.
For reasons unknown to mankind I decided to ‘do’ Dry July this year. It’s one of those things I’ve always planned to do – like FebFast etc – but never got motivated enough to officially start.
Although I had no fundraising target and HATE (ie. absolutely HATE) asking people for stuff, let alone money, I went onto the Dry July website and signed up and put a half-hearted call out on Facebook for donations.
Mark Manson is in Australia at the moment. I remember noting he was coming and wishing I could go to hear him speak.
I’m not a MM devotee but I like his writing and reference his posts often because I can relate. I know the concepts he raises aren’t new or particularly earth-shattering but I like his blunt no-bullshit approach.
I wrote last week about ageing ungracefully. It was mostly about the physical side of it. Or at least the aesthetic side.
Of course I realise ageing is about far more than our physical selves. We often hear about those who gain new leases of life after middle age, or those who go on to achieve great things… struck by inspiration.
