The year was 1979. The month September. The event - a dinner at family friends for no good reason.
My grandmother, Grandma Mart, had just sent us some new clothes. She was an excessively cool grandmother and often spoilt us, her only grandchildren "just because".
Amongst the treasures she had procured was an outfit I fell in love with. It was red. It was textured. There were puffy long pants elasticised top and bottom. There was a long sleeved top with elastic at the wrists and a tie at the neck. It was stylish. It was mine - and I wore it with pride.
When we arrived at the friend's house for dinner, one of my best friends, W, took one look and asked "why are you wearing pyjamas?"
I have never forgotten the lessons.
I should always doubt my taste.
I should not try to set trends.
Lingerie is not a foreign word for stylishly beautiful.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Monday, May 26, 2008
Treasured Memories
My child - as well as being special and wonderful and gifted and creative - is very much like every other child.
She hoards.
I should not be surprised by this. Her own mother has a hard time letting go to "stuff", her father was a collector extraordinaire, her maternal grandparents bring new meaning to the word and have several generations of historical relics on hand (or in the container or sheds) and I suppose we could count the blessings of war, family dysfunctionality and refugee status that her paternal family don't take part in displaying too much that is significant to the family travails (although they are typical of their culture in that every surface does have its own variety of clutter on display).
However, there comes a time when needs must means throw out!!! Yesterday was one of those times.
I am due to upgrade my computer, and the trade off that 'Salina is looking forward to is that she will receive this one. "Yay!!!" she says. And then groans follow when it is explained that this means LESS SPACE for crap in her room. As furniture changes will also be required, yesterday was the beginning of a long project.
She needed to clear several shelves in a cupboard to make room for clothes that were evacuated from one piece of furniture that has been slated for "out of the room".
During our going through the seven boxes reduced to two this means in real terms, we came across many things that she holds close to her heart. Old toys she has not played with of late, projects that were started and never quite finished - or never yet started, presents that were put by for "later" and artwork that is fantastic (says the unbiased mother) but not worth keeping for posterity.
We had the digital on hand to capture these significant structures before they got "donated to landfill" (or recycled - after all, most of the materials for them came from the recycle bin in the first place).
So I present you her gallery...
"But how could you allow her to part with such memories, you heartless mother," I hear you cry out.
Well, I have had to harden myself to such purges over my own life because I know the walls will eventually cave if you KEEP EVERYTHING.
And as well as the 7 shopping bags of rubbish, large collection to pass to cousins, box for a potential garage sale and 2 large boxes for recycling, a lot did get saved for her to look back on.
And we still have much, much more to go before we can declare this job FINISHED!
She hoards.
I should not be surprised by this. Her own mother has a hard time letting go to "stuff", her father was a collector extraordinaire, her maternal grandparents bring new meaning to the word and have several generations of historical relics on hand (or in the container or sheds) and I suppose we could count the blessings of war, family dysfunctionality and refugee status that her paternal family don't take part in displaying too much that is significant to the family travails (although they are typical of their culture in that every surface does have its own variety of clutter on display).
However, there comes a time when needs must means throw out!!! Yesterday was one of those times.
I am due to upgrade my computer, and the trade off that 'Salina is looking forward to is that she will receive this one. "Yay!!!" she says. And then groans follow when it is explained that this means LESS SPACE for crap in her room. As furniture changes will also be required, yesterday was the beginning of a long project.She needed to clear several shelves in a cupboard to make room for clothes that were evacuated from one piece of furniture that has been slated for "out of the room".
During our going through the seven boxes reduced to two this means in real terms, we came across many things that she holds close to her heart. Old toys she has not played with of late, projects that were started and never quite finished - or never yet started, presents that were put by for "later" and artwork that is fantastic (says the unbiased mother) but not worth keeping for posterity.
We had the digital on hand to capture these significant structures before they got "donated to landfill" (or recycled - after all, most of the materials for them came from the recycle bin in the first place).
So I present you her gallery...
 | The Dog Artfully wrapped boxes with inked features, this 3d canine representation was the joy of an afternoon late last year. |
The Cat This milk carton and toilet paper desgin was inspired last week. If only the digital camera videos would translate to this computer, I could show you her inspired farewell scene to the creature. |  |
 | The Lion This creation was a pre-school project at school, which culminated in a musical presentation. |
The Dogwash This installation piece has hoses for washing the dog, ramps and special pens for the customers, a shelf for holding instruments, cardboard cutout shampoos and a cloth for drying the dog with. |  |
 | The Horse This is one of many, many such creations. The saddle can be taken off, there was a bridle and the tail moves. |
"But how could you allow her to part with such memories, you heartless mother," I hear you cry out.
Well, I have had to harden myself to such purges over my own life because I know the walls will eventually cave if you KEEP EVERYTHING.
And as well as the 7 shopping bags of rubbish, large collection to pass to cousins, box for a potential garage sale and 2 large boxes for recycling, a lot did get saved for her to look back on.
And we still have much, much more to go before we can declare this job FINISHED!
Thursday, May 22, 2008
It didn't work
yep, you heard it right - State Pride was not enough to get the Mightly Maroons over the line often enough to stave of ignoble defeat by the cockroaches. Even though the MM's were close enough to the line often - it just makes that bitter defeat feeling more pronounced.
Sigh - it seems yesterday I should have been either more arduous in my endeavours - or just have not given a toss.
Ah well, at least the floor is clean.
Today? Today I have no goal to work towards (well, except for the one whereby more money flows INTO the house than is sent out of it) so I am doing the laundry, creating edible masterpieces (cubed veal a l'orange) and trying to find a sharp concise explanation of why people should pay me to put into a chamber of commerce newsletter.
That would explain why I am sitting here blogging feeling like this...
Sigh - it seems yesterday I should have been either more arduous in my endeavours - or just have not given a toss.
Ah well, at least the floor is clean.
Today? Today I have no goal to work towards (well, except for the one whereby more money flows INTO the house than is sent out of it) so I am doing the laundry, creating edible masterpieces (cubed veal a l'orange) and trying to find a sharp concise explanation of why people should pay me to put into a chamber of commerce newsletter.
That would explain why I am sitting here blogging feeling like this...
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
In which Ms Jeanie ponders strides, superstitions and the relative superiority of vacuums - all while attempting to string them together cohesively
...strides...
Julie asked us to ponder our stride relative to that of "the crowd" so I did.
Unfortunately it didn't result in a post offering insight and wonder and allow you to be even more amazed at my skills in analysing the situation regarding the world and my place in it, nor will it get you rocking back on your heels saying "I hear you, sister".
Nope, I thought long and hard about how the world and I are not in synch and have never really achieved that precision.
Then I realised that it was not that world and me have problems, per se - more that no-one really has the measure of the world and marches to the beat. Its just that it is slightly harder to keep up the pretence for some more than it is for others.
Of course, I could be completely wrong - won't be the first time - and there could be a whole gaggle of people out there who have always known the rules because their parents followed them and it is innate to them and there could be another mob who got the textbook on the right day, studied hard and now have degrees in being a great conformers - but I don't think I am. Wrong I mean.
Why not? Well, because all of the people I chose to associate myself with have something, some individual way of looking at and feeling for and getting through life and it really seems to me that most of us are doing the best that we can to be ourselves in this crazy system.
And because it is a trait common to all the wonderful people I know and love, I feel it is only fair to extrapolate this to mean that its pretty much an everyone in the whole, wide world deal.
Once upon a time I prided myself on my unique ability to really steer my course and make my choices in life and my goodness, I made them (to the chorus of my family saying "anything to be different" with accompanying eye-roll).
That was, of course, pre-child, pre-separation and pre-dealing with total crap life can throw at you from every other direction bar the one you are looking. Now I am wiser. Well, more baffled really - but now I realise that it is not just choices because we wish to define ourselves to stand our but chosing not to go under and be covered by the wallpaper.
And see, that is why some people probably think my time would be better spent on other pursuits rather than philosophy, cause if it confuses me, the thinker, I can only imagine how you folk are feeling. Luckily I put lines between my thoughts so you can scroll down to the next one fast.
And luckily for me, I do have something else to focus on today other than my two-bit theories...
Yes, indeed, tonight there is a football game... And here is where I march in tune to many who have maroon pumping through my veins...
...superstitions...
Now, some of you may not know that there is a direct relationship between sporting events and housework (in my home anyway).
Even though we have a superior side just through geographic spawning merits alone, the fact that the selectors have made court jesters out of themselves by overlooking the prince means that I may have to lend a shoulder.
(Warning - the previous sentence will make NO SENSE WHATSOEVER to anyone who doesn't follow the media reporting of Rugby League representative selection) (Oh darn - you are meant to warn before aren't you? Sorry)
Combine that with the fact that I was feeling fat, my feet were going crunch, my computer projects going nowhere - well, what better way to use my day productively than to do heaps of housework? I mean, I could have read blogs and crap, but how would that help my state pride?
Not only will it, hopefully, get the boys over the line more often tonight (although if they don't I am totally blaming the Scott Prince fiasco), but I now have muscles telling me they saw some action and feel it, I have a cat beside me perplexed at the noise and commotion and lack of his food tray on the floor and I have wet floors where they should be wet, and fluffy where they ain't!!
...the relative superiority of vacuums...
While doing this, of course I multitasked - I am a woman after all. One of my special powers is the ability to whinge in my head simultaneously to doing physical activity. Well, mainly in my head - sometimes I may say things, but as no-one else was around you will just have to take my word from it.
One of my little whinges started as a reminisce. It went along the lines of this:
Sigh. Plug. Click. Vooooom. Darn, this thing isn't sucking. Click. Silence. Pull it all apart. Blow in every tube. Reconnect. Click. Vooooom. Not much better. Pull it all apart. VOOOOOM. Okay, its not that bit. Blow in the tube. Not that bit. Blow in the head. Not that bit. Reconnect. Vooooom. Swear at it and run the cleaner over the same piece of fluff 10 times. Clean the head. Run over the same piece of fluff 10 times. Clean the head. (You can see why it is such good exercise)
Repeat this 10 times for the spare room (only used for folding and the occasional family member anyway, doesn't really get much in there). Move to the living room. Do the living room to the tune of Oprah telling us ALL that we should ALL feel alive when we are over 40. Scraped in there. I still have a year before I have to do what she says.
Vooooom. Darn, this thing isn't sucking. Click. Silence. Pull it all apart. Blow in every tube. Reconnect. Realise that the suck is more impressive at the bit where the hose joins the machinery than the end where I need the suck. Curse the machine. Curse modern machinery that sucks when it doesn't suck properly. Miss my old vacuum cleaner that didn't suck this much because it did. Pick the matted cat hair and Jeanie hair off the head.
Vooooom. Move on to 'Salina's room. Manage to suck up a thousand little bits of
project and avoid most of the moving mess that reminds me of how like me she truly is. Pull it all apart. Blow in every tube.
Voooom. Only our room to do now. The suck level is down to where I am sure a straw would do a better job. Pull it all apart. Blow in every tube. Get the motor end to try and suck the bits the other way. Doesn't work. Reconnect it. Try again. Give up and decide to blog.
Ah - housework - who said it was a mindnumbing task?
Julie asked us to ponder our stride relative to that of "the crowd" so I did.
Unfortunately it didn't result in a post offering insight and wonder and allow you to be even more amazed at my skills in analysing the situation regarding the world and my place in it, nor will it get you rocking back on your heels saying "I hear you, sister".
Nope, I thought long and hard about how the world and I are not in synch and have never really achieved that precision.
Then I realised that it was not that world and me have problems, per se - more that no-one really has the measure of the world and marches to the beat. Its just that it is slightly harder to keep up the pretence for some more than it is for others.
Of course, I could be completely wrong - won't be the first time - and there could be a whole gaggle of people out there who have always known the rules because their parents followed them and it is innate to them and there could be another mob who got the textbook on the right day, studied hard and now have degrees in being a great conformers - but I don't think I am. Wrong I mean.
Why not? Well, because all of the people I chose to associate myself with have something, some individual way of looking at and feeling for and getting through life and it really seems to me that most of us are doing the best that we can to be ourselves in this crazy system.
And because it is a trait common to all the wonderful people I know and love, I feel it is only fair to extrapolate this to mean that its pretty much an everyone in the whole, wide world deal.
Once upon a time I prided myself on my unique ability to really steer my course and make my choices in life and my goodness, I made them (to the chorus of my family saying "anything to be different" with accompanying eye-roll).
That was, of course, pre-child, pre-separation and pre-dealing with total crap life can throw at you from every other direction bar the one you are looking. Now I am wiser. Well, more baffled really - but now I realise that it is not just choices because we wish to define ourselves to stand our but chosing not to go under and be covered by the wallpaper.
And see, that is why some people probably think my time would be better spent on other pursuits rather than philosophy, cause if it confuses me, the thinker, I can only imagine how you folk are feeling. Luckily I put lines between my thoughts so you can scroll down to the next one fast.
And luckily for me, I do have something else to focus on today other than my two-bit theories...
Yes, indeed, tonight there is a football game... And here is where I march in tune to many who have maroon pumping through my veins...
...superstitions...
Now, some of you may not know that there is a direct relationship between sporting events and housework (in my home anyway).
Even though we have a superior side just through geographic spawning merits alone, the fact that the selectors have made court jesters out of themselves by overlooking the prince means that I may have to lend a shoulder.
(Warning - the previous sentence will make NO SENSE WHATSOEVER to anyone who doesn't follow the media reporting of Rugby League representative selection) (Oh darn - you are meant to warn before aren't you? Sorry)
Combine that with the fact that I was feeling fat, my feet were going crunch, my computer projects going nowhere - well, what better way to use my day productively than to do heaps of housework? I mean, I could have read blogs and crap, but how would that help my state pride?
Not only will it, hopefully, get the boys over the line more often tonight (although if they don't I am totally blaming the Scott Prince fiasco), but I now have muscles telling me they saw some action and feel it, I have a cat beside me perplexed at the noise and commotion and lack of his food tray on the floor and I have wet floors where they should be wet, and fluffy where they ain't!!
...the relative superiority of vacuums...
While doing this, of course I multitasked - I am a woman after all. One of my special powers is the ability to whinge in my head simultaneously to doing physical activity. Well, mainly in my head - sometimes I may say things, but as no-one else was around you will just have to take my word from it.
One of my little whinges started as a reminisce. It went along the lines of this:
Sigh. Plug. Click. Vooooom. Darn, this thing isn't sucking. Click. Silence. Pull it all apart. Blow in every tube. Reconnect. Click. Vooooom. Not much better. Pull it all apart. VOOOOOM. Okay, its not that bit. Blow in the tube. Not that bit. Blow in the head. Not that bit. Reconnect. Vooooom. Swear at it and run the cleaner over the same piece of fluff 10 times. Clean the head. Run over the same piece of fluff 10 times. Clean the head. (You can see why it is such good exercise)
Repeat this 10 times for the spare room (only used for folding and the occasional family member anyway, doesn't really get much in there). Move to the living room. Do the living room to the tune of Oprah telling us ALL that we should ALL feel alive when we are over 40. Scraped in there. I still have a year before I have to do what she says.
Vooooom. Darn, this thing isn't sucking. Click. Silence. Pull it all apart. Blow in every tube. Reconnect. Realise that the suck is more impressive at the bit where the hose joins the machinery than the end where I need the suck. Curse the machine. Curse modern machinery that sucks when it doesn't suck properly. Miss my old vacuum cleaner that didn't suck this much because it did. Pick the matted cat hair and Jeanie hair off the head.
Vooooom. Move on to 'Salina's room. Manage to suck up a thousand little bits of
project and avoid most of the moving mess that reminds me of how like me she truly is. Pull it all apart. Blow in every tube.
Voooom. Only our room to do now. The suck level is down to where I am sure a straw would do a better job. Pull it all apart. Blow in every tube. Get the motor end to try and suck the bits the other way. Doesn't work. Reconnect it. Try again. Give up and decide to blog.
Ah - housework - who said it was a mindnumbing task?
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Today has been going on for soooo long
and we still have a chunk of time yet to reach 9am.
I awoke I know not when or why, but it was dark and cold and obviously very, very early. Threads of my dreams immediately coagulated into blog ideas.
As I was sifting through them in an attempt to find that elusive trail that leads back to the other side to resume dreaming, my bladder kicked in and advised me that there were better places to be.
Sure - better places to be than in my nice warm bed with my darling right beside mesnoring sleeping soundly? A small battle of wills took place, but as usual, bladder won.
Now, generally I sleep like a log - crash when I go down right through to when I get up.
However, if that continuous loglike-behaviour is disturbed in any way I have a tendency to not be able to go back to sleep for ages. Like ages and ages. Like unless I don't need to get up for a few good hours, it is best that I don't even try to go down again.
Of course, given the cold snap and the warm delights my bed offered and the fact that the clock said 3.45am, I forgot this and did give it a shot.
I snuggled down and cuddled up to my sweetie - who grunted and rolled to the extremity of the bed.
I tried to think all sorts of dreamy thoughts - but blog posts kept jumping up at me and getting written in my head. Far superior posts than this one. Ones about genealogy and genetic predispositions and poetry and power dynamics in family structures and technological influences and textbooks and school teachers and torment and - just about any topic my mind skipped across became a mind blowing blog.
Of course, all this took place in my bed, not in front of the computer - the results speak for themselves really - so I moved my mind on to more logical things. Things like food and housework and work and money and budgeting and oh my, there is no cold meat for sandwiches and what do I need to buy for dinner tonight.
The minutes trudged along, and so several hours later at 4.23am I got up to do rather than lie there and ponder.
I thought I would be kind to my darling V, so rather than my habitual click on the computer as I rose I thought I would tackle housework at the other end of the house. Aren't I nice?
I cleaned the kitchen and found a recipe for corned beef fritters, as we had left-over corned beef (and vegetables - I have a habit of hiding vegetables in everything) and my daughter had loved SSB's last time we visited Granite Glen and I needed to have something to put in her school lunchbox.
I was chipper. The radio was (quietly) playing really woeful country music (not because I am a fan, but because the station I listen to for the news plays really woeful country music at ungodly hours), I was putting together a treat for my family and my to-do list was awesomely structured in my head.
And then? Well, then my darling sweet V came into the kitchen andpissed me right off managed to upset my equilibrium.
How can you do so with one so buoyant at 5.27am, you ask?
Step 1. Greet your beloved with the words "Hello alarm clock". Ensure that the tone you chose is one that indicates you have not entered the waking world happily and intend that feeling to radiate.
Step 2. Do not offer a kiss, a hug or even a meeting of eyes - instead shield them and say "F*$& its bright in here".
Step 3. And really, this is the most important step. Do the above WITHOUT CONSULTING THE CALENDAR. Or do so. Which ever. But any other week the response might be "oh I am sorry, light of my life" with a bit of understanding. This week - well, let me just say a little time out was called for before I got around to apologising for trying to be quiet and industrious while my family enjoyed their kip (oh, and subsequently also apologising for turning into a banshee and storming out of his vicinity, flicking off the light switch and swearing profusely - or something).
Hey look at that - its still before 9 - time to generate that awesome To-Do list and start ticking. Just don't be ticking me off. Its not advised. Consider this a mental health warning for all of us.
Oh, and in case you are worried - V still has all body parts intact, including his love and understanding for me, crazy hormones and all. Well, at least I think he does.
Hmm, I had best go downstairs and see if his fishing gear is still here.
I awoke I know not when or why, but it was dark and cold and obviously very, very early. Threads of my dreams immediately coagulated into blog ideas.
As I was sifting through them in an attempt to find that elusive trail that leads back to the other side to resume dreaming, my bladder kicked in and advised me that there were better places to be.
Sure - better places to be than in my nice warm bed with my darling right beside me
Now, generally I sleep like a log - crash when I go down right through to when I get up.
However, if that continuous loglike-behaviour is disturbed in any way I have a tendency to not be able to go back to sleep for ages. Like ages and ages. Like unless I don't need to get up for a few good hours, it is best that I don't even try to go down again.
Of course, given the cold snap and the warm delights my bed offered and the fact that the clock said 3.45am, I forgot this and did give it a shot.
I snuggled down and cuddled up to my sweetie - who grunted and rolled to the extremity of the bed.
I tried to think all sorts of dreamy thoughts - but blog posts kept jumping up at me and getting written in my head. Far superior posts than this one. Ones about genealogy and genetic predispositions and poetry and power dynamics in family structures and technological influences and textbooks and school teachers and torment and - just about any topic my mind skipped across became a mind blowing blog.
Of course, all this took place in my bed, not in front of the computer - the results speak for themselves really - so I moved my mind on to more logical things. Things like food and housework and work and money and budgeting and oh my, there is no cold meat for sandwiches and what do I need to buy for dinner tonight.
The minutes trudged along, and so several hours later at 4.23am I got up to do rather than lie there and ponder.
I thought I would be kind to my darling V, so rather than my habitual click on the computer as I rose I thought I would tackle housework at the other end of the house. Aren't I nice?
I cleaned the kitchen and found a recipe for corned beef fritters, as we had left-over corned beef (and vegetables - I have a habit of hiding vegetables in everything) and my daughter had loved SSB's last time we visited Granite Glen and I needed to have something to put in her school lunchbox.
I was chipper. The radio was (quietly) playing really woeful country music (not because I am a fan, but because the station I listen to for the news plays really woeful country music at ungodly hours), I was putting together a treat for my family and my to-do list was awesomely structured in my head.
And then? Well, then my darling sweet V came into the kitchen and
How can you do so with one so buoyant at 5.27am, you ask?
Step 1. Greet your beloved with the words "Hello alarm clock". Ensure that the tone you chose is one that indicates you have not entered the waking world happily and intend that feeling to radiate.
Step 2. Do not offer a kiss, a hug or even a meeting of eyes - instead shield them and say "F*$& its bright in here".
Step 3. And really, this is the most important step. Do the above WITHOUT CONSULTING THE CALENDAR. Or do so. Which ever. But any other week the response might be "oh I am sorry, light of my life" with a bit of understanding. This week - well, let me just say a little time out was called for before I got around to apologising for trying to be quiet and industrious while my family enjoyed their kip (oh, and subsequently also apologising for turning into a banshee and storming out of his vicinity, flicking off the light switch and swearing profusely - or something).
Hey look at that - its still before 9 - time to generate that awesome To-Do list and start ticking. Just don't be ticking me off. Its not advised. Consider this a mental health warning for all of us.
Oh, and in case you are worried - V still has all body parts intact, including his love and understanding for me, crazy hormones and all. Well, at least I think he does.
Hmm, I had best go downstairs and see if his fishing gear is still here.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
