Sapphire and nylon

It's coming up forty five years since me and my guitar first got together. I looked it up - if it were a person I could have said it was our sapphire anniversary! I give thanks that my mum who bought it got that choice right...and yes, she'd have hated my grammar!

Not being able to play it any more has been a grief I've not dared to fully express even to myself. It made up for not having a mum who made good kind choices, or anyone to celebrate anniversaries with, for not having places to be I felt safe in or people who cared how I felt, for all the loss and struggle and loneliness and pain...

I was never a performer - it was a private pleasure to put notes together, and maybe words, to express and deal with emotions, a therapy that created composure from composition...|I would hold my guitar and tunes would come out, and sometimes they'd turn into songs and I liked to play and sing them just for me, and they made me feel a bit more mended. But then for the part of my life when all of the above got way more intense and I became way more broken, that intense comfort was taken away - I couldn't get my arms and hands to do the right things any more.

I'd tear up if I tried to explain what it meant to have that...and lose that...and I'd learnt to try not to (explain or play) but a series of events set the longing off again, the kind of events that really needed the process more than ever...and last week, in desperation, I took my guitar down from the wall one more time and I found that if I tried really really hard I could play a little tiny bit, and I didn't know whether to laugh or cry or swear or sing...so I did all of them all at once!

It seems the well trodden neural pathways are still intact, so that I know where to put my fingers to hold down or pick the strings to produce the sounds I want, but different stroke damage on both sides mean actually actioning the brain's requests is physically very demanding. I can only do it for a few minutes a day (and they have to be minutes when there are no neighbours around to overhear of course) but every few minutes it gets a little easier...well, at the time it does... it still hurts a lot afterwards, and not just in the joints and tendons you might expect but also around my heart where the chest muscles strain ...and yes, that is indeed ironic! And yes tunes and words still appear, and yes it still makes me weep that I can't do it as much as I'd like to...but yes, it still makes me feel a little bit mended again.

This blog post has been a bit of a cheat - written in advance to upload early on a busy day, and not your usual five point plan of things for which I'm grateful, but there are more than a few in there. And maybe a portent too...I strive so hard not to want what I have not got, but there is some stuff I cannot get my being round how to be without, and maybe, maybe one day the time will be right for the rest of it to be in my life as well.

Drinking woman's crumpet

Gee, lots more challenges to deal with today...emotional, motional, motivational... I'm sure I'm giving thanks for them at some deep subliminal level...I really really am! 

Last night, in need of some serious escapism I decided to watch Skyfall again which I recorded the other night. I would have been even more grateful if I'd noticed I'd not recorded it all before I started! Never mind...I'm not the world's greatest Daniel Craig fan and I enjoyed the first bit (up to Ola Rapace falling a very long way - which I happily would do for Ola Rapace!) and even a couple of adverts including the one for Spectre which whet my appetite to see it, and a casting call for a new Milk Tray man which didn't whet my appetite for Milk Tray but set me thinking. Maybe it should be this guy - he can do pretty much every hetero woman's dream it seems!
http://www.boredpanda.com/funny-facebook-profile-photos/

I give thanks to Linda for letting me buy her a share in a bottomless pot of Earl Grey, a pair of buttered crumpets and a grimace about how grim we feel about certain circumstances. I was reminded of something I saw on Facebook this morning about accepting sometimes there isn't anything to be said to make someone feel better - even when that someone is you
http://www.timjlawrence.com/blog/2015/10/19/everything-doesnt-happen-for-a-reason

I give thanks for her kind offer of a lift to town with my stuff to donate to various charities and a lift home afterwards with my shopping. I give thanks I'm due to lift mine eyes the big hills tomorrow and to Jan for very kindly accompanying me. I'm sure she'd be very grateful if I could lift my spirits before I get there and I must admit to eyeing up the various beverages I have about the place are not tea and wondering if sipping them would help at all. I give thanks that knowing they probably would actually makes me crosser - I'm sure this is a good sign!

Keep karma and carry on

I'm grateful I was so full of the joys of various things yesterday, and got to write my blog before the universe decided I must be having things way too easy if I was feeling that happy and content. So since then... well it's business as usual I guess. I'm grateful I know what doesn't work, or doesn't work out, and what people do and don't do just is and  it's just up to me how I experience and process events and situations.

I'm grateful as ever for my resilience and resourcefulness, my acceptance and resignation. For remembering to be polite and kind...and for knowing when this is best manifest in saying or doing nothing at all. For trying, where possible and appropriate, to find some love and laughter to share even when there just seems to be pocket fluff in my heart.

I'm grateful somewhere to live, and for something to eat, for my bath and my bed and cups of tea. I'm grateful a patch of peacefulness to rest my head metaphorically, and a pillow to be a shoulder as required.

I'm grateful I understand I didn't get to be a brave soul without tough challenges to overcome, or to be renowned for my bonny nature in adversity without sorrows and loss, but I reckon it's time to put it out there that I'm ready to move on from this stage, to one where people marvel at how I remain unchanged as everything around me does and my life becomes full of learning to receive comfort and encouragement, good fortune, support and security and sharing and warmth. Because I really am quite sure I've learnt all the useful stuff there is to learn about their lack. Really. Quite sure.

Unplugged

Yay - I give thanks for new wireless headphones that actually work! Getting them home and set up took most of the weekend one way and another (sometimes you don't need just courage and cunning, but cars and hands that work the way they should!) but I am very grateful for the little bubble they make for watching TV programmes that are really so much better without an unintentional soap opera backing track. All I need now is to save up enough money to buy them for everyone in all the neighbouring flats so I don't have to listen to anything at all but waves, wind or birdsong if I should so choose... but until then I am grateful I can enjoy my stereo for the first time in years at the other side of the ancient solid building and no one can hear a thing. I'm also grateful I can't hear your chuckles of derision at what I'm listening to...I'm a woman of a certain age remember, it's perfectly reasonable to be close to the Edge!

Arriving back here later than I meant to on Saturday night I was grateful there seem to be less dangerous characters in the vicinity than there have been in the past, but it's still a bit glum coming home to a dark empty flat so I'm grateful I've come up with the resolve to forget about the leccy bill and the ozone layer and get into the habit of leaving a lamp on before I go out so that there's a patch of welcoming light when I step inside the door. And also to use the slow cooker more so that it smells as if someone is cooking my tea! There are sound renal dietary reasons why I stopped making the stews I used to, but Rachel's coming to eat with me this evening so she can share the potassium, and after acupuncture we are going to choir, so I'm as grateful as can be it's all as hygge as can be..

Mission almost impossible

Apologies to anyone, like the 'unknown' commenter, who might have been expecting to hear more about what improbable thing I did yesterday, but I've been tackling a few more missions trying their best to be impossible since and will self destruct shortly if I don't take an exceedingly good break. Although I receive feedback on Facebook and on the phone, in person, emails and text messages but as most of my original readers don't have access to keyboards any more a complimentary blog comment is always something to be grateful for!

I give thanks yesterday evening wasn't a whole night at the Opera installation, and not even part of it at A&E after working out the uniquely breathtaking pains in my chest, shoulder and arm were usually underused muscle groups tragically complaining about unaccustomed activity rather than something potentially simply tragic.

I give thanks for autumn scenery and Imee Ooi chants to soothe my soul, a full formally attired wedding party wandering on foot through the city streets to exercise my mind, and carrot cake and vintage blues to attend to the needs of other parts. ..

I'm grateful for loaves and fishes for my supper and a Lush bathmelt on the way with earplugs and a novel. Thank you... Don't mind if I do!

Courage, wisdom and serenity

I give thanks for falling asleep eventually...and for how good awakeness in the night is for applying your mind to life's conundrums. And yes, I'd rather have more sleep and less conundrums but where do preferences ever get you eh?

I give thanks for having the courage to face the fact that only by applying wisdom am I going to bring about any serenity in some situations. For knowing that being alone considerably more than often I would prefer is great for enhancing courage and wisdom...and also handy for not inflicting my pre-serenity gnarly narkiness on unsuspecting souls! No matter how angry or sad or lost or stuck you feel the answer is always to be more loving, to yourself and to everyone else...whether they appear to be part of the problem or not.

I give thanks that skiving off from outdoor chores yesterday meant they had to be done today because outside is always good...the air on your skin and in your lungs and the good things there for the looking...maybe making eye contact with someone and sharing a smile, or kind words and a chuckle. And the sea, the constant changing sea that says to me 'Hey I'm always here...my mood may change and I may go away a little way but look, I always come back'.

I give thanks that the reason it took me hours to actually get out was health related rather than illness related - all the noisy boys and girls were out again and I could remember and enjoy what a lovely peaceful comfortable restorative space my home is when that is so.

Dot dot dot...I wrote the above hours ago and then lots of other things happened for which I am overwhelmingly grateful but are hard to put succinctly. I give thanks to Colin for putting up with a rather loopy ramble about them but then it was kind of down to him that they all began to happen so at least half of it didn't need to be explained. And if I say we've both rediscovered something we used to enjoy and are better at it than we remember, and that I thought I'd never ever be able to do it again and hurt a lot in different places now I have, you'll think I mean something entirely different than I do. Oh well...be grateful for a little misdirection and mystery eh?

Everything but the boy

I give thanks for going out with a boy to my favourite restaurant last night... To be utterly honest, my companion probably wouldn't have been my firstest, favouritest, bestest choice of a boy to do this with, but rest assured both he and his good wife are quite grateful for that! And if I should ever be so lucky as to go out for tea with my firstest, favouritist choice, I'd still think I was lucky to go with Jared, for however unlikely a combination our friendship might appear to be, it is an enduring and enriching one for which we are both extremely grateful. And besides...I could never get tired of tapas!

My firstest choice for today would have been just to loll about in bed, or better still, as the neighbours were all out by the time I left it, to lounge around on the sofa watching recorded TV at my preferred volume instead of the best one to drown out other people living their lives at the volume they prefer...so I give thanks to Jenny for helping me remember I could actually do just that and settling down with a plate of brie on toast and the first episode of the new series of Fargo. It didn't last of course - neither the toast nor the tranquillity - but my goodness it was good, and I was grateful while it did...

I give thanks for trying to remember the benefit of being sick is that you're allowed to have sick leave...you don't always have to be rushing around being at least three times as wonderful as everyone else as everything is at least three times as hard. I give thanks for resolving (for the umpteenth time!) to be less driven...unless it's driven to beautiful places, restaurants (or even roadworks) by any kind of boy...

Oh and I give thanks that if that's impossible there's always http://www.boredpanda.com/?s=mountains or any similar search that takes my fancy to take me places instead.

Picture imperfect

I'm give thanks for all the things I've been grateful for since compiling yesterday's post...for being in stitches of the non yarn related sort in the library...for Rachel's husband making fish pie for our tea and Rachel making cake...for finally persuading my new laptop to import and process photographs...and when I decided I should then acquire a camera lead, Amazon reminding me I'd already bought one long before I got the laptop!

I'm particularly grateful for having all of the above to recount as today I've been in far too much pain to give anything other than auto pilot thanks. I've been grateful that if you relentlessly practice appreciation every day for years on end, you will actually go on doing it no matter how grouchy and grumbly you feel...and for living in a locality gentle on the eye and soul which sure does help. I give thanks for doing the things that most seemed to need to be done, and that I'm now on the way to do the thing I most need to do next - to turn to my mattress for steady support and my quilt for a warm embrace.

If anyone wants me, knock gently on my door with a mug of tea. In fact knock loudly as my earplugs will be in - everyone in the neighbourhood seems to be under the influence of substances far stronger.

Eponymous heroine

I give thanks for a gloaming stroll by the sea, with sunset skeins still in the darkening clouds and twinkling boat lights on the horizon...the mingling smells of salt, cut grass and wood smoke. For having a little meditate...I was sitting in the middle of this almost deserted beach last week and someone asked if I was meditating but I have to confess that wasn't what I was doing at all!

I give thanks for finding a grasshopper in my sweater drawer - deceased but still quite green and fresh. I don't remember a great deal of frolicking in meadows this summer so maybe it was there to remind me to still my mind. 

I give thanks for finding the Man Who Wasn't There. Don't be silly - it's a Coen brothers film exquisitely shot in 40s style black and white...

I give thanks for EPO making me feel a little more red blooded and at least remember why I might want to get breathless now and then. I give thanks for finding half a roll of Mefix to do what it says on the box...

I give thanks for re-launching my Phone-a-Friend appeal. I've been really touched by the response so far but I know there are more lurking in your lives just waiting to be freed...or waiting on the hall table to be sent!

I give thanks I mostly get the news I need on the weather report...but sometimes I like the pictures too

http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/features/34539347

And the magazine ...This is the expedition my 'little' cousin Lee is going on. There's many sorts of heroic in my family you know ;-)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-34466887

Webbed head

I'm give for being sent a sad song and a smile. For wandering into poignancy myself with Alasdair MacLean setting me thinking about moments that are gone and wondering how long...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWea8G4kre8

before stemming the autumnal melancholia and remembering I am, in fact, just what the Only Ones say (and the Burt Bros too!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKuc3faQAEs

I give thanks that as a result of all this distraction I finally worked out what the strange black plastic object is that appeared in my sink a few days ago - it's the whistle from the hob kettle - and that my flat now has a sauna in the kitchen!

I give thanks for links and connections, the world wide web inside our each and every head that lets us join our own dots our own way...and that sometimes, somewhat surprisingly, we draw the same pictures and conclusions as others do.

I give thanks for rocks that rock me (from last Sunday's stroll)

I give thanks for ebay ensuring I don't have to go naked this winter unless I really want to...and for dressing up my sorely toe so that I can go out in the dusky evening air and cure my cabin fever!

Knot what you think

I give thanks for being able to upload photos again... and, as I've failed to remember to take my camera out the last couple of days, having a backlog of ones I'd like to share...This was taken on the back beach a few weeks back, just after I'd been saying how grateful I was to live here...not realising I'd also just dropped my purse and a kind local stranger was trying to find me to give it back, kind of justifying my opinion!

I give thanks for all the pain I've been in the last couple of days - I mean there are people who choose extra for their sexual gratification or spiritual enlightenment aren't there, and I get shedloads of various sorts for free! Sadly I fail to get any of the first result from any of it (gentle reader if you have any idea how toothache or ingrowing toenails can be a turn on, don't be shy, let us all in on the secret!)...but the sound of my involuntary whimpers and groans does crack me up with laughter sometimes, and then that causes more yelps and sharp intakes of breath and more mirth so that's the next best thing right? And of course I don't always laugh about it so I give thanks for the reminder that as it's the same pain, it's all a matter of attitude, expectation and preference...

I give thanks for the owls outside keeping me company when I couldn't sleep. For waking up in the small hours and, reaching for my phone to see how small, discovering someone had been awake in the smaller ones and thought to send me a message.

I give thanks for an unscheduled catch up with Christine and a scheduled one with Linda. For receiving an unprecedented amount of nourishment at the hands of others this week - lots of tea and empathy and feeling less of a loose end!

Back up

Despite being grateful for that after dinner nap yesterday, and another early night with a reasonable amount of sleep, it still seemed incredibly hard to get back out of bed at a reasonable hour this morning so I gave thanks for a call from an engineer saying basically 'Let me in now and I'll fix your phone line!'... because, of course, I did!

I give thanks for squeezing in all I had to do around his visit before going out to meet Jenny for an enjoyable day out going back up the leafy line to enjoy the autumn light and colours, and potter around a different town. I give thanks we both felt well enough to do this on the same day... and for it being such a lovely day weather wise with more of this astonishingly warm mid October sunshine.

I give thanks for relieving some market traders of some very small wares - especially my favourite Rose Nag Champa cones - and various eateries of their delicious produce when we needed recuperation time too. And I was particularly grateful to Jenny for treating me to the latter from her treat fund raffle prize money.

I give thanks for my eager anticipation of a return to on line activities...though since I've been home I've done little but rustle up some tea and sleep. I'm grateful I got back up to write my blog!

Charge up

I give thanks for a day of willpower, ignoring most of the things that need to be done, and the lure of the sun to do the things that don't in. I give thanks for knowing when my batteries are on nil power and a level of laziness that does not come easily has to be maintained...

I give thanks for an early night and a long lie in, for dreaming both while asleep and awake. I give thanks for all my immediate neighbours (and their dogs!) being out for hours so that wallowing in fast track battery recharging peacefulness was possible.

I give thanks for booking a Tesco delivery for today in the late afternoon so, when I finally made it out of bed, I could lounge around in the bath instead. I give thanks for accepting it could be some time yet before getting my phone line fixed...and buying a mobile data bundle so I don't flinch every time I peek at Facebook and have to leave home to upload a blog post.

I give thanks for a large lush tea...I couldn't possibly manage another nap now, could I?

Fault lines

I give thanks for quite a quiet evening on the terrace - after going away for a bit of peace and quite it's nice not to wish I could turn straight round and go back again (much!)

I give thanks I have a fault with my phone line - rather than working for a phone company dealing with incoming calls about faults! I also give thanks I'm not an engineer working at the bottom of our road being accosted by frustrated customers with no connection to the outside world and thus a need to go out and talk to real people about why they should sort it out!

I give thanks that still having a broken phone line means I've made contact with a good friend who would sort it out if he could...but who will now meet up with me for a long overdue catch up instead. I give thanks that it also means having a nice lunch and chat at Jenny's, and a free use of her computer while I'm here (when I shut up and stop get on with it!).

I give thanks for more warm sunshine and the lovely views from her balcony...and that the sun has now gone in so that I can finish my on line chores and get home for a snooze...after another cup of tea has been made and brought to me. I know! Two days in a row...I shall be having delusions of languor!

Anyway whatever

I give thanks for an unexpected extra day of summer to tag on to my happy holiday...

For unexpected pleasure of a day with someone you couldn't make up . ..but I'm so glad someone did!

For all the usual kinds of things I tend to be grateful for...the sights of sea and countryside, light and shadow, the setting autumn sun, feeling appreciated, feeling brave, having a cup of tea made for me...oh and lots of other little miracles I won't bore you with right now...what with my internet still not working and all. (Phew got out of that one!)

I give thanks for my immersion heater, a good book to get back to and a mug of Rooibosch.

Sound advice

I give thanks that though I didn't fall asleep to the sound of owls in the trees, or wake to garden birdsong, I didn't have to listen to neighbourhood birds of any other variety, or neighbourhood men shouting at same!

I give thanks for being able to do one of my most favourite morning things - to sit on the doorstep drinking a mug of tea, feeling the fresh air on my skin and breathing in the breeze. I give thanks I try not to think about the things I miss but remembered this one in time. I give thanks for discovering the acoustics here are brilliant and treating myself (if not the neighbourhood!) to a bit of a sing...another thing I miss in my unsoundproofed home!

I give thanks for a good book to lounge around with and a good friend to remind me to put it down and go out. I give thanks for being somewhere with beautiful views and loads of seats to admire them from, when all my aches insisted I stop. I give thanks for a delicious honeycomb and caramel ice cream...

I give thanks for a sound siesta, and for waking in time to go out and see the marbled clouds tinted at sunset...from the back decking in my socks! I give thanks I don't usually have to rely on real time TV for evening entertainment...heavens, have you seen what's on? What's that? You watch it? Stop it at once!

Access some areas

I'm grateful I'm so good at making the best of my life...but the best bits are always the bits when I get away from it for a while! As it seems to get harder (both my life and getting away) I appreciate times of escape even more...so I guess I'm grateful for all the struggles and challenges, the various kinds of problem and pain.

I'm grateful for overcoming soreness of spirit and limb this morning and getting myself somewhere else. I'm grateful for paracetamol and perseverance. I'm grateful for our public transport system and for seeing it so well used. I'm grateful for headphones to drown out the sounds of my fellow travellers' voices.

I'm grateful for finding a new lovely place to stay and hide away, in an old favourite of a seaside spot. I'm grateful it has a bath and bed and cooking facilities so I don't have to go out and eat chips on my own. I'm grateful it has a supermarket near by and I'm not adverse to a ready meal now and then. I'm grateful it has Internet access in certain positions too.

Subversive

I give thanks for fitting in a longish landline call to a mythical plumber, and an even longer one to the renal anaemia service before either BT or the chap whose line it's connected to my flat stopped this access to the outside world. I give thanks that another call, that might have been lengthy on my mobile, went to voicemail, and that on hearing my message, a very kind lady I've never met conducted business with me via text. ​I give thanks for the Tesco online grocery shopping​, for eBay, Amazon at al for the rest. I give thanks for checking timetables and opening hours, for finding facts, for uploading photos and downloading tunes, for sharing links to things that inspire me and nattering with the world on my sedentary solitary days. I give thanks that I appreciated these things before they were gone...and for deciding, in the absence of a helpful friend who might let me do them at their premises the only way to deal with their lack is to go away for the weekend. I give thanks that my son won't mind me squandering his inheritance on this...or that if he would he's unlikely to contact me to say. If my plan to write it on an email draft and cut and paste when II give thanks that I managed to complete the last two day's blog posts before the library filters realised I shouldn't have and stopped me...presumably as this is subversive? I don't know! If my plan to save the text in an email draft and copy and paste via their eifi on my phone is successful I'll be grateful for that too!

How now?

I give thanks the price and speed of the internet access on my phone (to say nothing of nothing of the screen size) has driven me from my home to write my blog. I give thanks that the near me library is shut so that I've had to take a pretty train ride to log in somewhere else. I give thanks for the physical and financial wherewithal to do this...though it's a tad limited in the first department! I give thanks for the support of the local infrastructure.

I give thanks for the flocks of waterbirds and their reflections on the pale lit water of the estuary, for a field of brown cows, another of black ones with just two white, and a very long line of cream coloured sheep!

I give thanks for my Brave Soul coat for reminding me I am one!

I give thanks for my Walkman making a little bubble for me to organise my life in the public space...It's been a sobering wake up call how dependent I have become on the world wide web to do this and to feel connected when I'm disconnected. This weekend is going to be very character building I can see...My character will soon be the size of a small city!

Fast worker

I give thanks to Colin for reminding me to buy ginger, to Jan for reminding me to put some in a mug with honey and lemon to soothe my sniffles and to Jenny for cleaning my bath to make it all the nicer to wallow in. I give thanks for the excitement of thinking I'm getting a cold - I'm so rubbish at catching minor ailments and they're far more fun than serious health issues.

I give thanks that yesterday's frustrations were such good practice for today's...and that today's proved an excellent opportunity for people to be helpful, or at least encouragingly amusing! I give thanks not all of them related to unusable broadband due to a crossed landline - that would be a bit sad, wouldn't it? I give thanks I have some slow internet on my phone to demonstrate how fast even my non superfast connection usually is.

I give thanks for stopping by to look at the sea and all the aaargh turning to aah! I give thanks for a decent set of blood results turning the aah to ooh! Oh and I give thanks my body seems to have forgotten about catching that cold. Told you I was rubbish didn't I?

Can do

I'm grateful for a day that refused to bend to my will, because I know they're far more character forming than the ones you skip through (at least metaphorically!) I'm grateful I know not to take it personally, nor to take it out on persons here present (or persons who are elsewhere as the case may be!) I'm grateful for opportunities to come up with Plan Bs and beyond, and thus improve my ingenuity. I'm even grateful for a little light gnashing of teeth as I've one that really needs to come out and I'd far prefer it to fall naturally than be wrenched (shudders at mere thought!)

I'm grateful for wanting to eat dessert but not wanting to make it, and sticking some chopped plums, crumbled stale biscuits and ready made custard in the microwave... which meant I did! I'm grateful for wondering what to do with my recently replaced old can opener earlier... and then being asked if I had one to lend...

I'm grateful for the passing clouds and rain, the changing light, the patterns of drops on the window. I'm grateful I know there's no such thing as bad weather just inappropriate attitude...

Base desires

I give thanks for howling storm last night, the rough sea and mizzly drizzly rain today. For being in the midst of a particularly communicative phase of my life...and taking time to walk along the seafront on my own communing only with the waves.

I give thanks for the joyfulness I encountered in town - it's usually a smiley chatty place but seemed even more so than usual today. I give thanks for the jolly tho unsuccessful surfers, the tuneful buskers, and the cheery Big Issue seller, for all the people saying 'after you' on foot and in their cars. I give thanks for a lady asking for help reaching for a top shelf cake in the supermarket, and a useful discussion about its possible merits as a trifle base.

I give thanks for getting to a till just as the operator became free and the taxi rank just as a driver I'd not seen for a while became free too. I give thanks for trying some salted caramel choc ices and declaring them inedible as I'm not supposed to eat chocolate, ice cream or salt!

Home sorts

I give thanks for the autumnness of the day after that extended late flush of summer - I've been too tired to go out and it would have been hard not to if there had been more mild and sunny weather! I give thanks for stocking up my own personal photo library over the last couple of weeks so that I can keep basking in its glow.

I give thanks for lots of rest and quite a lot of bustling about in between, clearing out a couple of drawers and filling up a half a bin bag with unrecycleables clogging up my brain space as well as my home.

I give thanks for changing my bed linen, having now completed two complete sets. I give thanks for catching up with Laura (yes it's been a while - ha ha!) and unpacking the non urgent shopping that stayed in her boot when she had to hurry off yesterday. I give thanks that I now have a new doormat - (literally not metaphorically!) and a new parka for when it starts to get parky. I give thanks for discovering the reason Rachel hadn't booked me an appointment at her clinic tomorrow was that she can fit in one more home visit before she's off on her much needed hols.

I give thanks for a spot of Nordic not so noir recorded yesterday, always nice when there's a bit of age appropriate candy for the mature woman's eyes as well...If I see the mature woman I'll be sure to pass the message on!

Softly softly

I give thanks for not trying too hard to go to sleep when I'm awake in the night. It's a pretty pointless thing to do as the effort is not at all relaxing. I give thanks for hearing other folk around and about quietly awake as well, as well as the odd raucous ones quickly passing by.

I give thanks for trying to meditate instead - a task in which the trying is the whole point, where even if only two breaths here and there pass without having to note the incursion of thoughts, just noting the incursion of thoughts is helpful let alone the bits in between! I give thanks that after a while, even in a very 'thinky' meditate my thoughts change and insights and solutions to conundrums arrive unpuzzled over - so it's enlightenment of some sort anyway!

I give thanks that though I felt particularly rough this morning I realised this was partly in contrast to the not rough feelings I've enjoyed lately instead. I give thanks for an afternoon out on various consumer quests with Laura, enjoying each others company, the warm weather and pretty soft light between the shopping stops and coming back with treasures from a delightfully unfull Trago!

Lightening up

I give thanks for another repetitive blog post title. I couldn't begin to tell you exactly what date but it's sure to be there somewhere in over 1800 gratitude themed posts. Sometimes I think perhaps I should try harder to be original but originally I didn't think I needed to plan this far ahead, you know.

I give thanks for more sorting out, including the less strenuous but considerably more fiddly replacing of batteries in the LED lights in the cupboard under the stairs after the step work yesterday. I give thanks for Paracetamol to take the edge off my aches and pains and for sorting out enough stuff to take to charity shops for a taxi to town to be a necessity. I give thanks for managing to keep my eyes open for the Revive meeting, and to admire the beauty of the sun on the shallow pools in the sand and hazy light on the headlands. I give thanks for just enough energy left to collect new glasses (not sure about them yet), fresh medical supplies and bits of vital shopping, before dumping all of the above on my hall floor, cramming in the earplugs and crawling back under the covers for a snooze.

I give thanks for something quick and convenient for my tea, and for something even quicker for dessert - more of yesterday's delicious homemade blueberry sponge!

Change org

I give thanks for a change in the weather today - well, in the strength of wind anyway as I can be a bit stirred up when it's blowy and want to rush about.  I give thanks for a lie in this morning, after rescheduling a blood test and discovering the package I thought I had to get up to wait to be delivered was already safe with a kindly neighbour. I give thanks she admired my cardigan when I went to collect it - it's a good garment for starting a conversation!

I give thanks for plotting a change around and reorganisation. It's good to have a plan in stages if you live in a fairly confined space and can run out of energy or find yourself with too much pain to continue with very little warning. I give thanks for taking the first steps...and then the second ones when I couldn't reach the back of the high shelves! I give thanks for moderating my anti hoarding urges but still getting a big bag of stuff ready for departure to pastures new...with more in the 'just until I'm absolutely sure' pile. I give thanks for lots of rest and recuperation between manoeuvres and, when neither stopping nor starting the activity failed to shift my rather grumpy down in the dumpy mood, for a recorded Rude Tube for making me laugh it off a little instead.