What Makes You Sad?

I have felt profound sadness for the last three weeks about three very different things.

The first week there was a young girl, just turned 21, who was killed in a car crash locally. She was a passenger in her own car that was being driven by a young male. They hit a lamp post, snapping it off three feet from the ground, and the car caught fire from the fallen power lines. The picture that all this evokes for me is not pretty. I knew this girl as a contemporary of my daughter and also because she had a baby when she was only 18, who was the prettiest and sweetest little girl. I always spoke to and admired the child when I saw the little family on  the street.  This incident made me feel so very sad as that young mother had so much to live for. She was a lovely and very likable young girl and I have no doubt she has left many grieving people behind. Not least her lovely child who will now grow up without the mother she deserves. Life is so very fragile. I cannot bear the thought of celebrating your child's 21st and then two weeks later she is gone from this world. However I also believe that if our time is up it is up. Obviously that is the journey that those two young ones must take as is also the case for those they have left behind. It seems so senseless and it is hard to come to an understanding and acceptance of the death.

The very next week saw the very quick and complete removal and burning of some beautiful trees along what once used to be the Princes Highway between towns. Not only were lots of beautiful big gum trees felled they were then just burnt. Not offered for someone to use them for woodworking or for fuel. No just burnt the next day!

The local paper tells us that it had to be done because a road is going in there. The depth of my sadness is huge. I also know that other people were hurt by the sight. One lady described it as 'like a mass murder'.
It is an abuse to the earth, to people, to all the various creatures that would have called them home and an abuse to the very air we breathe. Once again it strikes me as being so senseless. If the architects couldn't find a place to put a road that didn't require so many trees being destroyed then perhaps they need to think outside the square a little. Perhaps that was not a priority in their instructions!

Then the next week I was told about a very old lady who has been forced into care against her wishes. It seems so sad to me that we are made to live a certain way that some nameless person says is appropriate. I am beginning to think that the North American Indians had it right, if as the story goes they left the old ones out in the snow. Please let me go to sleep in a blizzard and let my soul drift off to a better place whilst my body slowed down to a stop with the cold. It sounds like bliss in comparison from my perspective. I know other people who have really enjoyed and chosen to go to an aged care facility, as it gives them comfort and company that they didn't have at home. So each to their own but it is a shame that we don't have a choice in such matters. Once again it made me very deeply sad to think of this woman in a situation which she will find so hard to adjust to.

I am feeling happy now though, as I have a weekend off and time to call my own. I intend to walk in the beautiful bush and touch Mother Earth. I hope to get some lawn mowing done and some gardening. A bit of extra sleep won't go astray either. So enjoy your weekend  and remind all that care is needed when driving, say thank you to the trees and flowers that brighten up your day and give you the very air that you breathe.

Musing on Manners.

I am in the midst of organising my daughter's 21st birthday which is probably the first large scale party I have dealt with. She had all the children's parties for the first ten or twelve years but this is the big one. Also the last one!

It has been a real learning curve for me I can tell you. We sent out  invitations to approximately 140 people for a light lunch. They were due to be answered by earlier this week and with a lot of emailing to many of the younger ones we have ended up with about 95 replies. Now the day will be fairly informal and I am catering for it myself (with help) so it is reasonably flexible. I have stated and with feeling that I want no part of a wedding! How in the heck do you book a venue 12 months in advance when it is nearly impossible to get replies from people a mere 6 weeks in advance?

This initially made me very annoyed and I kept thinking how rude the people were. Now I have stopped and chewed the whole thing over in order to work out why it upsets me so much. The answer I have come up with is that good old fashioned manners is much more than saying thank you or excuse me. What good manners is really all about is thinking about others.

It is about having respect for and acknowledgement of other people! It is being aware that other people don't want to hear or smell you passing wind or burping. Other people don't want to have to wait on you to decide when or if you will reply to them. Other people don't want to hear you eating your food or slurping your drink because that can take away their pleasure of food and drink.

Further thinking on this brought me to a place where I realise that this is indicative of the way many people live today - with no respect for other people let alone for animals, trees, the earth and everything on or in it.

I think we should demand that good manners be brought back and that people should not be allowed to promise one thing and deliver another. People should be held accountable for what they do and their children should also be held responsible. I am not so sure that 'politically correct' is always morally correct.

I think manners are far more important to a fair and equitable way of life than is generally recognised. Yet when someone politely and genuinely thanks us or displays good old fashioned manners to us we feel good about that. Why is that so?

Your Path Is Always Right

If people offer their help or wisdom as you go through life, accept it gratefully. You can learn much from those who have gone before you.

But never be afraid or hesitant to step off the accepted path and head off in your own direction, if your heart tells you that it's the right way for you.
Always believe that you will ultimately succeed at whatever you do, and never forget the value of persistence, discipline, and determination.
You are meant to be whatever you dream of becoming.

Edmund O'Neill

I have no idea who Edmund O'Neill is but I really like the words above. I sent these to my daughter two years ago when she had just left College and begun University. I see that they are just as relevant to her today as she starts her second year of a three year degree and also to me and many other people I know. I also think that the path we start off on is not where we have to stay.

I think that it is great fun to just head off and see where you end up when you go for a drive or a walk in familiar surrounds. There should always be a certain awareness of safety but we certainly wouldn't be a global community if someone hadn't set off across the seas with no worry about safety. We wouldn't have put a man on the moon or sent people into space  at all. There are so many examples of people following their dream with no thought of failure  and they did succeed. There are also examples of people setting out and failing but did they have the faith and the preparedness that is required for unknown places?

I think that we as a whole are headed for unknown experiences, but with a little faith and a belief that we can deal with whatever the universe throws at us, then all will be well. If you think about it we are always headed for the unknown. Even the only two certainties in life, death and taxes, are unable to be forecast. We die when our time is due and we pay tax under instruction from government. So we have no say in what happens anyway and we all live with that with no great concern about it!

So get on with your dreams and day and enjoy it all. Life is short and we need to make the most of it. Take note of Mr. O'Neill. Have a good one.