September 28, 2015 by elegsabiff

Fear of flying? I WISH.

Whoever said it is better to travel than to arrive is insane.

I was packing this afternoon to go on holiday to family in Spain and noticed my semi-permanently-packed travel kit was missing its Valium. Checked the bedside drawer in case I had put it there. Nope.

It isn’t fear of flying, not as such. Underground cellar, train, plane, makes no difference, whether I’m is going somewhere or just trapped, it’s the being unable to move freely that turns me into the passenger from hell. There’s no fear, just rage. I’m tall, I’m no sylph, I hate crowds, and I’m claustrophobic. Wedge me into a seat without enough leg-room, heap people around me, seal a door and tell me that’s IT for 4 hours, and you might as well touch a match to a fuse. Anyone who wants to get past me gets a paint-stripping glare of hatred. When the person next to me takes up more than their fair share of the armrest, I could quite easily twist their arm out of its socket and leave it sticking straight up into the air. I remain rational enough to realize this is socially unacceptable, but only thanks to Valium.

It has taken two phone calls, and dissolving helplessly into involuntary tears of horror, to get a replacement script. I can collect it tomorrow, Tuesday, night. I fly at dawn Wednesday morning. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. No, really, I can. Thankyouthankyouthankyou to my local GP.

If you’re flying to Spain on Wednesday and find yourself next to an autumn rose with her hat pulled down over her nose, drool probably running from her mouth as she slumps in drugged sleep, do yourself a favour. Don’t wake her. Don’t even breathe too deeply until the plane starts its descent. Seriously. Your holiday will be so much better.

Deep breaths. Happy thoughts.

September 27, 2015 by elegsabiff

Oriah Mountain Dreamer’s “Invitation” – so beautiful.

Oriah Mountain Dreamer’s Invitation is beautiful, and I never read it before. Sharing.

It doesn’t interest me what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart’s longing.

It doesn’t interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dream, for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the centre of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life’s betrayals or have become shrivelled and closed from fear of further pain.

I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it, or fade it, or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own; if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, be realistic, remember the limitations of being human.

It doesn’t interest me if the story you are telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself. If you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul. If you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty even when it is not pretty every day. And if you can source your own life from its presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand at the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, ‘Yes.’

It doesn’t interest me to know where you live or how much money you have. I want to know if you can get up after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone and do what needs to be done to feed the children.

It doesn’t interest me who you know or how you came to be here. I want to know if you will stand in the centre of the fire with me and not shrink back.

It doesn’t interest me where or what or with whom you have studied. I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away.

I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.

(Oriah Mountain Dreamer)

September 4, 2015 by elegsabiff

Hi ho Silver! guidelines to making your Indian Summer the best it can be

If you remember Silver, chances are you’re a baby-boomer, fifty-plus (plus plus) and enjoying being this age far more than you ever expected. You should. Indian Summer is one of the most unexpected gifts of our lives, and some of us are so taken aback we don’t make the most of it. I wasted the first couple of years, for sure, but now I’m fascinated by all this unexpected lovely sunshine and making the most of it. Check the list below to make sure you are too …

Splurge occasionally. Buy the best you can afford for those you love, but include yourself: treat yourself to something you’ve always wanted to do.
Take pride in your appearance. This is an oddly invisible age, it’s easy to slip into thinking no-one is looking so why bother except for special occasions? Actually, more people are looking than you realize. Haircuts, manicures, good dentistry, make you feel surprisingly good. Ignore the sillier fashion trends, but keep your own sense of style. It’s part of who you are. Your health – ah, now, your health is priceless. Do moderate exercise, eat well and get your sleep. Keep yourself in good shape. Your summer will be the longer for it!
SING. Sing as loudly as you can, whenever you can. If you haven’t done it for a while, the creaky croak may be a shock, all the more reason to sing more. Fantastic breathing exercise and it will keep your speaking voice strong and vigorous for the rest of your life.
Lovely quote from Mark Twain: ‘I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened.” Yesterday has gone, and tomorrow has yet to dawn. Enjoy today, and don’t stress the small stuff. Do a Scarlet O’Hara. Leave it to tomorrow.
You want dogmatic, ask a forty-something! It’s time to outgrow that. We’ve had fifty years and more to learn that no matter how we push, the world continues to turn, but we also should, by now, know that there really is more than one way to look at life. If you aren’t already a convert, social networks – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and so on – can be lively, and you could meet up with long-lost friends. Keeping in touch with what is going on, staying interested, is important at any age.
Never use the phrases ‘I can’t do that any more’ or ‘I’m too old’ or that terrible one, ‘In my day.’ Your day is now . If you really feel it is time to give up physically challenging hobbies like playing squash at league level, or training for Iron Man (and since older footballers are now discovering walking football, are you sure your hobby is too physically challenging?) find new ones. You can travel, hike, cook, read, dance. You can adopt a cat or a dog, grow a garden, play cards, checkers, chess, dominoes, golf. You can paint, write, volunteer at a local charity, become a collector of odd things that fascinate you, discover the joys of model planes, trains, helicopters. Find something you like and have fun with it.
Always keep love alive. Love life, love your family, love your friends, love your neighbours. If you’ve been offended by someone – forgive them. If you’ve offended someone – apologize. Don’t drag around resentment with you. One thing we should have learned by now, it doesn’t matter who was right. I can’t remember who it was said that holding a grudge is like taking poison and expecting the other person to die, but it’s true. Forgive, forget and move on with your life.
We’re in an age of change. Old friends move away, following their own dreams of living abroad, or are lost to you, and the thought of replacing a thirty year friendship with someone new is, yes, daunting. Don’t grimly go searching for new friends. Instead, find new things that interest you. Meetup.com can offer some options you never even thought about before. In the process you’ll meet others who share at least one of your interests. Friendships are like weeds, they grow in the most unexpected places.
If you are a talker, talk less, and listen more. If you are one of nature’s listeners, talk more! A change is as good as a holiday . . . be less critical, more open. Remember your mother telling you if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all? Well, modern conversation doesn’t work that way, but you don’t have to be mean to be funny. There’s a knack to it. So they tell me, anyway.
If you hold strong beliefs, enjoy them, but don’t waste your time trying to convince others. Live true to your beliefs, and respect the rights of others to theirs.
Take no notice of what others say about you and even less notice of what they might be thinking. Let them talk, because no matter who you are and what you do, someone will disapprove.
Laugh a LOT. Laugh at everything. You’re a survivor, you’ve somehow muddled through to reach one of the best times of your life, and you’re being rewarded with this Indian Summer. Enjoy it!

I borrowed a lot of this from my mum’s only surviving friend, who is roaring into her eighties in an extremely inspirational way and who emailed me her Golden Age rules, without telling me who wrote them. If you are the original author, thank you for some lovely stuff, and please get in touch so I can credit you here. And apologies to the liberties I took, converting your 21 rules to a dirty dozen for Silver Age* life!

*Still haven’t learned whether the perfect name for us Indian Summer people has been coined yet.