Friday 30 December 2011

Resolutions and Mixed Tapes


Let me tell you story. You must of course agree to believe that this happened to a friend of a friend of mine, or I shall refuse to continue. OK? OK.

There was a girl who lived a life blessed with love, beauty, friends, words, brilliance, sunshine, great legs and the prettiest face. She walked a privileged path that consisted of blissful moments and first world problems.

She sat alone on the night of the last day before the last day of the year. It had been an amazing year of lessons learnt, treasures earnt and friendships burnt... down to the ground like a pyre. Adele smashed away in the background saying sometimes it lasts in love but sometimes it hurts instead. She listened and sniggered. She had learnt that the past is the past and if you can take something or anything or a smidge of a story from it then you'd done OK. OK?

We were born and raised in a summer haze, Adele continued. This time she smiled because we were. The sun has always shone on us.

For all the ups and ups and downs and crashes and grey bits, life was pretty damn good.

She is 35 years old. She is smiling. She looks to tomorrow and likes the way the plans are laid. She likes that the grey bits are hazy and unwritten. She is good with life.; good with the people she loves; good with the future; and good with the results of the choices she has made.

Now let it play out.

Nothing compares
No worries or cares
Regrets and mistakes
They are memories made

How I saw Lego

This is how I saw Lego, as a child and this is part of a brilliant advertising campaign.

Chew on the furniture and start bar fights

Wednesday 28 December 2011

Break it

You're walking down a leafy sunny street in the middle of the holidays. Most people are eating lunch with their families and aren't out and about. Those you do see nod and smile. They aren't friends but you have seen them around and they do the nodding thing and you do the nodding thing.

There is an actual friend-type person that you are on the path to running in to. It's a planned rendezvous. A tryst of sorts.

You keep asking yourself "What makes a friend?" How does that label get assigned and attached and maintained? Songs tell you a friend is someone who walks in to your house like they live there but the police will do that in cop shows you see on TV so it doesn't quite sit right. Others give analogies of gardens and tending flowers but your vivid imagination extends that to weeds and barren soil and other parts of the analogy where worms turn the soil to better it but are still icky.

This person that has been placed in your line will soon be in your sight. The thing with sight is that you don't always see what is in front of you. There is a plumish hue when he appears. As if the sun is setting in his stead. There is a warmth that you feel when you see photos of people having picnics. Not that cuddly corny warmth but the feeling of the sun on your skin, even when all you are doing is looking.

You call him an actual friend but your actual friends sigh and roll their eyes when he ultimately emerges in the conversation. Those are the deep and meaningful talks resulting from too many ciders and an unyielding urge to tell someone or anyone or maybe an actual friend, about him.

It is nothing new to you that he controls the entirety of who you are when you two are "us". At first it seemed like he was leading you in a tango. Sexy and strong and dominant and all the time caring that you are ok. He will look after you, so you follow.

You aren't sure when but the dance became more like a fight. You both wrestled and he slapped you. He loved it. You broke a little. Then you danced again.

Each time, you saw the glow as he approached and forgot the darkness when he left. Always thinking he brought the sunshine with him when he came and realising he brought nothing but the darkness which he left with you when he'd gone.

This will be another crossing of paths. Maybe a paving of cow paths. It always happens and starts to feel like that is what happens. You cringe. That should paint you a sign. That should bend the neon tubes that illuminate a Vegas like detour but you will tread the road.

He comes and talks and it wouldn't matter if you are there. You are inconsequential. Did you want a coffee? My shout. He talks through you and you feel the sound reverberate over and around and fizzily through your particles. What once felt like a buzz, now feels like a zap.

He leaves and there you are again walking through an empty suburb with trees. Yes, trees. There are people. They are strangers. There is sun in your eyes and you sneeze. Everyone is locked in their house with families that they tolerate. You wonder why it is getting so dark.

Break it. Break it so it is so broken that it can never be fixed again. Break the trees and their damn streaming rays of star light. Break the path you walked over and over again. Break your shoes that you walked it in. Break your rose coloured glasses and throw the jagged lenses in the street so car tyres will be punctured. Break it all.

Then start again.

Who you are

I write to you but I don't think you read it. It could be because I don't know who you are. Maybe you read it and wonder who it is that I write to but never think it is you because of course, I don't know who you are.

Please Enter

Monday 26 December 2011

A New Year of Respect



2011 was an interesting year for me, as they always are. This one highlighted one thing that I knew but had to realise. It goes along the lines of being happy first before you can make anyone else happy. That I realised, goes for most things in life.

Be rich before you give money. Be happy before you give happiness. Be wise before you give advice... or have a blog and too much spare time.

This year, I focused on honouring and humouring myself by finding the things that I liked and wanted to commit my life to. Work has been narrowed down to two areas I like and think make me a better contributor. Now I have to continue on that work path and make it work for me and my job. Friendships have solidified or dissolved to ensure that they are healthy and not damaging. Passions for hobbies and interests lost have been retried and some rekindled.

I am more of who I want to be.

One thing that I found repeatedly was sacrificed was respect. Respect for my guiding principals. Respect for people who deserved it more. Ultimately, a recognition that I sacrificed self-respect to make others happy and to respect them, when I should not have.

There is a fine line between generosity and giving because someone insists on taking from you.

Yesterday was Christmas. A symbolic day for new life. The right time to take back some of what had been taken from me. A time to stand up and silently rescind the hold that others have had over me that came from my giving and giving and their never actually asking but always taking.

Maybe everyone else is just so good at maintaining that balance but I suck at it. That is why I had to bring it back to one concept and one word that I could focus on for 2012.

Respect.

Respect for myself first then I'll deal with the rest of the world.


Sunday 4 December 2011

2011 - Top 10 Photos

Top 10 sets of my photos on flickr...

Creatures



Shoes



Happy Mana



Outdoorsy



Nails



Bling


2011 - Top 10 Tunes

My favourite songs of 2011 were...

James Blunt - Stay the night




Bruno Mars - The Lazy Song




Rihanna - S&M




Jessie J - Price Tag




Adele - Rolling in the Deep




RIP Amy Whinehouse - Rehab




Plain White T's - Rhythm of Love



Gym Class Heroes - Stereo Hearts




Gotye - Somebody that I used to know

Sunday 27 November 2011

Crowded


It is a strange numbing sadness that comes to you when you realise that you belong nowhere and there is no person or people that you are joined to in any way.

That could be why I am a nomad. Why I have so many acquaintances but no best friend. The reason I want to be so far from family and friends, where no one knows me.

I don't mind people. I enjoy their company but what I long for is my own place and my own space. Somewhere that I don't have to be diplomatic or ask if what I am doing suits someone else.

There is little to no doubt that I will be a crazy cat lady and I will prefer that.

Tuesday 22 November 2011

Saturday 19 November 2011

Friend Portfolio


My friend Jen Coombes introduced me to the idea of the Friend Portfolio. She is the greatest friend thief I will ever know and the best inspiration. She taught me that if you mesh with someone then just let it happen. Don't fight friendship. Don't try to force it. Let it happen and forget the rules and regulations.

I was at a Halloween party recently for a recently made friend, with my girls Olga and Elmo. I was busy in the kitchen dressed as an iPhone making my famous margaritas when I ranted about how friends betray you. The friends that you surround yourself with and the amazing people around you say more for who you are than any constructed identity or brand. They are the definition of who you are.

The girl with the strong Italian accent asked "where are you friends tonight?" and I pause and then answered "They are the two fully clothed girls who are swimming in the pool and attracting all the male attention".

Monday 14 November 2011

Self Hurt


Once there was a song that defined me... at least for a moment in my life. It is a song by Nine Inch Nails that was covered by Johnny Cash. Cash did the more powerful version. Some of you already know that the song is Hurt.

I wasn't an emo in that I cut myself . I wasn't an X-aholic that took substances to numb the pain or raise my mood. I wasn't going out and looking for fights.

No, I went out and looked for the worst people I could find. I wanted them to disappoint me and confirm that the world sucked. To reinforce that all those who breathe were going to let me down, like others had.

Today is different. I don't hurt myself today to see if I still breathe. I am aware that I breathe. Aware that I am alive and wonderful. That is a big thing. I don't want to be disappointed anymore. There is no validation in finding that and absolutely none in seeking it. People are people... flawed and wonderful.

There shall only be hurt when there is hurt. It will not be something I seek. Disappointment will not console me. There will be more. There is. Those people who validated my world view before are not allowed to anymore. They can be who they are but they won't make me believe the world is bad.

My positive self is here. It will not be bad. Life is good. Let it be so. Believe only that.

I won't let you down. I won't let it hurt.

Form me a habit


It takes six weeks to form a habit. Yes, six weeks. Forty two days. Then you can keep doing it because it is part of your life. To not do it would feel uncomfortable.

If people would accept more that they are not as in control of what they do as they consciously believe they are, then maybe they would honour the instincts and intrinsically driven reactions to stimulus that we have.

It is actually ok not to fully understand what you do. If it causes problems in your life then yes, maybe you should work out what triggers you and drives you. Otherwise, it's ok to do something or like something or be something because it feels ok to do so.

We spend so much time trying to match patterns. It is what humans do. The thing is that we do things that feel good and that positive reinforcement causes us to do it again and again until it is habit. Then there are things we do that don't feel good but are good for us. Do it over and over again and you will start to like it.

Cause and effect are often quite bi-directional. It is like happiness causing a smile and the newly discovered effect of a smile causing happiness. If you have a bad moment and smile then you will feel better. Don't believe me? Try it. You feel stupid at first and then even the feeling silly will make you smile.

If you are going to form a habit then choose something good for you that doesn't feel so great all the time. Commit to six weeks and it will be who you are or at least part of you.

You and me baby ain't nothing but mammals...

Thursday 3 November 2011

Managed Competition

Necessity is the mother of all invention and that doesn't just go for inventing things you can touch. It applies to all ideas.

Human beings are resourceful creatures who spawned from primordial ooze and morphed to omnivores with warm blooded adaptable bodies; stood up on only two paws and used an opposable thumb to strike flint to make fire; and then finally built industries and cities that crumble under their own over-consuming cyclical debaucherous weight.

Each time we boom, we bust.


Each time we build, we crumble.



Each time we make, we break.

Each time we prosper, we fail.

What makes us the dominant species for the foreseeable future is that each time we learn. We keep learning. Although our primal drives satisfy our lizard brains, we keep alive the great ape in us. That part that says "make this system better".

The city of Chicago renews it's garbage collection contracts about every decade, along with other city wide contracts that are held jointly by the public and the private sectors.



Each time the contract goes up for grabs and during the lifetime of this committment (which spans multiple mayoral terms) the private sector is judged against and compared to the public sector to see who does the job at a better price and simply who does the job better.

Often once a big contract is won, prices go up or quality goes down. After all, government pockets are bottomless, right?

In this system, the private sector always has competition and not just from the rest of the private sector. The huge in this case is the public sector and that keeps the competition alive. There is a maintained basic level of quality and an understood and accepted cost.

When these contracts have gone up for grabs in the city of Chicago between 1979 and 1994, The Economist states that "the private sector won 34 contracts while the public sector won 22."

What a simple and effective way to privatise yet keep quality and price in check. It even fairly applies those same constraints that private companies must operate under to fat cat public servants.

There is probably a lack of perfection in this way too but I like the transparency and constant reappraisal. The fact that providers of a service can thrive if they should or fail if they should seems right. The fact that privatisation makes sense in some decades and not in others might be reason enough to try this shared responsibility via managed competition.

Wednesday 2 November 2011

Darwin


My recent denouncement and departure from Darwin was preceded 48 hours earlier by the travel book publisher Lonely Planet recommending the city in the top ten cities in the world to see for 2011.

It spoke of a bustling nightlife; access to an ancient culture and pristine wilderness; and of a city with energy and oomph. Maybe not those exact words but that was the gist of it.

I don't want to sound like my hipster friend Cathie but I liked Darwin before it was cool.


It isn't though. With all feedback, you must take it as input in to your system and weight it with what drove the source to say it, or in this case rank it.

Lonely Planet was the travel book of choice when I was a crumpled, life-in-a-backpack traveling twenty something. It was for those moments when I took a break in my life and on a budget travelled the world in search of people to drink with and adventures to have.

There is no shame in that. Lonely Planet was my $50 travel guide as I saw places I had read of in books or googled while cheating at pub quizzes. It took me beyond the Eiffel Tower and to a lovely wine and cheese stall that allowed me to buy a bottle and some milk products and gaze upon that industrial marvel from a nearby park, while others sweated and stood in a line to be sheared at the top of the lift of the tower, all the while being unable to see the forest for the tourists.

Lonely Planet led me down thousand year old streets to restaurants in dark dodgy parts of town where I was welcomed joyfully and replied in broken language, only to discover the waiter was from Melbourne.

Lonely Planet took me to vending machines that sold beer, ice cream and used school girls knickers and on to restaurants that displayed lacquered food while serving fresh minky on dried seaweed.

Lonely Planet took me everywhere, made me feel safe, slept in bed bug ridden sheets, sat next to me while I was kissed in Paris, was a pillow on trains across the worlds greatest mountain ranges and even silenced a very annoying Irish backpacker when I needed to sleep.

So when my home town is named as a top ten city to see, I may still agree with Paul Keating and say "The best view of Darwin is from 40,000 feet in the air on your way to Paris" but that is my 35 year old self speaking.


There is a reason for the youthful traveller with their unkempt hair and non-Veuve budget to come here. It will give them stories, experiences, tales, memories and heartache for places that are so different to what we grew up with that we take a breath as we survey them and hope that our mum will wire us some money when we blow our last money on a cold local beer.

Saturday 29 October 2011

Airports and Roundabouts


There are a lot of beautiful things in the world and many many mundane ones. Inanimate things. Areas. Spaces. Structures that give you no thought but to negotiate your way past without hitting them.

It's a case of airports and roundabouts.

Thing is that if you stall long enough to have to think about them, they are magic in their own way.

The modern roundabout is simple and highly effective. It is a control structure that regulates traffic with easy rules and without bringing everyone to a stand still. There is immense beauty in its simplicity. Simple rules of uni-directional flow and everyone knowing who gives way to who.

Next time you meet a roundabout, absorb the structure and give way to the right.


Then there are airports. You enter through some sliding doors and check luggage and print tickets and clear security and drink bad coffee. Around you, large canisters full of highly explosive jet fuel hit the ground and leave it at extreme speed. A bunch of people in a tower sew their paths, as thousands of people arrive and depart on their way to another identical depot.

At the most, you walk a hundred meters to a gate and wait in managed silence for your horseless, groundless, floating carriage to arrive. Then you climb aboard a vehicle with a hundred strangers to share air and bad food, while you achieve uplift and cut what was months of travel in to an annoying several hours.

People talk of smart phones, mapping the genome and coloured contact lenses and they are fabulous. There are also things we take for granted that if you stop and think of, you will release that we live in the future.

Friday 28 October 2011

He doubts my source


Today he told me on the phone that pain only initiates the art and that my beautiful words then flow afterwards.

He is wrong.

When a passionate emotion owns me (beit pain or lust or love or hate or exhaustion), it drives every word I write. There is no eloquence in starting a sentence with it and ending it with another.

It is his way of living with the bump in joy he causes me. Bump down. Bump up. All cause.

I write it. I feel it as I write. It is good.

If you read this and feel the ride then say. Tell him, he is wrong.

Monday 24 October 2011

Fatalism and Free Spirits


Last week left me with many thoughts after a 3 hour conversation with an old acquaintance. It is not a conversation that I see being repeated but it was an awakening moment.

This person kept telling me that he is a free spirit. That he deals with the here and now and does not plan for things to come or worry about things that have passed. I listened carefully and with interest because even though I am quite random at times, my view of life and destiny are quite separate from his.

He spoke of life happening and just taking it as it comes. I cringed.

I have heard this cry from many people. They are usually stuck in a rut of some sort. They are uneducated; unable to turn the tide that carries them in to and out of situations of life; and they are happy in their silent surrender.

There is peace and happiness in accepting your lot in life but I believe there is meaning and adventure in owning each turn you choose to make and driving out a life based on choice and consequence.

Life is not something that happens to a person. Happiness does not choose or unchoose you. It is not written by a deity with all knowledge, all sight and all presence. For me, I am lucid. I am conscious. I am the person who decides what happens to me.

Maybe, I am not a free spirit who can just sail along on the crest of existence, only breathing and sleeping and eating and... well, all those basic things. There has to be more and I make it so.

The second that I lie down and believe that the outcome is determined before I took the steps towards it, is the day that I will give up.

The free spirit thing is fine as long as they are not actually a fatalist that has signed a contract with lazy and opted for letting life happen to them.

Thursday 20 October 2011

Absense


I stopped writing when I found you.

It took a long time to work out why I stopped writing. It wasn't you. Don't flatter yourself. My drivers are intrinsic.

It was the lack of pain.

The pain gave me a certain kind of agony that no one else can know but someone who knows exactly how to explain their feelings. If you have the words to describe it then you should be able to solve it. Unfortunately, that is not the case. Sometimes seeing something with clarity only means that you can watch in instant replay, the person who stabs your naked body repeatedly while you float above it feeling the knife as it slices your soul. Bleeding nothing but the essence of who you are.

Pain leads to art. Pain leads to music... paintings... drawings... words of whim... words of wisdom. Pain is truth. Truth is pain. There is nothing more honest that the rare raw bruised feeling that life leaves you with after you've stood and fought or loved or represented and then lost.

A friend once told me that there is no losing in life. That life is not a competition. Any true perfectionist will explain to you that losing is a game against yourself. It is the motivation to be more than you are and then the inability to reach an _apparently_ unattainable goal. Try tell the perfectionist that they can not reach that apple and they will make you sit in a comfortable chair as they prove you wrong.

The words come from the tearing of your being. They are the beauty you can only show when the lights are out, the vodka has been poured and the world has forgotten you.

Tuesday 18 October 2011

Friday 14 October 2011

My head is stuck in the clouds

I met him again. He's stuck in my head. My head is stuck in the clouds. It's one of those never-gonna-happen situations. That doesn't seem to kill it. It just is what it is. Over-thinking it will make it more than what it is or ever will be. Breathe. Live it. Let it happen. Then let it die.

Monday 10 October 2011

Memories in red and green

I married in dappled sunlight under the trees of a rainforest next to an emerald green river, surrounded by everyone I loved. I wore red.

She rises up like the tide


This weekend past, was a lot like those weekends I remember when I was a teeny bopper. It started with a fabulous night out with my girlfriends. We drank bubbly, met two new girls to add to our crew and then danced until our feet hurt and our eyes went all blinky. Then we went to a mates where we cooked frozen chips and covered them in MSG loaded chicken salt (with some Seth Arfikan) name.

The rest has been a slow blur of chained naps, necromancy via fiction, teddy bears with 20's headbands and constant grazing.

Tomorrow, it's back to work with early breakfast meetings to head off project dramas and then on to writing code and getting stuff done.

There is only one thing I need to get life to the point where I am 100% satisfied with it - physical health and that starts Tuesday with my new personal trainer. Apparently, his name is Dorian. I can only imagine he is super fit and hides a painting at home of an ugly fat man. Oscar Wilde would be happy with that scenario.

Maybe happiness is just being who you want to be.

Sunday 2 October 2011

Now you're just somebody that I used to know


There is a song bouncing off the walls at the moment by Gotye called Somebody that I used to know. My need to listen to it over and over again comes late at night at that time when it takes clenching teeth to keep my eyes open.

I was sitting at my work desk on the 22nd of September wondering what I'd forgotten to do. Did I miss someone's birthday? Did I have an appointment for a pedi or a massage? Was there a bill due?

I forgot it again. Even after toughening myself up a couple of weeks in advance for what would have been my fifth wedding anniversary or our 14th year together, I still forgot.

Right now, that seems to be a good thing but I can't lie. When I did remember, it ached. Ached through my entire body. Skin, organs, limbs and the split ends lying on the floor of my hairdresser's floor.

There may always be a pain there... where he used to be. Even now he's just somebody that I used to know.

Style

Sunday 11 September 2011

Plain White T's




My head is stuck in the clouds
She begs me to come down
Says "Boy quit foolin' around"
I told her "I love the view from up here
Warm sun and wind in my ear
We'll watch the world from above
As it turns to the rhythm of love"

We may only have tonight
But till the morning sun you're mine all mine
Play the Music low and swing to the rhythm of love

My heart beats like a drum
A guitar string to the strum
A beautiful song should be sung
She's got blue eyes deep like the sea
That roll back when she's laughing at me
She rises up like the tide
The moment her lips meet mine

We may only have tonight
But till the morning sun you're mine all mine
Play the Music low and swing to the rhythm of love

When the moon is low
We can dance in slow motion
And all your tears will subside
All your tears will dry

Ba-ba ba-ba ba-ba ba-ba ba-ba ba-ba
Da da-da dum Da da-da dum
ba-ba ba-ba ba-ba ba-ba ba-ba ba-ba
Da da-da dum Da da-da dum

And long after I've gone
You'll still be humming along
And I will keep you in my mind
The way you make love so fine

We may only have tonight
But till the morning sun you're mine all mine
Play the music low and swing to the rhythm of love
Ohhhhhh
Play the music low and swing to the rhythm of love
Yeah swing to the rhythm of love

Sunday 4 September 2011

This song is totally about me



I'm disturbed by how much this makes sense to me. Nobody's Perfect.

Understanding of the Speed of Light



Circles within circles


The other night, I was talking to a friend who was describing the difference between the way his inner circle looks compared to mine. He said that he has a lot of people in the circle closest to him and then the circle furthest away. There is nothing in the middle.

He says that my circles would look like a liberally applied pepper shaker applied to all circles.

Even if he is right, there is nothing wrong with either model. There seem to be definitions of what this type of person does and what that type of person does but I don't think they mean much. They are indicative but are not definitive.

For everything you do, there are people who will tell you who and how you should be. My favourite thing to remind people who come and ask me what I think of their's or someone else's situation is to let them know that what they are feeling is normal. It's all good.

Unless you are seriously mentally ill or have some type of personality disorder that messes with the way you think then you are probably doing fine. There is actually no right or wrong. There just is.

Walk your own individual path through life. Be free. Be whatever and whoever the hell you are. Let no other person living or dead, tell you who you should be. Try to tread carefully when your path crosses the paths of others.

Everything else is easy then.

Sunday 28 August 2011

Accept it as me


Tonight, I sit am sitting here writing and writing and tweeting and blogging and just writing. There is so much beauty in it. There is beauty in pain. The agony of the soul is a paintbrush.

There are times when I am happy and slightly lost. I don't quite know what to do with it.

Then there are moments when I reach for happiness and it's just out of reach. It eludes me and then I realise that I'm not really trying. Maybe there has to be a little hurt to make it worth trying. Maybe one day I will find another driver. Until then, I think I'll make the most of the pain and try to let it make the most of me.

Don't be sorry for me. Smile at that fact that I accepted the fragility of me. The beauty that is a broken Damana. A star that burns it's hottest, right before it implodes.

Accept it as me.

Wednesday 17 August 2011

Don't leave me here


If you find me one night lying still and breathing slowly, don't leave me there.
If my hand twitches and my fingers reach ever so slightly, don't leave me there.
If my eyes are only opened enough to show that I am still there, don't leave me there.
If you see me and you see me, don't leave me there.

Monday 15 August 2011

Some days


Some days, so much of me hurts that I don't quite remember how it was to not feel the deep persistent ache.

People ask if it has a cause, a name, a reason. It does but it is not one that they will be happy with. It is not something or someone that they can fix or heal or tell me isn't worth it.

It is that darkness that looms always. The promise of a sinking lead that pulls you under and so far down that even if you free yourself there won't be enough time to get back up for air.

Part of dealing with depression is accepting that when you are well, you may still plummet into that abyss again. Rudely, it is often at short notice and with an assumed RSVP.

Little things can add up and to be honest, it is more likely a culmination of many tiny pushes than one big ka-thump.

Nah, let me explain that better.

An event can't knock me down on it's own. Triggers don't work that way now. People can't push me over the edge even if they explicitly... harshly... deliberately... knowingly try. I'm too strong for that now.

What can bring me to the point of pain is me not looking after myself.

If I get sick and it lingers. If I get tired and don't sleep. If I get mentally exhausted and don't rest. If I let myself go and not reel it in then I'm in danger.

Depression is what happens to you again when the balance is lost. When the pace is no longer sustainable. When you don't have the energy to hold it back.

It is not about weakness or loss of control or neglect but more about forgetting that it is waiting. Thinking that you're fine and always will be is an error on your part.

Once you've truly suffered from depression, you must always watch your back. Although that sounds awful, being aware that you must does empower you. After all, you know your enemy so well and have defeated it before. If you see it coming this time then it has zero chance of getting anywhere near you.

Wednesday 3 August 2011

Goodnight


It's at night time when I miss him most. Somehow the cool of dark seems cooler without him. The shadows longer. The glow of lights, dim. Calm.

The days are magical. They are filled with people and distractions. Reasons to think of wonderful things. That hope that sunlight brings in its beams. Calm.

Time will pass, as it must. Daylight will stretch out during summer and steal some of the aloneness that dominates the older hours. I shall miss him less. That is the promise. That is the hope that brings the promise. That is the deceleration of the yearning beating heart. The destination that I crave. Calm.

Monday 1 August 2011

While counting the stars

Beauty - You're doing it wrong


This is for women. You are the ones who need to hear it. I am sick of repeating this so the next time I have to convince a woman of how stunning she is, I shall just give her a link to this post.

Beauty is not only skin deep. It is emergent. What makes you magically beautiful comes from deep inside you.

It's not clothes or shoes or makeup. It's not what a man thinks of you. It isn't based in the opinions of a group of women. Magazines don't know how to really make it or if they did then they'd tell you rather than constantly change the recipe.

It's not less than 60kg. It's not skinny jeans versus maxi dresses. There is no way to find it in the shape of your calf or the line of your neck. There is not a way to dress it, cover it up, hide it, disguise it or have it surgically removed or enhanced.

Beauty is the light that shines from your soul. It is what keeps you smiling when someone stares disapprovingly. It is what keeps you loving even after he doesn't care anymore. It is the secret that only you know. The things you love about yourself when you don't look in a mirror.

If you don't quite know what I mean then look at the opposite... the contradiction. What is ugly? It's not a big nose or a badly cut pair of slacks. It's a person who is nasty and unattractive due to their personality or their actions... and if that is the case then why would you think you aren't beautiful?

Do not go in search of beauty. It is always there.

Back to Black



I hope there is no more pain now.

Bye bye, Ms Amy.

Sometimes


There comes a point when you realise that what you are doing is so wrong that the only way to stop is to completely break it. To take it to a point where everyone and everything is forced to cease and desist.

Of course, you look like a complete jerk and no one ever knows that you made yourself the bad guy so that you could do what was right for everyone.

I'm tired now. Tired and hurt. It was for the good of the many. I'm feeling a lot like Spock right now.