Carpe Diem

And...it's still raining and I am therefore depressed.  Yes, I know, I know we needed it and it saves me watering the garden but I have two of the grumpiest bunnies in the world and an Iguana who can't go out in the sun.  I have a three-legged dog who leaves paw prints everywhere and a cat who walks over every shiny surface in the kitchen and bathroom - CSI would have a field day in this house!!!  Ooooh yes please, the lovely Grissam (sp?) yum yum.

I need something to cheer me up but have no idea at present what that would be.  I know I'm female but I don't like chocolate, don't drink much alcohol as it invariably makes me obnoxious and !  I don't watch much TV unless it's Sci-Fi or Fantasy fiction, QI or Have I Got News for You.  I hate shopping (for anything) and can cut my own hair and manicure my own nails...I don't go out clubbing - haven't been to a decent rock club since I left Manc  and so I'm a bit stumped as to how to cheer myself up.  I do not feel like dancing around the house to rock music as it might be construed by the powers that be as a desire for more rain! 

I would go out more if I thought I wouldn't meet anybody.  A people person I am not.    I live in an area where absolutely NOTHING happens and the most excitement we get is when the sheep break out of their electric fences and people stand around scratching their heads wondering HOW?  Sheep aren't stupid...if they can lie on their backs and ROLL over cattle grids, it's only a matter of time before they suss out electric currents!  If I want to do stuff, I have to travel miles and the impetus to do so after a day's work, tends to wane the longer the day goes on!

Whinge, whinge, whinge - sorry. 

I'm ambivalent about most things and passionate about none apart from cruelty to animals.  No, that's not entirely true, I am passionate about medieval history and reading.  I feel, however, having just read two books in a weekend that a person can only do so much reading before life becomes second-hand and one that belongs to others.  I guess more than anything I miss being an academic.  I enjoyed research and the problem with that is that a full time job gets in the way!  The archive section of our library is only open 9-5 with a late night until 7 one day a month.  Phooee!  As I often don't finish until 5.30 and the archives are 20 miles away that's a bit of a non-starter.

So, all you lovely people in blogland...any suggestions to cheer up a grumpy middle aged woman who is anti-social and miserable, who has a relatively clean and tidy house, with no children and who clearly cannot think what to do for herself!  Leastways, not that doesn't involve copious amounts of travelling and even then it might all be shut.  Good grief, this is Wales you know - where a country mile means a country mile.  Answers on a postcard please and oh yeah, keep it clean!!!

I have tried to access some of my friend's blogs but all to no avail.  I cannot read any of Marvo's posts and I have had just as much trouble accessing random blogs.  Have I been singled out for this unpleasant honour?  I know that there have been unending complaints about the speed of this thing but should it be so difficult to access a blog already posted?  Also, why can I not use the new bloody editor thingy?  Pain in the bum!!  I've just had to go through an entire performance just to change my font!!!  Grrrr.

So, yeah, lots of watery stuff has appeared down here in the woolly wilds of south west Wales.  Well, it would do...I've just washed and waxed the bloody car!!!!!

Ah but seriously...many things have happened that I don't quite feel up to writing about at the moment and whereas none of these things were life threatening or even life changing they are things that I need to put into perspective and I can only do that with my own thoughts first...then, when I am sure about things I can write about them hopefully in a witty and sardonic manner!!!!!

Anyways, I have just read my friend Thursa's private post and I can honestly say that I genuinely feel for her and the way she wrote about it made me consider some other things that I have not dealt with in my own life.

One of the processes I undertook on my path in life and spirituality was to go back over the things that had happened to me in my past.  Starting with the most recent and working backwards.  I think on the whole, it has taken me about five years but it has been cathartic and to some degree enlightening.  Basically, you have to go back through the most memorable moments of your life to date...looking at it analytically and asking yourself with total honesty and not with benefit of hindsight whether you would still make the same decisions as you did at the time.  With hindsight many things I chose to do make me cringe but putting myself back to the age I was at the time, considering all the other peripherals, I inevitably and with genuine honesty chose to do the same things again.  Given all the circumstances, those decisions are what make me the person I am today.  Not brilliant but I could have done or become something/one a lot worse!

Self doubt is a killer emotion.  It pervades every waking moment of some peoples' lives, mine included.  I have never been confident that my choices have been the right ones and I have made decisions using pros and cons and I have also made them jump in feet first.  Neither one seems to have benefitted me more than the other.  In truth, I lack confidence in everything I do, which is probably what makes me as anti-social as I am.  If I therefore asked someone a question which I believed to be innocuous and not loaded I would be offended, particularly through this medium of relative anonimity if that person was evasive or even downright unhappy about it.  Especially if I had been communicating with that person for some time!  This post will not make sense to everybody, just one or two people, so bear with me all those of you who think I have lost the plot - which is probably nearer the mark than I would like to admit!

So, yes - I suspect however, it would depend how they were evasive...I would much prefer someone to be honest with me and say look, bugger off, I don't know you well enough to share that information just yet...or...look, I will tell you but not just yet, the time is not right, the situation is fraught, or difficult or anything along those lines.  I would not expect it to become a big deal if someone answered me in any of the above ways.  Where I believe it becomes a big deal is if the person to whom the question is posed becomes instantly defensive about it.  Why do you want to know that?  Sorry, that's just too much information and I'm unprepared to share that insignificant information with you 'cos suddenly, such questions are a threat to my person or my psyche or this is an invasion of my privacy, back off your casting a shadow in my aura!  There again, I suppose the whole thing comes down to degrees of privacy and I guess there are times when although you want to share the information, it just isn't appropriate but you can't find the words to let them down politely - and thinking about how to word a response can perhaps be taken the wrong way by the recipient.  The written word does not always convey the emotion behind the type script.

However, no matter how hard I tried, it would be the evasion that I would find difficult to deal with.  Tell me no and tell me why - fine!  Firing back responses full of suspicion would just arouse my own suspicions and lead me into all kinds of self doubting moments as to why this got such a response from an innocent remark.  I would be even more suspicious if I had discovered that the other person had gone and found out that exact same information about me, without even having had the common decency to ask me directly and effectively gone behind my back!  Such behaviour is ungallant and unfair and yes, even has a hint of control about it.

That being the case I would at least expect a tit-for-tat exchange of information.  You know mine, why can't I know yours type of thing?  Is yours more important than mine?  If the question leads to your evasion why bother finding out about mine and in such a manner.  If your information is private and you cannot share, what right have you got to find out what you can about my information, which was never even asked for and which due to its relevant insignificance in my mind I would have shared with you gladly and un-reservedly?  You now have a piece of information about me which no longer puts us on an even footing.  It is sneaky, sly and devious.

I am taking back control of my own information, if you don't want to share yours - fine.  Do not expect things to go back to the way they have been if you are unprepared to balance this out.  Your evasion and my self doubt have combined like nitro and glycerin and the resultant explosion has put me in a seriously BAD mood.  I am unhappy with the status quo and either you need to change it or I will do it myself (and you might not like the result!!!!)

Ultimately I cannot really comment (despite the ranting of the previous paragraphs) as I am neither the poser nor the evader.  All I can say is that it has clearly made for an unhappy moment or two in the life of a good friend and I say to her...take back some control now, before you become swamped with worry and uncertainty.