Latvia

Belated pics from Riga. An amazing place with a fascinating history. Plus friends, cake and gin and tonic. A lovely holiday.

Sickness

Still in limboland with neurology department - not helped by the fact that although I had been referred by my eye consultant 4 weeks ago, up until Thursday I was still not 'in the system' at the neuro clinic. My case was being reviewed on Friday, so naively expected a phone call that day with my appointment. Ha ha ha ha ha.
Apart from that, we are a house of sickness. I am still getting terrible headaches and dizziness, and my little one is now uncharacteristically quiet and subdued with a high temperature. Phoned NHS direct to ask about swine flu, but they did checklist with me and it was a case of 'computer says no'. So, another day off work tomorrow, and I still have all the Christingle costumes to sort out.......as well as half-term assessments.........display board......risk assessment for trip to the theatre......last week's marking from when I was off sick......so, the usual end of term, in other words.

In my efforts to counteract my lack of visual accuity, I am becoming obsessed with lighting. As well as a range of lamps, I have become addicted to Yankee candles, which actually give sodding energy-saving bulbs a run for their money in terms of brightness, but also smell heavenly. Favourites are French Vanilla, and Creme Brulee, just in case my Secret Santa is reading this.

On an altogether more positive note, I am starting Spanish conversation classes with the divinely named Angel on Thursday. All in anticipation for Seville in February, and proposed salsa trip to Barcelona in April (and again in July?). Life is short, school holidays are long. xx

Grief

I remember when my eldest step-daughter told me that she was going to study psychology at 'A' level rather than English, tartly replying to her that studying literature would teach her far more about the human condition than studying Freud ever could. Through every shade of my grief for my dad, literature has been there to support, console, empathise. C.S.Lewis said, 'We read to know that we are not alone', and each transition is echoed in my books. So, I am Heathcliff, longing to be haunted:"Come in! Come in! Cathy do come." Or on the good days, I am taking the baton from John McCrae: "To you from failing hands we throw/The torch; be yours to hold it high."

But today, I am the snivelling Nina in 'Truly Madly Deeply': sobbing "I miss him, I miss him, I miss him, I miss him, I miss him, I know I shouldn't do this but I miss him."

Tingly toes

I need to dance - my toes are tingly and I'm sure I don't notice it if I am dancing. Haven't been for over a WEEK, good grief. With hubby finishing this cycle of tutoring, and me feeling low, I have been hibernating and cooking and worrying and working and there hasn't seemed time for anything else. Working seems to take so much longer with a dodgy eye. Today I had double vision for most of the day, and now it is evening I am back my cyclopic existence. So, out with the illuminated magnifying glass for my marking, and up to bed early to watch my big screen TV.

Wanna be in my gang?

Today I was on - irony of ironies - a first aid course at my old secondary school. It has been 27 years since I left and I am quite surprised at how warm and fluffy it made me feel being back there. Sitting in my old English classroom, I could feel the whispering presence of students past - Louise, Graham, Ian, Ann, Ali, Andrea - and remembered exactly where we all sat. I could even remember an essay I wrote in that room - 'What Freedom Means to Me'. I am sure it was a hotheaded spiel on freedom to protest( about what?why?), freedom to choose a career (ha!), freedom not to have children until I wanted them.....(double ha! When I got around to trying to have them, my body failed to do as commanded until years later).
It's funny, but I didn't remember all the geeky awkwardness that I felt for the majority of my school life. Sitting there with my two lovely colleagues and friends, I felt that I was finally cool!!! Finally, at the age of 43, I was in the cool gang!
But what I didn't realise is that being in the cool gang for me, means being pretty much everything that I depised and still despise about cliques - laughing at other people behind their backs, feeling superior ( Because I have a slightly less Essex accent than them?Because I have been luckier than them?), feeling more clever, better dressed, better educated. Basically I was a total shit, just like all those people were to me at school. What a fine line between being victim and a bully there is. Is it because I wanted to impress my friends? Or was it some deeply pyschologically closure exercise? I hope so. Because I don't really want to think about the alternative.

11th of the 11th

Thinking of Joe Windall, an exceptional former pupil of mine, killed in Afganistan in the Nimrod crash which took the lives of 13. His smile will stay with me forever.

Friendship

For those of you who

Held my hand
Held my hair
Held the grief
I could not bear

Let me weep
Let me rage
Let me through
My open cage

Thank you.

Czech Mate

Me and my new Czech friend .

Tired and Emotional

....but it's the end of the week and I'll always have salsa.

The answer is 42

To follow up my first post....there is no meaning to life. I have been having interesting discussions with friends recently about what we deserve in life. I was quite shocked that some of them think that they deserve happiness, deserve a man to love them, deserve a chocolate biscuit. As if life is fair. By the same logic I deserve optic neuritis, I deserve MS, and I deserved to watch my dad die in agony. It would be very scary if that were the case. What on earth have I done to deserve that? Or, the other side....what have I done to deserve my happy marriage, my beautiful daughter, my loyal friends?

To paraphrase Charlton Heston.......

They will have to pull my dancing shoes off my cold dead feet.

November blows

Today I have been thinking about what the doctor said about my scan. Mostly medical gobbledegook which I couldn't understand, but the words LESIONS and MS were plain enough. He kept going on about 'abnormalities' in my brain, which makes me feel deficient in some way! Strangely I have always thought my brain was the one thing I could rely on, and now it is letting me down. It is quite a surprise. Out of a fairly unhealthy family I have always prided myself on my physical health and taken measures to protect it - being a vegetarian, not doing too much naughty stuff, etc.

Apart from the bizarreness of thinking about my brain with my brain, it has been a windy, fun day. A trip up to London to see Lucy and exploring Spitalfields Market. Have got some Xmas prezzies already. Had to avoid thinking about Xmas 2 years ago.