Salt and pepper

Once upon a time I had longer hair. I also colored it.

My hairdresser was also a deranged budgie!

This year however, with everything going on, I've felt the need to accept reality in all things including my hair color. I'm 40-something. My hair is turning a salt and pepper color. That's reality. Instead of freaking out about it, covering it up with color and pretending it's not happening I have decided to embrace it. I'm inspired by stars such as Jamie-Lee Curtis



(I've just realised I'm emulating the haircut too!)

who seems to have also decided "No More!" and has just let the hair do what hair does naturally. I think it looks awesome on her, so why not on me?

I also have a friend who is only two years older than me. Her hair is silver white. She went grey at a very early age apparently. I look at it and think she looks awesome, hip, chic - I guess she has the attitude and spunk to match the look too. She keeps it short and funky. It makes her seem younger than she is.

I haven't colored my hair for the last two cuts. It's been with a mixture of "Oh. My. Goodness!" and excited fascination watching the color be slowly cut out, revealing the old natural mousy brown I haven't seen in a long, long time mixed in with a whole lot of salt and pepper.

I think I like it but even if I don't, reality is that it's going grey and reality is something I seem to be keen to explore with all its complexities this year.

Wordless Wednesday - snippets

Today was a beautiful, sunny day. The promise of Summer is in the air. I spent most of it down on the Peninsula.

You're still the only one that feels like home

On one of our getaway weekends. I wish we could've afforded to do more of them.

I have a firm belief that honesty is the best policy. I wonder why sometimes I find it so hard to be honest with myself, especially when it comes to how I really feel about The Man. I tell myself that I'm strong and that I'm ok on my own...that I want to be on my own.

Truth is, I love him.

He's the only one that feels like home.

His good points are more numerous than his not so good points.

He knows my secrets.

I know his. (or most of them anyway)

I know his battles...and have cheered him on from the sidelines for most of my life.

Most of my life....

Which is why the thought of him not being in it is incomprehensible.

His was the face I needed to see before heading in to have our babies...

and the face I sought first when I woke.

The arms I ran to when things got too scary or overwhelming.

I love him.

I think I always will.

Taking the time and that little two letter word.

I have honored myself with a day off work today. Initially I struggled with taking the day off but I realised deep down that I needed it. I put so much pressure on myself to keep to the rules, be everything for everybody and make sure everyone is happy that eventually I have a weekend like the one just gone where I'm constantly teary, say yes to things and then resent it and am just generally a basket case.

So this morning I thought I'd just make myself the priority and let myself stay home. I called work and said I wasn't coming in, nor was I coming in on Wednesday because I have a "specialist appointment" (I'm seeing my counsellor). I have slowly done things, putting things in order in the house and have my music playing in the background. Right now I can hear the lazy tones of Mr Mark Knopfler. It's calming. Oops! Now we have "I was made for loving you" by KISS. Talk about chalk and cheese!

I think part of my relapse is due to the fact that I have been unable to get out jogging for the past few days. I'm carrying some kind of calf injury. It's really quite painful actually, as though the muscle is in constant spasm. I should really get it looked at. So, I haven't been jogging, but I've taken the bike out once and was swooped by psycho magpies twice. They seem to hate my red helmet! This morning I walked around my jogging track three times, finishing with a light jog at the end. It wasn't too bad.

I've realised how much physical exercise has really been instrumental in maintaining a sense of well being and positivity. Maybe it has to do with releasing emotional tension through the movement. I know I'm very focussed when I jog; concentrating on my breathing and maintaining a good rhythm, so I think that helps my mind have a rest from all the ruminations it makes for the rest of the day!

Over the weekend I also realised how important it is to feel that I can say "No" without feeling guilty. I feel incredible guilt if I don't say yes to my kids in regards to taking them where they need to go. As a result, my weekends and days off are filled with trips in the car to social engagements and shopping trips. There's a story as to why my kids don't drive as yet, but I'm not going into it. All you need to know is that right now I am the designated driver. For the most part, I don't mind but there does come a time where I need to just have a day or a weekend at home, without having to get behind the wheel at all, because if I don't I end up being the blubbering, teary mess I was over the weekend, wondering when I'm going to get a break.

Therefore, if I need a break then I need to say NO and feel ok about saying it. There are plenty of wheelchair-accessible buses around this area, we have cards for taxis so that we're only charged a subsidised rate (normally half the regular fare). It's not as though the kids are totally house-bound without me.

No. Such a little word. Such a simple word, but oh so difficult to say sometimes! I think I might have to practice.

(and it's ok to do so! Sometimes.)

Thinking

I think a lot. Too much possibly. Maybe I even over-think things. Have a conversation with me and I'll hash and rehash it over and over in my head for days, weeks, months, even years maybe; particularly if it's very deep, emotive or an argument. It's a wonder I haven't gone nuts with all the rehashed conversations in my head.

I'll also look for the truth behind what you're telling me - even if initially I don't agree with you or don't believe you. Give me some time. Let sleep on it, mull over it, stew on it. I may still be strong in my position but I'll eventually see your point and learn from it...and I'll do what I can from my side to make amends and do better next time, regardless of the fact that you still don't see my point, don't even try and see my point and still continue to build the wall of your fortress, set your battlements and lay your minefields.

Sting said it perfectly when he wrote:

This prison has now become your home
A sentence you seem prepared to pay
It took a day to build the city
We walked through it's streets in the afternoon
As I returned across the lands I'd known
I recognized the fields where I'd once played
I had to stop in my tracks for fear
Of walking on the mines I'd laid.

And if I have built this fortress around your heart
Encircled you in trenches and barbed wire
Then let me build a bridge
For I cannot fill the chasm
And let me set the battlements on fire.

From the song Fortress off the album Dream of the Blue Turtles by Sting.

Excited

Can I tell you something? I really do get squeefully excited when I see that the number of readers of Life At Another Level has clicked up a notch. I don't feel as though I've written anything really blog-worthy over the past week and yet that little number thingy just keeps clicking up...so thank you all from the bottom of my heart! I have a couple of little stories from growing up that I keep thinking I should write - stories that still make my mother and I smile whenever we reminisce together. When she and Dad get back from their Outback trip I'll have to try to remember to interview them for some good stuff! I really want to put some stories in here about what it was like as a child growing up with achondroplasia and some of the experiences I have had - the good and the not so good, the downright funny and the downright dangerous!

Thanks for all reading along whilst I find my blog voice. I really hope that this blog can be an avenue that promotes awareness, understanding and acceptance as well as being a place where I sort through a few things in my heart and mind whilst sharing a little bit of who I am and my life here in Melbourne suburbia.

Wordless Wednesday - favorites

Just a bunch of things that are amongst my most favorite things.

Sarah with her new buddy Blake.

Chloe with Maya

Tim with his cousin Jess

Georgia this morning.

Recommended by my favorite drummer!

THE best cake in the history of the world.

Linking up with Aussie Wordless Wednesday.