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Storytelling is a talent passed down through the generations in my family. It is a way of life in that the more you live, the better the story; the deeper the experience, the broader the plain to connect with readers. Just like life is about people so writing is about people - about their love, their loss, their triumphs, their failures, and their x ever after. I write to understand myself and make sense of life. I share my work in order to find others who can relate to my characters, or their lives, or the moral of the story.

Saturday, March 19, 2011

Of sunny days and heavy hearts


Listening to: It's a beautiful day - U2
Hoping: I don't get sued/complaints about the pics I've used on my blog
(in hindsight I'll stick to using my own photos and pictures from now, just to be safe)
Reading: The Parenting Book
Writing: Prompts


It's a sunny day in Welly. Blue skies with patches of puffy clouds, very little wind, and so far it looks to be a promising day for my laundry. What does laundry have to do with good weather? Everything, if you don't have a tumble dryer.

Depending on how good the monkeys behave, I might suggest a brief trip down to the beach for an hour or so this afternoon. To be honest they haven't been that good this morning. For one they tried to lock me out of the house when I was hanging up my washing, and then they tried to eat my breakfast when I finally got around to actually having breakfast.

And, I'll just apologise right now if this blog post seems random. I'm squishing a whole month's worth of blogs into one and trying not to write a 500 page life biography while I'm at it.

On the topic of writing, I do believe the little bug has curled back up into its shell and rolled into the furthest and darkest corner of my mind. Just when it was finally emerging again, too. Life has a tendency to beat down on ones drive. The creativity is still present; I nearly finished a oneshot (that's a very short story for anyone who is not familiar with the fanfictioner lingo) last night for a competition club I'm involved in. The prompt is anguish. It couldn't have been more fitting considering the state I was in after receiving some bad news relating to the health of a family member. I still stand by the theory that writing is cheaper (and far more efficient) than therapy.

It also helps to talk to someone.

It hasn't lifted my spirits much, or relieved the ache in my chest. You can't expect to go on a rollercoaster ride and laugh and smile and have a good time when you're suffering on the inside. Life doesn't work that way. But letting it out in one form or the other has helped clear my head enough so I can think and decide what I'm going to do about it.

Writing and family issues aside, it feels like hell has descended on earth. I watched the news the other day and for a moment thought 'this is like something out of an apocalyptic blockbuster'. There have also been people (and this ticks me off more than I can explain in words) who have taken clips of the video footage shown on the news of a 13 feet high tsunami destroying lives and homes in Japan - and HEY, there's a white thing streaking across the screen. And this is filmed LIVE! OMG, what is that, a UFO? Can it be that there were aliens present when this tragedy occurred? Because really WTF is that white thing?

Now, some of you may have heard me say this, I do believe there are other beings out there which we know little about. I also believe in angels and God, but I'm not pointing out that there are angels hovering in the sky or that hey look there's God's hand/face/finger in the clouds either. Yet people are focussing on something insignificant, something small and stupid and completely irrelevant streaking across the screen while there is a tsunami killing thousands of people live on TV.

I get that a lot of people will shrug it off and go 'well, there's been lots of these things happening in the history of our world, this is nothing new'. It makes me wonder just what has become of the human race. Where is the compassion and empathy? Where is the humanity? First a HUGE earthquake, then a MASSIVE tsunami, then three NUCLEAR meltdowns, and to put the cherry on top a volcano erupting. It's one after the other catastrophe hitting one place in the timespan of two weeks. It's easy for people who are not personally affected by these events to flick off the TV when the news is on because they've grown bored of it.

The same thing happened with Haiti. Who ever spends a thought or prayer on those people lately? Only those who were affected by it. The rest of the human race have forgotten and don't really care that most of those people are still homeless and are still struggling immensely from day to day just to get by.

I think that anyone with a grain of compassion in their bodies, anyone with a mind, can imagine what it must be like for the people who are now stuck in Japan. I could write you a story about what it could be like, but could you handle it? Would you want to know? Would you want to look at it from THEIR perspective? Would you care?

That's the problem. People say 'oh how tragic, those poor people, it must be awful', but they don't really care. They forget about it until the news throws it back in their face to say Hey, this is still happening, it's real, it's not over just because you turn your head the other way.

I'm not saying everyone is like this or does this. There are a lot of people out there who do care but don't have the resources to help. There are a lot of people who do care and who are helping because they're trained and are competent in giving aid. I know I'm dissing a bit on people who are not personally affected by this catastrophe, but bear in mind that I myself am not personally affected by it either. I have no family or friends (that I know of) who are caught in that hellpit. I still care. I empathise. I pray for them.

Life taught me to live in the moment.
Death taught me to appreciate what I have.
Humanity taught me to hold onto my faith.
The Holy Spirit taught me of myself.
Jesus taught me love.
God taught me peace.



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