Escape (The Pina Colada Song)

I heard the Pina Colada song on the radio this morning by Rupert Holmes from somewhere in the early eighties. Funny how a song can release so many memories.

For me this song comes from a time that I went to live in Dar es Salaam in Tanzania for six months, which might not look far from Harare Zimbabwe on a map but is a four hour flight and hour time zone away. The contract and the song appealed to me at the time because I was also escaping some unbloggable things going on in my life and I needed space to get my feet back on the ground. The song fitted my mood because I could go to this new place and more easily be who I remembered myself to be.

I loved Dar.

For the first time in my life I lived close to the sea. Wonderful. Marvelous. I loved running (hmmm in those days I could run too) on the beach in the early, dawning morning. I loved a peaceful walk at the end of a day, meeting the fisherman and choosing flip flopping fresh fish for supper. Glorious. Dar also had its idiosyncrasies. Early in my stay, finding that I did not like long life milk too much I enquired of the woman who cleaned my flat where fresh milk might be found. (Tanzania was at that time desperately poor and such luxuries were not freely available - indeed most food was imported and most of the wealthier residents had considerable storage space devoted to dry and canned goods). She said that she would arrange for some the next day. Sure enough, the next day a small boy arrived with a cow and calf and bucket and asked how much milk I wanted. We negotiated a price for the quantity and made an arrangement for a weekly delivery, which I duly pasteurised - thinking often as I did so that it was perhaps just as well that I had grown up on a dairy farm.

I was very sad when my contract was up.

And ever since the sound track for that wonderful six months has been the Pina Colada Song. I would post a link to You Tube if I could figure out how to do that, instead you are going to have find it your self.

Damp winter

Our winters are generally dry and cool. The tropical climate affected by the altitude which makes it much colder that most people expect. Often visitors from temperate climates arrive with summer clothes only to find themselves suffering from the cold and miserable. Although winter days are usually around 18 to 20 deg C, compared to the wonderful warmth of summer, our houses are built for the heat and not the ten weeks of cold so the cold can be unpleasant. But always one can find a sunny spot out of any cool Antarctic breeze, where one can warm one's frozen toes and fingers (we are also not so good at winter clothing).

However it is unusual for our winters to be overcast and damp as this one is proving to be. It is making everyone miserable and bad tempered. La Nina  in the distant Pacific has far reaching effects - even into the heart of Africa. This morning I decide that I am going to reconsider my efforts to save the planet - what else can I recycle, reuse and simply do without? How can I save on carbon emissions? Even here in one of  the poorest of the poor nations of the world.

Deep in fear

For one reason and another I have walked often in deep, dark, paralysising fear.  Terrible though it may be it is often simply the fact of my life.  Underneath the apparently "normal" facade churns terror, relentlessly, day in and day out.  It does wax and wane like the moon, but it never entirely goes.  In defence I have learned to manage the terror and most days I have more control than it does. Those days are each a victory that I cherish.

Today the hours of learning to breathe through terror so that I can think and function finally paid off.  I had a client come and see me who was in a depth of terror as she finally faced the seriousness of her debt crisis.  She had no idea which way to turn and what to do next.  I could pass of the painfully learned lessons of managing terror and fear to someone who really needed them.  And the lessons learned helped her cope.

The value of learning to function in darkness which is not something I always think worth the effort, is reinforced.

More nudging toward life. Grace again.

Not so gentle nudging

Last week Robin wrote here a post about the horrific damage that a suicide can wreak on a wider family. She makes a moving plea that anyone considering this course of action do anything and everything to recover their health. Given my own suicidal impulses this post stayed with me more than usual. Then yesterday I read in Acts of St Paul's words to his jailer "Do not harm yourself" as he considered suicide after the earthquake that would have freed his prisoners. They seemed words spoken directly to me, such has been the bleakness of my own life recently. And this morning.......

Well, I was alone in the house and our little black half grown kitten followed me around, meowing persistently until I sat down with her. She cuddled up under my chin, sucking her paw furiously and purring vibrantly. She was deeply happy, content. I was made aware that even this little black cat would miss me if I wasn't here as she doesn't cuddle like this with anyone else.

Now of course the trick is to hold on to this knowing in the worst of moments.

Different time

Recently I have found that I spend a couple of hours a week, each, with three elderly people. The youngest, my mother, is 78 and the oldest is 84. All are reasonably fit and mentally alert but they have this in common - they all move more slowly that I do. Not a little more slowly - way more slowly. It takes my mother on average twenty minutes to make coffee when I could probably do the same task in five minutes. I have learned to slow my speech and my movement to match an entirely different pace. Well, it might be more accurate to say that I am learning a whole different time.

Initially it was like be trapped like a fly in treacle slowly oozing out of a jar. Frustrating and impatient making. I would buzz futilely against something I could absolutely not change.

As the weeks have gone on I have adapted and learned to pace myself differently and my time with these people has become a sort of moving meditation from which, if I get it right, I emerge into my frenzied world refreshed and alert.

Surprised I find that in my arrogance I offered them the "gift" of my time and find instead that they give me the very considerable gift of theirs.

Melancholy

Small turned eighteen yesterday. He had a wonderful happy day, rounded out by dinner with seven of his closest friends in a good restaurant. It was a fine, fun evening. He enjoyed every moment of his day, squeezing every last morsel of pleasure out of it as he is inclined to do. I was a proud mama, watching this boy who has fought against all sorts of odds to not only survive but come up smiling and together and approaching full adulthood with enthusiasm and anticipation.

Yet today I am overcome with a strange melancholy.

Perhaps it is just the loss of my "baby boy" and the bewildering speed at which he became a man. Perhaps, it derives from the realisation that within a year he will be at University and the house will be echoingly empty. Perhaps I am simply not looking forward to this phase of family life. Well not the empty house part of it..... my husband and I are already enjoying more time to ourselves and the freedom to please ourselves that comes with adult children who are in the process of leaving home.

A prayer received

I received this prayer as a "chain" letter this morning from a friend.


"God, our Father, If it is your will, walk through my house and take away all my worries and illnesses and please watch over and heal my family in Jesus name, Amen." 


Now although it didn't threaten all sorts of bad luck and proffered blessings if sent on to at least twelve friends, I didn't send it on. I didn't send it on because it just didn't seem like a Christian prayer. How, I ask myself, can a Christian pray that all their worries and illnesses be removed? Never seen that happen in real life. I have seen strength given where there was weakness and courage where there was none and joy for sadness, both in my own life and in that of others. Usually I pray not for removal but for courage and strength and joy and that my needs will be met.


Have I been wrong all these years?