Adult bullies. Narcissists. Call them what you like.

I wrote a blog on Sunday evening and then this one last night - I am placing them in reverse order .....

Adult bullies.  Yip you get them. 

It's usually defined as behaviour that is repeated and intended to hurt someone either physically or emotionally.  It is the latter one I refer to.

I returned and looked for and re-read in a friend's book recently a chapter about Personality Disorders and especially Narcissism.  It was an interesting read because I looked at it with different eyes this time around. 

I am always sensitive to bullying, because it took me such a very long time to recognize and acknowledge them for what they are.  

And particularly during this Lenten period I am having greater challenges than normal to understand why someone will willingly and knowingly choose to make others feel "lesser", thereby making themselves feel powerful.  Why you will be happy to never tell others (not everyone, just hand picked ones) that they are important.  Our Priest teaches us about #bestself.  I sometimes wonder if these people look in the mirror each morning and pat themselves on the back. 

Such people very often are seen by a great great many people as being even-tempered, loving, warm, kind and generous all the time.  But the unlucky select few who always seem to feel the wrath, be it silence or sarcasm or whatever, for every little thing they say or do that may be annoying to the other person, they tell a different story. 

Let me give you a very basic and stupid example - You tell someone that you really love when someone asks you how your weekend was.  That person then makes a conscious and concerted effort to make sure they NEVER ask you.  Best self?  I think not. Grown up?  I think not.  A good example?  I think not.  It is very much like "kleinmannetjiesindroom" - petty and self-centred.  Perhaps we need to pray harder for them.

Or just a good old-fashioned bully. 

How to rid yourself of the hold they have on you?  Trust me when I learn, you will be the first people I tell. 

Till soon, stand strong
much love
c'est la vie 
xxx

irritating little things

So what irritates you?  I do not mean the big major things that happen daily in our country and our world which may be unfair / inappropriate / disappointing and annoying to you - I mean the mundane every day things - what really gets under your skin and turns you from zero to 100 in a millisecond? 

• Not being greeted.  By cashiers.  In my office, when someone walks in, I am the one offering the service.  So I greet.  Nicely.  With a smile (mostly).  And when it is a crap day - I still greet and do my utmost not to grimace - because that is my job.  1 in 4 supermarket cashiers do not get this.  And I seem to attract that 1.  It is always the same pattern.  I step up to the counter, the cashier either says nothing, makes no eye contact or is extending a hand blindly to find my items whilst having a very animated conversation with the packer, who is after all the one who deserves her attention, not the customer.  The only thing that riles me more at that moment is when that one word "plastic?" is tossed my way.  I tweeted a major supermarket yesterday after a cashier behaved in such a way for the 4th time since Saturday ... their return tweet and call were lightening fast.  
• People who change lanes without indicating.  And then when they cut you off, or simply push in (usually because the high value of their car gives them the right to) and you flick your lights you get some very interesting gestures.  For goodness sake .. indicate and when there is a gap, take it.... or wait for someone to let you in.  I mostly do ... but heaven help you if you do not say thank you!! 
• Taxis.  Just that.  No description needed. 
• People who speak to me as if I am somewhat a person of limited intelligence.  Who confuse the word Secretary with one meaning "I have no actual thoughts of my own, so please do not speak in sentences of more than 5 words and do not think that I can do anything except type."  The shortest route to getting NOWHERE with me is that attitude.  Do not confuse the job I choose to do with my level of education or the positions I have held in the past.  Thinking that this is a walk in the park says more about you than about me. 
• Bad coffee.  Just that.  No description needed.   And if you cannot serve your coffee hot then why do you list it under Hot Drinks???
• People who repeat the same question over and over again until I give them the answer they expect.  If I answer you, then that is the answer.  Asking me the same question over and over again for 5 mins will not make me change.  If you want me to give you your opinion as the reply .... you got the wrong girl then. 
• Anyone who says a sentence to me beginning with "Everyone says .... Someone said ..... People are saying" ...... especially in a negative context - because my experience is that usually it means it is actually the person who is asking you who says it .... but they hide behind Everyone, Someone, People, Anyone ....   Don't.  For the Love of my Sanity.  Don't.   In my 3rd year of studies I had a lecturer who always told us that when we get a person who says "Everyone" we must ask them to give us 3 names of who.  I have used it often.  I have yet to encounter someone who has the chutzpah to give a name.  
• Telling me to calm down, be quiet or that I am overreacting.  Expect a nuclear reaction. 
• People who talk or whisper loudly during movies at a movie house.  If you want to chat, go for coffee.  Ditto for those who cannot make 90 mins without quickly checking their social media and answering their Whatsapps.  Unless you are on call to perform brain surgery, your friends can wait.  That light is bloody annoying. 

Right so having said that ..... what annoys you? 

till soon 

c'est la vie xxxx

giving our kids wings - and wanting to clip them at the same time

So lately a lot of people have been waving their daughters goodbye at the airport.  First a year ago Jess took up a fantastic position in CT as a professional chef.  Then my BFF's daughter moved to Kazakhstan several weeks ago to be with her fiance'.  Yesterday a close friend of mine bid her daughter farewell as she moved to the UK to chase a future there.  

So many moms and daughters.  So many dads and daughters.  So many siblings bidding each other farewell at airports. 

Which made me think of the saying which goes roughly like we give our kids roots to grow and then we give them wings to fly.  That sucks.  The roots to grow bit is fun ... they around all the time, even when they drive you crazy sometimes.  Then the wings to fly part comes - great sentiment ... awful feeling. We want them to fly, but would prefer it if they do it within a 20km radius of their childhood home. 

When I commented to my hubby that at least our child was still in SA, he wisely replied that it does not matter whether your child moves to another province or another country, if they are not home to kiss goodnight or to be around with you on weekends etc, then it is the same.  And the flippant thought that she is just 2 hours away by plane makes no difference.  I have friends whose kids that live overseas have been home several times over the past year, as much or more than my daughter has been.  As Eug says - when they are more than 500 kms away then there is no popping over. Unless free flights get handed out randomly.

The UK child and my child moved literally a year or so out of matric, which means that we had them around as schoolkids and for a year after, and then they were gone.  I miss the chunk that I missed out on inbetween.  To have time with her as a working girl.  But then I think of a girl who decided in gr 3 what she wanted to do as a career one day and stuck to that faithfully. Studying hard, graduating top of her class and working her way religiously into a fantastic position, for which she sweated and worked incredible hours and very much deserves.  And siblings that are joined at the hip - these goodbyes take their toll. I know how her brother misses her, and she him. 

But these kids take on a new home, new jobs, new circumstances, they feed themselves, do their own laundry and make their own way.  They sort out their SARS registrations, their bank accounts and their many other responsibilities. They do us proud.  And remind us "mom don't baby me".

This year I have made a conscious decision that by hook or by crook we will see each other more.  We have Skype ... strangely enough we have only done so twice since she moved 15 months ago.  We do Whatsapp, every day .... first message at 7am and last one after midnight.  During the day we sometimes get one quick one .... as a chef the restaurant consumes her all day so she cannot get time for saying hi, and that means her passion as a chef is first for her which is fantastic. 

So to the moms and dads and siblings out there that kiss their daughters goodbye (or sons) on a regular basis ...... we are a unique club.  We gave them wings ..... how brave we are ..... perhaps more so than them.  

Jess 21st 

till soon 
c'est la vie xxxx

prayer. giving. pause. just love me.

So Lent has arrived.  Sooner rather than later this year.  We hardly seem to be over Christmas and New Year and boom we are into this part of our lives. 

A friend asked me last year if Lent is made more difficult for me because I work for a Priest, and thus "do I feel that mine has to be perfect".

Allow me to step away from my blog for a moment .  whahahaha haahahahahahah whahahahahahahahahahahaha haha hahahaha heheheheheheheh whahahahahaha. 

OK I am back. 

Short answer No. 

Is anyone's Lent perfect, including Priests? 

Short answer - I think not.  Lent is not a competition.  I do not get allocated marks for mine. It is an effort we make.  And we falter.  Because we are human. 

There are no perfect Lents.  In fact there are no perfect anythings.  God does not expect that from us.  Lent is not a test at which one has to obtain a perfect 10 score.  Lent for me is a trip .... a pause ...... a slowing down.  We pray more, give more, fast more.  It is a time of reflection .... and quiet ..... for me it is also a time of looking at who we fill our lives with ....... and what we fill our lives with.  To me it is a time to look at who I give my love and energy to - and how much love and time they give me in return.  No friendship, no relationship, no anything can survive when one person has to work harder than the other at it.  And I need to pray about that.  Hard. 

I am not about giving up coffee .... or my favourite mag or such ..... we were reminded that we need to give up a luxury item .... we should be feeling the burn in a few weeks when Lent is well on its way.  And I have, given up something that I battle with, a default that I keep returning to - and I am determined to see it through although yesterday and this morning I found myself sliding back into a certain role again.  And I will pray hard. 

So Lent will be in my head and in my heart - and I will try and do all the Faith inspired things, but most of all it will be a time of introspection for me - who and what do I give my time to.  And why. Because that is worth praying for. 

till soon 
c'est la vie xx

4 cars. 3 colours. and a confused driver

So I have really had to focus over the past weeks when it came to vehicles.  

I am the permanent driver of a VW Polo sedan.  In white. 

Then I had an accident and it seemed it would be the demise of that poor car which was only 2 years old.  

The insurance then set me up with a car whilst they did their thing.  That decision was to spend R75000 fixing the car as opposed to having to pay out a biggish amount for it.  

The hire car was an Etios.  In white. 

Now this proved challenging.  I drive a lot.  Every day.  And me and the Polo had bonded.  Well.  I knew him (Marco) ... yes the Polo was called Marco, as in the pool game ... Marco .... Polo ..... Marco .... Polo ..... some of you are obviously going to have no idea what the hell I am talking about.  I knew Marco, and he knew me.  Now suddenly I had to remember that I had an Etios.  Also white. I came out of the Mr Price Home Store, into the parking, stood next to the car and pushed the remote.  "What are you doing?" a lady asked.  I was trying to open her car.  Her white Polo sedan.  I have an Etios.  Awkward.  I explained and backed away.  I hunted for my Polo in the Superspar parking, outside Pharmavalu and at many other places .... each time out of habit. 

Now I am slowly, after 6 weeks with the loan car whilst mine is being repaired, getting used to it.  I find it, regularly.  Then on Thurs I went to a meeting at a nearby coffee shop.  When I came out I stood next to the car and pushed the remote. "That is not your car", my friend laughingly told me.  It was not.  It was white.  But it was a Hyundai.  I stepped around it and pushed my remote at my white car.  "That is not it either", said my friend, now collapsing with laughter.  Yip, cos now I was trying to unlock a little white A class Merc.  Finally I got to the right damn car.  I just keep aiming for anything white on wheels. 

Now today the insurance wanted the hire car back.  But my car is still at the panel beaters.  Friends very generously offered one of their cars to me (they offered the day after the accident already). They are away and I can fetch it tomorrow.  So today I drove my hubby's little car because I had much to do.  It is blue.  

Now you are probably thinking that this would be simple.  I no longer had to keep my head straight about the white Polo and the white Etios.  This was blue. A totally new game for me. 

I came out of the supermarket and pushed my trolley around the bottom level parking for almost ten mins.  I had now finally got accustomed to looking for the white Etios.  At last.  Except that it went back in the morning.  And I was now in the blue Hyundai.  It only dawned on me when I recognised something about it.   

Tomorrow I am fetching my friend's car.  Make and colour unknown.  Please Lord let me concentrate. 

And then later in the week I am getting Marco Polo back again.  

I am going to tape a picture of my car onto the back of my cellphone cover.  Six weeks and 4 cars in 3 colours.  No wonder I am so confused.  

till soon, 
much love
c'est la vie xxxxx

the Deacon, the pause and God's timing

Today I had a wonderful long discussion at work with a colleague.  He is a Deacon but also has grown into a really thoughtful friend.  I did my Lifeline Counselling Course along with him and so through some very personal sharing and much counselling role-playing I got to know him a lot better. I have worked with him for a couple of years now and today again I realised the great gentleness with which he approaches others - do not think the word arrogant can ever ever ever be mentioned in the same line as his name.  He reminds me of the gentle lapping of a wave .... gentle and steady.   His wife is part of the Lifeline team and is often in the office as well and they are as well suited as cappuccinos are to almond biscotti :) 

He and I got into a discussion this morning about the mysterious ways in which God works, and how things always work in His time.  This is something that my friends know I say at least twice a week ... all in His time.  Something that occurred on Sunday had a knock-on effect on something else and so on and so on ... but the starting event set a chain reaction of good things going and a number of things fell personally into place for the Deacon, and then indirectly for me.  We laughed heartily at the fact that something that was so jumbled earlier in the week had all fallen together like a 100 piece jigsaw puzzle. I have thought about this timing often since my accident because I know had the impact been 30 cm further back the story might not have had such a great ending for me.  I often wonder, what if I had paid the parking quicker, what if I had not stopped to look for something in my bag, what if the shop attendant had not been so slow .... I would have been there 30 seconds later ..... or earlier.  How different things would have been. 

Today was a fantastic day.  It had all the P's in ...... peaceful, phones, parishioners and plenty (to do) .. the atmosphere was light and much laughter flowed between the two offices where he and I work.  In addition 3 different people came to visit me for 3 different reasons.  Two of them are close to me and their pop in left me beaming ... the other is a wonderful young lady I met last year who came for a chat.  All such special blessings.  All interested, interesting, caring and warm.  Much like my BFF. I wondered again about God's timing.  If I had not taken this job when I did, 90 % of these people and I would just be acquaintances.  But due to His timing, we have found a wonderful bond tied for a variety of reasons.  And my life has intermingled with hundreds of people over the past couple of years. 

I bumped into a lady yesterday who lost her daughter in an accident last year.  She was there with her granddaughter.  They stayed and chatted with me in the Repository and the little girl told me a few things.  It made me quite tearful, as it did her granny as well. The lady squeezed my hand and thanked me for my patience in something we are working on together and told me that I was where I should be in life. Again I marveled - I am not in a work space that I ever in my life imagined I would be in .... but once again in His time a meeting led to a job which led to my current position ..... I wish it had not taken so long to arrive in my life.  But He chose the time. And His timing has giving me so many many amazing and sometimes challenging people to work with.  A blessing indeed. 

When I had my miscarriage 19 years ago, I was heartbroken ..... but then there would not have been a Nic ..... so again God led me on the path.  And there are many other examples. 

I spend a lot of time thinking about the Year of Mercy that we are travelling on.  I read every bit of literature I can get my hands on to see what Pope Francis tells us about this, suggests to us as a way to live our lives in a way that demonstrates this.  It seems to have had quite a profound effect on me. 

I look too at life.  The arrogance, the hardness, the sarcasm, the better-than-you attitudes .... and then I see people of gentleness, kindness, love, interest, caring.  I hope to make this a starting point ... even more than I am trying now ...... to pause.  Before I speak.  Before I react.  Before I let one or two others know that their dismissive attitude hurts me greatly. 

I cannot change people who hurt me to prove a point.  Or hurt me with what they do or say or even what they deliberately don't say, perhaps to remind me bizarrely that I am the lesser in the relationship.  Instead I am going to pray for them from now on.  A friend who is also a counsellor asked me on Thursday when I spoke to them, "what does it say about a person who pats themselves on the back when they treat others dismissively, or in a way that suggests that you are the lesser person?"  I have decided that it says we should pray for them. 

So I will work hard on this concept of God's timing.  I will try my damnedest to live out the Year of Mercy suggestions and examples, and not just talk about them.  I will love. Because to have someone love you, the real you, is a great blessing.  I will try and live out the example that Pope Francis is giving us.  And that will be damn hard. 

And I will pause.  And pause again. 

till very soon 
c'est la vie xxx

so are you the laughing, crying, moaning, joyful, angry, silly or thankful one?

Been thoroughly perplexed lately about what makes some people tick.  Or if they tick at all.  

I have a very diversified life ... besides the blogging and the being a wife and a mom and planning a party and trying to read a lot and keeping up with social media and drinking coffee, I also have a job that is very different ... it varies from the phone answering, to buying stock ... from receiving clothes and food for the Outreach to buying cleaning materials ... from Baptism, Funeral and Wedding records and marriage preparation of admin to buying coffee, returning newspapers to suppliers and polishing my desk.  No two days have ever been the same.
For fun I handle a mountain high pile of admin and 213 other things each week pertaining to my job. 

So throughout my life I know and meet and interact with so any people for so many reasons.

Some care a lot and show it
Some care a lot and will rather be pierced in the eyes than let you know it.  Do they tick at all?
Some do not care two hoots and you are very aware of it
Some do not care two hoots and pretend they do, usually whilst skinnering behind your back
Some are nice.  A genuine kind of nice. 
Some are nice.  Because they need something from the person they are being nice to
Some just take you for granted because they think they can
Some just take you for granted because they think you will always be around
Some love you to death 
Some appreciate you 
Some annoy you as much as they are annoyed by you
Some even say thank you when you do something special for them or give something special to them
Some are sad and let you be there for them
Some are sad and take it out on you
Some make you laugh until your sides ache
Some make you so angry you wish their sides would ache
Some make you smile every time you see them. 
Some are sunshine
Some are rain 


Which tick tock are you most of the time? 

till soon
c'est la vie xxx