I haven’t been able to leave America, and in truth I don’t really want to, but leave I must. There are bills to pay and a job to keep…………..leaving is proving difficult. There isn’t a seat on the plane. As a little kiwi guy who hasn’t spent a lot of his life flying…….I am having to contemplate my first sleep at the airport, missing flight experiences. To make matters worse they have happened at LAX……an airport many people avoid in their world travels. Thankfully I have a good friend in LA with a heart of gold. So Echo Park here I come and a couch to sleep on instead of a cold hard marble floor. LAX is deliberately made inhospitiable and inaccessible I am told by locals so that the homeless wont sleep there. And of course there in the terrorist aspect. BUT I did sleep in LAX once on my first trip to USA and I turned up for my flight but on the wrong day……….that was in 2007 and it seems to have changed since then…….changed a lot. But in all things there is some good and so here I am with my rock star mate Brad outside his home in Echo Park. Better to sleep on a friends couch than the floor of LAX the good       book says……
I may be on that plane tonight…….leaving America again.

That makes a nice change from song titles like leaving Ireland……..in past times. While I am glad to be heading back to a job and our own home……….this trip has found Americans weaving their way into my being lots more. I have seen the people for a change…….all the other strangeness has faded into the background more. (I know its there tho} Driving down from visiting friends in the mountains yesterday…..I actually forgot for a while I was somewhere different…………..I could have been home. Not coz I thought it was the same……..I had just stopped making comparisons. All the time. Waiting for a flight to LAX……………. Being with Susan is like being home…….

This is my third visit to the States. To recap for some, I spent 9 months here in 2008, was here previously in 2007 when I met Susan, and here I am in 2010, now married to Susan and over here in the school holidays. As soon as I landed this 3rd time I felt a change. America is probably still the same but I have changed. This time I have found myself not having to figure it all out so much…….like why is it so different, what makes it all tick. I have partially dealt with or made huge inroads on those questions, now I have found myself just enjoying the people and seeing life beyond the politics of America. I have really really loved this trip and the people I have met.
Of course again there has not been enough time, with Susan my wife, or time to explore the vastness of America. I have found myself falling more in love with this country and its people, beyond all the madness.
We have explored Austin and both really love it here ( I am writing this at the airport in Austin waiting for a flight back to Denver or somewhere ). Texas has always attracted me since coming here in 2007, Dallas is flat, BUT Austin has hills…………..and Austin has the Saltlick………..one of the top 10 BBQ eating places in USA. Absolutely awesome awesome food…….down home cook’n……..and tasting so good it etches itself into your taste buds……….that’s even without doing the eat all you can deal. We were much more restrained. I will write more about Austin……..but heres a few images from the story.

In New Zealand it is winter. We are approaching the longest day and to be honest, while it’s dull and grey some days, it’s nothing compared to some countries in winter. New Zealand winters are tame as. Thinking in terms of emotional health, I really struggle in winter. I need the sun, and lots of blue sky. While I enjoy the rain and being inside in the warm, soup and a warm bed, winter really challenges my spirit. I am not the kind of guy who has to be doing stuff, so the still aspect of winter isn’t what effects my emotional health, its something with the light and the mood of the earth in winter.
I have moments hanging out the washing where I feel the sleepiness of the earth, that stillness in the trees as they sleep, the grass slowing down, in fact everything is slowing down, thoughts and feelings, the whole of creation is wanting to sleep.
Tis a good time for thinking and writing.

I have found myself over the years so believing that every weekend should be a three day weekend. Believing because after a three day weekend, apart from thinking Tuesday is Monday and turning up for things on the wrong days for a while until the penny drops, believing because it feels so good. How did people get on in the old days when you never stopped work?
That’s one of the things I love about God. The command to rest on one day of the week was sourced in common sense and a need to replenish the batteries, and for our own benefit as human beings. It was not some law by a megalomaniac creator wanting our homage………….
Three day weekends just seem to have that blend of time for everything.
Saturday on the jobs around home you need to do.
Sunday perhaps doing stuff you need to do with people and…….
Monday just for the luxurious things you would like to do……………

There is nothing like the feeling of Friday night or waking on the Saturday morning knowing you have an extra day………..and then there is the deliciousness of Sunday night knowing that tho it’s raining and the rubbish trucks still gonna come by, you don’t have to go to work.
Now I happen to enjoy my job as a teacher and 9/10 days i am okay with trotting off to the treadmill of necessity, BUT the luxury of that extra day is wonderful………..a day to lavish on sitting and reading, or doing what you want because you have had two other days to work on list reduction.

So my thanks to the Queen of England, and the Commonwealth and all that! Eh wot.
Happy Birthday to You.

Getting through to the end of a hard week I could think of a number of things I wanted to do as soon as the work week was over and I stepped thru my front door.

The first was to spend some time with my best friend if she was still up. I knew she had to get up and work early.
If that wasn’t able to happen plan two moved to top place.
COFFEE made in my own coffee machine.
I had slept in this morning and had wanted to have one ever since……
The other option was to head down town and take some photos, to do something for my creative soul.

So what happened?
I managed to spend some time with Susan before she hit the hay.
I made the coffee. And drank it.
I got ready to head down town to get some photos, and fired up my MP3 player to listen to some lectures I had downloaded, and that were so unlocking doors for me.
OFF I went…(after washing some dishes and enjoying the sun in my back window while I worked)
Here is something from that unwind time.
Doing something we enjoy and that gets us out of our weekly after work space, is good for you.It seems so basic but it’s what I don’t seem to do enough.
Healthy lifestyle is about what we do as much as it is about what goes into us, AND it’s not just about exercise in the normal sense.
It’s about how we exercise freedom with our choices, and choices that we make based on our knowledge of our needs and what will help us me emotionally healthy.
I am glad I went out.
Now I am off to the gym!

Beauty Therapy in a nutshell
(a muse)

I find myself hungry for beauty.
Not the kind you might think.
Beauty has many faces & unfortunately
the deepest & rarest beauty is born through pain.
Birth is never a painless process.
Ask any woman or polished gemstone.
Beauty sneaks up on me & jumps out from behind doors.
She smiles at you in strange places.
I know this.

The shell I live in does not totally define me,
but it can limit me.
There’s more than meets the eye to the man in the mirror.
I can see who I really am,
who I really can be, who I have rarely been.
I want to live longer, taste life even more deeply,
to love & laugh at myself & the world,
to finally give up being what I am not.

Beauty is not only skin deep.
The peanuts will have to go!

© BlindPoet
June 2010

My wife who is an American, (and I love that connection) recently pointed out how kiwis are in the habit of saying, ‘yeah, yeah yeah”, in quick succession when in conversation. And just like when you buy a new vehicle,  and suddenly everywhere you look you see one like yours, as I have listened to kiwis talk, suddenly we are all doing it. Yeah, yeah, yeh. It is really really true. I just smile in wonder at my wife’s observant nature to notice this phenomenon.
It had been pointed out to me (not by Susan) as well the verbal habit of the vascilating kiwi to include all options in discussing a decision or answering a question involving wanting to do something.
Yeah, well nah, ahh maybe……..
I am amazed at number of times I have heard this said.
A kid did it to me at school today and I just laughed and said arh well which one of those is the answer.

Another habit not just limited to kiwis is the saying of ‘anyway’ when we are in conversation. I am writing this in Mc Donalds and the lady in the cubicle next to me just did it.
Anyway…………….like what does that mean……..anyway
Now that I am a year older and tougher skinned, it don’t bother me but before I used to think am I going on, umm is this subject boring, or do you need to go somewhere……………
or like …………before the anyway………….nothing made any sense…

anyway

What do you think?

I have been thinking lately about the changes in my life, and the nature of love.

I  find myself so grateful for this moment that I live in now and how all the deepest changes and the creation of some kind of beauty in my life have been facilitated by relationship, and the journey of loving.

Relationships are never totally easy, they weren’t intended to be, and if they are you are supremely blessed or perhaps you are not really relating at all. It can be like a dance where you never touch or a safe non contact sport.

I don’t mean physical touch and contact here, I mean the soul kind!

The deepest and most wonderful intimacy  comes from being truly known and knowing, being understood and understanding, being accepted and accepting. Healthy relationships are works of art, and I so value mine.

Relationships of any kind are opportunities to learn a lot about ourselves.

Unfortunately sometimes we twist that ourselves opportunity into opportunities to tell others about what we have learned about them.  It’s like they are moons and us the planet they orbit, we only see them in the context of relationship to ourselves.

There are reasons people develop that  kind of relationship style, and they highlight the neglect of one of our most important relationships. The one we have with ourselves.

Those reasons probably all boil down to unresolved hurts and what we have done or not done with them. Often the truth is that we have deeply buried our hurts like dumping toxic waste down a deep mineshaft to be out of harms way. We develop malignant growths around them or we camouflage them with behaviours, decoys, distractions, masks, attitudes and addictions.  We protect, insulate and anesthetize ourselves from the toxic messages  arising from our hurts. These messages continually loop inside our heads and they tell us that in some way we are deficient, unlovable , useless, dumb, talentless or unworthy. And we believe it!  All untreated sickness eventually takes its toll on our health.

Instead of being open we become closed and understandably self protective. We point the finger at others, playing the blame game.  Looking at ourselves in relationship is just too painful when we have buried or bandaged unhealed wounds. Why would we look at ourselves critically and risk exposure to the messages inside our heads, telling us that we are no good, dumb, unworthy, stupid and will never change.

In pointing the finger at others, we could be repeating what we grew up with,  copying our role models, or the environment that shaped us the most. It may mean we have not come to a critical point of reflection and change. Defining moments have come and gone in our lives and we remain unchanged. We do not experience re invention, new growth or re birth. Life goes on down the same old same old path. 

Blaming others is an effort to escape honest and risky critical self examination. When we blame  others in aggressive, subtle or passive ways our love is far from healthy. Our behaviours, attitudes and actions don’t lead to the happiness and intimacy with friends and loved ones that we long for. We are alone with ourselves, and we don’t even like ourselves. This is the worst loneliness there is.

Why are we not able to make changes?

One reason is that change takes work, and its scary work.

Another is that we need some kind of light to illuminate areas that must change , but often our eyes are closed, or we are not looking at all or in the right places.

Change involves surgery, a scalpel to cut out what is toxic or some yuk tasting medicine to treat it and put it into remission.

Change can hurt, so most of us avoid the need to grow unless we reach that point of wanting to despite the pain .

That point may be arrived at through a faith calling us on to selflessness or better loving. It may be someone lovingly ( or out of frustration and anger ) opening our eyes to things that need attention. Or as is often the case, change is facilitated by some very painful personal experience that nearly destroys us.

My defining moment was the painful kind, involving the shattering of a family and a marriage of 23 years.

When the time comes, some people grow up, some stay the same.  I wanted to grow up. That was not one BIG decision, it continues to be a series of  little decisions, lots of them, some easy, some hard and often arriving out of left field when you least expect it.

Suddenly you realise, ‘Houston we have a problem’.

No not a problem, an opportunity to grow!

I discovered this website that has helped me to keep growing up, helped me to make more sense of myself and understand some of the ‘why do I always……..’ questions that have followed me for 53 years.

It’s all about how we love and may help you understand yourself  and your closest relationships and those of your everyday world more.

Check it out, it is very very cool.

http://www.howwelove.com/

Recently, I married my best friend. I am so excited to be in a relationship where there is courage, honesty and commitment to grow and change where we need to, AND have heaps of fun loving and loving healthily along the way.

I am so blessed by Susan.:-)

I have been reflecting recently on the love and faithfulness of my mother, before Mothers day arrived even!. Why is it that we don’t realise everything in one huge blob of understanding instead of the urrrrr   duhhhhh! moments that punctuate your life as you come to simple significant understandings. The answer is of course obvious.

1. We wouldn’t be able to cope with one huge dose of knowing and understanding, ourselves, others and the world around us.
2. We may not have grown in our lives to a stage of being able to understand, want to understand  or be worthy of understanding.

My mother has been wonderful all her life at letting her kids know how she feels about them, how she loves them and how God loves them, that we are all loved equally, that there are no favourites. My mother lives without a mask. And that is a rich heritage. She is not concerned about appearances, status or approval. She has lived a life that she knows is under the observance of God.

I realise in this moment of writing how valuable that really is. I hate pretense, and realise that I have lived in an open and honest home growing up, with all its faults and failings, that I have been loved by an open and honest mother. Perhaps that is why I place such value on being genuine and that the good parts of my self esteem I have to thank my mother for. I am 53 and have come to this understanding in the last week. I have so much to thank my mother for. I told her that on the phone the other day. I am lots of good things because of her. Thanks Mum. I love you heaps. I will be a better husband because of you and what you have taught me about love.