Thunder and lightning.

As I write this, it is thundering and lightning again and I hope to God that the electricity doesn’t go out.  I do have a flashlight and candles and come to think of it, maybe it wouldn’t really be such an awful thing, if not a little spooky, but I do have the Uberhund to protect me.

One time, when I lived in Sonoma on my own, there was a huge storm and the electricity went off and I sat in front of my bedroom window at night with a candle and watched the spectacle of the lightning and how the wind blew the debris across the street. It was actually a little bit exciting and a moment in time I won’t forget.

That was a time in my life when I lived on my own and wasn’t happy about it, even though I had the cutest apartment and had it nicely decorated. I felt lonely and the walls felt like they were closing in on me if I was alone there too much. I felt I was in desperate need of a man then and being desperate for a man is not a good state of mind to be in, because it means you will settle for less than you deserve.

I had an on and off again relationship with a very confused individual who wanted his freedom and me at the same time. Unfortunately, I believed I was in love with him. Looking back now, I realize it was an obsession that I needed to be cured off. It was one of those relationships that make you feel that you have been in a bad car wreck when it is over and takes a long time to recuperate from. Badly battered and scarred emotionally.

I saw lightning storms in the desert that looked like a curtain of lightning bolts coming down in the distance. That was an awesome sight, because it was almost silent and very warm were I was.

Have you ever seen the sun come up in the desert and see it paint the nearby mountains pink? And did you ever see the desert sky at night and see so incredibly many stars that you thought that the whole firmament was going to fall down on you?

I have very many fond memories of the desert, because I experienced them all in relative luxury, in air conditioned houses with swimming pools. But they were built out in the canyons between the foothills and there was no better place to be. The heat is incredible and you wonder how the pioneers ever managed, especially the women in their long skirts and sleeves. They were tough people.

My first father in law had a small mine in Death Valley. He wanted to exploit it on a bigger scale, but didn’t get permission from the government, although he tried for years. One of the things that was there was gold and he had gold nuggets in his possession. He used to go there on long weekends and take his kids when they were little and they caught lizards to keep as pets, much to the disgust of their mother. My father in law died believing that one day he would exploit that mine out in the god awful heat of that deadly place.

I really liked my father in law, although he considered himself to be a conservative Republican and he was a bigoted man of whom I always thought I could change his mind given some time. He spouted a lot of right wing rhetoric that stood directly opposite to my opinions, but I couldn’t dislike him for it. I figured he was lost somewhere in his upbringing and his lack of exposure to other points of view. I never took him seriously and laughed at him a lot and he didn’t mind. I think he secretly wanted to think differently, although he did think that Franklin D. Roosevelt was the worst thing that ever happened to America.

I lived in the United States for 22 years and have a myriad of impressions and stories. As I grow more comfortable in my new skin, I will be able to tell you some of them. There is enough time and distance between me and those memories now. I was married to a republican. Somehow his political points of view got lost in the translation when we were still dating. I came from a socialist family and married into a very conservative and bigoted family. I suffered quite a culture shock and no one took my points of view seriously, because I was so young. My sisters in law were born again Christians, woe is me. They did like their glass of wine, though, and all the guys liked their beer very much.

I fell into a deep dark cultural hole for a long time, until I grew up and made my own friends, but I sure am happy to be a socialist Dutch woman again. Phew, it took a long time.

Now I am taking myself off to bed. Wishing you all the best and much freedom of thought.

Ciao…

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Thoroughly Thrashed About Thursday

Yellow Pepper

Wednesday afternoon 1 PM. Oh, I had such a lovely sleep this morning. I went back to bed a 7 AM, after having been up nearly all night, and I didn’t wake up until nearly noontime when the phone rang and it was my sister who wanted to take the dogs to the pond. Much as the day beckoned with beautiful sunshine outside, I didn’t go with her, but very leisurely drank a mug of coffee and very slowly took my time to wake up properly. That was lovely in itself.

Today is the first day, since the radical increase in my mood stabilizer, that I actually feel totally calm. It has been increased by a third on Saturday and I think I am reaping the benefits from it now. I am still sitting here in my red bathrobe and actually give a hoot about getting the show on the road. It is all okay with me, in a little while I will get dressed and look pretty for Eduard, who is home already, because he has to work tonight.

Frances has given me a very good name for the images I make that I have been calling incompletes, she said to call them metamorphics and so I shall, because it is a very good name. Another name she suggested was organics, which also would have been appropriate, but since I have metaphore in my blog name now, I go with metamorphics, although I agree that they look very organic and alive somehow. Maybe biotronically so.

Egyptian Shield

It’s been a real challenge making these and remembering what I did right and what doesn’t work. Sometimes I make the same mistake three times, before I remember what I am supposed to do. You can see, I am not big on taking notes, but leaving it all up to chance.

I wish I could share my feeling of serenity and tranquility with you. I am on a smooth sea between storms. On the Pacific when it really is passive and peaceable. When dolphins swim and tumble along side your boat. That is not a fantasy, I have really seen that happen when I was out deep sea fishing in Mexico. The sea was blue and so was the sky and I was not seasick one bit.

We never did catch that marlin, but the trip was fantastic and I won’t ever forget it. It was like being in a book about a woman set out to sea who would never come back.

I find that in the United States I was much closer living next to nature than I am here, especially when I lived in Northern California in Sonoma County. There was nature in all of its glory all over the place and I felt like I was one with it and that I was as organic as all the earthy objects around me. The sea, the sea, like Iris Murdoch wrote. It was everywhere and ominous and beautiful and also terrifying. And the hills that were like hands that held you and the cows that grazed at the bottom of them in the fields. The lonely light houses and the whales that passed by in the near distance, so alien from us and yet so familiar, as if they were our cousins. Did they know that, that we revered them?

And then all the rivers that ran through the landscape and one, the Russian River, that ended in the sea and where you could find beautiful smooth pebbles on the beach. My son and I collected those. We were typical pebble collectors, walking bent over, silently, lost in common thoughts, picking out similar pebbles, watching them dry to less lively colors and spitting on them to get the colors back.

Dish with Pebbles

Well, now I need to make myself pretty for my husband and do some work around here. See you later.

Wednesday evening, elevenish PM. I went to the film house with Eduard tonight. He invited me specially and I sat on my usual barstool at the end of the bar where I can overlook everything, right next to the nachos machine, and no, I am not tempted at all. I drank cappuccinos and cola lights and ate all the cookies that came with the cappuccinos, because I forgot to eat dinner. What do I mean, I forgot to eat dinner? Well, it simply slipped my mind. I was going to eat some yogurt, but then forgot all about it.

There was a good atmosphere in the café tonight. The bartender played good music and when the song “Brown Sugar” from the Rolling Stones came on, he turned up the sound and the whole place rocked with middle aged people who became nostalgic for their youth.

I talked to a woman who belongs to the local neighborhood committee and she was very committed and political and inebriated, but very smart, and we didn’t have so much of a dialog as well as a monologue. I listened to her talk to other people in the course of the evening and I think she should run for some local office, but stay off the wine. What really amuses me, is how serious the other people took their conversations with this obviously inebriated woman, so she must have been still making sense. It always amazes me when people take themselves and each other seriously when they have been drinking, because I think the bullshit ratio increases with each glass consumed. I refuse to have serious conversations with people who have been drinking. Having said hat, I realize that both my husbands like their glass of alcohol.

I am sorry, but you are all my captive audience to my experiments with my metamorphics, so here comes another one. I have to keep trying until I get really good at them. So there:

Yellow Stone

I am now going to bed with some lovely food and my lovely husband, to sleep no less, because that is all I am good for at this time of the night. I’ll see you in a few hours.

Thursday morning in the early hours. Isn’t it teriffic? You go to bed and close your eyes for several hours and then you get to get up again and have a nice mug of coffee and a cigarette and start the day all over again. I think it is mighty amazing how that works. Of course, I do have to remember to sleep some hours during the day, like I did yesterday and that worked out beautifully with my mood remaining steady all day long. Yes, I have to keep reinventing the same wheel over and over again.

I am having quite a correspondence by email with my psychiatrist about me switching to the specialist team. He is a stubborn man, but I am a stubborn woman and I can be very persistent and I am not afraid to not spare the man’s feelings, although I do try some diplomacy, but if it doesn’t work? I go s
traight for the jugular. Eduard has an appointment with him this afternoon at 5 and it was my intention to go along and sit and wait in the waiting room in case I am needed for some part of the conversation, but it is supposed to be about Eduard and not me. So, that has to be very clear. It is very important that Eduard has this conversation and it has to be all about him and his concerns.

I have some very good short cake biscuits and I am trying to decide if I am going to eat those now. There is much temptation and I want to say, “Oh hell, just eat the damn things!” So, I probably will. That will be good with a fresh mug of coffee. Let me leave you with a last metamorphic and then I am off to read everybody else’s blog. I must and I will do it! I have been neglecting you people and I have my excuses, but I am falling way behind on what is happening out there. I hope nobody got married or divorced or had babies while I was preoccupied!

What will we call today? Thoroughly Thrashed About Thursday. How is that? The day before liberating Friday.

Moss.

Here we go, ciao…

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Lisa Sarsfield Images number 2.

It’s so damn early in the middle of the night, it’s not even funny anymore, but do I care? Well, only a little bit. I know that when the time comes, I’ll go back to bed for awhile, so it isn’t too much of a problem really, but I won’t go now, because Eduard is snoring very loudly and I would have to pinch his nose and poke him in his side. He is snoring because he imbibed too much wine tonight and this always makes him quite noisy during his sleep, as if he is sawing logs and running two tact motor cycle engines.

He told me something funny yesterday. Apparently his twin brother said to him one time that Eduard and I remind him of Punch and Judy (that’s Jan Klaassen and Katrijn in Dutch). He thinks that we are like these two hand puppets, because we are completely tuned into each other and can finish each other’s sentences, not because Eduard is a drunk and I hit him over the head with a rolling pin. We seem to pop up like Punch and Judy and act so synchronized in a way, that we almost become disagreeable to the onlooker, at least that’s the feeling I got out of Eduard’s story, in the way he told me what his twin brother said.

So, now Eduard and I have new nick names for each other. We are Punch and Judy and I think it is hilarious and it is true that I have always thought that Eduard and I are very much alike in character and that we have the same sort of behavior and the same sort of train of thought and that we come to the same conclusions when confronted with something unusual. We could actually be brother and sister, but that would be incestuous and we merely belong to the same original tribe and that is all.

We do behave in very similar ways though, and it is nice, because I can predict Eduard’s thoughts and reactions very well and I pretty much know how his mind works. I don’t know if he has similar experiences with me, but I think he is pretty familiar with me and it is only the fact that he is a man that prevents him from anticipating me better, although he is getting quite adapt at it and is making huge strides in this area.

The difference between us, is that Eduard is not manic depressive, but if I were not, I would very much be very similar to him and be an eternal optimist and chance taker like he is, although he is cautious enough not to do anything foolish. I, on the other hand, can do foolish things when I am hypo manic, but then be totally the opposite when I am not.

So, Punch and Judy live here in this apartment with their three cats and their one dog. It’s a jolly good show and we should charge admittance for anyone who wants to stop by and spend some time with us. Maybe we should build a little stage with curtains and wear costumes. I am sure I can buy a rolling pin somewhere and we could get Eduard a bottle of beer as a prop. We would cast the animals as extras.

I know that when we watch the news, we get equally affronted by the same items and when we watch a political program we agree pretty much on the same issues, except that Eduard is more vehement about them than I am, whereas I am just a bit more relaxed and I have to shush him.

Speaking of political programs, that program I was talking about the other day called “Netwerk” turns out to be made by a Christian Broadcasting Service, so their point of view is biased and now I can’t trust it anymore and I don’t think I’ll be watching it again, so I’ll have to find another program like it with a different point of view. I was becoming a bit suspicious of it in the way they were reporting on Muslims, their angle was more than slightly askew, so I knew something was up. Well, it’s a shame, but I don’t want that angle at all and I am sorry that it is on TV and masquerades as an ordinary actualities program.

When I was commenting last week on Kosovo becoming independent, I expressed concern for the Serbian population, but I needed not have done that, because it is the Serbian population that went rampant and protested en masse and with some violence. It’s not the Serbian population I should have worried about at all.

Now there is going to be hell to pay, because that awful right wing Dutch politician named Wilders has made an offensive anti Muslim movie, which he wants to show either on TV or the Internet this month and already Muslim populations across the world are up in arms about this and Dutch people and soldiers in those countries may have to fear for their lives.

There is going to be real trouble about this, but the problem is that the prime minister and the government can not forbid him to broadcast it, because of freedom of expression, but I wish they would make an exception in this case. It is a very bad move by Wilders and an appeal has been made on his sense of responsibility, but he has been stubborn and proceeds with his actions.

He leads the Party of Freedom, which is nothing more than a bit of a nationalistic, anti Muslim party and I know some people who have voted for him and they are not the brightest and best informed citizens of the bunch. Actually, you may call him a new sort of fascist, along with the Flemish Block in Belgium.

Okay, enough politics. I mustn’t get bogged down in that. It’s just that this month you’ll see an awful lot of Dutch flag burning by Muslims. We’ll join the Americans and the Danes in that.

It’s awfully early still and I must find a way to get sleepy again. I must sleep just a few hours more, because today I start my creative therapy class and I do have to be awake for it. It won’t look good if I show up there half asleep and yawning.

I hope you all have a Mad Monday, whatever that entails, and that the beginning of the week is not too tough on you. You know beginnings are like the crust on a new loaf of bread, they are very chewy and hard to get through, but when you get past that, the rest of it is delicious. Ciao…

P.S. I went back to bad and dreamed that a space ship had landed with little white rabbit people who needed to use my computer to gather information about the Milky Way, but nobody but me knew about it. I tried to tell Eduard about it, but he wouldn’t believe me and I kept trying to explain all the details of the story to him, but he kept walking away, and then in my dream, I realized that I was psychotic and I started to cry and woke myself up
crying and was very upset and now that I am up and awake, I am still all shook up and I don’t know what is real and what is not.

Are there really rabbit people or am I really psychotic? Am I upset because I am starting my creative therapy today? What is going on anyway?

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The Artful Eye Images number 2.

My unopened mail is sitting on the coffee table. I have “fear of mail.” I haven’t figured out yet why I have this condition called “fear of mail,” but is is a long lingering after effect of my last depression. Feeling so much better now, I should be over it, but each day I eye that stack of mail with much suspicion and dread and leave it unopened, and really people, do you think my mail is very important? Do you think there are bills there addressed specifically to me, or a summons to the court, or missives from the queen? No such thing. There is nothing in my mail that is going to cause me any huge amount of difficulty at all, yet I avoid opening it like it is Pandora’s Box.

So, I have told myself that this morning, between the hours of eight and eleven, I must open my mail and read it and deal with it properly. Somehow, having made myself that promise, or rather, having given myself that order, I feel my stomach tie in a knot, yet I know it is nothing to worry about and once I get it done, I will feel good and the world will not have come to an end, so silly me for worrying about it so much, but yet I have “fear of mail.”

Are any of you familiar with such an apparently irrational fear? What if I were the head of this household and I had to open the bills? God, we’d have our electricity cut off for me not having paid the bill.

Well, I do have my quirks and it is a good thing that I am married to such a stable individual like Eduard, who never shirks his responsibilities and who always is in the same steady mood and who seems fearless like a knight on an unflinching horse who every day rides off to save this damsel in distress.

It seems that between the two of us we have figured out the way for me to live most comfortably and safely with the least amount of stress and with the least amount of complications, except for the mail. Eduard takes good care of us both and I give it the effort that I can and have pretty steady moods and no anxiety attacks, except for the mail, and those aren’t true attacks, they are just ripples and bumps. Eduard is a great human being and if there is an afterlife, he deserves a great place in it.

Anyway, yesterday was a very uneventful day, because I managed, somehow, to sleep in the morning as well as in the afternoon. I purposely went back to bed in the morning to get warm and to sleep some more, but in the afternoon I was reading my book on the sofa and I fell asleep again and slept for two hours. I was a little discombobulated when I woke up with two cats on top of me and trying to figure out which time of the day it was and what in the world I was doing on the sofa.

Once I had that figured out, I had to get up and make myself a mug of coffee, so I had to gently remove the two cats who were heavy with sleep and didn’t want to be moved. I delicately placed them on the floor and they collected themselves and went off to find another comfortable place to sleep in. Sleepy headed cats are the best, because they slowly come to their senses just like human beings do and stretch themselves as if all their bones need to be realigned. They truly are little miracles of nature.

In the evening, I got very upset while watching the news, because there seems to be a division of the Dutch population which has an irrational fear and hatred of anything Muslim and this is whipped up into some sort of frenzy by some right wing politicians, who feed on this fear and do their utmost to climb higher up the political ladder and advance their own causes. I really, really dislike this and don’t understand the gullibility and ignorance of the people and do not understand why there is no deeper reasoning and larger amount of logic and insight.

But there, that is all I will say about that.

It is good to be able to watch foreign news on TV as well, as you get a good feeling for the issues that play in other countries and you very often see that they are the same issues that play in your own country, except that sometimes everybody seems to be inventing the wheel for themselves and nobody looks to their neighbor enough to see how he is dealing with it. Watching international news from different angles is interesting also, because you get different bits of information and different bits of input and commentary.

You all know that watching the news is my favorite TV activity, but lately I have started to watch a program that I had been avoiding because of its subject matters. It is called “Netwerk” and it deals with different political and difficult social issues and I was unable to watch it until recently, because I always felt so hurt and frustrated when I did. Now I have been making myself watch this program, because I think I ought to face the issues and form an opinion on them and I have found that I do that fairly quickly, as my gut reaction seems to be my true reaction to a story and that is my almost final opinion as well, unless someone comes along and gives me more information.

I think, for myself, it is my task to be well informed and to have my opinions rest on good information that I must garner from several sources. I don’t want to look at things from just one point of view, because one point of view is not enough information. A human being needs to be like a judge and hear all the evidence from all sides. The thing I fear most, is to not be well informed, as it can lead to very badly made judgments on very important issues and I think that this is a world wide problem, as we see one quandary after another appear in many countries.

I really do think we need to turn to each other and see how we as individual countries deal with our problem areas, so that we can learn from each other and pick up the best ideas. That’s why the EEC can be so helpful, so that we can learn from one another.

It is a terrible thing when populations live in isolation of each other and yet somehow have to be part of the whole picture and even indirectly interact with one another, if not directly through politics or trade. It is really a shame when we know so little of each other and are so ready with our opinions when they are very often based on a few prejudiced points of view. For example: the Dutch all smoke grass, have free sex and wear wooden shoes in the tulips. Americans are cowboys on big horses and all the cities have gangs that murder and loot and are not safe to walk around in.

Well, I have had my say and I will slowly start winding this down and get ready for another day to start. You see that I have a lot on my mind, but it is not that crowded up there and there is
lots of room to consider all sorts of stuff. If anything, I must ruminate on what is happening in the EEC more and find some websites that will inform me better. I must also visit the BBC News website and see what they have to offer me, as I have not been there for awhile, while it used to be a favorite haunt of mine.

I must have a good mug of coffee and another cigarette first and decide on which images I am going to add to this, because I always save that for last, even though that’s the first thing you see. I decide on whatever mood I am in and on whatever image fits that mood.

I wish you all a very good day and a lot of luck with whatever you are going to do. We’re past the middle of the week and before you know it, it will be weekend again. Ciao…

P.S. Image courtesy of Andrea.

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Picasso Images number 5.

Oh, I’m so terribly late this morning and I will feel all rushed, which is ridiculous, because I am my own boss and Jesker has great bladder control, so I don’t really need to hurry through this at all. It is just the idea that I am starting one hour later than I usually do, because I had such a nice long sleep and bed was so comfortable and warm and I didn’t want to remove myself from it. I know, or rather, I assume that Eduard walked Jesker early this morning, because Jesker is very comfortably snoring on his pillow as if there is nothing else on his mind at all.

He is the greatest dog in the morning and does nothing but sleep, until he decides that it is time for his noon time walk and then he starts pacing impatiently and makes me put my boots and coat on. He even follows me into the bathroom to make sure I don’t forget to come out again. So, I sit on the toilet while he looks at me with some amount of expectancy and I hardly have time to do what I have come to do. He is a very indecent onlooker, as are the cats who always follow me in there and decide to have quality time with me then. They have no manners whatsoever. If I close the door, they all stand out there bleating like lost lambs.

Everything is going very well. I have some sort of a schedule back in my life and it is not very exhaustive at all and I allow for a lot of pleasurable activities and peaceful moments and rest and sleep. Eduard and I have decided that I am not going to go back on the treadmill immediately, but that I am going to pick up the pace slowly and put the emphasis on peacefulness and pleasure. If I take a nap in the afternoon, I make it through the day quite well and my mood is steady. I go to bed on time at night with a glass of warm milk and a good book and install myself quite comfortably. We are both very much aware of what we need to do to keep me out of harm’s way and we are both taking good care of me, which allows me to be a good partner to Eduard and have time and patience for him also. We must never neglect Eduard in all of this.

I am very grateful that I can feel happiness again and peacefulness and pleasure. If there is a God, I suppose I should make a small offering now, but I don’t want to get caught up in magical thinking and lose touch with reality, so I assume that the medicines working on the chemicals in my brain have done their job and prevented me from months of suffering. I owe much to science and the application of it to the right medication and the right dose of it. I must always remember how bad it is without the medicines and how much quicker I go through my moods now and how much more quickly I get better.

Well, the Rotten Correspondent asked me if there was a preference here in the Netherlands for Hillary Clinton or Barrack Obama. All I can say is, that they are both well liked and that the country as a whole and journalists in particular, are undecided as of yet. Politicians are not making any statements yet and are not making their preference public, but knowing their affiliations, you can pretty much guess whom they would choose. It is really a shame that John Edwards is out of the race, because he was well liked here, although a bit of an unknown, but his politics were appreciated very much. It’s a shame that so much of this is like a popularity contest and I truly hope that the best man/woman wins. Somebody who is a good American president for the country and for the whole world. What we are clear about here, is that an end must come to the current government and its attitude toward a lot of issues. We see a lot of problems resulting from the current administration.

I always forget that I am not an American, but then again, I am a citizen of the world and America plays a major role in so many vital aspects of life in the world. America is a very powerful country and has major influence in a lot of things that happen. We, as a small country, know that. You can’t get around the Americans, you always have to deal with them first.

Enough politics, I really need to get going now and be housewifely for a little bit. Oh yes, The Caffeinated Librarian had a great post on feminism that has a lot of people reacting to it and you can read it here. Maybe it is time that we pay some attention to that.

Have a great day, do lots of wonderful things, feel peace in your soul and happiness in your heart. Ciao…

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Orange Stone Images number 1.

This night, with one interruption, I have slept six hours. I think that is not half bad. Now, I just need to get rid of the interruption, but other than that, things are looking up.

I did increase my sleep medication on the advice of my psychiatrist after I spoke to him yesterday and I can increase it one more time, so I may do that to get rid of the interruption. He told me to let him know how it went this morning.

Yesterday, I wore my bathrobe and slippers all day long. Eduard walked Jesker for me. I don’t feel so acutely depressed that I am miserable all the time, but I do feel very uninterested in doing things. When something is the least bit complicated, I avoid it.

Today, I am going to get dressed and walk Jesker myself. That’s a promise I make here.

Wasn’t that a surprise win for Hilary in the sate of New Hampshire? We are so undecided who to root for now. Barrack Obama or Hilary Clinton. It is all very exciting and interesting now to us Europeans. The American Presidency is the most influential position in the world. We are all affected by it. I think sometimes Europeans think they should be allowed to vote in this election too.

Well, now I’m off to visit my fellow bloggers. Ciao…

P.S. A very popular web log is The Confessions of a Pioneer Woman. And if you want to read something really funny about kids go here.

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Close up Yellow Pepper Images number 3.

Sleeping didn’t go as well last night. I was up early and I think I will have to go back to the sofa and lie under the yellow blanket for some more shut eye this morning.

Thanks to Diane Clancy I stumbled upon another website that is very good. It is of Gale Rainwater Photographer and man, can she take photographs! Simply stunning!

SUBJECT

We but begin to hope to know, having known
The no-man’s echo of your knowing voice;
We barely claim we have chosen,
Naming our choice.

To feast your coming it is you who must prepare;
Given your love we dare not not care;
Wherefore spare not spare us not
Do not spare.

Marie Ponsot

I thought the above poem was very appropriate in these pre-election times, although I am sure it was not written with this political madness in mind at all. If you want to know, Obama is very popular so far in the Netherlands, although Hillary Clinton has also been. None of the Republican candidates are interesting to us. I think they are all rather scary looking.

Right, American politics are important to the rest of the world also, so we do concern ourselves with it quite a bit.

That’s all I have to say for now, so ciao…

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Painted Hummingbird Images number 7.

Yesterday morning I didn’t wake up until 6 am, so I didn’t even bother turning on the computer, but just sat on the sofa and had my coffee and cigarettes, thinking it was too late to start writing a post anyway. It feels very liberating not to feel like I have to write one every day. It also feels very liberating to feel that I don’t have to turn the computer on every day.

In the end, the only reason I did turn it on, was later in the day to listen to some CD’s, because our CD player is not working, so I had to use the computer to listen to some music. They were CD’s that my daughter had given me last year and that I had not listened to in a long time. Glen Gould playing Bach, the Goldberg Variations, and Ella Fitzgerald singing all sorts of jazzy songs. Oh yes, and Paris Combo, singing in French, quite upbeat and happy. I always like the CD’s my daughter gives me as they are always quite cheerful music and not at all laden with all sorts of heavy emotions.

The last two days I have been quite active. On Wednesday I sold two gold rings for the value of the gold and with the money I got from them, I bought a new ring made from burnished precious steel, silver and gold colored, with a single zircon set in it. It is a quite attractive ring and looks like it is made of gold. It looks more expensive than it actually was, the band is quite wide and I am very happy with it.

I also sold some books at the second hand bookstore and with the money I got from them, I bought a new top and some new earrings and a necklace. When I got to the clothing store, they handed me a ticket with three stickers on them for 30, 20 and 10 percent off, that I could place on any price tags I wanted to. So the decision was easily made and I got quite a good deal on the items I bought. It was just my lucky day.

After that, I had capuchinos at Eduard’s work, even though Eduard didn’t have time to really sit and visit with me, but there were other people there to talk to and I didn’t stay long, lest they think I have become a fixture there.

Yesterday morning, I decided that what I needed was some nail polish to paint my nails with and I went to to the drugstore to get some. I bought what I thought was the right color, but when I came home and applied it to my nails, I realized that I didn’t quite like it as much as I was hoping to. Oh well, I thought, next time better, and proceeded to do jobs around the apartment, but later on I thought that I was not happy with the color and I took the bottle back to the store and exchanged it for a color I liked better. That was no problem, because I still had the receipt, of course, and I like the new color ever so much better.

Nowadays, nail polish dries quickly and you don’t have to sit around forever waiting for it to dry. I do realize that I have to let my nails grow a little bit longer to do justice to the nail polish. I usually keep them cut short, but now I will let them grow a little longer. It is so much fun to be a female and to get to fuss with yourself this way. It is like getting up in the morning and putting on your face. It is fun to apply all the various bits of make up and watch yourself transform. And then you do the hair thing and everything is perfect and you smile at yourself and all is well with the world.

Yesterday I looked for jobs to do around the place. There were all sorts of little cleaning jobs I could do. Things I had been neglecting and finally got around to doing. It was a lot of fun. I’ve got a really good cleaning product, that Eduard bought, that you spray on any surface and it gets magically clean, so that helps a lot. The computer desk is always a great gatherer of dust and dirt and you should see how clean I got it. It is white, so it really shows.

Needless to say, I am rating myself with an eight now and I suppose I don’t mind that too much, as long as I don’t get frantic, which is not the case now. I feel very happy and active and I very much feel like doing lots of positive things. As long as I don’t move up to a nine, I will be fine. I liked being a six, because I was so nice and mellow, but now that I am an eight, I like that too.

Eduard has put Christmas lights around the headboard of our bed. It looks very bright and cheerful and especially nice when all the other lights are off in the bedroom. We did have candles on our nightstands, but they were a little bit too dim to see by. The Christmas lights are much better. Isn’t he romantic? I wish for all of you to have such a romantic partner.

Last night we were talking about our time together when we first met again. Those first romantic days and Eduard wanted to know when I first knew that I thought he was going to be more than just a friend to me. I told him of the moment when I first got the idea that I was going to seduce him. It was when I was in Paris and talked to him on the phone and he asked me to come and stay with him in Annecy. There was just the tiniest idea of the possibility in my head then, although I wasn’t quite sure yet. But I thought the chance was there definitely. Eduard and I had such a history together. When we saw each other again, it was like old times and we just picked up where we left off and hit it off immediately. So, we both got the idea to seduce each other simultaneously. Some bottles of wine helped too.

Eduard became the love of my life.

His sister, who later became my best friend, was staying at a campsite at walking distance from his house and the next day, when we walked to her caravan, we were all innocent looking as if nothing had happened, although the air must have sizzled between us. She claimed later on not to have noticed anything, but I wonder if she didn’t? Were we that good at hiding something that obvious? We had a terrific couple of days. We ate good food and saw lots of good sights and spoke a mixture of French and Dutch and English.

Speaking of languages, I was listening to A Belgian French language radio station yesterday. They spoke very rapidly and I hardly understood anything they were saying. It went something like this: “Blah blah blah, Robbie Williams, blah blah blah, James Blunt, blah blah blah.” Then they would announce the title of the next song, “blah blah, You Are Always On My Mind, blah blah,” and play a song either in English or in French.

I like listening to foreign radio stations, as I like to pretend that I am in a foreign country. I don’t mind if I don’t understand most of it. We also receive a British radio station very well, bu
t they play pretty lame music from the seventies and do a lot of talking and there is a lot of hype, so I don’t enjoy listening to it. Which is really a shame, because it would be interesting to listen to a British radio station. Then there is Arrow Jazz FM, but their Jazz is very easy listening and very uncomplicated, so it poses no challenge at all and becomes boring after about three songs. I wish there was a radio station that played nothing but Baroque. I would listen to that all day long. There is a classical radio station, but they also play heavy emotional classical music for which I am not in the mood. I love the mathematical rationality of Baroque. To me it just sounds like good Jazz. There is rationality in good Jazz.

This morning my gastric band is going to be filled again. If I am not mistaken, I think this may be one of the last times, if not the last time. My weight has be slowly going down this week by ounces. At least it is going down. I have been living on wheat rolls with peanut butter and Cup of Soups. After today, I will only be able to eat half a wheat roll at one time. I hope I will still be able to have a whole Cup of Soup.

The wheat roll with peanut butter is a real treat and something I really look forward to eating. It is such a joy to bite into and taste the peanut butter. I know it is a nutritious food and that it is good for you. I am still taking vitamin B complex, Vitamin A & D and a multi vitamin. I think I am pretty healthy. My hair and nails are strong and my skin is soft and healthy looking. I use a Vitamin C moisturizer on my face and it really makes my skin feel soft there. I am using a really good face wash to get my make up off. You do these things when you get older. It’s all maintenance.

On an other subject. I have bought the cats Whiskas kibbles and they like it so much that they don’t ask for their other food. I must say that these kibbles look appetizing. They look like a cocktail snack and I am tempted to take a hand full. I am constantly filling up the bowl and they are constantly eating. We figured out that it is cheaper to feed them the more expensive Whiskas than to feed them the other kibbles that are cheaper and the wet food. We were spending 42 Euros a month on the wet food. That’s way too much money. We were also spending 30 Euros a month on buying the special cheese for me, so it is a good thing that I have stopped eating that. These are all sorts of expenses that you make that you don’t stop and think about, but they add up. We were spending 21 Euros a month on raisin bread and 9 Euros a month on little containers of potato salad. Eduard spends 45 Euros a month on wine. You see how you can cut your expenses down all across the board.

So, we save a 133 Euros if we don’t buy any of those things. Of course we spend a little of it buying other things such as Whiskas instead of the other cheaper kibbles and buying Cup of Soup, but it is a real lesson in economy and I think a jar of peanut butter doesn’t set you back that far financially.

Well, don’t I have much to tell you this morning. I am sitting here having one cup of coffee after another, typing with my nicely painted finger nails that look like little hard candies and make me want to eat them. I am so ready to have my gastric band filled, because I really want to shed those last ten kilos, at least the first five of them and I think I can do that in the coming month. I am at 90.7 kilos now and before December the 10th I would like to be at 85 kilos. You guys should all dare me to and I will accept the challenge.

I am going to end this epistle now and visit some blogs or read the BBC news, whichever comes first. I have a feeling I am not informed enough about what goes on in the world, although I watch the news religiously. I see the French president Sarkozy is being good buddies with Bush and I don’t like it at all. Something is rotten in Denmark.

Have a great day, everybody. May all your politics be dull and may the Belgians finally form a government. Ciao…

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Bewerkte Gele Bloem 3 nummer 2

Wow, yesterday turned out to be such a good day. It was amazing. At one point I was actually rating myself with an eight and that sure hasn’t happened much lately!

After I wrote my post, I visited some other blogs, but realized that I was still very sleepy and I laid down on the sofa under the yellow blanket and went back to sleep. This was very pleasant, as Eduard walked the dog for me, so I wasn’t in any sort of rush to get dressed and out there in a hurry.

When I woke up, I felt like a seven and there was an email from my psychiatrist with an appointment for Wednesday morning. Then I called my case manager at the temp agency and made an appointment to see her that afternoon. Having done that, I very merrily cleaned up the kitchen, vacuumed the apartment and walked the dog. As I was walking the dog, my heart grew very light and the sun started to shine inside of me and I felt happy and I thanked God for helping me solve the problems. That’s when I rated myself with an eight.

When I got home, I vacuumed the sofa and Eduard came home and found a happy housewife, much to his relief. We promised each other that never again would we put that kind of pressure on me to perform at any cost.

This is what I think happens. When things are going well with me, I and the people around me have a tendency to overestimate me and what I am able to do. Intellectually I can do a lot, but emotionally my load bearing capacities are not that good, setting me up for failure time after time. I am not stress proof! As a matter of fact, I do very badly under any kind of stress. This continuously leads me to situations in my life where I overwhelmingly under perform, causing me to get huge dents in my self esteem. I always end up traumatized and wounded and it is only now, when I know what is wrong with me, that I can walk away from it and not be totally damaged.

So, it was with this knowledge in mind that I went to see my case manager and was able to explain my situation to her. I told her I was manic-depressive and that I should have told everyone from the start and that I regretted not doing this. I gave a brief explanation of the above and what happens to me under stress and she didn’t get angry at me for not informing her sooner. She was really nice about the whole thing.

Now, my contract was with the city’s social services, so they had to let me go and release me of the obligation to fulfill my end of the contract. My case manager called the person responsible and he told her that they would let me go. He could have insisted on having me tested and having me fulfill my obligation some other way, but he didn’t, which was decent of him.

There is a subsidized program for people such as I, who can be tested to see how severe their disability is when it comes to their functioning in a work place and in doing any sort of work, and those people can be helped by maybe working special hours, or doing special jobs or working in social work places. I still may do that, if it is possible for me to get that sort of adaption. I would gladly work at any sort of job if it meant low stress and reasonable hours. I will look into that.

In the meantime, I feel good again. Yesterday my ratings were up and I had such a pleasant day. My friend Lucien called to say that she and her husband are leaving for a holiday in Spain today and, luckily, she is feeling well, so she should have a good time. I got a card from my daughter with the latest picture of my grandson in it, on which he is grinning very widely. So nice! He’s such a good looking kid, but I suppose all grandmas think that about their grandsons.

Today, if it is not raining, I am going to the chapel, as I feel that God has been especially kind to me these past few days, as I have prayed very hard to make things please turn out alright. I prayed for a solution and I prayed not to go crazy and I guess He was listening, so candles have to be lighted and prayers of thanks have to be said. After that, I am going to have coffee with Eduard at his work and eat many good cookies. The weatherman did say that today and tomorrow it is going to rain, I just hope it doesn’t rain until the afternoon.

So you see how something that would just be a minor irritation in someone else’s life, becomes a major point of stress in my life, to the point that I become suicidal. Yes, I was thinking along those lines and thinking how awful it was that I had a gastric band in case they were going to try and pump my stomach, so I had already decided not to swallow pills. Really, when you are in the depths of despair, you think these things! When the solution is so close by and you don’t see it! The line between sanity and insanity is very fine.

Well, anyway, not to become morbid, it is all past me now, except for my talk with my psychiatrist and I am sure that we will come to a solution too. I have my thoughts organized around that. I have rehearsed it in my head.

Eduard was fixing himself pork yesterday. While he was cooking it, he asked me if it smelled good yet. I said.”Yes, it does, but do you realize how much a pig has to suffer for that?” Eduard said, “Yes, I suppose you are right.” I answered, “I guess I could become really militant about that, 12 pigs are kept in 12 square meters. It’s an outrage!” Eduard said, “Are you going to vote for The Party of The Animals?” I answered, “Well, I just may, somebody has to!”

I am really serious about this, people. Think about the living conditions of pigs, how they are housed and how they are transported. It is a very sad thing. It says a very sad thing about human beings and their treatment of animals. Just contemplate it and wonder if you can live with that. Boycott pork!

Well, that’s all I wanted to say today. Happy tidings plus a boycott. When I feel good, I start to care about the world around me, otherwise I don’t have the mental energy for it.

Have a great day, do wonderful things, ciao…

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The Queen and Politics.

Well, here I am sitting with my nose plugged up again. For someone who is not supposed to have any allergies any more, it sure happens on a regular basis, which makes me doubt the allergy test. Or maybe I had something to eat that I am allergic to, because yesterday my head was itching quite a bit too. Oh yes, I know, there was corn in the little containers of potato salad and I did not pick it out of it. I just ate it. I like to live dangerously!

Yesterday turned out to be a very lazy day, because Eduard was gone all day. In the morning he had a work meeting with his volunteer operators and the rest of the day he spent with his friend Lieve and they rode their motorcycles together and visited a motorcycle parts swap meet in Belgium. They have decided to be buddies and maybe I should worry about this, but I am not, because I have to trust Eduard and I trust Lieve and I think they’ll both behave like the responsible adults they are. Besides that, Lieve is such a cool woman, she wears her tough looking motorcycle gear, yet she is gracious and feminine underneath it all. She is almost single handily restoring the roof on her 17th century barn. The roof is quite steep and it is no easy job, but she just makes up her mind and does it. I like those kinds of women and I think she is good for Eduard to hang out with. She is a real tough, yet gentle broad.

They came and had dinner here in the evening and watched that movie called The world’s fastest Indian, which is about motorcycles, of course and we drank Rooibos tea, because, of course, she had to ride her motorcycle home still. We showed her our pictures of California and our early courting days and Eduard showed her his book of photographs of all the motorcycles he has owned. Our cat Nouri likes her a lot and went to sit on her lap, which she doesn’t do very quickly with strangers. So, we had a nice relaxing evening and as a result, we went to bed rather late and I was out cold in no time at all once I was under the covers. I love feeling so exhausted when I go to bed. You know, when you are bone weary and you hardly feel like getting undressed, but just want to lie down and close your eyes.

I spent the day taking a nap on the sofa, which was very nice and I needed it and I did some laundry, which I hung to dry in the bathroom, because I didn’t know what the weather was going to do. It looked like rain, but then it never did. I hung out behind the computer quite a bit, because I have so many blogs to read now and so many comments to leave behind and then to go back and see if anyone had reacted on the comments yet. Very compulsive, and I have what Neda calls, B.A.D. Blogging Addicted Disorder. For the symptoms look here. I understand there is no cure for it and it is a life long affliction. I also do a lot of blurfing, which is surfing for blogs and which is Rima’s term.

I also did my share of Paint Shopping and made some new mandalas, which I am mildly happy with and some of them I may post here today. Some turn out better than others, it just depends on your subject and the colors of it and the happy circumstances of the combination of effects, which sometimes you have control over and sometimes not. But I did say that I would also post the lesser turned out ones and so I will. A few mandalas a day keep the doctor away. That would be doctor Freud, as doctor Jung broke with him early on in the relationship and a good thing that he did too. I see that it is very important to use the lamps and the sunlight as effects while making the mandalas, as they give them depth and shadows.

I am sitting here yawning, which is kind of unusual as I am usually quite perky in the morning. Every time I yawn, I am afraid that my jaw is going to get stuck open, as this happened to me one day and I had to go to the emergency room and have it put back together again. I had dislocated my jaw yawning. Sometimes it feels like that is going to happen again and I very quickly close my mouth. There is a way to yawn properly to prevent it from slipping out, but sometimes I forget and I just yawn spontaneously. I think that a lot of people at that time thought that I had really been hit by my ex, because they couldn’t believe that someone could dislocate their jaw by yawning. Not that my ex went around hitting me!

Eduard is up now, having his breakfast and Jesker is waiting patiently for his little piece of it. Eduard is used to going to bed later and manages to be perkier this morning than I am. He is already engrossed in a novel and can read with his whole mind present and accounted for. I am sitting here having one cup of coffee after another trying to wake up properly. I wonder if I accidentally made decaf instead of regular coffee. I will have to make a new pot to make sure. And then have another cup of Senseo, extra strong dark roast, that ought to do the trick!

I have been taking the Oxazepam three times a day and I find that it helps me get through the day quite nicely without feeling the stress that I had been feeling lately. When it works, I feel so relaxed and everything is so much easier to do. I really do feel that a weight drops of my shoulders. I had only just realized that I was carrying a weight there and I am sure that it is the weight of the coming fall and winter that is laying there. The weight of finding everything just a bit harder to do. The weight of postponing things and of not being motivated and of wanting to sit and not do anything substantial. The Oxazepam makes me feel lighter and makes it easier to do things. I take one first thing in the morning and it takes about half an hour for it to start working and I really notice the difference when it does. I usually end up taking Oxazepam in the wintertime and then go off it again in the springtime when my mood lifts again. I never have any problems stopping it, I don’t seem to get addicted to it like some people do.

Eduard left to go to work, but then came back in again to get his rain gear, because it is raining outside. We still had the shades down so hadn’t noticed that it was raining. Now the dog will have to wait for his walk a bit. Luckily he has a very strong bladder and he doesn’t like to go out in the rain. If it takes too long, though, I’ll have to take him with an umbrella and he’ll just have to get wet and get that good stinky dog smell until he dries again. He does like to be rubbed with a big towel and we both enjoy doing that and getting him as dry as possible.

So, the Oxazepam is working properly now and so is the coffee. I am perky and awake now. It took awhile but I got there in the end. I had the strangest dreams last night. I dreamed about the queen and that I was visiting her and that we were good friends and I helped her arrange her tea service for some guests that she was expecting. Then suddenly I discovered that I was a lesbian and it turned out I had a girlfriend who took me to a western American town that had a saloon where gay couples hung out and drank whisky while their children played in the dusty street. Homosexuals went to a clinic on the top of a hill and learned how to have safe sex. There were doctors there who assisted in the whole process and it was very graphic. Well, I do have an imagination, don’t I? I would have liked to have stayed with
the queen a bit longer, but I dream about the queen regularly and she is always a good friend of mine. I wonder if the queen ever dreams about her loyal subjects? I am always joking that I will clean the apartment really well in case the queen comes by to drink tea with us. It sort of motivates me when I don’t feel like doing anything. She’ll have to bring her own tea cakes, because we don’t have any of those at all.

Those are two high ranking people I dream about regularly, the queen and the pope. Both symbolically important people with just the right amount of authority. I suppose I secretly would wish to stand in their shoes, as they say here. Or be their confidant and whisper radical suggestions in their ears, which they would then take very seriously and follow up on. Maybe I have Machiavellian tendencies. Or maybe I would be like Rasputin at the Russian court. I never considered forming my own political party as I have never been quite sure what I would exactly stand for, that knowledge has become more clear to me as I have become older and more European again. But I think I would love to be an influential person somewhere at the top. A person who would get consulted on important issues and who would then say,”Well, let me sleep on that one night and I will give you my decision.” This would force me to read many newspapers as I still believe in the power of the press and the independence of Dutch newspapers.

Dream on, Irene. Voting is the closest I will ever come to that dream and that is not half bad after not having been able to for twenty two years. I do take it very seriously and stay up on election night and watch the results come in. With electronic voting that is done quickly and the results are known before midnight. It is very exciting to watch your political party gain seats in the government. It is as good as watching an exciting football match. I cheer too.

The queen is an enigma. She can never speak her mind and has to keep away from anything political, when you would like so very much to hear where she stands on issues. She has to remain silent and be an impartial player. She helps form the government, but we will never know her personal preferences. I would love it if she would one day make a speech and just clearly state what is on her mind when it comes to the state of the country. She supposedly does this in the State of the Union address, but it is written for her by the prime minister, although she can refuse to say things if she disagrees. We just don’t know.

Well, before you all get bored with this post, I better end it now. I could go and ramble on for a long time yet now that I am so clearly awake. I will write more in another post when I post some of the mandalas of the blue flower I made.

Have a great day, everybody. I know my family tree very well and I absolutely have no blue blood anywhere. Ciao…

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