This is my beautiful Stoutie.

I believe you’ve already met my gorgeous Georgie.

If you are thinking they look remarkably alike then you would be right, that is because they are sisters.

Last night, the saddest, saddest thing happened because my beautiful Stoutie died.

My wonderful furries are so amazingly special to me and it really was not time for her to go.

In amongst all the tears and desperate cuddles of George I thought I would like to ask this, to celebrate Stoutie.

Today, please stretch out on your back and ask for your belly to be tickled.

Roll about in the sunshine like it is The Bestest Thing ever.

Enjoy your food with every inch of your body.

Cuddle much.

Smile with your eyes.

Know that you are beautiful.

I feel like a very broken person at the moment, both emotionally and physically.

I have also been giving myself whopping doses of Reiki to my third chakra as a result of breaking my knee whilst snowboarding about a month ago.

Not literally breaking it, but tearing ligaments in my knee and ankle, giving myself insane haematomas and doing something weird to my ITB, which my Physio says is technically known as “mashing it”.

It is going to take a long time for me to stop wearing all the bits of Velcro and metal which are currently doing my ligaments’ job for them.

There has been so much change in the last few years it is literally insane.

It’s not going to stop, so I am going to have to do some learning about it, or go insane.

Then I think I threw a shoe last week.

In true shoe style, it was absolutely, never intended in a million years to be a shoe and yet it was and then I felt like something nasty on the bottom of the shoe.

Ugh.

Much angst as I tried to fix the situation. Much angst remaining even though it would seem the situation is slightly rectified. Oh boy.

But so much more was brought up in that one tiny moment – all the broken bits.

The monsters which say, “You are broken.”

The interpretations of “You are broken” which are far harsher than that one sentence.

In one moment, a whole rush of Bing!

Realising a lifetime of patterns in one reaction:

Believing that only perfect is loveable> feeling not perfect> being not perfect>therefore having clear evidential proof that I am not loveable.

Feeling really rather broken for not having sorted this out by now.

Feeling broken for having insanely high standards for myself, and insanely low standards for others.

Feeling… just broken.

Feeling sorry for myself for feeling broken.

And so on ad infinitum.

Choice.

I am able to objectively stand away and just observe these patterns coming up, which helps a lot.

I am also able to draw on amazing support from people who do actually love me when I can’t stand back and just end up crying and saying, “But nobody loves me! WAH!”

I can see that so much of this is triggered by feeling tired, being isolated and giving myself huge amounts of Reiki to my third chakra.

Because when you start healing that stuff, you start healing deep stuff.

As I have been giving myself the Reiki I have been picking up a clear message from my body which goes something like this, “Don’t worry about the leg – that’s being taken care of. Pay attention to the vulnerable bits, because they’re tired and lonely and desperately need this.”

So I’ll be giving those vulnerable bits some more Reiki.

By the way – I know I’m not broken, but what is also true is that I am feeling extremely vulnerable at the moment which means my monsters’ voices are rather loud.

What those voices point out as that healing needs to happen here and that healing is happening here.

Like an itchy scab.

Nice.

It leads to all sorts of things in trying to deal with it:

• Sadness. Always sadness. In the small places there seems to be loneliness in me and I think this makes me feel sad. And lonely.
  
• Defensiveness. Because I am so small I must be a tiger. Tired tiger…. Rah!
  
• Confusion. Why? Why? Why me? Why now? What’s going on? Oh… tired.
  
• Grumpgrumpalump. Everything is wrong. EVERYTHING I tell you!
  
• General NAFI – I am not arsed or f*cking interested…. Also known as “Meh”
  
• General indecision, ineffectiveness and unhealthy footling causing further tiredness. Often caused by avoidance of the sad and lonely feelings and accompanied by madly trying to get in touch with someone to stave off the woe. Woe, oh woe.
  
• Great quantities of back ache. Ow.
  

   

What I would love when I am tired:

• Cuddles and cwtching.
  
• Stretching maybe to help my poor back after it has put up with my posture all day. Easing out the kinks. If this is too much that is fine too. The bath will go some distance to helping that out too.
  
• Tea. Preferably brought to me.
  
• Creativity. Of some sort, although cooking is generally too physical in times of extreme tiredness. It brings me back to myself.
  
• Always this. Creating brings me back to myself.
  
• A bath –a lovely, hot, essential oil scented bath of gorgeousness. Possibly with bubbles. Rosemary and Rose Geranium… Clary Sage and Lavender… Bergamot and some more bergamot…. Ahhhhhh.
  
• A gentle, loving, care filled reminder that I am tired –rest is allowed as much as it is necessary. Being Superwoman can continue tomorrow.
  
• Stillness and quiet. Breath.
  
• Reiki? Yes, I like that idea of some Reiki in the quiet moments. Perhaps after a bath when I’m pink and relaxed.
  
• Permission. I think this might be quite important.
  

Many monsters raise their heads when I am tired. My defences are down and their voices clamour for attention and most of the time this leads to me trying to shut their voices out. Except tonight I just stopped for a millisecond and thought, “Oh I am just tired.”

I think it has taken me just under thirty years to recognise this and I am rather pleased that it now gives me a chance to sit back and take care of myself!

Now I am off for a bath.

This year – it’s about carrying my light. I know – how cheesy. But it doesn’t stop it being what it is about.

Last year was a tidal wash out of overwhelm that started in April 2009. In its wake I have been left bobbing about wondering what the hell happened and who the hell I am.

Writing about it has slowly led to me realising that the essence of who I am is something that I see as a light and that often, when overwhelmed I let it get smothered and forget who I am.

So holding my light or carrying my light is about learning to hold those things apart from me. It’s a glorified form of my shit or their shit.

More will follow.

They lack convention and I find this truly refreshing.

There is nothing wrong with convention. It is convenient, clean and possibly even elegant in its understatement and ease of understanding of what is “acceptable”.

However, to me it lacks the depth of character that truly bucking the trend requires and depth of character is interesting.

I would say this, for this is me of the yellow trousers in the past talking. The me who has stood at the fringes for a lifetime and felt truly “otherwise” to society. Where “the” way seemed truly incongruent and illogical to me so when I find somewhere that seems to hum with resonance, I fall in love.

So the coffee shop that has the grumpy waitress and the appalling service but also has comfy sofas and an old school feel to it – that is a special place.

The poem that so obviously has no meaning to anyone but the writer has a beauty of its own.

The mishmash jangle of colour in a loud print or garish painting.

The tiny cinema that seems stuck in time.

The hint of contrariness, and the stubborn refusal to be assimilated into the norm, the tiny hint of difference and I stand there, drawn in and itching to give into it.

But I do stand on the edges – I am one thing and the other. Assuming convention and craving the opposite. Afraid that to openly swim against the current will drown me in opinion and yet finding myself unconsciously paddling desperately that way anyway.

I want to wear the yellow trousers and like myself when I am.

I want to wear the yellow trousers and still be accepted by convention.

To walk the middle way.

“Who am I to wish for this integration?” I hear myself ask as I write.

“Who am I?” – the eternal question which begs to be answered every day, which proves elusive, as slippery as a fish.

Or is it more like, “Who am I today?” and do I have the courage to answer truthfully?

Sing Hi! Sing Ho!

To the You-ness of You.

To the You-ness of You

Shout out Kazoo!

KAZOO!

For the You-ness of You

Is a big whop bam boom!

They were words I really needed to hear at the time, from my Dad, so I wrote them in a way that I could hear.

A little weird I know, perhaps even binkers but now whenever I read the poem I am comforted.

I wanted to share…

DAD’S POEM

You are Beautiful

You are Amazing

I see stars in You

You Gorgeous, gorgeous child of mine.

Take my love and let it lift You up.

Use it to realise Your dreams,

Your true, priceless worth.

Take this father’s love and let it

give You wings, to stretch

Yourself until You know no bounds.

Because You are more amazing than

anything I have ever seen.

You are my child, more precious than You will ever know.

You are my child, beloved with all my heart.

You are of the goddess

Powerful, Mysterious, beyond my measure

A mystery from the stars, sent to fill me with wonder and amazement.

You are my child

My Child made of the stars – I love you.

With all my heart.

One belonged first to my grandmother as her engagement ring, then to my mum and finally to me, as my engagement ring too.

One was found on a walk, it is kept as a reminder of how random treasure turns up in unexpected places.

Two were gifts from my mum – wonderful expressions of who she thinks I am (she is right you know!)

One is a treasure found in Portobello market – a 1930′s marvel of romance.

There is one which is battered and tarnished.

A wee silver heart built into its band. The heart is inscribed – W C.

Yes – you can laugh – I did.

This wee heart – it is the memory of my first real love.

I recognised him instantly.

Previously I had been curious about him. A friend of my best friend’s boyfriend, discussed in passing, I was sure I would like him when eventually I met him.

Then one evening he walked past, jumped up, slapping a rafter as he did, and in that instance I knew him and was simultaneously smitten with the silliest school girl crush EVER.

I plotted and schemed.

My friend and I hatched plan after plan to bring us together in a way that was not completely obvious and therefore hideously embarrassing.

Those plans were never to be – I was going to ask him to teach me the guitar, then my guitar was stolen. Her boyfriend would bring him around and I’d conveniently be there, but then another friend would come instead… and so on.

All the while, when we were in public situations I would avoid him like the plague, no doubt blushing furiously if/ when he spoke to me.

Then one night, a movie night at another friend’s house, somehow we were sitting together. I was probably going blue from holding my breath with nerves.

At some point he simply reached over and took my hand.

That was it – we were a couple.

I already knew, from hanging out with him that he was a good man, but being his girlfriend taught me just how much.

I was welcomed into his family, made to feel much loved.

He listened to me and truly took care to show that he cared.

That ring was the first birthday present I received from him.

All too soon he was away to another country to study chiropractic at university.

The distance and the fickleness of youth did their thing, whispering that really it should no longer be, and we broke up deciding that it was for the best.

You know… considering…

I will never forget that love, with its passion and its care. It had its ups and downs of course and its fair share of humdingers, but always I knew that I loved him and that he loved me.

The purpose of this story tonight however, is not a chug chug down memory lane to reminisce about lost love, but to remind me that I did once have that love that I search for now.

You know – the one with passion, care and the secure knowledge that this is one I can and want to give my heart to 100%.

If I have had it once already then there is no good reason why I shan’t have it again, and that I am not so foolish after all, for looking for it.

In a two weeks time I become self employed.

I cut my hours down at my current job to a fraction of what they are now.

I earn peanuts as it is there so….

Shit.

The thing is though, that even though I am not prepared for this in any way really (unless the obsessive thinking counts as preparation) and even though I am terrified, this is my thing (you know – the thing) and I truly believe I have to give myself a chance to do it.

I am a scared bean.

A jelly bean in the most quivering sense of the word.

There is no bravado here, no “Rah Rah! I’m doing this so help me god.”

Unhelpful help…

I discovered today that when you’re terrified and quivering like a jelly bean over your chosen way, it really doesn’t help to have other ways suggested to you.

Even when they come from the most loving and helpful place imaginable.

It has taken enormous amounts of courage to reach this stage where I trust myself enough to do this and to do this in my own way.

Suggestions to do it any other way sound like criticisms, even though they are not and I know they are not.

Trusting yourself is a most tentative process.

When starting out in new things people are most forthcoming with their helpful suggestions about how to do it, or what your options are.

I find myself picturing myself holding a large spear with which to wield madly at the encroaching circle of “helpfulness”

Wanted: A band of outlaws

To stand in the centre of the circle with me and to have my back.

Who are with me, because it’s me and so why wouldn’t they stand with me?

Family.

Soul Family. (Permission granted to throw up now)

http://www.justgiving.com/theboudicachallenge

Good People who read my blog, welcome, welcome to my latest insane (simply a synonym for genius by the way) idea.

The background

My bike is also called Boudica.

Mostly because I dig Boudica and think she is one badass woman.

Also there is Nikki.

She is very cool. Her bike is called Hermin.

(I think Boudica and Hermin may have a thing going on but we can’t find out for certain. They’re keeping very quiet about it all.)

Anyhow…

When Nikki found out that my bike was called Boudica I made a stupid joke about riding around naked with butter knives attached to my wheels.

Nikki took it from a joke and suggested we actually do something useful with such an insane idea.

Naturally I loved it, except the naked idea (ouch). Some lateral thinking later and…. TA DA!

The Boudica Challenge was born!

And So…

July 24^th 2010 is the day that The Boudica Challenge takes place.

Working West to East and riding three trails in one day, totalling 35 miles (yikes):

Brechfa:      Gorlech Trail: 12 miles

Afan:          The Penhydd Trail: 14 miles

Cwmcarn:    Twrch Trail: 9 miles

Inspired by Boudica’s story, we are supporting Refuge, because one woman in four experiences domestic violence at some point in her life.

Furthermore, two women are killed each week by a current or former partner.

Domestic violence accounts for almost a quarter of all violent crime and in 90% of domestic violence incidents children are in the same or next room.

On average a woman will be assaulted by her partner or ex-partner 35 times before reporting it to the police.

It is shitty, shitty, shitty and if we can help by riding our bikes stupid stylee around mountain bike tracks then that is what we want to do.

More details…

We shall be riding in gold bikinis and cycle shorts since it is common knowledge that this is what all modern day lady superheroes wear.

Our hair shall be red – Boudica’s was. It wouldn’t be fair if we did not have red hair.

It is not a closed event – we want to raise the profile of mountain biking for women, and the more people involved, the more money we can raise.

If you want to be involved – let me know in the comments section and I will get back to you.

Fancy Supporting Us?

Well the least troublesome way is to donate using the link at the top of the page, that way from the comfort of your desk chair you know you’re helping and you don’t have to ride around in a gold bikini feeling stupid.

Or you could join in with us as mentioned above.

We’re setting up a website too and when that is up we will be letting you know if there is anything we need. So I hope you’ll visit us there when it is live.

Right then – that’s the news lovelies. More soon!