Christchurch Earthquake

“It’s not whether you get knocked down; it’s whether you get up.” Vince Lombardi.

This quote certainly seems appropriate to many people who have been directly affected by the earthquake in Christchurch (New Zealand). It still seems surreal to see the remnants of my hometown reduced to rubble. The beautiful centre piece of Christchurch was the Cathedral, but now so much of it has been reduced to a mass of stone and debris. The majestic spire and its wonderful spiral staircase leading to the top, an adventure for every young boy and girl growing up in the garden city, is no more.

Christchurch is known and loved for its beautiful gardens and wonderfully English feel. The winding Avon River slowly meandering its crooked way through the city, keeping pace with the gentle slow seeming rhythm of this garden city was once just an accepted and normal way of life. I wonder if this lovely place will ever feel quite so tranquil and safe again for those who have experienced either or both of the two major earthquakes in the past few months.

My sister and her husband were in Australia on holiday with us when we heard the news; we spent frantic hours trying to locate their teenage sons and our parents. Watching live coverage on TV as our beloved city was crumbling before our eyes was heart wrenching, like being unable to stop watching a train wreck, even though every fibre of your being is screaming for your eyes to avert themselves from the carnage.

Our parents were enjoying a quiet senior’s lunch at the casino when, with no warning, chandeliers, furniture, gambling machines and people began tumbling to a confused and roiling floor. Amid the screams and chaos my parents managed to take refuge under one of the few upright tables. Long minutes later, fearful and unsure, they quietly tried to reassure themselves and others that the worst was over and all would be alright. It took two hours to clear a path to the outside and four torturous and terrifying hours for them to drive the usual 30 minute route home and they were the lucky ones.

After the September earthquake and through the thousands of small tremors in the following months, Mum and Dad were shaken, more than just in the physical sense. Then after the major jolt of February 22nd they felt completely shattered, lost and bewildered.

My parents have lived all their lives in Christchurch and in the same house for the last 50 something years and had no desire to live anywhere else. Now suddenly they are staying in Auckland, feeling lonely and traumatised and totally unsure of what the future holds. And they are the lucky ones! Lucky to be alive, lucky to have escaped unharmed, lucky their house is cracked and crooked but still standing, lucky they are insured, lucky to have family in another city so they can escape days, weeks or months of no sewerage, no water and no power. Trying to imagine my parents who are in their mid-70’s having to improvise with toilet arrangements by digging a hole in their backyard was heartbreaking, and they only had to endure it for 5 days unlike so many others.

My nephews were travelling on a bus through the city, having been late and missing the previous one which was crushed by falling rubble. Fortune smiled down on my family that day, although the trauma my nephews still face after walking past crushed and broken bodies will always be with them. I was and still am proud of their determined spirit and resilience to reassure their parents that they were okay and their strength of will to get home (a four hour walk) to their home, their refuge, pets and hopefully to safety.

My family and I love Christchurch, it is a beautiful and gracious city and a place I am proud to call home, but do we want to live there? At this time my parents and sister are determined to move elsewhere, they can no longer imagine feeling safe or sleeping well when the city they knew and loved now shakes beneath their feet. Where the suburb they live in is like a war zone, local landmarks are completely gone, roads impassable and friends’ homes completely destroyed.

I remember them having similar thoughts after the September quake, perhaps not as fearfully said or with such stoic determination but life soon resumed to a semblance of normality and a city was being rebuilt with hope for a better safer future. After this quake many lives have been lost and the lives of thousands have drastically changed, but, somehow the human spirit continues with a surge of hope for happier times ahead. Perhaps the real litmus test of human endurance really is “Not whether you get knocked down but whether you get up.”

Why Don't I Like That Person?

Whilst out driving yesterday I saw five goats and a gorgeous dog happily together in a small paddock. I was delighted to see this odd combination together and mentioned it to my passenger with a smile. He said that the dog was one of a breed specially bred to be part of the goat ‘family’ and there to protect them. Hmm, I thought, with a little scepticism perhaps showing on my face.

He must have noticed my lack of belief in his information because when I got back to my office I found an email from him with a link to ‘livestock guardian dogs.’ Apparently dogs from a few different breeds are raised to care for and protect different types of stock, in this case, goats.

Yes I did phone him to apologise for my lack of faith in his knowledge base, he is after all a scientist so seems to have a vast array of usually useless information which he loves to impart (if he is reading this, just kidding – of course your information is never useless)!

Anyway that got me thinking about strange animal relationships that we often hear about, different types of animals being encouraged to foster babies from other species and raise them aren’t an uncommon occurrence. The oddest pairing I have heard of is a dog and elephant that appear to be the best of friends.

It seems that human beings also pair up in what sometimes seems an odd union. Not just the pets’ people choose but also their partners, maybe the old adage that opposites attract is more common than we think. I started taking more notice of the people around me and did find that it was sometimes difficult to see why people were attracted to one another in the first instance.

I don’t just mean physical appearance, although that is an easy one to notice without knowing the personalities of the people you see. I have friends who I really enjoy being with but know that we are very different in our likes and dislikes and also personalities. Maybe we need some who compliments us, and we them, for example the talker and the listener, the joker and the person who laughs at the jokes. Perhaps also the vibrant, energetic person needs a quieter friend or partner to keep them a bit grounded at times.

I have often pondered what makes us like some people instantly, take a while to warm to others and actually feel an instant dislike to someone else. One of my old tutors would have firmly stated that it is all to do with experiences we had when we were younger and we transfer those feelings onto people we meet who remind us of an event or person from our past, often very sublimely.

Someone who believes in re-incarnation would say that you have known the person in a previous life and had either a good or bad relationship with them, the feeling of love, like, admiration or animosity are carried over into this life.

Whatever the reason is I am very pleased that my partner and I have quite different personalities as I believe we complement one another and he certainly does keep me guessing and can still surprise and shock me. When we first met he wasn’t physically ‘my type’ at all, but once we got chatting I felt a lovely warmth toward him and a feeling of kindred spiritedness between us. Fortunately he felt the same toward me otherwise I wouldn’t be using that meeting as an example!

Now just let me end this blog with a quote to ponder if you are waiting for your soul mate or feeling discontent with what you have;

“We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love.” Tom Robbins

The Wonder of Laughter

Having a good sense of humor and enjoying a good laugh are powerful tools to ensure that your mood and emotional state support good health. Laughter is an incredibly powerful antidote to relieve stress, pain and conflict; it also helps to keep you grounded, focused, alert, lightens your burdens and helps to keep you connected to others.

Did you know that a good hearty laugh can actually relieve physical tension and stress and leaves your muscles relaxed for as long as 45 minutes afterwards? It is great for your health, including increasing blood flow which improves the function of blood vessels – great for your heart. Laughter also increases immune cells and decreases stress hormones, it improves your resistance to disease by increasing your infection-fighting antibodies. And then there are those wonderful ‘feel good’ chemicals the body produces called ‘endorphins’ that are released into your body when you laugh.

There is definitely a link between laughter and good mental health, it is impossible to feel angry, miserable or anxious when you are laughing. Laughter makes you feel good and helps you keep a positive and optimistic attitude even when life is difficult or disappointing. It also helps you see things with a different perspective, and helps to make you feel a little more rational and less overwhelmed.

Laughing with others is a fabulous and effective way to build friendships, strengthen bonds and keep relationships strong. Laughter can help to heal hurts and resentments, settle disagreements, encourage spontaneity, release inhibitions, foster emotional connections, and unite people during difficult times.

Phew! A lot of great reasons for us to laugh more, I need a healthy dose today so I am meeting a friend for a laughter filled lunch. 

You might want to check out the Entertainment page on my website for more things to inspire you to laugh;
http://www.reallifebalance.com/entertainment/entertainment.html

The Wonder of Art

Have you ever pondered how art really does imitate life? I know it is a bit of a stretch but let us consider children’s books, movies and TV shows. Have you noticed how often the creators of this type of ‘art’ use very adult themes and disguise them in their work? ‘The Simpsons’ is an obvious choice and kids movies that are full of two levels of humour, two good examples would be; ‘Finding Nemo’ and ‘Shrek.’ I also love the veiled adult humour of so many programs that my kids used to watch; "The Magic Roundabout" and "Rainbow" being two of my absolute favourites - if you have no idea what I am talking about it really is worth going to YouTube to have a look.

Another interesting cast of characters is Winnie the Pooh and his friends - I am sure they are all based on real people and all have some degree of mental illness. Pooh obviously has an eating disorder, he is a total glutton for honey and overeats in times of stress, times of celebration and just any old time he wants to - I doubt that hunger has a lot to do with it! Then there is Tigger, well ADD if ever you saw it, he never stops bounding around and absolutely can't stay still for a second. Rabbit has a bad case of OCD, what is it with all of that obsessive organizing and cleaning! Don't even get me started on the depressed state of Eeyore, poor old thing, always miserable and full of gloom, and needy little Piglet is such a tragic wee character.

The reason I raise this topic is to illustrate how many truisms we see in art that often reflect our own circumstances and lives. I was discussing this with a group of friends recently and between us all we had one who lives with depression, another has issues with food, another cannot sit still and me..... Well maybe just a little bit obsessive compulsive.

I heard a psychologist speaking on mental illness and the fine line between sanity and insanity and he said that he believed that everybody has some degree of mental illness, it is just how much it affects your life and day to day functioning that matters. Well if it is good enough for the Winnie the Pooh and his mates then it is good enough for me! How wonderful that we are beginning to recognize behaviour traits and oddities as just part of a person, or ourselves, and that it is okay. AA Milne may just have been a pioneer in making some of these so called ‘disorders’ acceptable and maybe just a bit endearing!

What is happiness?

I have been pondering what makes me really happy and decided that it is very dependent on the mood I am in, who I am with, the time of month, the time of year and even the weather outside. Sometimes after a week of rain just seeing the sunshine and feeling it on my face makes me really joyous, and sometimes when I am feeling really active I get great pleasure from hopping on my cycle and going for a ride. Then for about two days every month - (you know when) all I want to do is find the time to curl up with a great book and read.

Happiness really is subjective and certainly different for everybody - and as I get older I find that the things that I used to enjoy have become tiresome or not as enjoyable and I have discovered new things that make me smile. I am making a pledge today to try new things and step outside of my comfort zone more often - I will keep you posted on how it goes!



Lily

Back online after Queensland floods

hello and how lovely to be back online, with all this flooding we were lucky that our house stayed dry and the worst we had to contend with was that we lost power for a couple of days and the internet was unavailable for over a week. It has been a very tense and trying two weeks and my heart goes out to those who lost loved ones and those who are now homeless. 
My partner and I have been doing some volunteer work, they called the volunteers the 'mud army' and we certainly were, over 12,000 of us.  I have lived in Queensland for 5years now and was overwhelmed by the generosity and warmth of the people I met in the last few weeks.  The positive and hopeful attitude of so many people in the face of extreme adversity has been amazing and made me feel so proud to be living in this wonderful country where the true Aussie spirit and grit have been so evident.
It is both frightening and incredible to live in a climate where a severe lightning storm seems to appear out of nowhere when only 20 minutes before it was 30 degrees C and sunny. One day there was over 21,000 lightning strikes, 120km winds and hailstones the size of golf balls. The awesome wonder and power of nature really is on display, I wonder if it is to remind mankind that he isn't as in control of this planet as he wants to believe.
Being stuck indoors has given me more time to work on my book as well as my website (although not live till this week) so please do check out my new recipes, book reviews and a few other bits and pieces I hope you will like;  http://www.reallifebalance.com/

Lily

Had a great new years eve and now that the hype is over and the headache is forgotten it is time to consider that horrid new year's resolution thingy that we seem to feel compelled to explore each year.  I am never sure whether it makes me feel positive or regretful; positive about all the possibilities and a clean slate for the next 12 months or negative that I failed to live up to last years resolutions and maybe 2010 would have been better if only I changed some things about myself! 
I tried to discuss some joint resolutions with the other half yesterday, he just did that male thing and smiled at me with an ominous kind of nodding of his head.  I think he was remembering last years resolutions and how quickly they were forgotten!!  Anyway we finally agreed (well he did nod in a quiet, smilingly affirmative sort of manner) that we are going to try at least one new thing every week! 
I have a gift certificate for a hot air balloon ride for two so that is one week sorted - only 51 to go!  Hmmm, taking into account the free time we have available, finances, weather, mood and the life insurance exclusions I may have to put a bit of thought into this resolution - I need a wine - darn there goes last years no drinking before 4pm resolution!