A Thousand Years

For anyone with a romantic nature

I watched these two young ladies last night. It is a beautiful performance..and yes I needed a hanky.


A Thousand Years The Voice



Heart beats fast
Colors and promises
How do be brave
How can I love when I'm afraid
To fall
But watching you stand alone
All of my doubt
Suddenly goes away somehow

One step closer

I have died everyday
waiting for you
Darling, don't be afraid
I have loved you for a
Thousand years
I'll love you for a thousand more

Time stands still
Beauty in all she is
I will be brave
I will not let anything
Take away
What's standing in front of me
Every breath,
Every hour has come to this

One step closer

I have died everyday
Waiting for you
Darling, don't be afraid
[ From: http://www.elyrics.net]
I have loved you for a
Thousand years
I'll love you for a thousand more

And all along I believed
I would find you
Time has brought
Your heart to me
I have loved you for a
Thousand years
I'll love you for a thousand more

One step closer
One step closer

I have died everyday
Waiting for you
Darling, don't be afraid,
I have loved you for a
Thousand years
I'll love you for a thousand more

And all along I believed
I would find you
Time has brought
Your heart to me
I have loved you for a
Thousand years
I'll love you for a thousand more

Solar powered KAT

Sun and wind.. :D. Loving that the trees are swishing and my yard is drying.
How am I today?
I have taken washing in that has finally dried.
Vacuumed my house, cleaned, tidied, sorted bills, made awkward phone calls
Made a temporary bird table with apples on it for the wax-eyes and Bellbirds
started making a pile of necessary certificates
swept the yard
and am about to walk the dog
I have spied a job I am applying for that I would absolutely love and feel eminently suited to. Hoping they feel the same way too. It feels good.

Even though it is likely to get colder we have now turned towards summer. The sun today has reminded me of that.

This song has nothing to do with the post but its on my mind. It was one of Garys favourite songs.We used to go to Cane garden Bay On Tortola and listen to Quito sing He has a magic voice. Enjoy

Quito Rymer Mix up world

And a poem posted by Claire on her Blog Icelines

http://icelines.blogspot.co.nz/2013/06/tuesday-poem-why-then-do-we-not-despair.html

How are you?

The question that opens every sentence. And then the wait and then the 'how are the kids?

 What to say..I go back to intention and the fact that people are kind and well meaning. I can only give a fully real answer to the people who have or are suffering in the same way. 

I saw someone last night at the festival in town (Hana and Zach were part of it). Someone I don't know very well but who knows someone else I am acquainted with. The how are you and then the wait then the kids?  I am polite and am coming up with std answers that are all part of a polite conversation. But it is exhausting, very possibly I cant be pleased at the moment. I feel in part I am being dishonest when I have these interactions and I would prefer to only have them with people who truly care about me and my family and loved Gaz. 

What I like about our city, our country and our World is the degree of connection between people and that it is small. That is also what makes it hard.

Having courage means to speak from the heart, it also means people have to have courageous ears and not feel they have to offer any platitudes or well meaning advice. 

I logically know the process and understand how grief works. I don't need it explained back to me and I don't necessarily want to keep explaining it. The knowing and the feelings and the doing are just something I have to go through. It is a well trodden path that we will all have to walk.

My friend Sue C.S who's husband died a year ago said a metaphor she carries with her is one of pioneer woman hacking through thick bush to make a path into the unknown. Even though people have done this in various ways for the longest time we are the first of our friendship circles.

My courageous heart is sore.

How am I today?

A bit shaky..Someone dropped off a thoughtful gift but one I had to deal with and it undid me. A live cray. The body, the suffering the killing of it...all sent me hysterical for about two hours. I am slowly trying to get myself together. It was an incredibly generous gift but hard to take.

I can manage for short times away from the house and then I lose it. I think about returning to work but feel worried about my concentration. I know I need to relax and it will sort itself. 

I am fretful about responsibilities, being a single parent, having to take of care of things by myself, make decisions by myself..love myself enough. Gaz loved me for me and I knew it. He accepted me for who I am and how I was was and now I have to do that for myself. I get scared , I get angry, I cope when things are ok but not if there is a hiccup.

I did also manage to go to church and catch up with a friend afterwards and made a few marks on paper. I am writing which is helping clear my head and Im going out to tea at Debs. The days are a mixture as am I.

I will make a plan this week of things I need to do and do them. That will help.

I need to remember that I generally like to work and I have a good work ethic. I like to be busy and that this is an extraordinary time. I will once again be able and capable of taking care of myself and my kids. I wont always feel this way and unable to help myself. I am truly appreciative of family and friends and their love. One day I will be like Tigger again.

Did you know? My garden not only is producing new potatoes and mushrooms..there is a Kowhai flowering and a red Rhodo..My garden has its own ideas at present of when things should happen. It is a bit Narnian.

Tree 'fellas' yes a play on words

 Last night I got a phone call for the DCC informing me that they were going to chop my trees down and it was going to be tomorrow(as in today). They were large and the roots were becoming increasingly exposed and risky with all the rain in the last week. In light of all the slips they had decided it was best to take them out. I have managed to scavenge some wood and all I need to do is learn to use the chainsaw and I will be well occupied. Time to plant some trees.

 Found these while watching the fellas fell. More things out of season

Courage

Susannah Conway interviews Brene Brown


I was sent a link two weeks ago to Susannahs blog and clicked through again today to have a look..her book was recommended and I will order a copy. It is called 'This I know' .
 I clicked and listened to the first chapter..she has it nailed. What she says is what I am thinking, saying and writing. Her partner died 7 years ago I don't know the details as I havnt got there yet , but how she talks about grief post the death is so well done.
She also has a link on her page that offers a free workbook for the year and one of the questions in it, was to pick a word for the year.
I picked Courage.
It has been sitting with me for a while now in various forms and I think it will be a word for a life time. While thinking on that, I then decided that picking Courage  wasnt very creative of me. But what I was doing was limiting myself in my head with my idea of what courage actually is.
I then came across this interview while pondering and clicked on it. Brene is worth listening too.

What she says about courage
" The root of the word courage is cor—the Latin word for heart. In one of its earliest forms, the word courage literally had a very different definition than it does today. Courage originally meant “To speak one’s mind by telling all one’s heart.” Over time, this definition has actually changed, and today, courage is synonymous with being heroic or performing brave deeds"

Landslide

Just made a dash up the road to drop Zach at the school bus as it is traveling the high rd today due to a fallen tree covering the harbour road. We arrived at the intersection as the bus zoomed by in front of us and then I chased it (quietly) up the road through sleet and ice until it pulled over to let some cars past. Zach was horrified that he had to catch the bus in the first place..partly because school is off his important thing to do list at the moment but also he said 'the bus driver makes me nervous on an ordinary day driving, he's all shaky'. :-(
Not good to say that to your mother as she puts you in a bus in ice and snow on a dodgy road...That was when I wished I was dressed in other than my pink dressing gown and I was driving the four wheel drive not the Yaris and I would have taken him further. Urghh.
Our bay road at the moment reminds me of myself. It is collapsed in places and weeping. There are parts that are strongly rooted and the trees branches are providing stability and shelter and other parts where the bank has has just collapsed requiring a diversion. My favourite dogwalk path has fallen onto Portobello Rd requiring me to think of a new route. The shape of the road has changed and with each rainfall down here it changes the face of it permanently. The favourite and over used expression 'a journey'..is really our peninsula road.. It is winding, challenging it is never predictable, you always have to watch to watch out for untoward events.
Just got a text from Zach..his bus is at the top of Castlewood rd and cant get down because of the ice so the bus is driving to town then going all the way back down to Mac bay to pick the kids up. I feel a bit better about that somehow..seems a good decision by the bus driver.

Lower portobello courtesy of our local paper   the 'ODT'. I cant see who took the photo to credit them, apologies for that.

And a song I quite like

Landslide Dixie Chicks

Out of Season

I am beyond tired at present, I can feel it sneaking into my bones and halting me. I think of things to do and then forget to do them. People contact me and I forget to reply.
My brain as it deals with the bigger issue, eliminates the the little ones also.

I thought about biking today and walking the dog, but legs like lead. I did get dressed and go out and dig the garden and dug a bucket of spuds some yams and some parsnips. It felt good to be moving just a little and good to have purpose. There were no spuds in the pantry and I reneged on the market and town today as I didn't want to leave home. I needed some quiet.
I dug new potatoes today..it was a curious thing.
 I do remember tucking this lone spud into a patch and wondering if it would grow before winter, still it was a surprise as I weeded there to find them.
It is a Merlin (my favourite potato) and has pink eyes so maybe a little bit magical. Its skin rubbed off just like a new one.
Someone made a comment back at the start of Autumn, I cant remember who but they were talking about death notices in the paper. They said ' yes this is the season for it'
I looked at them feeling the anxiety and fear and thought don't be stupid Kat that is superstitious thinking and I also thought Not my Gary! We will have another winter together but I knew it would be hard.
Things out of season are peculiar they don't make sense and don't happen in a natural order..they make us think and puzzle and seek why and hows. The new potato in June bought seasonal ideas into focus. Winter is time for sitting by the fire yes? hunkering down and being bear like for a while. It sounds pleasurable..cave like. It is also cold and grey and wet at the moment.. feels like July. And the Autumnalis is flowering,,the waxeyes are ecstatic. It does do this - blossoms twice - but with it comes a blurring of season and time and creates a forgetting of where I am.
My title for todays blog was originally '' keeping track of the life you're living''  I was thinking about this as I have lost a number of items (smaller losses that fret me terribly). My extremely good pruning saw( maybe somewhere in the garden I have looked and looked), two brand new patterns from Global(must have thrown them out), my memory as mentioned above,  bits of money, joy..to be expected for a while. Appetite..I get hungry but appetite is different..My scarf (which I found).

The pruning saw was a hard loss as Gary would have known where I might have put it and would have helped me look. He knew my habits, observed where I wandered and would have had a bright idea where to look. If not , the next time he was out and about he would have kept an eye out...He knew me.
There really is just no-one else no matter how dear that is the same or fills that place of a long time mate..its in all the little things.I don't just miss him in one way but in countless..when I make breakfast, a cup of tea..turn tele on. Put my head on the pillow. Dig new spuds.

Faith and suffering

This Audio is a clip that was posted by a friend on her blog.  Carols blog
The person writing the blog is Carol Warner, the mother of Jacqui, who has synovial sarcoma.

It is discussion between their congregation and their family on suffering and where God and faith sits for them. I found I related to everyone in the family.They all had such good things to say and the short sermon before hand is great. Really well done. It is not hard to listen to ..it is a family sharing themselves honestly and articulately.

I highly recommend.

http://www.canyoncreek.ca/sermons/20130609%20-%20When%20Faith%20Collides%20with%20Suffering.mp3

Neons

I am sitting at my kitchen bench looking at an Autumnalis. It is a blossom tree that flowers twice. As all its leaves fall off for autumn the buds open out, a beautiful reminder of natures quirkiness and things that don't make sense.
I didn't sleep well my brain was in active problem solving mode, sadly not actually problems that I have any chance of solving but it was hard to switch it off last night. Puss woke me twice for some food..she has an inner ear balance problem and cant jump accurately so gets me out of bed to put her up on the welsh dresser for a snack.
I did sleep in-between waking (I shall get back into the cherry juice tonight) but then found it hard to get up..Gray skies and still.
I promised Mango a walk and then my studio today for some more painting.
I have been playing with Neon paint a bit..desert landscapes where neon pops up..curious bright spots in amongst ochre and siennas. I was thinking as everything you put down on the canvas is yourself..that the neon colour is all the people and the love and kindness that emanates. I guess I would have expected darker colour to come out of me at this time..neons have surprised me and I love them.
I am laying down midnight blues and blacks against them and the shadows are creeping around..but still bright.
Two tuis just arrived in the kowhai tree and sang to me (yes to me)

Speeches

I am starting to post the speeches as requested about Gaz at his funeral. They are on his blog and I will keep adding them as they come in. I havnt contacted everybody(Paul C) so if you see this email me would be awesome..KAT

no news is good news

I havnt watched the news for weeks and its a good thing. If I just hang in my world and look around me it is full of good and kind people. People are so very kind. 

I have had four enquiries about my Bourbon drinking, just to reassure folks I am not hiding in the dark drinking too much. I cant physically drink to excess anyway, my body says no and I just stop. I am just enjoying the odd one ( or two). Nice to have something to drink that is simple and warms you up. Rituals break up days.

I have been painting..started this and am really pleased with where its going. My studio is a healing place and gives me some structure in my day. The act of picking up the brush and decision making around it is kicking some brain functions back into life. I am still slow in my brain and a bit fuzzy. I don't remember anything from one day to the next. So if anyone asks me anything..please remind me and don't think I have ignored you.

four dollars cheaper than a therapy session.

I bought myself a bottle of Woodford reserve Bourbon, my new favourite. It is four dollars cheaper than my therapist and hopefully will last me a bit longer. I actually really like my therapist and Im fairly certain her advice is wiser and more effective than this bottle. But for the moment me and the Bourbon are talking just fine.
I think some settling is happening, the surreal aspect is still there but I am starting to realize Gary is not just going to walk in the door and turn up as if away for business. It is starting to become real. I think thats why I have havnt really stopped crying for three days. I never know how I will be from day to day so I just go with it and don't fight it. If I cry, I cry, if I am finding joy in something thats what I do.

I cleaned my studio today and did some painting, put Sheryl Crow on the ipod and painted.
Sheryl was chosen because that was the first name I came across. Gary always did the music.
I am trying to learn new things, hard when my brain does its switch down thing if it has emotion attached.

Arihana has moved home :-D. What to say? she is a joy and makes it easier.

I gardened yesterday and got some stuff moved. I have a picture of the areas that I gardened in my head and can see where its going for the first time.
My poor plants have got what my Dad calls "Philippa disease'. That means they get moved frequently.
So far they seem to be coping, and as I get to know my section more, things are starting to land in the right place. There is a plan afoot.

Today I prayed for a clear picture in my head of Gaz that I could carry with me and not get sad over. And one that is just for me. It came this afternoon.
 Gary sitting on the couch and telling me that he saw me ' I see you Kat' .
 When something like this happens you question everything..it doesn't matter if you know its going to happen because it still doesn't make sense and it hurts. It really hurts.
I go over stuff thinking 'where could I have done more' ? What else could I have done? ..more time please Lord.
I know this seems nuts but it does unpick the hard stuff and start to sort it, and if I pray into it it starts to ease.
I also prayed for a bridge between this grief and healing. I know its early but I need to know there is a bridge.
The one in my head is the one I crossed as a kid up in Glenorchy on one of the tracks. It was rope and swayed and had gaps that you could fall through. When I stepped on it to cross, it was fairly certain that someone at the edge would shake it and I would freak.
I remember Gary teasing me when we went up to stay with Mum and Dad in the Shepards hut. He gave one shake, I don't remember what I said but he didn't do it again.

This morning in church Sue talked about Wholeheartedness and what that meant and how we were placed to find it. She also talked of bridges and I thought thats nice thats what I was asking for and listened harder, it was good and reiterated but no aha moments.
This evening a friend rang and talked of a picture she felt she was given by God. It was a picture of her husband who had passed and Jesus with one foot in this world and one foot in the next and she said 'Jesus is the bridge Kat, he connects us between our loved ones who have passed and us who are left here'. I shared with her that I had prayed for a bridge and we talked.
Things come and they come in unexpected ways.
I saw her husband and mine talking with a glow that exists in my imagination. I did call them a rude name as they were happy and blissful and I wasn't there...name calling helped a bit..
Sues talk at church was the bridge that linked me through to last conversation..bridges within bridges.
I was reminded of a first journal page I did of paper dolls holding hands and it was all our friends and the love that connected us.

This week I have cried and cried and cried.

Ari moved home
I gardened
I biked
I took puss to the vet
I have also booked an Art journal trip with my sister..she squeaked when I asked her.
I DIDNT drink the whole bottle of bourbon and go driving around the back roads of the Peninsula with loud music on as tempting as it was.
(Sadly nearly half a bottle gone by tonight..too easy to drink, I highly recommend)
xxx