Ha. It’s another of those nights. Those nights when I go to bed, but feel so excited about everything and nothing that I have to get up again.

Part of it’s the music, I know. I’m listening to Everything But the Girl – Walking Wounded. One of the few CDs I ever owned. Bought it in Switzerland I think, Interlaken. That was before I knew any Japanese. I remember that as the CD case has a bit of Japanese on it, and it was only a few years after I’d bought it that I realised what it said (Eee bee tee jee = EBTG). It’s truly wonderful how music can take you back in time to a place, to a feeling, to a state of mind. Listening to this and looking at my swiss photos sees me up that Alp in 1997. Caw, that part of the world is staggeringly beautiful. I do hope that *Twinkle* and I end up back there one day (by that I mean that I hope that that remains one of our goals).

My weekly Organic Vegee box from Beanies

Doesn’t that fruit and veg look delicious?! I love organic vegees so much, more than any form of processed food – including Crunchy Nut Cornflakes. The taste of a fresh organic salad is, according to the interaction between my taste buds and mind, the most delicious taste there is. The taste of this pile of fruit and veg could only be surpassed by an identical box of produce that I’d grown myself. It will happen.

I had a difficult day yesterday. I was feeling troubled by Nelson Mandela’s treatment having finished his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom. What an incredible story. Certainly puts things into perspective. I think of his 27 years of incarceration, and of the appalling hardships endured by black South Africans under Apartheid, and then I think of complaints that I or my friends might have about noisy neighbours, our language course, or what so-and-so said… and I am reminded how spoilt we are. We have so much to be grateful for. Every single day.

Thank.

You.

When I reached the part of the book where he described his release I paused and paid a visit to You Tube, where I observed the same scene from outside of his body. Having just gained an insight into what had led to that moment I found it to be incredibly moving. I wiped the tears away, and bang! I was back there. Not South Africa, but our lounge, in front of the TV. It was the 11th of February 1990; I was 12 years old. …I can vividly recall watching that live news report on the BBC. I’d heard of Nelson Mandela and Apartheid, and I remember being excited, and so happy, running around the dining room and the lounge.

It was cold outside.

Sun shines down beyond the Arts Tower

I went to give blood today. Unfortunately due to my history of epilepsy, I’m unable to be a donor until 2011, and was actually advised to never give blood. It’s not that my blood poses a risk to others, it’s that giving blood poses a risk to me in that it could trigger a seizure.

The nurses were very good about it – they could see I was upset. In fact, they treated me even more nicely after that, insisting that I go and sit down and have a cup of tea and a biscuit.

So, I’ll just have to make do with saving people when I die instead 🙂 …and keep on buying cakes all week from the Bone Marrow Society. (Bloomin’ good cakes too).

I was pretty surprised by how many people were there. It was like discovering a whole hidden culture of Good Samaritans. How come I had never tried to donate blood before?

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Been missing *Twinkle* a lot this week. In a way I wish I could bottle this experience, and keep it as a reminder for future years when we are ‘always’ together, to ensure that I don’t get complacent, to ensure that I stay concious of how fortunate we are (will be) to be able to share our lives with one another.

I feel I’ve become more aware of our differences this year. Having so much space enables one to step back and think about how differently one sees some things. That’s not a bad thing at all. I see her as my teacher, thus the more differing perspectives, the more we can both learn (I would add that I don’t think that the differences would be so welcome if there was not an underlying meeting of spirit!).

I’m grateful that over the past year I have been encouraged to explore the idea that there is no right and wrong – there is only differing perceptions of ‘reality’. This proves to be especially helpful in situations where social norms would normally dictate that conflict was the appropriate response. With there being no ‘right’ and no ‘wrong’ there is no impulse to convince the other that one is ‘right’. One can have a completely different opinion from someone else, and yet accept that they are just as ‘right’ as you. After all, the ‘thing’, whatever it is, just is. It has no implicit meaning, it only has the meaning that we assign to it.

This way of thinking has really helped me to back down and accept *Twinkle*’s way of thinking without my pride getting in the way. I’ve not quite got it down to a fine art yet though – far from it! But, being aware is the first important step, and I’m glad to have taken that.

Changing the subject, this past week I’ve been marvelling at the brain’s ability to assign meaning to things I see. I’ve been playing a little game whereby I look at something, and then observe my thought process as meaning is assigned. Of course normally it happens to fast that we barely notice (you look at a traffic light, and before the you know it, you know it’s a traffic light!), but you can slow it down. One method is to turn the lights off so the room is pretty dim, then look around until you make out a shape. You can actually see you brain sorting through an amazingly comprehensive database of images, experiences, feelings, meanings! Absolutely amazing (and we think Google is clever…!). Another way to set yourself up for this experiment is to reduce the exposure on a bunch of photos, so the subjects are barely visible. Or, next time you meet someone whom you know you recognise but can’t actually place or name, watch your brain sift through your memory bank in a bid to come up with a match of sorts.

Ahh, the pleasure of introspection!

Well, I’d best be off to bed. Up early tomorrow, and my list of things to do is almost as long as my nose 🙂

Mush love xxx

p.s. I want this girl’s voice.