Why don't you ...?

Flowers - one of the most underestimated and affordable luxuries in life.

So why don't you:

- Buy yourself a small bouquet for your office every week? Or for your kitchen? Or simply for the place where you spend the most time during your day?

Set a budget and just do it.

- Have a simple red terracotta flowerpot with a lovely geranium sitting on your window sill and keep it company during the years?

- Put a simple glass of water with one flower next to your bed?

Please, no big bouquets in the bedroom, as they tend to smell very strongly and if you are not changing the water daily the flower's smell very quickly become something rather unpleasant.... Believe me, I speak of experience. Here again the old word is true: well meant is definitely not well done.

-  I am not speaking of money, but please do always buy the flowers in season. No need to have tulips before Christmas, when you can have lovely Ponsatilla for half the price and the tulips 4 weeks later for half the price as well. It is rather like the veggies: buy what it is season and enjoy the rhythm of the year ...

Btw: Changing the water of a vase on a regular basis does help the flowers to live longer. Even topping up is already better than nothing. I often buy flowers in the supermarket and they do quite nicely. If you can, buy two bunches of the same sort and it looks immediately more appealing. As a rule I like many of the same kind together - combined and styled bouquets are tricky and need really someone with a good eye to be well done. Otherwise they might look as bought at the gasoline station to a 50% discount... You do not want this in your house, let me tell you.

Smile!

Something lovely happened this morning to me.

As I have recently moved more into town and can now take the tram and metro to go the office, I have ample time and opportunity to watch people - if I want. Not in a bad way, but more in a study of my fellow humans in this city.

This morning, gray and cold and still darkish when I left, I had been sitting comfortably in the tram and at a certain point, together with  quite a bunch of fellow to-work-goers, had to change in the metro. Old lady that I am, I refuse to run to catch the Last Metro, but wait patiently for the next, which is - God willing - coming 5 minutes later.

So: I miss it and stand alone on the Peron, waiting for the next metro. All good.

On the opposite side, the metro coming from the other direction is standing a little bit longer and I can see the people sitting and standing in there.

And on one of the doors, squeezed together were children, little faces of all coloures of the rainbow peeping out of huge anoraks and with little hands in gloves - most probably going on a school trip, 8 or 9 years old.

They were looking at me and then the miracle happened: I smiled and they smiled back.

First timidly, then really happy, looking at each other, being delighted, smiling broadly. 

Kids, simple lovely kids, with their own histories, of which I know nothing, they simply smiled back. I waved to them. They waved back. Then the train started and we waved and smiled to each other and went our own ways.

This made me really happy. And I am not a weirdo going around in metro stations smiling to people. But what difference: the grayish crowd of to-work-goers all around me, people looking at their phones, hearing music, the odd one reading (how wonderful, books still exist!). And then three or four young human beings just being, making contact and smiling.

Lovely. Made my day.

Cinderella, by Kenneth Brannagh (2015)

You will think "the girl is now completely gone"- instead in preparing on sending one more duckling off through the Baccalaureate and then on to university (now only one to go!), she goes and watches in the movies a film for children, with talking mice, mad godmothers and a very evil, but admittedly, very well dressed stepmother. The godmother is less well dressed. I do not even speak about the horrid stepsisters, they simply look and behave ridiculous all the time. 

But oh, let me start about the interior of the house!!! This alone is worth watching the film at least 5 times, as well as the stunning costumes and set. Even if during the last years the choice of Kenneth Brannagh in films has been a bit odd at times ( Thor, anybody?) it is simply the fact, that after Henry V and after Hamlet, there is little left to him..  therefore his odd choices of themes are fully and utterly excused and we, i.e., the not so small children and their even older and older mother, all the time rush and see his latest film, be it Thor or Cinderella. (I do not like the dark thrillers and crimes series, therefore, admittedly, have not seen them.)Here, with Lily James being a charming Cinderella, all is set for magic and fairy tales.

But back to the film. All is there. Wonderful Derek Jacoby as the dying and clever old king, who understands that his son, called "Kit" needs to marry for love, whoever it might be. Sounds like Will and Kate. Then the prince, albeit having an appaling seat on his poor horse and far too white teeth, seems to be a rather simple but good guy, starting to know what HE likes and being not only a yes man. This does not like our friend the Great Duke, who wants to sell him off to a very lovely princess from far away - very becoming in time like ours nowadays. But the stubborn lad wants to stay with his own people, not having a queen who tells him that she thinks his "tiny kingdom" quite charming. Bloody foreigners.Well done.

All works as prescribed in the book, with less horrid details, no hacking of of feet and doves eating first and then vomiting the good beans into the plate, instead a charming goose and heaps of nice  and caring mice. But here things go for me a bit awry and something gets on my nerves very quickly: her mother tells her to be "good and courageous" always. This as such is not bad. But the girl is all the time so sweet and enduring, and the step mom and the ugly sisters so definitely cruel and vile, so much that  at times one wants to start to vomit all the popcorn out again. Is this the message? The yes girl becoming the prince for being good and enduring and never ever say no and never rebel and only sob when every body is gone? I feel uneasy here.

Of course, the recently acquired stepmother is herself, wonderfully beautiful and heavenly dressed Cate Blanchet, a poor devil in her quest for a safe position for herself and the silly daughters - one has a moment of pity for her too - but then, she knows how to get what she wants ( for herself at least, it being almost impossible to sell of the two super silly daughters she has). 

For Cinderella, it takes a long time and her mothers' a bit childish dress being ripped that the lovely kindness is ripped as well (I would have been so angry much earlier...) and here and there she does not want to be a good girl any more. Finally!! And voila, in comes the fairy godmother. Poor Helena Bonham Carter is definitely starting to get a bit weird. I wonder how she can walk in THAT dress?

Then we have the pumpkin, mice becoming horses etc etc and ensuite the best part of the film, the ball - dresses and wonderful interiors, though mostly done by the computer, but the feeling is good , even hilarious, and I become a little girl again wanting to have such a dress and waltz around with my darling prince who is riding around the country on a white horse and has good teeth and apparently can dance. 

All ends well, of course, the shoe is horrid but fits after the girl starts to sing and gets noticed after all, forgives the bad stepmom, but is clever enough to avoid having her moving in with them in the palace. So, not completely stupid, but good and courageous.  All perfect. Lovely wedding dress!!!

The first time I thought this is ridiculous and not really helpful for the girls and boys in our times - you cannot send children nowadays in the cinema and tell them the message: endure, do and ask nothing for yourself, hope the that the prince is coming and if you are good and kind, and all will end well. I am not even speaking of the appalling lack of books in Cinderella's life...

But then my wise children told me the truth. The film is aimed not at old mums like me, but at young children (really???), who still have a heart, where magic is true and live is good, full of promise. For them the message of being always good and courageous sounds very different. And yes, why not? No need for the suffragette in me to get up the walls but why not let the child in me dream on and have a moment of utter bliss, magic and good and happy ending? 

In times of hopeless politicians and other terrible unspeakable horrid people blaring on our faces on a daily basis, perhaps this will help us to keep that magic going, being stronger than reality? Because this is true: we human beings are stronger than reality and our lives do not have to be lived on automatic pilot, but we can chose and dream -  or chose and not dream. I for this time do not want to reasonable and clever. I want to dream about wonderful houses and a rather nice palace, dresses to long for, lovely woods, talking mice,  a rather dotty godmother who really can do some magic, good and just kings and queens, and a happy ending. Written in stone and to rely on.

Tomorrow then back to BBC, FT, FAZ and the depressing reality - let's be courageous and good and do something about it.

Happy Easter and spring is coming!

Happy Easter to who ever might see this sleeping blog...

Every year I have the feeling that the winters get more tiresome and the longing for spring becomes almost physical. Might be my age....  But I have noticed it again and again over the last years... This last winter was particularly tedious. 

Many friends and colleagues have commented on the fact that the waiting for some sunshine and the first green shots is becoming almost a religious yearning for redemption, for hope and for promise of something better to come. And when it arrives, almost over night, when there is a small window of opportunity, some warm sun, some warm wind and, hey presto, a lovely light green veil startles one into waking up from the winter blues and looking actively around to see, if life is indeed going on... When it comes, a feeling of deep joy and gratefulness does make one smile on the daily way to work and all the traffic jams of the world seem less bothersome with this small green hush of coming lushness.

I for one am more than grateful that every year this miracle happens. Despite political freezes or hotbeds, it simply is there, reliable and full of promise. Because we know: If there is a spring, a summer will follow and we can rely on that. 

Wonderful.

Ramblings on Mindfulness

I just come back from my link with the real world: the supermarket. 

Noticed again today that many people there look very concentrated while doing their shopping. They often stand and stare deeply interested on descriptions of the odd package of frozen vegetables or mustard glasses. I started to wonder and thought if I am missing out on something extremely important, which I might should do that as well. So I took a box of frozen green beans (so healthy for you!!) and there it was: "green beans, frozen and packed on the field". What a relief - I am doing good in not only buying but also eating those beans and can put my mind to rest on at least this problem!

It appears the latest thing is - or might have been already, as I do not live really in the world outside my triangle between my bed, my office and the supermarket - well, apparently it is MINDFULNESS.

Everyone talks about it and if you browse through the odd women's magazines, there are all the time references of mindful living, mindful eating, mindful dressing and also mindful sleeping and so on - starts to sound to me pretty exhausting. 

Interesting question: Is it possible to be mindfully exhausted? Does it look like Mrs Bennet calling for the smelling salts? Can one mindfully think over a problem without brooding over  fog in the mountains, like in a Caspar David Friedrich painting? It is possible to be mindful when gardening and killing slugs in the dozen - was my mother already mindful, when she worked for hours in the garden in the 1970ies, or was she just planting stupid flowers and vegetables for the bland consumerism of her family???? I wonder. I suppose so. 

If I am really honest with you, I think for a normal woman most probably already NOT multitasking is damned bloody mindful. We are told that cooking soup yourself is mindful and having a bath seems to be mindful as well, especially if you burn several well scented candles in the carefully curated bathroom and do not look at your facebook account at the same time. 

Everybody who has tried to fall asleep in times of turmoil has at least once tried to be mindful: empty minded that is, trying very hard not to hear the traffic outside, not to think about the problems how to pay for that damn electricity bill and worrying about, all at the same time, the children, your mold mother, the friend with cancer, the next school trip and- in the small hours - about oneself and the future, bland prospects. Back to sheep counting, as boring as it is, it works. I will try next time to count the sheep mindfully, acknowledging each of them and sending them on with my best intentions and wishing them well, here and now.

Let's face it, the new thing about mindfulness, hearing colours and feeling the music is not new. Prince Charles has done it for years, talking to flowers and so on and I do admire him for that. Being very mindful another question pops in my head: as he is one of the best well dressed men in the world - at least to me - does this have something to do with mindfullness as well? Could this mean he knew his ties by name and tried not to prefer one over the other, as not to give any reason for jealousy between them? Just a thought.

I believe that in our being of the world wide web just one very clever chap discovered that the time is ripe for asking the vegetables if they are happy and want to be bought by you in the supermarket. I confess, unfortunately I do not hear anything and have, after very hard trying to get into a relation to my carrots, never got any answer from them. Most probably I am not gifted enough, as in so many things.

But: I DO talk to my car ( "good girl, waiting there patiently for me at the end of the day in the garage") and have been know to have meaningful conversations with my much missed and beloved pug Mick. I smile at flowers and watch at the birds in the early morning, when walking to the train station. I always though I might be bonkers, but no, I have most probably been again well ahead of everybody else.
Now I will very mindfully cook soup. And will try to ignore the screaming vegetables...

So, here we are again.

It seems yesterday, but in fact I have not written on this blog for much more than a year. Almost two years, when I come to think of it, at least!

I have been busy in the meantime though. I changed job a gear up, have buried my second pug, have been divorced, have turned 50 (why did nobody tell me that 50 is such much more fun than the drab 40ies??), have said good bye to friends who moved abroad and are being sorely, terribly missed, have met wonderful new friends and cousins, have been trying to rush around Europe to see friends and family and now I have on of my boys finished at university, a second already gone for a year, my daughter starting in September her last year in school and my home population therefore is devoid of dogs and shrunk to a mere 50% reporting to duty for the shopping-at-the-supermarket-carrier-service. 

Life changes, and rightly so. I woke up this morning and thought: this cannot go on like it did. I am 50 now, most probably over the first half of my life ( touch wood, the old body is ailing but coping, and I wonder if I ever will loose those horrid kilos again - anybody out there for giving me some sort of encouragement?) is over and if I sit quietly - almost never - in a corner and stare at not existing goats in my garden, then the thought persistently coming back to my poor fluttered brain is that I still have so much to do/see/write/meet/get on with and wonder how to fit all those bucket-list things into a very busy life?

Then you will ask: what on earth is she busy with? Children on their way out and seemingly promising to turn out well, job secured and happy with, settling into old age comfortably, surrounded by friends and family -  what is there to be busy about?

Of course I am off the hook with the baby business. I see it all around me and have started to campaign ferociously to give all the support needed to those young mothers who must do it all: having the babies, obviously, but also having a job and being the wonderful wives they have been chosen for in the first place. 

But then, I think, why not starting to do some serious lobbying for the girls MY age???? But telling them what? To use every possible opportunity to get a babysitter?? Not really - and to do what??  

The fact is:  Now is the time for the Gap Years of The Older Woman (which age should we start with?)... no toddlers around for the moment.

Ok. This thing about campaigning for "The Older Woman and Her Handbag" needs some more thought and most probably more time, which I do not really have, considering that I had to restart a life with two dogs, four children and a nonexistent career a couple of years ago. But it might be a start already to get back and take the Red Handbag out of its dust cover, and looking into it, adapting it perhaps a little bit for the "Safe Side of The Fifties." Or better "The Right Side of the 50ies"!

So, I do not promise anything. But the fun of writing, as I do now, with a hot cup of coffee (please note: not a mug, but a huge wonderful swimming pool of a Wedgewood Edme Plain Cup!!) is so real, that I endeavor to get back to this blog more often. If someone out there reads it or not.

Cheers!!!

Jola

In Memoriam: Ploppy (2003-2014)

The world is poorer for one pug. 

Yesterday our dear old friend Ploppy passed on to greener and much more comfortable cushions to sleep there in eternal calm and typical nonchalance.

Some memories of the dog are unforgettable, so as the pure stubbornness of the beast to move on walking, when he had decided that it was enough. In true style he sat in the middle of the street and waited out our silly attempts to, a. move on, b. get off the middle of the street, and c. to please obey an order, for once in his life. He was unruffled. The only things that could move him to greater agitation was the fact that there was food to be expected and after a horrid walk there woould be a nice place to retire to and fall into a snoring state of almost opium induced quality.

At some time he was suspected to be in the pay of an obscure pre-1990 secret service - for his cunning understanding of human character, his steady nerves and the unimaginable coolness he possessed as a dog. I am pretty sure that in a former life he has been a Great Dane or an Irish Wolfhound, at least. 

Unfortunately he was never very healthy and suffered greatly of an auto immune sickness which made him grow old before his time. We and Mick will miss him greatly.