Walk a mile in my shoes.

Life is cruel to some and seemingly kind to others. People suffer through all manner of horrors and to the ones looking in, it is a case of platitudes said, but with the thought, "I'm glad it's not me." I have had a share of unpleasantness in my life and found little solace in others. Emotional suffering is a lonely road. It seems to be a case of either, others have been through equally difficult times and are on the other side, glad to be rid of the awfulness, quietly pleased they are no longer suffering, some do not want to be involved or cannot fathom pain because they have not met it yet.  Some kind souls try, but in the face of inconsolable sadness and without experience cannot find the depth of feeling to offer any form of relief.  Insensitive things are said like "Everything will work out."  To a person who feels that their world has collapsed and will never be the same again, how could that statement or others like it, help?  I have been witness to sudden, violent and natural deaths.  Someone has lost a loved one.  What words could possibly make it better?  The absolute truth is, none.  That is why I say nothing.  I will not disrespect someone with platitudes.  I feel things very deeply and that seems to be seen as a failing because I am often told I am over-reacting.  That is how I am, I can climb into the mind of others and empathise completely.   In some circumstances kind words need to be said, and if I find the right ones I will. Just a quiet hug sometimes will do for a sad friend who is feeling down, scared or worried.  It is the sense of being able to safely let emotion take over and allow the pain to be for a while that makes the difference.  No one should feel abandoned in their time of need and it happens too often. People do not know what to do in the face of abject despair unless they have felt it themselves.

"Silly or, not so silly, habits."

While true Obsessive Compulsive Disorder is a debilitating series of actions that the sufferer is compelled to complete, like constant hand washing or checking numerous times to see that a door has been locked, I have noticed that most people have a certain measure of OCD-ness.  Some only display traits when nervous and some need to perform certain actions on a regular basis.  I know this because I used to be a list-maker, a list of a list-maker and sometimes a list of a list of a list-maker!  I listed everything from shopping to packing and the list had to be perfect.  If I made a mistake, I would re-write the list.  The ridiculous part of it was, at the end of all the listing, I would never refer to it again.  I decided one day that the listing had to stop because it was a time-wasting compulsion.  Nowadays I only list when absolutely necessary, but I must admit, having a pen and a clean, lined piece of paper in front of me is pleasurable!  I still have a habit of making sure that all items on the table in front of me are lined up perfectly, but that usually happens when I am a bit uncomfortable in company and often I don't even realise I have done it.  In my group of friends, we often ask each other about our "silly habits" and quite a few interesting ones have emerged.  The toilet roll can only be put onto its holder one way, bedding must be absolutely flat before getting into bed, foods must be stored in date order and sell-by dates so strictly adhered to that food is discarded before the sell-by date, an unequal amount of objects in a set means getting rid of one to make the set equal and so on.  The more common habits which could become compulsions are to do with cleanliness and fear of germs.  I am certainly not in line for home executive of the year prize because I feel that free time spent scrubbing is not free time!  I know people, particularly women, who spend so much time cleaning, their hands are sore and chapped.  They also profess to enjoy it. . . beyond me!  Clean is good, but superduper-germ-free clean is possibly one of the reasons our immune systems are in such disrepair.  Rigid routine is another habit people employ, but if for some reason that routine is disrupted, the routinee can become quite stressed. Drumming fingers, clicking pens, repeating a word, touching a lucky object, all things we do, but these too can become a compulsion. The question is why? I think the answer has to do with the need to calm ourselves, which is aided by repetition, and to help us feel in control of our immediate environment. So, I ask, what is your "silly habit"?

On death, again.

It is more the exception than the norm for people outside the medical environment to witness death.  I ask people in the first aid classes I teach whether they have seen dead people and often the answer is no.  No, with a shudder.  This is a normal reaction because death is a feared, inconceivable state for most. I ask this rather morbid question because I am interested in how people relate to death. People who have witnessed death are usually irrevocably changed.  It is an intensely private and personal moment that causes people to feel strangely privileged.  I know I have felt this.  This is not always the case, especially with violent death, which brands its awfulness on minds forever, but in my experience, peaceful death does evoke a sense of release, relief and closure to those watching the process.  People who have been witness to death seem more able to bear grief than those who have not. Maybe it is because they have had those final, personal moments where a farewell could be said.  It seems that the ability to say our last goodbye plays a huge role in our coping process.  Maybe it is because through the experience of seeing a death, its feared mystery is removed.  We do not know whether there is in fact suffering during the process of death.  I have seen death and dying in its many forms in my personal life and during my time on the ambulances and I do not feel that the dying suffer during their last moments of life, no matter what the cause. They may suffer before their body begins to shut down, but once that has happened, they seem to enter a state in which there is a nothingness, a comfortable free floating.  I say this because as much as we perceive difficulty from the outside, there is no sense of horror or pain from the patient that I have ever felt.  Once death has happened, the essence of the person disappears like a candle extinguished.  Beyond the veil.  A body remains.  A shell devoid of the flame of life.

Remembering Dad.

It is Father's Day today in South Africa.  All across the country fathers are being spoilt with biltong and red wine, allowed the remote exclusively, not that that really makes a difference from the norm, and perhaps visiting their dads.  My dad died in 1986 when I was twenty.  He had been ill for most of my life and his death was a sweet release from a life of extremes.  My dad was born in 1914.  He would have been one hundred years old this year.  He was the quintessential Victorian gentleman complete with cravat and pipe.  A quiet, but caring man who drew people to him.  He was an adventurer and an avid teller of wonderful stories which all stemmed from his travels.  My dad was a pilot.  He could fly anything with wings.  From Lancaster bombers to spitfires to biplanes, the list is endless.  The story goes that his passion for flying caused him to run away from a solid career as an architect to live his dream.  He loved Africa.  I am lucky enough to have old sepia photographs he took all over the world.  Vistas from his birds-eye vantage point of hundreds of wildebeest galloping across the Serengeti, herds of marching elephant, sights we will never see again.  He documented everything and it is a wonderful legacy to have.  There is a story, in an old newspaper I have, of him keeping himself and two American tourists alive for two weeks in a remote part of Central Africa before being rescued after the plane he was flying, crashed. My dad fought in WWII and I wear his RAF badge with pride. Later, he became a commercial pilot with BOAC. Unfortunately a combination of injuries from aircrashes and having contracted amoebic dysentery in Central Africa caused him to become chronically ill, mentally as well as physically. As his health deteriorated, he had to stop flying. His mental state was pretty fragile and it caused him to swing between severe depression and manic highs, now called bi-polar disorder. He was a much older dad, but on good days and between his bouts of hospitalisation, he taught me to shoot his massive double-barrel shot gun in the back yard and made sure I knew my way around a car engine. He always had time for questions and stories and made us feel very loved and safe. He constructed bows and arrows, spent hours in the freezing cold at the ice-rink while my sister and I skated or with us at his favourite place, the beach. My dad loved to swim and taught us to be at ease in water from an early age. He would sit on his rock, in his brown dressing gown, smoking his pipe with his beloved dog by his side while we played. I swear I still see him there, at peace with himself and the world.

What lies beneath?

It apparently takes but a few seconds for people to decide what they feel about a stranger.  Could this be an accurate judgement?  I am not so sure.  Some people use instinct exclusively and accurately, but a pleasant, charming, yet dangerous stranger could pull the wool over many eyes.  There are often accounts from people who have discovered that their neighbour, after many years of living quietly nextdoor, has been arrested for a heinous crime saying, "I can't believe it, he was so charming" or "It couldn't have been her, she always gave the kids sweets."  Most of us like to believe in the goodness of others, we prefer to trust and feel bad if we don't because something doesn't feel right.  After all, criminals are people and look like everyone else.  There are traits that set them apart physically, but they are subtle and can only be spotted by a trained eye.  Some crimes happen through need caused by poverty, but other crimes are seemingly unfathomable.  Words such as evil, psychopath are said in horrified tones.  My question is are murderers actually that different to you and I?  What lies beneath to cause them to behave in a manner that most apparently normal people find so abhorrent?  Could it be psychology, a genetic trait or simply something they enjoy doing, like we enjoy chocolate?  Killing other humans is wrong in the eyes of the law and humanity, but what if it weren't?  Would we see an increase?  People seem to enjoy the sport of hunting.  Shooting and killing a giant, beautiful, defenceless beast such as an elephant is seen by some as an achievement that brings the hunter joy.  I personally feel it is wrong to kill any living thing, even ants are safe in my house! Perpetrators of murder, once arrested, often show remorse, but maybe that is because they were caught. Others show nothing and this is a source of comment because it goes against what should be. I believe that some serial killers have asked to be locked away because they simply could not control their urges. Does this bloodlust or power over life and death or whatever it is they experience become an addiction like a drug or mundanely, chocolate? Is it possible that every person has the potential for murder, but the switch has not tripped, perhaps like some people have inexplicable abilities in other areas? Typical serial killers often have similar traits such as being quiet, socially awkward, yet often charming, loners. People accept that they are a little different and are slightly wary, but never dream that behind the smile is a mind bent on murder. After all many people have these traits, don't they.

Mother. Spelled m,o,t,h,e,r. . . M,O,T,H,E,R.

My mother was born in good old England in 1927.  She lived through the war and was a woman to be reckoned with, a Hyacinth Bucket without the funny (although if she let her guard slip, she really could be hilarious.)  Even though she died in 2011, I still feel the grey tendrils of disapproval reaching through the ether as I mention her birth year. . .  because "A lady should never mention her age."   As a family we were insular.  We had to be because her standards were so high as to be unattainable.  She put people into class catagories according to where they lived or what their parents did or how they said "milk."  "Muulk" got you banned!  She constantly corrected pronounciation and spelled out the word as well, often twice. The world almost came to an end one day when my kind-hearted sister, at the age of six, I think, snipped off the flower of an aloe known as a red-hot poker, to give to my dad.  Dad had just come home after a long stint in hospital.  The problem was not so much the picking of the flower, but that it had been snipped off right near the bloom leaving very little stem.  Something most would see as sweet brought out the wrath of mother. She was quite an accomplished seamstress and made us clothing. I will never forget the unlined, proper tartan trousers she made me wear. Hard, itchy fabric, uuurgh. We were dressed identically too. Hygiene was one of her things and we girls were bought boy's white, y-front, cotton airtex underwear.  As children who know no better, we accepted this.  At school however, changing for swimming caused untold hilarity amoung the other children and huge embarrassment for us.  Nothing was ever thrown away and the drawers were full of things like unusably small bits of string, "just in case." In case of what, the great mouse escape? Everything we owned had to be marked in some form, usually with pieces of brightly coloured fabric. From suitcases to violin stands, our belongings always stood out. Food was also kept long beyond its sell by date. When she left for New Zealand in 2000, a frozen turkey was found in the freezer dating from 1984. Bananas were hidden in her scarf drawer to stop us "pigging them down," but often they were forgotten and went off. To make each other laugh, my sister and I roll our eyes at each other and say in a voice a martyr would be proud of, "Oh, I'll have the broken egg." Mother liked to make sure she was known to be sweating the small stuff, but on major issues, she internalised everything. Stiff upper lip and all that. A product of her time I am sure. I have to look back and smile. My mother was an eccentric woman, but one who was a character. Someone who believed in the Victorian adage "spare the rod and spoil the child." I vowed early on not to be like her and so far, so good.

On friendship.

Friendship is a necessary part of the human condition.  Having a true friend for life, Im sure, is an uplifting experience.  When I was a child, my sister and I were discouraged from having friends, I think in part due to my dad's illness and possibly because my mother found fault with anyone who did not meet her standards.  My sister and I had each other and we were a unit, but it made it difficult for me to learn what making friends outside of our unit was about.  I suppose that is why I became more of a loner.  I have made friends now, but I have no lingering childhood friends because of this.  It seems the more friends you have, the more popular you are seen to be, judging by the trends on Facebook.  As far as I am concerned, Facebook friends are a collection of trophies on a wall, they do not reflect true friendship.  I do not have many Facebook friends, but the ones I do have, bring positivity into my life. I prefer to sit and talk to my friends, face to face, just be myself warts and all.  Friendship is a work in progress.  One cannot sit back on one's laurels and just let a friendship be.  If this is so, it is a one of a kind.  Usually a friendship is a two way street.  It is about understanding and compromise, communication, ease of being and empathy.  Some friendships are difficult and require a lot of imput.  These are usually a one way street and are not healthy.  Often they fizzle out relatively quickly because one party is needy and puts conditions on friendship, but sometimes that ending can take years.  A well adjusted person knows what they will tolerate in a friendship and strives to maintain that position, but at times people will hang on to a toxic friendship because it is uncomfortably comfortable.  People will tolerate constant negativity, bad behaviour, skewed ideologies or even abuse in the quest to be liked.  If eventually the friendship ends, whether due to growing apart, an unresolvable issue or a conscious decision, a void exists, as it is with endings. Time always tells.  If, after the dust settles an unusual calm decends, that friendship was in fact meant to end. Thank the person quietly from your heart for the lessons they taught you during your time with them and move on.