Why "The Purple Pumpernickel"?

It was in the 80's that I remember sitting in a high school class room drooling over who I thought was Michael York, only to find out years later that it was Anthony Andrews adorned in velvet jackets, satin pantaloons, dashing frills and heels. Lets face it, in the day it wasn't the colour of his eyes, the curl of his hair or charming smile that made him dreamy. The Scarlet Pimpernel was old school.  A daring anarchist, gentlemanly, chivalrous and an intellectual hero that offered a little more than modern day six packs, bulging biceps, enviable hair and sarcastic quips. I can not remember when it was exactly that I realised the movie I had been referring to as "The Purple Pumpernickel" was definitely not the same movie, The Scarlet Pimpernel, I had watched during my teen years. It seems that getting the bull by the horns is something that I am not only prone to, but it just might be hereditary. My youngest little munchkin, God bless her, has fantastic hearing, unlike her mother, yet she is terrible at listening. A trait that even now, at 13, she has not improved on and is still prone to either just not hearing me or misunderstanding what I have spoken to her about due to a total lack of attention or care, I swear she has provided me with more grey hairs than the rest of them put together and she is by no means finished with me yet. Standing by the stove one day and my little Anni pipes up, she would have been all of 2 going on 3 at the time, "what are you cooking?"

"Nothin", I tell her, and her little eyes lit up as she most emphatically exclaimed just how much she loved "muffins." Que eyeroll. Her enquiry "What's for tea?" Met with one of my dads old favourites "a kick up the bum!" elicited such disgust as she explained to me that she hated cucumber buns.  All kids provide many little cherubs of somewhat misplaced wisdom, bless them, and what would motherhood be without them? In some ways I can look back at my own mishearing's and have a little chuckle. So why "The Purple Pumpernickel"?? Well I do try not to take myself too seriously and it kind of reminds me that we can all be a little silly and get it wrong from time to time.

Old wounds, lol, I look back and laugh at how reckless I was..

Be Patient You Lied

I Know What I Have To Come Home To

Your Velvet Tongue Let Loose Its

Silken Web Of Hooks And Lures All

Baited With Smooth Words And Charm

Enmeshed Within Your Promised Prose

Of Love And Endless Nights Proposed When We

Would Lay And Sit Between The

Hours Of Apart Together.

Although Your Touch A Thousands Miles Away

Your Face Was At My Fingertips

The Crease Of Your Smile Accompanied

My Morning Coffee And Toast

The Hours Passing Whilst We Discussed

Yesterdays Todays And Tomorrows

The Hope Of Growing Old In Each Others

Company Being Friends Forever

Sharing Everything We Had In Life Always

One Glance A Single Picture And All

My Dreams Undone Bubbles Burst

Heart Not Broken But Torn Like Paper

Each Word Spoken A Poisoned Arrow

Left Dying Desperate For Sleeps Peace

An End To Suffering So Much Pain

No Longer Knight But Loves Assassin

Cruel Merciless Harbinger Of Life’s Bitter Lesson

Love Makes Fools Of Us All

It's been over a year since I have blogged anything!! That's not entirely true, I think Facebook may have been my substitute blog spot there for a while. Why is it that we seem to have a need to share most things in life? Well, unless it's covered in chocolate with a few macadamia nuts thrown in.  The other day I was seeking a little "bathroom" privacy, unfortunately our toilet has a two door set up between our bathroom and laundry. My girl followed me into the "bathroom" mid-conversation and continued chatting away, I shut the door behind me and asked her if we could carry on our "conversation" later, so she left, walked up the hall and around the corner and then approached the laundry side door of the toilet and continued talking..?? Where there is a will there is a way I guess, much to my dismay at times, lol.  Still, what a privilege to be sought after to such an extent that even my desperate need to relieve myself is secondary to my child's need to interact with me. We had a horrible loss in the family earlier this year and the event seems to have made us all a little clingy.  Nothing reminds us that we are so short on time together as the sudden passing of a loved one, I was going to say that circumstances somehow play a part, but I can't see that the pain is less or the shock easier to deal with when it has been the result of a drawn out illness, an accident or sudden medical emergency that goes wrong.  Loss is loss and grief is grief and it is all rather horrid and I can understand the agony that God must experience when he sees death claim another of his children, this was never his plan. 

dancing

Sometimes I kick myself because I have made so many mistakes in life, if there was an allowance of stupid things you were allowed to do I think I would have surpassed my quota by now. However, as much I sometimes would like to shake myself, maybe slap myself across the face and tell me to snap out of it, every "stupid thing" becomes a lesson. God has told me lately that I am precious, that I deserve better than what this life has already given me. Actually, I should correct that and say that I have finally heard what God has told me all my life and no longer pay any attention to the nagging little voice that lives off my failures, feeds my insecurities and is only at peace when I am at my lowest. I have found great comfort knowing that God has promised me that he is always with me, he has seen every disappointment and pain and sorrow whilst standing at my side, sometimes whilst cradling me in his arms like a babe and he has shared my triumphs, always having my back. Anni said to me today "you will never leave me will you Mum?" and I said "not if I can help it Anni, but if anything ever kept me away from you it would be alright, wouldn't it?" she just snapped back "yep, cause we'd see each other in heaven". Thank Jesus I am His, that we all are. I nearly lost myself a while ago, would have "sold my soul" for empty promises and something I thought was love and it was an important lesson because I now understand the value of waiting for God to unveil the plans he has for us and to be patient, after how many years of playing this game? I've also learnt that there is no relationship more important than the one I share with Christ, if our relationship is in good stead then I'm ready for tomorrow.

Is there an echo of time with a twist in here?

In 1998 my 2 eldest munchkins went to the cinema to see the animated movie Mulan, my Miss 18, whom at the time was my Miss 6 went along with her elder brother and friends and I waited for them to finish in the Westfield shopping centre at Marion. After the movie we sat down at the coffee lounge for a post movie critique and run down, where Miss 6 announces 'it was really good Mum. The girl that played Mulan was the same girl that was in Pocahontas". I did have to glare at my son whilst asking him sternly to verbally restrain himself for all manner of remarks concerning how daft it is to think that a cartoon character is real, but that one gave him quite a few weeks worth of ammunition against his blonde younger sibling. Well in the spirit of nostalgia I grabbed a copy of Pocahontas for my little girls to watch and it was Miss 8 that piped up and said "Hey Mum, that's the same girl that was in Mulan" the funny thing was that my now Miss 18 actually said a few degrading remarks about Miss 8's comment until I reminded her that a few years ago she had came out with the same logic in reverse.  Bless them, they are the sweetest things.

It's oh so quiet....

Well, the rain has, for a second, subsided. The house is oh so peaceful with the exception of Miss 8's insidious questions and nagging and moaning about no nectarines being left in the fridge, wanting chips but not being able to have them and don't get me started on the comments about how boring rain is, lol. Yesterday I realised just how much more noise she is capable of producing then Miss 4 and Miss 6 when they are left alone together for an entire day, even though house bound. Scary thought, very scary thought. Miss 8 suffers from a switched on brain, she is forever questioning life and wanting to know what is going on and as impatient as I can get with her I should be grateful that she is interested in talking about everything with me and I hope the day when she doesn't feel like sharing her every thought with her Mum is a long way off.
The rain has just started to fall again and so have the complaints, Miss 8 hates this stupid weather, again, for the 100th time in the last hour, ah Lord give me patience.
I am very fortunate to share my bed with 2 little munchkins at night. Yep, I have gone from trying to ease Miss 4 out of my bed to somehow just having Miss 6 join us, don't ask me how that happens but it has. To be honest I kind of feel at peace knowing that they are close to me at night and maybe it's a misplaced kind of nesting thing that I can just gather my little chicks under my arms and sleep peacefully. Although the other night I must have not snuggled in close enough because in the middle of the night there was an almighty noise that happened simultaneously to me seeing Miss 6s' arms and legs, all splayed like a gangly legged spider, sort of flip off the side of the bed. Poor little baby was laying on the floor and I asked her if she were ok, she opened her red little eyes and smiled at me saying "I'm ok, I just hopped off the bed". I was really concerned about her, she made a horrid noise when she hit the floor and yet she just wiped a little bit of drool from the corner of her mouth, gave me a kiss accompanied by a "I love you Mum" and lay down and went back to sleep. It must have given me a bit of a fright because I couldn't just go back to sleep then. I started to think about falling out of bed and falling out of love. Yep, don't ask me why I think these things.
So here goes. You think your in love and you feel a sense of warmth and comfort that helps you sleep at night, sometimes you might need to pull the doona up a little or sleep with the fan on when things get a bit heated, but overall you feel happy to be in your bed. But one restless night, when you get maybe a little close to the edge, you just flip out and hit the floor. Initially it's the sudden shock of not being where you thought you were that wakes you up but as you lay there looking under your bed you see things or yours that have been put out of eyesight, lying under your bed and under a layer of dust. There is an old suitcase, a couple of boxes and a cricket bat, the cricket bat was there just in case anyone ever broke into the house in the middle of the night but it too, thankfully, has attracted a thick film of dust. The suitcase holds the clothes you loved wearing before you were married and a few special occasion pieces too expensive to give away, everything in that suitcase is now 2 sizes too small, well for the moment. In one of those dusty boxes are all the memories of your growing up, photos of holidays spent with your brothers playing by the sea, the school friends that helped you through your teens and still keep in touch along with a thousand moments recorded when you were happy to smile. The other box is full of trophies, some basketball championships but mostly indoor cricket trophies, but on top of all these are the certificates and achievements obtained through study and hard work. Now that you've orientated yourself and realise your on the floor and not on your bed anymore you stand up. Now I guess the secret to knowing if you have fallen out of bed or out of love would be the moment when you stand, look at the person with whom you share your bed and determine if that person holds more joy and happiness, more importance in your life than everything you have stashed under it?
See, there is a reason why I should be sleeping at night. My brain, a little like Miss 8's needs to stop working so hard sometimes.

I love a sunburnt country

Well, 2 days at the pool in a row and despite putting sunscreen on my 8 year old daughter she is now a lovely shade of crimson. Cora has the complexion of a delicate English rose, pale with a blush of pink in her cheeks, well not this week, she looks more like an Aussie bottle brush. Managed to find a long sleeve rash vest to protect her arms and I realistically think it has come down to find something that resembles a burqua in lycra to protect all of her. Do you think the suns rays are just harsher than in past years? As kids we lined up at the gate to be the first in the pool every morning of summer hols, except for church on Saturdays that is, and we were the last kids to be still splashing around when the lifeguard ordered us out so they could shut up shop. Who would have believed that for the price of an annual family swimming pass you could actually pay so little to have other people watch your kids all day. I don't recall every getting badly sun burnt at the pool though, despite not having sunscreen. Sometimes we may have swum in our t'shirts for the day but would lay stretched out on the hot concrete till we stopped shivering so we could dive back into the water for another hour or so before grabbing a bag of chips to nibble. Our Australian sun just seems to be so much harsher than it used to be, or our kids are fairer maybe? At our local pool we have visitors from far away countries that bask on the lawn till they are the colour of red baked bricks, I wonder in future years if their visits to Australia will result in a boom of melanomas in countries relatively free of them up until now?