My New Year's Wish

I've never been one for wishing that all your dreams come true and magic ponies in cashmere bubbles carry all your fears to the other side of the rainbow. Blergh! No. And because I'm not particularly taken by mystic bunnies that poop cotton candy, I'm not going to wish you the very best year you've ever had.

No.

In fact, I hope that your best year ever is still many years away and that the build up to THAT year is exciting and thrilling and possibly even a little adventurous.

As far as 2009 is concerned, I would love for it to be, for you, a bit like the opening act of a Shakespearean play - precocious and gripping, alluring and ever so enchanting. That it will put a wry smile on your face and tickle your curiosity just enough to get you interested in exploring it a little further.

I'm not going to wish you strength and courage and hope and prosperity. Sorry. If you're looking for those blessings, you might want to check out the Hello Kitty website. Nope. I'm not going to hope that all things change for the better. Uh-uh. If anything about you changes in 2009, I hope that it would be that you would become more adventurous, more daring; that you would take on the world with more Oompah! and that you would believe in your own abilities more and more.

I'm not going to wish you a perfectly happy year. A whole year of happy would rapidly become tedious. Instead, I wish you inner peace between the happy times. I wish that the gaps from one happy to the next will be short, and that as you pass from one to the next, you will remember that you are so much stronger than you think you are.

Sincerely

Jx.

Clever cost-cutting Techniques

It's holiday time, right? So the Mother of the Year has taken some leave, and we get to do all sorts of fun touristy things (which is easy when you live in Cape Town).

Yesterday we arrived at the V & A Waterfront, tried out the fun fair and went for a tour of the harbour. We ate fish & chips on the wharf and enjoyed soaking up a beautiful Cape Town day. On the way home, we stopped by at Century City, just to check out the toy store and make sure Father Christmas gets the right order. Ahem.

A cute Toyland train was huffing and puffing around the center court, taking lots of excited little people for a festive ride. T-Bird was enchanted. But it was late, and we were in a hurry to get home.

T-Bird: Please can we go for a ride on the train?

Me: It's time to go home.

T-Bird: Just a quick one?

Me: We're leaving now. And anyway, it's expensive, you know.

T-Bird: How expensive?

Me (I don't know the answer to her question): T, all these things we've done today, they cost money, you know. We've been on fun fair rides, boat rides, we've eaten out. A train ride will cost more money, and in the end it all adds up and becomes expensive.

T-Bird (mulling it over): Hmmmm. Well then, I have a brilliant idea!

Me: Hey?

T-Bird: A really very brilliant plan! (She starts bouncing up and down) What we must do is this: Air can stick to Dad, and I must stick to you. Then we must pretend that we don't know each other when we go on the train. And then we won't have to pay as much for the ride.

Me: Hey?

Nothing

There's nothing. Like standing on the edge of a precipice and looking down into a whirling navy depth. If I look down I am teased by the dark mystery of what fades away there, even though I know there is nothing.

I am not shaken or jittered walking this fine line. I can do it. I am strong. I don't need a rope, a hand, a pill, a friend. I am strong. I can do it. And anyway, there is nothing there.

I can't help but look down where it is dark and quiet. I wonder what that silence sounds like. I wonder if it would fill my ears like some cotton wool or putty. I wonder if I could touch it, that deep nothingness. Could I put my arms around some solid substance of nothing, pull it over me, dress myself in it? Sometimes I wonder what it would look like to look back from that pit of nothing and see the ledge that I stand on. Would it be like looking though a frosted glass window? Could I see myself in black and white? Could the nothing place reach into that real place somehow, and steal little bits of real, leaving little bits of nothing in its place? I think it might be possible, because sometimes, in the real place, I trip up over little bits of absolutely nothing. Sometimes I think absolutely nothing, where once I had very real thoughts. There are times where I look at familiar objects, people, places, and see absolutely nothing. Could there be another me in that black pit that takes these small bits of real from me? Sometimes I believe there might be.

Girl Talk

It sort of sucks, being a girl. Sort of.

Girls have got a lot of girl stuff to deal with. And big girls have got a lot of big girl stuff to deal with. And big girl stuff can be pretty off putting and uncomfortable at times.

Like, for instance, the annual pap and pelvic. I mean really! The price we have to pay! I don't know one person who actually looks forward to their gynae visit. And it's not about the gynae either, it's about assuming the position and having this person that you're paying a lot of money to, have a good ol' squizz and fiddle around your nether-regions. Bedside manner aside, no matter how professional or at ease the fanny-checker may be, there are a million and one things I would rather be doing than having the cells on my cervix collected for testing. (Like weeding. Yes, I would rather weed a soccer field than have that procedure).

I have a lovely lady doctor who is on a first name basis with my privates. Once a year they get together, shake hands, and wish each other well until their next appointment. I'm not really part of this exchange. I just take the goods for checking - I'm the delivery girl, really. Kind of like chaperoning a play-date. In fact, when my girly bits and my doctor get together, I look the other way while they do what they have to do. I'm not all too keen on witnessing the entire exchange, anyway. Having been on the speculum side of these little social calls myself for too many years, I really feel like my presence at my own check-up is sort of irrelevant. In fact, if I could courier my vagina to her office and pick it up when she was done, that would suit me too.

I guess the main reason that I would rather not be there is that my doctor, bless her, really tries her best to put me at ease before, during and after the procedure. If she only knew how much I just want to get this thing over with, she would refrain from making polite conversation. Especially asking friendly questions about my family at the moment of speculum insertion. At this point I have my eyes locked on a sliver of paint curling off her ceiling, and I'm thinking happy thoughts, like rainbowfairiesbunniesamongstthedaisiesflyingponies.

There I am, eyes fixed, fairiesbunniesbutterflies, when she switches her lamp on somewhere between my knees. Even though I can't see it (a cloth is discreetly placed over my well and truly raised knees), I know it's on because the heat of the bulb is toasting my inner thighs. Bunnyrabbitsstrawberriescrispapplestrudel.

"The kids on holiday?" she asks.

I'm pressing my lips together in preparation for that nasty little tunnel funnel. "Uhuh," I breathe. Daisiesponiesrainbowskak.

"And how's your hubby been?" she asks it as she slips her speculum into position.

I want to be polite, really I do, but now's not the time. "Er, fine!" I squeak. Daisiesdammitflowerscraprabbitspoodlesinpastryfarkingrainbows.

A moment passes as she collects the cells she needs. I relax a little. I clear my throat. "Oh," I say, in as normal a voice as I can manage, "actually it was a rubbish year for him. He nearly died of Salmonella poisoning, and since then he's not been a hundred percent."

The playdate is over. She hands me a paper towel to clean up with. She's got what she needs. The friendly chatter changes to focus more on medical stuff.

She wants to know how I've settled on the pill she prescribed to bring those polycystic ovaries under control. I think I'm ok, I say. It's just that my boobs are really sore for about 10 days before my periods. I'm getting dragon dementia for two days before my periods. I'm bleeding for 7 days, and I'm very aware of stabbing pains in my abdomen somewhere in the middle of the month.

She nods wisely. She tells me that ovulation pains and PMS worsen as you get older. And PMS is especially aggravated in cases of melancholic or depressive personalities. The boob tenderness, spotty skin and general crap associated with the menstrual cycle is all within normal limits. I'm really bummed.

"So what you're saying," I squint at her, "What you're saying is that this is the price I pay for being a girl, and if I get 3 days a month to feel normal, that's the way it's gotta be?"

She smiles and pats me on the knee.

"You don't get it," I continue. "I never used to be like this. Sure I was as regular as a tsunami, but I never used to want to set my husband on fire, drive over the nagging newspaper seller or put my kids on the edge of the driveway with a great For Sale banner floating above them. For the better good, I mean, really, if you love mankind at all, for public safety and possibly even the future of the human species, you have got to give me something to keep it together!"

And so I left my annual check-up with a wad of prescriptions tucked into my handbag, and a fanny that would prefer to go unnoticed by my acquaintances for another year or so.

Sucks being a girl, I told you!

Adding to the T-shirt portfolio

The Heart Wreath

Monkey Hanging on my Heart

Cacophony of Hearts

Rainbow Splat