Reflecting on 2011

Written 26 & 27 Dec. 2011

This is a topic that will probably take a few sessions to complete, but I’ll make a start tonight. I’m using my diaries to help me recall the events of the past year, although there are certain ones that are permanently etched on my brain.

This was a busy year, a year of many firsts for me, a year which, surprisingly, I survived without a permanent job – in fact, one of the most interesting and exciting years of my life. It was a year in which I pushed myself way beyond my former limits, in many aspects of my life, as well as a year of clarity and closure.

2011 has been a year in which I’ve re-learnt the value of friendship, and have come face to face with such love and magnanimity, that I have often been rendered speechless. When it mattered most, my family and true friends were there for me, supportive and caring, never questioning my judgement, nor doubting my integrity.

But the most significant thing for me by far, about 2011, was that I finally learnt what it meant to live my truth. This was the year I regained my freedom.

So, here goes....

1st quarter, January – March

January:
1. Played New Year’s Eve gig at Myoga Restaurant, in the Vineyard Hotel, with guitarist, Rudi Byrnes. The perfect way to see in the new year!
2. Continued interviewing District 6 land claimants – very interesting contract I was involved in since Nov 2010.
3. Recorded a demo of one of my original songs, “I’m So Happy Today”, at Ghalik Jacobs’s Little River Studio, with Wayne Bosch (guitar) and Tony Paco (percussion).
4. Uploaded the song onto the internet (www.soundcloud.com) two days later.
5. Demo played on regional radio a few days later and on national radio about two weeks later.
6. Spoke at a high school choir camp about my life as a singer-songwriter.
7. Started walking regularly with my best friend, Tracy.
8. Carried on swimming regularly at gym – max. at one visit, 30 lengths.

February:
1. Started sessions with life coach, Inez Woods. Wow!
2. Started advertising guitar lessons.
3. Had my Jetta’s engine overhauled.
4. Facilitated two discussion groups for a gender activist organisation.
5. Started a 14-week solo gig at Don Pedro’s, in Woodstock.
6. Did lots of walking, no swimming.

March:
1. Started teaching guitar lessons – by the end of the month, I had four students.
2. More work on the D6 project – compiling and analyzing data.
3. Created publicity pack to market the duo.
4. Did some editing work for a retail company.
5. By the end of the month, I had two weekly restaurant gigs – one solo, one duo (at Myoga, with Wayne).
6. Fitness level increased – max. at one visit, 60 lengths. :-)********************************************************************************

2nd quarter, April – June

April:
1. Extra 4 guitar students – total, 8.
2. From mid-April, a 6-week duo gig with Wayne at Doppio Zero, in Claremont = three weekly gigs!
3. Set up a routine of advertising weekly gigs in newspapers, on radio, Facebook, Gumtree, my blog, as well as my growing e-mail network.
4. Started focusing on my original music at solo gig – good response.
5. Carried on walking with Tracy.
6. Wrote a song (samba): “What’s What?”
7. Put music to a Diana Ferrus poem: “Have I Lost You?”

May:
1. My mom turned 81!
2. Local elections – 18 May declared a public holiday for this year.
3. By end of May, no more weekly gigs.
4. Almost no exercise this month. :-(

June:
1. Redesigned resumé - started marketing myself as a soloist.
2. Designed double-sided business card to reflect my two passions: Music & Words.
3. Applied for short contract, UWC job – Practice Teaching Supervisor - successful.
4. Eric Alan interviewed my mom and me on ‘The Taxi’, a new internet radio station.
5. Wrote a song (ballad): “Today I Opened My Eyes”.
6. Started planning concert of originals.
7. Very little exercise. :-(

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3rd quarter, July – September

July:
1. Got my first batch of professionally-made, Trudy-only business cards! (Before = duo.)
2. Spoke at a women’s breakfast (organised by Inez Woods) about my journey towards living my truth. Demo CDs for all.
3. Booked the Nassau Hall for my concert, set date for Friday 7 October, intending to record concert as live debut CD.
4. Secured the band for the concert: Wayne Bosch, Hilton Schilder, Errol Dyers, Charles Lazar, Tony Paco. (Or so I thought!)
5. Acquired 12 new guitar students. 2 of previous lot had dropped out. Total 18.
6. A little more exercise than last two months.

August:
1. Started contract job with UWC, supervising practice teaching B. Ed students.
2. Started tutoring a little boy – reading skills.
3. Did ‘Blisters for Bread’ Charity Walk (5km, with Mom and Tracy).
4. Started rehearsing for October concert.
5. Exercise: Not much.


September:
1. Three new guitar students, total 21.
2. Lots of rehearsing for concert.
3. I turned 50!
4. My Yahoo e-mail address hacked into – lost 11 yrs of contacts and e-mails I’d saved!
5. Changed concert to pre-recording, as particular sound engineer not available on 7 October.
6. Two musicians in concert band dropped out – secured new bassist for concert: Alistair Andrews! Hilton offered to do percussion.
7. Secured MC for concert: Derek Ronnie.
8. Had a crystal chakra alignment.
9. Exercise: Nothing!

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4th quarter: October – December

October:
1. Gregory Franz agreed to take photos at the concert.
2. Interviewed on Bush Radio; dj played two of my original songs: I’m So Happy Today and Lucy.
3. Fri 7 October - my concert of my original songs, with exciting backing band: Wayne, Errol, Hilton and Alistair! Wonderful, appreciative audience of +- 100 gave us a standing ovation!
4. UWC job came to an end – submitted marks for my 12 students.
5. Started 6-week substitute lecturing post at College of Cape Town, City Campus. Lovely experience. Met really cool people.
6. 2 new guitar students, total = 23.
7. Exercise: Nothing!

November:
1. Lectured at CCT for the entire month. Loved every day there.
2. My daughter turned 13!
3. My cellphone broke – lost years of contact numbers. Another forced new beginning.
4. Most of my guitar students stopped lessons towards the end of the month.
5. Went back to gym after 8 months – swam 20 lengths, restarting the journey.
6. Spoke at another women’s breakfast organized by Inez Woods – the theme was “Eat, Pray, Love”, and I was assigned “Love”!!
December:
1. Finished up at CCT on 6 Dec.
2. Mom treated me to “Phantom of the Opera”, at Artscape – wow!
3. Children finished up at school, excited to have passed to their next grades.
4. My son turned 17!
5. Christmas lunch at a cousin’s house – huge family gathering – then afternoon tea at another cousin’s …….a very satisfying, stress-free day!
6. Up to the 27th, I had done quite a lot of walking and swimming. Back in the groove of life.

I totalled all the walking Tracy and I had done this year, and it came to 248km – I am SO proud of that! This was one of the many things this year that had started as a thought and blossomed into action - proof that anything is possible. For December alone, I have swum 126 lengths. Now, that may not be much by someone else’s standards, but by mine, that’s pretty good! Tomorrow I’ll be back in the pool, and this time I’m aiming for 40 lengths. I should be back to 60 by the end of January.

So what’s the big deal? Why go on and on? What’s all the record keeping about? This stuff is important to me, because I’m breaking an old habit of playing down my achievements and focusing on my failures. It’s part of how many of us were raised, to regard acknowledging our successes as arrogant. I believe that, if you keep looking at your failures, you’ll keep failing. I live my life joyfully and intensely. There’s a whole lot that’s not where it should be, and a whole lot of serious stuff that needs my attention, but I would be missing the point - missing the lessons life keeps teaching me - if I disregarded the things that have gone well in 2011.

If I say I believe that “nothing succeeds like success”, then I have to look back at my many ventures and appreciate that there were indeed successes along the way. In Mind Power, you’re encouraged to think of past successes, build up an energy/thought vibration of success, and to let successful thoughts flood your mind, so that you predispose yourself to even more of the same.

I prayed for so many changes this year, and I can honestly say some of the most important ones were granted. I enter 2012 with a heart bursting with excitement and hope, a soul celebrating freedom, and a head full of ideas for the year ahead.

As I conclude this post, there are still a few days left of December, in which a lot could happen. I don’t have a New Year’s Eve gig yet, but who knows…..?

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Some thoughts on 2012
One of my main focal areas for 2012 will be generating an income (doing something I love) that will make me independent again and enable me to sort out the financial complications that arose in 2011. I will also intensify my focus on “a healthy mind in a healthy body”, both for myself and as an example to my children (because children learn from what we do, not what we say!). I’ll be flying solo for as long as it feels right. After that, I trust that, just like with the energy shifts I experienced in 2011, the year ahead will be characterized by more of the same, i.e. the perfect timing of the universe’s intervention in my life. But, more about this in another blog post. ********************************************************************************

Christmas 2011

Written: Sunday 25 Dec. 2011

Ok, NOW I’m excited! It’s 01h35, the house is quiet, except for the ticking of my travel alarm clock and the occasional vehicle sound outside. I’ve been troubled by my old friend, Insomnia, again.

Tonight my daughter decided we had to decorate the house, and her child-like spiritedness ended up affecting me. I’d thrown the Christmas tree away during the year (or was it before last Christmas?), because we’d had it for so many years, it was shedding its artificial pine needles all over. Anyway, tonight we ended up improvising, turning an unused speaker into a low table, draping it with a sarong and then putting a potted rosebush onto it. My daughter then found the box of decorations and basically put things up all over the lounge. She found the lights and somehow managed to wind them round the other speakers, and when they were switched on, she called us to come and look - I must admit, she’d brought some magic back into the house. And the children shall lead their elders……

Earlier, she and her brother had made the fridge tart for tomorrow’s dessert. Yay! I think I’d better go and sleep. I hope the people I’ve just sat making CDs for (songs from my concert at Baran’s, in March 2010) like their gifts. This is a low-budget gift idea, but, like so many other things, means a lot more to me than anything I could’ve spent hundreds on in a shop.

So, yes, without the cynicism this time: Merry Christmas! I hope that, away from the hustle and bustle of the day, you’ll find a few moments to reflect on the many things in your life that are happening exactly as they should. And for those people who are spending their first Christmas without a loved one – I know how that feels; my heart goes out to you. Draw strength from your cherished memories and trust that the pain will go away…. eventually.

Atonement

Picture: Part of my back garden.

Written: Thurs. 22 Dec. 2011

Watching the movie, “Atonement”, based on the book by Ian McEwan. It’s one of the three books my son reviewed for a big English assignment this year. He said it was one of the best-written books he’d ever read, and he’s a prolific reader. I should read it sometime. They had to choose three books that shared either a genre, a writer or a theme – he choose the theme of wrongful accusation. He spent months reading, making copious notes, then typing his essay.

Interesting that, with all the junk shown on SABC Television, they’d screen an excellent movie like this one.

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Tonight, I took a drive down to the gym, and got into the pool. There were only two other people swimming, so I didn’t need to share a lane. I swam thirty lengths, steadily working my way back to my fitness level of nine months ago, when I could do sixty lengths without feeling wiped out. I have my own way of enjoying the water – I swim underwater for the first part of every length, sometimes managing to reach the halfway mark while at the bottom of the pool, my lungs on the verge of exploding….what a feeling!

I’m not a good swimmer. I always swim the same stroke, breast-stroke – I’ve swum that way since my childhood. Next year I want someone to coach me, so that I may not only swim this stroke more efficiently, but that I may also vary my strokes, adding the crawl and backstroke, neither of which I can currently do for very long. I don’t think I’ll venture anywhere near the dolphin stroke - let’s just say I’m a dreamer steeped in realism.

Meditating while I swim has become one of my favourite pastimes, and I sometimes wish my lifestyle allowed me to do so every day. For now, I try to exercise every alternate day, with swimming sometimes losing out to walking. Another fitness/fun goal I’ve been thinking about is adding cycling (stationary bike) and dancing, varying my forms of exercise to increase my overall fitness and health and to keep myself interested.

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I dozed off, and now, as the clock strikes 01h00, I don’t know whether I should laugh or cry, as I missed the last five to ten minutes of the movie. I’ve seen it before, on the big screen, but that was a few years ago. Really wanted to catch the end. Beautiful classical music playing during the credits. Stirring.

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My annual dilemma is upon me once again – I feel intensely reflective, this time of year, and I crave solitude, silence and the tranquility of nature, but the traditions we observe thrust me into large gatherings of people, frustrating my soul.

So much has happened, this year, and I have so many decisions to make – quite big ones, in fact – that I really don’t feel up to the festivities of the next nine days. This is my second consecutive Christmas where my dire financial situation has made me wish I could just fast forward to beyond the holidays, and get stuck into the pressing matter at hand, namely, securing an income. If I don’t
generate sufficient money, I won’t be able to stay where I am now, and that would be a huge upheaval for my family. I’ve been living here for almost 15 years, the longest I’ve ever lived in one house.
I’ve started working on my plan to earn an income independently, but I’m so distracted by all this Christmas stuff, that I can’t reach a point of completion and conclusion. Today’s unforeseen expense of a new car tyre set me back shockingly, and right now I don’t know how I’ll get to the end of December, let alone the end of January. My guitar students who’ve said they’ll resume lessons in February have no idea of the impact of that decision. I have to run my little music school in a way that works for me – the alternative is too unstructured and too open to surprise and disappointment.

I believe that I hold within me the power to make all of this right, but I need time and space in which to effect the necessary changes. I have absolutely no doubt that I can bring into being every idea in my head – no doubt at all. A friend who’s dealing with serious illness told me she’s afraid of nothing, and I thought about how empowering that must be, and about how we allow fear to hold us back, incapacitate us ….. I don’t want to dwell in that space anymore; I want to live as boldly as my heart assures me I can.

So …… Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, blah blah blah. I’ve got other things on my mind, like survival.

My growing restlessness convinces me that 2011 will be the last year I march to the beat of any drum other than my own. It's about time!

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Three angels

Written Sat. 17 December 2011

As 2011 draws inexorably to a close and I ponder on the things that have changed, the things that have stayed the same, and the surprises along the way, I find myself needing to acknowledge some people in my life, people who might not even realize how their personalities, their choices and their life stories inspire and astound me.

I have a person in my life whose greatness lies in, amongst other things, his humility. I met him in August 2008 when I became his guitar student at Jazz Workshop Music School. I’d known about him and had heard what an amazing guitarist he was, but nothing could’ve prepared me for the beautiful personality that came as part of the Wayne Bosch package. Six months after we met, we did our first performance together, and five months later, landed a weekly restaurant gig that lasted 14 months, at Food Lover’s Market in Claremont, Cape Town. We’ve continued to do gigs since then, and he’s someone whose company I enjoy and whom I respect immensely, for the way he lives his life and for the brilliant musician he is. Wayne is easy-going and fun to work with - a consummate professional, who won’t ever disappoint you. During the gig, he’s absolutely in the moment, and doesn’t ever rest on his laurels. Yesterday we played at a wedding on a wine farm in Durbanville (congratulations, Julia and Clint!), and once again he made the repertoire fresh and exciting, by doing songs we’d done many times before in completely different feels. Never a dull moment. Today I pay tribute to Wayne Bosch and the way he brightens the world. He’s a world-class musician who deserves to be playing on the biggest stages, at the biggest jazz festivals around the world. I pray that all the elements, internally and externally, come together to move him decisively towards his destiny.

The second person I want to acknowledge today is someone I’ve known about since my childhood, although I’m not sure if we ever met as children. Our parents (her dad, my mom) sang opera together, many years ago, in the Eoan Group, a cultural organisation. In our adult lives, however, we met through a mutual friend, in about 1992. Early on in our friendship, we went away for a weekend with a group of about 8 women, and discovered we could talk for hours! Haha – that hasn’t changed! Over the years, we saw each other very rarely, when she was living in Ireland and would come down to Cape Town on holiday. In November last year, however, fate moved us back into each other’s lives, when we worked on a District 6 project together, interviewing land claimants. During the time we spent driving around the Cape Peninsula, going from area to area and house to house, we did a whole lot of chatting, and in that time we formed a bond that was destined to become one of the strongest, most interesting friendships I have. Inez Woods offered to do life coaching with me at a time that I couldn’t afford her sessions, so we decided our collaboration would entail an exchange of skills. We spent many hours in many coffee shops and restaurants, having these sessions that seemed to fill both our tanks and have a motivating effect on both of us. We’d brainstorm ideas and talktalktalk until we were exhausted, but each would leave with new ideas and long To Do Lists to tackle before our next meeting. I met Inez two days ago for another coffee-shop-brainstorming-session, and this time we looked back at 2011 - each one finding it harder to acknowledge our own achievements than to see each other’s successes – and started looking at 2012 with some seriousness. Each of us had set our sights on certain goals, and we realize now that 2011 was just the beginning. When I’m with Inez, I am filled with excitement about how much is possible. I don’t know how she does it, but she makes me feel like I can go out there and achieve all my goals and dreams. She has an energizing effect on me, and she never lets me off the hook! She’s an excellent life coach, and most of my successes this year can be attributed to her influence on me. She’s hardcore, I can tell you, but if you seriously want to stop wading in the shallows and want to start swimming strongly towards your target, she’s someone you should consider working with. Her blog is inezwoods.wordpress.com, and she’s also on Facebook. This year she started the WAG Network, with WAG standing for Women Against the Grain – check out her website www.wagnetwork.co.za and watch out for this movement, because its awesome founder, Inez Woods, is going to rock your world.

And finally, I’d like to pay tribute to someone in my house, someone I gave birth to almost 17 years ago, and someone who’s grown into one of the finest people I know – my son, Nick Geffen. In the first half of last year, he started having discomfort in his left knee, which developed into such debilitating pain, that he ended up having surgery. He spent most of last year dealing with the ramifications of this condition (the cartilage below his knee-cap wears away), including missing school, having to give up sport and having to use crutches for an extended period of time. This year, it became apparent that his right knee needed surgery as well, which was what happened. The transformation of this young man, since the second operation, has been profound. About three weeks ago, he finally started walking without crutches and the day that he climbed his first flight of stairs unaided – and without swinging on the banister – he described the achievement to me with tears in his eyes. He’s learnt, in the most extreme way, never to take anything for granted. He’s 16, he’s someone who loves school and enjoys studying, someone with a lust for life like I’ve never seen before, and he’s emerged from the past two years with more wisdom and spirituality than most people achieve in a lifetime. He is someone who inspires me constantly, someone whose zest and passion will move him through life with that huge smile fixed on his beautiful face. Last year had its own challenges for our relationship, when he decided to live with his father and not come to my house every second week as per the schedule, but, with counselling and the healing that comes with the passage of time, we got through that, and we now enjoy an understanding that surpasses anything we might have had. My life is enriched and brightened by this young man, and I am blown away by his capacity to live life and to do so on his own terms, with the compassion and integrity he shows. Wow!

I am blessed by so many people’s presence in my life, and today I felt a strong compulsion to say this about these three angels.

Day 1 of December school holidays / Phantom

"The times they are a-changing" indeed, as both my children are busy today, leaving me with an unexpected day to myself. Yup, momma's at the internet cafe, doing her online thang. Oh, well. This gorgeous weather reminds me I have some other domestic stuff to attend to, so I'd better keep this short.

Last night I experienced one of the - if not THE - most spectacular stage shows I've ever seen: Phantom of the Opera, at Artscape, in Cape Town's city centre. I was treated by my mom, and I loved it SO much, I want to go and see it again. Everything was fantastic - the costumes, the sets, and particularly the voices of the lead singers. Interesting to me that the female lead had an operatic voice, but the male lead had a rock voice. Both of them were stunning! I don't have the programme with me now, but when I do, I'll do a full article. The orchestra transported me to worlds far away from my seat in the opera house, and I felt my skin tingling, my hair standing on end many times during the show, as the chords and bass lines altered below the melody lines, adding elements of subversion and danger to the atmosphere. What a clever score! SO BEAUTIFUL! One of the highlights was the song, "Music of the night" by the phantom.

BUT, more at a later date.

The silver lining type

Written Thurs. 8 December 2011

The issue of closure has been on my mind a lot, lately. I’m big on closure – always have been. I need to end one thing conclusively before starting another, especially when it comes to relationships. Closure. Not as scary as we think it is. I think it all depends on how you approach life: are you the silver lining type, or the cloud type? Do you focus on every cloud having a silver lining, or every silver lining having a cloud? To move towards closure, there’s a whole lot of processing that needs to happen. Trying to fast forward the processing can result in loose ends.

Closure is as much a part of life as breathing. Life does indeed go on. In fact, we’re constantly faced with endings and beginnings, birth and death; my philosophy is that, the older you get, and the more life experience you gather, the better you become at dealing with these cycles. And that is one of the most exciting things about this thing called life – the cycles: the new beginnings and the endings and the new beginnings….

I always say that everything has a beginning, a middle and an end, yet most of us live our lives being prepared for only the first two. Even the ultimate goodbye, death, is such a taboo, such a no-go topic for most people, and yet it’s the one thing we can be sure awaits us all. So we delude ourselves that, if we don’t talk about it, it won’t happen. Every relationship has a beginning, a middle and an end: some relationships end with the death of one of the partners, and others with the death - one way or another - of the love that was once shared.

The person I have grown into has an identity unavoidably interwoven with people I’ve been connected to. The challenge is to delicately but decisively unravel, extricate, liberate, and to continue maturing into the Trudy I was always meant to be. I’ve made some promises to myself that I know I will stick to for the rest of my life, because this is the time to break old, stale, counter-productive patterns. This is the time to live my life in an unfettered way, to pursue my goals with faith and vigour, to live my truth boldly, and to step so far out of the box that people’s mouths may drop open in wonder. Haha!

I am consciously opening myself to new energies and embracing opportunities with an almost-childlike curiosity. Tomorrow I make my first-ever television appearance, and I do so as a singer-songwriter. I go into the studio and sing one of my originals, as part of a tv promo for The Taxi, a new online radio station, at a time of day that they’re being broadcast live on Cape Town Television, known as CTV. So yes, I’m grateful for the opportunity afforded me by well-known theatre and media personality, Soli Philander, owner of The Taxi, and looking forward to it like a child anticipating a birthday or Christmas.

And you know those cycles and chakras and alignments and spring tides? Well, I was hanging washing on the line about an hour ago (yes, I do these things at night, when my days are too busy), when I looked up at the sky and saw a huge moon smiling down at me. It must be a day away from full moon – my favourite moon - which means tomorrow is a brilliant day for me to do a tv appearance, because it will be the start of something new, something wonderful.

I suppose it’s clear I’m the silver lining type.

The Perfect Antidote

Written Wed. 7 December 2011

Last night I went to support Khadija Heeger’s regular poetry event, called “Poetry for Love”, at Sabrina’s, a restaurant diagonally opposite Long Street Swimming Baths. It was the first time I’d been able to go to one of her events, and this was unfortunately the last one for 2011. Sometimes it’s hard to believe the year’s about to end. Shoo, what a year!

The artists for the night were poets and singers, most of whom performed original work – what a treat! I am a great admirer of Khadija’s work: it leaps off the page when you read it, but the true power of her talent is most evident when she performs live. I’m fascinated by the way poets remember their poetry, but I suppose it’s like singers with their lyrics. When I see someone like Khadija performing to such small audiences, I feel frustrated, because, with her skill and finesse, she should be sought-after and celebrated. I love the sheer abandon with which she writes, going all the way with her imagery, taking her audience on a ride so wild, they find themselves panting when she’s done. Why, I keep asking myself, are such richly talented artists constantly struggling to get their work heard? Why!? Why are the “decision-makers” in the Performing Arts not actively engaged in sourcing artists of this calibre?

Also on the programme was UK visitor, Raymond Antrobus, whose poem about his impressions of Cape Town gave us a glimpse of our mountain and climate from a foreigner’s perspective. Delightful turn of phrase, warm, witty, wonderful energy from this engaging young poet. Such a joy to hear poetry like that– intense, raw, impassioned, yet deeply sensitive - written by a man. I was shaken to my core - I love it when someone’s manipulation of words stirs me like that. Check out his blog: http://raymondantrobus.blogspot.com.

Another artist was Daneel Van Der Walt, who sang original songs, accompanied by a guitarist (whose name escapes me - I’ll find out). I enjoyed her style, and would love to hear more of her work. She has a voice that’s versatile, with light and dark tones, as well as a soulfulness that at first took me by surprise. Her lyrics are clever, at times poignant, and her compositions are good. It’s such a treat to be exposed to Capetonian artists I haven’t encountered before.

Noni Nozuko Poni sang three songs, all a capella. The first two were in isiXhosa: Ntjilo Ntjilo, a Miriam Makeba jazz ballad, and a second song, which she wrote for her mother. The third was a soul ballad – I can’t remember who the original artist was. Noni has one of those voices that transport you to some other state of consciousness - you have to listen to her with closed eyes, and surrender to the sound, allowing it to envelope you. She has a huge vocal range, and her phrasing is delightful. Another artist who needs a much wider audience.

Maya Spectre also sang three songs: A Day in the Life of a Fool (also known as “Black Orpheus”, but with different lyrics) and Summertime, both well-known jazz standards. She was accompanied by Elton Goslett, whose electric guitar playing was crystal clear and utterly beautiful. Her third song was an original, which she sang unaccompanied. My honest opinion is that this kind of night lends itself to original work, so artists who have a body of original work should exploit the opportunity to do their own material.

The final poet was Yisir Daly-Ward, whose unassuming style belied the powerhouse of poetry she was about to share with us. Her first poem was short, and, because she read it from her phone, she came across as almost-apologetic when she read it. But her next two poems dispelled that myth. Completely. Wow! Once again, a gifted wordsmith, whose acute – and often humorous - observations of people, of life, of nuances, keep her listeners spellbound. Her voice itself has a rich tonal quality, a strength, a depth, a sense of age-old wisdom, of timelessness - I could listen to it for hours. What a lovely poet!

And so ended a thoroughly enjoyable evening. I had taken my mom along with me, and I think that, although she was slightly uncomfortable with some of the more explicit content (!), as a performer herself, she actually enjoyed the evening.

I’d come to the end of a 6-week lecturing contract yesterday, so I was a bit sad when I got to the restaurant, but all that self-pity came to a well-timed end once the programme started.

Poetry ……. . the perfect antidote.

First-ever tv appearance/Closure/Swimeditate

So who said that you couldn't experience really cool FIRSTS at my age? Today I sang one of my original songs, "Joe", live on Cape Town Television, known as CTV. It was just after 11am, and it was part of the live recording of "The Taxi", an online radio station, which has been live on CTV for the past week, from 10h00 - 12h00 daily.

I was nervous, of course, and have NO idea how it sounded or how I came across, but what the hell, it was cool, and just another piece of the puzzle, another page in the autobiography, another piece of the mosaic...... and other such metaphors.

Today was not only a day of new experiences, but also a day of closure, as my daughter took her leave of primary school. I attended the Final Assembly, bawled my eyes out, and then enjoyed the pleasant breakfast under the trees we were all treated to. Perfect weather made the entire experience very satisfying.

And so ends seven years of Bergvliet Primary School for my daughter, but 10 years for us as a family, as my son had been there as well. Next year we'll have both children at the same high school, and that should make life easier, especially w.r.t. transport.

Sitting in the cool (temperature) internet cafe. Have to take my mom to the shops. Later tonight, a treat for myself, by myself: a much-longed-for swim at the gym. Friday nights are the best time to go to gym, especially to swim, because you're one of the few people there, and you could easily get the pool to yourself. Ok, it does mean you get to swim with a whole day's germs, etc, but there are some things you just have to deal with, on the road to empowering yourself physically, spiritually and intellectually, which is what I achieve when I swimeditate (my own word for meditating while swimming).

Tomorrow night I do a house party with Wayne Bosch, which I'm really looking forward to. I get to sing and play my guitar for a whole night, I get to interact with really cool people, and I get to make music with one of our country's finest guitarists.

Why would I need to complain, when life sends opportunities like these my way?

Seismic

Written Sun. 04 December 2011

When I think of all the beautiful things that have been happening in my life, I have to smile. I told my best friend, the other day, that it felt like the universe had us in the palms of its loving hands. I know it sounds corny, but when I think of all the challenges I’ve had to face, especially in the last 14 months, and I see the energy shifts that have occurred (some decidedly seismic!), I can only thank all the benevolent forces out there for bringing me to this point, this wonderful point that feels like the best kind of closure – the kind filled with new beginnings.

Things that had been blocking my energy, causing me tension for a long time, have resolved in surprising and interesting ways. I’ve been blessed with opportunities to heal and to move on, in a few parts of my life. Teaching at a college for the past five weeks has been a new beginning that came at exactly the right time. I’m sending all my prayers out into the universe for more opportunities at the college, a place where I rediscovered a part of myself (the me-in-front-of- a-class part) and met a bunch of fascinating people. The staff weren’t too bad either. J Haha – jokes aside, I have some really cool colleagues, and I hope I get to work with them again.

In two days’ time, I end my short contract, and enter the next phase-within-a-phase of my life, with more uncertainty than I’ve had for the past five weeks, but with a renewed faith in the power of personal energy, that mysterious force which, once ignited, has the potential to effect radical change. What boggles my mind is the sheer force I believe like-minded people can wield, to achieve just about anything.

I’m inspired by the slogan of this year’s 16 Days of Activism against Abuse of Women and Children: “Peace in the home before peace on earth”. It starts on a personal level and it can only grow from there.

I will go through the rest of my life seeking out people as passionate as I am about using our collective power to change the world, person by person, family by family, community by community, city by city, country by country.

Inspired

Sat. 03 December 2011

23h50, the end of a beautiful, busy day - a day composed of a comfortable mixture of things I had to do and things I chose to do. I liked the fact that I achieved one or two things that had been on my To Do list for a while, like having the garden taken care of! What a relief! Not only had the grass grown really long, but we hadn’t been watering much, so everything had dried out. I look at some of my pot plants that were so beautiful a few months ago, and I know I have to re-prioritize my activities, because a neglected garden makes me unhappy, while a thriving garden inspires me. Part of my frustration about the garden is that I’ve just been too busy to tend to it, so the way it’s been looking recently is basically just a reflection of how busy I’ve been. Fortunately, my son’s become very aware of my workload, and has offered to water the garden tomorrow.

This has actually been a week where I’ve achieved some closure and made significant strides. On Monday I sorted out my gym arrears (long, ridiculous story linked to medical aid) and got back into the pool after 8 months! The feeling of that moment when I slipped into that wonderful, welcoming water will remain with me for a long time. I managed 20 lengths, felt I could’ve gone on, but started feeling a slight pull in one of my calves, so decided that 20 was quite enough. The week seemed to fly by, and the next time I was able to swim was last night, when I did another 20 lengths, this time limited by the closing time of the gym. But still, I’d had the luxury of the whole pool to myself, which always feels like a rare and valuable gift.

Sun 4 Dec. 08h00

Loved waking up naturally, this morning, without an alarm urging me into the new day. This, alone, feels like a holiday. One day I’ll have enough money to go away for a while, on a real holiday, but for now I’ll savour the little breaks life affords me, and feel the pleasure of those moments. The alternative is to dwell on what I don’t have, which is not how I choose to go through life.

Today’s yet another busy day, and I have to start as soon as possible, in order to get through everything and keep my sense of humour.

I’ve been thinking a lot about this past year and how interesting it’s been, so I’ve decided to set time aside to write a reflective article, detailing the amazing path life has taken me down, these past 12 months. Even if all I achieve is the soothing of my Virgo soul, I want to write it down.

What I do hope to achieve, as well, is to show others who have been retrenched, that:

i) LIFE goes on

ii) it’s ultimately up to YOU whether you sink or swim

iii) you have to be open to accepting CHANGE and to doing things differently

iv) you have to HUMBLE yourself and DEPEND on others for a while

v) if you open your mind, you’ll see the many OPPORTUNITIES around you

vi) it helps to spend more time with PEOPLE who lift your spirits and support your journey, and less time with people who constantly drag you down

vii) it seldom happens overnight, but your PATH will become clear, and you WILL find your direction, your purpose, your way of making money that is right for you

viii) you need to TUNE into yourself, know what makes you tick, and try to align that knowledge with an income-generating activity (or activities, in my case) – if you’re interested in living an authentic life, and not just working for the sake of working.

ix) in the words of David Miller, the Principal of Norman Henshilwood High School, “BAD TIMES DON’T LAST” (in a speech at Bergvliet Primary on 30/11/11)

x) you can actually reach a point where, with hindsight, you can APPRECIATE that losing your job was the BEST thing that could’ve happened to you, because it catapulted you into a far more MEANINGFUL and truly SATISFYING time of your life.

In conclusion, I’d like to quote from a speech made by Haajer Kader, an inspired and inspiring Grade 7 pupil at Bergvliet Primary School, also on 30/11/11, on the occasion of their Academic and Sports Awards: “Don’t let your past steal your present.”