30 posts tagged “flamingo dancer”
- The star jasmine is flowering over the arbour outside our patio door. It looks like a huge white bridal bouquet and smells like heaven.
- Daughter 1 has her wedding dress. It took her 20 minutes to select off the rack. Daughter 2 had her bridesmaid dress. It took her 15 minutes to choose off the rack. The Boy has his groom's suit. It took him 90 minutes to choose off the rack...
- Grandma Flamingo fell asleep during the funeral on Friday. I looked at her and she was dozing on the pew. I told her to snap to, or she was in danger of being wheeled out to the hearse. She was ram rod straight for the rest of the service!
- Mr FD is flying to Adelaide tomorrow. Peace in our time! I won't say for whom! He has orders to bring back jumbo Haigh's chocolate frogs. They are HUGE and YUMMY and last about 32 seconds in the Flamingo Dancer household! He has been told not to come home if he fails in his mission.
- God daughter turned 1 last week. She is soooo cute. I played with her on Friday afternoon. We unwrapped her birthday present together. She was very serious about it, with a little frown across her brow until she achieved opening the present and had time to inspect and then the smiles came. A woman not easily won...Flamingo Dancer to the core!
- I understand why Obama got the Nobel Peace Prize. Didn't you breath a sigh of relief when he said the USA wouldn't go ahead with its Stars Wars project and putting bases in Poland etc facing Russia? I felt as though we had taken a giant step back from another catastrophe. I feel it is recognition that the rest of the world is happy dancing that USA is coming into the 21st century and seeking peace, not conflict. Give him another if it helps!
- My brother in law turned 68 on Friday. I have a BIL who is 68! We did not put candles on the cake.
- Son has learnt a new way to get extra money from me. He says he needs cash to get a hair cut and of course no mother is going to refuse that, so I hand over the cash. He somehow forgets to get the haircut and three weeks later asks me for cash for a haircut. Of course he needs it more urgently now and so no mother is going to refuse and so he gets the money. Now when he requests hair cut money, I ask if this is for the pretend haircut or the real haircut. He still gets the money.
- You know that I am doing this just to waste time away from my studies don't you?
- For those of you who have seen the black face routine on Hey Hey It's Saturday, please don't think that is representative of contemporary Australian humour. Darryl Sommers has been the sad butt of jokes for the past few years and the only way he could cling to celebrity was to revisit a show concept that had its time 20 years ago. I was horrified to hear that they were bringing the stupid show back in the first place - it was always pathetic. A sad example of a television network who thought returning to the past would get ratings. One point though - few people picked up on the fact that the man with the white Michael Jackson face was in fact an Indian. Not that it made the skit any more palatable. Still the hoohah doesn't stop the children dying of starvation and malaria in Africa does it?
- Now that my daughters live away from home, it takes half a day of phone calls to catch up on my family each week - Mother Flamingo Dancer, Sister Flamingo Dancer, Daughter1 and Daughter 2...whew. Mr FD gets his mother and usually his sister, though there are times when we fight over answering the phone when we suspect it is her and I get the short straw and have to speak with her...
- It is raining tiny tiny rain drops. The first rain we have had in over 2 months. I am pretending I don't hear it, in case I scare it away. The lawn is crispy dry under my feet when I walk out to the clothes line...Mr FD just called out that it is raining. I told him to shut up. He apologised automatically as he is trained to do. I can smell the dust settling. Heaven.
- BIL asked me if I went to communion during the funeral mass. We both said at the same time "because that is the only way people know you are there!" I love my BIL - he understands my evilosity.
- It is raining harder now. Obviously the rain doesn't read blogs. Yet.
- I can't avoid the study any longer can I? Can I?
I am not into making lists as they tend to just make me anxious. I know that I will finish everything as it should be and to list it will just make me do a headless chicken dance rather than get down to my tasks. Believe me I have no need for inducement to perform a headless chicken dance!
Hey World,
It’s been 51 odd years and so I think it is finally time to have a word with you. A summary of your efforts and effects as it were.
First, right out of the chute you loaded me with a couple of physical problems that have shaped my life and me. Oh, and then there was the bit about telling 1950s Mothers that bottle was better than breast, and that we had to be on a schedule. Thanks for introducing us to the world of anxiety and rules, World, good idea that. Not. And before we move out of the hospital nursery, thanks for loading me up with the time bomb eye tumour – eye and I just made it to 18 years.
Ok World, out of the nursery and onto the catholic primary education with the Sisters of No Mercy. I enjoyed the terror and fear for those seven important formative years of my life. It was probably a good thing that I didn’t figure out until my adult years that a lot of the treatment that was dealt out was according to whether you were Irish catholic [Australian] and therefore favoured or German catholic [Australian] and therefore bullied by racist nuns. [Australian Irish catholic]. Not sure World, if that was a lesson I needed right then, but it probably fuelled the strong desire for social justice that drives me now. The big plus was the friend that I found in the kindergarten sand pit that still has an important role in my life to this day.
Thankfully I discovered books and reading, thanks in part to a neighbour that you placed next door. And my big sister. Thanks for that one World. It helped me escape the cultural wasteland of a happy home. I bless you for the happy home and the parents who obviously loved me. Of course World, you had to balance it out with a mother who passed her anxiety about EVERYTHING on to me, so that her voice questioning my ability to accomplish anything new or unusual in still in my head. Maybe that is why I have become so stubborn and will launch myself into the new challenges just to achieve. I won’t let you get me down you know, World, even though you try over and over again.
I did think the alcoholic father, a melancholy self medicator, might have been a step too far, but hey, everyone in my world had an alcoholic father after WWII. Despite that I never doubted he loved me and was proud of me. He was a gentle man, and he thought I could do anything. He shaped me stoic and persistent.
Ah the teenage years. At least there was release into the state school system. Sadly it was a country high school in the early 1970s and so the male teachers just taught to the male students. However, thanks to a couple of female English and History teachers the rest of my life had a shape. And of course I found those lifelong friends that I have to this day, as precarious as some of their lives now are. That was a good one, World, I’ll congratulate you on that one.
The eye was probably the defining moment for the teenage years, but you did balance it with the arrival of Mr FD in the middle of the drama. Not many men think a young woman with a hole in her head and a huge bandage is sexy but he managed it somehow, so big tick on that one. Big tick on that one all round – except he could have been a little taller. I think even he would agree on that one.
The twenties – marriage, babies, domestic life. The good life. I never wanted it to end. If I could have stopped time that is where I would be now. They grew up though and so did I. I just tried to make them confident, and happy, and encouraged them to follow their passions. I will let it up to them to score me on that one, but I enjoyed it all. It kind of pissed me off when you made it all progress away from me.
My 30s. Well, World, you gave me a mixed bag there. University education as a mature age student – 36 when I began the first degree. Back into the work force full time to educate those children. Emergencies that meant sleeping beside hospital beds at night and trying to juggle employment, but we all survived. Maybe even thrived.
The big 40. It was ok, you know. Frustrations at the lack of a career where I wasn’t used and abused and bored. Family life – you gradually took Dad away from us, first his mind and then his spirit. Can’t forgive you for that one, World. You gave Daughter2 too many physical burdens too, and we watched her fade until we snatched her back. Mr FD unemployed, and me the bread winner for awhile. We came back stronger, and learnt the life lesson not to let others – parents, employers or your own fears – set your life agenda. Even you World – I can’t always choose the people and events that you send me, but I can choose the way I deal with them. And I do.
The end of my 40s brought a change of city that I tried to ignore, but maybe in the long run was the best thing, World, for me in a long time. Maybe not for Mr FD, but that is his story to tell. Ups and Downs all around, but opportunities to be what we really wanted to be, all of us. New lives crafted, new friends made, old ones rediscovered.
Ah, now you have me in my 50s, World. Not bad. Not what I imagined – back at university, and a new career. A new me. New experiences, new friends. The Boy added to our family. Big tick there, World. Some financial security would be good, hopefully in the new year, World – no, definitely in the new year, thanks. Don’t worry, I will sort it out for myself.
Not sure, World, if you loaded up the early years with hard stuff for a purpose or not. Was it just luck of my draw? Could have done without most of it , well in a perfect world, all of it, but then again maybe I wouldn’t like me as much as I do now if I hadn’t lived through what I did. Do. Others had much worse, and others much better. One of the things about you World that puzzles me – our human need to rise above despite the cost to others. Man’s inhumanity to man. Ditto women.
Not ready to rate you yet, World. The race is not yet run. I expect there are going to be some more hardships, and hopefully some happy times. I like the happy dances. I hope that at the end I can shake my fist at you and declare that I took you on and did my best. Go on, move along, I am here.
Between now and the end of July I have many, many, long and complicated assignments to complete so I may not be around the neighbourhood as much. I haven't gone away, though I have considered drowning myself in the toilet bowl...
Don't go away in my absence, or I will hunt you down and hit you with my stick!
P.S. I got a 6 (on a scale of 1-7, 7 being a High Distinction, 6 a Distinction) for my touchy feely subject with the crazy lecturer - wonders never cease! I still don't understand what we were suppose to know...
Yesterday was my sister’s birthday. My sister is 8 years older than me, but even though we grew up in different decades, we are very close. My sister has lived a quiet life in a quiet town. She left school at 15 years of age and worked as a secretary until she married, as most women did at that time. Life has not always been easy for her, there have been ongoing financial worries that have always set boundaries on her life, and after giving birth to her daughter she was never able to have that longed for second child.
My sister’s life is rich in other ways. She has a very generous heart. She will volunteer the assistance of her husband to anyone who is in need (she is a flamingo dancer after all, you didn’t expect her to do it, did you?). She gives her time, attention and energy to all who come within her realm. In turn my sister has an army of loyal and loving friends, and a family that adores her.
The only problem is my sister has no sense of humor. Nothing. Zilch. She takes everything very seriously. I think the nuns may have taken it away from her. A throw away quip can find you given a 10 minute dissertation on positive thinking and relaxation techniques. Or an offer to sort your linen cupboard. Of course it also means that she is often the butt of family jokes – well ,maybe when we were younger, not so much now. Maturity makes one kinder.
So you can see, that my sister and I are like night and day, cheese and chalk, fire and water. I am fire. She is water. At times I get very frustrated with her and her small world view. I think there are many times when she doesn’t understand me or the world that I live in. She bound her daughter to her, I encourage mine to fly free. We have the same love of family and home, of doing the right thing. My courage out reaches her so I am often the one to step up when the hard jobs come, such as taking action to have our Dad removed from the family home when his dementia became too much to be handled in the family home, but I long ago accepted that. I can handle the guilt that his death soon followed better than she would...
There are times when I wish I was my sister, living her life of quiet and calm. Regular, routine, secure. At other times I know it would be the end of me. I think there may be times she wishes she had been braver and followed some of the paths I took – mature age education, some sort of career. I guess that we all build the life we need with what we are handed.
I guess this is all just to say, Happy Birthday, Sis, no one could wish for a better big sister. Or any sister.
I can't help it - the words roland garous keep popping into my head at the most unexpected moments. It's a worry, for I fear that they may be lonely there.
I decided this morning that I have to grow up.
Enough of this thinking chocolate is a food group. Enough of the dancing around mushroom fairy rings in my front yard (I now have 4 different varieties of mushroom in my yard. The battery on my camera is recharging so you are just going to have to take my word for it, but there are FOUR, and Flamingo Dancers never lie...)
Anyway , ENOUGH! My inner child has run rampant. I needs must reign her in. I am going to be a mother-in-law, sometime, somewhere. Have teenage children, well, other people’s teenage children this time, submitted to my tender mercies (remember Flamingo Dancers never lie!).
I have to do IT. Watch my diet, DO EXERCISE (uugggghhhh), be sensible. Have a serious face. Knock off the Easter Bunny. Complain that the birds make too much noise near my clothes line (I borrowed that one from my mother who did a full 10 minutes on the subject last Sunday! I do not lie.) I do refuse however to pass wind in front of others though, a sad affliction my BIL appears to have developed much to our mirth and horror. I will only grow up so much.
Not sure about wearing a singlet in winter. Not exactly a sub tropical thing. Though I do miss having my mother ask me if I am wearing one in front of all my friends – are the memories of those fun filled teenage years. (That time I lied, I don’t miss it. Didn’t want it, don’t miss it.)
I do wear a hat outside – all the time. Is that grown up enough? I moisturise the back of my hands to stop the granny wrinkles. Is that grown up enough? I have my blood pressure and cholesterol checked on a regular basis. Grown up enough? I have even made “plans” for when we retire ... MrFD goes into the home first. Grown up enough? The hair is more than a little grey. That is grown up enough.
So this is it people – grown ups ville....
I Lied! I am going outside to dance around my mushroom rings and sing oh what a wonderful morning at the top of my little voice. I am not growing up until I die, or maybe a couple of days after that!
MY BIRTHDAY
by Flamingo Dancer, aged 51 years.
The house was quiet, no one was stirring, except for Flamingo Dancer. It was her birthday and she dressed with style. A dress! A dress! A Flamingo Dancer in a dress! She climbed down the stairs and went to the kitchen, she opened the cupboard and found the rubbish bin overflowing... why me, she did think, why do I always have to do this, even on my birthday.
Little did she know that the Big Whatever had a suprise in store! Out on the front lawn, see what she saw -
Then off to classes...
I was met with a cheer, and wishes galore - especially when I announced to all and sundry, today was the day!
Classes were over and straight to the car...foot to the pedal and dash away fast...
Lunch was to follow, with a Daughter in tow. I was going to photogragh the delectable delights, but hunger overcame me - but I savoured the best for last!
Then off a high stepping we both did go...and now a noon nap does beckon before...
...an apron for MRS FD from Daughter 2!
and of course
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