Reflecting on life, 92nd birthday celebrations, Netflix rabbit holes, exploring and more - 12 March to 24 March 2024
We are in the last week of March and barreling towards Easter weekend for those who observe and celebrate Easter. I am still enjoying "funemployment" trying to rest, relax, recover, refresh and recuperate though at times I am on the trot for my Mom; if not shopping, taking her to the dentist and, tomorrow, its the optometrist. Besides attending aqua aerobics twice a week and trying to carve out time to simply be at home, under my own version of lockdown orders in order to work on my second book, shopping and being my Mom's chauffeur, I do not know how and where the hours of each hour disappear. Maybe they melted away in the heat and humidity of (what felt like) an eternal heatwave but I am not going to complain about the heat which, while reducing me to a real "Sweaty Betty", is nothing compared to people coping with grief through the lost of a parent, partner; a tragic health diagnosis; and other significant stressful events whether retrenchment, loss of a business, homeless and so many other challenges (let alone the 2 wars being fought in the world).
I am enjoying catching up with friends as and where this is possible, depending on our schedules; as well as organising for the marketing materials for my, soon to be launched, new small business, Professional Assistance (virtual administrative and secretarial support). I still am battling extreme exhaustion, I lie down for a 5 minute siesta and 90 minutes later I wake up, I grossly underestimated the level of my exhaustion but am working hard at rectifying that.
While working hard at doing nothing, which is really hard for me to do, I went down the Netflix rabbit hole
watching "Love is Blind Season 6" . I kept seeing posts about it from some of the social media accounts I follow so a moment of weakness is to blame for my escapade into watching this series for the first time. It is an interesting experiment where, if you have not watched it, ladies and gents chat to each other in pods and are not able to see each other. Only when there is a proposal and it is accepted do the couples get to meet. It’s the 21st century, in a way, of developing a relationship which, before cellphones and social media, may have all been conducted via letters and a brief phone call. There is no clue, for other gender, of the ethnicity of each other (unless that question is asked and, if so asked, is it truly answered?). I became fully invested (against my better judgment) especially because of this one couple, the fiancée was a Walking Talking Red Flag and I find myself wanting to yell at my laptop screen “Run Jimmy Run Run Run”. He had been ”dating” 2 different females; one of whom was not only gorgeous in terms of appearance but very secure in herself and emotionally mature; the one (who declared to him that she looked like Nicole Fox – he told her that she lied to him) is a clingy, insecure, needy child who has not yet achieved anything resembling emotional maturity let alone emotional intelligence. He chose the Red Flag aka Chelsea – from the pods, they had time in the Dominican Republic where she instigated the first fight because she was jealous that he was chatting to one of the other female contestants who is also engaged (only the engaged couples got to go to the Dominican Republic) they returned home and had to co-habit' each couple have had their devices returned to them and Jimmy must have looked for Jessica (the one he stupidly let get away) and Red Flag found out; and picked fight no 2 and so it went on. When he tells he truthfully that he finds her very clingy she loses her mind telling him he is disrespectful and rude; and there is more gaslighting from her – the episode ends as he packs up his stuff to move back to his apartment for the night.
Her behaviour really triggered me. I cannot cope with clingy and needy. The period where I temporarily lost my mind and married my 2nd ex was one ring faced by clingy and needy – he had nothing to be insecured about, nothing to mistrust me about but yet, when he was not glued to my hip, there would be infinite smses and if I did not respond in the time period he expected, “ding ding ding” for round number Gazillion and Hundred, there would be literate tantrums so I am so allergic to being clingy and needy. Thank goodness this all happened in the age of smses only and before the Blackberry phones when you could "ping" people - he would have worn out that feature! Even when I told my 2nd Ex aka The Needy One that it felt like he was putting his hands around my throat and choking me; and that I had not gained a husband but a third child, he continued with the insane neediness. I would arrive home and try drive into the property as quietly as possible, and if it was dark with the car lights off, so I could actually get out of my car in peace and walk to the house and have some space; otherwise he would be at the car door demanding my attention and would be my persistent and unwanted shadow, if I did not lock the bathroom I could not shower, bath or go to the loo in peace and quiet.
We are all human and have periods of insecurity, anxiety and uncertainty in relationships. I have been guilty of this but I have learnt and grown from the experience. I also learnt, in my first marriage, when I was so abused and had no security, no self-confidence to literally “suck it up buttercup” wearing the biggest girl panties I could find. My parents were in the USA, I was in Grahamstown, no e-mails or cellphones only phone calls (which were few and far in between because of the huge expense) and letters so I had to rely on myself to get on with life. I had always been independent since a lot of my formative years, especially my teens, I felt invisible (and I acted out to be seen and heard) and raising Morgan and Tristan essentially on my own (even when married to their Dad) cemented my need to be independent and even if I did not feel strong, to fake it till I made it. Hence my allergy to clingy and neediness in either a relationship or a friendship. With that period of amnesia, it all happened way too fast and I should have pumped the brakes to find out the real personality behind the mask as the clinginess and neediness only emerged once we were married (which is bizarre as why would a person be insecure when you are married) (there was also quite a lot of jealousy as I had friends, he had very few, and was jealous of my bookclub, my job, you name it , it was a trigger for some display of his emotional immaturity).
When Tristan was at Parktown Boys High School I chatted to another Mum whose son played in the same rugby team as Tristan and they were friends, we met on the Saturday and had a few pleasant chats and on the Monday afternoon she was phoning me at work for a chat about nothing; she phoned the next day and the next – I tried to employ the utmost tact and diplomacy asking her to please not phone me at work (and I would ignore her calls on my cellphone) as I was at work to do my job not have personal phone calls. She did not take it well and eventually stopped talking to me especially after Tristan and her son had a fight – it was no loss to me and I was not about to start wearing mourning attire.
So this creature on Love is Blind is one of my worst nightmares, I was relieved to see from the reunion show, that Jimmy has woken up and is no longer in the most toxic relationship.
Another contestant (a guy) on the show gave me the absolute chills and the hairs on the back of my neck to stand up; he gave me serious stalker, serial rapist vibes and only seemed to be concerned about “not being a C-list celeb” and “what will America think” or some other garbage – talking about garbage, at least this particular item of garbage took himself out and off the show.
The human dynamics and interactions on this show was fascinating to say the least.
Escaping from the rabbit hole of Netflix and my observations from Love is Blind, triggering my aversion to needy and neediness, I have had an interesting time with Discovery Insure who we opted for our short-term insurance for my new car and household items as their quote was by far the best. There was an issue with the Discovery Insure app and my profile and we had to go to the Discovery Drive Centre not once but twice and it took a somewhat stern and shirty e-mail from me, (as our poor insurance brokers were not having luck and it was no fault on their part) and the incredible service from Jared Jacobs at the drive centre to have all the issues resolved; now I have a tracker and every detail of each time I drive Dolce, is recorded.
In the last week, two encounters and discussions with different people have reminded me of the "six degrees of separation" theory and how small the world actually is, especially Jo'burg.
On Wednesday I went along to a "Silver Seniors" event at DC Coffee in Fourways which is a social gathering of anyone over 50, who might need some social interaction, meet new people, make some new friends and/or attend an activity. It was started by Sheilagh (who is in my aqua aerobics class) and is such a great innovation. I invited my friend Loren to join me and she was able to accompany me so we had a chance to catch up and we both had a great time meeting new people and discovering some connections. It was a good event for me to attend as, inadvertently, I was able to sell a couple of copies of my book and there may be an opportunity at a later stage to talk to the group about my book and the reason why I wrote my first book. I also thought it would possibly be beneficial to attend for networking purposes for my new business. There was a Nuclear Medicine specialist at the event and a retired chemist to name but a few of the type of people whom I met. The next event will also be at DC Coffee and will be a painting event (I may not attend as I am by no means Cezanne let alone Picasso or Banksy); and it will depend on the cost and whether I am working or not - time will tell!
Saturday, 23 March was my Mom's 92nd birthday. We celebrated with her, as a family, with an afternoon tea in the latter part of Saturday afternoon after Morgan, Tristan and Alyssa had finished work; and it was moderately cooler. The catering was done by Not Bread Alone Bakery and Woolworths; and not knowing what to give my Mom/Nana a birthday present (and wary of what is gifted to her as there has been a history of her returning birthday presents to me claiming she did not want them, did not use them etc) so I took a beautiful painting of poppies she had done many years ago, and had it framed and currently it is hanging up in her lounge and roses she received from my brothers look great in front of the framed painting as seen below.
Caramel and meringue cake baked by Not Bread Alone Bakery
Not Bread Alone also prepared the fruit kebabs, scones and lemon in phyllo pastry; mini cocktail sausage rolls and cheese and chicken frikkadels from Woolworths
It was a very relaxed and casual birthday celebration and, by all accounts, Mom thoroughly enjoyed her birthday. I have been concerned that she has been too isolated and had stopped inviting her friends in the retirement village to tea and not participated in social activities at The Village (both of which she regularly did before her series of hospitalisations) so was relieved, and pleased, that she did invite friends yesterday to tea so they too could enjoy her delicious birthday cake.
On Sunday, 24 March Johan and I ventured to Haddon in the south of Johannesburg to a restaurant, Vera Vita where we met our friend, Danielle and her young daughter, Olivia, and treated them to lunch. We were sadly not able to attend Dani's birthday dinner at Vera Vita some weeks ago so yesterday was a belated celebration of her birthday. Vera Vita is a great restaurant and we had a lovely table outside; we were so busy chatting and catching up that I did not take photos of our food. Johan's medium pizza was half the size of the table and he hoovered it up as it was so delicious; my grilled chicken breasts and side salad were lovely and Dani enjoyed her favourite dish which was tagliata (200g) - grilled rump steak sliced into strips and marinated with olive oil, balsamic vinegar and coarse salt, topped with rocket and grana cheese and served with 2 slices of toasted bread. I had a small morsel of the steak with the rocket and cheese - it was heavenly! Dani and I shared a bowl of tiramisu for dessert, Olivia had chocolate ice cream and Johan also enjoyed a bowl of tiramisu. It was a fabulous lunch and time spent with a special friend and we will definitely return to Vera Vita.
I am excited that I have connected with someone who will help me practice my italian over coffee (caffe) as it is the conversing which is so important and my speaking ability needs a lot of practice and to boost my confidence. I am so happy about this and talking about Italian, I am working on researching and planning for Paris and Italy 2024 so that is fabulous and I am so enjoying having the time and space to do this, continue to work on my Italian and doing all things that I love and have neglected because of former work pressures.
A couple of weeks ago, I popped into the Reea charity bookshop and only had about 10 minutes to browse as was told very quickly by a rather stern and officious volunteer that the bookshop would be closing in 10 minutes; it was enough time for me to find a book which on the back blurb started off with "How much money does it take to quit your job?" and is the story of a young woman, dissatisfied with her work and longing to travel, starts journalling, writes a blog and eventually quits her job and finds herself in Paris .... so much resonated with me and so I rapidly bought the book and got out of the shop très rapidement before I was locked in there (I would not have minded to be locked up with the books but for the need for refreshment and ablutions)! The book is entitled "Paris Letters" - was it meant to be or was it meant to be?? Its by Janice MacLeod and is proving to be a delightful read.
Not so delightful is a podcast I am currently listening to "Unreliable Witness" about a young woman, Eleanor Williams, who lied to the authorities, her family and her community about supposedly being trafficked, raped, attacked and assaulted. It is shocking and horrific and is all a pack of lies. She would hit herself in the face with a hammer! Who does that? A social media post she made resulted in huge and unwarranted attacks against the Asian community in the town she lived in. She also made false allegations about rape naming men who would try to end their own lives. My jaw is still on the ground. She has been sentenced to 8 years in prison and who knows what is going to happen when she is released. I am waiting for Johan to find me the BBC documentary about this creature "Liar: The Fake Grooming Scandal”. What is so devastating about this is how women in the future who legitimately report incidents of sexual assault, domestic violence and worse, will be treated and believed? Her behaviour and allegations have so drastically undermined gender based violence. Sadly I do not think that there is going to be any form of rehabilitation whilst she is behind bars and when she is released.
In closing, and to change to a far more delightful and delicious topic, who has noticed the very many versions of hot cross buns which are available in the shops vying for space and attention along with all types of Easter Eggs and other temptations, like the below which is pure evil in a packet (I am assuming as I did not give in to the temptation but I am a HUGE Maltesers fan), not to mention the Biscoff biscuits .... I should be blindfolded when shopping!!
I am intrigued that the hot cross buns selection ranges now from hot cross buns to extra spicy hot cross buns, chocolate hot cross buns, hot cross buns with no raisins, hot cross buns with cranberries, fruit free hot cross buns, Clemengold and golden sultana hot cross buns to hot cross buns with pink lady apples and caramel (which personally when I saw them today I was not attracted to as that is too much of a deflection from the traditional hot cross buns).
What have I been listening to?
Podcasts:
Something was Wrong
Mr Ballane Podcast
The Rise and Fall of Ruby Franke
The High Roller Heist
The Meidas Touch
The Michigan Plot
The Trial of Constance Martens and Mark Gordon
True Crime Daily
The Damage Report
The Daily
Murder 101
Unreliable Witness
Three
What have I been reading? What am I reading?
"Paris Letters" by Janice McLeod
Audible:
Dreamland by Sam Quinones
What have I been watching?
My usual bubblegum shows so I can decompress and not think; and just be entertained
Love Rat
Death and Other Details
Netflix:
Love is Blind Season 6
Buying Beverly Hills Season 2
Homicide New York
Murder on the Orient Express (movie)
Where have I been?
DC Coffee https://www.dccoffee.co/
The Daily Coffee Cafe Boskruin https://www.thedailycoffeecafe.co.za/the-daily-coffee-cafe-boskruin/
Libby Wiggins Physiotherapy - 20 Kent Road, Dunkeld
Not Bread Alone Bakery https://www.facebook.com/NotBreadAlone/ Vera Vita https://www.veravita.co.za/
Big F Car Wash
Discovery Drive Centre
Streateatery https://www.streaterylifestyle.co.za/
Love, light and blessings and may you have a peaceful and joyous Easter / long weekend - till next month!
Barbara
