Comfort Zone, Duty, Nondescript Items, Unmentionable Topics and the Travails of City Life - LBC POST Mashup ...er ....Catch Up!

Duggu, my new dog.

I admit it.  I'm hopeless.  There I was, thinking I'd only missed a week or two.  I'd missed a freaking month.  Between getting a dog, writing a book, releasing another book, rescuing another dog, being ill........I guess there's only so much you can do.

My comfort zone?  I live in a combined Indian family.  My nuclear family, meaning my husband and I (oh, don't I sound like the Queen?) and our four offspring and dog, have a couple of rooms to call our own in the family home, but owing to circumstances beyond our control, it is impossible to make those rooms completely private.  My husband doesn't mind too much, but he's out of the house most of the time and not being able to shut my door completely and shut out the world is what you might call stressful at times.  So where's my comfort zone?  Inside my own head, that's where.  Someone once told me a long time ago that it is impossible to control the outer environment.  So I don't even go there.  I adjust myself to my circumstances and try to be happy as best I can.  And so do my children.  Upstairs in our house, we have some privacy, so we enjoy that.  And I'm good at switching off mentally when I need to concentrate on something.  A bit too good at it, actually.

Duty?  Well as a wife and mother it's my duty to put my kids and husband first always and my own needs last, right?  Women who do that are praised loudly in the environment in which I live.  Well, I beg to differ on that one.  I do wear myself out at times taking care of my significant others, all half dozen or so of them (no, I only have one partner, I mean the kids, MIL and dog, as well), but before I go completely bonkers, I have to take time out occasionally and recharge my batteries.  If that doesn't happen, I get ill.  I just get that I can't do anything and have to lie down for a day or two with a headache.  So taking care of myself is not selfish at all, it's a necessity.  I just need to do it more, that's all.

Now as to nondescript items which have had a profound effect on my life.  Many years ago, a friend of mine, Carmel, who had been a trainee hairdresser, used to help me out by trimming my hair every so often.  I used to pay her for it too, as I'm not in the habit of making people work for nothing.  It was a mutually beneficial arrangement, as she got some money and I got my hairstyle (such as it was) maintained, quite inexpensively.  My sister Bernie gifted me with a pair of sharp scissors so that I could be sure that Carmel could do the best job possible. A very practical gift indeed.Some twenty five years later, I still have that scissors.  It's still working very well too. My kids use it for craft. I guess some gifts just stay with you forever, while others don't.  A scissors, for heaven's sake!

Unmentionable Topics at TED?  What's TED?  I'm sure I have no idea.  But now regarding unmentionable topics, I could wax lyrical, so to speak.  I edit books and when my online boss, Serena asked me what were my preferred topics to edit, I replied that anything was fine except erotic material.  Because of the kids, you know.  I wouldn't want them to stumble upon anything unmentionable if they were using my computer for a school project.  Besides, I don't think my other half would be too thrilled at the idea of my editing stuff like that.

Travails of city life?  Well, what's the alternative?  Village life?  I wouldn't live in a village other than an Irish one, if you paid me a thousand Euros a week.  I live in the city, but I'm mostly at home taking care of the family, doing my editing and writing my book.  I don't know, half the time, whether I live in a high rise apartment or a cottage in the woods.  Or a freaking spaceship.  Cities have their advantages as does rural living.  Six of one and half a dozen of the other.

And that's about it!

The Loose Blogging Consortium, a small group of bloggers including Rummuser, The Old Fossil, Maxi,, Shackman, Lin and Ashok, have been blogging along together for several years now, traditionally on Fridays.  With my hectic life, I often don't make it by Friday, but I try to blog along nevertheless.  I thank the group for the continued inspiration to blog when I otherwise wouldn't have done so.