Thoughts From Afar

[DeletedAccount53]

Thoughts From Afar: Part One of Three.


Notebooks and Pens and the Love of Books...

Wherever I go, I always take a notebook and pencil. To make sure I'm never without them, there's one in my truck, one in my bag and in our Belle Époque villa's library, my engraved silver pen and pencil, locked away in an old oak box with my most personal writing.

It is wonderful finally being home in Monaco because apart from our home library, our mini city-state has a private library which I can visit without prior permission because I'm a lifetime member by inheritance. However, because of Monaco's virus crisis and its recent worrying mutation, my twin sister and I choose to stay at home.

Here in our villa's library are books placed shoulder-to-shoulder on shelves from floor to ceiling, and also access to e-books though which are not quite the same, become most useful when downloaded onto our phones and our laptops. Now here is a secret few realise: phones and laptops have a greater capacity than e-book readers, so to download on our devices means there is no need to buy an expensive Kindle.

Our library also serves as our rest room, a place for our Steinway and our music equipment: an expensive stereo and a fine record deck that is Maman's. The equipment was gradually built over time so we can either play, or we just sit and listen, or repose on a cushy antique chaise lounge where I strum my Martin, a loving gift from Maman.

Gathered over time are my scribbles; some extracted from English and French Literature, but mostly my own, set up on my Mac's Vellum software. It's taken a long time to gather thoughts in pen and ink on fine notebooks and even longer transferred to computer where I'm writing a sequel to a novel in print. If you were here you would glimpse into our past years when all Julie and I had were each other. Years of solitude and often, distraught feelings of soul-numbing loneliness. And then dear Maman, an international model helped change all that, and for the better.

I love the empty dark hours best of all, when in our home library I walk along the bookshelves and bask in the warmth of our books, their gold lettering glinting beneath an old reading lamp, the book laid out on an antique reading stand, their stories softly pulsating between pages just waiting to be opened and read and loved and always, always cherished.

After taking a seat, I listen to Julie playing piano, her delicate fingers caressing the piano keys, lips absently mouthing the words, lyrics written from a bygone age, breath that occasionally quickens with excitement and shivers through her body in the most alluring way. And as I drift off into that familiar comfortable zone, my mind wanders of its free will and I smile from the thought that when life tosses you a bowl of sugar and some lemons, you mix them together and enjoy the lemonade; a bit random, I realise, but my thoughts are my own.


The Love of Books...

I adore our home library, a wooden labyrinth of William IV oak Gothic library bookcases, hand built between 1835 and 1840, among which hundreds of book wait to be read, their spines glittering in gold lettering, enticing me to reach up and take one down. Corridors and canyons of carefully collected literature beckon me, whispering words I've never heard before. The air is smoky with the scent of leather, ink and paper, caramel-rich and citrus sharp. This library was where I belonged more than any other, other than my bed shared with my beloved.

My love is reading books, but more than that I also loved the smell and the touch of them. I imagined the same sensation people experienced when they smelled a loaf of bread straight from the oven. So in my hand, the book's gilded lettering sparkled with a magical vitality, and the tips of my fingers tingled at the touch. Now I hold my hands up and freely admit to having a book fetish. Pleased to have found it, I trailed my hand across its raised front cover and returned to my chaise lounge to begin reading it.


On Pens...

A perfect pen falls in love with a single hand. Its love is lifelong and loyal. In the hands of another the pen will dry up; it will scratch out words and turn everything into an unintelligible, distraught mess. It simply isn't fair to put it through that pain, so choose your pen well.

Although we own luxury cars, we live simple lives. We hate spending money on things we don't have to, for all is here in our villa. We chop our own kindling instead of buying it. Like me my darling loves journals, but we agree to buy journals sewn into best quality paper, so that it brings joy when writing with our favourite pen and carefully chosen ink.


On Feeling Alone...

If you talk to someone and they don't listen, if your words fall into the air unheard, you feel invisible, unimportant; alone. To feel alone while with another person is, I think, the loneliest we'll ever feel.

True love means allowing a person to be exactly as they are - not trying to tinker with the wiring or adjust a few fundamentals here and there. It means wholehearted embracing, not simply enduring the bits you don't like, or trying to change them. Love the one you are with and accept them just as they love and accept you. Living peaceably this way makes us want for nothing but each other.


About Fear...

Fear, if we hold onto it, owns us. But to let go of it, then fear no longer grips us. To take on courage, we must let go of fear, but be aware that courage in our lives might throw a few things at us to draw it out.

I speak from personal experience when faced with a life saving heart operation. It was do - to allow my surgeon to operate, or eventually die. That was when I was young, and now I am fit and fine. Back then was around the time when Maman walked into our lives, and took us on. Now as I look at my beloved, my heart swells with love and the smoke of passion all rolled into one: Love, joy, happiness and desire.

I know how hard it is to ignore your fears. But I beg you to try. Or you will never discover yourself. And that would be a great shame. I know it takes courage, but believe me, deep down in yourself, you possess that courage. You have to believe to completely focus on what you want to do, and what you want to be. Seize upon any shred of courage and magnify it. Whip yourself up into a passionate courage and just go for it.

Ignore all dissenting and critical thoughts. Ignore other people's reaction and opinions. Ignore everything else until you feel completely magnificent, fearless and spectacular. In that state you can achieve anything you want.

Alice Hoffman, author of Practical Magic, wrote: "When you don't lose yourself into the bargain, trust you find you have double the love you started with, and that's one recipe that cannot be tampered with!"

Whatever you do, ordinary or extraordinary, significant or insignificant, it should always be done with passion and perfectionism. It's an expression of who you really are. Live with passion and you deserve every breath of life you get; live without it and you may as well go straight to your grave. Am I right? If you really want to illuminate this world, you've got to burn!"



Thoughts From Afar: Part Two of Three

Finding Oneself: A Personal Reflection...

There was a time when just entering adolescence, I questioned why life could be so cruel. For a time, my mother was a class act manipulator, and I was her puppet. The fighter inside me determined to tame the clinical depression; sometimes though I just gave way to angry outbursts when alone in my bedroom, kicking over the wastepaper bin. Storms of ***t, followed by hailstones from purgatory, and finished off with a shower of what the ***k. Then I realised a life changing moment: It doesn't matter what people tell you. It doesn't matter what they might say. Sometimes you have to walk away from them, or even run from them. Sometimes though, running away means you're heading in exactly the right decision. But that decision was to come later, not then. Other people's judgements are meaningless, unless you allowed them to mean something and then you have a real problem. Except I had another axe to grind: Dealing, eventually, with a world class manipulator.

Impressions, whether they are first, second or third, are often opinions formed without conscious thought. Perceptions based on nothing more on appearance or perhaps a look, they often create friendships as effortlessly as they can create enemies.

In my past, internet friendships were as ephemeral as the seasons of the year, except only those whose trust is constant, stay to nurture friendship and grow together. Alas, those who have trust issues that rule their lives - in one breath push friendship away as easily as a pack of cards off a table. In the trust of sharing, it means opening up, and that causes us to become vulnerable. Except if fear can be overcome, then friendship could last a lifetime.

Love isn't about control. It's not about deceit or holier-than-thou attitudes or pushing buttons just because you can. Love is about caring. It's about sharing and trust and honesty and it's about putting others' needs before your own. And then 'A' came along....'A' who became our birth mother's girlfriend.


Manipulators: Controllers...Like 'A'

I remember there was a defining moment when I shunned this woman; 'A' could not have been more opposite from anyone if she tried. Simply, she was horrible. Even a blind person with receptive senses would know these two were as highly strung as a string on a cello. What did it for me was watching 'A' doing dance classes. She and her dance partner performed sounding like baboons screaming for bananas. Appalled, I turned away and walked out.

I was right. Their relationship did end. Fickle over some carefully calculated jib of mine that was deliberately aimed at A's weak vain spot, I jabbed with deep pleasure. Frightened at being discovered of being that world class manipulator, that woman flounced out of our lives before dawn, never to be heard from again. Proud of having sharpened my 'axe' very well, I celebrated with a malt whisky.

Just before A's flounce, I knew what it was like to be manipulated. The very memory of her subtle manipulative ways caused bile to rise in my throat. For little more than a year, Julie and I had been on the end of a master of thorough deception, verbal abuse and unscrupulous tactics, we'd been unknowingly moulded like wet clay. Turned and smoothed, shaped and grooved, helped along by a smattering of charm, the occasional guilt trip and several violent outbursts towards the harridan leaving. Like Julie, I didn't even know who I was. Her interests and mine fell by the wayside. Our needs were inconsequential, and then we broke free when that ghastly woman finally left.

From then on, I remember laughing on hearing Julie proclaim, "'As Katherine Hepburn would say, 'If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun.'"



Then began a new era of friendship and closeness between us and our Maman. Then began a new era of friendship and closeness between this lady and ourselves. That same evening, she set up an evening celebration.

Lifting a massive pan of homemade minestrone to the stove to reheat it, just before serving, Maman poured a generous glug of fine Cognac into the soup, dropped in pieces of French baguette and sprinkled the lot with grated Parmesan and placed it to brown in the oven. The soup smelt and looked divine. Also a lover of Irish soda bread, she brought a homemade loaf to the table and some bottles of Guinness. Knowing her love of all things Irish, she'd have preferred Guinness poured from an Irish tap, we later heard. Being at this model's home was fabulous, and later, Sis and I made our nest in front of the wood burning stove, grabbed some soft woollen blankets and snugged under. Giggly from beer and that wonderful soup, we lay our heads close together and slept a full twelve hours.

One thing that was common between Julie and I and was the fact that we are collectors of lost souls; broken people. We seek them out and bring them comfort, very similar to that kind lady who gave us shelter. And then we begin to build them up, nurturing friendship and trust. With that manipulative freak of a mother well and truly gone and that alcoholic father dead for drinking, what also flew away was a murder of crows that had flapped their wings in my stomach. I was free! Free indeed.


My early years....

When I was a young teenager, often during summer nights I'd sleep in the garden among the birds. I woke before the birds had cleared their throats for the dawn chorus. It was so peaceful there. During the daytime in summer holidays I often read books, sitting beneath a bowering oak enjoying the soft mossy grass I sat on. Often I would write my journal, mostly in the evenings as the sun went down into dusk. Whatever time of the day, writing was important, for the motivation to write helped me get out of bed in the morning. Sometimes while sat beneath my favourite oak, a smoky cat from next door would walk across the lawn to me and spread itself over my chest, kneading its paws into my jumper and purring like a jet engine.

Other times I'd slip out of the kitchen door at night when the air smelt as if kissed by the sea. I remember the moon hanging low and full in the night sky. It was buttery yellow, heavy and rich. I could feel the moon's tug. I'd wrap my cardigan around me, not that I could feel the cool breeze, but just to give me a little comfort.

The night was clear, lit now by a full moon and a silvery veil of stars which adequately lit my way across the grass. That night I was moved by the sheer beauty and mystical quality. Awed at the sight of the night sky's stars, I could almost reach out and grasp one as they appeared so close. It was like being back in the Planetarium when I was ten, but out here was a million times more vivid and romantic.

"Look up!" Julie said, having crept out to follow me.

It was if the moon had exploded and spilled its light across the inky sky - stars sprinkled the dark canvas like diamonds, the cloudy Milky Way gleaming among them.

We'd seen a similar sight in our few nights in the Nevada Desert during Burning Man last year, when the universe had flung its arms open to us. It was majestic, and it made me feel small in the best possible way.

"There is always light," Julie said quietly. "The stars are always shining, even if we can't see them."

My sister always was philosophical.


Close Your Eyes....

Close your Eyes
And Dream a Dream
and seek
the Courage
To make it Real.
.
.
Reflect on The Past
Envision The Future
and Embrace Today
with an Open
Heart and Soul.





Thoughts From Afar: Part Three of Three

Being Gentle on Yourself

The kinder you are to yourself, the happier you become. And the happier you are, the less you'll seek happiness elsewhere. Then when you eat something, delicious and decadent, you'll actually be able to take delight in it. Instead of feeling dreadfully guilty and hardly enjoying it at all.

Be gentle with yourself. Life is hard enough, it knocks us about, bruises us too often, without us adding bruises of our own.

You wish you had a lover, though to your surprise you may even inexplicably find yourself drawn to someone of a different gender, but mostly because you believe that not having either means you're unlovable. Nothing could be farther than the truth - you just refuse to believe this possibility. When you are actively searching for a mate, more often than not, nothing appears. It is surprising, then, that someone enters your life when you are actively not looking. That happened to me when I gave up completely on searching that I realised my beloved was here all along.

If you don't treat yourself kindly, then you'll never be happy, no matter what else you might achieve in life. The 1st is to be kind. The 2nd is to be kind, the 3rd is to be kind. If you were a teeny bit kinder to yourself, your life would begin to unfold into something quite magical. I promise you. Stop calling yourself 'unlovable', stop calling yourself stupid, stop criticising yourself and giving way to mood swings. Let the tide pull away, go out as it does by the moon's gravitational pull. And then something softer, gentler will come to you in its wake.

I go out and walk in nature, feet bare in long grass and meadow flowers. I see my favourite oak tree, and find a soft place to sit against its old tree trunk, and settle down. The air is empty. The air is still. My mind is silent, yet my heart is full. I become acutely aware of the stillness inside and all around me. I realise then that this is true life and all the drama and noise on top of it is caused by people desperately longing for peace, but not knowing where to find it.

I laugh at the absurd, the seemingly impossible simplicity of it all. And as my laughter drifts into the air, I hear words that seem to come from within my soul, bubbling up like a geyser. Miracles are everywhere; you just need to take a closer look. Leaning back against the tree, I close my eyes and begin to hum a Michael Bublé song until the sun sets into dusk.

Today I'm beginning to feel found again; we create our own future. To see ourselves more clearly, we will grasp a better idea of what we want out of life. You'll discover happiness when you find the courage to stop living a safe life and start living a true one. We have our fears and dreams; live true to yourself. This means taking risks to create what you want.

To live true is to do something because it's in your heart and it needs to be expressed.

A person living true to themselves doesn't consider success or failure. They do it because it feels right. They do it because they must. If you live according to rational practices, you'll always be trapped in a small, seemingly safe, predictable little bubble. But if you live true, all the possibilities of the world will open up to you. You could make it your mantra: Don't live safe and boring, live true.

Except there is one thing you must understand first, before you can hope to get what you want. Until you understand this, you'll always be taking one forward and two steps back.

You have two forces in you. One person is freed by your mind. It creates fear and doubt, making you live by rationality, worry and guilt. And if you continue listening to it, it will lead you to all those things. It wants your life to be safe, stuck and dull; it wants an ordinary life.

The other force is personified by your heart. It creates peace within you, and fulfillment and satisfaction in your life. It wants everything for you; love, joy, your religious belief and with that an inner belief that with God's guidance you can earn enough to live. It wants an extraordinary life. And if you let it, it will lead you to those things when you fix your heart and mind on the God you believe in, and reach out your need to grasp into becoming true to yourself. That is what Julie and I found.

Have you ever talked to your heart? Oh, you should try it; it's wonderful! - So which forces are you listening to?

“Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” - Thomas A. Edison. Thomas Edison tried over two thousand times to invent the lightbulb.

So we must get the courage to carry on and not give up, which is the easiest to do, but to remember that great inventor's self-belief and courage.

Everyone compares themselves with the greatest in their field, but in doing so they miss the point entirely. Not many will achieve to be the greatest gymnast, athlete or writer, or composer, eg. Mozart, but, just like we can't live on a diet of flapjacks, we need variety in our particular interests be they sport, writing, music, cooking etc. So people may want Michael Bublé for dinner, but not for dessert, too. Right?

So instead of trying to be as good as someone else, instead of aping someone else's style, you must instead strive to find your own particular voice, discover what flavour of flapjack you really are.

Fill yourself with peace, joy and happiness on praying and meditating. And fill your mind with whatever is good.

"No need to hurry. No need to sparkle. No need to be anyone but yourself."
- Virginia Woolf

As I said previously in Part Two, I know how hard it is. But I beg you to try. Or you'll never discover yourself. And that would be a great shame. I know in my own life it has taken me a lot of courage, but believe you me, you really do have that courage.

You have to completely focus on what to do, and what you want to be. When feeling down or unsure for no particular reason, seize upon any shred of courage and magnify it. Sing out loud! Haa, sing into a hairbrush like I used to when younger! Any uplifting song will do - even Thirty Seconds To Mars' empowering Closer To The Edge. Whip yourself up into a passionate courage of singing and just go for it! I guarantee you'll feel better for a good sing! Even bathrooms have great acoustics! Singing releases the soul - even a church chorus or hymn - anything that is uplifting bringing joy.

As I shared before, ignore all dissenting and critical thoughts. Especially other people's negative reactions and opinions that lead nowhere and are unedifying; often found on social media. Ignore everything else until you feel completely magnificent, fearless and spectacular! In that state you can achieve everything you want, and I can see this in my twin sister Julie with absolute clarity how she's changed by taking this positive mindset on, despite her suffering Long Covid.

In this stage of life, if there is something we need to learn, then we must suffer in the learning. It's all part of life to strive for being the best we can be in any given moment. Perhaps love isn't to be found in one person: it can be seen everywhere. Waiting behind every shy smile, every kind word whatever creativity nobody likes, it is yours to love. Even a girl who has the gift of insight and empathy in spades, sparkles in your eyes creating a want in you to her to see what's waiting inside. She's there, waiting to illuminate you. Because if you really want to illuminate this world, you've got to burn!

Sometimes we lose ourselves in external things. We need to embrace our being courageous. And when you have done that, then you will have achieved your purpose. And you have got to carry on being your bravest, most glorious you can be.

In closing, I used to think the stars were angels. You, my reader, are one more star in the night sky.

[Dawn.]

This is amazing!

[Celyn]

This was beautifully rich and deep in detail. I loved the messages that you gave throughout this piece as well. Thank you for sharing!

[Ennui.]

I agree with Holly! Very detailed!

[DeletedAccount53]

Thank you. All of you. For posting how my writing affected you. It means a lot to me, more that you will ever know.

[Arabesque- golfing girl.]

This was lovely. Thank you so much for sharing this with us