Lydia has had a good rest this afternoon after a longish walk this morning.
I pushed her a bit, to go a bit further than she wanted to, although it was an easy walk for both of us really. Just over an hour on flat ground.
I’m tired too, though recognise I still need to push myself a bit as well. I’m tired but still not able to fully relax into the deep sleep that I need.
We had some over-ripe bananas so I made banana cake, with the addition of linseed, chia seeds, pumpkin seeds, all-spice and ground ginger. I used my standard cake recipe – 4oz butter/margarine, 4oz sugar, 4oz flour and 2 eggs, x 3, although I used less sugar to allow for the sweetness of the bananas. I also added some rolled oats. It turned out well. Baked in two loaf tins at 180 degrees centigrade, initially for about 20 minutes, then turned down and baked for a bit longer, until they passed the skewer test, coming out clean so I knew they were done.
As usual, Lydia has been keeping me good company on a quiet rainy day.
She hasn’t had her tea yet but doesn’t seem in any hurry for it. Neither am I for mine.
It wasn’t an uneventful walk for me and Lydia this morning as we saw several dogs and a horse from a distance, all with owners – or, in the case of the horse, with its rider.
I thought at one point the horse and rider were going to be heading our way, which would have meant me seeking a quick diversion from their path, down into a ditch, then up and out the other side. Thankfully, they turned in a different direction, perhaps after having heard Lydia’s initial reaction of barking on sight of them.
Lydia still struggles on sight of dogs as well as horses and I still struggle to find a way of reassuring her. She gets the principle of not reacting but just finds it hard to put it into practice. I think this is something that many or most of us struggle with, one way or another.
Putting Buddhism into practice was a key theme of the weekend course I’ve just been on. So, I’ll just keep doing what I can, reflecting and hopefully learning.
As it’s Tuesday I went to visit my friend who used to live in the village but now lives in a care home. As usual, she greeted me with a warm smile, leading me to feel very welcome.
Coming home, I do a few things that I need to do in the kitchen, give Lydia her tea, then start preparing ours.
I’ve made up a sauce based on a pasta dish that I enjoyed when I visited Rome quite a few years ago. I remember it had mushrooms, ground pistachios and, I think, bacon. I’ve also included garlic and onion.
I used a food processor to chop the mushrooms up very very finely so that they are almost ground like the pistachios. I’ve seasoned with lots of freshly ground black pepper, a good splash of Worcestershire sauce, some soy sauce and half a stock cube.
It’s tasty and I’m hungry so time, I think, to start boiling some water for the pasta.
I don’t think we have enough spaghetti so I’ll use fusilli which should also help to absorb the sauce and flavour.
Lydia gave me a gentle nudge in the early hours and I went downstairs to open the back door for her, propping it open so that she could enjoy some morning air, which I knows she likes to do, while sheltering inside. It gives her a chance to go and have a ‘peepie’ if she needs one and I go down later to close it, as expected finding her now curled up in her chair.
My lower back is aching a bit after my exertions of yesterday, balancing on a stepladder that I’d positioned so that I could reach the far corners of the walls I was painting. I knew I hadn’t strained my back – I’d been careful and I have Qigong and yoga to thank for giving me flexibility and strength that I wouldn’t have otherwise. I did, however, feel that I’d stretched muscles that I wouldn’t otherwise have stretched, and decided to make myself a cup of tea for comfort, to take back to bed. It must have worked because I didn’t wake until after 9am and I felt I’d had a reasonably deep sleep for a few hours.
It was the ‘Boot and Shoe’ walk – that I also call the ‘woodland walk’ – for Lydia and me this morning, the name coming from the house nearby. She was sniffing and pulling most of the way so I don’t know what scent or scents she’d picked up on, but they were strong.
After coming home and giving Lydia her breakfast, I decided to make some blueberry muffins. I don’t feel like my usual breakfast foods at the moment – even poached eggs on toast which I normally love as a brunch – and muffins seemed like a good option. I’d bought a large tray of blueberries when I went shopping yesterday and they are a good nutritious fruit.
For a standard cake mix I use a basic formula of equal quantities of butter or margarine, sugar and flour in a ratio of 4, 4 and 4 plus two eggs. This morning, I had 12oz of baking margarine in a tub leftover from when I’d made a cake a couple of weeks ago, so I used that as the starting measure. Deciding that I didn’t want my muffins too sweet, I weighed out 8oz of sugar instead of 12oz. I’m quite happy to use metric measures but this morning stuck to imperial as it made it easy with the amount of margarine I was starting with. Six eggs, a sprinkling of salt, 12oz of self-raising flour – plus a little extra baking powder just to help the muffins be as light and fluffy as they can be – an unmeasured quantity of blueberries and a splash of evaporated milk completed the mix.
I’d preheated the oven to 180 degrees centigrade and spooned the mixture into 18 paper cases. I baked them initially for 20 minutes and then moved the muffins from the top shelf to the lower shelf and the ones from the lower shelf to the higher shelf to help them all cook evenly. I set the timer for another 10 minutes but got engrossed in writing this post and didn’t hear it go off! The muffins, however, are just nicely browned, not burnt, and I am now waiting for them to cool down so that I can try one, or two, or more.
The carbs should help to set me up for some more painting this afternoon. Having finished the walls I’m now turning to woodwork that was done not so long ago but needs a bit of freshening up in places. It shouldn’t take long and won’t be anywhere near as strenuous as yesterday’s efforts. I do find the process of painting soothing, so I’ll just take my time and it’ll get done.
As it turned out, the small pot of paint that was in the garage, that I thought was a water-based satin white for woodwork, was actually a matt white emulsion. I only discovered this after I’d painted over with it in a few places but it’ll be fine. I’ll buy a pot of the paint that I need tomorrow and go over it again.
There’s also a skylight window frame that needs doing, so I started to prepare that by giving it a good clean with some sugar soap solution. I was too tired to start painting it today as it will need careful concentration – including masking tape application in places – to make sure I do a proper job of it. It will take a couple of coats and I also need to try and reach the outside pane to clean it. I cleaned the inside pane today but I may need my steam cleaner for the outside.
Positioned at the top of the stairs, I used a combination of a chair, stepladders and a left-side-step on to my ‘strategically placed’ filing cabinet today and was able to reach all parts of the skylight frame. It’s going to be a job for later in the week and probably going on into next weekend.
Trev’s back after going out earlier. He sampled and approved the muffins and I’ve now reached the 28th day of my latest 28-day writing cycle, so I’m taking a short break from writing new posts and will publish an earlier post each day instead, starting with ‘A Bag of Clay’ that includes a poem. Hope you enjoy it.
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Lydia emerging from the tunnel at the dog field this morning.
How do we find solutions to problems if we don’t know the root cause?
The answer, of course, is “with great difficulty”.
In fact, if we don’t identify the root cause of a problem, we are only ever going to be treating the surrounding tissue, which may alleviate symptoms for a while, but does nothing for the longer term.
As I’ve continued my journey of recovery from mental health and emotional difficulties that got buried deep inside when I was a child, I’ve come to realise that I’ve still got a long way to go.
I’ll turn 70 at my next birthday. I am, in all aspects, in a better place than I’ve ever been in my life, but the process of healing continues, probably because it’s only just begun.
There are times now when I can physically feel the emotional and psychological pain – pain that was compacted down into the mould that was made for me when I was young – finally pushing out from the core of my bones and the pores of my body.
It’s only because I’ve finally been able to acknowledge the source and reach a point of acceptance, that I can sit with this pain, experience it, let it go.
It’s taken a lot of work, a lot of searching, a lot of learning, a lot of losing, a lot of loving, to arrive at this point.
And I do feel sadness, regret, an ache for what I haven’t had, that a lot of people take for granted or even don’t appreciate at all: family. My own family.
But I also know that I have been so, so lucky to have met the people that I’ve met, learned what I’ve learned, found what I’ve found.
As I write there is gentle music playing, the back door is open and Lydia is lying in one of her favourite places, just outside.
It’s a spot that is fairly cool in this summer weather and from which she has a good vantage point of her domain: our back yard.
She barks occasionally at potential invaders – mainly pigeons – but mostly just enjoys being there, as I am enjoying, being here.
I realise that somebody, or circumstances, could take that away from me. But for now, I’m just glad for what I have. It’s a lot.
This may not seem like the most momentous achievement or purchase of the century, but for me, in the context of my life, it is.
It marks the point where I do, finally, know that I am in control of my life.
Over 40 years ago, I had a car but didn’t even have £5.00 to put petrol in it.
I’ve had a few car breakdowns since then but none as major as the personal breakdowns I’ve had to recover from.
There were times when I thought that my life was a write-off, and I had no insurance policy to fall back on; only a belief that I couldn’t give up, however hard it got.
And I didn’t.
My life’s journey has been about retraining my brain – to think differently; see things differently; do things differently.
So, today, I drive my car with two new front tyres and, though a little tired myself, feel a strong sense of relief.
I had a lovely walk with Lydia this morning, and a lovely afternoon with a friend.
I am no longer ‘locked in’, nor am I ‘locked out’. I am free to be, and to be me.
That doesn’t mean I can or want to be complacent; quite the opposite. I want to make the most of every day: learn, experience, reflect, be open to possibilities, accept what I can’t change; appreciate what I have.
I’ve recently read an article in the BBC’s Science Focus journal about willpower.
I’m not a scientist which is one of the reasons why I get this journal every month. I find out about all sorts of interesting things that I wouldn’t hear about otherwise, and it’s generally a really good, accessible read (although some bits go way over my head!).
In this article there was reference to willpower in relation to eating disorders and the impact that meditation and other aspects of mindfulness training can have on the power of the human will.
In my early teenage years, I had to use willpower to start to take control of my own life but eventually had to allow myself to move beyond it and enter that scary place where self-control no longer prevailed.
I still use willpower – to push myself from the point of doing nothing – which I can so easily fall into – to the point of doing something, making a start with decorating my house, for example. But as far as eating is concerned, I seem to have arrived at a much healthier state of mind, where I eat when I’m hungry and recognise the signs when I’m full. I enjoy food – a whole range of different types of food, not just the ‘cottage cheese and crispbread, endless omelettes and no chips diet’ that I lived on for many, many years.
When I concentrated on eating as little as I possibly could every day, I had little capacity to concentrate on anything else. I’m no longer limiting my life like I limited my food intake although I’m not just eating my way into the oblivion of obesity either.
Ironically, the room that I’ve started working on in the house is the dining room. I’ve found a fabulous wallpaper – ‘Mystical Forest’ – and I’m taking my time, doing a bit at a time, and can gradually feel that sense of transition from having to push myself to do it, to getting drawn in to the process of doing it, and taking pride in the way it looks. I don’t think I will gain any interior design awards, but it is a labour of love, to enhance the lovely home that me and my lovely partner are lucky enough to live in.
Glad About 
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