Dear blogging friends, it's been a while since I blogged and I am wondering as I type how you all have been. I will no doubt visit you in the next few days and look forward to seeing what you all have been up to in the intervening weeks.
Here, things are still a bit peculiar health wise but I hope (please God) to have some 'closure' at the end of this month, thus more on that later.....
Separately, a family member is getting married in 6 weeks. Well, I say family member, what I really mean is my sister. I guess she feels pretty distant from me as she and I have been estranged for a really long time. Without going into the gorey details (and they are pretty gruesome, believe me!), suffice to say we have been invited to the wedding.......the invitation, sadly, was only forthcoming when the proverbial gun was placed to said siblings forehead that lest she ask me/and mine, there would be no wedding (this from my father). So.....it's weird to be asked to a wedding of somebody you no longer know, but once knew better than you knew yourself, knowing in your heart that you have only been asked on sufferance, and not really wanting to go, but having to for the sake of ..... well, for the sake of your parents happiness, for truly there is no other reason that I really want to get all dolled up and attend the shindig, among the guests of which I neither know nor want to know, as I believe "our side" are not really represented that well and the entire guest list consists of work colleagues and various other connections and acquaintances of the happy couple....heavy sigh. Help! Anyhoo, dear blogging friends, above, and looking at the first photograph of the garden statue, (isn't she a beauty!) - behold the wedding gift. For verily I laid aside my sadness and hurt feelings (actually they are sitting in a jar labelled "forget this if you want to survive" on a shelf alongside the tin containing other tragic fragments labelled "Je ne regrette rien...but sometimes..."). If it is not entirely clear from the photograph, it is a bird bath. We could not identify the goddess at the garden centre where we purchased her and have not been able to identify her on various internet searches since (anyone got any ideas?) - except that, as per the garden centre owner, she is from Bangkok Thailand and is a Hindu goddess. I have a bit of a thing about the birds (and the bees, hee hee) as many of you will know, and I love the thought of giving a gift that not only gives pleasure to the garden owners (herself and himself) but will give pleasure, not to mention clean fluffy wings to the birds who visit them. We had an exhaustive search for a pleasing bird bath, let me tell you and it was on the 5th garden centre visit that we eventually found our goddess. Worryingly, when I did search for Hindu goddesses online, among a list of dozens, the goddess Shiva that seemed a close match for our statue, apparently is the goddess of war and destruction? Surely not. It's too late to take her back now anyway so if that turns out to be true I shall have to tell a white lie as to her true nature! I don't honestly think that's who she is though and am sure that somebody out there will enlighten me as to her identity. The weirdness of the upcoming event in terms of the astonishing "Hello" magazine level of secrecy is making me feel slightly queasy. I hope I can survive it all. I am not very good at plastering a smile on my face and playing the social butterfly! I am more of a .... hmm....let me see..... I guess I am more of a wedding in the back garden/fairy lights in the trees/homemade food washed down with a cold beer or a nice glass of wine/kind of gal.....No doubt I will be posting again on this between now and then......incidentally, the other photos were taken after a particularly heavy downpour of rain and the loudest clap of thunder I have ever heard in my life, which exploded right above the roof of our home. Jeepers, if she really is the goddess Shiva/goddess of war and destruction, what have I unleashed? Another wedding installment on another day.....
(by the way, if you are wondering what the wedding pressie is doing sitting in my back garden, she is there till I deliver her, closer to 'the day'. I'm sure that she is getting pleasantly weathered while she awaits her fate. For now, much love from AKR).
Dear friends, first and foremost thank you so very much to all those who have sent me such sweet and thoughtful little messages over the past few months, they truly made me smile and kept my spirits up, thank you from the bottom of my heart to all of you... and I also want to let you know that I hope to return to blogging, in a small way, very soon. May I take this opportunity to wish you all light, good luck and many blessings in this new year. Stay well, stay close to family and friends, stay safe and stay strong and ever hopeful. With much love, AKR. XX
For the time being, dear friends, I will not be flying my kite in the great blogging sky. Health issues are keeping me from doing some stuff and sadly, for now, blogging is one of the things I have to temporarily wave goodbye to. I will be back soon though and as I will be concentrating all my efforts on regaining good health, I hope my return will be sooner rather than later. Thank you to anyone who recently posted a comment and sorry I have not been able to reply. I really appreciate the little visits you made and thank you warmly and very sincerely. For now, I send you all much love and look forward to once more flying my little kite up into the big blue beyond, very very soon. Love, AKR.
It's Friday. The sun found it's way out from the forest of clouds and took a stroll across the blue laneway above. Breakfast was late Summer strawberries tumbled onto toasted bread, splattered with natural yogurt and honey and sprinkled liberally with cinnamon...all washed down with coffee...delicious. I felt well. I walked. I saw gardens I had not seen in a while. A small lady in a big hat was kneeling in amongst her flowers at the front of her home, I smiled and said Hello and she smiled and said Hello back. I breathed deep. Back home, the washing blew on the line and I could hear my neighbour's grand-daughter babbling in her lovely baby voice. I can feel energy bubbling inside me, a familiar but almost forgotten feeling. The poplars across the road are like upturned green broomsticks, lazily sweeping the pale mauve clouds across the sky. I am happy.
Dear blogging friends, it's been a while since I blogged and I am wondering as I type how you all have been. I will no doubt visit you in the next few days and look forward to seeing what you all have been up to in the intervening weeks. 
Here, things are still a bit peculiar health wise but I hope (please God) to have some 'closure' at the end of this month, thus more on that later.....
