Archive for the ‘Life’ Category
Posted by Shirley Anne on January 29, 2012
I had the strangest feeling last Friday evening. I had taken E out to lunch in the afternoon. We had travelled to various venues before arriving at the one we had originally thought of visiting in the first place. We had not been to this restaurant for quite some time, possibly more than twelve months but we had chosen well. We went the full three courses and I had my usual bottle of red wine. Later we indulged in a liqueur coffee before finally returning home. Well I actually was dropped off at the pub and I stayed there until well after midnight chatting with friends. E would have collected me had I phoned her but I decided to walk home instead. It was a dry and pleasant night if a little cold so the walk itself was nice but doing it in high heels was not to be recommended. I managed though and was home around one o’clock. I didn’t retire to bed until after two but spent some time online first. It didn’t take me long to board that train to Slumbertown but I was up again two hours later to pay the little girl’s room a visit. Half awake and half asleep I sat there a while and it was then that I was overcome with a very strong feeling, one I had never before experienced. Essentially it was a feeling of meaninglessness if there is such a word, a feeling that somehow my life was totally meaningless inasmuch as no matter what I do to be happy and to enjoy life in the end it is all quite meaningless and pointless. My thoughts turned to Scripture and specifically the Book of Ecclesiastes which describes what I was feeling about my life. I have mentioned this book before and I still recommend it as I do all of Scripture for what it contains. I have learnt to be happy and content with life, learnt to rest in the love of God and it is only because of that love that I find life bearable. We all want to be happy and content but do we really understand what that means? There are many pleasures to be had in life but they never completely satisfy the soul and we return to them repeatedly in the hope that we will have a good time and be happy. When the self-indulgent pleasure has passed we look forward to other things or a repeat of the same which tells me that life’s pleasures are but short-lived and have to be revisited over and over. In the end we tire of them. This is the feeling that I was experiencing. I realised that there is only one thing that lasts forever and it isn’t what my flesh and bones experience but it is what my spirit experiences, the love of God. Whilst I am in the flesh all I can do is to work, rest and play. I am on a merry-go-round that never stops and never really satisfies. I am constantly seeking new avenues for pleasure but it is all truly meaningless. We are but a breath, a whisper and our passing is hardly noticed in the vastness of the Universe. We live but for a short time and we are gone. All we can do is try to enjoy it the best we can. It’s what comes after that is more important.
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Enjoyment, God, Happiness, Life | Tagged: Book of Ecclesiastes, Ecclesiastes, God, Happiness, Life, Religion and Spirituality, Solomon | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Shirley Anne on January 28, 2012
Image via Wikipedia
We have lots of spiders in our house, I’ve mentioned this once or twice previously. Try as we may to be rid of them they still persist so we’ve resigned ourselves to that fact and simply try to keep them down in number. Now you might be thinking to yourselves what kind of house do we live in that has so many spiders? Well our house is no different from any other dwelling but it does have cellars, as many rooms below the ground floor as there are on the ground floor, eight of them and they are all reasonably clean. One even has food stored there in kitchen units that we kept when we refurbished the kitchen years ago. The room even has a carpet on the floor as do the cellar hallway and what we describe as the laundry room. The other rooms do not have carpets but the floors are swept once in a while. Despite this we still have spiders in the cellar rooms. This means that they occasionally migrate to the floor above. The room we have just stripped ready to convert to a wet room soon found it with new residents, even after a day or so but that is because of the holes in the floor! In the room in which we store the food there are other things stored in the centre on the floor. E had decided to vacuum clean a small rocking horse to give to our eldest son for his daughter when she is old enough to sit in it. It had a few cobwebs on it as did all of the other things stored with it! It got me thinking just how long would it take for spiders and other creatures to overrun the planet if we weren’t here? If humankind were suddenly wiped off the face of the earth which animals or creatures would become the dominant species and what kind of world would it be?
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Life, Nature | Tagged: Animalia, Arachnida, Arthropoda, Biology, Flora and Fauna, Laundry room, Spider, Storey | 2 Comments »
Posted by Shirley Anne on January 17, 2012
Image via Wikipedia
Saturday is my rest day…..unless someone has an emergency that needs sorting! I arose before 8 o’clock because I needed to phone someone to arrange having my garage door repaired. As it was I phoned just after 8.30 and he arranged to come on Sunday. That meant my day would be free. I know I need to start on some household projects but I wanted to do that at some other time. I spent most of the morning on the Internet or playing my guitar but after noon I decided to make a chilli-con-carne, something I generally have once each week but not always. Although this dish is best served long after it is cooked because the chilli seeds need time to break down and release their spicy flavour it still tastes good after an hour standing, warmed up of course! It would be around 2 o’clock when I received a call from an old lady some ten miles away. Her electricity safety switch (an RCD) had tripped and she found it wouldn’t reset. I talked the process of resetting it through with her over the phone to no avail. I told her that my van was currently out of use because of the problem I was having with the garage door but I might be able to get someone to take me there. I asked E if she wouldn’t mind doing that for me and she was pleased to do so. I relayed that to the old lady and told her we would be there as soon as we could, well within the next hour. So off we went to do the job. The fault took a little while to find and indeed could not be resolved simply by switching off the circuit breakers, hence the need for an electrician. I finally traced the fault to a section of cable located in a wall that had been pierced by a nail causing a short-circuit between the neutral and earthing conductors, which is why just switching off the live conductor (circuit breaker) didn’t cure the problem. The cable was located behind some wood panelling at the base of a stairway that her son had just repaired. He had inadvertently driven the nail through the cable. To be fair the cable was buried in the plaster and he didn’t know it was there. I carried out a repair and everything went back to normal. So much for my afternoon off work! The cash was enough to pay for the garage door repairs though and left a little something for E too.
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Life, Work | Tagged: Life, Rest and relaxation, Work | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Shirley Anne on January 16, 2012
Image via Wikipedia
At this time of year my thoughts turn towards the tasks I have to do annually. These are, ensuring my subscription to the AA goes through even though it is supposed to be an automatic affair, arranging for a date to have my vehicle checked for its annual MOT test, arranging to continue my vehicle insurance and having my road-fund licence renewed. Thankfully this year my advertising renewal payment has been offset a little. Having cancelled a few weeks of the current block of adverts I have 13 weeks still left. The treadmill of life keeps turning and we go through our annual journeys of events trying to keep up with it all. Falling foul isn’t an option if we wish to stay above the law but thankfully we do get reminded when things require our attention. I remember one year though when my bank failed to pay the AA their fee for my membership and I hadn’t routinely checked if they had received it. Later that same year I had the misfortune to be locked out of my van’s storage area in the rear as the door lock had broken. I needed access because I was in the middle of carrying out some electrical work in a client’s house. I called for help and that was when I discovered that my membership had lapsed. They came out to fix the problem of access but I had to pay my renewal fee first. This is where having a credit card comes in useful. As we get older there is a greater tendency for some of us to forget to do things so it is good to be reminded. It is the time of year when I need to remember that certain things need my attention.
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Driving, Insurance, Life, Motoring, Society, Time | Tagged: Arrangement, Business, Financial Services, Insurance, Maintenance fee (patent), MOT, MOT test, Vehicle insurance | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Shirley Anne on January 8, 2012
Image via Wikipedia
I had the day to myself on Friday as I was released from my jury service until Monday. Not wanting to let the opportunity pass by to enjoy myself for the day I invited E out for an extended lunch, well they are always extended when I dine out. I love the experience of wining and dining out and generally socialising and it is nice to do that with friends and family but it is nicest when in the company with someone very special. In my case that would be my ex partner E whom I love dearly. I take the opportunity to dine out with her as often as I can so that not only do I get to enjoy myself but that she can enjoy life more than she usually does. As is the case I often ask her if she is happy so that I can help her to be happy as much as I can. She is hard to reach sometimes but I persevere for I don’t want her to feel unhappy if I can do something to change that. I wonder sometimes what makes her tick, what it is she wants out of life because I feel she is missing out on things when she should be getting the most out of life. I know she enjoys her outings with me but she is often reluctant to show that. So it was that we both went to one of our favourite haunts in the next town on Friday and had a carvery lunch with dessert and drinks. I polished off a full bottle of red wine and later had a liqueur coffee with a cream topping, similar to the picture on the right. We both had soft drinks too, she was drinking Pepsi-Cola and I was drinking the diet version in-between my sips of wine. I like the taste of the cola following the wine and sometimes I mix the two in the same glass when I am tired of drinking the wine neat, which isn’t often (LOL). We arrived at the restaurant/pub at around 1.30 and we left just before 5.00 stopping off at the supermarket for some rum, whisky and cream. I wanted to enjoy another glass or two of a liqueur coffee! I am off to work on Saturday morning which will be yesterday by the time you read this so I will not be able to have a drink, if I want one, until late in the day. I probably won’t indulge as I value having a healthy liver which needs a break now and then! I might have a drink today, Sunday but then nothing until the end of the week when I have finished my jury service. Mind you, I may get on a case that lasts longer than this coming week but in any event I will enjoy a drink or two at the weekend. I might even surprise the staff at my local pub by paying them the first visit for over six weeks. I love life and I love people who are prepared to enjoy it with me. Life is too short not to enjoy it.
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Drink, Enjoyment, Food, Happiness, Leisure, Life, Lifestyle, Philosophy, Values, Wisdom | Tagged: Alcoholic beverage, Drink, Food, Friday, Leisure, Life, Lifestyle, Monday, Pepsi, Philosophy, Saturday, Soft drink, Wine | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Shirley Anne on January 5, 2012
Cover of Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit
I was watching Sister Act 2 on Monday afternoon. Ok, ok, I was bored but having seen the film once before and knowing the story made no difference, I like the sentimental things in life, besides I had nothing else to do. For those who may not know the story it is about a nightclub singer who goes back for the second time to the aid of a Catholic run school to help them with their pupils. Part of the story involves the trials of the schoolchildren in their quest to enter the interstate singing competition for the best choir, which incidentally they won. Well it is a movie. Just prior to the choir going on stage they were watching one of the other contenders and began to lose what confidence they had when the choir leader, the nightclub singer played by Whoopi Goldberg, gives them a small lecture about not giving in to the fear of losing. Paraphrased, she told them that nothing in this world was ever achieved without effort and if they were to run away from problems in life they would continue to do so all their lives. How true a statement is that? Throughout our lives we are challenged and tested but if we give in to defeat we will never achieve our true potential in life. This is true for anything that presents itself as a challenge before us. The most successful people in the world have a stream of failures behind them but because they persisted they finally won through and became successful. The motto should be, let no-one stand in your way, let nothing defeat you without you try your best to overcome and to reach your goal in life, the desires of your heart. You must stand your ground and not be swayed by anyone else.
Shirley Anne
- Treasures of wisdom (hopeforallmin.wordpress.com)
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Ambition, Life, Philosophy, Wisdom | Tagged: Ambition, Arts and Entertainment, Catholic, Choir, God, Lord, Music, Philosophy, Singing, Whoopi Goldberg | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Shirley Anne on January 1, 2012
E and I went to Preston hospital this afternoon to see our first grandchild. I couldn’t wait to see her and hold her in my arms, in fact I was only there ten minutes when I got the chance. I didn’t want to give her back! So adorable, so tiny, so beautiful. I was reminded of the time my two sons were born and how they looked and how it felt to hold them for the first time. Now my eldest at 29 is a father. How time flies. E got her chance to hold her a minute or so later. We didn’t stay too long, about forty minutes or so but we’ve plenty of time to see them all later. On the way home I asked E if she would like to dine out as we were passing a favourite restaurant of ours. She did and so we dined out for the first time in many months. A pleasant day all round.
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Family, Food, Happiness, Life | Tagged: Drink, Family, Food, Preston | 4 Comments »
Posted by Shirley Anne on January 1, 2012
Image via Wikipedia
Being as it is the start of another year I am wondering just how long it will take me to get used to writing 2012 instead of 2011? In the past I have taken a few days to get used to the change to the year number when writing cheques or letters and such but I have never had a problem with the month change. To me, the first day of the year is no different than it was yesterday, is no different to all the other days but it sort of interrupts a routine. The daily name changes and the monthly name changes seem more finite than a simple number change at the beginning of what we accept as a new year, so we initially make mistakes. Although today is no different from any other day it does mark the beginning of changes in my life. I will not be doing anything today or tomorrow but on Tuesday I will be starting my jury service as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago. It has been about twenty-five years since I was on jury service and no doubt many things have changed since then, for one the venue. I remember little about the procedure but having read the booklet that is supplied I shouldn’t have any problems adjusting to my responsibility. All I remember about my last duty as a juror was the one case I was involved with. My electrical work is on hold for the next two weeks depending on my duty as a juror. There will be other ongoing changes in my life. I just hope they will be for the better for all around me I see changes in the world which are not. Whatever happens I will have to make adjustments according to my own circumstances and try to accept the things I cannot change elsewhere. How long it will take me to adjust to changes I will have to wait and see. I have an inkling what some of those changes might be both in my personal life and those in the world around me but I live from day-to-day and do not worry about such things.
“What can be said in New Year rhymes,
That’s not been said a thousand times?
The new years come, the old years go,
We know we dream, we dream we know.
We rise up laughing with the light,
We lie down weeping with the night.
We hug the world until it stings,
We curse it then and sigh for wings.
We live, we love, we woo, we wed,
We wreathe our prides, we sheet our dead.
We laugh, we weep, we hope, we fear,
And that’s the burden of a year.”
Copyright unknown
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Life, Philosophy | Tagged: Crown Court, Jury duty, Life, Liverpool, New Year | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Shirley Anne on December 29, 2011
Image via Wikipedia
So here I am on Thursday. I wanted to write about Thursday as a day that is special but now it is here I find that it isn’t so special after all. Many things will happen today but that can be said of any day and that’s what makes this day no different from any other. Sunday will mark the beginning of a new year but only for those who observe the Western calendar and for other calendars it will not be 2012, so why do we make something special out of it? For many years now I have not celebrated the coming of the new year and that originally was because I never had anyone to share it with. Later in life there were opportunities to do so and like everyone else around me I went along with it but I was never that bothered whether I did or not. Eventually all my interest fell away as opportunities to celebrate became fewer. Now I realise that the event is nothing really to celebrate but just another day. People ask me why I don’t bother and cannot understand that I don’t but respect my wishes not to participate, or at least I think they do for I am asked almost every year. The point is this, I am not into the sentimentality of it all, even the falsity, nor even the alcoholic stupor that naturally follows such events. I can get drunk at any time should that be my desire. I just cannot see the point of it all. So Thursday, Sunday, this year or next year all makes no difference to me, they are all just the same, days in the life. Friday follows Thursday as it always does and each new day brings with it new things or not, there is nothing special in any of it. As for this Thursday, well who knows what this day will bring? Here is a link that will show you how we came to celebrate new year and why it is 1st January…..http://idkh.org/2011/12/26/what-we-may-not-know-about-new-years-day-2/
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Celebration, Life, Time, Tradition | Tagged: Friday, Gregorian calendar, Holidays, New Year, New Years Eve, Sunday, Thursday | Leave a Comment »
Posted by Shirley Anne on December 27, 2011
Image via Wikipedia
Another year is almost over and many will be looking back to see where they went wrong or where they succeeded in life. Perhaps they will be thinking why they didn’t really get to grips with last years resolutions with perhaps making a better attempt this time round. It is really about a mind struggle, overcoming one’s self, being determined but also being disciplined. Nothing was ever completed without effort. So what are the things which are most important to you? Is it a real desire to finally lose weight and more importantly keep it down? Perhaps you want to finally give up the weed? Is it a determined effort to make more of your life? Is your desire to help others more, pay more attention to your family, get those jobs finished, or even started, you know, the ones your wife has been asking you to do for years? Do you think that whatever plans and resolutions you make will succeed? Well they won’t, not unless you make the effort. So you have the next twelve months to make those dreams come true or at least make every effort to make them so. This time next year you may be finding how pleased you are with all that you’ve promised to do and succeeded or you may find yourself making more promises that you cannot keep. I do not make new year resolutions, not because I am afraid that I might fail, not because there may not be any to make, for I know that my life is far from being perfect, it is because I won’t make promises that I might not be able to fulfill. Any decisions I make will be on the spur of the moment, when I see a need and out of love. I won’t wish you all the best for the new year as the ‘new year’ means nothing to me but what I will wish is that your life will change for the better from this day forth and without the need to make resolutions, unless you absolutely swear by them!
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Happiness, Life, Philosophy, Values | Tagged: Happiness, Life, New Year, New Year Resolution, People, Philosophy | 2 Comments »
Posted by Shirley Anne on December 24, 2011
Image via Wikipedia
Christmas eve and all is well. Nothing to do, nowhere to go, no-one to see. Quietly indulging in my red wine flicking between the television channels to see if there is anything worth watching, something that hasn’t anything at all to do with Christmas, very difficult at this time of year. I tire of the pressure that is imposed on us all, if we allow it of course. Monday morning and it will all be finished with, forgotten and stored away until next year. Folk will already be looking forward to their New Year celebrations and many will stay ‘in the party spirit’ for the whole intervening week between the two celebrations. Each to their own of course but it isn’t for me. It has been at least three weeks since I visited my pub and it will be another three weeks at least before I make another visit there. Hopefully all will have returned to normality by then. I am not really a party animal but I do like mixing with people and socialising over drinks and perhaps the dinner table. I lead pretty much a quiet life and enjoy the simpler things. As I write this (on Thursday….well I said I wanted a break from blogging) there has been no news regarding the arrival of my first grandchild but I will post something when it happens. I won’t be wishing everyone a happy/merry Christmas/New Year but I do wish everyone to be happy in their lives, to love one another and do unto others as you would have them do unto you. May God bless you all.
Shirley Anne
PS….I got a phone call which got me out of bed in order to reconnect an electrical supply for someone 12 miles away. Somehow I knew that was going to happen, a premonition, a vision if you like but I knew it was going to happen. The strange thing is I get these visions quite often lately. The supply was re-instated and all is well.
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Enjoyment, Happiness, Life, Lifestyle, Love, People | Tagged: Christmas, Christmas Eve, Holidays, New Year, New Years Eve | 3 Comments »
Posted by Shirley Anne on December 16, 2011
Image via Wikipedia
I love watching old movies and shows on television. The later ones bring back memories of times gone by when I was young. I was born in November 1945 and I can remember many things from the late forties, from the fifties and sixties right up unto today. I remember the ration books that people had to have in order to buy food and other commodities because many things were in short supply due to the second world war. Gradually things improved and rationing was abandoned in or around 1954, the year following Queen Elizabeth’s succession to the throne. I remember the bunting and the decorating of bicycles, prams and other things with red, white and blue crêpe paper as we celebrated the coronation of the queen as children. I would be almost eight years old then. Many houses had been destroyed during the war so many people had to live where they could, usually with relatives. My parents were fortunate to get accommodation in one of the newly built prefabricated houses, prefabs, that were erected to ease the housing shortage. We stayed in that house from 1946 until 1958 when we moved to a semi-detached house in the suburbs. The prefab had many things in it that most people couldn’t afford to buy for themselves, things like a refrigerator, an immersion heater, a boiler (as opposed to a washing machine which came later), a built-in cooker and what was commonly called a ‘all night burner’, a fire that also heated the water by having a water pipe coil linked to the storage tank (indirect heating) and a modern electrical control panel. We didn’t have a telephone in those days, not many people had. We didn’t get a telephone until many years later after we had moved into the semi-detached house and even then not until about 1970! We had a radio but no television until 1953. The things which altered our lives more than any other were the telephone and the television. We could hear the news over the radio but to see the news was a real eye-opener. We could see places we could only dream about visiting until the advent of cheap flights and overseas accommodation. The telephone most certainly changed our lives. We had embarked on the journey into a faster way to communicate with people. When I began working for myself the mobile telephone had been developed enough for anyone to own one and it was that fact alone which enabled me to run my electrical business efficiently whereas before I had to telephone home for any messages, now people could telephone me wherever I was. Now of course the mobile phone is much more than just a phone, it is a tool for visual communication too, a device which can connect us to the Internet enabling us to get information from anywhere in the world. The Internet enables the world to come into our living rooms, we can see those we are talking with, we can watch television, listen to music without having to store it at home on discs. Technology has advanced so rapidly over the last sixty years and it has done it exponentially. Progress begets progress and is running away with itself. I wonder where it will all end? Things we can do almost immediately today would have taken days to do when I was a child.
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Communication, History, Life, Society | Tagged: Communication, Progress, Semi-detached, Telephone, Television | 2 Comments »
Posted by Shirley Anne on December 11, 2011
Image via Wikipedia
I didn’t have work scheduled for Thursday as the job I had planned was put back until next week so I thought I would get up early and spend some time on my treadmill. I did get up reasonably early at nine o’clock and about half an hour later I was running. I have been slowly building up my stamina on the machine so I was able to go that extra distance on it. It was something like 11 o’clock by the time I got dressed and went out to deposit some cash in the bank and run another important errand. When I returned home I wanted to wash my van and remove the (locked) ladder from the roof. I set everything up and began cleaning the vehicle when I began to feel light rain falling. At first I thought it was just the spray from the hose pipe because it was rather windy but by the time I had almost finished it began to pour down heavily. Somewhat soaked I managed to put the van into the garage and went indoors to prepare my lunch. I had the afternoon free, so I thought but late in the afternoon I got a call to do a job. From what the guy said over the phone his shower wasn’t working so I said I would be there in fifteen minutes. It turned out to be the wall switch not allowing power through to the shower. I had a replacement in the van and thought it would take no time at all to fix but I hadn’t planned on the very poor workmanship of the original installer. Absolutely no spare slack on the cables and the wrong box fitted in the wall. The switch was also placed in a rather awkward position close to an adjoining wall making working on it difficult. The job took much longer than it should have done but I managed in the end. I get annoyed with the quality of work that some of my peers produce and I put it down to poor training. I am glad I don’t have to rely on them to do an electrical job for me. Shortly after I returned home my eldest son and daughter-in-law arrived to unload most of their belongings for storage in our house. They have an interested party wanting to buy their house and hopefully they will finally be able to move as they planned. They will live at her parents house but use our house for storage as it is far larger with plenty of spare rooms. The idea is to buy another house at some point in the future when they can save enough to do that. They won’t have as much expenditure to worry about once they’ve sold their present property so saving will be far easier but of course with a baby on the way they will need money for that. Happy days or maybe happy daze!
Shirley Anne
- Time is a funny thing… (thegirlinrouge.wordpress.com)
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Life | Tagged: House, Shirley Anne, Shopping, Thought, Thursday | 2 Comments »
Posted by Shirley Anne on December 9, 2011
I had been under the impression that my son and daughter-in-law were going to become parents for the first time on or around about the 20th of this month but a few days ago my son told me that the expected date was actually the 25th. That should be interesting. I hope everything goes well for them and I am looking forward to seeing my first grandchild. None of us know the gender of the child because my son and daughter-in-law didn’t want to know before the birth. They simply want a healthy baby, as we all do. They don’t know it yet but their lives are going to change dramatically when the baby arrives, something all of us who have had children know only too well. It only seems like yesterday when my son was born and I have fond memories of those times and a couple of years later when my other son was born. Both of my sons were a joy to myself and their mom and were no real trouble to bring up. They had their moments of course, as all children do but they were no problem to us. I hope my grandchild grows up in the same way and I feel sure that will be the case. So in a little more than two weeks from now we may have an addition to our family but who knows? It may happen sooner!
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Family, Life | Tagged: Children, Family, Life, Parent | 6 Comments »
Posted by Shirley Anne on December 4, 2011
Image via Wikipedia
It was around this time ten years ago that I decided to go for full transition. I had been out for three years to all my new friends and some others but not to my family although by this time they were aware of my dressing. I started the ball rolling by making an appointment with a laser clinic in Liverpool and the first session I think was on 19th December that year, 2001. I had much more to do and to make decisions about and all of that is recorded in one of my pages above so I won’t go into detail here. As soon as the Christmas and New year celebrations were over I set about doing what I had to do and I then had the daunting task of telling my wife and family. That too is detailed in my page above. I am in my tenth year now as a fully transitioned female and although many things have changed about me I remain just the same inside. The real me, my spirit, the person writing down all of this is the same one that used to play in the street with other children sixty years ago, who went to school, who was bullied, who made something of a life, got married had children, got divorced and is still plodding along as best she can. Yes, nothing has changed inside for me over the last ten years or even over the last sixty-six years but the outside has changed dramatically. I live my life differently in some respects than I did ten years ago but the basics remain the same. I sit here reflecting on what has happened in my life and I wonder if I could have made a difference to the way things turned out. Probably yes, I could have but would it have made any real difference to me, the person inside? To the outside world we change, we fit in or we adjust so that we are happy with life. With me, ten years ago I had to make another of those changes so that I could remain happy. In doing that though made changes to other things, not least of all relationships. Not my marriage, that had died five or six years earlier and for other reasons but relationships with others did change in some cases. I never had many friends throughout my life. When I was young I had one friend but I moved house and we lost contact. He tried to re-establish that friendship some seven years or so later but I wasn’t interested, I had become very anti-social. From that point onward I never had friends by my own choice until I got married when we both shared the new friends we had made during the previous two years. Again, we moved on and lost those friends due to the pressures of life. When we divorced I had no friends apart from the one girl I had met in Spring of 1999 whilst out socialising as Shirley Anne. We have remained friends ever since but we don’t see much of each other now. Other friends either live too far away or have dropped off the radar. My family is dispersed and for the most part out of contact. I wrote a letter to one of my sisters some weeks ago but she couldn’t be bothered to write back. My children have flown the nest and I get to see them quite often but fleetingly. Basically I have nobody at all except my ex who for the moment is not very close at all. Am I better off now than when I was ten years ago? In some ways absolutely! In other ways no! That’s life and try as I may to change things it doesn’t always mean that it will improve. A happy and sad Shirley Anne at the same time.
Shirley Anne
0.000000
0.000000
Posted in Family, Friendship, Life, Philosophy, Relationships, Time, Transsexual, Values | Tagged: Christmas, Family, Holiday, Liverpool, New Year, People, Relationships | 2 Comments »
