Wednesday 31 August 2011

SCHINDLER GOD - The Lift Speaks

I recently attended a session with a most prolific Motivational Speaker who recommended that to deal with the cosmic tension in lifts, to thank everyone for attending the meeting.
Thinking about how the workers in my building could neither greet others nor their reflections in our very ergonomically out there lifts, hilarity prevailed.

Today, I was ready to call that meeting. Ice Breaker-ready, in fact. I had all the pick-up lines and the pick-me-up quotes to start a small revolution in a very confined space. Our tight group of about 8, all wearing purple and black - not Random, instead cosmically ordered - were a tad more upbeat than the normal crew, predicting weather with layman's palette: cold, hot, windy, uncertain, bearing germs and subtly holding onto the uncomfortable communion that preceded a hesitant disembarkation onto a silent floor with a barking In Tray.

But my rise to Motivational Speaking Glory in a Schindler Creation was shortlived by a very eerie pre-recorded message declaring: "Do not be alarmed; Help is on the way!" It repeated the consolation enough times for us to determine that this was the standard debriefing for elevator malfunction and the concomitant panic that accompanied being stuck for an undetermined period in a cubicle with 4 x 4 full-length, amply illuminated mirrors and companions not of your choosing.

OR ...

It could be that message in a capsule that we all need all day long, with every question and every breath. That God is there, ready to help, fixing things in ways beyond our reason. Reminding me that whilst I had spent a significant amount of my meagre education on problem formulation and consolidation of alternatives (one progressively worse than the former), HE has ALL THE ANSWERS, planet and species solutioning on a meta-everything level that years after, with a rather pathetic post-traumatic optical dependency called hindsight, we are still thanking Him for the things He gave and the things He didn't and the Serenity to know the difference.

Moral of the story: listening to voices is not as cracked up as it's made out to be. May it be the Right One ...

Tuesday 30 August 2011

I JUST GOT SERVED

There are a couple of reasons why I believe in the law of attraction.
a. I have a visceral reaction to pink Motel signs
b. Most of the food I've ever tasted, licked, read about or eaten are all 
    around me in a very permanent relationship
c. The gods and angels need mortals to prank and miracle practise on (I
    am a channel of their peace and instrument of their trials)

So when I asked the universe to send me a multi-everything  butler named Miguel, there was all of a 12-month delivery period, punctuated with many other men in the hospitality industry thrusted into my life. I didn't figure it all out until I thought about HUGO BOI, the latest instalment in the fast metabolism, smooth talking, too-gorgeous-to-be single Rastafari restaurant manager who really whet my appetite. Well for certain things, and regrettably, for not a very long time. I must admit though, of all the cocktail mixing, cutlery from the outside in group, he was the best. And as I am editing my cancellation request to the universal post-office, in many ways perhaps the worst. Everything about him, apart from his very lean and almost bony butt, was homely. With him I wanted to share everything because he spoke about his mother and sister so much (one would think that strong women would influence his faulty mind, but alas, they worship him just a little more than I do) He ate all the time, loved music and the mirror ... I never imagined observing vanity being great for self-esteem, but try hanging out with a man who considers himself a perfect specimen of the Almighty, who hogs the mirror and smiles at himself with so much pleasure I suspected for a short while my foyer was haunted and that he was communicating with some unseen beings.  

But I digress or regress or whatever ...

Then there was Peter who followed me, wine in paper cup, deeming me the most beautiful woman he had ever seen (He's like 45; has he lived in a cave for the past 44 and half, and how are his eyes reacting to light?) and immediately saw me on his CV. Fortunately I was able to talk him down from the ledge in the restaurant where I was sitting and upon further investigation, discovered that he was recently seperated from his wife (I suspected they would reunite again in their drive-way later that evening) and owned a chain of fast food franchises. Hospitality or hospitalise me!!?? All I wanted was a butler of African descent from the agency, not the mob!

Tony, 58 yr old refugee, another 5-course dilemma all on his own. Loves and stakes out all the restaurants I frequent, and knows the menus of most by heart and price range. He loves food and polishes plates. Literally. Mister Muscle of the Platter. He insists that it has everything to do with his impoverished war-torn childhood,  where often they grated two or three veggies to make a broth for the entire family. And whilst I celebrate his coming out, I cannot help but picture a Macbeth scene with witches and cauldrons and soup regrettably not palatable for the average detox regimen.

Of late, I have 20 year old waiters lingering over the more than 40% tip with promises of clearing my table, my way and temporarily my mind in the most imaginative and delicious ways. 

IT ALL ENDS HERE. I am sending Miguel to Finishing School and thence to my friend Mabel. I feel like I've waited for him my whole career, and now that he's here, there are replicas or at least of similar qualification, with added weirdness, all around. I SURRENDER! Henceforth I will eat simply. Dishes will auto-clean or be recycled. I shall fetch my own mail and do my own shopping from a list not telepathically forwarded to over-efficient, gifted and gorgeous person, but written by my own hand or stored on my own phone, dammit. OK, once own phone is retrieved. I shall queue in all manner of spots by myself and look happier for it. I shall with immediate effect online-everything else as I learn to know all the rooms in my home and master the art of laundry, ironing and sorting by texture, colour or event!
I will live with the silence and pouring my own welcome home drink and pouring out my heart to my very self-absorbed therapist who is decidedly anal about the upholstery on his couch. From Freud to friggin madness if you ask me nicely! Anyhoo, dealing with the matter at hand, henceforth, Accounts payable will be an action and not a filing tab.

I can be that bulb-changing, landscaping, catering and hosting so-and-so with great prospects. 'I have nothing if I don't have you' sings another diva, but I am writing a new song from one of my personal greats: I'm gonna make a change for once in my life ... I will omit the Man in the Mirror chorus which drags me back forcefully and lovingly to Hugo ...

Oh Dears, wish me well. I will have to stand on my own two feet in shoes I've bought and drunkenly retrieved from under the chaise myself, myself.

How treacherous this life!

But I see no way around breaking the food guy spell of really crazy runners, (head) waiters, baristers,  and restaurant managers, owners and Quality Assurers in the dairy section ... who have come in search of 'love' (moist and manic mostly I suspect) and who have driven me round the bend and up the pole...

In the words of my wise, first-time-round divorce lawyer: "be careful what you wish for; you might just get it." And thinking about You Go (Hugo's) vintage Bob Marley collection, it's worth the consideration!

MOMENTARY SUSPENSION - WOMEN IN GREATNESS

It has been a while since I shared a few thoughts. And as my lamps constantly remind me, there is under the spatterings of normality and the layers of post-travel dust, at least some rhyme and reason to this journey. It was also blissfully wholesome to NOT be self-absorbed and distracted, and I must admit Women's month was the perfect antidote to my business as usual diva-esque behaviour.


Being asked to present to some phenomenal women a few weeks ago, it was really powerful and insightful to find that I was more energised and inspired by women who had been through so much - REALLY!!!! Here I was with my deranged-on-account-of-stylist-being-out-of town and howling at the moon because the prayers and fasting week didn't produce much results largely (no pun intended) due to the fact that I was praying so hard for the fast to be over and that restitution came in large bouts of euphoria and even larger bowls of pasta. Here were women who survived violence. Not of the last day of the 75% less sale, but at the hands of the men they loved and despite the odds walk with dignity, spreading the word of courage and encouragement. Young women who have had to make real life-altering decisions, whether to raise their own children or to give them up. Women living positively, fearlessly and with no hangups.

I hung up my suspenders and for a mini-break suspended my issues, revelling in the true power of what it means to be a woman and to be the change I want to see and feel in the world. It was great to trade the I and ME for the US and WE, and to feel the tension of healthy compromise and value creation.
I had been ill for so long that my organs were not even making an effort. My mind needed to meet me half-way. Between the antibiotics and the antipasti I found a quiet place where my faith and love was restored.

We do have the power to change the world, one small 'Thank-you' and 'I Love You' at a time. Appreciate all you have and praise God for all the great women in your life!
I do!