So here it goes

It's been such a while since I did the whole blog thing; I'm not sure I have it in me any more.  But I still experience things, I still have opinions (so many opinions) and, before I started trying to type this, I thought I could still write.

Life sometime throws things at you from left field that take you completely unawares.  When I was going through counselling a couple of years back, I was once presented with this scenario: "You're on a boat and the waters have been calm for days, since you started your trip.  You bob along and all is well, then a storm hits and the boat gets tossed around on the sea.  What do you do?"  Well, you have to change, you're no longer in your comfort zone and you have to adjust and do things you've never had to do before.  I'm still appallingly bad at this, but I have recently been witness to one of my friends encountering one utterly hideous thing after another: unimaginable heartbreak, confusion, loss, despair - his world collapsed in the space of a fortnight.  He could have fallen apart, he could have given in, but he didn't, and I have never felt so much pride and respect for one person as I do for him.  Martin, you are amazing.


Skiing?  You?
Yes, I'm learning to ski.  With a holiday booked in a bespoke ski chalet in France in January, I'm GOING to fucking ski!

It's hard to describe the whole process.  Anybody who has learned to drive will understand: the whole thing is totally alien to you; your ankles are locked into position in rigid boots, feet are strapped to 5 foot bits of fibreglass, and you're expected to shuffle about on snow - to enjoy sliding on it, when all your life you have navigated to the stuff with super-grip souls, terrified of slipping. 

So you learn how to side step up a snowy slope, to hold a position there - knees leaning up the slope, skis slightly on their edges.  Knees are NOT suppose to bend this way, the joints don't allow it, but you persevere so as not to start some hideous domino slide with your classmates. 

And then comes the standing at the top of a slope, trying to hold position without sliding down.  What the fuck?  No.  Again, this is just wrong - knees are not supposed to do this.  But you smile at the instructor and then try to "roll the knees out" to start moving, which you don't.  What do you mean, "just roll the knees out"?  I'm doing that, nothing's  ha........!!!!

And so the snowplough comes in really handy.

I'm at the stage where I can get up a slope, stand at the top, and get to the bottom without much incident.  I can't turn though.  No matter how hard I try, something stops the "feet, point in that direction!" signal transmitting through to the tips of the skis.

Like driving, I can see this being a long and arduous process.  But I'll get there in the end.


House
We're buying my house.  It's fantastic.  I'm so excited.  This time, it's going to be fantastic.


So, despite life throwing me that wicked curveball on the high seas a few years back, despite me thinking that the sun would never shine, that I'd never be happy again, all those people, but especially my dear Piggy, proved me so very wrong.