Author: howtobemeagain

In which I ponder…love, family and distance

/ howtobemeagain / 2 Comments

love-around-the-world

When we are young, we imagine we are invincible and, unless forced by circumstance, we rarely consider our mortality. In middle adulthood (I think this is where I’m at now, although some – including myself – might want to discuss whether I’m actually an adult, but I’m certainly in the middle of something), those of us who are lucky enough to have them around, kid ourselves that our parents are immortal.

I’ve not always had the greatest of relationships with my parents, in particular my mother. But the passing of time, and in particular the experience of parenthood has taught me to be more tolerant and more grateful for what I have. All parents are just doing the best they can at the time, with the tools they’ve got.

I love my own children with a passion and a depth I did not know was possible until I had them. And I can remember then having an epiphany about my parents – realising that they must feel like this about me too.

Moving to the other side of the world means that visits are infrequent, although I have been fortunate to have seen my family at least once a year during the 8 years I have been in Australia. The time passing between visits, though, means that those incremental signs of change and ageing that can go unnoticed when you see someone regularly are visited upon you starkly every time you meet.

For my dad, this has meant his hair has gotten whiter, and he’s become a little grumpier. His wit is still as sharp as ever and he is still in demand for his professional knowledge on boards and the like, and for his local activism and advocacy. Adventurous too – he just got back from Machu Picchu. We will gloss over the unfortunate incident involving alcohol related but apparently elegant (according to him anyway) pirouetting on the local station platform. Suffice to say, dad is not much different to how he’s ever been but during the time passing between two visits 18 months apart, my Mum seemed to get smaller, a bit frail and rather muddled.

However, it is one thing facing the mortality of one’s parents, which is in the natural order of things. It is quite another watching your brother and the rest of your family deal with a terminal diagnosis for his beautiful 11 year old son when you feel you are too far away.

I’ve learnt through the experience of emigrating that love, family and friendships recognise no borders, particularly in these days of technology and easy (ish!) travel. In many ways I feel as connected as I was when I was only round the corner or a few hours drive away. Social media allows us to continue to have a window into the lives of people thousands of miles away on a minute to minute basis, and Skype and texting and other applications mean that chatting is frequent. But there are some ways of expressing love that do not translate well across hemispheres. The loving touch, the hug, a much needed cuddle. Picking up a prescription and dropping it round, helping out with the shopping, turning up with an unexpected bottle of wine…how do I love thee? Let me count the ways…

I can’t help wondering if I am on the right side of the world. I love Australia and I have made a life here, but when the inevitable happens, will I feel I loved Australia so much it was worth sacrificing time with the people I love – and who love me? Will my annual visits provide enough memories to sustain me when they are gone? Am I doing enough to support my family?

I’m not sure that I know the answer to these questions but I do know that I am not the first, and will not be the last, to consider them. They are the dilemma, the pain and sorrow of immigrants all over the world. I suppose I just have to hope that I have enough time to decide.

*****************************************************************************************************************************************************************

My nephew has been diagnosed with Battens Disease and you can read about his brave struggle here.

In which I ponder….Spanx

/ howtobemeagain / 1 Comment

spanx-spnx01-067-gvz

I realise that this may appear to be a little off topic. And if the truth be known, I have been out tonight with some girlfriends, and we may have consumed some alcohol, so forgive me if this post does not seem quite so zen or soul searching as previous ones. But I have stuff I need to talk about. And that stuff, tonight, is Spanx.

So this evening, when rummaging about in my underwear drawer while I was getting ready to go out, I came across a pair of Spanx. Not just any pair of Spanx, of course – these Spanx belong to me. I bought them some years ago – I think when I was married – but they have not seen the light of day for some time.

Now, it’s freezing in Sydney tonight. Not by European standards of course, but very cold for New South Wales. There are places 90 minutes south where children are making snowmen in their gardens, which is sufficiently unusual for it to have pretty much consumed my Facebook feed for two days.

So I looked at these Spanx, and they looked warm. Really, really warm. And I thought about how warm I would be if I wore these Spanx under my jeans. So I did it. And I have to say, they felt good. I felt warm, but more than that, I felt kind of held together, secure, like none of my 46 year old flesh was likely to escape and cause me embarrassment.

Later in the evening I nipped to the loo. When I say ‘nipped’ though, I mean I virtually undressed in order to release my nether regions from said Spanx. And whilst I sat, half naked, in a bar toilet, feeling somewhat exposed, I got to thinking about Spanx. And my overwhelming question was…

What are they for?!

The thing about Spanx is that they are not designed to keep namby pamby Sydney Siders warm on winter evenings. They are designed to make women look slimmer – to smooth out all signs of age, childbirth and late night post drinking visits to Macdonalds. All very well of course, if you subscribe to the idea that these things need to be disguised.

So I think the idea is that you wear them so that people can’t tell what your body really looks like.

Let’s think about that for a moment.

Let’s imagine that you are out, as I was this evening, at a bar and you are wearing your Spanx. Because of their unrivalled ability to hold everything in and smooth everything over, you look remarkably svelte, and not at all like you might have produced two children. You are chatting to a guy, who is clearly interested in this smooth, potentially childless you.

And now let’s flip forwards. You’ve been on a few Spanx assisted dates. He’s come over for dinner, and it seems likely that your Spanx might be removed after dessert. Is he going to be disappointed that you are not as svelte as your slimming underwear might suggest, or just appalled at the sheer size and complexity of your knickers – because, let’s face it, anyone who has ever worn Spanx knows how tricky they are to get on and off, and how unattractive they are. The reality is, you don’t ever need anyone you are trying to impress to see underwear like this.

I wondered then whether they are more suited to the longterm relationship. But your longterm partner knows you are not smooth and svelte. He also knows you have given birth to two children. They are probably his children. So should he not revel in the softness of your child-giving body?

I know some of my women friends will tell me that they wear Spanx because they make them feel good, and not for men. Ok. I’ll chose to believe that, and I do. I don’t believe that women wear Spanx purely to attract men, nor to make men feel good.

But I can’t help thinking that this is a little disingenuous. Because by wearing them, we conform to notions about how women ought to look, which is removed from the reality of how we really look, and I can’t help thinking that these are ideas that have been largely formulated by men – not women.

My advice is this. Be proud of your body. Don’t hide it from people – because the people who are lucky enough to ever see it in detail will love it with every soft fold, bulge and stretch mark. Anyone who doesn’t, doesn’t deserve the honour of seeing it.

And only wear your Spanx when you are very, very cold.

In which I ponder dating…

/ howtobemeagain / 1 Comment

best-funny-advice-about-dating

Over the last few years of singledom, I have learnt a few things about dating. And the lesson that stands out most clearly is this:

There is no group of people less qualified and more willing to give advice on dating than those who have been partnered up for 20+ years. 

There. I said it.

Dating is very different to being in a long term relationship – which is of course a skill and an art in which they have considerable expertise.

Having said that though, I am no slouch when it comes to long term relationships. I might be single now, but I was with someone for 21 years. At one point I was even winning the sibling rivalry contest in my family for who could be married the longest. I still am actually, although I very much hope I am overtaken.

It’s been surprising to me how many people – particularly women – tell me that if something happened to their marriage, they wouldn’t ever bother partnering up again. They believe that my life is full of forbidden pleasures, fun and a level of self determination that they envy. I can almost see the grimaces on the faces of my single friends from here.

Well, the grass is always greener eh? Conversely though, the majority of single people I meet – male and female – would very much like to find that special someone. Personally, I would hope that in any future partnership I would have pleasures, fun and self determination anyway.

This yearning for someone was driven home a couple of weeks ago when I attended a Marianne Williamson workshop. I was surprised by how many audience member questions related to issues around finding the right partner for life. And it was no small workshop – a full house at a large auditorium. People just really want to be with someone – after all, no (wo)man is an island.

But married and partnered people give out such conflicting information and advice – largely because they are not single, have not been single for many, many years and have no idea how dating and being single has changed in the interim*.

Sometimes they tell you that you should not do anything – that someone will come along when you are least expecting it. Ok. Perhaps. But on the other hand they also tell you that you need to get out there and meet people.

But not in bars.

And not on the internet because there are only weirdos there**

Right. So perhaps I will bump into someone at the supermarket, or at work (in an organisation which overwhelmingly employs women. Yay for that, but not a good place to find a man – even if finding a man at work was something that I would ever, EVER do). I must get out there looking for someone, but trying not to look for them. Or something.

What most married/partnered people imagine is that one of your nice friends – and for that you could substitute ‘married/partnered’ friends, as they tend to view your other single friends with a little bit of suspicion – I mean what sort of things do single people get up to together for goodness sake?! – will introduce you to someone. But married/partnered people tend to know other married and partnered people. They know you – who is single. And often that is it.

Additionally you apparently shouldn’t want to find someone – because that could be needy and desperate. At the same time though, you should be clear about what you want – even perhaps make a list (seriously?!). And you shouldn’t compromise, whilst also being careful not to overestimate your worth in the dating market. As one friend said to me – ‘stop going for the attractive men. Just find someone kind’. Hmmm.

Well – ideally I’d like to find someone I was both attracted to and who is kind. And loads of other stuff, but I’m reluctant to make a list. I’m very conscious when dating that there is really no point in continuing if you know that you are never going to want to see that man naked. A lovely single friend sent me a text recently which said ‘is it wrong to date someone I know I’m never going to sleep with?’. My reply – ‘you know the answer to this question…’.

One thing I know is that being in the wrong relationship is way more painful than not being in one at all. It’s why I’m a bit picky. By the same token, being in the right relationship would win hands down over being alone.

For myself, I appreciate all the advice – which is well meant and full of love. But at the same time, I’m just doing my own thing, and I know it’s difficult to accept but I know more about it than they do. I’m mixing it up with the odd foray into internet dating, along with not dating at all, and going out and about with my usual business and leaving it all up to fate.

If no one comes along, that’s fine. I can do this life on my own and it can be wonderful and joyful and exciting. But maybe I’ll meet the perfect man for me and it will be all those things and more. Maybe I already have. You never know…

*To give you an indication, dear Reader, of the extent to which dating changed between 1990 – which was the last time I had been single – and 2011, let me tell you a story…I ventured onto RSVP for the first time and chatted with a lovely man for several days. He was a journalist, interesting, my age and seemed very normal. I eventually felt confident enough to give him my mobile number. And by return he sent me a photograph of his erect penis. Now to be fair, this has never happened again, and I’ve given my number to plenty of people since. But I’m pretty sure this would not have happened in 1990. Partially because smart phones were still just things in sci fi movies. But you know what I’m saying…

**My dad, on discovering that I was using an internet dating site, said incredulously – ‘What sort of weirdos are looking for someone on the internet?! Erm, this sort of weirdo Dad. This sort.

In which I ponder how to let it go…

/ howtobemeagain / 2 Comments

balloongirl1-e1340132014629

In the last few weeks, a 21 year relationship which began with love, hope and excitement, produced two beautiful children, and at its ending had spanned half my life, was reduced to a reference number and a one line entry in the Commonwealth Courts Portal.

Divorce, particularly when a marriage has produced children, is never anything to celebrate – even when the end of that marriage was both necessary and desirable. I felt sad, a few tears were shed, and a check in with a friend was required.

It sometimes feels as though some wounds are so big and so wide and so deep that they will never heal. I feel frustrated that when so much in my life is good, and positive and amazing, there is a corner of me that seems to have so successfully imprinted the pain of the experience of my marriage that I am easily plunged back into the moment of it.

I’ve recently felt as if I have unintentionally created a circuit where if any, even minor incident, raises uncomfortable feelings for me, my thought processes are immediately diverted and I am back in the pain, humiliation and devastation that marred my marriage. It’s as if opening the door to sadness and anger for any reason lets these feelings also tumble out, like Pandora’s Box.

However, I realise that those feelings can flood out only if I allow them. My life is not happening to me – I’m creating it every minute of every day. Alfred Adler said that all behaviour is purposeful. So what am I getting out of allowing myself to feel like this?

I was listening to a workshop by Carolyn Myss in the car recently and I think I might have found a clue. She talks about people living through their wounds (she calls this ‘woundology’) in order to protect themselves. And this rang a bell with me. I often feel that I am impervious to further hurt, because I am so hurt already. I’ve told myself that nothing is going to hurt me as much again, so I’ll be ok. But maybe this is only working because I’m holding onto the hurt. Have you ever had a terrible headache, for example, and directed yourself away from it by pinching yourself elsewhere? We find it hard to experience pain in more than one place at once. And if your head already really hurts, then banging it doesn’t really make it much worse – in fact it can serve to distract you a little.

So whilst I still hurt, nothing else can hurt me. If I let go of that hurt, I open myself up to the possibility of being hurt again.

But it occurs to me that pain, upset, wounds and challenges are part of the rich fabric of life. They are a mechanism through which we learn and develop. No one escapes. Everyone has a wound or two. And it might be possible that by holding onto mine I am preventing myself from further personal development. Even more importantly, it’s probably true that by creating mechanisms to prevent the bad stuff coming in, I am also denying myself the opportunity for joy – as they are one side and the other of each other.

So now all I have to do is work out how to let it go…

Postscript – to any previous readers, I seem to have inadvertently deleted my last post on the courage required to be authentic. Sorry about that! Entirely accidental (and a bit annoying to be honest!)

Additional postscript – I worked out how to reinstate posts I’d deleted, so it’s back. Yay!

In which I wonder about the courage required for authenticity…

/ howtobemeagain / 2 Comments

the_invention_of_lying02

We are sitting in a local cafe having a late breakfast. Julie is staring at my face intently, in a way that suggests something beyond mere interest in what I’m saying. She suddenly interrupts.

“You shouldn’t wear that eyeshadow you know. You’re too old”

She pauses for a moment then says with conviction

“Yep. Nah. Doesn’t look good”

She should know. In a former life, she was a successful make up artist, working on Hollywood movies.

I laugh.

“Ok. What should I be wearing?”

*************************************************************************************************************************************

I am at the hairdressers. I am trying to persuade my hairdresser, who has been cutting my hair for so many years that we’ve become friends, that he should give me a fringe. He’s being a bit evasive but is pretty much saying no.

“I’m not doing that”, he says. “You’ll regret it.”

“I won’t”, I say. “Why won’t you do it?”

He sighs.

“Because you’ll look ugly”

“That’s a bit harsh!’ I say, then we both laugh. And I don’t have the fringe.

*************************************************************************************************************************************

We are on the phone. I am relating the latest drama with my boyfriend. I can hear that she is getting frustrated with me.

“I don’t know why you put up with this shit. While you put up with this sort of shit, you’re just inviting it in, and it’s why you have the same relationship over and over. Fuck Wendy. You need to get in your power. You’ve only got yourself to blame!”

She is nearly shouting.

A week or so later we are in the car on the way back from somewhere or other.

“I want to talk to you about the conversation we had the other day. I get where you’re coming from, but I’m not you, you know. I know I’m doing some of this stuff, but I’m on a journey, and I can only be as far along it as I am at each moment. And when I tell you about it, it’s not necessarily because I want advice or for you to solve it, but I’m kind of working through it in my own mind as I’m telling you…And you were shouting”

“Oh” she says. We are both laughing.

“Was I shouting? I won’t shout”

*************************************************************************************************************************************

Over the last few years, there have been some tough times. People who I thought would be in my life forever, have come and gone, and I’ve whittled down my group to a small core of people that I trust absolutely, after experiences that could have led me to distrust everyone, especially friends.

I was wondering what it is was that these people have in common – given that they are so very different, and that some live in the Northern and others in the Southern hemisphere, so few of them have met.

And I think it is authenticity.

I think I’m blessed to have friends who are courageous enough, and love me enough, to tell me the really hard stuff. And they’ve told me some really hard stuff – way harder than the shocking revelation that your eyeshadow is for youngsters, and you are no longer a youngster. This sort of honesty means that when they tell you the good stuff – you know it’s actually true.

I think women are particularly bad at this (and this is perhaps why I’ve always had lots of male friends). Friendships that are based on only saying what you think the other person wants to hear (‘no – you look great in that dress’, ‘of course it’s not you – it’s him, the bastard’ etc etc), lead to relationships that are not based in trust. And of course trust is the basis of everything.

But I also think I am fortunate to have gone far enough in my own journey to be able to hear the hard stuff, to extract out of it what is meaningful for me, what I think is my stuff to deal with and what is theirs, and then to move on forever learning. This also means that when paid a compliment by the same friends, the negative self talk that so often interrupts the pleasure of being told something nice about myself is quietened – because I know these friends don’t bother saying it if it’s not what they truly feel. And when people are speaking to you from a place of authenticity, you just know.

And it makes me wonder – what would life be like if we all told the truth a little more? Both to each other, to ourselves and about ourselves? Scary but a little bit wonderful I think.

In which I wonder about ‘being friends’

/ howtobemeagain / 4 Comments

My friends, I am single again. For those of you who never knew I had temporarily eschewed my single state, worry not – because I am again an ‘I’ rather than a ‘we’.

This relationship ended with what I like to call the classic ‘constructive dismissal’. This is where your boyfriend behaves in a way that indicates, quite clearly, that he is no longer that into you (doesn’t return your calls, takes a day to reply to polite text enquiries about his health or his weekend, when asked when he’s available to catch up for dinner/drinks/a quiet night in tells you only about all the busy busy stuff he has got on, and nothing about when he might be able to squeeze you in – you get the picture…) but because he lacks the balls to actually end it himself, waits until you can no longer take it and you end it for him.

I’ve been in this situation before – the most extreme version of which was my marriage, in which my husband’s persistent affairs demonstrated a pretty obvious ‘not that into you’ scenario which he was not brave enough to confront himself, and it was left to me to tell him to leave. In some senses, I suppose, this did give me a certain sense of empowerment (although it didn’t feel like it at the time), and I’m sure he was surprised that I let it all go on for so long before I gave him his marching orders (I know I am, looking back with the benefit of hindsight).

After the end of our marriage, it was my ex-husband’s fervent wish that we would be friends. At first I tried very hard at this, until I realised a couple of things. The first was that he had not been a very good friend to me over the years. A friend would not have treated me the way he had done, and there was really no evidence to suggest that he had anything to offer me in terms of friendship. Friendship with him seemed to be very one-sided, and mainly about me overlooking how badly he had hurt me, and continuing to care about his wellbeing and happiness.

The second thing I realised was that my being friends with my ex meant that I continued to provide him with the bit of our marriage that he had most valued – possibly the only bit that he had valued – someone in the background who provided stability, and made him look functional. So he would come to my house and hang out, get a meal cooked for him, have me check he was all ok, spend an hour or so with his children, and then bugger off to his latest girlfriend’s house – which was pretty much what he had done throughout our marriage.

And so I put a stop to it. I told him that we were not friends and we would not be – because he had no idea how to be someone’s friend.

But now I find myself having ended a relationship again and the man in question wanting us to be friends. It’s given rise to a lot of old feelings that are not his fault, but have left me pondering why this makes me so sad.

I think the thing is that what I want from a man – first and foremost – is someone who will treat me at the very least as well as they would treat a friend. When I’m in a relationship, they are getting something deeper, more valuable, more precious than just my friendship. Why then treat me with more respect and care when I am not a girlfriend than when I am?

I think often these friendships serve mainly to help people feel better about the way they have behaved in a relationship, and I’m not sure what is in that for me. In addition to that, I’ve been (unsuccessfully) dating for nearly 5 years. I’m not sure I want to repopulate my friendship group with men with whom I’ve had a relationship. Although – to be fair – I have made a few friends out of men I dated. But those men were good friends to me during the relationship, and the transition into that new status was painless for both of us.

Then, of course, the ‘friend’ thing tends to get complicated when new people appear on the scene. A friendship is not meaningful if you are dropped when they find a new woman, and many women don’t react well to ex girlfriends pursuing even platonic relationships with their new beau. In my age group, we are all, after all, often already dealing with the ex wife. I have a dear friend, who used to be a boyfriend, whose girlfriend ended her relationship with him when I appeared (invited, obviously…) at his birthday party. When I spoke to him about it, he said that any girlfriends would need to accept his friends, whoever they are.

That is, of course, how real friendship plays out over time, no matter how it started. So if your boyfriend has failed to be a good friend to you whilst you were his girlfriend, what evidence is there to suggest that he would be any better at it when you are not?

Only time will tell, I suppose…

In which I learn to live without ego…

/ howtobemeagain / Leave a comment

ego

If there is something I’ve learnt in the last 4 or 5 years or so, it is that everything is changing, all the time. Things I thought were concrete changed over night, sometimes in minutes, and it was adapt or (figuratively speaking) die. Initially I felt that some of these changes were forced upon me, but I’ve come to realise that in virtually every situation I made choices, and that overall those choices have been positive, even when they’ve been painful. And when I look back across my life, I’ve quite consistently chosen change – because often change means progression and progression has been important to me.

But recently I’ve found myself weighing up certain things where the burden of having to decide for myself without being able to blame anyone else has been almost overwhelming. And it’s led me to consider two rather uncomfortable things about the way I live my life.

The first thing is that I have a tendency to blame. When something goes wrong, I quickly look for whose fault it is – generally because I’m afraid it is mine. I’m much worse at this in my personal life than in my professional life – I suppose because it’s more personal. At work I know that when things go wrong it’s rarely the fault of one person, and usually the fault of a whole system. But when I’m at home, I’m looking for the culprit and to be honest it’s pretty annoying when it’s me. One of the problems with being single is that if your preference is to live in something of a blame culture, there’s no one left to blame*.

So these days, being on my own, when big life decisions need to be made there is only me to make them, and therefore only me to blame if it turns out that the decision I’ve made sucks big time. And this is making it very hard to decide stuff. And then recently I was ruminating over something that had been hanging over me for some months and my friend Julie** said this to me;

‘Why do you think you want to do that? That sounds like your ego talking’

I’ve given this a great deal of thought. And I think she is right – I think I’ve been operating too much from my ego, and this is part of what has been making decisions so difficult. Combine that with my blaming thing, and you’ve got a big problem – because if there’s no one to blame but myself, then my ego is going to suffer. And there is no one I punish more than I punish myself. It’s no wonder I seem to be paralysed around some major life issues.

Being concerned with my ego, even subconsciously, and therefore with status must mean that when I’m making decisions I am letting myself be preoccupied with issues of external validation. And this is no way to decide things. I need to be able to get in touch with what I really want by removing all thoughts of what other people might think, of how it might affect my status, and of where the validation for those decisions might lie. Even seeking to apportion blame is really a form of validation, isn’t it?

So I tried this out on a big decision I had been struggling over for some months. I thought carefully about what is really important to me when I’m not worrying about how I’ve got to get ahead, prove myself, be the best – or at least try. What does the authentic me want? What does my heart, rather than my head say?

Suddenly it’s made things a whole lot easier. And it means that for once, although it’s a little uncomfortable, I am not choosing change.

*to be honest, it’s quite often the children. Just saying.

**if you become a regular reader of this blog, you will come to realise that I have a confusing number of friends who are called Julie or Julia. I like to call them ‘My Julies’. Ali G style.

Before, during and after

/ howtobemeagain / 5 Comments

So I went to this Wake Up Sydney event and Clare Bowditch really struck a chord – if you will excuse the unintended pun. Actually – she struck two chords.

Clare talked about living your life as if you are the ‘before’ in a ‘before and after’ picture. Not just in terms of physicality – although I know I am not alone in having lived most of my life in perpetual preparation for the wonderful things that will happen if I am ever 5kgs lighter – but in terms of life generally. As if now is just the rubbish bit before all the really great stuff is going to happen.

And I realised that this is how I have lived the last nearly 5 years – since my marriage ended.

I’ve lived as if these years are something to be endured, to be passed through until I get to the ‘after’ in which I will be happy, and loved and everything will make sense again.

I’ve done this by constantly focusing on the future. Where shall I live? (A much more complex question than it might initially appear, but I’m sure we’ll get to that another day). What shall I do? Who will I be with? What will my life be like? How shall I plan for this life that I’m going to have – this life that isn’t this one?

Some of this has been both necessary and desirable. I’ve needed to plan for a financially secure future, for example.

But what if this is it? What if I found out tomorrow that I won’t make it till next Friday – let alone this mythical future life I’ve been waiting for? I would have to face the fact that I have not really been participating in my own, actual life that has been happening in the here and now – because I’ve been so busy getting ready for the new life that I’ve been hoping is around the corner.

And it occurs to me – this is the life in which my children are spending their last few years at home. These have been the years in which I’ve successfully made a career for myself in a new country, in which I’ve rebuilt a life that could be fun and exciting and enriching. And I’ve barely noticed. I’ve been way too busy getting myself all ready for the much better life that is surely just about to start. And when I haven’t been doing that, I’ve been ruminating about my former life.

I think I’ve been missing out. I’ve been missing out on my own life, because I haven’t been taking any notice. And the only person I’ve got to blame for that is me. My life is happening right here, right now and I’m going to start loving being ‘during’ my life.

And what was the second chord? Well Clare asked us to talk to the person sitting next to us about what we had wanted to be when we grew up. And for me it was a writer.

So – welcome to my blog.