Beaches and roads

Sightseeing Lanzarote

Holidays

Getting back

Hiking on Isla Graciosa

Lanzarote

Zomervakantie, deel 1

Work

Let's put it this way. Jobs are easy. They're just about coming to work every day and carrying out everything you need to do. Right? So that's what we did. This whole year long, every day, we showed up and tried to do the right thing. Not fun. Not social. Not safe or loving or emotional or any word that doesn't belong in an office. On its bookshelves anyway. The only goal was to get it right. That's all. Except that it was not easy. And apparently very hard to understand. It was all just a job. Not us. Look at us.

So what did I learn this year (in my job, that is)?

Too much closeness can come back at you.
Not everyone can handle friendship and work.
This job is real, and mine, and not to be walked away from just like that.
(But it is, in the end, just a job.)
You can't change the image of yourself in other people's minds.
Being the leader attracts people who want to see you fall.
People who only want to see you fall exist.
Responsibility can get very, very ugly.
To believe in yourself is a prerequisite, not an asset.
Leading means to accept to be the bad guy sometimes.
Means understanding when you're never understood.
Means being asked to forgive endlessly, but never being forgiven.

But this as well:

A good team can make you fly, a poor team can stop you in your tracks.
If you aren't brave enough to face the people you keep attacking, you will never be brave enough to face yourself.
What didn't kill us, DID make us stronger.
When we get knocked down, we DO get up again.
WE will be the winners.We WILL go on.
Good workers - and I mean real, good workers - are hard to find, but priceless when you find them.
And I found at least two in this room with me.
They take my breath away.
And I smile.

In the end, everything that needed to be said, was written on a balloon that floated away into the night. It wasn't much. After all, it was just for us. Not for all of you. It didn't say how sad we were to see you go, our friend. It didn't say how angry we were at your backstabbing, our spy. It didn't say how grateful we were for your presence, our stayer. It didn't say how we love you, our girl. It didn't say how we didn't sleep at night either. It didn't say how heavy it was carrying all of this on our backs. It didn't say how we cried, how we fought, how we shouted and kicked the walls. It didn't say how much patience it took, or perserverance, or frustration, or strength. It didn't say how many profits we made, how many kids passed, how efficient we were. It didn't say how the skies are about to split wide open for us, after tomorrow, after you have left and we can turn the page. It didn't say how my eyes will tear up at the sight of the first rays of sunshine.

It only said: Us. Tomorrow. Go.

Horoscope...

Libra Horoscope for week of June 19, 2008

How well are you capitalizing on this year's unique opportunities, Libra? Now that we're halfway through 2008, let's take an inventory. I'm hoping that six months from now, you'll look back and make the following declaration: "It's so funny that in order to find out where I truly belong, I had to change my ideas about where I truly belong. Feeling at home on this planet and in this life wasn't possible until I got cured of my delusions about what it would feel like to be at home on this planet and in this life. I had to lose some of my certainties in order to gain more security."

From 'Written on the body'

Bigger questions, questions with more than one answer, questions without an answer are harder to cope with in silence. Once asked, they do not evaporate and leave the mind to its serener musings. Once asked, they gain dimension and texture, trip you on the stairs, wake you at night-time. A black hole sucks up its surroundings and even light never escapes. Better then to ask no questions? Better then to be a contented pig than an unhappy Socrates? Since factory farming is tougher on pigs than it is on philosophers, I'll take a chance.

- Jeanette Winterson -

Love demands expression. It will not stay still, stay silent, be good, be modest, be seen and not heard, no. It will break out in tongues of praise, the high note that smashes the glass and spills the liquid. It is no conservationist love. IT is a big game hunter and you are the game. A curse on this game. How can you stick at a game when the rules keep changing? I shall call myself Alice and play croquet with the flamingoes.

In Wonderland everyone cheats and love is Wonderland, isn't it? Love makes the world go round. Love is blind. All you need is love. Nobody every died of a broken heart. You'll get over it. It'll be different when we're married. Think of the children. Time's a great healer. Still waiting for Mr Right? Or Miss Right? and maybe all the little Rights?

It's the cliches that cause the trouble. A precise emotion seeks a precise expression. If what I feel is not precise then should I call it love? It is so terrifying, love, that all I can do is shove it under a dump bin of pink cuddly toys and send myself greeting cards saying 'Congratulations on your Engagement'. But I am not engaged I am deeply distracted. I am desperately looking the other way so that love won't see me. I want the diluted version, the sloppy language, the insignificant gestures.

The saggy armchair of cliches. It's all right, millions of bottoms have sat there before me. The springs are well worn, the fabric smelly and familiar. I don't have to be frightened, look, my grandma and grandad did it, he in a stiff collar and club tie, she in white muslin straining a little at the life beneath. They did it, my parents did it, now I will do it, won't I, arms outstretched, not to hold you, just to keep my balance, sleepwalking to that armchair. How happy we will be. How happy everyone will be. And they all lived happily ever after.

- Jeanette Winterson -