Happy birthday Paulo

Happy Birthday Paulo

I took the picture of the Laaf in my brothers garden. In the efteling, a themepark in Holland there is a whole city with a school and a bakery etc full of these Laafs. Years ago you were able to adopt a laaf. My brother has now two laafs in his garden. Aren't they gorgeous.

You can become blind by seeing each day as a similar one. Each day is a different one, each day brings a miracle of its own. It's just a matter of paying attention to this miracle. Paulo Coelho Today I have a spare moment to say Happy birthday to Paulo Coelho. Yep we were born on the same day. I am from a different year though We are going out for lunch today and the sun is shining. It is spring here in a weeks time and there is already blossom everywhere. What a beautiful time of the year. Aroha Marja

Solong farewell auf wiedersehen goodbye

photo Kim anderson

When I was thinking of the above title, my son ,being silly, was actually singing it when he left for school "solong, farewell, auf wiedersehen, goodbye. Just another coincidence. But anyway you got it I am leaving.

I choose this photo of Kim Anderson as the last simply because it is so beautiful and if you want to take one thing from me then I would like that to be that you tell your children how special they are.

I am choosing to spent more time in life outside Blogging. More things have come up, still want to learn some things but it was hard to make that choice because I love Blogging. To peek in different worlds, make friends and to see there is so much beauty around us. I collected beautiful quotes and stories which I can revisit whenever I want just as I can revisit you when time permits. I know when I keep on Blogging the things I want to do are going to be side tracked.

I still had so much to tell, so much planned but found that I just didn't have the time. But one day a big wave will take me and and I will splash it out all over you.

I don't have the perfect end. It is just time for change. If you ever come to Christchurch let me know my blogging friends and I put the coffee ready. I leave my Blog and I wish you well and leave you with the following quote

For nothing is fixed, forever and forever and forever, it is not fixed; the earth is always shifting, the light is always changing, the sea does not cease to grind down rock. Generations do not cease to be born, and we are responsible to them because we are the only witnesses they have. The sea rises, the light fails, lovers cling to each other, and children cling to us. The moment we cease to hold each other, the sea engulfs us and the light goes out. James Baldwin

Thank you, Aroha and I will miss you Marja

Once and for All

photo from here

This was said by the Belgian production het Ontroerend Goed "We're gonna do a play about teenagers but about a lot more than teenagers who feel like teenagers during their teens:about the utter chaos in our heads,the urge to go far too far, pimples?and dozens of other topics that will enrich your lives. We'll pull down the barriers between the way we are onstage and off We'll update the definition of puberty We get on your nerves, but for once you'll understand why.We will make all other art on puberty superfluous You'll think we're super cool."

'Once and for all we're gonna tell you who we are so shut up and listen' is a play performed by 13 teenagers in the age from 14 to 18. They don't talk much because everything they would say is a cliche said one girl. The show is therefore very much physical theatre.

We bought a ticket through the school and went to this play yesterday night. It put us right back to earth. My mother told me once "When you became a teenager I asked you why do you have to be like this" and I said "I don't want to be the nice girl anymore" I wanted to belong, to grow up, to find out who I was, to have fun, to do the things adults do, to love, to escape, to do things differently than my parents did. I was a teenager.

When seeing this play it all came back, the good, the ugly, the energy, the lethargic, the vulnerability, the rebelliousness, the childishness, the aggressive. It is shown in chaos, a roller coaster of hormones, of growing up.

I had a busy week doing a lot of work, dealing with problems than on a Saturday having to deal with a teenager caused a breakdown. Than we break up, I mean cheered up and went to the play.

Afterwards, we were all eating chips with mayo at 10 pm at night (bad to the bone). We were sitting on the couch together in peace, we hugged and we understood. We were thinking about the line one kid said on stage "Everything has been done before but not by me and not now." Tomorrow everything will be back to normal again. But we know now all the above belongs to normal.

Aroha Marja Give your teenager a hug tonight

Quote of the day

Today is my brothers birthday. Happy birthday broo

Roses made by my friend Julie

Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could. Louis Erdrich (The painted Drum: A Novel)