100 days

So, like so many before me, I have fallen to the trap of ignoring most things since I've been married! I admit my guilt and apologise to all the friends I've blamed for doing exactly that.

The problem is, how can I happily ignore my new shared existence for the solitary task of writing a blog? I have to be fair and state that my other half, has been nagging me to return to my writings but the temptation of sharing the simplest and most basic things in life with him is far too strong for me to forsake and this has resulted in a worrying back log of daily chores, meetings with friends and bloging about life, universe and everything else I (we)'ve been up to.

So almost a 100 days after my wedding day (which was a nerve raking but enjoyable affair) how is life different?
I still wake up early in the morning, have my coffee and rush to work 5 days a week. I still return home after spending the whole day in endless deliberation with people at the office and dose off in front of the TV by 10. On the face of it, life is very much back to what it was a 101 days ago but appearances could not be more deceiving!
I wake up in the morning to be greeted by a loving joyful smile, I think I must have fallen in love with that smile all over again because of these morning treats, the whole day begins on a high note from such an apparently small thing. It's wonderful to realise that you can make someone so happy just by being there...
My morning coffee is not just a coffee anymore, it's the outcome of many tries and tests to ensure that it's as I like it, now my morning coffee awaits for me and is preceded with a kiss and followed by a farewell hug before I head to work. There hasn't been much of a summer this year in London but my sky has never been so blue when I leave to the office in the morning.

Now, for the first time in a very long time, my work isn't my world. I have finely managed to move away from rotating alone around a thing to navigating on a more defined path with someone. It wasn't, and still not, easy to realise that my choices now impact someone other than me. The responsibility is magnified exponentially but then the reward has grown by far greater measures. I still don't know in which direction the wind will blow but knowing that I wont be pushed alone, some might think this is a bit cowardly, makes the journey much less stressful and much more enjoyable. I am a strong person, but I never realised how heavy the burden was till I had shared it with him. Now the weight is lighter and the carrying is easier.

Finally I have someone I can share all the things I love with, adventure and all. Listening to Barber of Seville under the pouring rain then singing Figaro on the train back home while trying not to wet the seats with our drenched cloth, promenading at the Royal Albert Hall for a whole season, who other than my husband will agree to stand for 3 hours listening to classical music more than once a month? We have been there 3 times already, the BBC Prom season is still at the beginning and I still cannot believe that I'll be attending the Last Night of the Proms in person, with him.

It seems that I can cook! Not to the extent of Abufares or Kano but enough for my husband to put on some weight! In the time honoured tradition of Syrian wives, the aim is get the husband 10% heavier within the first 6 month. Now, not cooking for anyone before and having my diet restricted to takeaways and microwavable dishes for the past 5 years, I didn't have much hopes when hubby came over but either he's still very much in love, or miraculously, I have managed to pick up a couple of hints from mum. She, bless her, now asks me what did I cook when I talk to her on my weekly phonecall home, she's always ready with fast and easy recipes to whisk in 20m or less. The problem is, I'm never one to follow a recipe and I always end up following my own instinct with ingredients and timing. So far I have made Courgette(a.k.a Zurchini) with yogurt and rice, garden peas with tomato sauce and rice which ended up being a cross between the traditional Syrian dish and a meat and vegetable curry and stuffed mushrooms with vegetables and cheese toping. I'm discovering the joys of inventing something totally crazy and having someone cleaning the plate to the last rice grain and then insist on doing the dishes!

It has taken me long to return back to my notebook and blog, not because I don't want to, but because life has been so good over the last 100 days and while we share our sorrows with other without much reluctance, we jealously guard our happiness and keep it a well hidden secret. Maybe because you're always worried that the second you say you're happy something bad will happen, maybe because happiness just keeps you wrapped in its warm embrace that you easily forget about anything beyond it. I have stolen myself away from it this afternoon while he was mowing the lawn; enjoying the gentle breath, stealing side glances at him and writing, I check that he's really there and that I'm not going to be woken up from this dream anytime soon. I still reach out to him to make sure his there during the short summer nights and we still call each other as much as possible during the day.
I started this blog to share with him the things I couldn't say over the phone, it has been my dream and my emotional base for so long that now going back to it while he's by my side feels a bit unusual. I don't know what this blog will be from this day onward? Can it remain as “Snapshot from a Syrian girl's daily life in The City ”? I'm not sure it has ever been but I believe that blogs, like any product of the creative process, grow organically. Maybe in a year's time, this will be a place to share cooking jocks/disasters or best cleaning advices. Maybe it will be full of events and activities in London, or maybe, just maybe, it will remain a snapshot of a Syrian girl's life, a small corner when I can share a dream and the pursuit of happyness.

I'm at one of those moment of pure happiness now, dare I dream when/what the next one will be?

First Dance

So why have I decided to write this blog at 37000 feet above sea level? Well simple, trying to waste my time during a 6 hour flight I started listening to some music on my ipod, so far a normal thing to do in these cases but this time I wasn't listening to just any music, I was listening to my shortlist for my First Dance!

One would think this shouldn't be too much of a chore, that every couple must have an all time favoured that they shared at a special time and that lasted with them through thick and thin. Sounds all so romantic (which is what a first dance should be) however having had an unorthodox relationship with my husband to be, we didn't have just one special moment but a million and while a song might have a special meaning, each new day for us carried so many challenges and so many changes that each had it's own special tune that has its place in my heart and I'm sure in his.

I remember the first song was the one that just spelled the missing and longing, “when I need you”, yes my dear reader, I only had to close my eyes and his loving arms would be keeping me safe and warm as we had to cross miles and miles of empty space in between us.

But the distance and the longing has shaped our relationship in ways that couples living close to each other cannot see, the love that we shared was far more reaching and engulfing. If a first dance can be to an Um Kulthum song, then my choice will be “el 7ub kuluh” all the love I loved in you. Anything before dissolved into a distant memory and life and love were just him.

There were times in the past three and a half years that I was simply overwhelmed by what he means to me, I'll be going about my work and my life and a feeling of pure unstoppable joy will overtake me with the thought that he loves me, he was my “everything” and he was the cool water in the hot summer and the line in the sand guiding me to the way.

Life goes on and what started as a rush of emotion has settled into a calmer wider ocean, vast and welcoming, life was perfect even with all the craziness of the world around us and one had to wonder “what a wonderful world”

Always, forever and a day, “we both know that our love will grow and forever it will be you and me” and I will love you so for always. Not a lot of certainties in life but this is one of the few I know and live by.

Now as this part of our journey comes to an end and a whole new life is stretching before us, I know that this journey will be an amazing one, I know that “you and my can light up the sky if you stay by my side”, “all the stars are coming out tonight, lighting up the star tonight for you” my one and only.

I know that if it was up to me, I would spend not only our wedding but my life, dancing to the rhythms that we shared over time, how can I chose just one and say that's the one when life with you is one song of love and companionship?

For me, at last I found that someone worth sharing life with, “at last, my love has come along, my lonely days are over, and life is like a song”.... at last I found the dream that I could speak to, a dream that I can call my own. You smiled and then the spell was cast and here we are in heaven for you are mine at last..
at last .....
at last ........

2008

Another year is coming to an end and like every year, we look forward to the year ahead and rethink that year that passed. Going with the latter , 2008 has been a phenomenal year to say the least. Events that we didn’t imagine took place during 2008, things that lifted us up and others that came crashing down on all of us. What is happening now in Gaza is just the last drop in a cup full of sadness we had to drink over the last 12 months.

For me 2008 has been a strange year, I went through unbelievable highs and very dark lows. The year held personal loss that had reaching domino effects on other things in my life and had a fundamental life changing gain that set the stage for a lifetime of change, sharing, partnership and love. Thus is life, gives you in one hand and takes from you in the other.

A year on from my last relevant post and the world had changed shape yet again, I’m not sure if I’m wiser of better on the eve on this new year, the one sure thing is that I’m older, age is the one unstoppable truth of a dying year, everything else is debatable.

A year has passed, a line has been drown and a new tally will start in a few hours…happy counting 2009

Young @ heart

I know, I know, before you jump down my throat for using this line in describing myself, since I'm only 29, let me remind you the young & old is a relative description of a person's status & as such cannot be restricted to one age group!

This line barged in on my thoughts returning from work today while thinking (& excuse my mental jump here but I did use the word barge) about the merits of living in hilly green Kent! On a day when London is basking under C30 temperature & 90% humidity I only had to step outside the train onto the platform to feel the difference, the cool fresh breeze was a wonderful change from the artificial coolness of recycled air in the office & the mugginess of the air on the streets.

So I was in the middle of mentally congratulating myself on my choice of location when this intruder line jumped in without any obvious logical connection to see.

So me being me I took my blackberry & started punching in the line & retracing the mysterious thinking patterns that led me to it. If you're wondering, this is how I write the majority of my blogs & that should answer to why my sentences and thoughts are all over the place sometimes.

So back to young @ Heart! I will ask for your patience here for this will take some extra lines to go through. I remember my family’s reaction when I first told them that I'm planning on buying a house outside London! To my parents who spent their entire time in this country centralised in Fulham road, living on the edge of zone 6 (about 27miles away from central London for those who don’t know the “Zone” lingo) resulted in a reaction similar to telling them I’m buying the house in Scotland! They were very polite about it knowing that I’m the one who will be living in the place after all but they didn’t hide their “concerns” about the distance and the daily commute that I will have to follow.

My siblings were more open about it, “why the hell do you want to live outside the tube network”, “1 hour commute every day by train!!!” and the star reply “you’ll be a total foreigner there sticking out like a sore thumb”! well that day has passed and I’ve been living in my house for more than 3 years now, my parents love staying over with me whenever they come, they swear by the easiness of moving out and about and I’m a usual stop point for those on their way to cross the English channel.

Me buying my house was the first “adult” decision I’ve made! You might think that coming over here to begin with was a big enough call but actually it wasn’t, it was a mix of luck and impulses that led me to England and it was a similar set of reasons that led me to my current job which resulted in my settling here rather than returning to Syria after my degree.

That first decisive conscious choice that I made was followed by other, equally important and fundamental ones which resulted in me being where I am today. But here is the trick, I’m a free independent woman, living on her own and shouldering a job and a mortgage but it hasn’t been that long, relatively speaking, when I was the youngest of lot, spoiled in every imaginable way and without a care in the world! that is my “young at heart” soul that had to make a disappearance in a very short period of time for a verity of reasons. Luckily, or unluckily depending on how you see it, it hasn’t disappeared without a trace, it still peaks it’s head every now and then when I shock people (especially those who only know the new me) with something completely out of character.

At the same time, for those who lived with me before, they remember a cheerful young girl without a worry in the world and they expect to see that girl every time they see me! It is a bit difficult at time when people expect you to even talk in a cheerful way every time you’re on the phone, and if you don’t then something is wrong and they have to fix it! It is a hard call to make, do you let them in on the new grown up version of you and let them see the worries and the concerns and all the life calculations that grown ups do or do you keep the young at heart version alive and well in their eyes so that not to cause them any undue concerns?

This has never been easy, a lot of the times, I wish I can go back to my young version, let someone else worry about the big things, the life decisions and the tough choices. Sometimes, the burden of responsibility can be overwhelming and people tend to forget that because one is always putting on a mask of easiness over everything but what is the alternative? Can I go back to being me 5 years ago? No is a very simple and effortless reply, I have so many priceless things because of the past 5 years none of which I’ll be willing to let go of.

Do I forget about my young self that is lurking in the deep, longing to be set free from all these adult demands? Not too sure.

It maybe the biggest call of my adult me, a call that a lot of people had to make at one point in their life. To chose between a life full of pull and push between old and young and a life which is rapidly progressing forward without any emotional maturity ties to its youth.

I’m not sure, but I think that while the former is much more of a rollercoaster ride, the latter is too smooth for my taste, not being able to be childish when I want to is way too boring and way too “grown up” for me!

So the answer at 29 is for now, I will always be young at heart, I will carry the freedom of my 24 self to prevent me from tying myself too much with life’s road and decisions. Young at heart is a safety from being too rigid and too old to see the freshness of a new day and feel the coolness of an easy summer breeze on a tired face waiting at some platform in green, hilly Kent.

Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

A love less ordinary

I close my eyes and reach out, I can feel the warmth of his skin against mine and for a second the emptiness disappear folding the distance between us and I feel his face against the palm of my hand. He’s a breath away, I keep my eyes closed and I’m free falling through the gentleness of his smile and the joy I see reflected between the two of us stretches a lifetime of dreams and promises.

Whenever I think of love I think of a love less ordinary, as if there is something such as an ordinary love! I look back and see a passion that defied the distance, a connection that broke the lines of logic and normality and a simple belief in something extraordinary.

For long I wondered how this happened? I questioned with the scared heart of a child why was I blessed with such gift? When all around me are giving up in love, was I to be the one to carry on the faith that pure, unconditional, dizzyingly vast and all consuming love is out there to be won?

Years have passed, what started as a unique friendship has changed overnight to an avalanche of emotion that buried everything with a blanket of sweetness. Years on, and that sweetness remains, magically fragranced, intoxicating the soul with so much happiness.

Years on and I’m a changed person, but how can I not change when I know that after so long, I will never be alone again? A person can live his or her life alone, friends, family and colleagues are shadows that pass along the way but there is a personal space around that is never breach or violated. I walked through life with that space untouched, and with every broken heart, with every sad farewell the wall is tougher to break and harder to breach, I walked that lonely road till he walked to me and that wall vanished to thin air… He showed me what love is, held my hand and promised me with a believer’s faith, a child’s joy and a warrior’s strength that I will never have to walk alone ever again. He didn’t have to promise with words for the look in his eyes made a thousand and one promises for all to see and for me to cherish.

Now I know that I will never be alone again, oblivious to the distance separating us, I just close my eyes and lose myself in that promise. I know that while miles and miles of empty spaces between us he’s only a heartbeat way.

He is my faith and our love is my constitution, I can take anything that life throws at me for I shall never be alone.

For now I have known love and for that I will never be just a thought passing in time.

Now I’m truly loved and for that, I will forever leave a trace of something more than just a life lived.

You whisper your love for me to wake up to

and my heart blossoms a rose under your fingertips

Lists, lists, lists...

So, I think I’m officially the worst blogger to be tagged, ever! Syrian Brit tagged me more than 3 weeks ago, that was my first tag and, after this delay, I think it will be my last!

So I was tagged to list 6 things to do before you’re 18! Well my 29^th birthday was a couple of days ago so theoretically I’m not that far from the time I was 18 but it still feel eons ago.

Any way before I start with my usual flow (that is hard to stop) I have to start by listing the 6 rules to this task:
1. Post these rules before presenting your list.
2. List 6 actions or achievements you think every person should accomplish before turning 18.
3. There are no conditions on what can be included on the list.
4. At the end of your blog, choose 6, or less, people to get tagged and list their names.
5. People who are tagged write their own blog entry with their 6 suggestions.
6. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged.

Well, as Lujayn did, I’ll skip the last 3 due to the delay in replying to this blog plus the fact that most people I know on the blog sphere have already been tagged with this task.

So here it is, my contribution to this serial chain of ideas?

1-Read a book!

I know that this sounds extremely daft but I don’t mean to read just any book, before you’re 18, you should have read at least one book that was able to touch your heart and leave an imprint on your soul. Before you’re 18, you should discover the influence a written word can have. After that life just flow by so quickly and you will barely have time to open up to a book that way, and if you don’t, you’ll miss on so much. In today’s word that gives so much weight to the visual and high tech, the book is sliding away from the public landscape and if you don’t build it in your life before you’re 18 it will be very difficult to do so later and you’ll lose out on one of the greatest pleasures in life. When I was 18, the book that left the deepest impact on me was Roots; it still occupies its special place on the bookshelf on my mind.

2-Stay awake for 3 days working on something!

You will have the energy and the passion to drive you to do so and both will be much less available as you get older and “wiser” and things that will give you such a drive become more and more rare.

You stay awake on excitement and enthusiasm alone and by the end when your energy has finally been consumed you look at the fruit of your labour, let it be the last page on a book or the last touch on an essay and you’re filled with an overwhelming sense of achievement. Your achievement maybe only such a climax in your own mind, most people will tell you that you can’t really do something of substance before you’re 18 but then the eagerness of youth and the pride of a young mind cannot be suppressed by anyone and no one can convince you that what you’ve done isn’t a wonderful achievement. You have such high spirit and too much faith in yourself to allow that to happen, something much harder later in life.

3-Be there for someone,

When you’re 18, you’re in a gray area between adolescence and adulthood; it is during then that people are not sure of which side you’re on. During that time, the first time you get beyond the selfishness that marks us as children and teenagers and someone turns to you for help and you’re there for them that what marks your life in the years to come. If you never do that before you’re 18, you’ll find it more and more difficult to do when you’re older and the demands of life and more and more with every passing day. I remember the day that this happened with me as if it was yesterday, and I know that it has shaped me into the person I’m today.

4-Travel

The second your feet land on foreign soil you feel the possibilities open up in front of you. It’s amazing, how the narrow comfortable world you know, the casual and the mundane that one slips into in his or her own day to day surrounding dissolves when this new world stretches in front of you.

Before you’re 18, you have to know that the world is so much bigger and the possibilities on where you can be in this world are endless. Expand your horizon as much as possible before you’re 18 and you start being afraid of how big the outside is. Before you’re 18 the world is an adventure, the more you take in from this adventure the more you can expand into it afterwards.

5-Put a list of 6 things you want to do by the time you're 30!

It’s funny that just before Syrian Brit tagged me to do this blog, I was sketching the outline for a blog about the different lists we all have, that outline was lost when my blackberry crashed and I never returned to it! Nonetheless, one of the lists I thought of was the list we all put together when we’re younger and just coming out to the world.

Every 18 year old should have already put a list of things to achieve before they’re 30. The faith of an 18 year old will allow them to be bold and creative, they’re ambition is still in full force and the knock backs that life hands them are still too weak to cause damage. At 18, one can take on the world and that’s what one should aim for.

When you’re 30, although you haven’t done the things on your list, it did help in pushing you up and forward. Your list is your own, you don’t have to share it, and the advice is not to do so. This is your own Mount Everest that you will challenge yourself to climb it the following 12 years. Why 30? Well, I’m 29 now and my Mount Everest has changed a lot from how it was at 18 but it remains as challenging as it used to be then.

6- Fall in love

I know that this has been mentioned before in different ways and by many people but I don’t think any list can be completed without it. Before you’re 18, your notion of love is that what you read in books and see on screen, a view that is, in 99 cases out of a 100, skewed at best and totally distorted at worst. The distinction between love, sexual drive and friendship is very vague at that time and it’s so easy to think that any one of the latter two is love. Fall in love before you’re 18 and you’ll get your heart broken, you’ll feel the hurt and ache but you’ll become much wiser. Take your first step towards really falling in love; you’ll learn the difference between infatuation and love, between friendship and love and between desire and love. This is a lesson that you have to start learning before your 18 and carry on learning through out the following years. It is only when you have passed your finals that you can truly know the meaning of falling in love.

Another day, Another year...

So, another day and another year has gone by, like most (if not all) people on the planet we square our positions, do our yearly inventory, tally up all the books and pass a judgment on whether the year that passed was a good year or a bad one!

And like most, it’s always somewhere in between, the year had its highs and lows and on average we end the year roughly where we started or, if lucky enough, a bit happier, more satisfied or well off.

So what was 2007 for me? Another step towards the big 30 which seems so much closer nowadays; not sure what the judgment of the first 30 years will be, I leave that to the wiser/older crowd to suggest and to me at 31 to decide!

2007 witnessed a gigantic step in my personal life, a lucky, or unlucky depending on how you see it, man has decided that I’m a suitable partner to spend his life with believe it or not. He has popped the question 2 years ago now but the whole family/formality side of things came into existence at super speed earlier this year. Over our 2 and ½ years relationship, we’ve driven each other mad, up the wall, into success and towards better, brighter places in life. We’ve shared so much and learned so much about each other and more importantly about ourselves. Words like love, passion, friendship, care and happiness were redefined in 2007 and I can only hope that this trend will carry through in 2008 and beyond.

Career wise, I’ve now spent more than a year at my current position after finishing my rotation, I’ve crossed swords with a few, argued with a few and stepped on a lot of toes over this period but no matter how horrible the day goes, I wake up most of the times looking forward to arriving at the office. I enjoy what I do immensely and although when I started this road in 2004 I was heading in a completely different direction, God/fate/destiny had a different idea and I ended up at a much more exciting, and unexpected, place. It can be mad at the office sometimes but it can never be boring!

I can’t believe that I’ve lived in this country since 2003! It feels so long and so short at the same time! The days when I was living and working in Damascus are ancient history in a way but I can fully remember the “me” that was then! It seems a life time away but I can see it so clearly as if locked in a glass box that is the old me. Have I become a wiser, better person since I came to this country? I have no idea to tell you the truth, living in London is now such a part of me it’s hard to imagine living in any other place. I remember telling a fellow Londoner/blogger before that I love the city with all its contradictions and sides. For me Damascus carries my past, family, roots but London is the sky I’m expanding my branches into. I appreciate the freedom it offer and the challenges it carries and I think I still have a few more “London years” in me yet.

What do I have in store for 2008? I was reading Abufares’ blog today about New Year’s Eve over the year, and if not anything else, it simply shows you that a new year can carry you anywhere and while you try to plan a year ahead you never know where the wind will throw you in the year to come. Where will I be on New Year’s Eve 2008? I don’t have a clue, I just hope that I’ll be spending it with the people I love and share the tallying with them then.

I hope 2008 will add to me as much as 2007 has and for it to be a happier one for the people I know that all of you dear readers.

Happy 2008!

Waiting for deliverance

Some times I feel as if I’m living my life waiting for my life to begin! Waiting to get into college, waiting for college to finish, waiting to get a scholarship, looking forward to completing my degree; waiting to get a job, waiting to buy a house; waiting for love, longing for my life to begin…
A lot of people say that life is in the journey not the destination, that so many people wait their beginning to the grave and miss out on all that matters with their constant waiting and longing and I’ve always tried not to be one of those people; I tried to enjoy every moment and live every day but what can you do with a restless mind and an even more restless soul?
I wrote before about the pursuit of happiness, how you get one moment of joy and spend your life travelling from one peak to the other, eternally seeking the Holy Grail of earthly bliss, and I’m not going against what I’ve written there, I am extremely blessed to have someone I’m walking the road with but is it wrong to ask for more?
I’m writing this blog mostly for myself, I think I need to see my own thoughts in black and white so that I can extract some sense out of them. Why have I chosen such a public space to do so? Beats me, maybe I’m too scared of digging deep into my thoughts alone, or maybe, just maybe, someone out there would have the magic answer to my constant wondering

Tranquillity seems such a far reached dream....

Pursuit of happiness!

Or should I write “Happyness” as the film is titled? It has been some time since I last watched a film that moved me so deeply and have made me really stop and think about what we all want in life and what we work so hard for, Happiness…

Being based on a true story, a time in the life of Chris Gardner, the film has a different taste to your usual morally strong, socially oriented films. The knowledge that this has actually happened to someone, that the drama is derived from real life and is not a fragment of imagination from a talented writer gives it that much more weight and that much more impact on us outside viewers.

I saw the film for the first time on my way back from Syria, I blamed an already over emotional, over active set of feeling, or maybe a horrible neighbour in the seat next to me, for crying in a plane full of people but then I realised the most of the people on the plane were trying to hide a tear or two after seeing the film! Then I accepted it as the impact of brilliant writing and acting in a very good film, there was that bit of doubt about the liberal artistic changes to the real story to fit the film, that bit more of spices to create a stronger set of feelings in the viewers but the aftertaste remained, hence when the film was out on DVD and I noticed that within the special features added there is an interview with the real Chris Gardner I couldn’t help but buy the DVD and take it home.

I watched the interview before the film and the impact was amazing, realising that there were little, or no, artistic additions to the story, that this man has actually spend nights in train station’s lavatory with his son because he had nowhere to go was shocking. To know that someone have reached that low and then managed to end on top is inspiring to say the least!

We all seek happiness; we all, whether we know it or not, work towards it and have it in our horizon in every direction we go to. A lot may disagree, may proclaim other intentions or other goals but even the most unselfish act one does are aimed to get a sense of self satisfaction and happiness for being able to help someone else.

These days, with all that is happening around us in this crazy world, happiness, very much like that blue bird over the rainbow, is hard to see, hard to find. Even if we’re happy in our personal life, we feel guilty for being happy when so many around us are so miserable, as if feeling happy is something to be ashamed of now. With life being not that simple, all that much cruel and all the more complex; being happy is reserved for simple or selfish people who can ignore that craziness!

But I disagree, pursuing happiness is part of our humanity, one of reasons for our existence, seeking happiness is the thing that drives me to wake up in the morning, to struggle with work and annoyances all day, seeing that happiness in the horizon is what gives me my will to live.

But do we ever reach that horizon? Can we ever be happy? The pursuit of happyness gives you a good clue, that one moment in the end, he calls that time Happiness! One moment when all is well, all is right, that second that is suspended in time is what it is all about! That perfect embrace, that one single kiss, the first time you hold your child or that first time to he says I love you, that is what happiness means. Don’t fall for the illusion that it will be forever and a day, it is not lasting or permanent, that happiness is reserved for that moment, and once that moment is passed, so does the happiness that came with it and all that we’re left with is a memory of that moment, that sweet aftertaste that we remember and desire for a long time to come.

But does that mean that the Pursuit of Happyness is a mirage that never lasts? Some people despair and think that is the case, some see this pursuit as waste or a fantasy that would drive you mad in the end. I beg to differ…

It is that single moment that gives life meaning, you seek it, it comes, it takes your breath away and leave you with an afterthought of warm, sweet pleasure but that is not all that it leaves you with! Like clues to a treasure, each moment of happiness points you in the direction of the one after it. The moment passes, but there is a new horizon and a new rainbow that we seek and work hard to reach, till we get to that new point of utter happiness and so on for as long as we live.

Life is all about that, moving from one point of joy to the other, remembering the ones that passed and dreaming of the ones that are on the way. The excitement of living is that we never know where the next pursuit will lead us, the possibilities are endless and we are pilgrims searching for that holy grail of endless joy. The journey is never easy, most of the time is hard, stone hard, the journey might include sleeping in the lavatory with your child or seeking shelter in a homeless home, but for all that hardship, that moment is that much sweeter and last that much longer.

In this there is the answer to whether it’s worth it or not; is something worth the heart ache, the stress, the struggle? A lucky person would say yes it is, would know that the reward is worth the price and would fight for it. A lucky person won’t take the easy way out and settle for a medium level of semi happiness just because the alternative is much harder. A lucky person would realise how precious this happiness is and realise that for their life to mean something he or she should go down that rocky road for some time to come.

Finally, a lucky person would have someone to seek that happiness with, one of those rare times in life when your walk is not a lonely one, your fight is not a me against the odds but Us against the world, for those lucky few, part of that perceived happiness is involved in the journey itself, for those lucky few, the road is as precious as the moment. For those lucky few, like Chris and Christopher Gardner, happyness is always close by…

Be happy

Picture is the property of © 2006 Columbia Pictures Industries Inc

Sorry &a bit more

I have been away for some time now, more than a month has passed since I last posted on this blog and I know that there was a number of you who commented on various previous posts but for a lot of reasons that would take way too much space I could not reply to you...For them who took the time to read and comment and to you, dear unknown friends, I send my apologies for this prolonged absence.

Thinking that I haven't written anything for some time has led me to think of the question, do you have to write for the sake of writing something? a blog, being a place were we bloggers note down our thoughts and ideas, should never be a commitment as such, it must not become a thing I have to do but should always be something I would like to do. In the end we, the happy bloggers community, aim to share a thought or a feeling or to advise and inform; but do we have a commitment to write? Is it ever a job in that sense? I think, and I hope you agree, that it's not! I have days when I sit in front of my screen and feel the need to communicate with you my dear friends and that is when I open a new posting and start typing. I feel that at those times, I’m happy that I’m talking to you, laughing, or just chatting about the various every day events that I have faced or noticed. I believe the every human has his/her unique way of understanding things and absorbing them (I have said as much before somewhere here) and telling things our way help all of us to gain prospective on life, universe and every thing else* and that is what every blogger aim to do, share, absorb and convey to others what little they have to offer.

The last few weeks have seen so many changes in my life, foundations of a new life have been set firmly on the ground God willing, and I feel that I’m on the verge of something so amazingly wonderful but so unbelievable personal that I want to scream it to the world but can't do yet...

In the last few weeks, I had so many firsts I stopped counting, but every one of these firsts was a moment that is now captured in my memory forever, suspended in time, detached from every day life and secured in the depth of who I am...

In the last few weeks, I've known what it means to belong, to love, to care, to share; what it mean to build a life, to live the dream (if only the beginning of one) and to fly high with the wind beneath my wings...

I’m writing this in such a public place, but at the same time, I’m fooling myself if I pretended not to be addressing it to one person in particular... I’m whispering to you but doing it so loudly across the infinite virtual space between us. Why am I doing that? I don't know but I know that I need to and you know me better than to ask for a reason...

I don't know much, but I know one simple thing, I know that I have the most precious gift a person can have, I know I have a heart beating for me and for me alone and I can never ask for more...

Thank you, for being a friend, a companion and a partner
Thank you for sharing the dream, the road and the trip with me
Thank you for being you, and for not wanting to change anything in me

Thank you...

*Of course from “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”

How do you know?

How do you know that you love someone? It’s not only by the good times that you share together but by the bad ones too.

You know when you pass through that time of emotional paralysis were you can’t feel and don’t want to feel anything, when it’s so easy to just open the door and walk away and he understands that, he just stays away, give you your distance but at the same time stay close enough to catch you if you fall, he’ll surround your emptiness and patiently wait till the emptiness is filled again with all that you share.

You know when you cry for no reason but he knows that you need to cry, and he won’t tell you to stop, he won’t tell you that you’re being silly and that tears don’t solve anything; he will just hold you close and allow your tears to run freely on his embrace.

You know, when you realise that your tears, no matter how silly the reason is, are never wasted, are never shed in vain because they just water the love he holds inside for you, he just builds a world that is just for the both of you where nothing is hard, no pain is too great because he just there making the pain go away…

How do you know? When you realise that you don’t have to make sense all the time, because he’ll always know what you mean, when you know that you’re never alone, never again because you have him in your life all the time.

That’s how you know…

Hidden beauty

“There is so much hidden beauty in the world”, I’m not sure if this is a line I heard once in a film or read in a book but today while having a conversation over the MSN with a friend it came to me how 99% of people fail to see that beauty around them.

We were talking about enjoying the feast of the senses that some situations offer, a nice meal with wine and a soft blues music in the background, listening to a classical piece or enjoying a wonderful sunset. What I realised is that most people think of the grander gestures and magical moments when looking for this world beauty failing to realise that it’s not the surroundings that make the difference but the allowing your mind and senses to see what runs under the surface in your day to day life.

While he was describing his ideal “feast for the senses” settings, the dinner scenario, I thought of an evening a couple of days before when I was returning from work, and had to wait at a nearly deserted bus stop in a sleepy small town outside London trying to stay warm with the chilly autumn wind. Most evenings, I would try to pass the time reading my book or playing Brickbreaker on my BlackBerry, the latter being highly addictive, but that night I had finished one book on the way to work in the morning and my mobile was on the last bit of battery power in it so I had to settle for my ipod and wait half cold, half board for the bus when the angelical voice of Katherine Jenkins’s “House of No Regrets” flowed in and suddenly the night was filled with magic, the scent of falling leaves, the paled moonlight trimming high clouds moving slowly across the heavens under the spell of the night breath. For 15 minutes, the world exploded with beauty and the senses that were buried deep under the day’s work flexed outwards to embrace that magic.

One of my favourite writers once said, in not so many words, sense and conscience are like a Japanese paper fan, most people live with this fan opened to one fifth of the full circle, but sometimes, something (or someone) happen and your conscience and senses open up to that full beautiful circle and you see that hidden beauty running just under the face of the world, undetectable by the majority but available for all who seek it.

A couple of nights before, waiting for the R2 bus to my house in the sleepy country, that fan opened up. A moment that washed over my tiered mind, a memory that is so dear and precious.

Thank you Katherine…