Arti's accounts

One thing I’ve been talking about in counselling recenlty is about hiding and being found. It made me remember the following incident from when I was little.

When I was 3 or possibly just 4 I was in a department store with my Mum. She was spending ages looking at skirts (they were maternity clothes – that’s how I can be fairly sure how old I was, my sister was born when I was 4 years, 2 months) and I was getting bored. I asked her if I could go and look at the wedding dresses that were nearby (and frankly looked far more interesting) and she said I could. I then discovered that the wedding dresses were right next to the top of the escalators. I had a lovely time going up and down the escalators until one time when I was at the bottom, a man stopped me and said that I shouldn’t be playing on the escalators because it was dangerous. This left me a bit stumped because I was at the bottom on the ground floor and my Mum was on the upper floor and I now felt that I couldn’t use the escalator to get back to her. I think I wandered around a bit tearfully until I was “found” by a shop assistant. She asked me what my name was. I suddenly realised that this lady didn’t know who I was at all and as far as she was concerned I could be anyone I wanted. So I told her my name was Jenny (which it isn’t)! I was quite happy with doing this – enjoying the experiment really. She took me to a funny cubicle place where there was another lady who made a tannoy announcement about a lost child called Jenny! Pretty soon my Mum turned up. (I’ve talked to her about it since and she said she knew straight away that it was me, firstly because the first thing you do when you hear an announcement about a lost child is to look round to see where your own is, and secondly because they described what I was wearing.) She was relieved and happy to see me but also quite demandingly wanting to know why I had said my name was Jenny. I didn’t tell her!

Well, my week’s holiday has been OK – a definite improvement on the week before anyway! I don’t think I’m looking forward to my counselling session tomorrow though. I guess I’ve just managed to “shelve” some of the issues that were coming up – a good short term strategy for coping – but I know tomorrow is an opportunity to open up some of it again and I don’t think it will be all that comfortable an experience! Gulp!!

I spent some time at home catching up on jobs and doing things with friends. I went with one friend and her 3 young children to a Safari Park – great fun, though I’m not sure whether it was watching the animals, or watching the children’s reactions to the animals that was most entertaining! Suffice it to say, that the highlight (at least for the youngest 3 of our party) was a baboon weeing on the car! I am told by another friend who has spent time in East Africa that they better wash the car quickly or it will ruin the paintwork! Hmmmm – is there a market here for “organic” paint stripper? – because I think I’ve just discovered something pretty effective!

Anyway I thought it was about time I answered at least one of the interview questions set by Jack

1. You’re obviously fond of outdoor pursuits and holidays. Where was your best outdoor holiday ever?

This one had me stumped for ages. I could think of loads of individual highlights from different holidays. Things that included: sleeping in a slate mine; sleeping outdoors under the stars (except it was in a wood so you couldn’t see the stars and midges bit the one half of my face that was exposed to the air while I slept on my side!); Walking the Watkin Path up Snowdon when I hadn’t intended to go all the way up but did it anyway; Walking up Scafell Pike; wading knee deep in water (with my parents in tow!) when the path at the bottom of Derwentwater had flooded and we were in a real hurry to get the last ferry back to Keswick; standing on the ice on Derwentwater on a New Year holiday; camping with friends in Glen Nevis; my first holiday in a camping barn with a family who are friends of mine – the list goes on. They all happened at different times though, not on a single holiday. My worst outdoor holiday would have been easy too. That was when I was camping on my own and went down with a severe stomach bug. If you’ve never actually had the experience of violent diarrhoea and vomiting in a small tent several hundred yards from the nearest loo – well, funnily enough I don’t particularly recommend it! But the best outdoor HOLIDAY ever… well….

Then I remembered – it definitely has to be – my 40th birthday weekend last October! It was really good fun. A group of friends came with me and we stayed in a fairly basic camping barn (the roof leaked and the only heat was a coal burning stove). Interestingly enough – it wasn’t any of the outdoorsy stuff that made it the best, though we did do walks and ended my birthday with fireworks,- it was just being there, enjoying myself and sharing a really special day with some of my closest friends, who (strangely) seemed to be enjoying themselves and wanting to be there too!

Well I don’t seem to be doing much better with my blog even now my computer is fixed do I? I keep thinking either I’m too tired or I’ve not got much to write but actually the latter is not the case at all really. I’ve been quite inspired by Jack’s blogging this week (how I wish I knew how to do that natty linking thing but I don’t!) and feel that in 5 days I’ve learned so much more about her than before. It’s made me realise there’s lots I can blog about who I am and where I’ve come from. It’s also made me think more about why I haven’t done so before. Some of it is fear of being vulnerable I think. Strange really as this is a relatively anonymous forum in some ways – though I guess pretty public in others.

In an attempt not to copy Jack’s style too exactly, ( though I guess she wouldn’t mind) I’d though I’d start with where I am right now this week. It’s been a funny few days, not least because of my counselling session (more about that later!). I’m still enjoying my work though I can see I’m going to have to find another layer of stuff to get my teeth into. At the moment, I’m doing the basic supervision and training of volunteers plus some general admin. I think when our project develops some more (it has the aim of increasing the number of “clinics” across the town where people can access free legal advice and help, particularly in one geographical area where there is a high percentage of people who have not traditionally had much access to that type of support) it will give me more stuff to get engaged with. Part of me at the moment though is quite happy to take things calmly and slowly, even when it means the highlight of my day is putting in (yet another) stationery order. ;D

I had an enjoyable afternoon on Friday, when I spent about an hour and a half scouring our local charity shops buying interesting toys for toddlers. It was work-related, honest! Clients often bring their small children when they come to see us and inspired by a particularly manic afternoon on Thursday where two toddlers managed to generally be all over the place (one nearly escaped as someone opened the front door and also pulled out the data cable on the photocopier), I thought it was about time our rather poor and limited selection of toys was complemented by things more likely to keep them ocupied for a bit. I spent just under £15 and managed to get:
A really well made Jack-in-the-box (Fisher Price for those in the know!),
A kind of bug on wheels that lights up when you push it along (Also Fisher Price).
A soft cube thing for babies where various parts crinkle and rustle and make noises when you handle (or chew!) them,
A bright purple pick-up truck type vehicle,
A board book with moving pieces to show trucks, diggers and generally mechanically related objects,
A small doll (new – having bought so many things with wheels I thought I needed to have a bit of “balance”)
A fire-engine where the little man bobs up and down when you push it along (also new but it only cost 99p!)
A series of concentric bright plastic rings on a pole that can be taken on and off (Fisher Price too!)
Colouring books and wax crayons (not felt tips – I’m not THAT stupid) as it’s summer holidays and we are getting quite a few older children in too!

I really enjoyed it and it meant I felt quite justified in throwing away the wooden penguin (sorry Smudgie) that was on wheels but just fell onto its nose when you tried to do anything with it and the squidgy plastic teething toy in the shape of a foot that looked as though it had been on a 30 mile route-march on a particularly muddy day!

The trouble is, I know that whatever I buy (and I did resist the piano/xylophone type toy as I though it would drive me crazy), the data cable on the copier is always going to look more attractive!

It’s been a thoughtful week for me at work too as I’ve realised how seriously our clients can be affected by poverty or mental illness (or both). It has made me see how hard it is to help people sometimes and how wise you have to be at times over the best way of handling things.

My counselling session on Monday was interesting and also pretty unusual. We were working on an issue to do with anger. I felt pretty peculiar afterwards but was also aware of some positives. Today has been the first day since then when I’ve not been working and so have been able to take stock a bit more. I still feel rather peculiar but aware of positives again too. There’s also some fear and anxiety as I move, just a little, into what I think for me are relatively uncharted waters.