I
was born of average cheerfulness, and have trawled through some troughs and
peaks since birth. Some lives are terrible, some lives are wonderful and most
lives, like mine, pitch a bit in between. Somewhere in this process I have
picked up the habit of being more than averagely happy. I practise at it, by
appreciating stuff.
I
don’t really recall when or how I started this practice, but if I could be more
specific then I could share the process, and a world full of deeply happy
people is worth aiming for.
Deep
happiness means you come to terms with bad things- my definition of cure is
‘making better’ not ‘taking away.’ We need challenges and experiences to grow.
Enough
digression.
So,
now I want to track back and check how I got here. I don’t much care for
dwelling in the past, but this is more like map making, more of an expedition.
I have been keeping a diary on and off for some years, in bits of notebooks,
which I am slowly transcribing. Already clear that mistakes have been a guiding
force and that clouds with silver linings can still rain on you.
So,
let’s meet me, as a teenage mother in the late 1980s.
‘June
1989
The
bed-sit.
Who
am I anyway?
I’m
nineteen years old. That’s not a huge span of time unless you’re waiting for a
bus, so time, I guess, is my buddy. We have potential, time and I, we can do
things.
So,
what do I know?
I
know how to make life difficult for myself, how to be swallowed up by a big
nasty negative blob type entity even though a) I’m aware of doing it b) I don’t
even want to. Maybe it’s squiffy hormones; I have just had a baby. I keep
crying and I feel like a stranger, I don’t know who I am. I remember having
confidence and I was going to be a goddess.
I
love my little daughter. She’s the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen.
I
have a dream, something I want to travel towards. It’s a big family house. I
know what each room contains. I know it’s painted in natural shades with lot of
bright pictures and sculptures and bookshelves. It’s a space of substantial
beauty. Anyway, I feel better for getting this lonely stuff down on paper.’
The
simplicity of my young dream is rather nice, and the feeling of time being on
my side. (The mirror tells me time is not necessarily on my side anymore;
fickle time!) The bed-sit was interesting, and by that I mean there were often
drunk people in the communal kitchen and several cats used the bathroom floor
as a toilet. My sense of humour is well developed, I’m just having an ‘out of
puberty into motherhood’ transitional hormonal moment, and am, here, perfectly
able to look on the bright side because I have something to aim for.
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