I am, I really am. My life has changed in a moment. I know, I know, there are those of you out there, me included in fact, who are wont to respond ‘ your life changes in every moment’ – and yes, of course, I agree. So it is not the fact that my life has just changed [again] that is remarkable, it is that in that moment, I recognised the immensity of the change occuring. It struck me. Slapped me in the face and dropped my jaw. And here I am marking this moment, still unsure, still now, moments later, in a place that is unfamiliar. What was possible has become probable. The terrain has shifted slightly and I am re-adjusting, regaining balance. Bear with me.

I have just read an email from Hope, Steve’s wife, advising me that he will very soon be in a position to give me some of my inheritance money, enough at least to pay off my debts. OMG. Here I am, just before 2 in the afternoon, on Wednesday, sitting in Cari’s dining room finishing off a bottle of champagne that Frank gave me yesterday, and that Cari and I opened last night. OMG. My life has changed. I will very soon be debt-free. I can’t remember the last time I felt debt-free. No wait I can, I felt like this when mum died.

Intoxicated. Free. Released.

Any day now, any day now …. and that day has come. Again. As it comes every day, as it come every moment of every day. My light is shining. I am released.

x bhavatu sabbe mangalum x

It’s a roundabout journey, and I’ll start at the end. My dad, Sid and his love of tools. He had lots and lots of tools and things, Many of them still in the garage when I left the family home about a year ago – and dad died 25 years ago. Dad was more often outside than in the house, building or demolishing something. Mum would call him for coffee and then get annoyed as it went cold as he lingered over his latest project. He was not a great tradesman or artisan: he just loved it. Working with concrete, knocking down or building something out of wood, tinkering with the car or the lawnmower.

One of the television adverts I remember most vividly from my early childhood days was one for Sidchrome spanners. The catchline was ‘you canna hand a man a grander spanner’, and I think because of the name of the spanner (Sidchrome) I always associated the advert with my dad (Sid). Anyway, while dad was no great shakes (there’s a weird English term, deriving I understand from someone who couldn’t toss winning dice) at the manly pursuits of mechanical engineering, joinery or carpentry, his desires and dreams were realised in my brother, Steve who is a gifted chippie (unlike myself who has virtually no construction ability whatsoever!).

What caused me to think of spanners, and recall the Sidchrome advert was the term ‘a spanner in the works’, (another strange English idiom – which must be quite a difficult one to grasp for those of us for whom English is a second language). Well someone put a spanner in my works a couple of days ago.

It was only the day before that I was staggering and stumbling on my way to Frank’s in the late afternoon – and wondering why? Why am I not striding along as usual? It didn’t take me long to realise the answer – because I was shattered. Over-exercising and under-eating had left me weary and bone-tired. Under-eating because Cari had gone to visit her daughter in Manchester a few days before and I was not bothering to look after myself, and over-exercising because that week had seen an increase in my clientelle at work from one to three.

Now it’s not that I get a lot of exercise caring for older men in their own homes. Usually a lot of meal making, dish washing, bathing and general housekeeping. The exercise comes from getting from one place to the next.  And as the number of men has increased so has the need to get around a little quicker, and once again, Cari has come to my rescue.

I started using Cari’s mountain bike to get from one client to the next. It’s probably been about 20 years since I rode a pushbike in any serious fashion, and as I staggered along to Frank’s I realised that for the last two days I had been riding about 15 miles each morning – and walking another 3 – 5 miles in the afternoon. No wonder I was feeling a little weary (and maybe that’s why my bum’s so sore?). And I could have (easily) in that moment thought how hard, how tiring, how ridiculous all this is – riding 15 miles to visit three men; spending 4 hours away from home for £10 in pay. However I did not. I remembered where this particular journey had begun.

It began that morning, as I rode from visiting Roger towards Frank, and the sun had come up, and the sky was clear. I had time to stop somewhere so I rode into a small park at the back of Sutton. Rested my bike upon the back of a park-bench, I stretched, feeling the effects of the ride in my muscles. The sun was at my back, casting shadows across the green expanse in front of me, and in that moment I felt glorious. I felt truly grateful to be alive. Life is GOOD, life is wonderful. I spoke out loud “I feel great”.

So that’s the end of this story – at the beginning. Oh, I didn’t tell you about the spanner in the works after all that. That’s what comes from trying to recount a journey backwards, from end to beginning. Anyway what is a spanner in the works when the world is such a wonderful place?

x bhavatu sabbe mangalum x

I was all ready to dive face first into a blue funk today. Did the groundwork last night; angry, sullen, silent, evasive. I made sure Cari knew. Not nice at all.

And now today – it’s 1.30 in the afternoon and I’m in bed. Haven’t got up, except to have a cigarette, haven’t washed, haven’t eaten, except to gnaw at a fingernail.

I was all ready to just lie around and wallow in my ever-so-justified anger, resentment and self-pity. To feel just so hard done by. Same old stuff. About the inheritance and who my brother is. Same old stuff that I have struggled with for the last 7 years or so.

It was starting to feel quite comfortable methinks …

I really thought I deserved to be able to vent some anger and feel sorry for myself. I was suffering after all. I was being victimised. I was hurting.

Maybe I was …

And …

This time …

I made it work for me. Sure I stayed in bed, sure I had a cigarette. Sure I got angry and hurt Cari (sorry my darling – and thank you so much for being there with your magic wand). And hopefully next time, as with this time, there’ll be less anger and hurt.

This time I turned lead into gold.  I stayed in bed for 5 hours and instead of sulking I made this, from scratch. I’m really pleased with it.

Ok, the golden nature of my creation may not be readily apparent right now. It was I discovered after I published it a VERY limited edition. Only a very select group of people witnessed it – and I didn’t do much of the selecting either. I am hoping the lead will again be transmogrified into gold with the help of my good friend, fellow alchemist and general all-round good ole honest cowpoke, Buck. To learn (a little) more about all this, click here ©

So thank you Steve. I know a lot of you out there have been waiting for me to see the light and speak the truth. Thank you all. Thank you Steve for being who you are. As much as mum, as much as Toby, as much as Max, you have played a huge part in my transformation over the last 5 years.

And what a transformation it has been. There have been times, more than once, when I have felt the philosopher’s stone in my hand, in my heart, in my mind. There is no better feeling – when all the world is warm and golden.

To all my friends, thanks. To those of you in the vid, don’t worry you look wonderful! To those of you not in the vid, that is only because I could not find your pic today. Send me a new one, or better yet lets get together and we’ll take a pic of us together, with huge smiles on our faces. I love you all xx

x bhavatu sabbe mangalum x

For everyones benefit, mine, yours and in particular my brother.

Steve, I love you. Always have, always will. However that does not mean that at some times, particularly recently, during the moment of caring for our mum, I have felt incredible anger towards you. This anger is evident in the post the fisted hand makes no sound.  This anger is my stuff.  It is not a true reflection, or image, or view of who you are – it is my stuff.  It is my suffering, it is my anger, and as it is mine, it is only me who can rid myself of it.  Nothing you do can change the way I feel, only I can change the way I feel.

And I know from experience, that the way for me to change the way I feel is to work my stuff.  My expression of my anger and bitterness in the ‘the fisted hand makes no sound’ post was a way of working my stuff, an attempt to rid myself of that bitterness and anger – that when it is there, inside me, only serves to make me small. To make me less of the full and positive and strong person I can be.

It was a venting, a release, aimed at the letting go  of those feelings that cause me to suffer. And it has worked.  I now feel much freer of that anger, much more able to love and trust you as I want to.  As I have said to many of my friends, as I believe - life is very much a process of getting the healing done.  And in this, it is those people, those things in our lives that ’cause’ us to feel pain, to feel hurt, that are the GIFTS. For if we are brave, these are the things that provide the opportunities to get the healing done.

I have let go of my anger. I have let go of my disappointment. I have let go of living in a past moment.  Caring for mum as she was dying was incredibly difficult for all of us – difficult in so many ways – and that moment has passed, as have all the things attached to it.

There were times during the last 5 or 6 years when we have felt and expressed anger towards each other. I was holding onto some of that anger – that was nothing to do with you, it was me that was clinging to that anger, it was me that was having difficulty letting go of it. My spiel on the ‘the fisted hand makes no sound‘ post was simply my anger. It has passed, as you can understand when reading the next post – a hand opens and claps” – addressed to my sons, when I say ‘ no anger, no blame, no bitterness’.

My hand is now open, thank god – and I can once again hold you and love you as I want to. It was this inability to open my hand to you – I had closed myself off from you – through my own sense of pain and suffering – it was this that was causing me so much pain.  That I could not let go of my anger and love you freely.

So bro, sorry for that. I am sorry for the anger I have felt towards you. Know that it was nothing you did, it was not based on you – it came from inside me, as anger and negativity always does.

I love you.

Ok, own up, who printed some material from this site and posted it via snail-mail to a third party that shall at this point remained unnamed. If you are the one responsible you know what i’m taking about, if you’re not the one then this will all seem a little nonsensical.

I’m not angry or anything like that – as obviously by putting my words and thoughts out here I am making them public property and they are here/there for all the read. I am just curious to know who felt that there was such a urgent need for some people ( as in Steve and Hope) who don’t browse this site to be made aware of words and feelings expressed on this site. C’mon own up….

Own up and I’ll send you some business cards with the site address on it – makes it easier to recommend the site – you don’t have to cut n’ paste – just send the web address to whomever you think would benefit from browsing the site.

C’mon….who was it…..I’m curious….

x bhavatu sabbe mangalum x