Boxes everywhere

If I've seemed a bit quiet recently it's because I'm moving house. My flat is full of boxes (17 at the last count), every room has got things turned out of drawers, piles of things to pack, and things to take to charity shops and recycling bins...

Finished tasks

Well I've now finished reading Pride and Prejudice and played my flute in church - 2 tasks down and 28 to go!

Unfortunately number 1 is taking a loooooooong time to sort out. My mortgage has hit problems, I have to move out of my house by bank holiday, and I'm not sure what I'm going to do in between....

Depression

A couple of years ago I was diagnosed with depression. I thought I'd got it under control, and I seemed to be doing okay with it until last week. I got a really bad cold, which made me feel down anyway, and then I hit big problems with a house I'm buying. I took Friday off sick but then I was working on Saturday, and my Sundays are always busy so I didn't feel like I got any rest. By Sunday evening I was crying for no reason, and that feeling stayed with me today, so much so that I had to leave work at lunchtime and go home and sleep.

It's difficult to describe what depression is like to someone who hasn't experienced it. For me, it's like being in a bubble - I can see the world going past but I feel disconnected from it. Little things worry me much more, especially when it's about personal relationships, and while I really want company I know I'm not much fun to be around, so I worry about that as well.

I'll be back at work tomorrow, because I don't want to take too much time off having already had four months' sick leave in the last year. I really hope it lifts when I've got rid of the cold.

I'd like to hear from anyone else who's struggling with depression - a problem shared and all that...

Day off

I have a day off today so I'm watching Gone With The Wind. I'm enjoying it I think, although it's not quite what I expected, and it's certainly longer than I expected!

Quick update on the flute - I played it in church on Sunday so I'm happy I've completed that thing to do before I'm 30 :-)

Milk and coffee

I don't have anything interesting to write today. My fridge is broken and I've got people coming round for food tonight so I've been a bit preoccupied wondering how to cater for people and keep my milk cold while pretending I'm civilised... I did find a mini-fridge in Woolworths at lunchtime that I'm hoping will solve my immediate problem!

In the meantime, enjoy this thought from the Good, Clean Funnies List :-)

A group of alumni, all highly established in their respective careers, got together for a visit with their old university professor.

The conversation soon turned to complaints about the endless stress of work and life in general...

Offering his guests coffee, the professor went into the kitchen and soon returned with a large pot of coffee and an eclectic assortment of cups: porcelain, plastic, glass, crystal - some plain, some expensive, some quite exquisite.

Quietly he told them to help themselves to some fresh coffee.

When each of his former students had a cup of coffee in hand, the old professor quietly cleared his throat and began to patiently address the small gathering... ''You may have noticed that all of the nicer looking cups were taken up first, leaving behind the plainer and cheaper ones.

"While it is only natural for you to want only the best for yourselves, that is actually the source of much of your stress-related problems."

He continued...''Be assured that the cup itself adds no quality to the coffee. In fact, the cup merely disguises or dresses up what we drink.

"What each of you really wanted was coffee, not a cup, but you instinctively went for the best cups... Then you began eyeing each other's cups....

''Now consider this: Life is coffee. Jobs, money, and position in society are merely cups. They are just tools to shape and contain Life, and the type of cup we have does not truly define nor change the quality of the Life we live.

"Often, by concentrating only on the cup, we fail to enjoy the coffee that God has provided us... God brews the coffee, but he does not supply the cups. Enjoy your coffee!''

The happiest people don't have the best of everything, they just make the best of everything they have. So please remember: Live simply. Love generously. Care Deeply. Speak Kindly. Leave the Rest to God.

And remember - the richest person is not the one who has the most, but the one who needs the least.

Item 21 - Learn to play the flute

One down, 29 to go!

I bought a flute on ebay last week and spent Friday night learning to play it. By 'play it' I mean I can make a pretty good sound and know the fingerings for all the notes, and can play songs from music and without, and know what notes I'm playing.

That might seem a bit excessive for what is in effect 2 days of playing the flute, but I'm a musical person so I could already read music and understand the theory behind playing before I picked it up. I played the recorder when I was younger as well, and the fingering isn't too different, so the only thing I really had to learn from scratch was how to hold it and blow it.

My goal now is to be able to play it in public (probably at church) in the next month.

Item 16 - Read Pride and Prejudice

I found an interesting copy of Pride and Prejudice in the local Christian bookshop. The text is unchanged but it has interesting snippets interspersed about British customs and traditions at the time P&P is set, tips about love ("don't act like Mr Collins!"), comments about how religion is portayed in the text, by the characters, and in Jane Austen's life, tidbits of information about P&P on TV and film, and little comments from the people who wrote the comments on bits they particularly enjoyed.

I'm about half-way through at the moment - Mr Darcy is about to propose to Lizzy at Hunsford! Fun fun fun :-) I reckon I'm going to finish the book in a couple of weeks :-)

The worst sin

I was thinking about things that I do that I shouldn't this week, and I've come to the conclusion that the greatest sin we struggle with is lying. I know all sins are the same in God's eyes, but I bet we
lie more than commit any other sin, and I think it's probably the one thing that no-one could manage to give up completely.

It's also a secret sin in some respects because people don't know when you're lying or not, and it's something that can be joked about very easily ("Did you eat the cookie?" "No... " *shifty eyes*). It's difficult to have accountability for it - can you remember every time you told a lie or stretched the truth a bit yesterday?

There are blurry lines with lying as well. Where do you cross the line from playing make-believe to lying? Or telling a story to making out that it's true? What about exaggeration? Or lies of omission?

Any thoughts?