Five Minute Friday: Keep

I’m back this week to take part in Five Minute Friday, where you follow a prompt and write for five minutes flat. I did it long-hand and cheated a bit by giving myself 10 minutes. I think it’s fair!

 

Ever since we decided to buy a house last December, I’ve been trying to work out how to trim down our possessions, what to sell, what to give away, what to keep. I was… optimistic in my ability to make efficient decisions.

I’m not exactly a hoarder but I am not a tidy person and I like to keep hold of stuff. It’s a lethal combination. I like physical books and Badgerman likes physical music, specifically CDs. Between the two of us we are a removal company’s worst nightmare. I still have diaries from when I was a teenager, literary horrors full of emotional outbursts which I have no intention of reading again, but physical reminders nonetheless of the person I used to be. A part of me wants to hold on to that.

I tell myself that I might some day need this bit of string or that old candle holder and I store it (badly) until that day comes. And of course, for the most part, the day never comes and in the meantime, clutter accumulates, until you want to move out and dear lord do you feel inadequate then!

Sometimes I wonder ‘what would I take with me in the event of a fire‘? The answer should never be belongings, unless your passport happens to be by the front door, but it’s a good question, isn’t it? Would I feel like I lost myself if it all went up in flames? I am not my possessions and I do not want them to own me, yet as I ponder what to do with them all, I can see how much they do in fact have more of a hold on me than I would like.

Advertisement

Five Minute Friday: Prepare

“Are you prepared?”

This is a question I’ve been asking myself quite a lot over the last week. In between Christmas and making huge financial decisions about our future, let alone packing up a house in a month, it has sure felt relevant.

Can you ever be fully prepared? We certainly aren’t, and it doesn’t sit altogether comfortably. I shouldn’t be surprised. In becoming an adult, becoming responsible, one of the things you learn is how to mitigate risk. That’s why we have insurance, and guarantees, that’s why we prepare.

Isn’t it right? Be responsible, consider your options carefully, and avoid risk at all cost. In some ways it is completely acceptable and reasonable and right, and yet, you simply cannot avoid risk. It is a part of life, and one of the things about adulthood is realising that there will always be risk. You may sometimes feel like you tether on the edge of a precipice, because the world is ever turning and you never know what the future holds for you personally, for your family, your nation and worldwide.

So we are, in a way, prepared. And in others, we are not, and it’s OK. It’s something we all have to live and make peace with, and learn to thrive in it, embrace and revel in it. So here’s to life, and being prepared.

A bit.

I’m joining in with the Five Minute Friday crowd, so click on the link below to find other entries.

Five Minute Friday: Still

I’ve decided to challenge myself a bit and so I’m trying this thing called Five Minute Friday link-up that’s happening on Kate Motaung‘s blog, where you write about a particular subject for five minutes and hope like you’ve never hoped before that the brain vomit that follows doesn’t put your followers off forever. So this is me figuratively jumping off a cliff.

And… GO.

Confession: keeping my mind still is massively difficult these days.

I’ve noticed this especially in the last month, I am keeping myself distracted, distracted, distracted. Mostly by not giving myself a moment to think about things too deeply.

there’s nothing deeply wrong with my life at all. Of course, the girls are keeping me busy, but I can’t keep running after them all day, its driving me crazy. I’m not the type to always organise craft or other activities for them so we spend a lot of time at home just pottering about. And I expect independent play.

as for me, I don’t fill out my time very well. I’ve been watching online shows and what-not because I am feeling frustrated with where I feel I am going generally.

this stay at home thing is a season, and I want to move on yet not at the same time. Plus no time with Badgerman to really reflect, especially this side of Christmas living with a maths teacher! His life is crazy. church life? is driving me a bit bonkers if I’m honest, I’m frustrated with situations I’ve observed and not willing to look more deeply because I know there’s been a shift in how I think about my faith and I can’t just casually swim along in the evangelical waves anymore, not like I used to 10 years ago. So in this season of doubt and discomfort and running around after little people, I can’t keep still, I won’t keep still, because if I do it might come crashing down. Or something. Who knows, maybe it’s all in my head? The one thing I know I need to do is to stop and keep still and make some internal decisions about what next but I’m procrastinating instead.

…………

Addendum: Mmm, I’m not sure how I feel about this first go, it sure is muddled. You’re supposed to get better at this, right?