The fastest thing on the road

The journey home from work the last few days has been even more interesting than usual. Not for any spectacular reason - no wonderous sunsets, I haven't been knocked off my bike or cut up by a car ... although the reason is transport connected. Simply, I think I have been the fastest thing on the road .. OK , maybe not the fastest, but at least I have been moving. The traffic has been horrendous, almost at gridlock levels along one particular part in Portsmouth.

I shouldn't be that surprised - Portsmouth is a busy city, so its roads get a bit cluttered at times. Most cities are like that now. But to see the traffic stationary for almost the whole length of a major road in and out the city for three days in a row ... and not because of an accident, or a broken down car, or any other kind of incident but for sheer weight of traffic .... it is quite a sight to see ... the car doesn't look such a convenient mode of transportation then. All these single tin boxes with just one person in, fuming at the single tin box in front of them, all of them just sitting there, going nowhere. It is not only car drivers that are affected though ... I think I counted about six buses, most full of people, stuck too. That causes other problems - people waiting for buses in other areas of the city that will not come anytime soon because they are here. ... it goes on and on ... such is modern life. I just look on .... and pedal on by . I might not be going very fast, it might take me a while to get where I am going ... but I am still moving, and I will get there in the end. Makes me glad to be a cyclist for a change ......

A sky full of (faux) diamonds

It is that time again. Time to resume my reign as Queen of Darkness.... well, almost. The clocks changed back from British Summer Time to GMT last weekend, so we are now really into Autumn. A time of "mellow fruitfulness " it is said ... or in my case, of ever encroaching darkness on my journey to and from work.

It has been dark on my morning travels since about the end of August, but with the change back to GMT it will soon be dark in the evening too. I don't like the dark evenings that much ... they are connected in my mind with mainly cold and wet conditions .... and too many opportunities for car drivers NOT to see me on my cycle !! It is not all bad though, for a whole new world opens up to me now.

The failing light creates new pictures around me ... a world bathed in the gentle golden glow of an autumn sunset (or sunrise., if I am VERY late in the morning ! ). As light fades almost completely, a world of washed out colours on buildings and trees emerges, making the view around me turn into a series of moving silhouettes. When night finally descends , my world strangely turns back into a place of light again ( although only in patches ) ... into a place of twinkling lights and electronic rainbows. Looking out from the ferry I use each day to cross Portsmouth Harbour, I am , on a clear cool day, surrounded by a cloak of deep dark blue sky and sea, studded by thousands of stars. Looking up to the sky, they are real ... tiny points of clear crystal shining down. Looking across to the harbour entrance, or in the opposite direction towards Portsdown Hill, I still see thousands of stars, of points of light but they become, in the majority, not pieces of crystal but amber .... the glow of street lamps and neon signs in the distance ... thousands of faux diamonds shining in the darkness.

So the approaching autumn and winter is not all bad , for I have a world of diamonds and rainbows to look at ... even if they are not real. They light and bring colour to my journey to work, bringing me beauty and comfort until the true colours of Spring reappear.

Negative power of words ....

This is connected, in a way, to a previous post about words. That one was upbeat and light - about the joy of words and reading ... this was originally written when my state of mind was anything but happy ( I don't feel as bad as that now .. this was me at my most down and almost depressed I think ). I am not entirely sure about posting it here (perhaps it is a little too personal ?) but I think I should ... it shows how words can have a negative as well as positive effect on people. Perhaps I was being a bit too sensitive to others opinions, to what others said to me at the time ... but this is what I felt ... and still do to some extent.... . Despite what I have written here, I know words are not only negative, the cause of the problem ... they can be the solution too ...

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There is an old expression that goes like this : ' Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me ' ... you will never know how wrong that expression is to me. Words can do so much damage, can hurt you in ways sticks and stones never will.

Sticks and stones may break your bones, but bones and bruises heal fairly quickly. They are just physical injuries. The injuries caused by words - be they said to be directly hurtful or just those carelessly spoken - these are not visible to the naked eye. They have the ability to wound not your flesh but your self-worth, your sense of self, your confidence, your core of being. These wounds can run very deep indeed and take a lifetime to heal, if they heal at all.

Words can, to use another expression, ' cut like a knife ', can wound you deeply. Ridicule of a person for just being themselves, for being different, for not fitting in with the perceived norm - this slowly but surely chips away at a person, little by little inflicting tiny cuts until they become open wounds, continuously opening the same wounds again and again, never allowing them to heal. Every time they open, even more pain is inflicted and endured.

So that person starts to build defences, puts up barriers in their mind to try and protect themselves, to stop the wounds from being continuously re-opened. They withdraw, hide away, keep away from others just in case they might to hurt again. In trying to escape the pain and torture they feel, they become isolated - and an even easier target for those who wish to hurt. They are then accused of being anti-social, of not being a " team player ", of being aloof, a snob .... so the words continue, and they continue to hurt, to cut, to wound - it is like never ending circles, going around and around, down and down, driving the person deeper into depression and despair. What ever they do, it never feels like it will end, will stop.

So yes, you can be hurt by physical means , by the sticks and stones of the expression , but words can do damage too, more than you can possibly imagine. Abuse and torture doesn't only come in physical form .... some people should remember that.

A new beginning ...

I have rather neglected this blog for a while ( for most of this year really ),so I thought it was about time for a bit of a restart .... a quick update on the main subject matter ; that is, me and my world .... just as I did at the very beginning ... so here goes ...

At home, there isn't much change at all. I am still living with Mum and bigbrother , still plodding along as best we can. Mum is still Mum - worrying about everything and everyone ( especially bigbrother and me ) , and bigbrother is still bigbrother - as protective and possessive as ever,wanting to know my every move. What can I say ? ... I still love them both to pieces, despite the odd disagreements between us ... but what do you expect with 3 very different adults in the same house. As for me, I am still as unattached as ever - and still not bothered about it ! Let's just say I am not holding my breath for a knight on a white charger to come my way and sweep me off my feet anytime soon..... I am content as I am.

I don't need to mention that my petit obsession with a certain Frenchman ( and his work, of course ... ) continues unabated * hee hee * .... I don't think that will ever completely go away . I've been a fan/ follower/ admirer ... describe it as you like ... of Jean Michel too long to stop now ( about 20 years !! ... more than half my life !! ). I wait to see where he and the music takes me next .... . As for my other fledgeling obsession, connected to a 903 year old Timelord ( or Casanova, or Hamlet, or whatever role David Tennant is playing at the moment ! ) - that is developing quite nicely, thank you very much !!!

In the other main part of my world - work - the cast of players change from time to time ... people come and people go, but not much is really different. Michelle, John ( who has become Michelle's little helper again, now that Stuart is no longer here ), Kath, Sarah, Mandy, Lesley, Zoe G .... they are still there ... and so , unfortunately, am I ( not that I want to be most of the time lately .... more on that later ). Since Stuart left in March, there hasn't been a manager at the store, at least not one who is here for more than a few weeks. There has been Jason (brought in to help Michelle as Deputy to her Acting manager), then Lee ( who was brought in as Manager so Michelle became Deputy again .. and who left when he was given a "project" by Head Office ), and now Billy ( who is helping Michelle - now acting manager again ! ). But Billy is only here until our permanent manager arrives ...whenever that is. I am not holding my breath on that happening anytime soon. My status in-store hasn't improved greatly, in fact I think it has become worse - virtually invisible most of the time now, I am now just a human attachment to the ovens ... a means of getting the products from the prep area to the shopfloor. Other than that, I might as well not be there ... or at least that is what it feel like. I am treated as if I know nothing, or not spoken to at all ... it is making me more than a little fed up ... but I will get over it - I usually do. Need to focus on positives, not negatives all the time. Just wish I could find another job though ... but that is easier said than done, so I stay ( for the moment ) ... better the devil you know, as they say.

So that is that - an update on the pantomime that is my world at present. The next act starts soon .....