My favourite song of all time

This song is just brilliant.

On showing gratitude

I wrote yesterday about how lucky I am to have the life I have. After all I have in abundance what many only dream about. Fresh food, clean water, a comfortable home are all parts of my life that I often take for granted.

I found this post, written by David Pollay, about gratitude and how important it is as a way of improving our lives and making our world a better place. He suggests investing time identifying the people and things we value and then take the time to learn more about them. What do these people do, how, and why?

Once we commit these important people to memory we can begin to express our appreciation to them in whatever way we choose.

Finally, we can link our gratitude chains together. This is a perfect way of helping us see how that which we enjoy in life is connected in more ways than we can possibly imagine.

I wonder what the garbage guy's story is?

How lucky am I?

Today was a hot day, the hottest December day in Perth since records began. I'm writing this post in the comfort of airconditioning. Comfortable against the blazing heat thanks to the modern comfort of an energy guzzling machine. It costs money to run, just like the car.

If I lived in many other countries I wouldn't need to worry about the expense of running an airconditioner. It simply wouldn't be an option. If I lived in Indonesia or Sri Lanka there's a good chance I'd have much more fundamental things to worry about. Feeding my family, clean drinking water and a roof over my head that didn't leak would be high on the priority list.

There are so many people in this world who live through unbearable poverty and unimaginable misery. If I could just help one of them live a more comfortable life and be happier then my life would be complete.

Marty Robbins - El Paso

When I was in my teens my favourite singer was Marty Robbins. I just love this song. It's such a great tale of love and tragedy.

Johnny Cash the legend

What a classic film clip from a master.

A Christmas Grinch post

It's the first blast of summer today. Step outside and it feels as though you're stepping into a furnace. It doesn't help that I had afternoon nap. I always wake up grumpy! Now the heat feels so much more intense.

Weather like this is perfect Christmas Grinch weather. I don't like or want Christmas because...Soon, though, all this malevolence will wash through me like a crap through a sewer pipe. Then I'll feel so much better and wonder why I wrote such a grouchy blog post on Christmas day.

Good friends listen well

I have a lot to learn about listening. I'm not sure if it's a bloke thing, but I tend to listen with an ear for a solution. It's so easy to fix someone else's problems rather than simply listen.

I have a couple of friends who listen really well. They listen in a way that gives me a sense that they have an unswerving commitment to whatever it is that will bring me happiness and contentment. No judgement, no assessment, no advice. Just pure respect. At the end of a conversation I always feel lighter and refreshed.

Great listeners are a gift to this world.

Feeling good without a job

It's funny how life turns out some days. I was chatting to someone today about me not having a job. For some time now I've had a sense that perhaps I'm not as good as I thought I was and this was affecting how I felt about myself. The conversation was both timely and welcome.

One of the themes that came out of the conversation was the way society demands that we have a career. It's almost unwritten law that if we don't have a job we don't have social status. I've been feeling this a lot lately. It's even more subtle than the job-no job debate. I detect that some people place a person on a social hierarchy dependent on their job. For example, a doctor may rate highly whereas a garbage collector may rate fairly low. Why can't people simply accept one another on the basis of the human being that's before them, rather than on their appearance or job title?

Then there's the money thing. It seems to me that the more money you make, the more some people value your opinions and the higher up their pop-chart you get. Again, it's a shallow form of humanity.

From this societal expectation, it's easy to feel unwanted, unworthy, and unnoticed. At least that's the way I've been feeling. That is until my conversation. From it I took away that life is not about the work we do - although that can be an important way to generate some self esteem and provide structure for our lives. Life is all about the contribution we make.

Contribution comes in so many skins. I volunteer as a way to give back, and in the process I derive a sense of satisfaction and well being. Some people raise families and spend time with their children. Of all the work we could ever undertake, this one pays the least, but probably has the highest rewards.

From today's conversation I've formed a renewed sense of being comfortable with where my career is at and am feeling a sense of my own centre that doesn't rely on a job description or pay cheque.

The problem with relationships

Marriage on a good day can be great. On a bad day it can be War of the Roses. I've been lucky to enjoy a marriage that's been a significant contributor to my happiness. That's certainly not the case with all relationships.

Marriage vows, of the traditional form found in most Christian services, contain more lies than a job interview. Take the "to death do us part" bit. Does anyone really mean that? I don't think so. In most cases the promise is full of implied conditions such as "so long as you don't sleep with someone else" or "so long as I feel happier being here than somewhere else". Only the most new age of Christian services would include honest vows.

This "to death do us part" creates a sense of failure on the part of a couple who decide to separate. It's simply not needed and, I argue, not healthy. Surely it would be better to stay together while ever two people are committed to one another. If staying together produces greater happiness for both partners then stay together. But when when life changes, move on and stay friends. A marriage committed to "to death to us part" is pointless. A marriage committed to one another's happiness and well-being makes sense and contributes to a better world.

This thinking works for all kinds of relationships. Intimate partnerships, friendships, work, you name it, a relationship founded on a promise to stay together for a life time is simply not realistic. Better to start off with a dose of reality and make sensible commitments than set oneself up for continual failure. Sure, commit to another person's life time happiness, just not to a life time in the same bed.

Did I make a difference?

Today I had a conversation with a young man. He's a young man with a troubled history. One of those histories that you hope your unborn kids don't inherit.

The start of this story is the first time a needle touched his skin. The first buzz of the craziness of a line of speed. The slow, smooth wash of a cone laden with ganja. And from each of these firsts came a life slipping, sliding, scrambling, and slithering into a life of blurred senses and frightening criminal actions. A life, once full of promise, that today clambers for the tiniest of recognition beyond bars.

Life in these surrounds seems at first to be desperate and hopeless. Each day turns into the next with only the sun's slow arc across the sky to set them apart. Hope is what is read in a magazine and life is what is enjoyed by others.

But this young man is different. In his eyes is a steely resolve to start anew, to be something more - or just to be normal. Sometimes even the most mundane goals are those from seeds of the greatest tree of inspiration.

His are goals to be merely normal. To contribute in ways that the most ordinary of the free take for granted. And in this struggle to be normal and average is a struggle to learn the skills that many boring, pedestrian, mundane successful people take for granted.

Forget the grand, forget the eloquent. Just let's make it to tomorrow in a way that leaves this young man proud to be just ordinary.

In my heart of hearts I hope I'm there to cheer him on and to make that tiny bit of difference. In so doing I hope that his life becomes the most beautiful, ordinary life there is.

Ban plastic water containers?

It's easy to complain about life, to be critical but do nothing to make a change. That's exactly what I was beginning to do several weeks ago. I climb Jacob's Ladder at least three times a week. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings at 6am. Jacob's Ladder is an amazing place. At the top the views of the river and city are sensational and on a crisp, clear morning I love being part of the sun peeking over the Darling Scarp and bringing myself to life with the sound of birds and people doing good things for their health.

When I climb stairs I tend to look down. It's a smart thing to do. And that's when I began to notice the amount of litter under Jacob's Ladder. There were pieces of paper, glass bottles and plastic drink containers. Actually, make that lots, and lots, and lots of plastic drink containers. Under bushes and shrubs, under the stairs, in the grass. All over the place. And that's when I started to complain to myself.

Why isn't the council doing something about this? Someone should do something about this mess. Should, should, should. Then I got to thinking that, rather then simply wish for something different I could do something about it. I'll phone the council and ask them to get someone out there. But that could take ages so I thought why not just clean it up myself?

And that's exactly what I did. Over the next few visits to the ladder I took some big green garbage bags and cleaned the place up. Now, each time I climb the ladder I keep a look out for plastic drink bottles and collect them and throw them in the bin. It feels great to keep a little part of this beautiful place in the world looking clean and tidy.

Now the question is, how do we get rid of the water bottles in the first place? My challenge to anyone is to observe the litter on the side of a road or footpath. In most cases much of it will be plastic drink containers. If keeping our part of the world clean is not motivation enough how can we create an incentive for people to recycle/reuse/collect these containers. I'll bet if we had a clever solution there could be a great little business in people collecting drink containers to claim a reward. Outside of a small incentive for people to return them to a collection depot, as they do in South Australia, I'm not sure how else it could be done.

What a mango asks about carrots and water

It's just started to rain. That light rain that slowly gets heavier and heavier and where the air is still and thick. A thunder storm is not far away.

The weather has little to do with eating a mango. Eating a mango in the tropical heat of an impending summer storm feels the right thing to do though. Almost as if I'm in the tropics far away - just me and my thoughts and mango juice dripping from my hands and down my arms. It's luxury to eat so decadently.

This mango came from Derby. It was plucked from a tree by a friend and boxed up with a dozen or so other South bound mangoes. Just as fresh and as ripe and as chemical free as can be. Perfect.

All this mango heaven got me thinking about carrots - and water. My nephew brought around a fresh garden carrot the other day. Plucked from their garden and brought right to our front door you'd think it would just be the tastiest, crunchiest carrot in existence. But it's not. Within no time at all it was soft and soggy and you'd barely contemplate eating it. I got to asking "why does this carrot, so fresh from the ground and so free of chemicals, get to be so soggy when the ones we buy in the shop stay crisp and strong for so long?" What's the difference?

Which brought me to water. The other night on the tube there was a feature on fluoridation of water. Here in Perth our water is fluoridated. We don't get to chose if we want it fluoridated or not - it just is. And this brings me back to carrots. I don't know what's in those shop-bought carrots that are so crisp and taste so fresh. Are they genetically modified? Do they contain chemicals that could be doing me harm? Why do they stay so crisp?

Of course I'll probably never know the answer. But one thing I do know is that mango was simply delicious. And being that it was plucked from a tree in a back yard, untouched and unpreserved by chemicals it was a real gift to enjoy.

Sometimes hope is hard to find

I was driving to my IT guys office today and saw something that gave me reason to think maybe we shouldn't be hopeful about the future. I should probably firstly say that I'm usually a positive person. In most circumstances I can see how the human spirit can, and usually does, triumph over adversity. But today was a bit different.

My travels took me through Rivervale, a working class suburb of Perth, but one that isn't particularly rugged or rough, and one where you could expect to drive trough without too many problems. What I saw shocked me. In broad daylight and in full view of the public, I saw a young man shooting up on the sidewalk. It wasn't so much the drug taking - there's plenty of that happening. It wasn't even so much where it happened. After all, even wealthy suburbs are full of drugs. I guess what unsettled me was the apparent hopelessness of the scene. Here was a young man with his life in front of him and all he could see was the point of a needle plunging in to his arm in order to get high. I just thought that, if that's the future of our country and our planet, then we don't have much of a future.

I'm really not sure what to make of this but I guess what I saw is a very small unrepresentative sample of today's youth. What I didn't see is all though young people working at creating a future for themselves by studying or working at a trade or generally contributing to society. I hope to continue to set an example to give the world a better future.