Life in Adelaide and Musings

I awoke around 10am. I was very tired. I find my body gets very achy from driving. I felt very happy and found myself reflecting on this. I turned my phone on and in that precise moment it rang. It was Owen, he was my friend formerly with UNESCO. He is a former Principal and educator. Really interesting person. His wife Sue is an academic in the social-emotional intelligence area and researching futures thinking. Both of them are experts in the field of sustainability, values and now Owen is looking at child safety. He is training people in this area, how to notice abuse and report it. Both of them have travelled around schools to educate teachers and others in values and sustainability, a very intersting couple. They should be retired but they are truly interested in the future.

Anyway, we had a brief discussion and agreed I would contact him after the Rotary meeting. I had asked to go to the Rotary meeting for the experience of attending. I was curious to see what would happen. The subject was roses which is not really my interest, but it is worth expanding my awareness.

I got dressed went down the road and looked around for a card for David and Diane. They were lovely hosts and kind to bring a stranger into the house.

David organised for me to follow him and he would show me the Adelaide cricket ground where the Rotary meeting was held, he found free parking and warmly shook my hand and was off to a reunion. I really liked him as I felt he was a true Rotarian and I could see his natural friendship. I’ve found some are there for vested interests in business and then there are others who truly wish to serve the community. Paul Harris the founder of Rotary speaks of ‘service above self’, some understand this most don’t. We are all learning what service means and it is done joyfully. Paul Harris was a wild card and traveller and made friends around the world. I felt the essence of Rotary was friendship. Through this we can help more people as a world community. They see themselves as linked to serving humanity and world peace. The latter is my reason for my own connection with them.

It was interesting I had a dream the night before of Rotary and David was on the wireless connection, I just saw this image of communicating with the world through the internet and I saw Rotary as creating peace. The dream was enough to make me reconsider working with Rotary again. I had met well intentioned people but I don’t think many understand the true meaning of peace, many are men in these clubs, older men 60+ and many have engineering and business backgrounds so clowning and peace is not something they have ever considered. So I have some communication barriers. However, I see this journey as the peace work so I regard these barriers just as challenges and peace as my full time focus. So I can’t really lose.

Anyway, I went along to Rotary. I was told the Rotary Club of Adelaide was the largest in Australia. They have 200 members apparently. I sat with Brian (David’s brother-in-law). A lovely guy who told me his wife had died and he had met a childhood sweetheart. He said he had just thought of her and they bumped into each other (I hope I got that right). Anyway the point was they ended up marrying. They had a connection but had not seen each other in 40 years. I love stories like that, true love stories, I see it as meant to be.

I listened to the speaker on roses, I wasn’t that excited but happy that he was. How beautiful to dedicate one’s life to the garden to getting the hands dirty and being passionate about roses. They are indeed beautiful. I asked him a question about the origin of roses – Europe and Asia I believe, I then asked him their function in nature. He spoke of rose hip and fruiting plants and gave some ecological explanations. I was interested in this knowledge as I love the natural world. I am not into the aesthetics engineered, more the natural composition of roses. I believe the natural rose is pretty ordinary. Yet personally, I see great beauty in the ordinary and ordinariness in the beautiful. I like paradoxes. Depends on ones definition of beauty. Nature for me is beautiful whether it be the rose or the thorns.

I sat next to a Rotarian who was all smiles, I enjoyed his positive energy. At the end he left and shook my hand. I also left and wondered what next.

I headed to the city and walked around. I typed my blog and that consumed me for a few hours. I enjoyed looking at Adelaide, it is a beautiful city and people are friendly here, you can feel the energy. I also am aware that I am attractive and a woman and I tend to be treated more positively, I did think if I was ugly would my experience be the same, even with my floating around. I felt probably different but then again, life is magic, so anything can happen, I guess it depends on what you believe.

I did speak with a homeless guy today who wanted money at first. We got talking and he said he finds people don’t look him in the eyes. I told him to ‘be the change’, to smile anyway. I told him the story of Jack Nicolson, the US actor, who apparently became sad and the advice was ‘fake it until you make it’, so he smiled anyway and eventually turned sorrow into joy. This guy liked that. He felt that people saw him as less and thought of him a drug addict. He found people could be rude and I sensed his feeling of rejection. I said that people believe homeless people are losers or lazy, always taking from others, they don’t appear to help themselves would be the belief I feel. Interestingly people see homeless people as mostly young guys. I tried to help him see that people believe this innocently, they just believe what they read and watch on television. There may be elements of truth but they don’t understand the reality for each person or what happened for them to decide to go onto the street. Do we decide to be compassionate or walk past? We’ve all done it. People I feel are also afraid of homeless people, they seem dirty, might be dangeous, what if they became them? they would be isolated and rejected? so they try to avoid. People also avoid people with clip boards, so there is a general avoidance of being cornered. I found myself avoid one today and reflected on why, fear of not having enough money to give, the negative feeling of saying no. Then I thought about going and buying a book. So why not just give to the other, they are me. Sometimes I do sometimes I don’t. My feeling is to be brave and be honest. I am working on it. I still have work to do on myself. This guy and I really connected, he even didn’t want to take the money but I made him take it. He said I am enjoying talking to you. My tram came and I hugged him. I could see he was happy. I said to myself ‘give more’ silently inside. I meant to make room for people, to not judge, to not fall into those patterns others do. This is the power of group think. I know everyone is great in their own way. Just continue to be open. He inspired me, maybe I could be a bridge between homeless people. I could do this as a clown as people trust me. I could interview people open their world to others. I find I am exploring how to create my life to be more in service of humanity. I am playing with ideas right now. Reinventing myself.

I then went for a coffee. My friends Owen and Sue called and invited me to dinner and to stay over.

I caught up with them at their house and we went and had dinner. It was really nice to reunite and talk about peace, values and sustainability. I showed my world trip clowning around and the current trip around Australia. I also showed them an interview I did with a couple in Alice Springs about the aboriginal intervention and abuse issues. I thought Owen would like that. What interested me is that I naturally just showed it when it popped into my mind to do so. No planning, no previous thought I must show it. I am flowing with the moment and it feels that what happens is as it should be. I showed them my clowning in indigenous community and some shots of Uluru and the Olgas (Kata Tjuta). It was great to share. They love caravaning, so hopefully that inspires them to go North. They would love it. I had a really lovely time with them.

I love the fact that I don’t know what is going to happen. I love the mystery that I live each day. I am fascinated when wonderful things occur. I find my trust in life just grows. My friends felt I was brave, but I don’t see that. I really feel I just trust. I let go of control. I have little money so there is no point worrying about car trouble. Just deal with it when it happens. So I find I have to live in the moment as I can’t control or pay for outcomes. I just have to flow with it and find peace in change.

I am getting a wee bit tired now and will sign off. I caught up on the blog now.

Sweet dreams. May you wake up to peace every day.

 
Mohandas Gandhi

“Nonviolence is a weapon of the strong”

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