Life, the universe

Sunday, May 23, 2010

Dear David
How goes it? We're all missing you so much - you've no idea how loved you were. Well, pehaps you did have an idea. I suspect you had an idea about many things. How else can you explain the date on the photo with the tag on your toe - 18 May 2009. Exactly a year to the day before D Day 2010!

I was busy last week (after you passed away on Tuesday) in trying to get as many images of you together as possible. Contributions from Mimmo, Cosmo, Michael, Jill, Alvie and Zena. Jill had to photograph some old B&W photos with her digital camera and send those through. We had many from your wake in March last year.

I'm thinking to present them as a slide show and speed up the display of similar images so it looks like a silent movie. What do you think?

You probably know by now that the Dees got up on the weekend against Port Adelaide in Darwin. They were fantastic - you would have been so proud.

Well - better get back to work. So hard not to think about you and the times we could have had together. What did you like to eat/drink? Your favourite wine? Best butcher at Preston Market?
Chris

Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Beauty to the vision impaired

I was listening to the radio on the way home last night and an unsighted man rang in to raise an issue around political correctness when dealing with vision impairment and other disabilities.

This lead me to question myself - How can I describe beauty to a blind person?

I cannot describe how the beautiful woman looks with visual cues. Can I describe who she is through metaphors? Can I draw an analogy between light and visual cues and sound and audio cues?

Or can I describe her through the rich pallet provided by our taste senses?

She looks like the taste of a complex Heathcote Shiraz.

She presents herself as the complete beauty of a Mozart symphony; a Puccini opera.

Her hair is the colour of the touch of velvet. Her skin is smooth and clear with the radiance of a cello piece by Yo Yo Mah.

Her smile lights up the world like a Sousa march at full volume.

Her hair is so dark that only a blind man can really know it.

And there is charm in her too. Her whole is the integration of words and music that are synthesized in Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody; in Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven.

Does this describe beauty?

Saturday, May 31, 2008

Ten Rules for Being Human

1.	You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it's yours to keep for the entire period.
2.	You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called, "life."
3.	There are no mistakes, only lessons. Growth is a process of trial, error, and experimentation. The "failed" experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiments that ultimately "work."
4.	Lessons are repeated until they are learned. A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can go on to the next lesson.
5.	Learning lessons does not end. There's no part of life that doesn't contain its lessons. If you're alive, that means there are still lessons to be learned.
6.	"There" is no better a place than "here." When your "there" has become a "here", you will simply obtain another "there" that will again look better than "here."
7.	Other people are merely mirrors of you. You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects to you something you love or hate about yourself.
8.	What you make of your life is up to you. You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.
9.	Your answers lie within you. The answers to life's questions lie within you. All you need to do is look, listen, and trust.
10.	You will forget all this.
by Cherie Carter-Scott

Thursday, February 28, 2008

I have a notion that we exist in our own valley of time - the valley of the present.

We move forward through this valley to the future with the past at our back like a gentle breeze.

We walk in harmony with others so they become part of our present - and even should they move on, they are part of our time.

With luck we meet someone on the path of the present who we know and who knows us.

We walk side by side facing the same bright future with confidence.

Thursday, January 03, 2008

A Big Day Out
Today is Friday. Normally the last day of the week - but for Ross, Anthony and I it is the first day of the week.

Yesterday we took the day off and had a Big Day Out. The idea came to
me when I heard that Ross was due to have his last chemo treatment in early January. He was then to be in isolation for the next 6-8 weeks. Ross absolutely loves fishing and, when he had to sell the family holiday place at St Leonards, passed on the small outboard to Ryan.
One of my good friends at work also loves fishing - with him it is a true passion. AND he has just purchased a beautiful ocean going fishing boat to catch southern blue fin tuna in Bass Straight.