BLOG 54 LAST MINUTE dot com!

“Wretched excess is an unfortunate human trait that turns a perfectly good idea ….into a last-minute frenzy.” Jon Anderson, Musician (Lead singer of Yes, Collaborator of Vangelis etc etc)

I have good intentions of being prepared. I have even better attention s of being early. These intentions are justified… after all who likes charging through the ticket barrier and running down the platform just to watch the train sail off without you?

As the scouts motto goes… “Be Prepared”. Actually, they went as far as to give each letter of the motto a word to go with it - Bravery, Enterprise, Purpose, Resolution, Endurance, Partnership, Assurance, Reformation, Enthusiasm and Devotion. I’m not a scout, and I’ve never been a girl guide either…. but I do get the point. Just get mind, body and action organised to do a task so that you reduce chance of failure. I know this… I mean to achieve this.

Like I said… the intention is there.

The reality?

The train sails off without me. I am a huffing, puffing, doubled over mess, glaring angrily at it, feeling indignant that it couldn’t wait 1 minute for me. Whilst doing the walk of shame back to the concourse, it always occurs to met that the damn world does not allow for my particular brand of spontaneity and impulsiveness. Not that this recognition actually makes me DO anything about it!

For instance, I know 25^th December is Christmas day… I do… honestly. I know this from January the first of any given year (being that Christmas day at that stage was but a week before).

But when the first Christmas advertisement appears on TV (for my non-UK readers …that means the last week of August) I sneer at the TV saying “Pah! Summer is barely over and LOOK!” Come September when the first piece of tinsel appears in the shops… I up my game from indignant to moderately outraged. By October it is impossible to buy your favourite perfume unless it comes in a gift pack with a key ring, soap on a rope and a hand cream. Now I’m screeching like a banshee about the commercialisation of Christmas. Come November and every high street looks like the Las Vegas Strip and it become impossible to use public transport (for every seat with a person in it there is another full of bags). By December, all the shopping centres have gone 24/7 and ‘Rockin’ around the Christmas Tree’ is on a permanent loop-tape. So yeah… there have been visual and social clues that maybe I should be engaging in some preparation for the season ahead.

And yet… let me give you a snap shot of my Christmas Eve.

Oxford Street 4pm…. Jax… running around Selfridges in a ‘Supermarket Sweep’ style frenzy. High Street 9pm… Jax… charging round Sainsbury’s with trolley on the verge of tears as they have no fresh turkey and the frozen ones will take 48hrs to defrost.

And yet, I had been complaining about Christmas being forced into my consciousness since August Bank Holiday.

You see the quote I began this with says it all… wretched bloody excess.

In my case, it is excess of time. If I know I have something to do and it isn’t to be done in the next 5 minutes… it goes on the list. The famous Jax To DO list… which never actually never gets done till I am in a howling slightly hysterical panic.

We all recall my trip to Barcelona was fraught with tasks not done till the last minute… and I’d love to say that was a one off. But No. I have done nothing for the Latvia trip either. In fact I dare say, I have done even less. Despite the fact I have known about this since May, I still have no idea how I am to get there, let alone make arrangements this end. We all know in the end I’ll be throwing random things in a bag the morning I go. (Consequences will include clomping around the Baltics in odd shoes) If ran a travel company it would be called ‘Seat of Your Pants Tours’… cause basically that is how I scrape past the finish line … by the seat of my pants!

If something isn’t to be done right now, surely spending right now preparing for it will be time badly spent if it turns out the task gets cancelled. Maybe I have been exposed to too much fiction where our heroine spends ages organising something just for our hero to arrive late. I just don’t want to be Samantha, who spent hours on valentines day, lying on the table covered in sushi just for our hero to arrive extremely late (having been delayed at work) saying he had eaten on the way home! Now if I were Samantha that scene would never have happened as I wouldn’t even start making the sushi till I heard the key in the lock!

Also to me, it almost seems like tempting fate to prepare by doing sensible things like consulting what some people think is useful information. I always think that things will just come right at the last moment and to do stuff in advance will just jinx a positive outcome. It always stuns me when I am exposed to the fact most people don’t live like that.

Last night on our way back to the city from visiting with a friend in the country, I was amazed when my travelling buddy looked up my connecting train on the wap function of their phone. I was perfectly content to do my usual running around the terminus in a panic looking for my train and platform. Of course having looked up the information, my friend advised me that I’d never make my connection and could provide me of an alternative route instead.

The information was spot on… our trains arrival time meant I had missed my connection and it was wise to change terminus and go another way. I was even furnished with the departure time and platform of the new routing. The information meant I didn’t have to panic… it even gave me enough time to pick up a Japanese take-away enroute.

But would it have occurred to me to use the internet on my phone? NO. Left to my own devices, I would have ran across Victoria Station to a random platform I think my connecting train may possibly be scheduled for, make out of breath squawks at the platform staff, then slink embarrassed over to the information desk who would inform me of what my friend managed to tell me from the comfort of the previous train… you’ve missed the last Victoria train, go to Charing Cross. Avoidable entirely it was proven – but THIS is how I live.

Somehow, the idea of leaving things to the last moment has got confused with impulsiveness in my head.

I have come to fancy that my impulsiveness is a very attractive quality of mine. I thought that meant I must be avant-garde, idiosyncratic, individualist, free and easy. I thought that because I do seem to possess the ability to pull rabbits of hats at the finish line (to mix metaphors) – and nothing ever bad happens because I’m not prepared in advance I was actually pretty cool (if unorthodox is still one of the tenants of cool).

Okay… one year they really hadn’t a spare fresh turkey or goose in the back of the supermarket (I had always kind of banked on someone forgetting to collect a pre-ordered one so I could snaffle it up half price on Xmas Eve night), but it really wasn’t so bad having a traditional Finish Xmas dinner of a mixed platter of meat and fish – which was all they had on the shelves. I styled it out faking a previously unknown Finish heritage and even made my guest do the traditional Finish after dinner sauna followed by visiting the graves of relatives. Harder than you think when you have no known rellies alive or dead in the Greater Plymouth area, which was where I lived at the time. But given that I got away with it and all these years later those people STILL buy me gifts from Finland to remind me ‘of home’ - I have always thought my leaving things to the last minute opened me up to challenges and experiences that just add to life’s rich tapestry.

In fact I would go further and say that I had come to think that to be organised was to ensure a predictable outcome. And Jax thought predictability is something that equates far too easily with dull. Ana to Jax Dull = Boring!

However it came as quite a shock to me that impulsiveness for most people does not mean antonym of boring. To most people impulsive means careless, foolish, and rash. Basically it means not being prepared. And being unprepared for the things in life that are predictable is, in most peoples view, frankly just making life harder for yourself for no bloody good reason!

One only has to look as the debacle around my TV set. I know the programmes I love. But have I ever watched a complete series of anything? Um No.

Again, it’s having to pre plan that dooms me. Even though all I have to do is actually USE the free monthly magazine Sky so kindly send me, and use the programme planner on my Sky box so I can actually catch the WHOLE series of House, Come Dine With Me, Monk or Make me a Supermodel. Errr… that involves actually committing time to something that doesn’t need doing right this minute. So instead I operate on the ‘I think it might be on around now-ish’ method.

I am quite good at remembering the day my programmes come on, but because I never look up broadcast information I usually have no idea of the time. This involves turning over when people are settled into a completely different programme… just to check. Unfortunately I don’t ever make a note of the channel either so I go to all the channels whose names vaguely ring a bell... very upsetting when I find out that yes Hallmark did have House and are rerunning old series, but the new series is actually on Sky 1. I watched about half an hour worth on Hallmark before I realised Gregory wasn’t interacting with ghosts of all his dead ex-staff… it was an old episode and they were still alive! You can imagine how much worse it gets trying to find which of the many Living channels has Make me a Supermodel is on. Living 1-35 with a plus 1hr plus 2 hrs version of each! For the love of monkeys… is this REALLY necessary?! It takes so long to find which version I need, that by the time I tune in… Tyson has done his bit and some anorexic from Kentucky is crying and I don’t know why!!!

Of course programme information is not only available in the free stuff Sky send me, it is in every newspaper, zillions of magazines, and available on all broadcast media. To say nothing of the fact I can series link a programme, whilst watching it, so that I never have to worry about finding something I enjoy again. But I don’t… cause it smacks of pre-planning… which smacks of caring about TV a little too much.

But then I keep hearing that Baden-Scott fellow from the Scouts blathering on that being prepared means that by having thought out beforehand any accident or situation that might occur, you will know the right thing to do at the right moment, and will be to do it. He’s right. My free and easy approach is (if I’m honest) just making life harder for myself for no bloody good reason!

So, I think for the sake of standing firm to my life should be easy ethos, I’m actually gonna give this whole ‘be prepared’ thing a go.

I will admit that running in heels is a great skill of mine… but maybe wheezing asthmatically for the first ten minutes on a station platform is not so attractive. I think for a change, it would be nice to walk to a train station knowing the estimated time of departure of a train.

I do save a fortune on my Oxford Street dash… but I guess those totally unsuitable random purchases are not always a reflection of how I feel about the recipients. And yes, ‘Christmas around the World’ is getting to be a tired theme when it comes to dinner. I think that with 94 shopping days left to Christmas, (at time of going to press) I am actually going to pick up the odd pressie over the coming weeks… and put an order in for a traditional British bird.

And whilst not pouring over TV Quick does prove I am not a slave to the goggle box, I do have to admit that it would be nice to follow the WHOLE story-line of a programme I am watching. I think I may just programme in the few series I really like… besides, I heard Project Runway is back, and I have already missed a few of who are in...and out.

So, given my new resolve, do excuse me if I stop this article… apparently I have to check what the weather in Latvia is like, so I can pack appropriately… and I have heard that it would also be good for me to find out exactly how on earth I am actually gonna get there!

JaxWorld has been nominated for ‘Best Blog about Stuff’ in the Bloggers Choice Awards. If you enjoy this blog please vote for it using the following link:

http://bloggerschoiceawards.com/blogs/show/80516?load=comments

BLOG 53: I'm Fantabulous Dahlinks!

FANTABULOUS DAHLINKS!

“I am a deeply superficial person.” Andy Warhol (American Artist and Initiator of Pop art)

Don’t you ever get a little tired of having to be slightly dishonest about the things you most value? It seems we must constantly have worthy motives all time. Everything must be for the greater good of mankind.

And whilst I think that the greater good of mankind is a good thing, it’s not exactly honest as a reason why I hold some things dear… and other things… well, not so much...

For instance when it comes to that question about who are your musical influences… you never REALLY say the bands and artists that genuinely influenced you, you just say the ones that make you sound like the person you really should be. It gets even worse with who your hero’s are… you want to say you pretty much hero worship the supermodel in the Calvin Klein ad as he changed your view of men’s pants forever– but end up saying the guy who invented penicillin cause he saved untold amount of lives.

You see, you always end up saying the thing that sounds right.

If you asked me who my twentieth century heroines were…I could spout many. Marie Stopes (thanks for the contraception), Rosa Parks (thanks for saying ‘no sir NOT today’), Barbara Castle (big thanks to her and all those behind the Sex Discrimination Act of 1975), among them… all very worthy. But no one truly dear to my heart, if I’m honest.

If I were honest? Sad to say it will be the ones who were a combination of pretty, sexy, successful and fearless. I have no evidence of any of my top five saving anyone’s lives or doing anything other than looking good, making a fortune from what ever skill they had and having a sharp tongue to anyone who got in their way.

The kind of women who would not be frightened to eat dinner alone in a restaurant or say “Stop huni this simply isn’t doing it for me” (Oh yes… even THEN). We are talking the likes of Nancy Astor, Dorothy Parker, Katherine Hepburn, Shirley Conran… and Kimora Lee Simmons.

Women who realised that whilst worthy causes must be supported, life really can be so much better if only we paid a little more attention to the sparkle… and a little less to the tweed.

I know… I know… I sound as deep as the shallow end of the swimming pool. But can anyone tell me WHY being deep means that one can’t appreciate style?

A word I say often is fantabulous. I’m not sure if it is even a word but it is a literal blend of Fantastic and Fabulous.. the word represents a place where glamour, wit, innate style and a certain appreciation for the kitsch all meet and decorate intelligence.

You can’t be fantabulous and stupid. The rules of fantabulous say you have to be aware… if not… you just won’t get it.

To be fantabulous you must pay attention to what goes on around you… and provoke a reaction… and you must be ready at all times to comment. These are the things all my heroines have in common.

So… in pure Jax’s style let’s have a look at my dear to the heart heroines… women of substance who made their world a fantabulous place too!

Proving ground breaking achievement is not the remit of just those with nothing better to do, here’s the first on my chronological list. Strangely given that she was a Yank, Nancy Astor was the first woman to serve as a Member of Parliament (MP) in the British Parliament. A stunning beauty, Nancy was a model for the great portrait capturers of her day - one only has to gaze upon the portrait by John Singer Sargent to see that the girl could certainly wear a frock! Equally her homes in Buckinghamshire and London were the most stylish and copied of the day. Aware that she was not taken seriously due to her status as a fashionista and beauty, she rather enjoyed watching those who made the mistake of taking her lightly trying to back track once she had achieved the unachievable. There are so many of her sardonic quotes floating about but one of my favourites is “The penalty for success is to be bored by the people who used to snub you”.

Being fantabulous was simply second nature to the next heroine on my chronological list. Dorothy Parker was an American writer and poet. She was also nominated for an Oscar for a little screenplay she wrote called A Star is Born. There are just two other writers who have remained constantly in print since their first outing... one is a British Chap called William Shakespeare, the other is the chap who put together the old and new testament and called it the Bible – so it’s fair to say Dorothy could write. She was probably the owner of the sharpest eye when it came to spotting 20th century urban foibles, Dorothy is much remembered for her caustic wit and polished one liners. A sexy and stylish woman, Dorothy was much desired and much married… defying the stereotype of the intellectual woman. Her most famous quote on this subject is of course... ‘Men seldom make passes at girls who wear glasses’

Another fantabulous woman with a Hollywood connection would be the great Katherine Hepburn. How ironic that the woman once referred to as Box Office Poison is officially ranked by the American Film Institute as the greatest female star in the history of American cinema. Way ahead of her time she was unconventional, direct, outspoken and intellectual with an acerbic tongue. She defied the era's conventions, being very direct about her left wing politics and her non marital sexual relationships. Katherine lent her name to some liberal social and political causes, particularly family planning. She also defied convention by wearing trousers this caused a revolution in fashion as women rushed to copy her, which was considered outrageous at the time. The woman who manages still to hold the record for the most Oscars won by a female performer, never once did a thing that was expected of her. On this subject she is quoted saying “If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun”

Have your cake, she said. Eat it. But just don't be silly enough to bake the bloody thing. Of course the next fantabulous woman we are talking of is of course, Shirley Conran. So easily she could have just been a footnote in the biographies of her famous ‘Mr Habitat’ husband and 2 famous designer sons. But instead Shirley became the poster girl for the second and gentler wave of practical feminism. Like 9 novels were not enough, Shirley popped out 6 non fiction books and a career as a journalist and editor… but how do you do all that and raise a family and support a high profile husband cried the women of the day! It was a time when women were trying to juggle being the star of the boardroom, the queen of bedroom whilst winning Michelin stars in the kitchen. Shirley of course was a self confessed cheat, admitting it couldn’t all be done and pointing out that anyway life was way too short to waste time stuffing mushrooms. Shirley brought respect to corner cutting rebranding it as efficiency and made no secret of the fact that she would rather lie on a sofa than sweep beneath it. A fan of looking good, she even brought her ‘just cheat’ ethos to the aging process, rebranding nips and tucks as just routine maintenance! A direct to the point Brit, Shirley made it acceptable for women everywhere to feel they really do not have to be everything to everybody and it’s absolutely fine to cherish yourself. My favourite quote is where after it is established that there is nothing wrong with putting yourself at the top of your list she said “First things first, second things never.”

Life is hard enough when you don’t have money, and even harder when you are half Korean and half Black and growing up in Missouri, without being only 10 years old and 5feet 10 inches tall. What better revenge than to be awarded an exclusive modelling contract with Chanel just after your 13^th birthday? But what is more outstanding is to go on to be CEO of a $140 million dollar company before you are 30. We are of course talking of Kimora Lee Simmons. Kimora admits to having the quality of fabulousness to an unbearable extreme - a quality revealing all that expresses glamour, style, charisma, power, and heart. In a way she is full circle back to Nancy Astor – a beautiful loud mouth who proved dangerous to under estimate. A woman who has been captured by the portrait makers of the day, whose home is the envy of millions and the social hub of the glitterati. A woman who cultivates power, independence, confidence, and positivity in everything she does. On her softer side, Kimora heads several charities and youth advocacy organisations, and despite being bullied at school provides funding for students from that school to attend college. However, like a magpie if it glitters, Kimora has it and has quite a reputation as the princess of bling. The media are never quite sure if she is knowingly kitsch or just ghastly crass, a matter she did not help to clarify with her recent quote “You guys aren't gonna handle me...You're gonna be handled."

So there they are – an MP, A Writer, An Actress, A Novelist and A Model. Spanning from just before the end of the 19^th Century to the start of the 21^st, five women who made a mark, whilst looking good and living well. It’s a comfort to know the fab five managed to achieve that – even if not one of them achieved world peace, equality or an end to third world poverty.

You can see why I lie. It doesn’t reflect well to say your heroines didn’t actually further the cause of the species much.

However the fab five do remind me of myself so much more than a more worthy set of candidates.

When I hear the world comment of Kimora’s love of bling, I’m aware I own home furnishings made of sequins, teddy bear fur and of the same mirrored mosaics they make disco balls from.

When I hear the world comment on Shirley Conran’s guilt free household cheating, I’m aware I pay others rather than do tasks I loath and have been known to let Marks and Spencer’s go uncredited for more than one ‘home cooked’ culinary extravaganza.

When I hear the world comment on Katherine Hepburn’s in your face opinions and outrageous fashions, I’m aware that I too seldom back down and have been known pass inappropriate wear off as personal style.

When I hear the world comment on Dorothy Parker’s bullet speed put downs and her voracious appetite for male company, I’m aware that I too feel sometimes it just has to be said and yes maybe a few more female friends may balance the see saw.

When I hear the world comment on Nancy Astor’s hostessing and gown wearing , I’m aware that seldom a month goes by without an invite with my address in the venue box, and I really do need to wear clothes more than once before I decide they need replacing.

And when I look at photographs of these five women you can’t avoid the way how each went out of their way to provoke a reaction – be it Nancy’s bare back, Or Dorothy’s angled hat, or Katherine’s gentleman’s suit, or Shirley’s cosmetic surgery or Kimora’s bling tastic diamonds .

But then I recall how ready they were to handle the reactions they cultivated and how sassy their answers on any given subject were.

And when I do think of them I smile, and know that just the fact I get that these women are heroines’ means that I must be fantabulous too!

JaxWorld has been nominated for ‘Best Blog about Stuff’ in the Bloggers Choice Awards. If you enjoy this blog please vote for it using the following link:

http://bloggerschoiceawards.com/blogs/show/80516?load=comments

BLOG 52: ON YER BIKE!!!!

ON YER BIKE!!!

“Every time I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the future of the human race.” H. G. Wells (Novelist, Journalist, Sociologist and Historian)

It is a sad state of affairs to complete childhood without the ability to ride a bicycle.

I should know, I managed to complete childhood and a couple of phases of adulthood without the skill. I never could learn how, a simple task that a small child could accomplish had defeated me. However bicycle riding is the great metaphor for success, being that it takes some perseverance to overcome the problem of balance. I cannot tell you how disheartening it is to have Albert Einstein’s famous quote (aligning any task that takes will and effort with bicycle riding) paraphrased at you… worse still be told that any skill you may have forgotten will come back to you…’just like riding a bicycle’. Fact was… I couldn’t ride a bike.

I had just about come to terms with this anomaly, when as part of the great task that is child raising, the time came to each my son to ride a bike. I have to admit this was a task I farmed out to someone more suitably qualified, but watching the process revealed a great truth to me. A shaky child on a bicycle for the first time needs both support and freedom. Support to feel he won’t fall… and Freedom to do just that… and not be scared.

Within moments he peddled away in self propelled joy… and I realised that there was a lesson in the process for both of us somewhere.

Freedom and Support are the two key ingredients for a successful life. Too much of either and you are doomed, too little of either and you can never progress.

A few years later, I found myself in the unenviable position of being a lone parent. Being a lone parent is something the vast majority of people who find themselves in that status attain by default. I know no one personally who had planned to be there. However, once you are, there is little time for navel gazing and wondering how/where it all went awry… you have 2 people’s jobs to do, and the task starts immediately. But again, as the months went on and I went soliciting advice from friends, came the comforting words that if I had got thus far, I could continue… as it was ‘life was just like riding a bicycle… you can’t fall off unless you stop peddling’.

It was of little comfort to me to be made constantly aware that I had never in real life actually started to peddle. I could not self propel a bike – in fact I could only sit on a bicycle if it had stabilisers… and adult stabilisers are NOT a sight to see.

By then my son was 8 and quite and experienced cyclist. He would ride to the park – I would jog out of breath alongside. I had no choice but to sit on a bench and holler instructions for him not to cycle out of my eye line once we got there. (Flo Jo I am not).

Then one day. I asked him.

“Do you think you could teach me?”

So he did. With a patience befitting someone many years his senior, my child revealed a positivity, honesty and perceptiveness I had little idea he possessed. He was observant and sharp, revealing to me what techniques I had for holding up my own progression. I grazed my knuckles to the bone… I flew over the handlebars into a gorse bush (ouch!)… but my little Svengali insisted that I get right back in the saddle. His only reaction when I showed him my wounds was “Cool”. I actually think he WAS jealous!

After a couple of days I learned to balance, stop, start, signal and peddle the bike. As I completed my first circuit (round the tennis courts) – he cheered for me like a proud parent and let all the glory be mine.

It was a seminal moment in our relationship. The child had taught the parent a life skill. Although it was humbling to me to have to ask a child for help, I think it was very good for me. All too often we can forget how much a child has to teach us. In this day and age where if you wish to truly understand a computer for instance, your best teacher would be a 12 year old… it is something we adults are being forced to come to terms with. But it was great to have him succeed where so many others had failed – the child is a natural born teacher!

Also, it meant from that moment on we could enjoy the activity together. We are both several bikes on from that seminal moment in the park… and we are both the scourge of our neighbourhood with our mutual disregard for the laws on cycling on the pavement! It is wonderful to have the locality opened up for us by our mutual skill and to be able to take off on adventures together.

It amazes me how simultaneously liberating self propulsion is… and also how thrillingly dangerous it also is. I now get why it is such a metaphor for life.

Over the past few years of being a cyclist I have learnt that my bicycle does not only propel me to where I need to be… but it does more. It also offers me the thin edge of danger (maybe that is just cycling in Greater London!) but it certainly keeps me alert and comfortably apprehensive.

When balanced precariously on two wheels, everything seems completely different and poses a personal threat. As a pedestrian or motorist you simply glide over a pot hole… on a bike it becomes the launch pad for a flight over the handle bars. As a pedestrian or motorist an unleashed dog is more noticed for its breed or cuteness… on a bike it becomes the unpredictable ball of fur that snap after your coat tails or chase your back wheel. Even freewheeling joyously carries a slight apprehension of how exactly you will control your rapidly gaining speed. And yet for all the anxiety and overwhelming sense of being in control of your own outcomes soothes. On this cycling is just like life: Qualms and terrors of unpredictable change become but a challenge you have to believe you can vanquish as giving up is not an option.

Cycling has taught me to appreciate the journey once more and to arrive knowing that getting there was part of the fun. My bicycle and I have learnt uphill takes mighty effort (even with a mountain bike)… and to do so gives tingling satisfaction. But it was on the saddle of my bicycle that I learnt finding a less challenging route is also a great skill that satisfies also. It taught me that sometimes it pays to ask WHAT is the big hurry? To notice that sometimes time IS on my side, so why take the arduous uphill journey if it is only beneficial because it was the most direct route?

It took several bike rides to and from my parents to understand this. My parents live delightfully downhill of my house. I can get there with ease, the avenues are wide, many have cycling lanes and I freewheel without a care in the world. However taking that route home is like auditioning for a heart attack. I was often spot sweat soaked and pushing the bike up the hill (curse those Romans and their straight lines!). Then it occurred to me that I was putting myself through an arduous uphill struggle simply because I had travelled that way out. I had to ask myself WHY was I coming and going by the same route? I’m not a bus… I don’t HAVE to follow a prescribed way.

So I cycled across the tops of hills that run from my parents to beyond my place. Okay, doing so meant I’d overshot my house by half a mile... but the hill back to my house from there was downward. Flat, Flat Flat… then freewheel! It was whilst taking this route that I discovered that whilst there were no wide avenues or cycle lanes, it was a much prettier and interesting route. On this ‘round the houses’ route an ancient woodland and a sheep farm had to be negotiated.

I’d lived in the area since I was 7, and I had never noticed the sheep farm before. From the road it looks like a clearing in the ancient woodland. I have rocketed past it in cars, on buses and even on foot, maybe giving it a sideways glance and thinking it was a garden centre or a golf course. Of course, cycling across the tops of the hill away from the public thoroughfare meant I could look down… and in. Also allowing myself time to journey rather than travel, meant that I could go and knock on the farmhouse door and ask about it. The owners were really friendly and told me all about their urban farm and invited me to their open day. My son and I both cycled over that day (note to self: Think again about getting bikes over styles… a lot harder than it looks) – the open day was really good fun. Plus in a real surprise they had invited some cowboys from Western Canada to attend who did some entertaining tricks. I found it a bit of a shock that this had been on my doorstep for decades, but I had failed to notice it was there.

But that is the thing about taking the time to try another route. Sometimes you have to do a detour to find something you were never looking for that will bring you great joy.

I used to think that if a mountain was put in front of you… it meant you had to climb it.

But it doesn’t at all. A mountain is put in front of you for you to decide what you wish to do about it. One should bear in mind going up is only about getting to the destination... to choose otherwise is the path of adventure where arrival the destination may well get delayed, postponed or you may not arrival at all. As my bicycle trips have taught me… going up it is just ONE of many possible options.

I totally get it now why a strange wheeled contraption invented only in 1818 has leapfrogged into our language as metaphor for modern living.

It takes a certain amount of courage to even learn to operate the contraption.

It takes the support of someone you trust implicitly to believe in your own courage.

It takes the freedom to be able to break free of that support to propel yourself.

It takes the foresight to see danger and avert it.

It takes the enjoyment in just being alive to enjoy what you have achieved.

And for giving me all of that I would like to thank Baron Karl Drais von Sauerbronn for taking his invention to the Paris show in 1818, and all the inventors who perfected it to the bicycle we know today.

But above all, I would like to thank an 8 year old boy, who took the time out over a spring school holiday to teach his mother at last, how to ride a bike.

JaxWorld has been nominated for ‘Best Blog about Stuff’ in the Bloggers Choice Awards. If you enjoy this blog please vote for it using the following link:

http://bloggerschoiceawards.com/blogs/show/80516?load=comments