Make Your Own Footsteps

Wednesday evening found me tossing and turning in my sleep, listening to the dogs barking across the valley and watching the moon move gently across the sky, my tummy full of butterflies and my head full of senarious at the idea of going to THE BIG CITY. You see yesterday I joined TBH in Penny Peugeot on his trip to work to sign some documents in Nicosia. It was not the signing of the documents that worried me, but the meeting of his work colleagues and boss, as we did the signing in the office, and the thought of killing time in a shopping mall until lunch when TBH could take me home............

I should not have feard meeting 'the team' they were all very friendly, including 'THE BOSS'. It is a family run business, built up over 40 years and I was greeted with true Cypriot hospitality ,a real warm and friendly atmosphere,the boss's lovely mother offering me tea, it was good to put faces to names that TBH has mentioned over dinner some eveings and to see where he works, get a bit more of a feel for the job that he does and the place in which he works, I always think it is nicer to have an image in ones mind of where someone speaks, emails or skypes you from. It is some how comforting and gives a reality to the empty void of cyber space.

So, after the signing I was droppped at THE MALL. I have never been a very good window shopper.

The idea of peering through shop windows longing for something inside never seemed very satisfying to me, I am the sort of person who likes to go get what I need and get out as soon as possible. Since I left the big buzz malls of DXB and began the jorney of a simpler life here in CY,I found myself walking around yesterday questioning how many different styles of dresses are there these days, tunic dress, maxi dress, summer dress, 2 way dress, special ocassion dress, gosh there was a time when you only ever bought a dress for a ' special ocassion' and the rest of the time you made your own. As I walked past the beauty counters in a famous department store I pondered, how many toxin filled foundations can one put on one's face at any given time, only for it to run and smudge during the heat of these hot summers days, leaving your skin unable to breath, forcing you to cleanse it once you get home with yet another designer cleansing product. And what do we really need with all this STUFF???????? Believe me, there was a time when in one particular store I would have 'popped in' and walked out with a trolly load of STUFF that on impulse I thought would make my home better, more cosy, more trendy,more luxurious, but recently I have come to realise that this follow the sheep menatailty.............

only heards us all into one direction taking us deaper and deaper into the media driven tunnel of buy buy buy,leading us to believe that buying is the source of enrichment and enlightement, buy this and it will lead you to happiness and contentment. How long does that retail therapy feeling really last, before what you bought ends up in a land fill ouzing toxins for future generations to discover whilst playing on a piece of waste ground.

Happiness and contentment come from with in, from being around and with those you love and from understanding what and who you really are, being on your own journey, carrying as little luggage as possible. I was delighted to find that over the past few months my mindset has changed enough that as I walked around the store, with every item I picked up I asked myself is it a want or a need. I left the store with nothing but a few photos, as the saying goes, 'take nothing but photographs, leave nothing but footsteps' I was glad I had made my own footsteps through the day yesterday. Facing my fears of meeting new people, being in the city and out of my comfort zone, going in a different direction to the sheep.

Reflections.

It has been a strange one this week, a time for looking inside and mirroring myself and TBH, with both of us asking some interesting questions. Who are we? What are we really about? What do we really believe in and where do we really belong? I suppose it came about after an unexpected but delightful meeting of a friend's new wife,she is from Zimbabwe and oozes Africa and all the good it can be. We shared our plans for the future, and returning to Zimbabwe is one of hers as she is very optimistic that Zimbabwe can and will get back on it's feet in due course. This discussion sent a ripple of uneasiness through what had been a a fairly still mill pond.

Having only made the change from Dubai to Cyprus a year ago,TBH and I suddenly found ourselves yearning for Africa once again. I mean really yearning for it, as if it were calling us from the very heart of the Rift Valley echoing it's cry across the plains of the Masai Mara. For some reason Africa does that to you, once it is in your blood and pumps through your veins, it seems to draw you in like some mystical drug, and there's a constant nagging in the back of our heads that says,

' come home come home, this is where you belong, come back, come back you've been gone too long'

Perhaps it is also part of being an Expat. As it opens up ones minds to different countries cultures and experiences, it drives one to constantly wonder what is around the next corner.

There was a brief interlude from the questioning when we were given a free concert beneath the stars, as we sipped our wine on the rock at Impi ridge over looking the valley and a villa below, where a wedding party was being held and a live Cypriot band sung love songs into the balmy summer night breeze.

A few days at a crossroads of deep reflection by me,

and my cloggy husband

concluded that whatever has been was and what ever will be, will be, but what is most important is here and now.

So we have peace again at last, happy with our decisions and content that for now this is where we belong.
And as another summers day draws to a close and I wonder who on the other side of the world is watching the sun arise as I watch it fall, I wonder how many of you are happy with the here and now, and how often do you reflect on the could Be's or could have been. How many of us really live the moment?