Five Minute Friday: Messenger

Want to play Five Minute Friday? It’s easy peasy!

1. Write for 5 minutes flat on the prompt- no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking

2. Link back here and invite others to join in.

3. Meet & encourage someone who linked up before you.

GO

All day, every day, I am a messenger in some way or another. It's my job, for a start - I'm a copywriter, so I get paid to deliver a message. Professionally, I am always thinking of my target audience and of how my words will come across to them. Personally, it is no different. Today I had to tell my son that his class will be merged with another class next year, with a class containing the girl who has been bullying him this year and making his life a total misery. That was a hard moment to be a messenger. I managed to give it a positive twist and he wasn't too upset in the end, which made me think about how important the delivery of the message is.

Delivering a positive, exciting message can be great fun. When we told my mum I was pregnant with our third child, I was almost jumping up and down with excitement and couldn't wait to get the words out. Telling her about my dad's stroke two years earlier was a whole different kettle of fish.

Words can build a person up but words can also hurt and destroy. Choosing your words carefully is a really great use of your time and something you will never regret.

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Five Minute Friday: Friend

For an only child who never lived in one country for long, my friends have been my family. I made friends quickly, intensely and easily. I've always been a loyal friend - crushed every time I discovered not everyone is like that. I love my friends fiercely and I especially love knowing that the world simply isn't big enough to create a distance between us. Two of my very best friends live in New Zealand and Australia respectively. Thanks to email, Facebook and cell phones, they feel closer by than some of my friends who just live in the next town.

There have been friends I didn't see for more than 10 years and when we finally had the opportunity to touch base again, the years fell away and we just carried on where we'd left off. Having my friends spread across the globe has its advantages - no matter where we travel, we can always count on a bed for the night. It also has its drawbacks, like when we were getting married and distance meant many of my good friends couldn't be there.

I've recently made a new friend. She lives in the next street and was tough to get to know. I know from experience that it pays to persist with such people as many of my longest-lasting friendships started that way. She has proven to be a caring, funny, loving friend who I can take long walks with and talk about everything under the sun. I'm glad to have a friend like that who doesn't live two continents away! To have a friend and to be a friend are very precious things indeed. I, for one, cannot imagine a world without friends.


Linking up with the Gypsy Mama for 5 minutes of writing on a Friday...

Five Minute Friday: Good-bye

Want to play Five Minute Friday? It’s easy peasy!

1. Write for 5 minutes flat on the prompt- no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking

2. Link back here and invite others to join in.

3. Meet & encourage someone who linked up before you.

GO

Over the years, I've become somewhat of an expert at saying good-bye. The more often you do it, the easier it gets. One of the reasons it got easier, however, was because I realised the French got it right with their 'au revoir' - literally, till we see each other again. Having lived in 9 very different countries and 20 different homes over my lifetime, I've said my fair share of good-byes. Some were heart-breakingly hard, others not quite so hard. One of the good-byes on the harder end of the scale, was to a friend from New Zealand when we were living in Singapore. She went back to her country of birth, I was moving to Europe. In the intervening 22 years or so, we have seen each other surprisingly often and we're in touch almost daily now, with short messages on Facebook or longer emails. When my dad died, she couldn't sleep and phoned me at 2 am (her time) to talk about him. I know I will see her again, whether it's next year or in a decade or two. This is the way it is with so many of my childhood friends - somewhere in the world, we meet again.

The more permanent good-byes - my dad, my uncle, my grandparents - they're of the heart-breaking variety but I also know we'll see each other again. One day, in heaven, it will be a case of 'au revoir'.

Even though I've done it countless times, I still hate saying good-bye, even if it is 'au revoir'. I'd rather keep everyone right here. Then again, having a wide variety of friends to stay with all over the world means many of our holidays double up as chances to 'revoir' and those moments are so precious, they're almost worth the wrench of saying good-bye in the first place.

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Five Minute Friday: Ache

Got five minutes? Come and write with us, we promise to tell you we loved it!

1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking

2. Link back here and invite others to join in.

3. Please visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments.

Five Minute Friday

GO

The moments in my life when I've ached the most have been some of the most memorable. My muscles screaming and my lungs on fire as I climbed a volcano with two of my closest friends when we were 16 and on a real adventure without parents. The soreness after having given birth to the two most important little boys in my world. The sadness in my heart after losing my dad, a few friends and a number of family members. My sleepy head and my blistered dancing feet after our wedding.

Of course, there have been many forgettable aches along the way and those are annoying, troublesome, irritating. The big aches, however, the ones to remember - they're not bad. There is such a thing as a good ache. This is something I try and fail to explain to my four-year-old. He suffered from bad headaches when he was about 3 and he now often wakes screaming with growing pains. Those headaches, they were bad. But growing pains, they're good! They may not feel like it but they mean you're a healthy, growing boy who's going to tower over his mum one day. They are an ache full of promise, of the man you will one day be. That thought, in turn, makes my heart ache - ache for the baby he was, ache with sadness of losing my grip over him, having to let go a tiny little bit each day. That too, is a good ache.

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Five minute Friday: Grit

On Fridays we write like we believe we can fly. Won’t you join us? Five Minute Friday

1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking

2. Link back here and invite others to join in.

3. Please visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments.

GO

Last week I had lunch with an ex-colleague. We talked about where our lives had taken us since we last met and she told me that I was strong, that I was brave, that I had grit. This surprised me because I really don't see myself that way. She meant that she was impressed with the way I had picked up my life again after being made redundant and then losing my dad so suddenly.

That doesn't make it any less surprising to me. In these economically difficult times, so many people are being made redundant. Some even lose entire companies, their companies, so being out of work for a short while is really not something that takes grit to overcome, I feel. As for losing my dad - for me that was briefly the end of the world but I have two very young sons who still have an entire world to discover and I am privileged that I can accompany them on at least part of that journey. I really don't see myself as someone with grit, per se. I'm just a mum and a wife and a daughter and a friend, getting on with life and making the most of it. I have found a new job that I like and I'm still grieving for my dad (does that ever stop?) but it hurts just a little bit less each day. If that means I have grit, then sure, I'm one gritty girl! I just think it means I have a lot to live for and to be happy about, grit or not.

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Five minute Friday: Trust

Around here we write for five minutes flat on Fridays.

We write because we want to, not because we have to. We write for fun, for joy, for discovery. On Fridays we just write without worrying if it’s just right or not. Won’t you join us? Five Minute Friday

GO

When I was younger, people often told me I was too trusting. It was a major source of disappointment on several occasions. If someone asks me to do something or I offer to do something, I do it. If I have to take good care of something, I do. Somehow we always expect the people around us to be like us but the reality is that so often they aren't.

Now that I'm an adult - at least in age! - I find myself at the opposite end of the spectrum. Not in the way I behave but in how I see others. Especially since having children. Trusting others with my children, well, there just aren't really words for it. Even my husband, who is a fantastic dad - he just isn't me! The step towards choosing daycare was a tough one. How could anyone else be trusted with the most precious creatures in my world? But trust I did and this time, I wasn't disappointed. After having my second child, I suffered from post-natal depression and that brought with it an onslaught of fear and distrust. Leaving my kids behind for just an hour was a complete wrench. I hated feeling that way. When I recently had to go on a business trip, the first since having kids, I was so worried all those old feelings would come flooding back. However, I trusted in my husband, in my neighbours, in school, in daycare and I really trusted with my whole being. And you know what? They all proved to be trustworthy. Sometimes you just have to trust in trust.

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Color or colour?

GO

Is it color or colour? Having grown up amongst people from many different kinds of English-speaking countries, often the way they spelt things was an indication of where they came from. Why is it that the Americans organize whereas the British organise? I was educated within the British system, so I had words such as colour, realise, organisation and aluminium drummed into me. Since I entered the corporate world in a few large multinationals, suddenly I've had to let go of my Britishness, at least in the written word. As a copywriter, this is a pretty important facet of my job! It feels so unnatural, however, to write things the way I was always taught not to. It's then that you realise how much of an impact your teachers and your education system have on your whole life. After spending all day at work writing American English, which feels rebellious and wrong somehow, I find it somewhat of a relief to be able to write 'correctly' again once I am home. I even see the influence of language now in my sons - they speak English to me and Dutch to my husband. If I accidentally say something to them in Dutch, they will frown and tell me what I should have said, which is the same phrase in English. That is what I love about language - the many nuances and colours of language and the way it influences our lives.

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