I thought I'd better stay true to promise and place some more frequent musings up here so perhaps the time lapse between this and my last log-in is not as great as those monthly maximums of late. Perhaps only just.
After a long run of on shore winds that followed the last post we have suddenly been hit by a relentless succession of swells, with offshores and good to near perfect conditions for days and days. Of course the strange thing about living here is that familiarity does breed contempt, and self imposed work discipline has meant late sessions in underprime times. Like the late go out on dark.
Why the self imposed denial? Well, in truth, all my project meanderings of the past few years, filmic and otherwise have given me, apart from some accolades and many friends, a rather deep and terrifying hole to dig out of, at a late age when digging is the last thing I expected.
It has meant the blog, which as I've said before has been a cathartic place to connect with near and dear, and dear and far, has become a place I've tended to avoid because of fear of emotional exposure.
I was thinking about this this evening, and then decided… bugger it, as I'm not that anonymous, and I can hold my head up in many ways as I keep on giving it a crack, successful financially or not. It doesn't help the terror, or perhaps it does. Ask me in a year or two.
As our editor Jock says, when we're cigar chomping magnates we'll look back on all of this and laugh.
Jock you are rather epic.
So today I find myself alone at home, errant son away somewhere being errant, older son not so but catching up with devil boy to coax some sense into him and trying to change university courses at the same time. My dear Sue is up in town working and chasing work to keep us afloat as I sit here in a down moment in between working on sub edits on our magazine, have anxiety attacks and try to allay them by this blog post. By now you'll realise this is rather stream of consciousness, but that is how I've been working in Safetosea since it began so no need to change now.
The one thing that has kept me alive, and I mean this seriously, is the sea and its proximity. My wandering up to the headland at Bells or Southside, a long look out to the horizon and those deep breaths of connectedness to something great, coupled with enough paddle outs to keep my body fairly strong has made the other stuff weighing me down bearable.
When I started this blog I had a house, assets, and family. I still have the family. Risks, and expectations... have their risks.
Lesson learned, and as I said to Sue yesterday, when we met nearly 30 years ago, we had nothing. We built something, it's gone awry, but we can do it again. And we're still together.
Last Sunday Bells was big and perfect, and local photog Steve Ryan took my picture on the second wave of a lovely session. I'm six months short of sixty, and I never expected to be riding such beautiful waves passably well, so many years later. Of that I'm thankful and the sun is still shining.
Thankyou and goodnight.
