It's thursday! I'm almost singing before my eyes open (at an ungodly time of the morning). It's always the best morning, I don't know why, its as if my mood is infectious. The children get dressed, eat up and are ready before 7:30am, which in itself is a miracle. Thursday moods are contagious. We dance through the school run and nothing important is ever forgotten. It's Thursday after all.

The usual drudgery of housework is a breeze, the vacuuming, the bed making, the bathrooms. I dance to the rythym of "It's Thursday, it's Thursday." in my head and it all gets effortlessly done. Nothing is too much trouble and I want to be as organised as I can. It's Thursday.

I do the school pick up with a song in my heart. I can hardly wait now, I'm nearly there and the song pounds in my head "It's Thursday!It's Thursday!", now I'm impatient. I'm just bursting with trivia. I buy the perfect accoutrements (that means wine and chips or spirits, mixer and chips), and I pick up the children. They seem to pick up my great mood (IT'S THURSDAY! IT'S THURSDAY!)and we are joyful and playful as apposed to tired and fighting.

I get my sickeningly joyful self home, settle the children with rarely given treats (such as unlimited teleision and chips), pour myself a non measured wine, dial a number and sigh with contentment.

"Hello?"

"I've got soooo much to tell you!"

It's Thursday.

Everybody is scared of dying. It's natural to want to live. That's why the "Twilight" sagas have been so seductive: to become perfect and eternal. Who wouldn't want that?! But to only have ten more years....

What would I change anything? To change things would be detrimental, maybe I would no longer have children to hold, and ones that I can hold no longer. Maybe I'd be thinner, but would I have shared so many joyful meals (and many wines) with the people I love? Maybe changing things would mean I didn't have Adam & god knows I've said before, everybody needs an Adam. All the things I went through, the sorow and the joy (sorry for the preachy) led me to this moment.

I am contented and joyful, or joyfully contented. I have found where my heart lies. If I only had ten more years I hope I could live them with joy (and maybe take up smoking agian coz by god, I still miss it!), maybe I'd take a little less for granted & drink more but I wouldn't change anything. My life led me here and it's wonderful.

How do I stand out? An interesting question that strikes me two ways. In my day to day life, as a genuine functioning member of society, friend, mother of three, member of a mothers group; I am the one who couches advice in funny anecdotes least they're offensive. I hide behind humour. I am usually the first to find the funny moments in anything, no matter how painful. I am pratical, for all my laughter, I can usually judge things at the heart of the matter. Practical: a blessing and a curse (at least sartorially).

As a third child and only daughter, I am the one who hides behind loud opinions. It stil surprises me after all the years of living independently how I am still almost instinctually called back to the role I was cast. A show off, a bombast, ridiculous. Never a lady. As an adult, also an advocate for my family, seeking peace through (often) painful interference, even when it was none of business, I figured if it was keeping me awake at night, I should probably take it to the family members it should be keeping up at night. If it's not my problem, take to those who's problem it really is, let them sort it out.

So how do I mostly stand out?

I hope as someone who has a family that are all friends, regardless of our differences, we love love each other. Better, we also like each other.

Where ever you are I hope you're happy. What you may not know is that you broke me. I know you didn't realise it, but you did. Even all these years later I'm still a bit broken.

You ruined the way I'd always seen myself. You hurt me, my family and you made me change the way I look at life. You with your painfully pleasant kicks and jabs. That's pretty much all I knew of you. You hurt me and you were gone. Hadn't I had enough hurt alredy?

God knows over the years men treated me terribly. All those fuck & run merchants and there I was, with starry eyed optimism, believing they were gonna call me, soon. Soon-ish. Sometime in the next week (month?). Harsh.

And lets not forget my so called best friends. The ones who told me I looked like a teddy bear biscuit in that brown dress. The ones who only noticed any weight loss in my legs. The ones went who out & didn't invite me. The ones who said "Yeah but that was your choice, etc". Ouch.

Even all that didn't hurt me as badly as you did. I cried for 36 six hours for you. What did I get from you? A petite dark haired girl who didn't speak to me. Who didn't look at me. Who never will. Who hurts me still. Heart break.

Someone told me that before we're born we pick our paths, that life is a choice even before we're born. I have to say that honestly, your so called "life-choice" did me no real favours. I would rather have you in my life and be the person I used to be. How ever pathetic and groveling I may have been.

The question I ponder is; will I be sixty and still dwelling on you? Will you always be the "what if" or the "if only"? Will I still cry for you in the shower? Will you forever have hurt me irrevocably?

(I lied in this prompt. Lucy is not someone I went to high school with. Sorry, to any one who reads this, I needed to write (type, what ever) it down.)

Love Mum.

Just over a year ago, I discovered I was a little bit pregnant, actually I was quite a lot pregnant, 20 weeks to be exact, with number 3. We (me, hubby and two children) were living in a 1960's three bedroom. Have you ever lived in one? The bedrooms are tiny! Even the master bed room was only 3 metres square, it barely fit a queen size bed (well, it did fit but we had to sort of sidle around the sides of the room to, oh I don't know, exit.). So we (actually "him who is hubby") decided we must build a new house in one of those "soon to be up and coming" new estates. In the interim we lived with my parents. That is a different answer. And so, after 10 months of living at the parents, our house was completed and we moved in.

We have been here about 3 weeks, I had this stupid ides that I would keep this house beautiful. If you move into a brand new house that is clean and perfect, surely it's nothing to wipe all the surfaces everyday? Thus keeping it pristine and beautiful. Well, more fool me.

Many visitors came to see the new house, resulting in many an impromptu dinner invite/house warming. My birthday came. And Christmas with all the new toys to be set up in the family room. Not to mention of course that I unpacked all the essentials and the rest is in the carport, I can't decide whether to look in all those boxes or simply give them to charity.

Currently, there is a baby 'play mat' on the floor, various toys, the dishwasher needs to be emptied and then reloaded. The lounge has become the dumping ground for all the things that don't yet have homes. There is three, yes three baskets of clean clothes to fold and put away. Also about five loads to wash and hang on the line. Which I will do, tomorrow, or maybe Tuesday. About forty mosquitoes squashed onto the ceiling (couldn't believe how many there were down here, I just kill 'em and forget about 'em). Beds not made, rooms not tidied. And I thought I would be cleaner here. The problem is, I brought myself to the house. I guess a least you can tell I live here. I've put my mark on it so to speak.

Well currently as I write this I'm sweating, just a little. It's 30 degrees celsius (86 degrees fahrenheit) today, my favourite weather. For Australians, this time of year means BBQs and beaches. Seafood and a chilled wine, that's Christmas "down" here.

Also, I live in Melbourne and it never snows here, I know aren't I lucky? I suffer through mostly mild winters. Well, while I live here at least.

But anyway, what I'm thinking about now is my good beach read, putting sunscreen on and how to stay cool without putting on bathers. Jealous? Well, at least you "north hemispherians" can comfort yourselves with the fact that in about twenty weeks I'll be dying of jealousy, while I suffer through winter .

I have a friend. A good friend, someone I know inside and out. Someone I am as honest with as it gets, for me. She, Cate, had a perfect and accidental pregnancy, and an accidentally perfect and wonderful son. For Cate that was the easy bit, pregnancy, birth. The hard part comes with parenting.

Ten months after the birth of her son, she is having another. So joyful and blessed. So utterly full of bliss, I would have hated her if I didn't love her so much. But of course, as you may have guessed, tragedy struck. Her bliss, her gift, her joy had a "genetic disorder". What innocuous sounding words for such devastation.

Cate was 24 weeks into her pregnancy. She went for a scan, so excited, sure to the very marrow that she was having a daughter. The sonogram techs were going to tell her the sex of her baby today, that was all that Cate was anticipating. She was so excited, having one so close to another was just what she wanted. They would grow up buddies, playing and kicking the shit out of each other. At least, that's what she was looking forward to.

Two minutes into the scan it was obvious something was wrong.
"I can't get the baby to roll over, I'll get the doctor" Was what the tech said, but it felt wrong. And of course it was. The baby's heart was misshapen, the left bigger than the right. A common occurrence in "trisomy 18/Edwards Syndrome". An amniocentesis would be necessary.

The results came back with no good news. The baby, a girl Lucy, had Edwards syndrome. She was lucky to have survived this long and it would be miraculous if she survived the birthing process. In short, her baby was dying. The best thing to do was induce labour.

And so that's what Cate did. She followed the advice of her doctors. For right or wrong Cate went in to have her baby. She cried all the day before. Spoke to Lucy and told her all about the family. Cate could only assume that Lucy wouldn't know her brother or father. All that baby new was her mothers voice.

Cate went into hospital to get induced, she got pessaries every three hours and had to stay on her back. The midwives told her that what she was receiving to induce labour, was also dangerous to the baby. She felt her baby stop moving, and die. She went through twenty hours of labour. Not a tear fell. It was something to get through.

So Lucy was born, and not born. Perfectly formed, smaller than a normal baby and bright red like a jelly baby. Dark haired, like her mother. Beautiful, sort of. A miracle. A broken mother, with breast milk but no baby.

I held her hand through every step, helped her numb herself from the pain. Helped her drink through it, grieve, find find the funny parts and laugh at them. All of it.

Cate has since and two perfectly healthy, beautiful daughters. Every time she looks at her family all together, when she's counting her blessings, that's when she misses Lucy most.

I know why this prompt exsists. Thanksgiving. Nothing against it, truly, but everyone the whole world over doesn't celebrate it. I'm australian, we also don't celebrate halloween, for the record. I love this site and it's prompts, really enjoy them, I do wish it was a little more global and a little less local. And no, we don't ride to work in kangaroos. Or throw a shrimp on the barbie. And a dingo didn't steal my baby.

Hilarity
The glass maybe half full, it maybe half empty, as long as it's funny.When hard times have struck, and I don't mean your average " I got fired" type malaise, but genuine "I may just lay down and wait to die" tradgedies, I was told that because I could still laugh and tell funny stories, I was probably going to survive. For me personally, humour is most often deflective, taking the moment away from emotional (which I find uncomfortable), and into laughter. It mostly prompts people to do the same.

Maternity
According to my husband (because I was out of ideas), being maternal is one of my top five. While it was not something I hoped he would say (perhaps sexuality?) I have to admit, I love, love, love being a mother. I am not one of those new, glowing mothers who say "Oh no, everything is just perfection." HELL NO! I find motherhood dirty (baby vomit, anyone?), frustrating (just toilet train already!), tiresome (sleep, please, for the love of god sleep!) and draining (yes, you will eat your vegetables!). I also have fun, laugh uproariously, dance like nobody's watching and sing like nobody's listening, to coin a cliche. I am sometime crotchety, cranky and tired but I do the best I can at the time. I hope that's what all mothers do.

Gatronomically
I love to cook. Well, I should really ay I love those recipes that taste hard but are actually really easy to do. I have a file full of these sorts of dishes and I won't share them with anyone. When people say " That's delicious!" I always reply "Yes, but very fiddly to make." So nobody asks me for the recipe.
I also love to eat, which is fortunate, because I don't live too far from Fitzroy, which is the multicultural food capital of Australia. Want Iranian pastries? Fitzroy. Fijian spit roasts? Fitzroy. You name it, Smith Street, Fitzroy has a little restaurant or cafe that sells it. My god, you should try the tibetan at the "Wild Yak"! It's like meeting god and eating him!

Egotistically
I have to say I love writing about myself. It's not necessarily in my top five but I thought it was probably a good way to finish these questions. I did enjoy the prompt but to be honest, finding five qualities I like about myself was hard work, and incidently took me aaaaages to write. I hope you enjoyed

How do I decribe the hand of fate, or god or whatever you want to call it. You know it is believed by people these days that men of faith were not men of science.The more I see of science, the more I believe in miracles. The fact that two cells combining started all that I am, with my own thoughts and beliefs, makes me believe in fate, or god, or something. Whatever-you-call-it.

I am (for better or worse) Catholic. I call myself a fundamentalist because I belive in religion but not the church. I could go into so many reasons for my particulars beliefs but that is a completely different prompt, the bare bones of it are, I believe in God.

The thing is I have seen the hand of God in my life at least three times, in my niece being born in 1993. In my brother being my best friend. In losing my daughter in 2006. I know I skate over these things lightly, not really telling you the why and wherefore's, but I am not really eloquent enough to go into it. For me, when things are truly important, I can never get it quite right, the words don't express how my heart feels. Frankly, I'm not a good enough writer.

All I can tell you is that these were moments of growth for me, a time when I was irrevocably changed. For the better? I think so. I see that all these things happend in some unknow story that I don't yet know the end to.

tropical la habana beach club

Assusming of course that if teleportation was possible, time warps/time freezes are also possible I would first, freeze time and teleport to England, grab my gorgeous friend Dee. To country Victoria, grab my friend, the lovely Breda and her baby (she couldn't bare to be parted from her). Then I'd grab my funky friend Amy from where ever she was "rep-ing". Also and let's not forget Kirsten, although for her, I'd hang her pregnant belly on the end of her bed, thus freeing her from all responsibility (although she'd have to put the belly back on once we were done) and take her to. It goes without mentioning that Adam was the instigator/helper of all of this. It wouldn't be a party without him. Of course, we're all going somewhere fun, I'm not yet quite sure of the destination yet. Somewhere warm with cocktails and good loking men and good conversation and no hangovers. We may be there for a while. Infact we may never come back! Well, would you?

Many years ago, there was a possiblity my much loved niece and nephew would go into foster care (or become wards of the state, so to speak), it was a very frightening time for me and my family. I looked at these babies, they were delightful, good children, not given to misbehavior. Before you tell me that I'm looking through love's eyes, I tell you, they WERE good children. No bias intended anyway. I reasoned with myself that if they could go into foster care, surely there must be lots of good children out there that need good homes. I always promised myself I would consider it at some time in the future.

Flash forward 4 years later and it was looking like after one pregnancy and a perfect son, that children, because of genetics, were no longer a possibilty. Heartbroken though I was, I believed that maybe fate was giving me a sign. I think that I should be a foster mother.

Many disapointments and two more children later, I am not yet fostering children. But give me time, I believe I am called to this. I come from a great family, the sort that I believe should be normal. I never understood people that only saw their families for special occasions. You what? God, I see my parents, brothers and various others at least weekly, not to mention that we all email/facebook/text/speak on the phone. Don't get me wrong, I have friends of my own and a healthy social life but to be with out my family, well, I'd just DIE!

And so, so I think the gift I was given, a loving, noisy, supporting, argumentative, critical, wonderful family, is something I can try to pass on. I can only try but I believe those children who need it will, eventually come to me, however briefly.

Hmmm, why do I love this photo? It was taken, by me, on a night when my best friends were over for dinner. We laughed alot, drank a little wine and then I decided to pull out the camera and take some photos. There's more to this collection than just the one photo, in fact, there's about 20, but I took this of myself, while trying to convince my friends that they looked faa-aabulous. I like it, I'm wearing no make up, not a scrap, in daggy old clothes (if only you could have seen the sweat pants I was wearing), but I look.. happy, pretty, even. This photo reminds me of how my best friends make me feel.

The problem with this phrase is that it brings to mind people who believe in "faeries", and unicorns. I understand that it is a backlash to the early 1990's obsession with "shit happens", which also spawned such pearlers as "don't go there" and "talk to the hand". But please, let it go. Magic isn't happening when you're broken down in peak hour traffic and I'm behind you. Road rage happens and mostly because of that shitty sign. You've been warned.

Smoking
Ahh, is there a more satisfying feeling than that first big drag? The sheer pleasure as my shoulders relax and my troubles slip away. I've lived smoking and I'll probably die smoking, I've quit and come back like a lover to the evils of nicotine.

A fruity white
That first sip, of your first glass of wine feels utterly opulent. You have a whole bottle, oodles to spare, you may drink it, or you may not. Oh, the choice!

My bestie Adam
Not always a vice, sometimes a back board, sometimes my greatest supporter, often talking some sense in to me. My best friend and brother, those words don't begin to encompass Adam and the miracles he creates.

Shoes I love that I will never wear
Picture six inch, glass platform heels, or stilettos with a metal heel, or a dinky, cute polka dot bow on the front of a pair of peep toes. Love, love, love but wear? Never! What if I ruined them? For me great shoes are a like a work of art, I don't want to wear them, I want to display them on my coffee table.

Early morning anger
I H-A-T-E morning, yes in capital letters. Or I could say, I hate fucking mornings! However you like it. I don't. Like mornings, that is. There are too many demands on my time and too many people who need my help. So if you, as a full grown, fully functioning member of society ask me where your god damned socks are, I tell you to fuck off in no uncertain terms.

Logging onto "plinky" tonight, as I'm wont to do while the house is silent and everyone is sleeping, I had the lovelist suprise. Someone who is important to me, whose approval and admiration I seek, is following me on this little known blog of mine. I am so pleased and delighted because I have been a fan of this persons writing for sometime.

This wonderful writer I speak of, has so much of my love and devotion. To have been through so much and still maintain her integrity, honesty and innocence is like a miracle to me. It is a privilige to call myself a fan.

So to you, whoever you are (surely you know by now), I will leave a hint, YOU are the "super awesome" one.

The baby starts to mew quietly. She, the mother, picks up her glasses and uses them like a magnifying glass to squint at the clock on her husbands bedside table.Wishes she'd had laser eye surgery. It's 4.30am. Mother lays there, tense as a fist, praying the baby back to sleep. Questions run through her mind, why, oh why is the baby awake 3 hours early? What time was the last bottle? Who did the last bottle? Her husband. With that, the baby's mews turn to full blown sobbing and the mother slumps out of bed, whacking her husband viciously on the head with her pillow, sure he is to blame. He does not even stir. Bastard.

Stumbling in the dark over shoes, clean laundry and the odd toy, the mother stubs her toe on the door frame, swears quietly and stumbles back to retrieve her glasses. Finally reaching the crying baby, the mother sees baby has wiggled out of her bunny rug blanket, poor chilly thing. The mother wraps her baby, firmly, a job she sees her husband is incapable of, and hurries back to bed. Hoping fervently the baby will not decide that since she's awake anyway, she may as well have a bottle.

Curled up in bed, cold and angry, the mother listens to her baby's crying slowly subside to soft chatter and than, blessed silence. The mother thanks god with much feeling and sighs with relief , it's now 5am.

I'm sure most people would say their favourite place is home. But, while building a brand spanking new house, I'm currently bunking (and yes that's exactly what it feels like) at my parents. So occasionally, rarely, not nearly often enough, I get the privilege to escape my parents, husband and three (yes three) children and hang out at Adam's. I'm sure in these (ugh) "blogs" I've mentioned Adam before, but truly, hanging out with him in his messy little dive of a flat is the best place for me to get my shit realigned. We listen to music no one else could possibly ever appreciate ie: bad. Solve the global finacial crises. Cure all serious disease and dance to caberet. I leave with a terrible case of the guilts (how COULD I leave my family for a WHOLE night?), but spiritually cleansed. Ahh bliss.....

It's thurday! That means tonight Adam will call, we'll have a few dinks (the wine's already chilled) and solve the problems of the world, over the phone (we call it "by proxy"). I can hardly wait! It's sort of a reverse date, I suppose. I mean, I'm still hanging on him calling, but instead of shaving my legs and putting my sexiest clothes on, I washed my make up off, and am slouching 'round in p.j's.

Ah Adam. Glorious Adam. Find me a meal that's not better between bread, and I'll call you a liar. And that's Adam. He's the bread to my meal. He makes a good thing better simply by being there. Have you ever had your own laugh track? Your own studio audience? Had someone who never laughs when you're being serious (no matter how ridiculous that "serious" may be)? Who makes you laugh until your face drops off? Who constanly challenges you? That's my Adam. He's about to call, so I'm about to end this, I'm sure we've laughs to have and theories to discuss.

By the way, Adam is my best friend and my little brother.

On Monday night, I wasn't tired. Oh, I know, it doesn't sound like much, but I have a husband and three children to cater to, so to not feel tired by nine pm, is something of a rarity. Luckily, I know what to do.

Ok, so I did housework, shoot me. I also watched venus move across the sky. I pottered around all by myself. Alone time is a rare commodity in my life, I'll take it where I can. I watched "Steel Magnolias" and bawled my eyes out. I read a whole book. I drank coffee until my eyes were rolling back in my head. Put simply, I enjoyed myself. Ultimately what keeps me up at night, occasionally when I'm not tired, is a feeling of freedom, to spend time with myself. I love it until about 7am, when I collapse and the babies wake up.

Leila
A sheer delight, with a habbit of headbutting thing when she doesn't get her own way, but listening to a 18month old attempt "twinkle twinkle lttle star" lights up my world

Child pending, aka Rudi
My GIANT stomach is testament to the little girl I'll be having in may. Named "Rudi" by her brother (no one knows why), and kicking the hell out of me at night, I simply can not wait to meet the final chapter in my famiy.

As their eyes meet, she in a gown that makes her feel like a princess, he in a suit that makes him debonair, the bride reaching the top of the aisle, they look into each others eyes, so filled with hope, with the belief that THEY will be different, will last the test of time. I find that the most beautiful, honest and truly the best part of a wedding.

When the MCG (Melbourne cicket ground) was being refurbished, Kerry Packer, who is an Australian media mogul, paid to personalise his private viewing box. It has it's own fully stocked bar and smoking facilities. Apparently, he had to pay serious amounts of dosh to have exhaust fans and pipe lines fitted to suck the smoke out of the building. I always thought that showed commitment to addiction (and money). It probably doesn't hold more than 25 people, but that would allow my inner circle to come and witness me drink and smoke waaaay too much. Possibly while NOT watching the cricket, it bores the shit out of me.