My kind of sanctuary.

“A yawn is a silent scream for coffee”

~ anon

Our local baker has it in one.

Not only does he create the most decadent of treats but the coffee’s very MOREish too.

I yawn frequently.

He listens.

A suitably rejuvenating beverage arrives.

He’s going to MISS me on Tuesdays and Fridays.

It feels like it’s been forever that I’ve been filling in shifts at the shop for one or other of my colleagues.  

Whilst the bank account’s benefited, my sanity hasn’t.

Between the shop and markets, and my visit to SA, it’s been full on craziness.

Yay for the shop being back to its FULL staff complement this week.

Yay for having Tuesday and Friday back!

Lulu the little West Highland Terrier we met at Orakei

I’m smiling.

Or should that be grinning.

Ear to ear grinning like that famed Cheshire cat!

Onward and upward, OUT of the fog. 

Reflections can be ANYwhere!

The hound’s grinning too.

Longer rambles with no time constraints.

Longer forays through the mudflats.

MORE pointing the lens in any direction but mine.

To celebrate our newly regained freedom we’ve rambled farther this week.

Churchill Park and Orakei Basin have been our ports of call.

The Basin, unbeknown to me and many others who ramble there, 

is one of the volcanoes that make up the Auckland Volcanic Field. 

Yes, that comes courtesy of Google, the arbiter of all things intellectual and inane.

After the volcano erupted many years ago it became a fresh water lake.  

As sea levels rose, the lake was breached and its been a tidal lagoon ever since.  

And there I was thinking it was JUST a tidal lagoon.

Assumptions.

How wrong they can be!

Churchill Park and Orakei Basin have a magic of their own.

Each, in it’s own way, is a sanctuary of sorts.

Soul food is provided in abundance.

From ducks and reflections at Churchill Park

to Shags and reflections at Orakei Basin.

There's something caught in this Pied Shag's chest but I can't work out what it is.

It could be a fishing lure ...

Where there’s water there’s BOUND to be reflections, 

a hound and an abundance of birds!

As always, life is in constant flux

but to be able to revel in each moment, 

knowing it can’t be replicated, is liberating.

As it should be.

In the words of an ancient Greek philosopher, Heraclitus

“You can never step in the same river twice.”

Just love these raised walkways around the basin.

All we have is the PRESENT moment.

Live it.

Getting an eyeful of us.

A panaramic view of Orakei Basin

Railway line running next to one of the boardwalk and my adopted city in the background.
Love this little spot in the world.

Couldn't resist the red boat's reflection alongside theirs.

Pockets of stillness.

“Build pockets of stillness into your life.” 

~ anon.

The hound and I are investigators of the ordinary. 

The route we take on our daily ramble is mostly the same 

but there’s always something different to see each day.

From her perspective and from mine.

Winter PJs are nowhere near as interesting as summer ones.

That aside, it’s just NOT the same walking without her.

I MISS her keen nose and sharp eyes.

Most of all I miss her company.

She enjoys watching the world wake up as much as I do.

She’s probably thinking 

“Silly humans ... why do they stay in their beds so long!

There’s a whole world out here waiting to be explored.

The birds are up and the sun’s shining.

Bring on those waves!”

I echo her sentiments.

Except for the waves bit.

I love being outdoors and on the beach as much as she does

but it’s only my feet I’ll get wet during winter.

They got more wet than usual today.

Low tide and a glorious morning mean only ONE thing.

MUDFLATS

In embracing the glorious mess that is me, I sometimes take it quite literally.

This morning was one of those times.

Mud does something to a girl.

It’s not the most glamorous of accessories

but a necessary evil when stalking my feathered friends.

Oh to have the freedom that they have.

When they’ve had enough of the girl with the bright orange scarf they take off.

So graceful and effortless and free.

Till I find them again.

I am more than blessed to have this sanctuary of sorts in my life.

Even without the hound, 

it provides a modicum of normality to the chaos that surrounds me.

Standing on the shore with the waves filling my ear-drums,

I’m removed from the hubbub of everyday life that continues unabated around me.

If I close my eyes, I can make-believe I’m anywhere.

THIS is MY pocket of stillness.

A rainbow on my road!

I envy her dim-wittedness.

“I am NOT what happened to me.  

I am what I CHOOSE to become.” 

~ Carl Gustav Jung

There are times when everyone feels defeated.  

Let down.  

Crushed.

We look into ourselves and can’t always see a way out.

It’s easy to stay there.

To abdicate responsibility for this gift that is life.

Then I happen upon a quotation like that.

I read and digest a blog written in 2010 about rocking your way forward, 

no matter the boulders in your path.

... and it reminds me that EVERYTHING in life is a CHOICE.

Even FREEDOM is a choice.

All of us get to consciously decide what has meaning in our life and what doesn’t.

I choose to focus on the positive.

I choose to focus on the issues I can control.

I choose to be flexible with those I can’t.

I choose to ramble too.  

Often.

It’s a choice that guarantees that ‘feel-good’ feeling.

It’s a choice that allows me to BE in-the-moment.

This state of being-in-the-moment is what’s so compelling about the hound. 

It’s hard for us humans to get that. 

Even in the most difficult of times, 

she’s cheerful and ready for any action or new experience.

Despite her intelligence though, there’s a dim-wittedness 

to this happiness and carefree state that I can only envy.

She doesn’t DO despair.

She doesn’t DO defeat.

If she was human, her mantra in life would probably read something like this.

“My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; 

and to do so with passion, compassion, some humour and style.” 

~ Maya Angelou

Is it any wonder I have need of her in my life.