For the Sunday Muse prompt #172: ** When the rain comes breathe in the clarity it brings- savour the stillness you remember from the times it came before, the delights the memories of past days and gone weeks and seasons long disappeared, bring you. Cherish the muscle memory of the steps that draw you along this path to the days of innocence, because drop by drop, the sorrows of the far country are dissolving in the rain.
Photo by Marcel Fagin on Unsplash ** As I write this I am looking out of my window onto the lush greenery of the park across the road in the tiny corner of South Yorkshire in which I am currently ensconced, as different from the edge of the world in which I have spent the last eleven months as it could be. For 45 degree Celsius and 90% plus humidity, I give you a bone-chilling 14 degrees Celsius with more than the odd spattering of rain; a mild Yorkshire summer by all accounts I am told. ...
Photo by Lindsey LaMont on Unsplash ** I finally got round to migrating my contacts to my local phone, the process of downloading them from one account to a new one the last grudging act of acceptance at being here, a signal as it were of the finality of moving. It felt great to be able to do all I use my phone for - WhatsApp, podcasts, ebooks and all - from one device. What I did not bargain for was the trip down the rabbit hole of memory that exercise would be. ...
The less common variant of the “Where are you from” question I get comes from the unconventional way my surname is spelt. Family folklore suggests that my great-grandfather, whether in a fit of pique or an attempt to be contrarian - no one is certain which it is, took his rather mundane Yoruba name, replaced a couple of vowels with consonants, and declared himself unique. To this day when I ‘goggle’ myself, every reference is to someone I know and have met, bar a frankly confusing article that includes TB Joshua, Togo and Canada. Make of that what you will. ...
Photo by Victor Xok on Unsplash ** One of the non-perks of living at the edge of the world is that everything has to be ferried in, and even the small matter of activating a registration requires a 60km ride into the nearest town. All of these meant that having finally received a critical piece of documentation, I needed a taxi ride for the third time in a week. As it turns out, I got the same chap as I had on the past two trips, my experiences of which varied from merely irritating to downright terrible. The full story is too long to recount but involved a couple of wrong turns and ending up in a different place, which added thirty minutes to what was already a lengthy forty five minute lunchtime dash into town. That ordeal was compounded by a malfunctioning temperature scanner at the gate which required three tries before I was eventually granted access to the office. ...
Thankful for: Payday on the 25th, I had come close to scrapping the bottom of the barrel, if I say so myself! A good return to Instagram, my post got liked a fair bit which is perhaps a tad shallow of me but whatever :) My Freetrade investment turned into positive territory for the first time ever it seems. Progress. Have a work-related query which seemed like it would be a hassle to resolve which has now been resolved. Grateful for supportive work mates!
Over the past few weeks, temperatures have slowly crept lower and lower, dipping below zero on occasion and leaving the city centre sidewalks crunchy and slippery underfoot at times. The leaves that the trees - once leafy and full but now stark against the light of the reluctant mornings - shed haven’t helped the state of affairs, trapping moisture which turns into treacherous ice once the temperatures dip below zero. All of that, and being this side of Halloween, means that it is the beginning of the Christmas Party silly season. This year, I have just the two to attend, a far cry from the halcyon days of $100 oil. I suppose this belt-tightening regime can only be a good thing, given it underscores a more prudent, sustainability-focused outlook for the industry. Tight belts or not, there is a certain bluntness which alcohol engenders, that is one of the things I am looking forward to witnessing. ...
\\\* Grateful for: Opportunities to give back by giving a presentation at an AFBE school engagement session. It helped that there were friendly faces there, M included. Catching up with old friends via lengthy phone calls during which it feels like we never stopped talking, everything running seamlessly into each other Brunch at Bell D’Amico after several months away down south. Sunday brunch is becoming a thing! Survived another week at work - waiting can be a pain! Participated in a health challenge at work which shows my underlying numbers - blood pressure, cholesterol etc are in a good place. :)
Image Source: Lachlan Donald on Unsplash Lately, I have been thinking a lot about crossroads - the metaphorical kind of course - points in one’s life where decisions with the potential to change the trajectory of one’s life are foisted upon one. The triggers for this latest bout of thinking are varied but the one common thread is a sense of dissatisfaction which has simmered below the surface for most of the year. Turning forty is certainly part of that, particularly as in its immediate aftermath, it felt like I had reached the top of a mountain only to find there was nothing to be seen there. There is also the desire to head down south for good for family reasons, which perhaps has declared open season on everything I have done for work over the past fifteen-ish years. In the rarefied atmosphere in which my thought experiments exist, everything is an option: from a complete pivot away from oil and gas into something more tech-related, through a less severe move away from being the (siloed) technical specialist I have spent the past few years evolving into becoming more of a generalist to a gap year, travelling the world. ...
\\\** Thankful for: Friendly faces: Out and about during my lunch hour, it was a breath of fresh air to run into T around U Square. A friendly face in the midst of the day’s battle is always a welcome sight, dare I say Came through a difficult presentation to Senior Management at work, it feels like I am settling in more and more to this new role at work. I still want/ wish my next move is wrapped up ASAP though. The future beckons.