Saturday, 29 December 2018

new beginnings...

...are better than shoes.

As we are approaching the end of this year and the new one is almost here, I felt that a post about new beginnings is due... What a year this has been! Personally... well... if I were to have kept a diary in 2018, it would have been a rather sad read... it has not been easy this year... but, I would be lying if I said there were no good moments in it! There were! Not just “good”, wonderful moments! It’s just that... overall... well let’s say I’m glad it’s about to leave us, although I do appreciate the generous amount of wisdom that was it’s gift... for wisdom is so often acquired along with a fair amount of pain...

So, a new year is knocking on our door and it means a new beginning and surely it comes with the hope that the new year will be better than the old one... you see, that’s how it works, in the beginning of the year we are full of hope that it will be full of laughter and love and health and marvellous experiences and as we approach the end of it, well... we know what has happened, either good or bad, and we may be filled with joy or, regrettably, sadness... however, whatever the year that’s about to end brought upon us, it does not retract from the hope that the next one will be better! Because we are humans and hope... dies last! And thank goodness it does! Because hope is what keeps us going!

A new beginning is close, the beginning of a new year, full of potential, and it is up to us to welcome it with open arms and with open hearts! Anything can happen and it is up to us to believe that “anything” will be good or bad... I choose to believe it is going to be good! I choose to hope! I choose to be kind and I choose to let go of all the bad and I choose to embrace this new beginning, to start fresh! I choose to put on my best smile and a new pair of shoes and welcome the new year together with my loved ones and to raise my glass of champagne (full disclosure... champagne is not my thing really but tradition calls for some bubbly...) and look at the fireworks and wish “happy new year” and mean it from the bottom of my heart! And, no matter what happens in 2019, I will do the same a year from now and I will always keep the hope that the best is yet to come!

Happy new year, everyone ☺️🍾πŸ₯‚ 

Friday, 21 December 2018

#DragRace

I know, I know, I know.... I’m sooooo late catching up... well, there’s no explanation other than I’ve been living under a rock for the last decade! How come no one ever told me about this TV gem is beyond comprehension... yes, sure, it’s other people’s fault... I’ve been oblivious until about a month and a half ago when bestie S told me to watch it and I will always be grateful to him!! And when I mentioned how taken I was by the show to darling L, he told me “well, love, you are lucky, you have 10 seasons to binge watch!”... yes, another devoted fan he is...

Of course I knew RuPaul, I will never forget the first time I saw the video clip of “don’t go breaking my heart” (admittedly, I had not really noticed him in the “love shack”) next to Elton John... I thought he’s the most beautiful woman I had ever seen in my life! I still believe she’s the most beautiful woman on TV (yes, I use “he” and “she” and I’m ignorant as to which is the correct but my words come from the heart and I write them with the utmost respect and admiration so, my apologies if I’m unwillingly insulting anyone and please correct me! I mean it!) The thing is, to little ol’ me, growing up in a small town, RuPaul’s presence and talent and that brightest of smiles made me think that it’s totaly ok to be a man who enjoys dressing as a woman and what matters really is one’s quality and truth! Also, that that smile could never be the smile of a bad person!

So now that I have binge watched 5 seasons (and have cried my eyes out because Netflix does not give me the first 5... why?!...) and I have passed hours and hours with the ladies and their humour and talent and kindness and confidence (oh, how I wish I had one tenth of their confidence) and pain (oh, so very often so much pain!...) and I have become a bona fide fan so much so that S and I went to see the ladies when they gave their Xmas show in Amsterdam, now that I know the faces and the stories and I have my favourites and my not-so-favourites, now that I have confirmed my teenage conviction that RuPaul’s smile is not the smile of a bad person (yes, you get to know people on TV, of course you do!) but quite the contrary of a kind and wise person, now I can tell you beyond any doubt that #DragRace IS better than shoes! 

Tuesday, 18 December 2018

knowing when to let go...

...is better than shoes. Here’s why.

I’m a persistent person. Some will say it’s because I’m a Gemini, they may be right... the fact is that I fight for what I want and, usually, I know what that is. I don’t just know what I don’t want, I usually know exactly what I want. And not only when it comes to shoes, usually I know what I want in life. But at times I have been wrong about what I wanted and I have fought to keep things going when they were clearly wrong for me, I have sustained toxic relationships because I was loyal and I have tried to fix things even when it was clear beyond any doubt that there’s was nothing left there to be fixed...

It is not yet time for New Year’s resolutions, but I think if I were to have one of those (and I usually don’t...) it would be to learn to let go... yes, it often feels like defeat but in life we often get defeated and not recognising it when it happens may only result to bigger losses. Knowing when to let go is wise, stop banging our head against a wall saves us from a lot of headaches and at the end of the day, when you know what you want and you are not getting it, let go, move on and open up to the possibility to actually get it somewhere else or from someone else... things are what things are and even me, with my endless persistence, I now know that in most situations we can change very little... and that very little has to do only with ourselves, never with other people...

So... don’t get angry, don’t fight it, don’t get sad... or... do get angry/sad for a moment but then just let it go... others... well, they are usually doing the best they can... it’s not their fault it’s not enough for you! It’s not your fault it’s not enough for you! There’s no fault! It’s just life... sometimes things work out and sometimes they don’t and learning to let it go when the latter happens, can save us from a lot of pain... it’s worth trying, right? πŸ˜‰

Monday, 3 December 2018

thoughts about intimacy

I read an article about why people cheat in relationships some time ago and the author’s argument was that basically people cheat because they choose personal gratification over the intimacy of a relationship... I think this may be correct. But I don’t want to talk about this in this post, I want to share my thoughts about intimacy and why I think it’s better than shoes.

Intimacy is rare. Think about how many people in your life you feel really intimate with. Your family, maybe. A few good friends. Your partner. Not that many people, right? Now think about how long did it take you to feel intimate with these people. In the case of your family, well, a lifetime I guess... With your friends, well, I would bet that you only feel really intimate with the oldest ones, that it took you quite some time to open up and reach the point of feeling really comfortable with them, to feel you can share everything with them... The same with your partner, surely intimacy took some time to build, it’s not something you had in the beginning of the relationship, right? I mean, even if you have sexual intimacy, real intimacy takes time to establish... Also, intimacy takes a lot of effort in relationships, effort and courage to reveal yourself as you really are, to be honest and vulnerable and risk being hurt and rejected. Having real intimacy in a relationship means, I think, that you are emotionally invested in the relationship.

So, I would say that all this makes intimacy precious. Valuable. And, in my opinion, worth having. Yes, precisely because you are emotionally invested, if things go south, it really hurts. But that should not stop you! The risk of loosing should not keep you from having! Better to have loved and lost than to have not loved at all! (...not my saying, obviously) Better to have known real intimacy, warmth, connection, support, even if with an expiration date, than to not have had it at all! Better to have held hands for what felt like a brief moment in life than to have lived a life where there was no holding hands at all... don’t be afraid of intimacy, seek it! Offer it! Take it when it’s offered to you! It will warm up your heart, it is the only antidote to solitude... it is better than shoes!