Drama Detox Unit open for Business…

DRAMA DE-TOX UNIT

A Cautionary Tale Dedicated to the recovering Dramaholic in all of us….well many of us.

This is a fictionally true transcript from Dramaholics Anonymous, held at a venue….and a venyou…. nearby………..

Trouble ~ “Hi my name is Trouble and I am a Dramaholic.

Person A ~Hi Trouble”
Person B ~”Welcome Trouble”
Person C ~ (Just nods head slightly…doesn’t like to welcome Trouble anymore)

Group Leader: “Welcome Trouble. It is so good you have decided to come along and we’d appreciate it if you would tell us a bit about yourself”

Trouble: “Well I was born into Trouble…my mama was a Drama Queen and my daddy was nowhere to be found.
Mama modelled Drama to us kids very well. She taught us to always pick the wrong kind of guy, make sure there was lots of chaos in our life before getting rid of him and then go out and find another one and get on with the whole dang thing again!”

Person A~ Praise the Lord I think we had the same mama
Person B~ Heavens above…I think I might be your mama
Person C~ silence….no longer even looks Trouble in the eye…

Group Leader“So what has made you decided to come to Dramaholics, Trouble?”

Trouble “Well there I was in the midst of wagging my finger at yet another person who seemed to just want to make my life more complicated..my latest boyfriend who proved to be just like the last three …and all of a suddenI looked up and saw my mama standing there in front of me”

Group Leader “Why was this a problem”?

Trouble “Well she has been dead for ten years but I tell you when I looked up in that bathroom mirror and saw my mamas familiar weary face and angry brow and recognised that disappointed look in her eye, barely concealing those unshed tears…….I KNEW I was in big Trouble!
I stood there looking in the mirror and remembered all the times I had fleshed out arguments in my life.
How many times I found myself bickering with people cause they were so wrong and I was so right and I KNEW I needed to make them see my point of view.
After all the Trouble in me had a very strong calling to point out to others their failings and how to correct themself so they would be just like me.
Then I remembered how many times I would get to a peaceful place and it felt REALLLL uncomfortable so I would start looking around and find someone to make a bit of Trouble with or criticise someone near to me for letting me down or not acting how I thought they should be acting!

Group Leader… “Well Trouble..you have come to the right place and the first thing we would like to do, after the big group hug , is give you a new name…((((((((00000))))))

So from now on we will all know you as:

“GrownUp!

”We reckon you have had enough Trouble for one life time and with your new insight…cause you have finally seen that you have been creating this Drama in your life for too long now…you earn your Brand New name…

Grown Up…..(blinking modest tears of appreciation and realistion how lonely she had been for so long whilst she was Trouble) “Well thankyou SO much for that…I am amazed that I only had to come here to Dramaholics once to finally really get the message……that when I let go of Trouble…then I really truly am all Grown Up!…

The End

The BE~ginning……

“Men occasionally stumble across the Truth but most pick themself up and hurry off as if nothing has happened”.

Hope your visit to Adelaide is a peaceful and productive one RW

“I breathe deeply”

“I release that which does not bring Peace to my Mind”….

“The Magical Child in Exile – Why Does the Creative Well Being Run Dry? ” is related to the “Drama Detox unit” and can be read by clicking on the dots here…………

Northern Exposure…

I somehow missed watching Northern Exposure in the 90’s and have had the delight of discovering it many years after the final episode.
Sal was a fan of the show and his daughters remember watching the show with dad when they were young.

So I was pleased to find that the Adelaide library has the full six series, 110 epsiodes…and for the last few weeks have watched from episode one through to the final, moving scene on the last show (see video clip “Our Town” below.)

The creators of the show were members of the Esalen Institute. Click here for wikipedia info on Northern Exposure and Eslan
“Northern Exposure’s flavor came from a combination of various influences. The show’s creators, Joshua Brand and John Falsey, were members of the Esalen Institute in California where an eclectically “spiritual” worldview was presented, best exemplified in the writings of Swiss psychologist Carl Jung and American anthropologist/mythologist Joseph Campbell (whose works are frequently referenced in the series). There are also fantasy elements inherited from the works of Carlos Castaneda and the magical realism novels and stories of Latin American author Gabriel Garc’a M’rquez. Both creators were also conversant with classical Russian Literature. This characteristic is evident in the satirical elements from the show that are hallmarks of the Russian literary grotesque style of such authors as Gogol and Dostoevsky.”

The influence of Joseph Campbell, Carl Jung and the interplay between the seen and unseen realms along with Native American mythology and magic are unsurpassed by any other television series in my humble opinion..

Mandala

I made this Empowerment Mandala for our discussion on “Boundaries” in the women’s group…..

Each participant has a black and white copy as a way of ‘kick starting creativity and the use of symbols as an alternative to talk, talk, talk therapy……

Death of the corner deli. Once the center of story telling and Community..

This afternoon I was driving through some of the older suburbs near where I live, about 4 kilometres out of the city, and noticed one of the old Rosella Sauce signs on the side of what was once the local store …that also been a ‘High Class Shoe Repair” store…(see second image).

Across the road was another old store, now closed that may have been the fruit and vegie store or the local butchers….perhaps even the post office back in the days when telegram changed lives and parcels from over seas took months to arrive.. Milk was delivered daily, leaving milk money out overnight was the norm and the fruit and vegies often came in the back of a truck that strolled through the streets once or twice a week…

Except for a rare visit to the city the corner store was the only ’shopping centre’ around and was also the centre of the story telling, gossip and information sharing hub in the ‘village’ of the surrounding streets.

These two stores that once supplied the groceries, meat, fruit and vegetables of hundreds of families are now old fashioned relics to an era that has all but gone…

Remember “Northern Exposure’ that huge hit tv show of the 90’s that was set in Alaska?
Ruth Ann’s store was a relic of the past, brown paper bags, tins on low shelves and an assortment of grains and goodies near the counter – stories and news exchanged over that heavy wooden counter.
It was personal and the word ’service’ really meant ’service’… not a corporate marketing theme.

What a time of rapid changes and extinction we are living in as mass marketing’ gobbles up the slow and familiar ways of not-so-long-ago-times.

Breathtaking is the canvas when the Sky Gods illuminate the heavens on a warm summers night…

I recently drove a western suburbs beach area as the sun was setting.

The sunset was dramatic. Cloud spirits appeared, dazzling streams of light…a big glowing orb landing on the horizon as the sun set.

Truly growing older could not possibly mean failing eye sight
……I feel like I am seeing things better than ever before…and EVERYwhere!

Adelaide’s Central Fountain…

This fountain sits in the centre of the City…

The plaque reads:
This fountain is based on the three rivers from which Adelaide draws its water. The Murray-Aboriginal Man and Ibis…The Torrens- Woman and Black Swan and The Onkaparing-Woman and Heron

The Aboriginal Flag was blowing in the wind behind the fountain…the flag was raised in that very spot for the first time over 30 years ago….

I came across the following interesting info on the Beacon of Light page [click here]…
Recently the Adelaide Fountain Group sought to establish a beneficial lift in the energies over Adelaide starting by focusing on a sacred site in Victoria Square. The intention was to use this as a focus, linking out to problem areas to create change. Their work was developed from the original Fountain Group, based in Brighton, England, whose work had created a reduction in violence. The effects of that work are properly researched and documented.

The Adelaide Fountain Group was founded by Roger Brown, who has, unfortunately, now passed over to spirit. This group worked tirelessly, to create community healing, through the use of visualisation techniques to generate positive energy flows in Adelaide.

An Engineers Guide to Cats…very informative and too true!

This one is for cat lovers only……and engineers of course!

One of those ‘must get around to it’ projects…..I finally got around to it!

Some time last year Sal mentioned that as I had commandeered the best end of the couch, I had the table and the lamp and he would really like somewhere to rest his cuppa too!

So as per the no-such-thing-as-coincidence by coincidence the very next day I came across one of those craft-kit tables in a second hand store for less than a cup of tea and pkt of biscuits.

I painted it in a colour to match the very-comfy-new-couch-with-the-swing-out-recliner-at-each-end and never got past doing the first coat of the design….

What better way to spend easter than painting in my outdoor studio on the egg-shaped template, completing the process begun over a year ago….after all Easter is all about endings and beginnings…

Here is the table from half done to complete…

Tandanya (Adelaide) is a beautiful City that sits on the traditional Aboriginal (Kaurna) Land…

Tandanya is the Kaurna Aboriginal name for the Adelaide city area and was for many, many thousands of years, a place for special ceremonies connected with Red Kangaroo Dreaming. Adelaide is built on Kaurna (pronounced Garn-na) land.
Source -Tandanya Web Page

The older I get the more I am able to appreciate the simple things in life…like living in a city that has a river flowing through its center…and many black swans, pelicans, ducks, galahs, cockatoos and rainbow lorikeets swimming, flying and nesting along the river banks…

i took some photos today as we walked a few kilometers from Bonython Park into Elder Park (cappaccino break)…and back again. (Just realised I can’t spell cappaccino properly!)

Beautiful day out in the city that recently endured over 2 weeks of 100oF + wether, months of no rain…but is now green and moist again, true to the elemental cycle of a City in the desert.

They say that eventually we begin to act like the people we spend most of the time with…

Is this true or does it just relate to the animal kingdom I wonder?

These two Pelicans give food for thought……we met them whilst enjoying a walk along the river that winds through this beautiful city we live in….

The other day my partner and I set out to go for a walk and I noticed we were……Dressed the same!!
Too weird…kahki trousers, light, long sleeved top, black sleeveless jacket over the top.

Quick wardrobe change!!!…….

Snooze Snooze

Yawn yawn

Stand stand