So, you know my hairloss story… it hasn’t changed

My dermatologists appointment is on Tuesday.

In the meantime, I’ve been considering my hairstyle again.

I hate it!  I look like a frump.  I cannot get my hair straight even after using a straightening iron forever.  And if I do get it straight, its all fluffy and crap within an hour anyway, so what’s the point. 

Lance thinks I should go short again, and so does Madi.

The thing is, it’s a age thing.  I know I know, it’s all in my mind.

I’m not getting any younger, and the only people that have short hair are older people.  And I don’t want that yet.  Even my hairdressers lately have said that only older women have short hair.  I don’t want to surrender to the idea that I’m getting old.  As it is, that’s the major factor for me not giving up my job and doing photography (I have yet to see an older successful female photographer)

I’m close to 40 you know! I’m on the downward side of 35 now… it’s closing in quickly.

But then, I saw this photo today on Kat‘s blog. MY GOD, how stunning is that haircut on the makeup artist!!

And then I’m tempted all over again.

I went to Louisa‘s house yesterday to drop off her photos and over a cup of coffee we were discussing some of the scary stories she got told when she was pregnant, and how she stopped people from telling her.

Then a little later, she mentioned that someone had asked her, after Nicola was born, whether she’d heard my stories.  Until then she hadn’t realised that I’d had so many miscarriages and nearly lost Bradley and then Connor being in NICU etc etc.  And she was surprised that I hadn’t said anything.

The thing is I believe that every mother has a story.

At some stage, every single mother has had a problem.  Whether it was during pregnancy, or birth or feeding or pooing or whatever.  And in addition, every mother has a different story about each child they have.

Now I know I talk a lot.  If asked, I would have told her my very long story.  However, my story is a scary one.  And it’s not likely to happen to everyone, so until a new mom is ready, I won’t be telling her my story.

It would put her off pregnancy and babies for a long time actually.

And that’s why Louisa didn’t hear it then.

However, she heard parts of it yesterday And I think she gets now why she didn’t hear it sooner (apart from the fact that it’s not the kinda thing you talk about on Twitter )

And talking about mother’s stories… I’ve just read this on the DPS blog… and it’s truly inspirational.  It’s called shoot to live.  I took quite a few photos of Connor when he was in NICU and I’m glad I did, but this mother’s story is amazing… this is why photo-a-day is a good thing to record your kids lives even though it’s a schlep and you think they’re trivial things you’re recording… you never know if they’ll do that particular thing again.

I think I want to change the project 365 name to Shoot to Live after that actually!

Yip, that’s me… I’m stressing about the wedding I’m booked for in Feb already!!

I went to the venue today to scout around for creative shoot locations… and I forgot to look for somewhere to do the family photos!! I even remembered about the one specific photo they requested… but to find a location for the family photos completely skipped my mind!

Arrghhh!! It’s not like I have time to wander around on the day!

To be a portrait photog is one thing… a wedding photographer is something else completely!

The whole timing thing on the day is stressing me out more than anything else… and I shouldn’t blog about it either, because I know they’re following my blogs!

I should be fine though… I know what I’m doing… I know where to go for the creatives.  It’s just daunting! I did that other wedding so long ago!

A friend of mine was stressing just as much a few weeks ago for a wedding she was booked for.  At the time I thought, how silly to be so stressed… she’s an excellent photographer… she’s ultra creative (much more creative than me)… she’s done umpteen couple shoots and portrait sessions… it’ll be a walk in the park for her!

And now I’m sitting sheepishly in the same boat.

And talking about Wedding photographers… when I was looking around for examples of photos done there, I’m shocked at how badly photographers use their sites and blogs! The post I did about the venue just now is almost on the front page of Google already!

There’s a photographer who seems to take photos there regularly, and only one of his weddings comes up on Google… I had to go hunting in his site for the rest! It’s so so silly!

Some of the comments from my post yesterday about leashing Connor when shopping reminded me of a story I got told at a kids party the other day, and also reminded me that I hadn’t blogged about it yet. This is a true dinkum story even though I haven’t heard about it in the news… a friend’s husband got told the saga at a local policing forum.

This used to happen a few years ago in this country, and I haven’t heard this kind of thing happening in a few years, but apparently the cops are very worried about the increase in child trafficking in anticipation of the World Cup next year.

Anyhoo, this is what happened a few weeks ago in a major shopping mall close to where I live in Johannesburg.

A mom was shopping in a large department store with her 3 year old little boy.  Boy was running around while she was browsing and looking at things on shelves.  She turns around to look for him, but couldn’t find him anywhere.

The mom went to the tills and the manager got called, and he had the sense to lock the store down to look for the child. They apparently closed the front doors and back doors stopping staff from leaving too.

After searching the entire store, the child was eventually found… and where you may ask…

… in the staff toilets in the back of the store.  He was found on the floor of a loo, drugged, hair shaven off and in different clothes already!  He was ready to be removed.

Absolutely FRIGHTENING! I’ve heard stories like that before, but kinda thought it might be an urban legend… but clearly it’s not.

And so, even more reason for me to leash Connor to stop him from running off!

You know the post I’ve just written on my photoblog about Connor falling into the duckpond?  Well, I actually can’t stop thinking about it.

I’m actually beginning to think Connor has a death wish has guardian angels watching over him constantly.  It frightens the living daylights out of me.

I’m beginning to think quite irrationally about the whole thing.  You’re probably all going to tell me to stop thinking like this, and that I’m being silly… but this is my blog… and this IS what I’m thinking… so you can read it or just move to the next blog thanks!

My biggest fear since the last incident… when he drank the cleaning liquid or maybe it was when he ran straight into the door and concussed himself or maybe it was when…

…is that he’s going to die when he’s young.

He didn’t exactly get the rosiest start in life with the time he was in NICU and was so very ill, and since then he’s just been seriously (or nearly seriously) hurt so very many times.  He’s only 2!!

Imagine he wasn’t able to climb out on Saturday?  I didn’t see!! I didn’t hear him!! No-one did!!! He could’ve drowned!!

I can’t exactly wrap him in cotton wool, but I wish he’d be more careful.  He scares me

Bradley has started lying with a straight face… but luckily, I can still catch him out.  But it’s driving me a little batty, I just want him to stop!

Today was a perfect example of that, and of me stretching the truth a little to prove a point to him.

There’s a Spar supermarket down the road from our house, and we went there this evening to get bread and milk and to collect our pizza takeout that we’d ordered.  Now that supermarket gives the kids lollipops as they walk out… which they’ve come to expect now… and tonight Connor asked the shop owner where his sucker was.  LOL!

Anyhoo, by the time we got to the car, both lollipops were being consumed, and I noticed an orange wrapper on the ground next to the car.  Whe we got in the car Bradley mentioned that his lollipop was orange.

So I asked him if he was the one who had littered, explaining that I’d seen the wrapper.  He looks straight into my eyes and says “No, it’s in my pocket”.   So I just told him that I wanted to see the wrapper when we got home.  He sat there for a while, and then finally told me the truth.

I decided that this was a good time, not only to discuss the lying issue, but also the littering one… which he’s also doing more and more these days.

So I told him what he must do if he had paper or rubbish he wanted to get rid of, and explained why it was important to throw it away properly.

I told him 2 stories about what will happen to that wrapper.

If no-one picks it up and it rains, the wrapper will float into the drains.  The drains lead to the rivers.  A fish will swallow the wrapper and die.  So now he’s a little wide-eyed.

Then I said, the more likely result is the following.  The wrapper is shiny. Birds will picks the wrapper up in their beaks and use it to line their nests.  However, the baby birds like the look of it and start pecking at it.  They swallow a piece of it, and they die.

Then Connor pipes up “Poor birdies” from the back of the car.

By now Bradley is a distressed, promises not to do it again, and pleads to me not to tell Daddy (he knows he’ll be stripped of TV priviledges for a while).

Hope it worked!

We went to Parys again yesterday, and I thought before I started my little rant that I would post a happy photo from playing with the kids in the garden.

I got so cross with Lance’s mom (MIL) yesterday again because of the stories she was talking about in front of the kids.  Firstly the house is absolutely damn freezing, and for some reason they think that it’s colder outside so they refuse to venture out into the sun.  So anyhoo, if you’re wondering, the camera and the new skipping rope was my way of getting the kids to play outside in the semi-warmth of the sun.

Because inside… it’s not fun for anyone.  There are china dogs on the floor… yes folks… dinkum I’m not lying.  Ooh and not to leave out the pink china cats and the brass flies hanging on the wall, and the pink china bell things with gross fake birds stuck to them with prestik.  And you try keep a 2-year old from touching stuff like that!! It’s not easy!

And that’s just the start.  The kids play with their toys on the carpet while Lance and I try and get her to speak in Afrikaans (once Tannie Gwen and Oom Hennie leave at 2pm on the dot for their weekly visit to their friends).  Now ordinarily that would be weird… to make someone speak in a language that the kids don’t understand.. but believe me… it’s a whole load better than Bradley and Connor listening to her talk about all the hijackings, murders, car accidents etc that have happened in the entire province (because she’s worried about us).

Every time it’s the same topic.  Oh and her new-ish one… the fact that she can’t get medicine from the clinic because of the doctor’s strike and the fact that a 20 year old gay coloured guys took her blood pressure last month and she didn’t trust him because he was far to young to know what he was doing.

I would absolutely LOVE to see more of the town one day, and maybe even go for lunch one day… but heaven forbid we suggest that because she doesn’t trust restaurant cooking at all and they might just poison her.  Oooh and to suggest to take her somewhere is just a waste of petrol and all the other drivers on the road are out to kill her anyway.

It’s exhausting, and very depressing. And to make it worse, because of all the negativity we dare not tell her much of our news because all she’ll say is how she’s so very worried about us driving because of all the crime etc etc etc and then the whole story starts again.  So she doesn’t actually know what we get up to.

And so it’s over for another month… before we have to drive the 90 minute trip to spend 90 minutes with her, just to drive 90 minutes back home… because we cannot possibly spend more time there on a particular day.

On a happier note, the kids actually love going there, because they love her cooking, and we all get to play outside and play catches and kick the ball etc, so it’s not all that bad.

Just when I thought we’d had enough drama for the weekend… with Bradley losing his tooth and then falling under a train… Connor HAD to just do something to top it off.

This evening the kids were watching TV and eating popcorn. I was upstairs editing photos, and Lance was in the diningroom working on his laptop.  All of a sudden, Connor starts calling softly and calmly “Help me Mommy”.

Bradley is sitting right next to him and ignores him.  We ask Connor what we can help with, but he just keeps saying help.  It seriously doesn’t sound like  stressed call though.

Eventually Lance decides to investigate to discover that Connor had lodged 2 popcorn kernels up his nostrils and he can’t breathe through his nose!!

I swear! These kids! Luckily he managed to get them out by blowing his nose really hard.  Thankfully I didn’t have to rush him an ER!!

And yes, I feel guilty as hell.  I should’ve gone downstairs as soon as he started calling.  If he’d sounded stressed I would’ve been there immediately, but he sounded so very calm!

So that was my exciting weekend, hows has yours been?

I saw something a little disturbing on the way to the  shops yesterday.  In one sense, I could completely understand how angry the mother must have been, but the rest of me felt very very sad for her poor son.

I was travelling the car with the kids.  We were going on a busy road, when I saw a car stopped on the side of the road.

A woman got out the car and ran around to the back door on the passenger side of the vehicle.  She opened the door and yanked her son out.  He must’ve been about 7 or 8 years old, and he landed on the floor and kicked her.  She didn’t say a word to him, then slammed the door shut, ran around the car again and jumped into the drivers seat and turned the car on.

And then I couldn’t see any more.  I wonder whether she actually drove off without him.  If she did, she couldn’t have gotten far, because he wasn’t there when I went back home that way 15 minutes later.

Can you imagine how scared that boy was?

I think that must’ve been a very scary experience even if his mother had allowed him back into the car before driving off… let alone if she’d actually left him there.

And before you say why didn’t you stop… I had the kids in the car and didn’t want them to be influenced by her crazy antics. If he was on the road when we came home, I would’ve picked him up.

This has got me thinking… that mother has no idea how much damage she’s doing to him.  He’s going to grow up thinking that it’s OK to get angry enough to leave a loved one on the side of the road… and that’s never OK.

It made me wonder whether a guy I knew a long time ago had a similar experience when he was younger.  Let me elaborate.

One evening, long time ago, a friend and I met 2 guys in a bar.  I had a fling with the one guy, she ended up having a fling with the other guy.  My fling ended quite quickly… as my relationships tended to during that time , but she saw this guy for a while.  And he ended up being quite a scary and scaly character.

A few months later, she bumped into his next girlfriend in a club, and she asked how he was doing.  This woman told my friend, that they ended up fighting quite hectically, and one night, he got so angry with her, that he stopped on the highway (in the middle of the night), threw her out the car and just left her there!! She didn’t have a cell phone or anything, and had to find her way home… and she hadn’t seen him since.

Scary shit! So lady in the car… if by chance you’re reading this blog… just careful what you’re teaching your son!!

Do you remember my post a few weeks ago about the doctor who was using the same syringe on more than one person?

Well, he’s gotten away with it.

Yip, the South African medical fraternity has done it again, and closed ranks completely!

Apparently, even though international practises dictate that it’s not the right thing to do, in this country, it’s apparently acceptable!

Yip, that’s right.  It’s apparently “not best practise, but it’s common practise” in this country to use the same syringe on more than one person, and just change the needle (according to the Health Practitioner’s Board and a medical aid company).

So, I ask you with tears in my eyes, are you AT ALL surprised at the HIV rates in Africa?  Because after this news, I’m not surprised at all!

I lost a little bit more faith in the ethical and moral standings of certain people this week, that’s for sure.