That little dash

That little dash between the dates

How little it does seem

But in reality it takes the cake

When you see the whole meaning!

Birth and death; both parts of life

But it’s the dash in between

That counts the most; as you will see!

What about the ‘in between’?

What have you done in life?

What will be said when you pass on?

What will you want them to talk about?

What will you have said?

What will you have done?

What will be the topic?

When they stand and recite?

Your family; as it gathers around your body?

How have you spent your days?

What benefit to this world?

Will you be proud of what is said?

Make the most of each day you have!

Spread the word of the Lord!

Enjoy your life! Let it be said!

He lived the life of Jesus Christ!

He loved and cared for all!

His days were long, his faith strong!

A pleasure to be known!

For every day was used in full!

Each moment was a blessing!

Dear Mum

Thank you for loving me. I’m sorry for all the stupid things I did when I was a teenager. I know you have always worked so hard all your life. You are in your seventies now and you still look after dad and cook and clean for him, just like you did for all of us when I was young. Thank you for getting up at 5am on those cold winter mornings so that you could light that old wood stove and cook creamed rice for us for breakfast before we walked to school. I know we didn’t have much back in the sixties; you and dad worked so hard to make a life for us in this new country; Australia. Dad built us a tiny home with his own hands. It only had two rooms; one for sleeping; one for everything else. We had a kerosene fridge and an old tin bathtub which doubled for what ever was needed. I remember going swimming at Moorook with you. Though you couldn’t swim; you were there for me and even jumped in to save a boy; even though you were terrified of deep water! That’s what mothers do!

When I visited you at Easter time, you said the most beautiful thing to me. You said that you “loved me and always would, no matter what I’d done or where I’d been; you would always love me; because that’s what being a mother is all about!” Thank you mum for giving me your unconditional love! (Just like Jesus does for us all!)

Thank you to all the mums who love us no matter what we’ve done; no matter where we’ve wandered; no matter what we’ve said. We love you and thank you daily, but especially on Mother’s Day!

Better Health Care

5/11/11

How easy it is to be alive and just appreciate living a “normal” life. Spent the other night in RAH, surrounded by other normal people who’d had an accident of one kind or another. Actually 3 of the six ladies in my ward had broken their hip. I had severed my tendon in my little finger and had them re-attached that very morning and the other two, well one had injured her feet and the other, I don’t know.

I spent the day in various states of unreality as the pain swirled around my head and left me reeling. Lost most of the day really because the week quickly and quietly slipped past and suddenly it was Thursday. My daughter spent most of the day waiting with me as I was discharged and finally allowed to go home to her place where she had to care for me until Friday when my husband was finally able to come and pick me up.

What really bothered me the most was that we all had to live in one room with five other women! At first, while I was still “off my face” on the pain killers nothing really entered into my own little world. Did I make a nuisance of myself whilst “under”? I hope I wasn’t too much of a bother. I’m truly sorry if I was! Finally when it all settled down and I felt slightly even “normal”, I noticed that the three broken hipped ladies were in a lot of pain. I would have loved to have been able to get up and assist where possible! But that’s just me! Not just that but two of them were obviously suffering from dementia or something similar as they were constantly talking, yelling for people who weren’t there or just babbling on in their own language in their own little world.

The Italian lady was constantly calling for her family members and was actually restrained so that she couldn’t get up and do further injury to herself. She was crying out for water at one stage and so I got up and gave her a drink from her cup and held her hand. She made no eye contact and didn’t respond. It felt so bad not to be able to help her in some other way but my prayers were all that I had to give that day. The poor nurses were ever rushing about help one or another of us all as the day went by. The other dear lady spoke Croatian intermingled with the occasional English and was even having telephone conversations with people, though she had no mobile phone. When her doctor was with her, she spoke to the other doctor, behind him, though there was no-one there, as he said.

At the end of the day these two women were having conversations with each other though I doubt they understood a word the other uttered. One would start the calling and yelling and the other would follow suit. Though I had my eyes closed most of the day, I broke through the consciousness barrier a few times and watched what was going on around me. Poor Gwen next to me had the frightened eyes of a startled rabbit and just needed a comforting hand to hold. I was too far away from the Croatian lady to be able to interact with her but she was in my prayers also.

In our newspapers some of the mess of our hospital system filters through. What a terrible state this world is coming to when people will all different illnesses are put into one room to be cared for in one of our city hospitals. Nurses are abused when trying to restrain people with mental illness who should be in better care. Nurses are overworked and I certainly didn’t hear that many a “thank you” being said to them. I do not blame anyone but the government for these problems. How much money is being gathered by taxes that never get to our health system? How come politicians get pay rises when our own nurses have to struggle? How come the mental health system is such that when the mentally ill ask for help they may or may not be assessed before being plonked back into situations where someone is killed before anything is done? How come we have to wait and wait for operations that are necessary but aren’t done because of little or no funding?

I recall my parents telling me about the “free” health system in Hungary back in their day. Though it was free they still had to bribe the doctors with eggs, chickens or whatever they had, before the doctor would help. What about in Russia, after reading the story about a woman who went for a holiday in Moscow. As she had no family there, she was given the drugs she needed to help her recover from her broken hip, but not the food she needed to recover. No such thing as hospital food there, can’t complain in the language, can’t complain at all! If a nurse hadn’t befriended her and brought food, she would have died there. Does our system have to get that bad before we react? Where are all the voices needed to make these things happen? Do we care so little about things until it happens to us? What is going to happen as the world powers who dominate don’t care about the common or “normal” human being? Look at the USA’s health system. How many in the well-off country of the United States can’t afford to get the proper care their families need? Where is this world coming to?

Everyone who has a voice needs to speak up before it gets any worse!

We all need to lift our voices to stand up for those who have no voice!

Please think of what is to become of us should the worst possibilities occur! Stand up for our rights to better health care!

Cured of Hoarding

I have been a hoarder for most of my married life. I sometimes wonder if this was because of a childhood where we never really had much. My parents left Hungary with just the clothes on their backs. They left in dead of night, crossing over the border into Austria after the revolution against the Russians taking over their homeland. They came to Australia as refugees and were housed in Bonegilla refugee camp in Victoria. I was born at Albury Base Hospital and later we were sponsored by some lovely families in Tasmania, finally settling in South Australia

I consider myself fortunate to have been born in this lucky country and can’t see myself ever wanting to leave here. This is where I belong!  My children are Australians as are my grandsons. With all the turmoil around the globe I can understand the reasons behind so many boat people wanting to come here to live. They want to be free to live their lives without fear and terror, without being reduced to illness and poverty as they were before. Isn’t this want any parent wants for their children? Isn’t this what everyone wants and needs to be happy?

I feel so sorry for all those people who feel they need to leave their homes to undergo a perilous journey just to get here. They see this wide brown land and want to make their homes here because of our freedoms and culture. I am an Aussie and though I understand their plight, I also see how many Aussies are afraid to let them in. Why should we accept so many others who will not change their ways and become Aussies like us, but want to continue with their own religious beliefs? Why should we let in Muslims who may or may not be terrorists just waiting to rise up and kill us all?

With all the terrible things happening all over the world, how can we feel safe? How can we be assured of anything when we see how the whole world is falling apart before our eyes? So many earthquakes, so many floods, so many cyclones and tornados killing people wherever you look! Even here in Australia there have been floods, cyclones, bushfires and murders, people afraid to leave their doors unlocked for fear of being killed in their own beds! What is this world coming to? We are coming to the point where we are afraid of our own shadows!

What happened to trust in God and prayer? So many do not even believe in God any more! Schools have to call the Easter holiday by another name so as not offend all the others who may not believe in what we do! We should not have to change our ways, it is those who come here should change to fit in. So many problems arise from all these things that need to be considered. It seems as if everything is being turned upside down! Everything has to be politically correct.

So many rules and regulations are being forced upon us to try and stem the tide of problems that are coming about.

No smoking in this or that place! No smoking in cars where children are present!

I agree that we need certain rules and regulations to protect the young and the elderly from being abused, from predators being able to prey on the weak and the ill, but where will it all end? When will there be enough rules and regulations to make the whole world safe? When will things start getting better?

It seems like it will never happen because there will always be those who will be able to skirt around the rules and do what they want any way. The rich will get richer and the poor will get poorer and strife will abound.

We are starting to become a cashless society. Look at that advert where the guy buying the sandwich and paying with cash is looked down upon for holding up the line! There are so many people being scammed and having their lives turned upside down by identity thieves. Everywhere you look there are problems. What is this world coming to when you are afraid to stop your car on the side of the road to offer help to someone who is stranded because others are doing the same on purpose to rob you?

God help us!

There needs to be a massive change in all our lives to help us all to realise how important it is to go back to teaching the Ten Commandments in school. How important it is to go back to God and ask for His help! There needs to be a revival of interest in the basic goodness we were taught as children. When it was still safe to let your kids ride their bikes over to friends homes and stay for hours without us living in fear that someone or something might have happened to them.

Please, everyone, we need to come together and pray for so many who need our help without even realising it. We need to pray for our neighbour and take care of the widows and the elderly and the ill and weak. This is our job! This is our mission. It is not to gather ‘things’ or to hoard our wealth for you all know that we can’t take it with us! Every ‘thing’ can be replaced but life is too precious to waste in worry of what is to come.

All the things I’d hoarded are now gone and in the dump. All the things that I wanted to keep for my grandchildren are now destroyed. All that I thought would “come in handy” at some later date is now in a huge hole being used as landfill.

The most important thing is that I have finally realised that ‘things’ don’t bring you happiness. Surrounding myself with things just made everything more difficult to cope with the mess that the flood left of our home. 

Ross River Virus

Last year I was involved in helping feed a couple of bus loads of people from NSW and QLD. Though I only assisted a little, it was a privilege to help my fellow church members, who put a lot of time and effort into catering for the event. As I assisted it was wonderful to see so many people get together and do our state proud by cooking and supplying such a lovely vegetarian meal for our visitors.

As I was setting the tables and doing the usual to-ing and fro-ing with the plates of food, I noticed a woman who seemed to be upset about something as I never saw a smile on her face during the whole time. I assumed she was upset with me for some reason, and I was feeling a bit guilty for not helping enough. Later as I struck up a conversation with her I found out that she thought she might have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome or something similar. (How easy for anyone to assume the completely incorrect reason for some-one else’s behaviour!) As we were talking I commiserated with her and explained about my Ross River Virus symptoms and found out that a friend’s young daughter had been complaining of the exact same symptoms as mine. I urged her to get that poor young girl to the doctors as it sounded so much like what I’d been going through.

Before December of last year, I had no idea what it would be like to have this awful disease. The tiredness, swollen joints, pain and irritability and all the fun stuff that came before the telltale rash; were just one more obstacle to overcome in the last few years. Just when I was finally getting better from my Chronic Anaemia and starting to feel like I had a little energy, along came a flood and washed through our whole house and messed up my life all over again! The symptoms came on very quickly and I had all but the rash within a few weeks.

Then, after a blood test came back positive; there I was, having to have extra long Nana naps again, and I could hardly move because of my swollen joints. It was so painful and difficult to do any thing!

Thank God for my local doctor who gave me some anti-inflammatory injections to ease the pain as nothing else was working! The respite from pain only lasted a few weeks and I was back again for more injections. I also found out that I only had the milder version of the virus and that some people had to suffer for up to seven years with much more serious symptoms!

I urge anyone who is feeling these symptoms to see their doctor as there is help available to ease the pain and awful stiffness in their joints and also for the general malaise being experienced. Please, anyone who has been near the swollen River Murray any time in the past few months, and has these symptoms of painful joints, headaches, tiredness and lethargy, tiny red rash all over the body: go to your GP and have the blood test to check for Ross River Virus! It is certainly better than Murray Valley Encephalitis, which has already claimed one life!

Forks over Knives

I watched an amazing movie the other day called “Forks over knives.” Two US doctors described how though they once advocated the “Meat and two veg” diet; even living on a cattle and dairy farm themselves; they were now advocating a vegetarian wholefood diet. Extensive studies showed that this diet could even reverse cardiovascular disease, diabetes and many other “incurable” diseases and cancers! A ten year study in China showed how regional diets also showed up regional diseases depending on diet. They went all over the world and found our “western” diet was a major contributor to many of the diseases of this past century. Our refined, fast food diet; too much sugar; too much meat; too much childhood obesity; not enough exercise is causing us to come to a stage where the next generation; our children; might NOT outlive their parents!

You’ve all seen that add in TV where Toni Collette (for Commonwealth Bank) conveys through that poem; you can drop that insignificant letter “T” at the end of the word CAN’T to make the word “CAN”.

Well, think on this: DIE or DIET. That little letter on the end of this word is significant! If you don’t watch your DIET; if you drop that significant letter at the end of this little word; you end up with DIE!

We each have the ability to choose our diet! We each have a choice in this affluent country; with so many foods available to us all; to choose good healthy foods but we are getting lazy! We are too busy to cook simple wholesome meals because it is easier to just get take away for dinner.

This body we feed with our greed for simple, easy food is suffering for our choices! The manufacturers of sports cars have a manual describing the care needed to keep the vehicle in good working order! Our manufacturer; God; has a manual for keeping our bodies in good working order! It’s called the Holy Bible!

Please; let’s take the time to think of our future and our children’s future! Take time to make some simple wholesome foods for our families!

A couple of weeks a go a lady at the supermarket asked me if some tinned soup was nice?  I replied that I didn’t eat tinned vegetable soup, I make my own and I described the recipe.

I get out my large saucepan and into it I add the following:

A little olive oil; heated. Then add 1 large chopped onion, 2 cloves chopped garlic. Cook until tender. Add 4 chopped potatoes, 3 chopped carrots; some cauliflower florets, broccoli florets; lentils or four bean mix (basically whatever vegetables I have in my fridge) when it’s all tender, I add a couple of cans of Heinz Big Red Tomato soup. Yummy!

Rosehip Vital

I recently told my friend about my success with Rosehip Vital, a product intended for use in arthritis. I asked if she had heard of the product and she replied that she had indeed, but thought it must be just another scam. Her response made me sad to think that with all the advertising on television and all the exposures and rubbish that are served up to us daily; how do we really know what and whom we can trust? She assumed that the people on the advert were just actors paid to “pretend” to be relieved of their pain to make another buck for some multinational company. How are we supposed to believe that what is presented to us on the screen is the truth when so many times it has proven to be false!

Just the other day some anonymous person sent me an e-mail telling me that I could make heaps of money on-line by just checking out this or that website. I am sick of all the rubbish that is forwarded to my address without any truth whatsoever. How can we believe anything when so much is “false advertising”?

Also, how can we trust anything when hackers can just log onto our account in our name and change things around and so steal our identity? Or is it really believable that just by buying some “exercise” machine, we can lose all those unwanted Kilos without any effort? I know we are a “Now” society and we expect to have everything happen in an instant but life just doesn’t happen quite like that! If you want something you have to work for it!

I am telling people about my success with Rosehip Vital because it honestly worked for me! My neck pain is gone and I am able to do so many things that were impossible only three short weeks ago. I have found that by taking a women’s Ultivite capsule daily, I have also found and lessening in my Ross River Virus symptoms! After suffering form anaemia for the last few years I have now also noticed that my hair is growing and I feel like a fog has been lifted form my mind! So to everyone out there: yes! The Rosehip Vital does work in reducing the swelling caused by arthritis and the Ultivitamins do help with the feeling of well-being! (Ultivitamins contain vitamins, minerals, herbs and anti-oxidants.)

I am so glad to be doing something positive in my life that works for me!