Abandoned Place of Worship

This collection of images are of a derelict old church building that has either dilapidated over time or suffered a fire. It is in Bristol City Centre opposite the town centre mall. 

It is such a shame to see a place of worship be so neglected to the point of desolation... The sole comfort one has is that a church is not a place, but the people so when we see these sorts of things it ought not to make one wonder where the church has gone but rather make us grateful that true worship and religious expression is not confined to a building but we can express and experience our faith everywhere we go / we are as the people are the body of Christ which is the church.

ShutterDay: Rain

English weather remembered fondly as...rain

One of the things about England that as a foreigner has been the hardest thing to adjust to is the weather. Its erratic unpredictability is not dissimilar to a double standard man, 'unstable in all his ways'. One can never be sure if it will rain or if the sun will shine or if it will snow or just bring bitter winds from every direction! I must say that the one thing I love about English weather is the snow which is always a high point for me!

But it is English rain that has become an old and dear friend. 

My heart and my cloak cupboard have made room for its many forms... 

We often walk along the street together playing out our relationship. 

Sometimes it shouts at me with a down pour;

Sometimes it drizzles with excitement however short lived. 

Every now and then it mists with frustration as it cannot see the way through. 

More often than not it gently pats me on the head as if to say all will be well;
As it sprinkles itself across the horizon...

Yes it is my long enduring relationship with English rain I love the best...

Friends are the family we choose for ourselves: Mich

Real LOVE gives you wings...

It must first be said that I was a very volatile girl when I was growing up, not unlike an active volcano. Having always been a passionate person, in my youth it was unbridled, raw and wild to say the least. I did not discover tact until much later in life and developed and acid tongue that burned whomever it set its sights on post offence. Yet I had a very gentle, very sweet nature and a heart big enough to love the world's 6 billion plus inhabitants, yet my fear of rejection and hurt shrouded it so well hardly anyone could see it nor understand me...que Mich.

Mich is one of my oldest (having just turned 30! lol) and dearest friends who entered my life at age 16, the beginning of Act 4, scene 1:the Falling in Love...being in Love stage. 

An aside: So that this makes sense I should say at this point that I view my life as a theatrical play with many players, scenes, themes, cliff hangers, laughter and tears. I like to think of the significant stages of my life as acts and scenes much like a Shakespearian play. 

You have heard of one meeting their match, but when I met Mich (pictured below at the 'tender' age of 17) I met someone more than my match...more than me and therein lay the challenge. I was determined to make our acquaintance short and sweet, preferring to surround myself with those who were not a threat or could be dominated so a strong, self assured arrogant boy was an ill fit in my already full on theatrical drama life I call, 'Just Rue'. I was however completely taken by that boy and rather than a brief and polite acquaintance, he became a co-writer in defining what love would mean to me and in my life hence forth...So just like that Act 3 ended and we began a journey together that is Act four; 'Falling in love...being in love' with its countless scenes. It must be said at this point that as in any great Shakespearian play, Act 4 had its many cliff hangers and laughs, cries and ended  in tragedy.

 But I am not going to tell you about that, this post is about the boy and what I learnt from him in the brief time we wrote Act 4 in the story of my life. Looking back Mich probably had not bargained for what he would get in me anymore than I had with him and so when he did fall in love, it was unrestrained, raw, honest and real. He threw his hat in the ring and like fools rush in, he dived head first. Being the more cynical one it took me a while to realise that my heart had betrayed me and ran away with his.

What Mich taught me throughout Act 4 is that love is a choice...an unconditional daily choice to be with and give yourself completely to the one your heart has chosen...He taught me that love has to begin with friendship, be based on truth and thrive through honesty and mutual respect. He taught me that love doesn't always say what you want to hear but it will always tell you the truth. That there is no fear in love and that you are enough...no need to change who you are bend over backwards, reinvent yourself to be loved, real love will find you as you are and love you unconditionally that way. You must understand that at the best of times I am not an easy person to love and at 16 I was impossible to love, get through to, understand but he persevered and his  prize was the best of me. In the end I was the victor with the greatest portion of the spoils in that not only have I known what it means and feels like to be really loved but I learnt how to love others that way. 

So today as I think about that boy who taught me how to love and accept myself. And to give of myself without counting the cost for the reward of loving is always greater than the pain of loss; I am grateful that he loved me once and that the friendship we forged then was genuine. So on this occasion of his 30th birthday, I thought it only fitting to celebrate my friend  by showing him some blog love right here! 

Happy Birthday Mich...see you at 40! :-)

Beating the heat

Brief: Write a piece on a childhood memory the photo inspires in you...

Photograph provided by The Red Dress Club

The photograph as well as its title inspired my post today. I can remember some of my fondest childhood memories being around water. From my dad teaching us how to swim in our back garden, to holidays in Mauritius and Australia to Cape Town and of course going home to Malawi and driving past the beautiful like that bares its name. Of all these memories I remember best being a child in an African village playing in a brook filled with dirty waters and rolling around in the mud banks during the summer school holiday. I was raised in the city  in a middle class environment and there was little that we lacked growing up from basic needs like food and shelter to luxuries like holidays abroad and gifts at Christmas and on birthdays. We were a better than average family in relation to material worth and social standing yet many of our relatives struggled and were poor...


As I got older I understood our family history better and could see why the disparity was so distinct. My parents were both hard working 'self motivated over achievers' from working class families in rural Africa. One starting from a little village in northern Malawi near Ekwendeni; the other from a farm in a place called Mutoko, Zimbabwe. Twelve years apart they began their journey with similar vision, drive and determination;  inquisitiveness and desire to have more at the end of their lives than when they began. The goal, to leave a legacy to their children. Their paths seemed destined to not only cross but merge into one in spite of or maybe propelled by the odds, daring life to hinder their course. Not not overcome or derailed by setbacks and challenges each passing through seasons of marriage, divorce, death, exile, children, boarders or languages. All resulting in the life they gave my siblings and I... their audacious request made of life as they built and climbed out of the state of their birth caused them to arrive  much like the victors baring the spoils of war. Vision realised and goals met they never lost touch or contact with their villages and families, helping those they left behind and doing so with a humility that often shrouded their success.


So much so were my parents true to their roots that my happiest childhood 'water'  memories are not placed in an exclusive holiday resort in exotic locations. It is not in our home with a full length swimming pool in the garden or the gifts and toys and television viewing. It is those spent at the brook at the far side of the village where I spent many summers playing freely in the dirty waters and mud with the village children in rural Malawi without a sign of comfort, luxury or expense in sight... My parents 'beat the heat' that is set firmly under the less fortunate, stewing them in place, fixating them on their hunger, keeping their focus on what lies before them rather that allowing them to lift up their eyes to a different perspective, one that allows them to have a vision and make an audacious request of life. In so doing they taught me to be content in whatever state I find myself but to never settle for less than I know I have in me to achieve.