How have I been ?

Things have been a bit topsy turvy in the life of Thinking recently.

My recent leg injury has shattered my confidence…hmm…something I thought would never happen.

Being not the most confident person…I couldn't really afford to lose any but I have...

Unable to even back the car out of the garage…walk to the gate…go out for a meal with friends…and in some cases even be alone.

But it's also knocked my confidence with the blog too.

You know me…hmmm….I love to blog.

And the other day I made a decision that was typically spontaneous of me….

The decision I had made was to take a break from blogging.

I was ready to pack my virtual bags…switch off the computer…say goodbye.

But I can't.

And I won't.

I have too much to say and lots of friends to say it to.

I'm an unsociable old bugger and wanted to make some friends - of which I have done in droves via this wonderful creation called the Internet.

To each and every one…I am continuously grateful for your time in reading my blog…hmmm…

If you want to leave a comment then you know how much I love to hear from you…if you don't want to leave a comment….perhaps you don't have time or you just feel you have nothing to say…then that's fine too.

But I promise to reply to you on my comments page if you do.

Some people write for an audience…some write for fun…others write for themselves.

The reason why I write on my blog?

All three reasons. Always have…always will.

I need to get back on my feet and shake off this lack of confidence.

I don't know how I'll do it yet….but I was hoping that your presence might help me.

I really can't face the doctor again!

Just want to forget about it the way it never ever happened!

hmm....Love…as always…

Thinking.

Salute !

What category we put the police man into?

I mean….is he a labor…an industrialist…a businessman… a self earned man...a student…?

What category he belongs to?

On firing the KESC employees...all the labor union got into action...hmm....

They forced government to do something about it. All the newspapers were writing sympathetic notes about those fired employees....hmmm...

If…God Forbid…any labor looses his life during working in a factory or in a protest…the whole newspaper started selling the news…the news channel started a picture on his life…they telecast his whole life and labor unions haunt the industrialist to give enough funds to the deceased family so that they can start life without him.

What about a Policeman?

How we/government compensate his family for his life?

On my information...hmmm...the incentive for the shaheed family is only One Lac Fifty thousand…also Ten thousand to the Shaheed’s daughter on their marriages.

On these days…is this amount of money enough for any reasonable family to start their life?

Do the Shaheed get enough space in the newspaper?

Does any news channel invade his house to telecast his difficult life to the AWAAM?

Do we notice any news about poor Policeman child in a hospital asking for people to help him?

Does this mean….that they are so happy and contented on their job?

Does this mean that they are over fed by our government?

They have all the luxuries anyone could ask for?

Or does this mean that they are the most ignored category we have between us?

How could I ask someone to protect me when I am not giving him enough reason to do so?

How could we ask our policemen to gives us extra efficient service when we don’t even care whether their family is ok or not and how he is doing in his personal life?

We feel pity on poor…how we know that they are not the one among them?

I think our Police Department is the only Government Department where there are no Unions...either Labor or Officers.

How many of us personally know anyone belongs to the police department?

We have outcast them from general public.

And then we cry on their not being sympathetic....hmm.....

Just go through this list and I am sure your eyes will fill with tears: http://www.sindhpolice.gov.pk/martyrs_shaheed.htm

My deepest sympathy for todays' Shaheed Policemen. And condolences for their families.

Silence

Last night I got into bed and coughed a bit...hmm..

Then a bit more...

And a bit more....

Then a long coughing fit...

I got up to get a drink of warm water...

Got back in bed...

Sneezed.

Got up for a tissue.

Got back in bed...hmm...

Coughed...

"Right...that's it!" yelled beloved husband suddenly....

"I've had enough. It's been four months and you are still coughing. I can't stand it any longer.

Rant...rant...rant...blah...blah...blah"

(You get the gist)

I lay there quietly giggling away while he continued with his outburst...hmm...

I waited until he'd finished ranting then I quietly said:

"I've put up with your snoring for 3 years"


Silence.


hmm !


______________________

We had yet another party this weekend..hmm....

He was taking ages to get ready.

As I was trying to get dressed and get a present wrapped and a card written...

He was more interested in doing a jigsaw...reading newspaper...playing with his cellular phone... singing in the washroom while shaving.

"What am I doing?"

I thought..."I spend all week trying to pursuade beloevd husband to do things he don't want to do...

hmm...I'm not going to do it this time as well.

I don't care if we gets to this party on time."

So I told him...

"The party starts in 30 minutes. If you want to get there on time...you need to get ready.

If not...you'll be late"

"I don't mind being late" he said...

"It's ages till the food anyway"

Silence.

hmm !

My Bedroom Window

My bedroom window isn’t very big and it’s nothing fancy...hmmm...

It’s just a little bedroom window above my bed with some pretty fabric draped across the top.

But it is my bedroom window. The one my beloved husband put in just for me.

Actually this apartment…has no balcony…so this is the only way I can have a track of whatever is going on outside my apartment.

When started living in this apartment I became homesick for everything familiar that I had left behind…for the view of main road and a nearby children park from my mom’s bungalow low wall.

I had a lot to learn about life and love along with some growing up to do.

As time passed I grew fond of my own view; though I can’t see the children’s park as there aren’t any and also I can’t see all the time lively main road from my bedroom window…but it has an unique view…

This UNIQUE view consists of a bungalow’s small garden in which I see an elderly woman working on her flowers and trees.

That same bungalow has times of few visitors…mostly children…which enjoy evening in the Garden with her grandmother (I believed)…or may be aunt.

Through it I have learned to love the view from my own bedroom window more and more.

The beautiful flowers’ rows that change color with the seasons…chickens pecking in the pasture…a corner of the garden where the lady have mounted a swing.

Sometimes I see the view from my bedroom window inside my bedroom…my beloved husband working on some project…talking to his friends on phone…asking his beloved wife to give him tea… or a wife trying to clean the apartment…ironing of clothes...running to the kitchen remembering the boiling milk on stove.

As I have a love scene outside my bedroom window I see love on the inside of the bedroom window too…joy in our meals shared together…faithfulness through the laughter and the tears.

Memories built together as a family…in our little home looking out of my own bedroom window.

The view from my bedroom window is unique.

It is different from my mom’s...hmm...different from a friend’s...even...different than yours.

But it is mine…the life God has blessed me with.

It is special and exciting to see God’s hand guiding. I look forward to enjoying the ongoing view from my very own bedroom window....hmm...

Lady Drivers !

When I first started driving aged 21....hmmm...

I can't remember what the cost of attaining the driving license was but I do remember spending an awful lot of time on reading the traffic/road sign book.

These days…it seems no matter you know the traffic rules or not or even you have a driver license…only you need a car to be a driver.

It’s the way it is nowadays but when it comes to a LADY driver...I don’t know why I see people scattered a smile and make faces of not approving Lady as a driver.…

I know so many lady drivers who drive extremely carefully in their tiny engine cars.

There is of course this stigma that if you're a lady driver then you're also probably a reckless one...too.

But that is something I am finding hard to agree with. Our main road known is like a race track especially in nights and drivers speed up and down like there's no tomorrow.

There are at least two major accidents a week on the stretch near where I live…caused by speeding or those who are just careless.

There is no average...no statistical fact and certainly no particular sex group that causes these accidents...some of which are fatal.

Of course…when my mother-in-law drives her car I fear for the lives of others on the road.

I never got in the car with her because she used to frighten me with her recklessness...hitting the curb....fiddling with the radio...waving at passing motorists/cars...hmm...

And to top it all...she used to talk turning her head regularly toward her audiences whilst driving which was a reason in itself for me not to get in the car with her.

And why not…my husband...even though a good/male driver does have his moments where he is too busy waving at someone he knows that he fails to see the stationary car in front.

I wonder why people disapprove the lady drivers with the same brush for a reason.

I can bet with them if they can prove that the most reckless drivers on our roads are lady drivers...inexperience possibly playing a large part.

But when I see grown or young men driving like nutters along a single carriageway...overtaking...weaving in and out...kids in the back...it really begs the question....

Why people disapprove Lady Drivers?

Flexibility !

I’ll just say it:

I’m allergic to schedules...hmmm

I like to think I’m a flexible person.

Which mean that I am ready for any work Allah would assigned me.

It also trips me up sometimes…whenever I believed that I had say YES to HIS assignment and was about to finish it(which I believed finished)…it somehow prolonged by some hidden incidents I don’t have any authority of and this exactly test my nerves.

Confused?

Me too!

But I think the bottom line is very simple.

I need to be very straightforward with Allah…asking Him what His overall priorities are for this (particular) time in my life – and then sticking to them.

At the same time…when some new opportunity appears, I can send up a quick prayer for guidance.

Do I do this consistently?

No.

But in the last few years …Allah has been helping me to internalize this fact:

Whatever my circumstances….He expects me to be a good steward of each opportunity sent by Him.

This cuts out excuses and self-pity on one hand….and overload or distraction on the other.

When I’m at home…my weeks generally consist of going to office…spending sometime with my mum…and keeping in contact with friends and family.

I like a quiet life…– and discovering a great deal of joy in doing so.

But when it comes to be talkative and laughing whole heartedly…I try my best to do the assignment properly.

I visited Lahore. Since I was there…my time as a tourist looks a lot like staying with friends:
we share meals…go out together…play music…parties…take walks…talk…and talk…and talk some more.

There’s a fine balance between being responsible for my time out…but not selfish with it...yeah??

But when we packed our bags with so much hugs and kisses we came to the Lahore Air port for departure to Karachi…the flight was delayed due to the fog in the air and thus we were sent back to the hotel.

I secretly yelled in my heart…claimed someone’s bad luck has to do about it…. and asked Allah that didn't I managed to properly do the assignment HE gave me?

Suddenly I realized…my anger…and asked me…why I am angry?

I like to think I am a flexible person and like to welcome uncertain things…and this exuberant…purposeful flexibility certainly does not come naturally to me!

But God is busily building it into my life.


An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered.
An inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered.
-G.K. Chesterton

Note: The picture is from the balcony of my hotel room...the parrot was having a nice and calm look out for his freinds on a very chilled morning...and didn't know that someone sneeked in his privacy.

hmm....To Allah be all glory !

I need a Break !

I think I need a break...hmmm....

Everything is starting to get to me.

Everyone is starting to annoy me.

The city is beginning to grate on my nerves…and I think I've just been in a city environment for way too long.

I need to go somewhere where fire trucks…ambulances and police car sirens aren't blaring every ther hour, at 3 am, 5 am, 7 am, and so on.

Where people aren't walking too slowly when you need to get somewhere in five minutes.

Where cars don't honk their horns at your car when you are calmly waiting for the signal to turn “green”.

Where plans with people…checklists at work…piles of laundry…unanswered emails…and unreturned phone calls don't continuously weigh upon you with each passing second.

I want to drop everything and go away.

A lightly-sanded beach with aqua water with nobody except someone who would bring tea...coffee…subway sandwich at my beck and call.

I want to breathe in air that smells like the sea..free of car exhaust and wet mud and stale Marlboro Lights.

I want to exhale and feel light and unburdened and free...hmm...

I need a break.

Or else I'll break.

End of the World !

hmm....so....the world ended yesterday.

After months and months...people were saying the end was near...

And when it finally came....it wasn’t really all so bad.

In fact...if people had known exactly how the world was going to end....I don’t think they’d have freaked out about it so much.

Especially the guys walking around in sandwichboards...waving signs and shouting THE END OF THE WORLD IS NIGH!

With the help of the theory....they normaly preach you to give away your blah blah activities and become a good human....

When I aksed one of them...WHY?

He said....because end of the world is nigh !

When the end came...I saw one of those guys just sitting there and smiling...and was doing nothing.

hmm...so...I joined him...and we watched the world's end together.

And...soon after that....

The new one begin.

Happy 2011.