All the Small Things

What happens when you push yourself, and stop listening to the subtle messages that your body sends you to "stop"?

You land up in hospital for eight days, followed by an order to take up bed-rest thereafter.

Well, maybe not for everyone, but that's what happened to me a few weeks ago. At 32 weeks pregnant, I finally crashed and burned one Sunday, and we made a hasty trip to the maternity ward to discover that I was in preterm labour. Long story short... I am now 35 weeks pregnant (phew!) and on strict orders to rest, with baby girl growing healthy and stronger every day.

Thing is, when you find yourself stuck in a place like a hospital (or a prison, I imagine) unexpectedly, with all your personal comforts suddenly taken from you, you come to appreciate all the small things (and some big things) that you didn't even think twice about beforehand. As if life somehow owes you those things upfront, like oxygen and sustenance. During my eight days incarceration, and on the day of my homecoming, I came up with a list of things that I will never again take for granted, some of which I thought to share....

Tweezers. A week in hospital without tweezers, and I closely resembled the hairy James P. Sullivan from Monsters Inc. This was my first act of homecoming - to re-shape my eyebrows and sigh in satisfaction at the mirror. Followed by a gloriously close shave with a non-disposable razor... It was heavenly.

James P. Sullivan, AKA "Sully" - Monsters Inc.

Yep that's what I looked like, don't judge me.

Music. There is no music in hospital. The nurse's badly-chosen ringtone does not count. I eventually figured out that if I kept the TV above me on, tuned to a movie channel, I could catch the ten minutes of music played during every movie credit roll. Yes, I actually did this, such was my desperation. I watched a lot of junk for those ten minutes...
On my homecoming, I put on a favourite music album... and nearly cried for the beauty of it.

The smell of home. You know what I mean - that mixture of scents and fragrances that you know as yours, almost as though you and your loved ones have unintentionally marked this territory as 'home'. On the day of my return from hospital, I came into the house via the garage. It smelled of my husband's greasy rags and the petrol lawnmower. I took a deep, desperate-for-more breath - it was the scent of "welcome home".

Waking up with someone you know and love. Poking my husband for snoring, fighting over bed space, listening to him breathing... what a joy to wake up next to him every morning.

The Silences. A familiar wind rustling familiar leaves just outside my very own window. The hum of my own ceiling fan, and the creepy house-noises I've come to recognize. Strictly speaking, these are sounds, not silences, but after eight days of trolleys, beeping machines, and clanging trays... these are the sounds of Silence.

My breakfast ritual. One WeetBix stick. A dessert spoon of whole linseeds. Two dessert spoons of All-Bran flakes. One sliced banana. Loads of milk. Yum, and a very happy tummy... I've realized that I am such a creature of habit - I missed my daily breakfast so much that I actually had it for lunch on my first day back home.

Normal chatter. However well-meaning it may be, "How are you feeling?" becomes a tiresome topic of discussion. I feel tired and sore and scared and annoyed to be in hospital. But I don't want to get you down, so I'm going to smile and and say "Oh fine, better than yesterday". Since being back home, normal small-talk has been resumed. So-and-so's dog's strange behaviour. What's-his-name's new Christmas tree. The latest specials at Pick n Pay. It's La-di-da's birthday today, did you wish him? Tell me something, anything. It all matters, no matter how mundane.

Variety. I came home, and desperately wanted to be in every room of the house, all at once. From being confined to one bed and a drip all week,  I wanted to sit and breathe in the languid stillness of the bedroom; flop onto the horribly uncomfortable lounge couch; prepare tea in the homely mess of our sprawled-out kitchen; sniff the towels in the bathroom that smell of showers and fresh soap...


In a nutshell, it is great to be home. There's no place like it. You should think about your life, your home, your loved ones, your little habits, your surroundings... and take the time to enjoy them. When I got married, my amazing, wise brother gave me the best advice about my wedding day: he said, "Stop often. Look around, listen, and just take some time to enjoy that moment of your wedding day. Otherwise, it will go so fast, you won't remember anything."

The same could be said of life in general: Stop often. Look around, listen and take some time to enjoy that moment of your life. Do it, fellow inhabitants of this planet. You will regret missing all the small things in life far more than wasting a few moments to experience it.

Monday Ramble: Handbags and Brownie Points

It was my birthday recently. And it was on a Sunday two weeks ago that my darling husband phoned me from the mall and asked if I would like to come and choose my birthday present. Long story short, he had been handbag-shopping for me, and wanted to make sure that I liked what I got. (+brownie points for handbag, +brownie points for handbag-shopping, +brownie points for having the sense to know what this girl would want for her birthday) 


So off I went, only to find that hubby had not just been handbag-shopping, but had been shopping at stores that only sold branded handbags... Diesel, Guess, Gucci, Louis Vutton.... Hubby was going to buy me a quality bag, and he meant business about it! After an hour of looking at all the possibilities (+brownie points for an hour of patient shopping), we settled on a beautiful Guess handbag which cost enough of a fortune to make me cringe, even though we twisted the salesman's arm into offering a small discount. 

I thought my handbag was just perfect (+brownie points just for the hell of it) and boy, I was thrilled! Imagine my disgust, fellow inhabitants of this planet, when I discovered this past Sunday that the stitching that holds the handbag strap on had come loose, and the whole bag was quite literally hanging on by a thread. After two weeks! Well! *hell-hath-no-fury-face* Off I marched, back to the store from whence the offensive bag came, where I was greeted and treated with the most sincere apologies, and a salesman only too willing to allow me to select another bag.  


And I decided that I have a real problem with that. If you are going to manufacture a product like Guess and then charge someone's arm and leg for it, you better make damn sure that every single product leaving your factory be immaculate and worth that arm and leg. The whole glorious idea behind branded handbags is utterly destroyed for me, and by principle, I refuse to ever own one again. 


So I took a pair of jeans and a T-shirt in place of the bag. (+brownie points for unknowingly giving me two birthday presents instead of one) 


My thanks to the shop Branded, for their beyond-exceptional services, and my thanks to my husband, for being the most thoughtful man on this planet. *love*


Oh, and another ridiculous thing about branded handbags: did you know that they give you a bag to store your bag...? A bag for your bag, well I've never!!