Here I am, curled up in bed, sleep a million miles away, even though it has been a long, busy day and I am tired. I look at the clock and see it’s well after midnight. Oh the joys of the sleepless! It never ceases to amaze me that as you get older, you can be so tired and yet you snuggle into bed and instantly your eyes are wide open and you are wide awake! Is it something about the stillness of night, the fact that you can be alone, with your own thoughts, that ensures you are awake when you should be sleeping, your mind alive with creative ideas and fascinating thoughts? Or is it simply that one is older, and needs less sleep, so that while tiredness seems a fact, sleep is nonetheless, elusive?
So, what to write about that might amuse, enthrall or even remotely interest my readers? Do I even have any readers? Am I deluded, thinking I am writing something that anyone else would be even vaguely interested in reading, or do I have just one single person out there in Cyberspace who connects, reads and “gets it” ? Are you there? Do you know? Can you “hear ” my thoughts?
Many more able writers than I, have penned many a verse about growing old – about seeing the world in a different way, as age progresses, but it occurs to me anew that the old saying “there are two certainties in this world, death and taxes” is more true than one might have first imagined! As you age, you realise that there is not a great amount of time out there in front of you, waiting to be lived – that somewhere, somehow, the years have slipped by and you look back and realise that there may be only 10 or less years left to achieve all that you had planned!
You look at your children, now adults with children of their own, and realise that somewhere along the way they grew up and no longer need you in the same way. If you are blessed as I am, you also realise that your children have become your friends, there has been a subtle shift from the parent/child roles, to the parent/friend roles. You of course, never stop being a parent, but the focus of being a parent becomes more on enjoying the adults they have become than on teaching them to be the adults you want them to be.
One of the greatest joys in this world, is the birth of your children, to see them for the very first time, so small and so totally dependent on you and your ability to care for them. Holding your first newborn baby, a squished little human, and having absolutely no idea what to do, is a scary thing! But you learn, you grow as much as your baby does, and you adapt your whole life to this new and amazing little human you have created. And one day you wake up, and that tiny little human has grown into an adult, one that you have nurtured, disciplined, loved, resented and loved again, thought would never grow up, calmed their fears, wiped their tears, patched their skun knees and elbows, held them as they wept for a lost love, wept as they rebelled and did things you didn’t like, loved them even as you hated what they were doing, Saw their mistakes, but could do nothing to prevent them making them, helped them repair their lives when those mistakes became disasters, and suddenly, realised you had done a pretty good job with their upbringing, and found a deep and lasting friendship with them that was totally unexpected!
They tell me that there is another shift eventually, when child becomes carer, when you become so old and senile that your child needs to assume the responsible role for you. I have not got there yet, and I hope I never do! I hope that for me, but more so for them. Such a sad thing to have to do!
Life they say, is a stage and all must play a part – quoting I believe an Elvis song, but anyway, I suspect that it’s true – we are here and we have a purpose and a “part” to play. Is it a good part, one in which we give back to the society in which we live, or a bad part in which we take from that same society? I guess that choice is ours to make, but like all choices, there are consequences. What are your consequences? Are they good or bad? Did your choices give or take? Is that not the caption of every life? The thing that will be written on the headstone of our graves?
But I am becoming maudlin – death and taxes, the two certainties of this life! I think we should add love to that maxim – there are three certainties in life, love, death and taxes! Surely each person deserves to know love at least once in their lives? We cannot blame others for our actions. We cannot excuse our behavior by blaming anyone else. It is true that some have had a very hard time, a sad childhood, feelings of being unloved, but it is a hard cold fact that the choices we make, for whatever reason, are OUR choices, not to be put off onto someone else, or some other circumstance, we make our own choices, whether good or bad, and each of us needs to own our choices.
Every human being has choices to make, we do it all the time, all day, every day. And we base those choices on many different things, but what we all need to know is, the choice is your own! If you make a bad choice – you own it, you made that choice. If you made a good choice – you own it, you made that choice.
The choices YOU make, can affect everyone around you – like a pebble makes a ripple in a pond, expanding out from the epicenter, so your choices affect those around you, directly to those closest to you and less directly to those further away, but having some effect on all you know! Do you see what a fearful thing “free choice” is? What a great and awesome responsibility? Do you make your choices carefully, with thought to those around you? Or do you make your choices selfishly, with no thought to what effect it is going to have on those around you? And do you see that there is no one else responsible for your decisions but you?
Whatever else I have learned from life, there is this – no one else is responsible for you and your life and decisions – you make decisions and choices – you must make them accepting the outcomes and results -as your own personal responsibility. Accept the consequences – and there are always consequences – of either good or bad choices and decisions, as being your own – not your parents, not your circumstances, not your past life – just you, your convictions, your beliefs your morals – these are the things that must influence your decisions and choices!
Which leads me into the field of just, moral and upright living! It is considered “old fashioned” “Victorian” and “outdated” to speak of morals, ethics and justice, but these are things so needed in our world right now. We need people with strong morals, with a sense of ethical and just behavior!
Are our youth being taught what it means to live a moral life? With strong ethics and a sense of truth and justice? I don’t think so, I don’t see it at all. I see young people being taught to “do your own thing” “take what you want” “it’s your right” “life owes you” and similar sentiment! Are they being taught that truth in all things is important? No, they are being taught that if you are good at sport, any sport, truth does not matter! They are being taught that anything goes, as long as you are good at sport. We see this demonstrated time and again, as sporting “heroes” involve themselves in drugs, antisocial behaviors, adultery and more, yet they are soon being once more touted as “heroes” for the very simple fact that they are good at their sport and earn money for their sponsors. Social moral values are eroded in this way.
Do our young people have strong, moral and ethical leaders to look up to and model themselves against? No, we have leaders who promise things they can’t deliver, lie about their lives and affairs, and there are no consequences . What does this teach our young people? It teaches them that it’s OK to be a liar, a cheat and a fraud, as long as you either play sport, or are a politician. Being a politician means you can promise the public anything to get elected, you can lie, cheat and scheme, and then say you “made a mistake” and go back on it all, and there are no consequences to be answered! And the Australian public will pay for you for the rest of your life, with massive benefits and a generous allowance, whether you were a good in the position you held, or whether you lied and cheated and defrauded the public. It won’t matter, you will be paid for the rest of your life to ensure you live in comfort. There is no other job on this planet that offers such benefits! In the real world, if you are employed to do a job, and you fail to do that job as expected by your employer, you are fired, no benefits, no payment! And yet, if you are a politician in high office, the same does not apply. You can be the worst possible person in that job, do a dreadful job, cost the public millions of dollars, lie and defraud, but you will be paid a handsome sum for the rest of your life for “serving” the Australia public! What does this show our young people? I think the answer is quite clear!
What causes the fall of a society? Corruption and immorality, lies, cheating and deception! These are the things that historically have seen the demise of powerful, rich and successful societies. Do we think we are immune? Do we think we are so “advanced” and “modern” that we are exempt from these laws? It is my belief, that we could see the end of society as we know it, because of these things, it will not be a pretty picture! Am I an alarmist? No, I just see that we are headed down a path that other societies have gone before us, and it’s not a path to follow! We can change it, we can make better choices. We can save the world for the next generations! We can make a difference, each of us separately and together. There is a choice, though I don’t believe that choice will exist forever, there is a choice that we can all make together, that can change the course we are on currently.
The question is – do we have the moral courage to make that decision? As a society, as a people and as a planet?
The Wendy Diaries 