Wednesday 23rd March 2011

I’m writing again…finally!  Thank you for your patience and for showing up again to read.  Interestingly enough, guess where I’m writing♥  We have left Australia again!  We are in a plane about half way on a 13 hour flight between Sydney and Los Angeles on our way to the United States. What is this telling me I ask myself♥  I am feeling both distressed and embarrassed that I haven’t been writing. Distressed – because one of the most exciting experiences at the Kerala Retreat for me was that I created a new habit

New habit

where I was able to write every day. I was so happy about that! Writing is a high priority for me and my goal and intention with the blog was to write every day wherever we are. At this stage doing a daily post takes me about 2 hours and adding another 2 hour task to my already full and busy life since we’ve returned from Kerala hasn’t worked.

And I’m embarrassed I tell myself (or my critic tells me) because I am exposing ‘my short-comings’ publicly – again.

I remind myself one of the TOOLS in our TOOLBOX is that when we try new behaviours we see doing them as Experiments.

And what I have learned from this experiment♥ I have learned that I need to make an appointment and schedule into my diary each day my 2 hours of writing time. And the reality is to do this I will have to cut out doing some other things. And I’m not sure how do-able that is on the upcoming cruise so I will ‘play it by ear’………………

For those of you who don’t know our first destination on this trip is Miami as that is where we board the cruise ship The Norwegian Dawn to go on a 10 day Southern Caribbean Cruise which includes doing the full 5-Day Basic Training with Donna Eden in Energy Medicinewww.innersource.net In fact it is the major reason we are doing the cruise…even though we do love going on cruises!! 

……And that was all the writing that was do-able on the flights. I was too tired or too cramped or I had run out of battery or all 3!……but….

Arriving at Miami Airport!

What an Air Travel Marathon – at long last we arrived!….12 o’clock-am it says over the loud speaker…. WELCOME TO MIAMI the sign says……at the baggage claim waiting, waiting for our cases……Surprise, surprise!…..I actually find somewhere that I can sit…..Not often the case in airports…….Maybe they use some sort of logic that we have been sitting so long in planes that nobody would want to sit down!! I find a corner to perch myself on and pull out a scrap of paper and start writing as I am so tired and so hungry and so sore and so grumpy and soooooooo grumbley and when I’m like that I am not very nice… in fact, NOT nice at all… It’s hard for me to be kind and nice when I am over-tired and grumpy….short and sharp would best describe it…

Writing is good as it engages my frontal lobes…….and if I write about things I start noticing how I am focusing on the negative which is good because then there is less chance that I will dump it all over he-who-is-closest-to-me….that is, my darling Shelton….who really has been so loving and kind and has carried (as he always does) the lion’s share of the luggage – AND don’t forget!! – has been on the same trip as me and has longer legs than me!!

I am going to indulge my grumbley self and let that part of me write about ‘the glamour’ of travel…..I need it right now!….. Our trip, according to Shelton, has taken about 36 hours overall – yikes!! How could we have been so unconscious or stupid or both to have booked such a trip let alone “endured it”♥♥ It’s a verrrrrrrry long haul……. We left Perth on the red-eye at 11.30pm on Tuesday night which took 3.5 hours to Melbourne, then 6 hours in Melbourne airport (thanks so much Zoe for coming to visit and helping us to pass the time), 1 hour to Sydney, 13 hours to Los Angeles, 3.5 hours to Chicago and then 2.5 hours arriving into Miami at 11.30pm!! And then adding in the disembarking and embarking and getting from one end of the various airports to another and going through security and the wait time in between and waiting in countless lines….  Mind you we were very blessed and did get 4 seats across on the Sydney to LA ‘leg’ so we could stretch out across the seats and do some ‘serious’ napping/sleeping even though there was lots of turbulence and was bumpy a lot of the time. Bumpiest flight I can remember from Australia back to LA and we’ve done a couple per year over the last 10 years. United Air as a carrier is soooooooooooo basic after our recent Indian trip using Singapore Air!!

You think we would learn having flown so many times and remember when we book tickets not to take schedules that include such marathon flights/routes…. I was gob-smacked when I looked at our itinerary…..which by the way, I hadn’t checked out until arriving at the check-in counter at Perth airport….. Going from LA to Miami via Chicago is like going from Perth to Melbourne via Cairns!! There is logic in their routes in that each airline has their hubs and Chicago is one of United’s. Grrrrr!!…..Arghhhhh!!

I‘ve so had enough of being cramped with limited ability to stretch my long legs, enough of not being able to sleep properly for the last 36 hours……enough of airline and airport food and having run out of “my healthy food” that I prepared… tired of stupid airport floors – who would design miles of corridors with carpets on them which makes it hard to pull bags on♥ – so many miles walked in airports…… Noticing there is pain in my body…..especially after 2 weeks of not exercising – my groin, my foot…it makes me limp, my pace is slower…I don’t feel as strong…… I have to really intentionally tell myself “I can do it”. I visualize my “I can do it” steps……

It’s now well past 12 o’clock am….still waiting and then the loud buzzer announcing the conveyor belt is starting to move and the cases begin to spit out….it always puzzles me how when a plane lands that people hurry and scurry to get off and quickly walk to the baggage claim where they invariably end up waiting and waiting for the luggage….

I am always amazed at the amount of airports we go in and out of and that we get to the end of our flight and our cases are there for us at the baggage claim!! It’s a miracle all the people looking after us and taking care of things behind the scenes in any industry and I always marvel at this each time we fly……

In fact there is a very naive part of me that still marvels looking at planes how they even ever get off the ground!!…….but we won’t go there now…

Cases collected and the shuttle whisks us the short drive to the Hotel and we get a check–in gift of a giant warm chocolate chip cookie – Doubletree Hotels’ “signature” apparently! Shelton is delighted. His favourite. The room is inviting and comforting….in fact, a great room and hurrah it has a bath so I indulge and have a soak with aromatherapy relaxation and soothing oils for about an hour (which includes having a snooze in it) and finally to bed in a great bed at 2.30am and a great sleep!!!!…..

Questions for you: What do you do when you get grumpy …….or you are tired and overstressed and the negative things feel like they are piling up♥

I do appreciate your indulgence of me grumping and grumbling :O)…. from a now renewed and positive Susie again, with love and gratitude xx