My life....

So many things going on around me, sometimes it feels like I'm on a roller coaster....

December is traditionally a month during which I am inclined to goof off, a tendency which I suspect is not peculiar to me alone. Fact is that having survived 11 months of the year, I figure I deserve a little time off to recuperate, prepare body mind and soul for the new year to come.

My year..... was certainly an interesting one, that I confess to. It surely had its moments. The year started off on a positive note. Professionally I was given responsibility for something which I was able to put my heart and soul into, and six months of rather exhaustive effort on my part certainly paid off. On the flip side, my relationship with my colleagues deteriorated significantly. Perhaps my demands too exacting, perhaps my bluntness. End result though, certainly more against me than in my favour.

I consider myself to be a principled individual. And I believe that these are not compromisable. I am exacting when it comes to my responsibilities and expect no less from those around me. Commendable attributes I like to think, but the nett result rather discouraging.

To balance my professional life, my personal life was at a high. The woman I love filled me in many ways, and the fact is that I could not think of anyone else but her to be there, to share my life with.

Come the mid part of the year, the chicken entrails suggested that I needed to divert my energies into something tangible, something constructive. Taking the advice literally I embarked upon building a retreat. Numerous permutations later the final draft was rather different to what I had envisaged, but quite pleasing to my not too discerning eye. The Mangroves was born. The end result has been quite satisfactory, and while much remains to be done; what has been done warms the cockles of my heart.

Around this time I also got to hit the road and travel back to Africa. It's strange that I always think of it as going back, but the fact is that I have developed such an affinity that it always feels good to do so. This time around I think I set a new record of sorts, 11 countries in 40 odd days. Exhausting, but oh so exhilarating too!

This year was also about personal relationships, more so than the last decade has been I think. New friendships were made and old ones re kindled. I consider myself a lucky man, for over the years I have been blessed with the friendship of some exceptional people. I will never find the words to express my gratitude for that but believe me, I am grateful. To each of you, I can only say that I love you. Some of you I have known for years, others have appeared in my heavens just recently. Each one of you knows me for what I am in varying degrees, some more intimately than others, but all of you have touched me.

An unexpected turn of events and, disconcertingly, things at home took a dive. Right now, there seems an uneasy balance of sorts, Perhaps the calm before the storm for I sense that more is to happen.... we shall see. I have come to some rather depressing conclusions though. The first is that a greater proportion of marriages now are shams. Perhaps they start off right,, but then, the demands of life begin to take their toll. It also takes a special kind of person to make things work too.

Oh life's paths...... I don't regret my choices, but you know, since of late, I've been thinking back to a time where I could have taken another path..... and I am wondering where that would have taken me.....