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Dalene
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Country: New Zealand
Birthday: 3/28/1966
Gender: Female
Interests: These days it is mostly about my children. The little bits left are spent online.
Expertise: To be an expert one would presume to know it and have no need to continue learning. I don't think I am an expert of anything.
Message: message me
Website: visit my website
Member Since:
12/20/2000
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| Never say never
Didn't think I would ever do it, but I crumbled under the pressure. I'm moving to a new spot in Xanga Burbs.
If you like to keep reading me, let me know and I'll tell you where I am. If you couldn't be bothered with it all, I'm bound to run in to you again sooner or later. Until then, happy blogging. | | |
| Currently Reading: The Secret History
Ooookay, so maybe Iraq destroyed their WMD long before the war, and maybe they were never a threat to the US ever, and maybe just maybe this was not a legitimate war after all. Oops!! But hey, at least we know the US is definetely safe now, well that is unless those nasty WMD are now hiding in Syria or Iran or Pakistan. Or maybe they have even found their way into France! | | |
| Currently Reading: The Secret History
And while it takes courage to achieve greatness, it takes more courage to find fulfillment in being ordinary. For the joys that last have little relationship to achievement, to standing one step higher on the victory platform. What is the adventure in being ordinary? It is daring to love just for the pleasure of giving it away. It is venturing to give new life and to nurture it to maturity. It is working hard for the pure joy of being tired at the end of the day. It is caring and sharing and giving and loving… Marilyn Thomsen
I didn't always want to be a stay-at-home-mother. In fact at some stage of my life I could think of nothing worse. That was probably before pregnancy, but even after my son was born I thought we could do fine with me working.
But the older he got the more I realised that I did not want to be the kind of parent that spent more time away than with him. New Zealand was my break, because I could never have done it in South Africa. It's only been two years, but I have not regretted my decision for one single moment. In fact I'm still very thankful that this is something I could do.
I love being home with my children, but that does not make me super mom at all. I'm not the kind of mother that spend most of my day on the floor building puzzles and legos, but I am here. And I have now came to believe that the idea of quality time is more important than quantity time, was a weak feminist selling line. My kids need quantity time, lots of it. They thrive on me being here when they need me. They don't need me to play with them all the time, but they do want me to be available when they need me. I believe they will always need me. Once they're teenagers they might not want to talk to me all the time, but they will still need me to be there. I remember being angry when I was a teenager and I got home one day ater school andmy Mum was not there. I needed her to be home.
Does that mean I have no life? That I have sacrificed my life for my children?
I spend 90% of my time in my children's company, but my life is not consumed by them. I spend a lot of time in my head. While they are busy building legos at my feet I am busy changing the world in my head. I'm bemused by parents that go to work because they weren't stimulated at home. I don't need to be stimulated, I arrange my own stimulation.
I read a lot, I'm always researching some kind of topic (thank goodness for a son with an atypical developmental path), I do a lot of volunteer work and now I have added a few hours of paid work.
I think even though a lot of good came out of the feminist movement, they loaded a new load of baggage on women of our generation. We have been brainwashed to believe that life is not fullfilling unless you have a high flying career with a huge pay cheque and the latest technology as symbols of your success. Some days I think about my ideas on parenting and I wonder how a leftie like me, can have such conservative beliefs on parenting. Seriously though, I don't think my parenting beliefs have a conservative rooting, rather a new age one, where I and other like minded people, realise that our children are more important than careers.
That to me is the true beauty of feminism. It gave me a choice that I would not have had fifty years ago. I might not bring home a huge pay cheque, and I may not get a promotion, and I'm certainly not getting a big bonus at Christmas, but I'm still doing everything I've done when I worked. I chair meetings, I make decisions, I motivate people, I engineer change. Sometimes I look at myself in the middle of the Playcentre meeting and I giggle at how very efficient we run our business as if the world is dependant on it. Who cares if it is big business or community work, I'm getting my power kicks
and I'm having a great time, while I'm still available for my kids.
That does not mean being home is a rosy fairytale. I do get frustrated with my kids some time and I yell or are grumpy at them, but if we add all the hours we spend together, the grumpy ones are insignificant. Some days I really miss the silence and wish I could escape just for an hour or two to hear no one and see no one and I do when my dearly beloved walks through the door. One of these days I'm going to splurge and buy myself a walkman or earplugs. (Earplugs might be the more likely purchase on our limited budget). I hate housework and would love to be able to afford a cleaner and who knows, maybe one day I will. Every now and then I am struck by a panick attack about our finances, but when I imagine myself at 80 and looking back onto my life, I know without a doubt that I have made the right choice. | | |
| If there is light in the soul, there will be beauty in the person. If there is beauty in the person, there will be harmony in the house. If there is harmony in the house, there will be order in the nation. If there is order in the nation, there will be peace in the world.
Chinese Proverb
I've been living in New Zealand for two years now and I am proud to be part of this nation. It is a good feeling. It is a foreign feeling. I found it impossible in the past to feel proud of a nation stained with racism, prejudice and crime. I'm sure the Kiwis are not flawless - there is the very suspicious relationship of Kiwi men with their sheep - but there are a lot to be proud of.
They are a nation with exceptional vision. They signed the Treaty of Waitangi while the rest of the world was very busy oppressing others. They were the first in the world to grant women the vote. That counts a lot in my book.
They are a nation of doers. If they want something done, they do it, they don't sit around waiting for someone to come around to do it for them.
They are a moral nation and they stick to it, even in the face of severe international pressure.
They are a passionate nation, and do not hesitate to show their passion. I remember in 1981 when they protested the Springboks playing in New Zealand. Their passion annoyed me then. Now I can admire them for it.
They are a nation that care about their environment.
The are a talented nation talented on the Arts and Culture level. Lords of the ring tells it all.
They are a nation that nurture their own indigenous culture.
They are a thinking nation.
They are a nation that value life more than money. They often choose life - whether it is family, sport, outdoors - to making money.
They are a down to earth nation. They always seem genuinely surprised when someone complimented the country. | | |
| Personally, I prefer our twisted brand of freedom than the tyranny imposed (on especially the women) in any of the countries that are predominately Muslim. I get bemused at why people support free reign for obvious murderous monsters.
I am not sure what Crackpot meant with the above comment, but I presume she assumed that since I do not support the Bush administration, I support the Baath Government.
That is not true. I support neither.
I feel passionate about my rights of free thought and free decision. I want to be able to think freely, discuss freely and choose freely, without a government indoctrinating or bullying me to think differently.
Personally I agree. The Baath government has committed some horrific crimes. Some of the people in certain Islamic countries are living under horrible tyranny. But my problem is who gets to decide what is wrong and what is right. Who gets to decide what is acceptable and what is not?
Right now it is the United States and for one reason only. They have the most powerful military in the world. The United States have decided that the Iraq should be governed by a new government and if the United Nations wouldn't overthrow the government, they would do so. Let's for one moment lay all our cynical thoughts to rest, and trust that the United States declared war on Iraq on the most moral reasons, that it had nothing to do with oil or power or anger, that their only mission was to free the Iraqis, then my question is still, free to whose standards? What right did they have to make such a decision?
With the war in Iraq the United States has set a new precedent. A country has the right to declare war and overthrow a regime. This scares the life out of me. Not too long ago I lived in a country that was governed by a regime. I imagine my country was bombed because the government didn't want to listen to reason.
Those of us that live in the Western Worlds, seem to do well in capitalist consumerist society. But what right do we have to insist that the Middle East should adopt our values or lack thereof.
I think the United States and the rest of the world is wrong to impose their ideas of democracy on the Middle East. I am not trying to say that they should not have a democracy, but I am saying that if they want a democracy they should have the right to find their own to one. The very act of imposing a democracy is an ambiguous action.
So what do we do with the Tyrants of the world? There is never going to be an easy answer to this question, but I do believe declaring war on everyone that threatens our view of freedom and humanity and democracy is a very dangerous position. The change of an oppressive regime should be one that is facilitated by a world body representing all the countries in the world. Change should not be forced by one or two or three powerful countries through a massive and destructive war.
In the end it appears that the United States attacked Iraq for no other reason than to overthrow the Baath government. The Bush administration tried to link Iraq to 11 September, they scared everyone with their threats of Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction, they intimidated everyone with Iraq's support of terrorism, but in the end the reason for the war seems to have been to free the Iraqi people. That kind of power is terrifying in my view. We can not allow such devastating decisions purely because one country is far more powerful than any other country in the world.
The United States didn't listen to the rest of the world. They went ahead against a lot of opposition and destroyed Iraq. They should at the very least now listen to the Iraqi people and let them select their own government. | | |
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