2021 – Are we there yet?

Hi there, I know it has been a while and the end of 2020 is almost in sight. Being busy with life, the busyness of life and doing what can be done to avoid COVID has taken priority over writing.

If you have been busy navigating life in the zone, here’s a few things you may have missed about life in the GreyZone, COVID free.

DITY- Men…Doing It to Yourself

Extreme Art Making

Flying in the Sky with Deborah

“Women of my age tend to drink”

Culture in the GreyZone: Do we need to mention Xanadu is 40, Psycho at 60: Hitchcock’s shocking game-changer.

DITY- Men…Doing It to Yourself

In a world’s first study of long-term impacts from ladder falls, researchers from the Queensland University of Technology and Queensland Health, found that ladder falls are one of the most common injuries presented at the emergency department. Injuries could range from the expected broken bones n damaged egos to serious brain trauma and could even result in death.

And it should be no surprise that the researchers found men over the age of 50 made up more than half of ladder-related fall cases. Former music host and guru, Ian Molly Meldrum sustained serious head injuries when he fell from a ladder. Peter Starkie the founding member of the 1970’s chart topping Australian group Skyhooks died age 72, after falling off a ladder in Melbourne.

And you will be shocked to learn that most of these injuries did not occur on worksites. A researcher Dr Rob Eley, at University of Queensland’s faculty of medicine, noted the accidents did not happen where strict occupational health and safety codes are in place, “but in the home”. Eley found that almost all of the injuries that occurred could have been avoided.

“Often, they were the result of inattention – people climbing back up a ladder to fix one last thing or grab a tool; or reaching too far, then falling.”

As Australia’s population ages, and more men enter into retirement age, these types of home improvement injuries are on the rise, Dr Helen Ackland, a researcher at the National Trauma Research Institute found in her research.

“We’ve had 80- and 90-year-olds up ladders … they’re used to doing things at home themselves, so they continue doing it past the age where they probably should be delegating to someone else.” I think I may know someone who fits that description, just this last weeknd three times I had to tell him to get off the ladder.

And the tips from the researchers included that while regulation could help, “How about not falling to begin with?”

Eley notes that alcohol has been a factor in some injuries. “The message that I say to people is be very careful when you’re using a ladder, even more careful of using a ladder with a power tool, and certainly don’t use power tools on a ladder after you’ve been drinking.”

The study from Queensland University of Technology and Queensland Health, was published in the journal Plos One.

Product Safety Australia has launched a national education campaign ‘Ladder safety matters’ to encourage older Australian men to stop and think before they use a ladder. Find out more here.

Extreme Art Making

As long as you are as fit as 60-year-old, Simon Beck, who walks for hours creating amazing snow art. The art works created by just using his feet, walking to precise co-ordinates.

Cartographer Simon Beck has been a snow artist for over a decade, using snow fields the size of sports fields as his canvas, to carve his own epic geometric designs and designs in the untouched powder. The circles and tumbling triangles unfold slowly with each step. The meticulous moves he’s made reveal themselves into the entire design when viewed from above.

Up close I guess he looks like a lost man wandering about, rather than an artist hard at work.

Beck’s design begins with careful planning, mapping out a design on paper using one millimetre as the scale for one step on the ground. A day’s work can be 12 hours of trudging through the snow, where Beck uses his snowshoes, a ski pole, and other tools to get through the long task of walking to realise his design from the sketch. His incredible artwork relies on the co-operation from nature to provide the right conditions and from the nearby skiers to not plough through his creation.

As someone who is spatially challenged, I found the designs brought to life an unbelievable sight to consider they start on a piece of paper, and using only a compass, and by counting paces he produces mathematical and geometric inspired works of art.

Visit Simon Beck to see his amazing designs

Flying in the Sky with Deborah

Entering the grey zone in 2020, was the 40^th anniversary of a land mark high court decision which saw Deborah Lawrie become first female pilot of a major Australian airline.

Lawrie became a pioneer for women’s rights after taking Ansett all the way to the High Court in 1980 to protest against its decision to deny her the right to fly because of her gender.

It was her tenacity and determination to become a commercial pilot that has made Deborah Lawrie a trail blazer in 1980.

While some smaller regional airlines had female pilots, no major Australian airline had ever employed a woman pilot and it required years of rejections and a battle in the Sex Discrimination Commission before Ansett finally took her on.

In an interview with the ABC she said “(Reg) Ansett ran the company and he was very anti-women. His main reason was that he considered they wouldn’t be safe,”

Indeed, in previous cases it was argued that her earrings could be a safety hazard if they got caught on the side of the aircraft in the event of an emergency evacuation.

Deborah Lawrie set numerous milestones in 2020, including being inaugurated into the Australian aviation industry’s Hall of Fame, marking 50 years of flying and being the World’s oldest female commercial pilot still flying for a major commercial airline. Well into the grey zone, at 66 Lawrie was an A320Training Captain for Tiger Airways until Tiger became a victim of the COVID shutdown.

“Women of my age tend to drink”

The Australian National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) has released new guidelines to reduce health risks from drinking alcohol.

Perhaps coincidentally released in the year of a pandemic where there was a rise in consumption at home and just in time for the season to be jolly, the new guidelines replace the 2009 version. This revision recommended a reduction in both the daily and weekly intake.

Research from 2019 for Edith Cowan University may provide an insight in attitudes to alcohol as we move towards a return to normal. In conjunction with Danish researchers, the investigation into drinking behaviour as a social construct found alcohol use to be “a deeply gendered behaviour.”

Research found that older women may drink as an assertion of control that takes precedence over the health impacts of booze. While some women reported reducing their drinking due to health concerns, others neutralised alcohol‐related health risks through compensatory behaviours including exercise.

A quote from one of the participants into their attitudes to drinking stated “Women of my age tend to drink”.

That’s a good enough reason for me, it sure replaces “if you lived with my husband/partner- you would drink too!”

Culture in the GreyZone

It was 20 years ago 50 years ago today…

By the time Paul McCartney sued his fellow Beatles, and their parent company Apple Corp, in London’s High Court of Justice on December 31, 1970 to dissolve the icoic band, their relationship had already gone south.

The attempts to recreate the magic of their early years through the White Album, Abbey Road and Let it Be had come to nothing, except containing some of their most enduring songs.

Their music and influence remain embedded in the fabric of pop culture. This year of 2020 marks the passage of time from this tumultuous period of Beatles history, when several milestones themselves are worthy of being acknowledged in the grey zone.

The Beatles broke up 50 years ago, officially in December 1970 but in practice the magic had ended in April 1970;
50 years have passed since John Lennon’s solo album was released in December to the UK and US markets.
It is 40 years since Lennon’s murder on December 8, 1980
In 2020, John Lennon would have turned 80.

Do we need to mention Xanadu is 40?

Being an Australian, I must mark the passing of Xanadu, the movie, into the grey zone. The movie which turned 40, starred our iconic Olivia Newton-John fresh from her breakthrough in Grease. The 1980 movie, must have seemed like a good idea/career move at the time but was a messy attempt to combine a classic musical with the roller-disco craze.

The movie was such a flop that Universal cancelled press screenings of Xanadu, it was alleged to have co-inspired the Golden Raspberry Awards, which are given for “failure in cinematic achievements,” and Variety called it “a stupendously bad film whose only salvage is the music”; the musical spawning 5 hits:

“Magic” Olivia Newton-John
“Xanadu” Olivia Newton-John/ELO
“All Over the World” – Electric Light Orchestra (No. 13 Pop, No. 45 AC)
“I’m Alive” – Electric Light Orchestra (No. 16 Pop, No. 48 AC, certified gold)
“Suddenly” – Olivia Newton-John/Cliff Richard

Psycho at 60: Hitchcock’s shocking game-changer

Psycho was unleashed on unsuspecting cinema goers in 1960 by the master film maker- Alfred Hitchcock. Hitchcock was himself 61 at the time, was well into the Grey Zone. He was innovating with how the audience followed the action through the predatory and salacious gaze of Norman Bates.

He made a new rule that’s now commonplace in cinemas. In those days, people entered a theatre whenever they wanted, even if it was long after the movie’s starting time, and would stick around to see what they had missed.

Hitchcock didn’t want late-comers wondering where Janet Leigh was, so dictated that no one would be seated after the film started. The film’s newspaper ads pleaded with the audience to play along, saying, “Please do not give away the ending. It’s the only one we have!”

Knowing absolutely nothing about the movie going in, audiences were left unprepared for the combined shock of losing the main character and having it happen in the most traumatic way possible, the music a mind-bending crescendo of screeching violins, violas, and cellos with the sickening schik-schik of a knife penetrating skin.

But it’s not a slasher movie – Hitchcock’s genius lies in what he doesn’t show. At no point do we see the knife actually “slash” or penetrate the skin, yet still it makes audiences flinch.

Hitchcock’s deal on “Psycho” was also a game – changer. The unprecedented deal was in exchange for his autonomy at Paramount, he deferred a salary, instead receiving 60% of the negative ownership, the gamble earning Hitchcock roughly $40m in today’s money.

Till next time

I trust this post pleasantly distracted you from the every day. Thanks for reading and best wishes for your safe journies through the grey zone, till we meet again next time.

December 18, 2020 0

Life in the Grey Zone

While we’ve been masking, isolating and sanitising our way to dodge around the virus that has targeted us in the grey zone, there have been many other good and interesting events happening in the world.

Here’s a few of the notable happenings in the grey zone that you may have missed over the last few months.

Tea drinkers unite and live longer.

“The black tea drinkers are getting older,” the head of Unilever recently told investors, “They are consuming less,” he said and will soon “start to fall over”.

According to Unilever cups of tea are falling out of vogue with young people. As a result, the firm is struggling to grow its black tea brands in western markets like the UK and the US.

Unilever’s chief financial officer, Graeme Pitkethly, said that although young people do drink tea, it tends to be “quite high-end, expensive products”. Pitkethly was quoted as saying “I drink five or six cups of builder’s tea a day, but unfortunately we are dying at a faster rate than generation Z and millennials are consuming it.”

The consumer goods giant has said that Generation Z and millennial consumers much prefer herbal teas and coffees instead. Over the last two years, demand for black tea has fallen while demand has risen for herbal and cold tea infusions.

Researchers reported young people’s tastes have changed with black teas being seen as too strong, needing sugar or honey to sweeten the tea in turn losing out to herbal teas which were more appealing with floral aromas and they are perceived as healthier.

A legitimate reason perhaps; unlike theories of the rise of Instagram which means that beverages need to make a big impact so that people want to take a photo of their Starbucks Frappe topped with cream.

Like any seasoned tea drinker firmly in the greyzone, the health benefits of tea are easy to find. Researchers at the University of California and Brown University found tea improved eyesight; those who drank at least one cup were 74 per cent less likely to develop glaucoma. Totally practical and appropriate reason to savour a good cuppa.

Leave me comment to let me know if you like a nice cup of tea and how you like your tea.

Grey hair- it’s not because I’m old!

Scientists at Harvard University have shown how stress can speed up the greying process. Biologists found that stress causes nerves involved in the fight-or-flight response to pump out a hormone which wipes out the stem cells used to make hair pigments.

Stress can be considered a form of accelerated ageing. The discovery has raised hopes for treatments that can slow down or even halt normal age-related greying. A breakthrough if you don’t find greying hair appealing!

Perhaps another reason to slow down, de-stress and perhaps forego or delay children who are surely the largest contributor to premature aging.

It’s time to destress – now where’s that nice cup of black tea?

Making news in the zone

Class is always in style

Dame Judi Dench has become British Vogue’s oldest cover star, securing her first front page for the style magazine at the age of 85.

Dench began her acting career in 1959 on television. Over a 60-plus year career she earned her national treasure status, playing roles such as M in the James Bond franchise and as Queen Elizabeth in Shakespeare in Love, for which she won an Oscar in 1999, aged 64.

Commenting on the couture she wore for the photo shoot, she says, of one outfit. “The cloak I was made to wear! Like five foxes fucking on my back!” she said. “A battered, mangy old cat… A great big orange bruiser. What’s that about?”

Who knew gardening was an extreme sport?

Brian May has complained of “relentless pain” after he was taken to hospital following a gardening injury that tore muscles in his buttocks.

Writing on Instagram, the Queen guitarist said: “I managed to rip my gluteus maximus to shreds in a moment of overenthusiastic gardening. So suddenly I find myself in a hospital getting scanned to find out exactly how much I’ve actually damaged myself. Turns out I did a thorough job and I won’t be able to walk for a while or sleep, without a lot of assistance, because the pain is relentless.”

One tough hood.

George Hood, a 62-year-old former US Marine, broke the world planking record with a time of 8hr 15min 15sec, adding an extra 14 minutes to the previous record. Hood had lost his 1hr 20 sec record in 2016 to Mao Weidong, a police officer from China, who set a new record with a time of 8hr 1min.

Eight hours is a long time spent with your face hovering 20cm away from the floor of a gym. Hood reportedly trained for up to seven hours a day to set the new record.

Planking performed by a grey veteran is a safe and healthy core body exercise. Not a dangerous death inducing activity, brought to infamy by young Instagramers who planked to fame at cliff edges in search of the perfect photo opportunity.

Playing on

Playing football as a professional had remained a distant dream for Eez Eldin Bahder for decades. At the age of 75, he registered with the Egyptian Football Association as its oldest player yet. The father of four and grandfather of six, started playing football in the streets of Cairo at the age of six. Though he carried on playing as an amateur, he abandoned his dream of becoming a professional striker pursuing his work as a civil engineer.

October 6, a club which plays in Egypt’s third division had signed the 75-year-old Bahder who scored a penalty on his debut to secure a 1-1 draw. The grandfather needs to play just 90 more minutes for his team to be officially recognised by the Guinness Book of World Records. Should he play the second match he will beat the current holder Isaak Hayik, who played keeper for Israel’s Ironi Or Yehuda, aged 73.

Culture Zone.

This year, 2020, marks an era when cultural icons of our younger years moved into the grey zone.

Mad Max. The low-budget film of a dystopian future was released in Australia in 1979 but this year celebrated the 40th anniversary of its US release where Australian accents were dubbed with American accents and the title changed to the Road Warrior.
MASH the movie. While eclipsed by the TV series which ended in 1983, the original movie turned 50 this year. The movie starring Elliott Gould, Donald Sutherland and Sally Kellerman is still recognised in the top 100 comedy films of all time as judged by the BBC. I do prefer the TV version with Alan Alda, Wayne Rogers and Loretta Swit.
Friday the 13th: The maligned slasher movie which evolved into a franchise well into the 2000’s, this year turned 40. A hockey mask would never again be seen as a piece of innocent safety equipment.
The Female Eunuch. Germaine Greer’s feminist masterpiece 40 years on, came to be regarded as a funny, angry, clever and hopeful attempt to change women’s lives.
Let it Be. The single and the album were released in 1970. The song gave the Beatles their seventh consecutive year charting a number 1 hit, sharing the all-time record, at the time, with Elvis Presley. The album marked the final Beatles album, recorded as the fab four before they disintegrated and moved into their solo careers.

Hopefully this provided a welcome break from the virus targetting the greyzone.

So…till next time.

June 8, 2020 0

Stuck in a nowhere zone

Too sick to live, too well to die.

And so my frail, fragile father lays on his hospital bed as his organs shutdown. Stuck in a greyzone waiting for nature to take its course – as the nurse put it.

My heart breaks to see him like this. We’ve had the meaningful chats. Now it’s time to try and somehow distract ourselves from the inevitable.

Whenever inevitability decides to come.

Twice rescued and bought extra time. Extra time well used till now.

Family have gathered, friends have visited. Memories replayed, all the unsaid things now said. A final drink or two, the ‘pre-wake party’ Dad called it. He always did like to be present for a drink and a chat.

The long slow painful years of decline have disappeared into the rear vision mirror, and now before us all is a new reality Like an animal stuck in the head lights – life and death are frozen in front of us all.

I think he resents the decisions I made telling the doctors to go ahead with treatment. Yet he did want to find out if there was a miracle cure, a way out.

There wasn’t and here we are in the greyzone, lost and not sure where to go; trapped in each day trying to make the best of each opportunity. My sister’s coaxing him for another walk to the cafe, I chat about the football team; if only he could stay for them to win another championship he would be an immortal- a championship is galaxy light years away.

Perhaps the arrival of the great-grand child will come forward and his inevitability will be delayed so they will coincide? They are now rushing towards each other; will their timing be right to meet?

We’ve had the extended time but he’s had enough.

Still yet this zone, this extra time, is a privilege. We’ve shared and said all the things we wanted to say, held each other, shared a drink, shed a few tears, had a few laughs.

I’m sad and yet unlike other stories we’ve had the privilege, the wonderful opportunity to be here together. Joined moments to remember our shared history.

He has had, we’ve all had, the opportunity to prepare. Unlike so many others, an opportunity he didn’t have for his son who was suddenly gone.

But now I wish I could lead Dad out of this zone.

July 1, 2019 0

The value of experience?

“It’s good to see a few grey heads here.” I smiled at them.

The wind swooshed up and over the escarpment, rocking the gliders as they were prepared for us.

They chuckled, “why do you say that?”

“It means you’ve jumped off and landed a few times! You’re experienced”

A little apprehensive, the last thing we wanted was a young kamikaze pilot intent on showing us a few of their fancy tricks more than a hundred metres in the air.

Hitched into my harness and clipped into the glider, I needed to fold my 6 foot frame into position under the glider canopy and lay flat out to check the settings.

I regained my feet, somewhat ungainly.

“It’s ok, we know it’s not as easy to get up as it used to be.” Trevy, my pilot, laughed.

Last instructions on what to do, he re-assured me to follow him and it would be fine.

“Hold my harness, here and here – just follow me, don’t fight it, I’ll steer us around.”

We inched towards the dirt patch at the edge of the jump off point, the wind slammed up and over the hill trying to lift us off before we were ready. Chris and Dan, the only one without a head of grey but who had a few wrinkles instead, gripped the edges of the glider. The chilly wind swept over my face, the material shook, the rattle made it a little hard to hear. Trevy waited for the right wind, as the frame shook hard, he coached me 1, 2 steps and we were in the air – “lock your legs into the strap- it’s more comfortable.” He shouted over the wind, reminding me of the procedure.

Swooping and hovering over the trees and beach below, it was magic.

Trevy was busy reading the wind and checking for other gliders, he talked through his pilot’s mental check list, till we settled into a comfortable rhythm.

We yelled a conversation about work, moving and our families, as we swept back over the escarpment, turned and ran with the wind stream up the coast. Over the water, we glimpsed breeching whales and swept back to climb again. The wind was freezing, our noses running freely. Circling below, Carol was out gliding with Dan. Thirty minutes passed in a flash and it was time to land, gently like landing on a pillow.

What an experience!

Carol and I sat in a café, to finally regain some warmth. The flight provoked a conversation about experience. Here we’d put ourselves in some else’s hands – experienced hands. People we’d never met, we just trusted them. Carol said she’d felt better that there was no young daredevil but still she had quizzed Dan – how many times had he flown -many he re-assured her.

Here was a situation where we left ourselves to people we’d only just met, our lives in their hands. We were reliant on their experience to launch and land safely – the ultimate KPI. “Must safely land 100% of the times you take off.”

It turned our thoughts to the feeling we’d both been experiencing. We’d felt undervalued in our work. Our experience seemed to mean little. Hard won experience was simply untapped.

For us, it was the realisation that until you have experience and seen situations many times, it’s hard to define – perhaps that was the problem. It was the little and big things of knowing what to look for and where the traps lay.

Like when Trevy and I hit a small shudder in the air. Trevy pointed out that it was the turbulence off Dan’s wing. “On a still day that could be a big problem, you needed to keep your distance.”

Why was there the reluctance we mused? Had we approached the situations the wrong way; after all, no-one wants to hear “I told you so”? But that’s never been our motivation.

Perhaps others needed to prove themselves, was it their insecurities? We shouldn’t take the shunning personally.

Conscious not to be perceived as being stuck in our ways we don’t say – “we’ve tried that it didn’t work!” We had both sat back and in our own ways, let it all swim around us. Letting annoyance build to varying degrees.

Instead of sitting back to avoid stirring turbulence, we resolved that we’d prove our experience was valuable. Otherwise it was doing ourselves and our work a disservice.

We know we’ve both been here before. We needed to rely on our experience and take the time to explain our opinion.

We were not being difficult or stuck in a position but like Trevy and Dan we’d need to use our experience to work out how to get lift off, read the winds and manage the turbulence. All the while reassuring ourselves and others our hard-won experience were worth something, to avoid the traps and safely glide into a landing for us all.

November 4, 2017 0

The countdown is on…..

The rip hit me. Another rip of tape. Wrapped around the box, the slap on cardboard to fix the packing tape in place.

The countdown is winding down to day zero. One room is empty and in a few days the second room will be vacated. Another step into adulthood for our other son. Slowly he’s been helping us acclimatise by splitting time at home and his Fiancé’s home. She’s been doing the same with her family. Some days we’re again a family of 4, albeit a different 4 and sometimes there’s just the 2 of us, home alone.

It’s been on the horizon for some time but now it’s squarely in our sights. This is a new and exciting phase for us as a couple. It’s also sure to be a shock which may take some time for us to fully adjust and become comfortable. We’ve been trying to find the balance of helping but not intruding. He’s an adult now, though we’ve been adult for a bit longer, that is we have some experiences which may or may not be helpful.

This is the quieter son, the ultimate quiet achiever who we were once worried wouldn’t get out of his own way to achieve his potential. While the communication in the house is usually subdued it will now almost certainly be like a submarine on a secret mission. Days will pass into long periods of radio silence. Sometimes we know too much about Mr Noisey’s chaotic life and we’re suddenly drawn into the vortex of chaos. Unlike the noisy one, we’re not going to receive the daily phone call from Mr Quiet Achiever.

This change. Maybe it’s not in terms of good or bad, just different. We’ll find out soon enough.

We’ve also been attempting to re-balance our lives. We’ve had a period of stability and comfort in routine. Perhaps the secret is to not get too comfortable.

Still those nights when there’s only the 2 of us are just days away. Could we have done more to prepare ourselves? We’ve always been a close family and now that closeness has been physically dragged apart to leave just the 2 of us closer than ever, if we’ve prepared correctly.

We’ve been talking about it. We’ve agreed we need to keep rebuilding our general interests. This means keeping up with the news (but not too much – it gets depressing), reading widely, finding new podcasts we can discuss and share. Seeing our friends more regularly. A neglect we’ve all been guilty of. We’ve all relegated our friendships behind family demands and now it’s like a new awakening.

The two of us need to find new things which challenge and educate, little simple things we can look forward to sharing and to talking about. Succumbing to the daily grind alarms us, we’ve been there. We need to be on alert to guard against the never ending groundhog day syndrome.

The longer term options, the dreams they are back on the table and now we can concentrate on those instead of the children. We’re looking forward to the house being ours. We can do whatever, wherever, whenever; As we leave it is how it will be when we get home. Already it’s starting to feel empty

Three things we’ll just need to adjust to life as a couple.

Each evening it will be only “how was your day?”, “did you see/hear/read?” For one other person to respond. Could be a quick conversation. How to make sure it doesn’t end up a mono-syllable followed by silence?
The IT & home entertainment helpdesk function will need to be via phone rather than in person, or hello Mr Google.
Where will the younger perspective on life come from? We don’t want to end up old and out of touch.

It’s all exciting, a little scary and a little sad. The walls full of family photos will be nice reminders, it’s not like we’ll never see them again.

We need to find the challenges to keep growing and to find our way through this transition period. Let’s see how we make our way to the empty nest on the other side of the grey zone.

July 17, 2017 0

Zooming in the grey zone

Doing things in the grey zone rather than as a family of dad, mum and children, was a new experience for us today; Opening up the first of new possibilities.

A day of jet skiing would normally be something planned a few days in advance: Check the weather, check the wind conditions, invite out some friends and their children. Whomever can make it, make it.

The day before, lunch is prepared, the car is packed with beach games, the large shade tent (our taj mahal), beach chairs, wave board and the towing biscuit. That had been the way for a few years now.

Today we woke up, and decided to go for a jetski. Just us, while the weather is good and before our life at the end of summer is again consumed by normality. No prep, no organisation and no children; they’re both busy working today. A quick check of the weather forecast , throw a few things together; A change of clothes, towels, life jackets, swimming costumes , some water and we’re on our way.

Launch and setup is now all one activity done in 30 minutes rather than drop off the family, unload the car and carry it all down to the beach ready for setup, while later I then drive to boat ramp to launch. This all takes over an hour till we’re ready to start the fun.

We zoomed around on the bay earlier than usual. The water glass like smooth and the weather gorgeous, we rode just as a couple taking turns at the controls.

It was great conditions for towing a waterboard or kids on a tube, just that today there was no-one to tow! Ironically while we usually would have crammed in as many rides as possible before the wind lifted and chopped up the water making towing uncomfortable today the smooth conditions lasted till lunch. I watched another ski tow a tube backwards and forwards until the weather chopped up the water when we packed everything back into the ski and shot off back to the ramp to leave.

While we would have liked the boys to have been with us to share this, it was a taste of the upcoming life in the grey zone.

We’ll need to convince our friends, now also free of children to join us at the bay. The children have been the the centre of our collective universes, the gravitational pull that held the group of friends together, so now it’s time to re-group and re-establish our relationships without children, as another experience in the grey zone unfolds.

January 31, 2016 0

Why the Grey Zone?

What if you suddenly awoke, looked in the mirror and realised you had transitioned from a place of certainty and structure to somewhere where the edges and boundaries you had known in your life now, blur with uncertainty? This is, life is now more grey than black and white?

When 60 is the new 40 and 50 the new 30, surely 40 is the new 20. Is this a threat or does it present opportunity?

The age and dates are no longer definitive boundaries setting expectations of how people dress, behave, relate and dream.

This is about living through the grey zone and sharing practical experiences and thoughts. Events, once given labels, like a mid-life crisis (usually a negative), or the transition period (moving from something concrete to something less concrete). Life is now not so black and white, so I prefer living in the Grey Zone.

Why? It’s a great place to live, there are so many possibilities……

January 8, 2016 0