Compassionate...

... for Knots in the String.

A 80+ year old friend was injured in a farm accident last week, falling two metres backward and down onto a stony, dry creek bed, and my husband and I were called to help. When we saw the situation, knowing the injured man and what he is normally like, my husband’s and my hearts beat a little harder and faster.

Some might know that my husband had a very bad farm accident some years ago and the event was the catalyst for me to write the fiction novel, Passage.

I was quite honest in the Author’s Notes, saying that the novel was indeed influenced by that time. Last week, both of us relived the pain and the seconds and hours of that awful day when the ambulance pulled into our own farm and paramedics assessed my husband’s injuries.

He had 14 rib breaks, front and back, a broken collarbone, extensive bruising, a damaged neck (better damaged than broken), a huge hip haemotoma that required surgery, and a palsied diaphragm which has never repaired. He was lucky. He lived to tell the tale, albeit with some PTSD.

So with understanding, my husband sat at this man’s head with the green whistle, holding it for him and speaking in a calm voice – Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out – until the ambos had stabilised him. I sat at our friend’s side, holding the wadding between the rocks and his upper side to lever him away from pressure on any broken bones. Once he was strapped to the slide, it took seven of us to manoeuvre it up the rock and dirt creek wall to the waiting ambulance.

We spent time this week thinking of him (fractured scapula, stitches in his arm and deep bruising), and for my husband at least (perhaps me too), regaining a sense of composure. My other half was so caring, so strong, and I felt he was the complete embodiment of compassion at a time when his own accident was flashing painfully before his eyes.

With my current fascination with Japanese words and philosophies, I found the word Omoiyari, which is commonly translated to empathy for others and which leads to thoughtful action. That was the embodiment of my husband as he helped out, last weekend.

A couple of days later, I saw an Instagram post from an acquaintance in respect of a dear little 7 year old boy who had sadly succumbed to leukaemia. There was to be a memorial service and I immediately contacted the poster, asking if she would like hearts for the service. Yes please, she replied, and so I contacted two of my heartist friends (Debra and Judy) at www.1000hearts.com.au and between us, we hope to make 100+ hearts in 7 days, in the little warrior’s favourite colour – green. In addition, we’ll supply as many blue hearts as we can stitch by the end of March for a leukaemia fund raiser.

When I contacted my stitchy friends, I hoped they would agree to help me because I knew I simply couldn’t accomplish what was required without assistance. I should have known that their empathy and compassion was alive and well, and I’m filled with gratitude.

Of course, I’ve seen lack of compassion over the last week as well. It’s grubby. But that’s not a story for here…

Doing:

Nothing changes. Gardens, dogs, writing, cooking, foraging. A swimming challenge across a channel where the ebb tide was rocketing. At the end of the swim, I sat with my head in my hands, gasping for air – I felt like a jellyfish when I stood up. There’s no way I would have attempted that swim without my 6’2’’ son coming behind me, as I suspect I might have washed out to sea. Exhilarating to accomplish but…

Later in the week, husband and self boated over to Maria Island on satin seas, remarkably different to that channel swim, but it’s a stunning picture story for another day. The beauty of the place remains constant, the only thing that changed were my shoes.

#Sebago no longer make my favourite shoe-style and finding comfort for troubled hoofs has been disastrous. Last week, I found some shoes that fitted comfortably and suited the coastal life. I purchased three pairs because I’ve learned from experience. The marketplace is fickle so when you find the bees’ knees in fit and comfort, try to grab multiples - jeans, shoes, t-shirts, lipstick. Even your dog’s treats!

Ballet. We learn new things, we’re moving ever forward. We’re now more familiar with the French terms – we concentrate and are ribbed gently by our teacher for serious faces as we do exercises once, twice, three times – trying to create a muscle memory. Afterward, I go to the garden or a deserted beach and have a little go, all on my own. Writer Jilly Cooper obviously has other views: “I'm bored stiff by ballet. I can't bear those muscular white legs like unbaked plaited loaves, and I get quite hysterical every time one of the women sticks out her leg at right angles, and the man suddenly grabs it and walks round in a circle as though he were opening a tin.” Jilly Cooper.

Boo sucks to Cooper! Not an artistic or creative bone in her body, despite her huge backlist of writing!

Watching:

Endeavour. I suspect a period of mourning when it’s done. We’re at Series 6…

The Great Pottery Throwdown. LOVE this show. Keith’s tears, the creativity. The raw talent. I want a raku-fired Japanese tea set…

Reading:

In bed at night, I barely manage a couple of pages of either Macallister’s Ballet Confidential or Cooper’s Tackle. Polar-opposite books, that’s for sure. Cooper’s book frankly lacks the spark of her early Rutshire novels and you would all know that I say that with a heavy heart as I’ve been a Cooper fan for many years. I’ll finish it and place it in my Cooper collection, but not with any great glee.

Listening:

The Lost Bookshop. I like it and then I don’t. Ups and downs. But if one is willing to keep the threads together and not tangle them, it’s a good book. There are times when I’ve wanted to shake all the protagonists hard. Is that a good thing?

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Now for the bonus prize! I’d like to highly recommend Everyone Else is Taken. Knowing those of you who kindly subscribe to my posts, I think you will enjoy this. Sue is new to Substack (but not new to me) and I have a feeling she will fly!

And so I think back to our farming friend as his body mends. He’s in pain and will be for some time. But think how many others are out there, in pain of one sort or another - mental, physical, it makes no difference. Wherever we live, there are those who suffer - we know we are fortunate. If we place ourselves in their position, just a quick mental juxtaposition, it doesn’t take a moment to realise how we would want to be treated. Compassion sows its seed and grows. It’s that easy.

But then knowing you all, I daresay I’m preaching to the converted anyway. (Image from 1000hearts.com.au)

Music today? Oh my gosh - can’t go past this!