A Slice of Pudding for Breakfast x 2!

 

This morning I got two delightful slices of “pudding” for breakfast! When I arrived at work I had two surprises sitting in my email box.  The first was one from my brother, Jason, who lives in Mauritius with his wife and two beautiful daughters. 

He travels quite a bit to Africa for business and this past week he was back in Kenya again.  There in my inbox I found an email from him, attached were these two pics he took for me on Monday, 26^th March 2012 from the aircraft as he flew over.  There in all her majestic glory is my “mountain” I will be conquering later this year, capped with snow dripping down her slopes like hot icing melting down the side of a warm cake…. There she was, Mount Kilimanjaro standing tall in all her glory.

There she lies far off in the distance, but wait it gets better….

Mount Kilimanjaro, snow-capped and waiting for our arrival….!!!!

– Both photos taken by my brother –

My excitement is now officially just permanently orbiting out there in space; it is no longer coming back down.

Thanks Jase for taking these pics for me. They are amazing and I can just image what it is going to feel like when I am the one sitting in that plane and I get to catch a glimpse of Kilimanjaro for the first time. My heart already begins to beat a bit faster… You just gave me a taste of that, thank you!

My second surprise of the morning was the most beautiful email from a friend who read my blog post yesterday.  Her email enraptures how I dream everyone could celebrate each other and where they are in their respective journeys.  I love how her joy oozes out of her words and makes my eyes water as I smile. Life is about celebrating each other’s journeys and cheering each other on. One of my big dreams is to be a mom too one day and I know that chapter is coming up in the future!  Jess, I love your enthusiasm for my journey, it makes me more excited for where I am going and what I am doing and I love watching you grow in your journey and seeing the love that explodes from deep within you for your daughter.  The precious moments we do get to share together on this journey are worth more than a thousand words could ever say.  Your mail makes me think of Emma and all that she gave me while we journeyed together.  It gladdens me to know that maybe I can give back a little to other, just like she gave me.

Thank you my friend for sharing this with me and in turn for letting me share it with the world.

From: Jessica Martin
Sent: 29 March 2012 22:06
To: Lara Hinrichsen
Subject: FW: [New post] Who You Calling Crazy?

“………… I love the fact that even though we are at different stages in life, that we are able to celebrate each other! I love being a mom, I love the fact that I can wake up with a little girl who makes me laugh, cry, pull out my hair and make me crazy with joy, all within a matter of 10 minutes. I love the fact that even though I would love to have the time to even write down my bucket list, I have not been able to, but that’s ok! I love the fact that I can celebrate with you in making your bucket list something tangible and true! I know that I will achieve things in life, but that I might have to wait for a season to do this. This is your season to shine… this is my season to nurture… different places but both important and valuable! You are a continuous inspiration to me! And when I despair, I look at what you are doing and I think, I can carry on! There ARE people out there who are striving to be better, striving to make the world a better place for themselves and for others.

The slogan for the Waterfront Theatre School where I studied dance and drama (my absolute passion!), was “Higher”, and I will always strive for that in my life…. I believe that you will too!

Keep it up my friend! I know that we are not always able to spend a lot of time together, but the time we do spend is precious….!

Love you babe!”

 

Love you right back girl!!

Here in Cape Town, it’s Friday and the heavens opened up last night and today, and the earth is delighting in showers from heaven. The gardens celebrate and I celebrate every time I get caught out in the rain.  I didn’t do my training walk this morning due to the rain but I got the chance to snuggle up in bed for an extra one and a half hours.  I have almost forgotten what that’s like. How utterly divine it was!

This weekend I am off to Witsand on the East Coast to celebrate the love between two of my very dear friends, Ursula and Johan, as they share their love with their family and friends and we get to watch them say “I do”.  I promise to make up on my missed training by shaking my God-given bootie on the dance floor all night long on Saturday night!

 

“For what it’s worth: it’s never too late to be whoever you want to be.

I hope you live a life you’re proud of,

and if you find that you’re not,

 I hope you have the strength to start all over again.” 

~ F. Scott Fitzgerald.

 

May you all have a wonderful, celebratory weekend in whatever you decide to do this weekend. May it be filled with love, naughtiness in the purest sense, laughter, and special moments. Thank you for sharing my journey and such deep gratitude to you all for supporting me in my journey and for supporting my fundraising efforts in memory of my best friend! She’s dancing on those clouds in the sky today, giving thanks by sending rain!

I celebrate you all!!

Have a great weekend!

 

Who You Calling Crazy?

  

These days I am getting plenty of popping and rolling eyes when people engage in a conversation with me. They look at me with this mad look on their face and then they ask me one of the following questions: (Now make sure you put the emphasis on the italics!)

• Are you crazy?
• Are you feeling ok?
• Are you mad?

The best is when people tell me there is something wrong with me!

That last one usually makes me laugh out aloud. But this all is becoming a pretty standard conversation since I went “live” with my plans to the big wide-world. I laugh when someone asks me that. Me crazy? Haha, no, are you?

So I thought I would dedicate today’s blog to getting some clarity on the crazy situation and break it down into bite size pieces:

Google has this to say on crazy:

1. cra·zy/ˈkrāzē/

Adjective:	Mentally deranged, esp. as manifested in a wild or aggressive way: “Stella went crazy and assaulted a visitor”.
Noun:	A mentally deranged person.
Synonyms:	adjective.  mad – insane – demented – daft – lunatic – nuttynoun.  lunatic

 Nope, definitely not me!

 Google has this to say on mad:

1. mad/mad/

Adjective:	Mentally ill; insane: “he felt as if he were going mad”. (of a person, conduct, or an idea) Extremely foolish or ill-advised: “he had some mad idea”.
Synonyms:	crazy – insane – lunatic – demented – wild – rabid

Nope, that’s not me either! Now if I was planning on summiting Everest I might consider myself slightly foolish, but only slightly!

Google has this to say on insane:

1. in·sane/inˈsān/

Adjective:

In a state of mind that prevents normal perception, behavior, or social interaction; seriously mentally ill. (of an action or quality) Characterized or caused by madness.

Nope, I think I am a pretty well-rounded young lady.  I think I behave pretty well in public (remember my dear friends for every blackmail photo you have of me, I have two of you!) and I do quite well at socially interacting “outside” of Facebook and the likes! So that comfortably rules out insane.

Now www.thefreedictionary.com has this to say about crazy and yay, finally, I actually agree with some of this craziness!

 cra·zy (kr z )

adj. cra·zi·er, cra·zi·est

• 1. Affected with madness; insane.
• 2. Informal Departing from proportion or moderation, especially:
• a. Possessed by enthusiasm or excitement: The crowd at the game went crazy.
• b. Immoderately fond; infatuated: was crazy about boys.
• c. Intensely involved or preoccupied: is crazy about cars and racing.
• d. Foolish or impractical; senseless: a crazy scheme for making quick money.

Well I’m definitely crazy about boys and I am crazy excited and enthusiastic about climbing this mountain! If you have witnessed me buying another item on my “list of things to buy” you would know, I practically jump up and down when I find another pair of thermal -18 degree hiking socks to add to my growing pile of things to pack! Yes, I can almost see you all shaking your heads!  If I could leave today I would. In fact, my climbing partner reminded me on a quick coffee get together we had yesterday after work that we were originally meant to be climbing Kili right now. The reason why we are not currently on Kilimanjaro is because a very dear friend of ours decided it was time to get married on 31 March 2012 and so we decided to postpone our trip and this weekend we will be enjoying wedding celebrations up the East Coast.  Never mind, the mountain is not going anywhere and Ursie, we wouldn’t miss your wedding for the world, not even for Kilimanjaro!

As I’m writing this, one of my colleagues walks past my office and he stops to say “Just remember when you gooi (throw) up that mountain it’s going to make you….” (He points to his head), I wait for the standard crazy mad link. “It’s going to make your blood in your head boil.” I laugh. Well that’s a new way of putting crazy! Now you see what I mean for how this is becoming the norm for every conversation people have with me. I think I need to start carrying a mirror with me for moments like this when the question pops up. As the person asks me I am going to hold that mirror up to them so they can see what they look like as they roll their eyes and make their eyeballs pop out of their head.  It is quite a skill actually, yet they think I am the crazy one?!

Okay to give you all the benefit of the doubt, in truth, maybe when my car rolled f-i-v-e times 3 ½ years ago I knocked my head a bit hard. After all, I did have some memory loss for about six months afterwards so my poor brain did take a bit of a beating as I tumbled inside my car like a washing machine on spin cycle… but I still went on to finish my degree (no brain damage there) AND it was on my bucket list long before that ever happened.  No, if anything that just made me hungrier for life…

 Maybe I should talk to my mom and find out if she ever dropped me on my head as a baby? I don’t think she would have done that somehow, well not on purpose anyway. I bet though, it could have been my brother. Now there’s a real possibility.  We used to beat each other up something terrible as kids. Punching and kicking each other. Maybe this is all his fault (pointing finger towards that island he lives on in the middle of the Indian Ocean).

All I know is that I want to live my life to the fullest and I want to squeeze every little bit of juice out of life. My friend, who is getting married this weekend, loves sucking the marrow out of bones. I don’t get her when she does that to be honest because it is just gross (awful) but I guess I want to do the same with life, I want to suck out all the marrow life has to offer.  I want to do everything that makes my heart race a little faster and I guess if all of this certifies me as crazy, well then so be it, call me crazy!

Crazy for life!

Crazy for adventure!

Crazy for doing something I’ve never done before!

Therefore, having looked at all of the above, I can conclude and confirm, I am 100% of sane body AND mind.

Next time you call me crazy, I’m just going to laugh as usual, lean back in my chair and say “I’m crazy excited!” and laugh even harder as I watch you roll your eyes! Look who’s the crazy one now?!  

Pic: Certificate of Insanity

Sucking the marrow.

One shot at life.

And I ain’t getting any younger.

Living MY best life.