Q is for Quotes

A couple of months ago I was browsing through a store and saw this adorable little notebook with teacups on the cover. Said notebook became the home of my collection of quotes – from books, movies, songs, people. I think the quotes I collect say a lot about me as a person, and for this particular post, I thought I’d share a few of my absolute favourites.

“I want to be the best version of myself for anyone who is going to someday walk into my life and need someone to love them beyond reason.” ~ Jennifer Elisabeth

“I always start writing with a clean piece of paper and a dirty mind.” ~ Patrick Dennis

“Follow the three R’s: Respect for self, Respect for others, Responsibility for all your actions.” ~ Dalai Lama

“A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.” ~ Herm Albright

“No one has ever drowned in his own sweat.” ~ Ann Landers

“A kiss is a lovely trick designed by nature to stop speech when words become superfluous.” ~ Ingrid Bergman

“Rudeness is the weak person’s imitation of strength.”

“I melt. And am not of stronger earth than others.” ~ Coriolanus

“I sometimes have a queer feeling with regard to you. Especially when you are near me as now; it is as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly and inextricably knotted to a similar string situated in a corresponding quarter of your little frame: and if that boisterous channel and two hundred miles or so of land some broad between us, I am afraid that cord of communion will be snapt, and I’ve a nervous notion I should take to bleeding inwardly.” ~ Jane Eyre

“You have witchcraft in your lips, Kate. There is more eloquence in a sugar touch of them, than in the tongues of the French council; and they should sooner persuade Harry of England than a general petition of monarchs.” ~ Henry V

P is for Pilates

November last year I discovered Pilates. I had a very different view as to what this form of exercise was about – I still had images of Julie and Kirsten of the OC, bored California housewives looking for something to do.

And then I met Naz, our trainer, who made me do Pilates in a dress for the first time (I was with my sister that evening, and just went along to observe). The next week, I officially joined.

Naz makes Hitler look like a Backstreet Boy. The hour we spend with her every Tuesday is split into twenty minutes of very high impact aerobics, thirty five minutes of Pilates and five minutes of stretching. We don’t perspire in her class. We sweat like pigs.

I like doing physical things but I hate gym (too boring and monotonous and solitary). And this has been a blessing. We are a small class of about seven ladies, so Naz can focus on each of us. The other ladies are all very cool, and are great at motivating one another.

In addition to being able to see the physical changes on my body, I am sleeping better, have less tension knots in my neck, and have been able to avoid going on meds to help with depression (endorphins are AH-mazing).

I’ve also started a class at school with my kids, incorporating some of the stuff I learn in my own class (trying to pay it forward).

So, get up and go and find a form of exercise that works for you and that you can stick with.

O is for Originality

In 2013, I enrolled into a Journalism class. Two nights a week for four and a half months and copious amounts of writing (I actually miss having writing deadlines, and this challenge has been good for me).

Our first writing assignment was labelled “Originality” and we had to answer fifteen questions about ourselves, so that our lecturer could get to know us better (we were a class of seven people, so this was possible for her to achieve).

The last instruction was for us to tell her some things that we have very strong feelings about. I read through this assignment this evening and although it is now two years later, the following still stand:

“I believe that wisdom does not always come with age. I believe that every major problem we face in the world today is a result of greed, intolerance and lack of accountability. I believe that there can be no love between a man and a woman before marriage. I believe that the breakdown of society is directly linked to the breakdown of families. I believe in speaking and hearing the truth – even if it is bitter. I believe a smile is the best form of charity.”

N is for Nerd Girls

I would like to dedicate this post to the women in my life, the ones I have met recently and the ones I have known almost forever – my best friend, A, my sisters, my mother and my new friends I’ve made via Twitter (Z, K, Deb, Holly, Red, etc.).

This is us, ladies.

I am not going to sit here and spew some unrealistic crap about how looks do not factor into what makes a person hot, because it does.

I will say that tastes vary and attractiveness is subjective (and therefore cannot be STANDARDIZED, LABELLED or STEREOTYPED), and so everyone will have their own idea of what they find hot.

But. Intelligence is ALWAYS sexy. In my own experience, limited though it may be, most men fear intelligence in women. A clever girl will see through all of your bullshit.

But she will also be able to recognise your insecurities, and when this cleverness is coupled with kindness (which you will find it often is) she will never use them against you, she will never play on them – she will work to bring out the best in you, and if you are equally smart, it will lead to her to giving you the best of herself.

So guys, once you overcome your fear, break out of your Paris-Hilton-esque mind-set and are brave enough to venture into our world, you will find us nerd girls surprisingly sexy and romantic. 

M is for Madrassah

The word "madrassah" is an Arabic word that literally translates as "school". For a Muslim, it refers to the Islamic equivalent of Sunday School, where young Muslim children go to learn about their religious history, to learn of the practical applications of Islam (prayer, fasting, charity, pilgrimage) and to read Arabic (thereby enabling them to read the Qur'an).

Of all of my mother's children, I was the child most resistant to this stage of my life. Yes, I went. I learnt how to read Arabic, and I learnt how to pray and fast, but I did not enjoy the experience, and my religious duties were for a very long time a chore to me. We were always warned of the punishment that we would receive if we did not follow our Creator's laws correctly.

At the age of 23, I got to perform my obligatory pilgrimage. It was the most difficult, but the most profoundly beautiful experience of my life, but it also made me realise how poor my basic knowledge of my religion was. A year later, I left my job and enrolled at an institution that offered religious studies for adults. I stayed at this institution for three years and my experience with madrassah this time around was completely different to my experience as a child. I was not only reminded of the correct manner of the various forms of worship, I also learnt why they were important and how they developed over time. I got to know my Creator better and my love for Him and my religion grew.

I didn't enjoy madrassah as a child because my teachers did not instil a love for Islam in me.

I still do not follow my religion perfectly. No one can because we are human, and therefore imperfect. 

But whatever I do now I do happily and willingly, from a place of understanding and love.

L is for Letters

During the eleventh grade at high school, a group of my girlfriends and I received a naughty letter as a joke from a group of our male friends. This became a competition to see who could scandalize the other more…and ultimately led me to my first boyfriend experience.

Said boyfriend and I were together for thirteen months. During that time, he used to write me letters when he was in English (he had an arse-numbingly boring teacher) which he used to slip to me during intervals (we were not in the same class).

I kept these in a special box, which still smelled like him four years after we broke up.

I love receiving letters – not email (although I don’t mind these when they’re personalised messages instead of chain mail) but hand-written ones. There is just something about it – the smell and texture of the paper, the handwriting of the writer, colours and types of ink…these things can tell you so much about the writer, and what they think of the person they're writing to.

Mostly though, I love them, because a hand-written letter says to me that someone finds me worthy of their time and effort.

K is for Keats

I was flipping through the movie channels one afternoon and came across a movie called “Bright Star”. For those of you who do not know (like me), Bright Star is the title of a poem written by John Keats. I happened upon this movie somewhere towards the end, but I do know that it documents his life and, more importantly, his relationship with Fanny Brawne, the inspiration for Bright Star.

We read some of his poems at school (Ode to a Nightingale and Ode on a Grecian Urn comes to mind here) but beyond that, I have no other knowledge of him. But the character of Keats was so beautifully portrayed by Ben Whishaw (I mean, I was completely convinced of his love for Fanny, despite the fact that Mr Whishaw is not attracted to girls) and it led me to do a little bit of research on the poet.

I was amazed to discover that he studied medicine and had received his apothecary’s licence, which allowed him to practice as an apothecary, surgeon and physician. He left the medical field because it interfered with his writing (brave chap) and composed a number of poems and wrote many letters.

Unsurprisingly, I am more drawn to his letters, than his poems. “They glitter with humour and critical intelligence. Born of an ‘unself-conscious stream of consciousness,’ they are impulsive, full of awareness of his own nature and his weak spots.” The romantic that I am is naturally drawn to the letters he wrote to Fanny. Reading them showed me how powerful words can be and inspired courage in me, who, as a fledgling writer, is extremely self-conscious and afraid still to display her weak spots.

Sadly, he did not linger long in this world. But for me, John Keats is the perfect embodiment of the following words from Virginia Woolf:

“Every secret of a writer’s soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind, is written large in his works.”

J is for Jane Eyre

Over the last five years or so, I’ve fallen in love with the classics. Not all, as I am struggling with Thomas Hardy, but among my favourites are Shakespeare, Austen and recently Orczy (thank you again, Holly, for introducing me to the Baroness).

I tend to favour romances, and as a rule, only read stories with happy endings (real life is hard enough and I unapologetically prefer my entertainment to be as far from reality as possible). It is for this reason that Austen is a particular favourite of mine.

However, Austen’s heroines are too perfect. I like stories which depict women as equally strong and vulnerable, and equally virtuous and flawed, and Anne Elliot is the only Austen heroine, in my opinion, who portrays this beautifully, which is probably why Persuasion is my favourite Austen novel.

My absolute favourite classic story though, is Jane Eyre. Those who know me well might find this surprising, as the story has a very dark element, as is indicative of the Brontë sisters. I’ve read Jane Eyre quite a few times, and in addition to the story, the language always surprises me. I know language changes and evolves with time, but I wouldn’t mind at all to be wooed in the way Rochester woos Jane. Some of my favourite scenes include the part where Jane leaves to visit to her sick aunt and Rochester’s happiness at her return to Thornfield Hall.

My favourite line from the novel comes from Rochester, when he tells Jane, “I have a strange feeling with regard to you. As if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly knotted to a similar string in you. And if you were to leave I’m afraid that cord of communion would snap. And I have a notion that I’d take to bleeding inwardly. As for you, you would forget me.” In all of my reading, I have yet to come across a more beautiful way of saying, “I am in love with you”.

As regards the actual story, a few things come to mind, which gives me hope as regards life and romance…

The heroine is a teacher, and makes a significant difference in the life of her student; Jane does not compromise her principles or dignity for the sake of a man; Rochester falls for Jane’s mind, heart and spirit, not for her arse; Jane is tested in many ways, but never takes the easy way out; the plain Jane, not the princess, gets the guy in the end.

Of all the tales I’ve read in my life, this one will remain one of my all-time favourites, for imparting the simple wisdom that life may not be a fairy-tale, but it is quite possible to experience fairy-tale moments and fairy-tale endings.

I is for Introspection

Plato asked, “…why should we not calmly and patiently review our own thoughts, and thoroughly examine and see what these appearances in us really are?”

Two years ago, I would have laughed uproariously at the above question and said that Plato = NATO (No Action, Talk Only). All my life, I have been a doer. The bare minimum thought before taking action. Always the one who had no patience for talking or thinking (in excess, I mean), and no patience for people who basically live in their heads, and not enough in the real world.

However, Plato has a point, and circumstance and people have steered me towards a path where I had to sit and examine my conscious thoughts and the motivations behind my actions.

It is human nature to readily be critical of others, but to turn that critical eye on oneself…it is one of the most difficult and uncomfortable experiences one will ever have to deal with.

I still believe that it is dangerous to permanently reside in your head. A tree does not become a piece of furniture because the carpenter wished it so – he had to get off his ass and convert the tree into timber, and fashion the timber into a table, or chair, or book shelf. Action is imperative when you want to progress.

But action without thought, can be infinitely more dangerous (I was the poster child for this), and it is up to us to be able to strike a productive balance between the two.

H is for Hiddleston

This challenge would be incomplete if I did not find a way to talk about Tom Hiddleston. Sigh. Where do I begin? Or rather…instead of going on and on and on about his perfection (which I most definitely can do), perhaps I could talk share two positive ways my actual life has been impacted due to this person and the madness that is the Hiddleston Fandom.

Unexpected Friends: My favoured means of social media is Twitter. If I’m having a particularly bad day, I can simply open my timeline and my mood is instantly lifted. It is there that I officially became part of this fandom, which consists of millions, all ages, all shapes, sizes and colours, spread all over the globe. I must thank you, Tom, for the new friends I have made through you. I have yet to meet any of them in person, and I sincerely hope that I will get the chance to, because they have been a comfort and solace through a particularly difficult period. Together with Tom, they have re-introduced me to Shakespeare, expanded my reading repertoire, encouraged me to try new things and celebrated my successes with me.

Embracing the woman: For as long as I can consciously remember my life, I have been a tomboy. I was a little girl who played with toy guns instead of dolls, played sports, preferred jeans and dirt to dresses and make-up. Even when I hit my teens and twenties, getting me to dress up or even just presentably was a chore. Grooming was not my thing. But then I became part of this crazy world and became kind of infatuated with this man. As I watched his interaction with his female co-stars, or just females in general, I became more and more aware of myself as a woman. I want to be someone’s Peggy Bell, Kate, Virgilia, Eve…

I take a little more pride in my appearance these days and I embrace what makes me woman. 

Who knows? Someday Tom and I may run into each other (the world is such a small place these days)…and I want to make him turn around and look again.