I have had this blog post meandering in my brain for the past week and have neglected to execute it due to how I wanted to go about it. I guess I should start by conveying how much I despair for the youth of today. I’m not even trying to be funny, I truly mean it.

A couple of days ago I logged in to my facebook account and had a message from one of my friends. She asked me to take a little look at the page of a younger mutual friend of whom is 13. Firstly, the facebook age limit is 15+ (in my opinion this is still far too young) the 13 year old’s page was filled with utter filth. The friend and I had been discussing this a little over the past 8 months since this young one opened her account… At first it was a little bit funny to see the kinds of silly status updates – we were laughing at how innocent and dramatic they were. After awhile, with the raising friend count (its around 300+ to date, I bet you only a very small handful of these people does she know in ‘real life’) the status updates became more intense. They were filled with expletives and mild cases of cyber bullying from – I assume, girls that go to her school or girls who go to schools surrounding her own.

The language that they use on her page makes even myself cringe. I think of how I spoke at 13, and believe me, I was no angel – but there are expressions and words that quite frankly, I didn’t even know about at that age. My parents knew where I was at all times, I was not allowed for sleep overs at boys houses, I was forbidden to stay out later than 5pm on a school night (and even then, I wasn’t allowed to leave my cul-de-sac street) and by God, if I ever got caught using those kinds of words, my Dad would have marched me straight to the bathroom and literally washed my mouth out with cake soap … and even worse, solvo, if there was any. I am not even kidding.

This friend boasted the other day about her 16 yr old boyfriend, and sleeping over with him – she talked about where she went for the next day in detail (as in specific locations), among other things. And it makes me wonder, her Mum is someone I know quite well, who is also added to her page as a friend. Has she not seen this? Does she not care?

No, wait… it gets better.

Two days later I logged in to facebook to see she had uploaded some new photos. She’s a pretty girl and looks older than 13, to be sure. However, the photos made me worry. Her bra is exposed from her top and she is doing the very typical “strategic angle pose” which allows the viewers to get a worldly view of her cleavage. Nice. And then another photo, altered slightly with a monochrome filter – although not so much that you can’t see her figure clearly. In this photo her legs are open and she is wearing a tiny pair of shorts.

I could have heaved. She went on to ask a friend that if she was as beautiful as someone had complimented her, why she was not in a relationship (said 16yr old dumped her according to fb) and it made me momentarily sad for her that that is how a thirteen year old girl is to define herself.

Why don’t parents keep a close eye on what their children are doing on the internet? She has so many facebook friends, I for one would be culling that for starters. She would be deleting every single person that she does not know personally (as a mother I’d be culling it to the friends of my daughter or son that I knew personally) I would be setting that profile to private (this is by the way, all hypothetically assuming I got drugged and plied with alcohol and allowed my child under duress to even create a profile to begin with… I’d rather pour gasoline on myself and set myself on friggin’ fire than let a child under 18 parade their lives around online) and I would be privvy to the password and I would be checking in every second day to make sure that it is being used for the right reasons.

I am a facebook user, yes. In fact, I post a lot of private things on it. However, I make great use of the friend lists. I have a list for family and relatives and best friends. I have a list for Michael Jackson fan-friends. I then have a list for acquaintences. I do not allow anyone of whom I do not know see those private things. I do not post smutty photos of myself. I love facebook because it caters to exactly what it should in my life. I use it to keep in touch with the friends I have made through traveling through the past 10 years – and it allows me to keep in contact with my family and the friends that I left behind in Sydney.

It is NOT a substitute for real life friendships. I do not desire to really communicate with my “real life” friends through it – or substitute facebook for communication via phone or face-to-face.

I wonder when parents are going to start doing their jobs. It’s all well and good to think that you can trust your kids, but really, the internet is a big, dangerous place. I find it crazy when I hear / see some of the stuff on there. And really, no one is to blame but the parents.

Gosh…

Wellity, wellity, wellity — I changed my mind. I am not removing my blog. I like my blog and I am not changing url or making it private.

In other news, I am super bummed out because there has been a temporary lapse in sanity with regards to the Michael Jackson This Is It DVD release. It has been officially released around the rest of the world (well, in most countries) and for some reason it will not be released in Australia until the March 03. Where is the sense?! Where is the sanity!? It’s not even a good idea. In saying that, I saw the film 5 times at the cinema (and each time I loved it and appreciated it and cried just a little bit more) so you’d think that I wouldn’t have an issue (considering the fact that the last time I saw it I vowed I’d never watch it again, ‘this really is it.’ I swore…. yeah right!) but… seriously. 2 months later than every other country in the world?

I might end up ordering it from the UK or the U.S. Dumbasses. However, this is a DVD set that looks all pretty and special. There is about 3 different box sets… and no doubt I’ll need to get all of them…. Sigh. The life of a hardcore fan.

I found a different church that I enjoy going to last weekend. It’s in the next suburb (it’s still a Catholic church, don’t be alarmed!) with a lovely priest. I think I’m going to start seeing more of it. I love my local priest to bits, but there is no youthful presence, which this church has… so we’ll see. I also know some of the parishioners.

Life’s panning out quite lovely at the moment

Life is great.

I spent the day with two of my closest friends, shopping, bowling and kicking her husband’s ass at Nintendo Wii (this may be a slight exaggeration, alas, humor me.) and now my arm aches from it.

I wanted to also add that I am changing my blog url, and I don’t plan to make it public anymore. I realized that it comes up in google searches and stuff, so I’d like to keep it private…. so I guess if you’d like the URL leave a comment (and input your real email address, no one else can see it, just me) and I’ll send you an email and Ill allow access to my new blog.

I don’t even know why I’m still sitting here, I am so exhausted. Time for bed, ready for home tomorrow.

You thought that you could get thru at least a page of entries without me writing something about Michael Jackson, didn’t you? Ha.

On the 26th of January it will be 7 months since my idol joined God.  I can hardly believe time has passed by so quickly and swiftly. It’s been a rough time, rougher than I ever thought it would feel. Which, apparently is a surprise to some. One of my closest friends expressed the other day how shocked she was that I was dealing so well. She admitted that she pretty much expected me to curl up and die lol. Considering how badly I took the whole 2005 trial, it’s probably no wonder. In my defense, that was almost 5 years ago and I was a lot more emotionally unstable than I’d like to think that I am now.

I loved MJ so unconditionally for as many years as I can remember. I loved him strangely enough more as a person than as a musician – I took notice of him as a child for his humanitarian efforts. I didn’t even know of his music until I was around 8 years old. And that love for him was only amplified after he spoke some very precious words to me at 18 when I felt as though the sky was falling down around me. He asked me a lot of questions in my life, genuinely curious about everything. I felt pretty directionless in my life and felt as though there was no goal that I could successfully reach. The smallest things, like even finding a good job seemed taxing.

After talking about my life in Australia and some trivial conversation, he took my hand and gave it a little squeeze. And the words that changed my life. It was a moment that I didn’t dare share with too many for fear that it would become meaningless and also for whatever reasons, I was almost ashamed of what he told me – as though it would allow others to see that my weakness was ever-present. But what he told me completely changed my life;

“I believe in you” …

I didn’t know how to respond to it and I felt sad that he obviously saw in me what I didn’t say out loud. I tried not to cry. (Story of my dumb life! lol!) But, no one had ever said those words to me out loud. Especially during that period of discontent in my life, it was so important to hear something like so. He went on to say that if one person believed in you, you were capable of doing anything.

I loved, loved, loved, loved that man. It was a time where I didn’t know Christ. And I didn’t know that Christ believed in me just as much as my beautiful earthly hero did…

I came away from my time with him feeling motivated. He said to a bunch of us on the same day there was nothing in this world that was impossible. And I came away with the knowing, finally that he was right. After that moment, I wanted to always try hard at everything in my life, to be not just ‘good enough’ but great at everything I attempt.

I hoped one day I would have the chance to show him how much he had changed my life.

He was so sweet, sweet to me and sweet to all of my friends who had instances with him. All he ever wanted to do was to help. In whatever way that he could, to whomever he could. I am sure if someone lambasted him over and over and insulted him to his face, he would take it on the chin – and if that person asked for forgiveness and the shirt from his back, I am certain he would have given it.

What a guy. Still so tragic, and so shocking. Sometimes it’s hard to hear his music, even harder to watch him.

Life goes on though… It’s just meant to be this way, not that that’s very comforting and unfair it seems, but at least he isn’t being heckled by the world and being taken for everything he has by the vultures that once surrounded him.

I don’t think I could ever really articulate just why he meant so much without seeming so fanatical, it’s hard to verbalise, but I suppose it’s just one of those things. Everyone has one person in their lives that makes a profound impact upon them – or so I would really hope. It just happened to be, that mine was one of the most remarkable, talented, giving persons that ever lived.

My hero, Michael Jackson.

I am feeling a little bit better since yesterday morning where I woke up with a stabbing pain in my kidney after a barrage of bad dreams, nightmares if you will – that I seem not to remember the finer details of. What evs, man.

I’ve decided (despite my previous entry) that this year is the year of not fearing. Mr. T (the boyf) has convinced me to pursue the writing thing. Maybe I’ll apply for uni at the end of the year and take it on part-time. After doing some paid web design work, I realize that I actually am not really in to it as much as I thought I would be. My patience truly lacks and I doubt my visual creativity. On the other hand, people are kind of demanding to work for since they don’t really understand how time consuming it is to design something.

So… we’ll see.

I got an invite to an Australia Day barbecue on tuesday.

Two holidays that I have always been against are Australia Day and New Years Eve… mostly it’s always a free license for bogans to come out of the woodwork and drink ’til they’re stupid and cause trouble – especially Australia Day… not only is it a free license for the bogans, but it’s also almost like the one day in the year where racism runs rampant. Bogans on beaches sporting Aussie colours and southern cross tattoos (which I think are extremely lame btw… yes I am talking to you if you have one! LAME!) while the chicks are making messes of themselves with mixer drinks and mouthing off to immigrants or naturalised Australians-alike. It’s the same BS every single year.

However, the barbecue is to celebrate two people from church who are becoming naturalised Australians from South Africa on that day and there probably won’t be a lot of drinking and debauchery since all the people attending are from church and probably the local priest as well. Should be nice, but I don’t know what I’m doing yet.

Today is one of those days where I wake up and think of how much easier it would be to pretend that it’s still dark – to bury my head under my pillow and force myself back to sleep. I remember briefly waking up around 9 this morning with a thought that maybe I should trust God and choose to make the day as joyful as possible, but that thought got buried beneath the thick layer of debris and crap and… well, here I am.

Unfortunately it’s nothing that I appropriately care to share with the internet world, but in a nutshell – I find that each day I wake up with new anxieties a new nervousness about situations that are absolutely beyond my control. As is my pattern, when one thing is not going so well, I start to go over the rest of my life with a microscope and focus completely on things that are either in the past or not really worth thinking about.

I have trust issues – really. I can’t even trust God anymore. I feel like from the get-go last year I had never trusted God more in my life. I consecrated every single thing in my life to Him, and slowly by slow each thing of any importance got whittled away from my life, including my Christian friends which I needed more than anybody could have known. Even one of my closest friends betrayed my trust; and I tried to keep in mind the whole time that God would never allow me more than I could handle – but the fact is, is that I wasn’t handling. I couldn’t even get out of bed some days. I functioned like a robot, but the second I was alone I was in pieces. And I prayed so constantly, begged, really, for things to just look up – but nothing did. And still, things are hairy.

I am aware of just how pathetic and whiny and bratty this may sound – because God knows, I just am not that important, but I feel like I trusted God with my life, my entire life – right down to the very last fiber – and I got hurt more than any friend has ever inflicted upon me, worse than any enemy has hurt me.

And when a Christian friend tried to explain it was maybe that God needed to do away with distractions in my life so I could concentrate better on Him, it only made me more furious. A God that would break my heart a thousand times over so I could concentrate more on him… it’s almost laughable – not to mention more hurtful. And then talk of God testing me… I sincerely hope that that is not the case, because I stopped testing my friend’s love for me in primary school after I realized at an early age how childish and unfair it was. If I am being punished, I am stumped because for so long since truly understanding my church and my faith, I dedicated myself so whole-heartedly, and tried my best to just be good, all of the time, even when it wasn’t easy.

As a result this trust problem has created a wedge not just between God and I, but between basically every other single person in my life including my closest friends who I once trusted with every bit of me, right down to family and more recently my boyfriend. I hate feeling this way, it is not a comfortable feeling. It’s a feeling, or an inherent ‘knowing’ that at any time this rug of normalcy, sometimes-happiness is going to be pulled out from underneath me and everything is going to end up once again in shambles. And once again the days will run in to nights, the tears will turn in to headaches that will keep me up til every crazy hour of the morning…

And the paranoid thoughts? lol! Well… who knew that I could take any situation and turn it in to a monster.

I know it will pass, I know my trust will be restored but I don’t blame people for being impatient and even offended by my lack of it. I just wish I could be fast-tracked to a point in my life where everything makes sense again. Right now everything seems up in the air… I want the debris to settle and my heart to feel confident, to have joy in the Lord, joy in my heart and joy in the contentment that I feel with my family, friends and relationship.

Right now I have to go to work fighting a kidney infection, the ability to not cry for the whole shift, and a headache that is threatening to split my head open.

Here are a list of things that are frustrating me.

I’m one of those people that suffers from worrying too much about things that are no longer in my hands. It’s so frustrating because it really makes it more difficult to “let go and let God” …

Speaking of frustrating, I opened the Australian News Paper website today to find that the front headline is not the devastation in Haiti, but it’s actually “Oscar Predictions” … you’ve got to be joking. I find the level of celebrity interest these days to be nauseating. Why are these things deemed so important? There are thousands of people dying, left for dead, unaccounted for, without homes in Haiti and the newspaper is too busy banging on about what dress it is tipped Angelina Jolie may come out with!? For real.

What also frustrates me is when people assume things without understanding the full story. Yes, yes it’s true, I have a boyfriend. This makes me smile. What doesn’t make me smile is when I feel like I have to be apologetic about it. I am a good friend, I know this to be true (in the cases of my close friend, possibly a little flaky in other areas lol) and because of my past experiences with being ‘forgotten’ or ‘left behind’ when my close friends find partners, I have taken extra care not to be that girl. It’s a new experience, to be in a relationship – one that I haven’t really experienced for a long, long time. It’s fun and new and T and I have become that very nauseating couple that I vowed never to be. (Oopsie daisies!) That’s neither here nor there because irrespective of all of those things – I still shouldn’t have to feel bad about it. Obviously my time has to be shared around a little bit more different. T. lives quite a distance from me so we see each other really only on weekends (which were previously spent doing absolutely nothing at home) – and during the week I work – nothing different than usual. Besides my time on the weekends, I’m doing nothing different, but yet T. has still been to blame. I wonder if I had kept our relationship to myself, how much of a difference it would have made to anyone.

If anything since meeting T. I have been coming to the city more often and making much more of a concerted effort to see my friends. Generally, I haven’t wanted to be / felt sociable in quite some time due to circumstances in my life, and T. has helped me make that change – so I have probably seen more of my friends more recently than I have over the past year. Bottom line, stop making me feel bad for not being alone! … Sheesh.

The last frustration that I can think of is how annoying it is when I want to clean my room and it’s 11am and I have my boyfriend coming at 7pm, and someone is sleeping on a fold out bed and won’t get up so that I can sort my mess out!!!! Argh!!!

On the upper my mood is significantly better than it was yesterday, praise the Lord.

I was going to start off this entry by commenting that I hadn’t posted in a fair while… and then I realized what a redundant thing it would be to say — much like this opening.

Life for the past 6 months has not been easy to say the least. The whole terrible year kicked off around February for reasons which I am not willing to really share, and after February every terrible thing that could have happened, happened. Deep in the abyss of a heartbreak, it seemed like every kick was thrown…. And then Michael died, lol, after I was so happy to go to London to see him as a little bit of reprieve from the crap that was going on – seemed like the final straw. Apparently not though, cos when I got back things went from terrible to ‘the worst’ and I cut myself off from everyone, really save for my internet buddies. My friendships with a lot of people changed, ended, and really, I had no motivation to do anything or face life. This included my faith life as well, hence why I forgot/abandonned this journal.

We have a great priest who has helped me understand a few things. I have taken a step back from a lot of my church duties, but slowly and surely, I’m feeling more human again. December wasn’t too terrible. I saw my Dad and family. And in November, I started working a new job at a cafe owned by some friends of mine at church. It helps to be surrounded by Catholics all day long. In fact, I have to leave for work very shortly.

Also, I met a lovely boy a little while ago who gasp, shock horror! I’m feeling very much in love. Though, due to the past year, I’m feeling very on guard – almost like the pin can be pulled at any second. Hence, we’re taking things very, very slow. Probably for the best anyway. Never safe to rush in to things.

I was explaining to my friend the other night about how I feel good faithwise, but I’m celebrating my faith less vocally, and more personally — I think it’s just a phase, but it reminded me of this blog and how it helped me be more vocal about my beliefs and how good it was to just share how I felt faithwise, so I decided to post here again for a little while and see how it goes.

And now I have to run off and find some food and then go to work for a couple hours. God bless anyone who comes across this page!

Hey everyone,

I just wanted to write a very quick update from London. It is 1:30am and I’m having a bit of trouble sleeping. I am hugging my Peter Pan plushie to my tummy thanks to Euro Disney in Paris and am feeling a bit thoughtful.

Tomorrow is my last day of my trip and then I am back to Sydney for five days to catch up with my friends and to see my doctor.

Can you believe it’s been one month and two days since Michael passed? Does the pain lessen? No. Do I feel any less heartbroken? No. Have my tears stopped? No. In fact, i have barred myself from thinking about him too in depth while I’ve been here. I was at dinner last week with a girlfriend in Paris and her friend– both huge fans and I began welling up in front of them both — however it’s been wonderful to be around friends that understand.

In saying that all of my friends have been good to me — fans or not, in fact the only person who was horrible to me about it was a girl from church — funnily enough.

I went back to Brompton oratory yesterday for a solemn mass. It was nice, but I miss my own church. I can’t wait to be back there.

I guess I’ll try to get some sleep cos we are doing a fair bit tomorrow but I wanted to say, God loves us. He loves us so much that we as humans can’t fathom… But it’s true. God will never put something on our plate that is too big for us to chew. And always have hope because without hope we are lost.

When I get home I will upload my photos and stuff to flickr or if anyone wants to add me to facebook they can send an email to divinetreasures83@gmail.com
And I’ll add u. Xxx

Pray for my safe return to Sydney both journeywise and healthwise, amen?

Xxxx

Hey everyone.

I am writing to you from Greenwich, London. This is my 5th day and counting. I still have another few days before I head off to Paris. It has been kinda difficult to be here. The first few days were fine, but the past 3 have been very hard.

Last night we went to a Michael Jackson vigil at the o2 Arena and I just cried, and cried and cried.

I also think I have broken two ribs. I know, I know… trust me. I caught up with this friend of mine that I’ve never met before and when he saw me we were so happy that he hugged me so tight and lifted me up. Know that I’m 4ft 11 and my mate is about 6ft1… as he lifted me we both felt two very, very loud cracks followed by searing pain. And I have been in a lot of pain ever since… It’s bearable. I have no travelers insurance (I am not eligible for it, they laugh me out of their damn broker’s as soon as they read about my prev. medical history lol) so I won’t go to the doctor but from what I am told there is very little that can be done for it anyway except firmly strapping it with bandages and being very careful… which I have been doing thusfar.

Besides that I have some very sore legs… my joints are aching twenty four seven but I am praying it away. Please pray for my healing… I am sure everything is taking a toll on me. I will post some photographs of my trip.

To be honest it hasn’t been all sad… some of it has been nice. It was so good last night because I met with a girl I have been penpals with for more than 10 yrs. We have never met before and haven’t even had much internet interaction its been all by snail mail and I ran in to her by chance…. I am so surprised I recognised her because I have only ever seen a photograph of how she looked at around 17 yrs old and she’s 25 now. It was so great to see her, it made me so happy and she gave me such a huge hug. It was so good to be around people who felt the same grief I have.

My priest sent me an email yesterday morning that made me cry. I emailed him about something very unrelated. A few weeks ago I told him I was coming to see Michael, it was a quick passing mention and he sort of laughed but said MJ puts on a great show (he’s seen an MJ concert before) and I guess he realised since the last time I saw him that I was quite devastated about it… in his email was a huge paragraph (randomly) about how he hoped I wasn’t too devastated and how wonderful he actually thought Michael really was and went in to detail about how he has suffered so much in his life at the ends of greed and viciousness… it was just so nice to hear that from someone like a priest… and he put a few nice words to help me put it all in to perspective. And also? It was wonderful that he was thinking of my heart without making me feel ridiculous about it.

Meanwhile I went to Brompton Oratary for church on Sunday and it was beautiful If you havent seen it… you should look i tup.

I have 7 min left online so I am going to go back to my room and rub deep heat in to my legs… ack…. pray for me!!!

Paris on Friday. Finally!.