It’s been a shocker of a couple of years, hasn’t it? Not just for me, but for everyone. People have been trying to make ends meet, or keeping a business going, and at the same time facing a pandemic and government restrictions. From home-schooling the children, to wearing masks and facing mental issues through loneliness and stress from lock-down, it has been a change of lifestyle so foreign to all of us, that it has broken many people.

Unable, often, to visit loved ones, and seeing elderly family members facing the horror of the Coronavirus and the indignity of ventilators and maybe even death. All these difficulties have not helped at all.

So, try and remember to keep yourself and those around you well. Try and find the time to smell the roses, keep busy and diversify your interests.

If you are interested in any of the books or paintings featured in my blog, please follow the links below, or Direct Message me. Thank you.

Here is a gorgeous painting by Mykey, that has the marvellous message to slow down and do just that.

The story it inspired follows.

Perspective on the world.

“For goodness sake, Daniel, will you hurry up!”

Danny sighed and tried to keep up with his father’s long strides. But it was difficult. He couldn’t take his time and actually look at the world around him. At the speed his father travelled, everything was a blur.

Suddenly in the concrete pathway, he saw a smudge of colour. He stopped and bent his head to look. A fragile flower was struggling to exist in a crack in the pavement, but it was definitely surviving. Danny smiled and was about to smell the bloom when his Dad turned around, grabbed his hand and yanked him along towards the city building towering in front of them.

Danny blinked. He was just a little scared. Seeing a doctor when you never had to before, was a huge step to take for a small child of four. He stood and waited at the lift, clutching his father’s hand tightly. The doors opened they both walked in.

The jolt of the elevator starting caused Danny’s stomach to flutter with nerves. He hoped he didn’t upset everyone and be sick.

But the feeling passed and before long they were sitting in a waiting room, with several other people. Danny sat, swinging his legs, until his father hissed at him to stop. Then the lady at the counter told them to come into another room.

Danny was overwhelmed by it all. There were machines whirring and all sorts of charts up on the walls. A man came in and shone a bright light into his eyes. A nurse made him tilt his head, and dropped in a liquid into his eyes that made them sting.

Then they waited.

That visit was one of many in the next few years. An operation or two and many more examinations followed, until finally he had spectacles placed on his nose.

The joy of seeing that trees in the distance had leaves (he never knew that before) and the ability to see everything that others took for granted was amazing. To be able to stop and touch and smell the flowers around his home, created a life that Danny felt made all those traumatic visits to doctors over the years, so worthwhile.

When he was able, he thanked his father, but insisted, now that he could see so much better, he would always take time to appreciate the beauty around him.

***

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