Today is going to be short, sweet and to the point. I have too many socks to sort, and cold weather packing for tomorrow’s flight to Kansas, to ramble on.
I want to know, what’s your personal quality you are the most thankful for? This is an excellent exercise in turning that inner critic around and get it going debating your good points. Heck, you might even get into an argument with yourself! Just one? No ties? Nope – just one quality you think is your best. You’ll watch yourself trying to squeeze two into one. Like a bad song, it’ll return to your thoughts again and again, growing bigger as the day wears on. So this might help: If you could frame it and stick it on the wall, for all the world to see, your crowning achievement, your little darling, what would it be? Patience, positivity, unconditional love, open-mindedness, people skills, maths…? It has to be the very best – the one you like, feel is the strongest in the race, would get your furthest, are the most proud of. Try it and see. It’s not as easy as you’d think to pick just one thing you like about you.
I start off with organised, because that’s what Alan showcased in his wedding speech on why he loved and married me. I was disappointed, not wanting to be a Bree Van Der Kamp, I wanted everyone to picture me with softness around the edges, compulsively giving, or super smart. Organisation always seems a controlling, on-edge, uptight quality. But then I see others’ lives (like my sister packing skills or my husband’s desk) who have zero organisational skills, or maybe they just don’t want to be on top of stuff, but I realise it’s something I very much value.
I am terribly tenacious. I don’t give up. And it’s got me quite far on the path to my goals in life. I recall going to some horrible job interview at the beginning of my career, desperately wanting to be in advertising, but having not attended the Red and Yellow School, South Africa’s premier advertising program. I was up against the best, and all I to show for it was was how badly I wanted it. I felt defeated, flat, torn open after several hours of interrogation, and I slumped back up the road to my beaten- up hand-me-down car I’d parked up the hill away from prying eyes. En route, I passed a little pub that caught my eye because of its name: “Tenacity”. I took it as a sign, and went with that tencity that flowed through my blood thickly and determinedly, and it got me that job and others, before I realised I wanted to be tenacious in something else altogether.
Loyalty, my sister would answer if you asked her for my greatest quality. If I love you, you can do no wrong. To get to the point where I’ll stand up for you, even when you’re on my toes, is a test in tenacity for sure. I don’topen up and trust easily. You have to prove yourself and your own loyalty, but once you wear the badge, I will always look the other way when you’re a slime dog, and don’t deserve it, and against all popular advice.
I am great with creating memories. I know how to throw a party you’ll remember, set up a theme, make people happy. Every moment is an opportunity to celebrate something. I am all for traditions, decorations, tryng new recipes for honourary lunches, cracking open the champagne. And I can get quite excited about the mundane. Movie night turns into a popcorn-fest with cocoa at the end. People say that makes me fun to be around. I know when I am being leant upon to make others happy. And I really don’t mind. It comes from my mother who has the imagination of a writer and the budget of a German’s wife.
But I have to pick one, and it has to be my own choice, so I am going to go with intuition. I have this odd sense of knowing what people are really thinking, if they actually like me and what they’re going to do next. I can see what’s coming. I sense things all the time. It allows me to dream when I am asleep and awake, and make things happen, it keeps me connected on an esoteric level, and allows me daily miracles. Without this, life would be black and white, logical and quite scary, I think. Too uncertain and unknown, I would cling to the edge of the swimming pool like I did for much of my childhood. It would be like an ongoing reality show where the director’s only trying to confuse the audience. A one-dimensional wartime poster. Nope, I’ll take intuition and raise you magic, any day.
