Good to be back

:) It's always nice to feel healthy again, after I've been struck down by my Evil Stomach. I've not blogged for days, because I've really not felt like it. My Day Off on Saturday was ruined by my Evil Stomach. I'm going to get my Evil Stomach sorted out. I believe that I have an ulcer; my doctor is not taking me seriously though. He thinks I have indigestion, and that I should just do a massive burp! Hmmm - if he saw how much pain I'm in with this 'indigestion' he would know that it is an ulcer. I know it is an ulcer, and I am not a doctor, so I don't know why he's not listening to me properly. I get the feeling he thinks I'm being hypochondriacal about it! So, I'm sacking him off and going to see a different doctor. I love my own doctor dearly - he is excellent, usually. But I feel it's time for a second opinion. I don't want to put up with this awful pain any longer.

But there's always a positive side to pain of course, we all know that - that when you come out the other side of it the world looks fresh and beautiful, and you're just glad to be alive! I'm glad to be alive this week, and it's perhaps a blessing that I did have the Evil Stomach at the weekend, because I've been doing good in the mothering sense this week :) I've been lovely to my kids, been patient (mostly, mmm), have spent plenty of time with them, and still have ideas for things to do for the rest of the week. Completely different to the Easter holidays. It's a shame we've only got this week off, and not next week as well. But then, it's not very long until the Summer holidays is it?

What a rambling post this is! Sorry.

What I was thinking about before I was ill, was whether I'm mentally healthy. Yes, that's what I was thinking about. I'm not depressed, I don't mean that. But I noticed that I really spend all of my spare time in non-reality. All of my own-time activities involve going somewhere else in my head. I read fiction and fantasy, about worlds that don't really exist, except in the minds of their authors. I read about the past, about events and people that were real, but that are not real now. I write, about people and places that are not real, that I have to go right into my own head to find. And I watch films - almost always completely made up! Can that be healthy? Anne (of Green Gables) was always getting told off for having her head buried in a book. I don't ever get told off for it - because I'm 33, who would tell me off?! - but am I wasting my time? We've only got one life, and it struck me that I might be squandering it on day dreams. Is it more important to be doing real things? If it is, then what should I be doing? The trouble is, when you've got kids asleep in bed, you have to do your things around the house - so popping off for a quick trapeze lesson in the evening is out, as is nipping up to somewhere more northerly for a glimpse of the Aurora. What I would really like to do, is be Prof. Brian Cox's travelling companion! He's off around the world at the moment, with his film crew, making his next BBC series on The Wonders of the Universe (the last one was The Wonders of the Solar System). To be able to ponder all those questions about our existence for your job ... wow. That would have been wonderful - but alas, I was rubbish at maths and never considered the wonderfulness of science until I was in the middle of drunken arguments on existentialism at uni (you know the kind of arguments all students have at some point, when they're in a philosophical mood? What's at the end of the Universe, what is Nothing, are we alone, do we actually exist, or are we all a figment of something's imagination?).

But let's face it, I'm never going to make the Next Big Scientific Discovery now, am I?! So, what can I do that's important? I want to do something important. I don't want to just amble through life making no difference at all. I know we'll all return to star dust in the end anyway, but while we're here we should be trying to make the world beautiful, I think, so that our souls (if we have them - I don't really believe that we do, but it'd be nice) can look back on the time of this world and think 'wow, that was brilliant'. So, to that end, perhaps I am doing the right things with my spare time - learning to be a writer, to make something that someone will read and will enjoy. Books make people happy, and happy people are beautiful. (Unhappy people are beautiful too - don't want to alienate anyone! I think the whole world's beautiful, even the bad bits have a kind of beauty in them for the simple fact that they exist at all!) And to get good at writing, I think you need to spend a lot of time in your own head. Therefore, I must conclude that although I may not be of sound mind, that I may be mentally unhealthy to exist in a world of non-reality for several hours of my day, this is who I am, and it's fine.