World of Wonder
A world of wonder, shrugging demise

In a space of time, warded off eternity

Taken into moments, crystallising taste

Building worship to one another

We are gods of our own world

Legends in our own mind

Uncontrolled emotion, fusion of deception

Lies and frustrated eroticism

Madness, pure elation

Decided triumphal propensity

Towards a state of being

Suspended animation

In time of war and peace

Making all the rooms in my heart

Fear free, fear full.

Too busy to recognise

Falling into a world of wonder

Shrugging demise.

Copyright ©2006 Jade

Christmas....

Christmas Eve was an adventure of American Football, running home in the snow, eating too much food, and having a walk through the ice covered city with good friends chatting.

Wow the year has truly come to an end..

When i started this blog it was March 06, and here i sit on the Eve of Christmas in a cold, beautiful Denver.. having experienced so much.. when the curtain comes down on anything in life, it causes you to reflect back and look at your accomplishments, failures, joys, disappointments.. but it also causes you to look ahead at a hopeful start.. newness and the anticipation of good things despite how your year has gone.

The biggest question i faced this year was - can i be alone with myself and truly enjoy the company i keep in the empty moments.. and i have come to a very affirmitive answer.. not because it just happened, but because i learnt great lessons in those times, and i got to know myself from the core of who i am. In my moments on aloneness i had stepped out of myself somehow and experienced the stream of life, and when i made really good, close friends, i felt the stream of life...

Two very different streams of experiences with such very different flows.. and i became my own sun-warmed rock in the centre of each stream.. not dependent on anyone, yet interwined in everyone whom i love and who love me.

I have met myself. at 31 years of age, i know who i am, my dreams and goals firmly planted and rooted in my heart.

So as a new year draws in i find myself at the end of a thread of what wants to be written, an expectation of something more.. deeper, higher greater...

and i embrace it.

Merry Christmas and a Happy new Year to all...

My new life in Denver....

Upon my arrival in Denver.. i was met with mild weather, gorgeous views of the mountains, the christmas lights all around the city, the pretty horse-drawn carriages touring the city, and alot of Austrailian friends!

Its been a busy week - i have been sending out my resume, getting to know the city, attempting to drive and learn the new rules in the city, changing all my details and basically moving my whole life to the city!

Goodbye Charlotte.. its been fun...

So then this week i had a job interview, a snow storm and a divine facial.. Everything has shut down as we have waist deep snow.. i am on my way outside to attempt a snowman!!

Denver has grown on me and settled in my heart and as i await for christmas and a new year to bring in another chance at newness... i can only sigh.. what an incredible year.

I am on the brink of enjoying my last two days in Charlotte, not doing much at all, except packing, meeting friends, doing errands and NOW only finding so many things and places that could have come in really handy about a month ago! Murphy's law!

I feel quite excited about my move to Denver, anticipating the snowboarding, skiing, the mountains, the city, the snow, the cold, the cold, the cold.....

So, in this next phase of my journey where my short weekend roadtrips will be taking place in the Rocky mountains, and mostly in the West, i look forward to putting a little more speed into seeing as much as i can and savouring this experience even more.

whoooohaaaaa......

My Celebrity Lookalikes.....

My Art

Woman, Wife, Friend, Sister, Daughter, Colleague, Teacher, Mentor, Poet, Client, Writer, Aunt, Neighbour...

Thinking about all the roles i have filled and currently fill in my life.. makes me think.. i have been one, more or all of the above at various times in my life.

In my constant introspection, i often ask myself at any given time or the whole of the time - have i truly been the very essence of compassion, of duty, of style, of beauty. Was i a symbol of selfless humanity, a standard bearer for the rights of the truly downtrodden, a very normal, yet extraordinary person whose passion transcends nationality. ..

A devoted and loyal friend, a colleague constantly reaching for perfection, someone whose heart is open and transparent. Having conducted my life with strength, dignity, humility, laughter, excellence and passion. Dedicated to justice and love. Steadfast, unwaivering in my convictions and resolve.

Well, i cant really answer my own question.. i can only hope that at the end of my life.. the answer would be yes.. thats my goal, that is what i am striving for....

THANKSGIVING

Nov 23, 2006

This was my first thanksgiving experience in the States.. i never realised what a big deal it was!

Everything is closed on the day even the restaurants, people spend their time with family and friends and everyone is very nice over the Holiday period!

Giving thanks for something is a great way to spend a day.. it reminds us to stop and look at what makes us people. Often life gets so busy that we forget about the things that matter and the people that matter.

Today life matters.. i give thanks for this year, for this experience for this life that i have been richly blessed with.

I give thanks for the many people in my life who love and care about me and whom i so deeply love and care about.

Thank you everyone... for everything!

Denver, Colorado...

After Las Vegas, i spent just over a week in the bustling city of Denver. It's a beautiful trendy little city, with alot of nightlife, trendy up marked bars, lounges and clubs.
Yet for some reason when i returned to Charlotte i felt like i had arrived back home to the safety of the cocoon that i have called home for the past 8 months, and it made me realise a few things about myself that i never really knew before... i love change, flexibility, sponteneity.. but there is a part of me that holds on to the familiar.. a part of me that longs for my hearts' "home" wheever that may be at any given time

I guess one can only do so much travel, only stay in so many hotels before the need for normal and boring and routine set in...

So with that in mind and Denver looking set to become my new home.. i am on a little inward journey to bid farewell to Charlotte... this weird little southern place that taught me a whole new perspective on the American life....

Mother...

Your love follows me

To the Deepest ocean

I believe in the hopes you inspire

The dreans you encourage

A friend, a heart so brave

With Grace and strength

Arms that stretch across the oceans

of time and space
before i was myself..

you made me...

Copywrite: Jade

I went to Las Vegas last week which was a bittersweet experience. I experienced all the lights camera action of Vegas, but also came down with food poisoning which i would not wish upon my worst enemy. Vegas is not for those who are afraid of "seeing it all" and at every turn when you think you have seen it all something else makes your jaw drop!! LOL

I also enjoyed travelling, but these days the delays, the security checks, the turbulance and not to mention the bacteria you contract seems rather a high price to pay! Nevertheless, Las Vegas is like a fantasy land, it really feels as if you have escaped the real world.

I am currently in Denver, the snow starting to fall in this pretty bustling city set between the Rocky Mountains of Colorado and today i started thinking about these 8 months that i have been here in America.

It seems like i have experienced so much, yet if you ask me beside my travel and studies - what i have been doing, its very hard to define. I have had the opportunity to search myself, get in touch with who i am, what i am and what i want from life in these 8 months of "freedom" from the rat race, the "real world" and the stress of everyday routine...

I have spoken in earlier postings about moments of elation, moments of pain, moments of reflection and moments of just being.. and today i was thinking - have i "found" myself in this time that i have had to myself to just live and do whatever it is that i wake up and feel like doing? did i need to be found?

Well i didnt write another novel, i didnt change the world or save a life, i didnt become super rich or attain any superficial goals.. but i have learned how to reach inward and withdraw my life lessons - to truly be who i am.. to wake up everyday and feel that not only do i have a purpose - that i AM the purpose that i was created for.. if that makes sense to you then we see eye to eye.

I have often spent my life wanting to hold the whole world in my heart - but for the first time i really know what my heart is made of. In the simplicity of my circumstance i found the complexity of my dreams and my goals and my ideals.

I have felt my absolute aloneness and my undeniable belonging. We all long for a "home" and to belong to a place.. i set out wanting to know truly how to become intimate to become one with myself, my people, this world.. and the beginning of that was to look inward and see who i truly am and who i was meant to become. My voice in this world, in my circle of friends back home seems to have faded.. the sounds of all the declarations of my sincerest intentions have died and drifted with the wind of time as people "forget" your voice...

Yet i know now that this experience has given to me a pause before my next great exhale - when i breathe into being the next stage of my life...

Until then, i inhale and enjoy this experience that i am ever so grateful for. My life, my now.. America and me are one this day - with this people with whom i was not born, yet find a new identity in.. i will love until the sand of this time here has run out... I am at peace and whole in this moment.

Update..

Well i can drive now, been through the Charlotte heat and humidity, eaten as many pretzels as my stomache can hold, met a few cool friends, have my regular crazy (only in America Type) shows that i tune into every week or so, picked up a few Americanisms, drank as much refill sodas as possible... now what???

Well, i have started my studies and settling down a bit in the sense of a routine and regularity. Its been really great and i never knew how much i have missed being intellectually stimulated. I guess the human brain was not meant to live by fun and sun alone....

I am on the hunt for a job, and since the winter has settled in, it seems a little bit hard to find. Nevertheless, I press on...

Looking back to the beginning of my blog - i sit here and take Reconnaissance of what i set out to achieve from an inward perspective...

Intimacy with myself, with this world, the intimacy that touches the sacred in all that is life. This experience in the USA has been really unspeakably amazing and at the same time extremely challenging to my fundamental comfort zone.

This ache and longing to be greater and larger than my own heart and soul , this longing is the thread that guides me back through the labyrinth of compromises i have made, back to my soul's desires. I was afraid of what those desires would ask of me.. the desire to come here has asked me to sell it all, leave family and friends, comfort and a good life behind me to pursue a dream that i was not sure when realised would be what i expected...

But i realised that if we are not consumed by the transforming fire of our desires, it becomes a day dream.. something we sit and say "one day.. i will".. and yet we never do.. So i take the risks that come with that.

And i must say - It was not and is not easy at all. Wisdom is often born in the shadows of pain and trouble.. and in this we need to be fully absorbed in order to have the WHOLE experience.

Now i stand on the brink of the experience itself ending and "reality" beginning... i ask myself - what now? is this where i want to make a life? do i now want to chase yet another experience or do i just prod along as i currently am??

Something to think about. And yet nothing to meditate on.. but to live everyday with gratitude, with thanksgiving that i have the opportunity to be here, the luxury to choose my life , my dreams and see them realise.

Concepts of beauty...

Embrace me, hold my soul
Echo through me
Take me by the hand
when i a bare
come
help me
climb outside myself
and see the world unlimited
speak unyielding
words creating
life....

Copyright: Jade

30 week update!!! Autumn..

Yeah can you believe i have been living in the USA now for almost 30 weeks?

I keep saying that time flies by - but this is ridiculous!!! LOL

Well i dont have much of an update since i spent the last 6 weeks travelling.. But i am so comfortable here and i feel at home yet still a little foreign (which is nice sometimes).. I now have the task of taking up my studies and finding a job of some sort. I have auch a passion and a love for the English lanuguage (no comments from the critics please!!!)... and i have decided that whatever i study in life will have to involve English.. so you will more of how that goes.

I have now well and truly eaten all the Cinnamon Pretzels i can stomach so i have out myself off it! I now need to search Amercia and find another amazing treat that i can stuff into my thighs!!! :-(

Summer is starting to come to an end although in North Carolina... it feel like it never ends.. its still in the high 80's (thats about 25 - 30 degrees celcius or someting), but thankfully the humidity has simmered down to being bearable. The sun sets early which is always a pity because i miss those long days....

I am not sure what Christmas will be like here - or where i will be but i look forward to it.. Oh Halloween is RELLLY big here - everywhere you go now is themed in preparation for that... stay tuned..

More next time... to the treadmill i go....

Just ME ME ME

My True Voice

I have always had this deep need to be able to express myself in truth and with the authentic voice that lives inside me.

It always seems that life comes at you hard and you lose your ability to speak with that voice.

I spent some time this weekend with a really good friend of mine in Virgnia Beach and i realised that when your heart is covered by those who love you.. your expression will always come out true.

The other night i had a dream that i was in London taking an overland train and i was very distracted and oblivious and confident that i knew which train to take.. i hopped on and sat down in my rush, put my bags down with a sigh of relief and then relaxed. As the train started moving i fell asleep for what felt like a short while and at the first station i woke up and i was in France!! I hit a panic, jumped off the train and in the midst of the busy crazy station decided to pick another one hoping that it would take me back on track.. But alas.. all the route maps were down and i kept on picking the wrong train and ending up further away from where i needed to be..

So this had me thinking... that sometimes in life when you go on a journey you really need to pay attention - be focussed no matter how matter of fact the circumstances maybe - because life as i have come to know it on my 31 years on this earth can be very unpredictable and if you live your days uncircumspectly.. you might just be thrown a major curve ball...

But having said that.. there are always ways and other trains that will take you back on course somehow.. and to me alot of the train directions are my very good friends whom i value and appreciate every day of my life. And the family who sustain me and who are so deeply rooted in me.

So... dont miss your train.. you could be derailed for a while! :-)

In the Shadow

In the shadow of my life
My spirit roams free
Basking in all the dreams
My wonder grows deep
To never be forgotten
The adoration gets steep
Into my bosom of love begotten
In the shadow of my life
An endless rainbow
In the shadow of my life
Oh a shadow, just a shadow
No true reflection
Of the years I took a bow
Of the dreams left unfulfilled
And Roads less traveled
Regrets begotten
Wide eyes marveled.
In the shadow of my life
This is where I stay
Safety, beauty everyday.

Copywrite Jade

After my trip to NYC i went to South Africa.. Home... I have always thought that when i finally do go home i will feel a sense of peace resonating through me because home is always home.. but good as it was, i realised that i dont belong in Africa at this moment in my life.. that life has forged a new path for me albeit short term. And that made me feel really great. The sense of knowing that I am following my dreams and destiny.

Visitng all my friends and family was ofcourse wonderful, nice to see how everyone has changed and even how some people have not changed. Driving in familiar environments and eating the most wonderful food on earth! And yes i can say "earth" because i have travelled alot in my life and tasted alot of good food around the world.. still... no food like at home!

After my very busy trip to SA i stopped over in the UK... i walked so much i think my feet are taking revenge on me now! I walked more in London than i did in NYC! I went to every single church, museum, art gallery, historic sight, shop, flea market, etc etc that London has, had experienced every mode of transport that is available in the entire country and ofcourse spent a FORTUNE on everything!

Seeing my family and friends in London as well was like a homecoming. I have been flying to London every year for the past 11 years and it really feels like an extended home. Except this time i did more touristy things than i normally do. I went to some great restuarants and parks and the weather was just fantastic.

Give me London any day!

New York City


It has been a few weeks since i posted anything due to the fact that i have been away for the past 6 weeks. My first stop was in New York City which i thoroughly enjoyed. It was my first trip up there alone and i did all the touristy things possible. I stayed in a gorgeous apartment on 44th street so getting around everywhere that i wanted to be was quite easy.

One of the things i really love about New York, is the feeling of being so fully alive just because everything around you is so full of life and excitement. But there is just something about the city that awakens your senses, your superficiality just jumps out at you - the urge to shop, walk, look, touch and experience takes over and all the wonder of everything no matter how old everything may be to you or how many times you visit this magnificant city, you never tire of this city that never sleeps - and believe me - that is NO exaggeration!

I went to the MET (The Metropolitan Museum of art) and i had a little tear in my eye because it is something that i have wanted to do for so many years of my life and it was just more than i even expected it to be.

When i am surounded by such amazing art that was obviously created not only with trememdous skill and passion, but with keen vision and creativity.. it makes me feel like stepping out of my own heart and allowing the self that is restrained within this body to become one with everything and take a walk back in time to see what inspired each piece, each brush stroke and each line.

I am such a lover of art in all forms, it just climbs into my soul and the history, literature and poetic beauty of this expression captivates me like nothing else that i am passionate about...

So that was New York City.

Another roadtrip under my proverbial belt. Drove down to Wilmington Beach, North Carolina, what a ball. Nice and relaxed. A beautiful hstoric little beach town. I didnt do much more than walk in the beach sand, going to tourist sites, relaxing and collecting my thoughts and breathing in life..

"Our destiny changes with our thought; we shall become what we wish to become, do what we wish to do, when our habitual thought corresponds with our desire. Orison S. Marden

Random Pics of America:

- South Africans at the Indianapolis Grand Prix - took this picture because i could NOT believe in this day and age these people would have the nerve to sit in public sporting the OLD South African flag! my goodness!

- Me on swing in Charleston

- Atlanta the city

- My apartment and former ride

ATLANTA
Last weekend i spent some time again n Atlanta with a bunch of people, we had loads of fun, experiencing night life, some art, laughter, frustration, pampering and touristy things. The traffic is just manic though - not a city i want to live in for sure.

This week i played my first game of tennis in about 2 years and let me tell you it was no joke - the technique comes back to you with some pratice.. but the fitness level just gives your age and laziness away!

(The pic is me in Venice by the way.. I had no more pics of Atlanta!LOL)

Here are some interesting things about me alot of you dont know:

• I was a Junior tennis player in primary and middle school - had coaching for about 3 years
• I did Gymnastics for 1 year but i left because i couldnt do a dive roll!! Thanks Mr Smith :-)
• I played chess for our school and won the chess championships one year
• I did a hair commerical with my brother
• I did modelling - editorials only, i entered in a few pageants but due to the fact that i am a midget, that didnt work out - me and the Lord are still gonna have some words about that ! LOL
• I danced ballet when i was 5.. but i think was too fat cause i kept on rolling everywhere instead of floating as one tends to have to do!Ok ok i have been told i am a majoy over-sharer.. so thats all you guys get today!
  
  I am off to Wilmington Beach this weekend. Cant wait.
  

Iron Rose

Hello my Soul
In Sweetness i find you
The softness you bring
Fragile, peaceful
smile
Of the worlds of love
A heart been taken, protected
Loved
my Rose

Hello my Soul
In broken pieces
Storms of life
Come crashing dwn
blood strains, brokenness
Broken dreams & mistakes
unspoken, unwritten
where emptiness is fastened
A deep hunger for your affections
My Iron

My beauty, my pain
Me, My roses, my Iron, my life
Have me free..Have me in Chains
my Iron Rose

By Delise Moore

This week i had a job interview that went quite well, i also stood in the long queue to obtain my Social Security.. some useless information.. but information that will make me more American by the day!

Here are some pictures of Charleston, North Carolina.

History...

There is something so subtly powerful and significant about History. If we do not know and understand the facts about where our world, our cultures, our values, traditions, explorations, wars and legacies come from, we are actually living in a bit of ignorance i believe. To assume that history has nothing to do with us personally is very deceiving. I recently visited a beautiful little town called Charleston, filled with remnants of the American Civil War. Just to experience and immerse myself in the History that defines part of a nation was quite an awesome experience.

Historians do not perform heart transplants, improve highway design, or arrest criminals. In a society that quite correctly expects education to serve useful purposes, the functions of history can seem more difficult to define than those of engineering or medicine. History is in fact very useful, actually indispensable, but the products of historical study are less tangible, sometimes less immediate, yet so very crucial to mankind.

After all what else do we leave behind on this earth other than our History? the mark our lives have made on this world and its people?

I am such a lover of History and seeing the greater purposes for which men have fought and died, alot of those privileges we enjoy today by no working of our own, but as a result of someone willing to give up their present "luxuries" in the puruit of a better future for mankind.. and today we call that 'making History"