One of the interesting things about living in the rolling grasslands of Australia is that you have to have fire plans in place in the summer. The heat can get extreme and one careless act or a lightning strike can cause great damage. When we were there this year, the extreme heat had not yet hit the area we were staying, but my daughter and her partner had set up their fire plans for and had everything packed for a quick getaway if needed (it was not).
So we do made sure that our valuables were ready to go. It is interesting trying to decide what valuables you want to take if you only have a short time to leave. It was important to plan because what you leave behind may be destroyed forever. What are important, items which bring back memories like, pictures, souvenirs,important papers (passport, birth certificates, wills, mortgage documents, etc) or material things like clothes, TV’s etc.
After we had taken the time to set up everything by the door, we were able to relax and went off to the lake. Lake Eldon is a beautiful and big lake and we did not have far to go to set up on the beach
It was interesting to me that when we set up we were the only ones at our location. We were close to the road and within about two hours, other people from my daughters’ area came and settled in with us.
We enjoyed a wonderful afternoon swimming, and enjoying the heat of the day while meeting a number of my daughter’s friends and their children. The next day the fire warning had dropped and the extreme heat had move on, so d we could relax and enjoy the summer sun without the extreme heat.
Every country has a different view of practical jokes and pranks. This was made clear when we were in Australia. A couple of young radio personalities made in part of their show to make prank calls as practical jokes to celebrities, politicians, and regular folk. They had an early morning show and it was well loved in Sydney. When the Duchess of Cambridge was hospitalized for severe morning sickness, the presenters made a prank call to the Hospital.
The radio prank, which was pre-recorded and vetted by lawyers from the radio station before it was broadcast, was picked up by media worldwide and was acutely embarrassing for the hospital. One of the results of the prank call was that the London nurse who answered the prank call was found dead after getting tricked in the prank call by the Australian deejays who successfully pried information about mom-to-be Kate Middleton's hospital stay.
The British press went on the attack blaming the presenters for the suicide and wanted the presenters fired or put on trial, the Australian press and the public were more cautious and I would say supportive of the two presenters.
The two hosts, made tearful public apologies on television, have been taken off air, and are receiving counselling. One of the presenters said: “There's not a minute that goes by where we don't think about her family and what they must be going through, and the thought we may have played a part in that is gut–wrenching.
The death was tragic for the family, and friends of the victim as well as for the presenters. The resulting press furore showed the difference in attitude between the two countries about practical jokes and prank phone calls. Prank calls are or have been a staple of some radio stations in Australia for years and are well received by the public and people who get pranked after their initial embarrassment move on with their lives. In England, I suspect that prank calls are not part of the culture and the outcry supports that idea. In Canada, shows like This hour has 22 minutes provide an opportunity to poke fun at our politicians and others. I found the difference in culture interesting and enlightening.
An interesting story from the Guardian.
A palliative nurse has recorded the top five regrets of the dying. There was no mention of more sex or bungee jumps. A palliative nurse who has counselled the dying in their last days has revealed the most common regrets we have at the end of our lives. And among the top, from men in particular, is 'I wish I hadn't worked so hard'.
Bronnie Ware is an Australian nurse who spent several years working in palliative care, caring for patients in the last 12 weeks of their lives. She recorded their dying epiphanies in a blog called Inspiration and Chai, which gathered so much attention that she put her observations into a book called The Top Five Regrets of the Dying.
Ware writes of the phenomenal clarity of vision that people gain at the end of their lives, and how we might learn from their wisdom. "When questioned about any regrets they had or anything they would do differently," she says, "common themes surfaced again and again."
Here are the top five regrets of the dying, as witnessed by Ware:
1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
"This was the most common regret of all. When people realise that their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people had not honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made. Health brings a freedom very few realise, until they no longer have it."
2. I wish I hadn't worked so hard.
"This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children's youth and their partner's companionship. Women also spoke of this regret, but as most were from an older generation, many of the female patients had not been breadwinners. All of the men I nursed deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a work existence."
3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.
"Many people suppressed their feelings in order to keep peace with others. As a result, they settled for a mediocre existence and never became who they were truly capable of becoming. Many developed illnesses relating to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a result."
4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
"Often they would not truly realise the full benefits of old friends until their dying weeks and it was not always possible to track them down. Many had become so caught up in their own lives that they had let golden friendships slip by over the years. There were many deep regrets about not giving friendships the time and effort that they deserved. Everyone misses their friends when they are dying."
5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.
"This is a surprisingly common one. Many did not realise until the end that happiness is a choice. They had stayed stuck in old patterns and habits. The so-called 'comfort' of familiarity overflowed into their emotions, as well as their physical lives. Fear of change had them pretending to others, and to their selves, that they were content, when deep within, they longed to laugh properly and have silliness in their life again."
What's your greatest regret so far, and what will you set out to achieve or change before you die?
SINCE 1966, George E Vaillant, Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard, has followed the lives of several hundred men in the Grant Study. They are now aged around 90. The latest installment in the study is called Triumphs of Experience
The longest study of human development ever undertaken, it began in 1938 to chart the physical and emotional health of more than 200 US men. Vaillant says there is some welcome news – our lives go on evolving in our later years, and often become more fulfilling.
Some are unsurprising. Alcoholism has a devastating effect on family and professional life. If a lifetime of achievement is your goal, then it is better to have had an emotionally supportive childhood than a socially privileged upbringing. Pragmatic and practical men are more likely to be politically conservative, while sensitive and intuitive men lean liberal. Other findings upset conventional wisdom (Republican men are no less altruistic than Democratic men) or proved to be just downright confounding: The longer-lived a man's maternal grandfather, the more likely it is that he will enjoy mental health.
“So out of control does the whole process of ageing often feel that I was relieved when our wealth of data revealed that some aspects of successful ageing – or lack of it – are in fact negotiable,” he writes. The study said recovery from a lousy childhood was possible and memories of a happy childhood were a lifelong source of strength.
Marriage brings more contentment after 70, and ageing after 80 is determined less by heredity than by habits formed before 50. Ageing with grace and vitality depends more on us than on our genes. In addition, what what a man thinks at a late stage of life much depends on how successfully he has come to terms with life's regrets.
Mr. Vaillant concludes that personal development need never stop, no matter how old you are. At an advanced age, though, growth consists more in finding new hues and shades in one's past than in conceiving plans for the future. As the Harvard Study shows with such poignancy, older men treat what lies behind them much as younger men treat what lies ahead. The future is what young men dream about; they ponder the extent to which it is predetermined or open; and they try to shape it. For old men, it is the past they dream about; it is the past whose inevitability or indeterminateness they attempt to measure; and it is the past they try to reshape. For the most regret-free men in the Harvard study, the past is the work of their future.
Sources: http://www.thesenior.com.au/News/The-Senior-News/Seventy-year-study
