What gives us the idea that we are somehow special and that we will probably become something amazing/accomplish something great?

Does everyone feel that way, I wonder?  Are some people happy to just be?  Happy to fill their niche and do their part in an unassuming way, content with home and work and what they have become?  Or does everyone have this expectation that they are going to stand out among the crowd?  And what about the crowd?  You need a crowd for someone to stand out of it.  Is everyone in the crowd happy to be the crowd?  Are some of those who think they should be, or are going to stand out, really meant to?

What if you are meant to be 'one of the crowd' and you have a misguided notion that you should be standing out?  It may sound somber, but I think it is valid.  I realize I have always - from my not-so-great childhood already- thought that I am very special and that I will stand out from the crowd.  Is it a way for a child to reach up into its potential?  I remember when I was about 13 hearing a talk on the radio on how hard it is for a person to rise just one level above the level they were born into and how much energy and effort it takes to rise above your circumstances.  I also remember deciding that no matter what it takes I will rise above my circumstances.

We were poor, my mom a single mom, my Dad who left us when I was 5 had passed away a year before and there I was, deciding that I will never be average.  I am something special and I will be known.  Visible.  My life will be meaningful in more areas than just domestic or local.  It sounds fine, but really, what if everyone feel that way?  Who is going to be the crowd?  It is obviously rather relative - we cant all be Nelson Mandela or Robert de Niro.  Perhaps we can comfort ourselves with a lot of philosophy and pondering the meaning of life and how 'every effort is worthwhile no matter how insignificant.'  But that simply doesnt answer my question right now and it doesnt still the longing to rise.

That brings me to the next question - those people who rose above the crowd - really rose above - did they want to?  Did they decide to?  Did they also feel somehow that they are special?  Did they expect to rise and be famous or significant?  Was it conscious effort?  Did they suspect that their life is somehow great or are they really special and automatically rose above the crowd, because unlike those who think they are, they truly are: special.

And then here is the big question:  What is the price of rising above the crowd?  Is it worth it?  For those who work hard at it and accomplish it by effort, exertion and striving AND for those who are so amazing that they quietly and effortlessly rise above the crowd - is the price not too high?  I have noticed that in many cases true greatness come from a very broken and disturbed place.  There often is a big imbalance and disturbingly burdened soul, or at best a dysfunctional human, behind many of the masters of greatness, whether it is in the arts or politics.  I suspect even among the ranks of altruism, there are difficult people behind some of the greatest endeavours.

Final question:  What about me?  (if anyone replies to this blog with "you ARE special Meleney" I shall scream and probably vomit myself to sleep tonight!! It is not what this is about.  I am really simply making this matter personal.  Who gave me the right to decide I am going to be one of those who rise above the crowd?  Did I decide that myself?  Did I set myself up for a lot heartache, hard work and strife?  Am I willing to stop striving?  The thought makes me shudder.  I believe I am more or less at the half way mark in my life.  If I have to stop striving and accept that I might have been misguided in my notion of greatness, what will keep me going?  I look back at the first half and I am not happy.  I have failures that haunt me.  I have seen that my desire for 'more' has sometimes robbed me of what I had!  But God knows if I have to resign and coast along for the second half of my life and sink into the knowledge that I was never meant to rise above, and that I will probably never reach greatness, I would rather die right now.

Can someone who did rise above the crowd - really, really rose, not just stood on their toes for a few years- please tell me that they also got to this point where I am now and give me the key, the secret?  Will they please tell me if it is possible to stop striving and still rise?  Is there someone who can tell me that I can surrender and not slip down, but magically coast upward?  Is this why Jesus said "This is how you should pray: Our Father in heaven, let Your name be glorified, let Your kingdom come, let Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven...?  I know on an intellectual level that I have no choice.  It is always going to be what it is and my striving is not going to force the will of God.  But I cant somehow, on an emotional level, accept that I could indeed just surrender and that great things will happen without my effort.  Ag crap!! What am I going to do?

Anyone with a spare press?  Leon needs one to fix the Jeep's wheel.  I thought a press was something that dry-cleaners use to make clothes flat.  Or The Press - that amazing organism that plays possum whenever you try to hold it responsible for its deeds.  

You've heard it:  We don't make the news, we just report it.  Yes.  Sure.  You are just the messenger and unlike all of us on this planet, you are the only entity devoid of an agenda.  Amazingly.  Completely without bias, utterly selfless and brimming with wisdom.  And not swayed by profit, nor Board decisions, Shareholder opinions and -God forbid we look like conspiracy theorists - that Band of Brothers behind the scenes.  

I am not completely against The Press or the Media, but I am weary of that Spawn of the marriage between Media and Marketing. I could have taken this blog into a very serious, political discussion right now, but I am too tired and not angry enough about anything in particular at this moment.  So I will just say this about Media and Marketing.  Who are you fooling?  Just about everyone?  Oh.  I thought so.  

Well I'm not fooled.  Usually not.  Unless I am hungry/depressed/bored/overjoyed/euphoric - then I might be fooled. But generally I am not.  Take these lamp post adverts for a fitness/diet programme.  They use the bikini-clad torso of a girl (perhaps) that has never been fat in her life and that has muscles that can only be the result of 12 years of hard training and steroids, under a headline "Loose weight today."  What do you see?  The torso and 'today'.  I can buy this product, buy into this programme and although that torso belongs to someone who wouldn't know how to loose weight if it was a small child at Disney World, I will probably look just like that TODAY!!  

Marketing is about saying NOTHING about the product you are selling, and EVERYTHING about something unobtainable that can be made to look obtainable when your product name/logo is placed cleverly in a photo in relationship with it.  How many glossy property development brochures have actual pictures or lay-out plans of the development on them?  Do you want to see the small rooms and deduct that you will have to cut your bed in half and turn it into a bunk-bed if you want to fit a bedside table and your husband in there with you?  Or do you want to see that gorgeously groomed couple with the marvelously angelic off-spring staring into the wide open spaces (that will disappear as soon as our development is finished) weaving their fingers through the flowing wheat like Russel Crowe in The Gladiator.  Wheat?  What the Frikkadel?  When last have we seen wheat in Pretoria?  But we want to.  We want to buy a piece of overpriced property in an estate where some old lady will crap you out because your children rode their bikes past her front door, because we want to be that lovely air-brushed woman, with the husband who adores her and the  ready-made boy and girl in the right age group and perfectly synchronized age gap.  

Next time you see marketing that tells you something about the product it is selling and not some added benefit abstract or real, pinch yourself.  You are not awake and you will drive into the dude in front of you and find out that Budget Insurance really does offer low low premiums.  And nothing else.  You get low low premiums.  You dont actually get covered for anything.  You just get the joy of sending off low low premiums from your pocket to theirs every month.  (It's my blog and I can say what I want to.  Besides I know about Budget Insurance's low low premiums and no no pay-outs.  Did the whole dance with Ombudsman etc. until I just...gave...up!)  

I have finally decided to start my own blog.  It took so long, because although I am generally an 'early adapter' (bell curve) I also resent hopping on every band-wagon with too many passengers.  For instance, I must have been the last cow to own a cell phone!  I just did not want to receive a call while purchasing milk and cell-phones looked to me like remote controls, except I was the one being 'controlled'.  (Another thing I resent - actually not 'resent' - just simply wont tolerate) I simply will not hit 'share' or 're-post' when told to.  NEVER! Never ever!  I smell out manipulation from a mile and I am Salesman-Bane!

I now have a phone and I love it for playing 'word mole' but it still freaks me out when someone says in that whiny, accusatory and wounded tone: I tried to get hold of you on your phone, but couldn't (and then the unspoken implication: "...which is why we are no longer friends/the deal is off/I wiped you out of my little Black Book of Life!!)  Truth is there is one single missed call with no message left as the only evidence of this desperate search for me, the failure of which having resulted in the deduction that cruel rejection is the only explanation.  ("I was in the loo", or "I was in a meeting/with my family at the dining table/fast asleep on account of 'the call came in at 5h50'/God-forbid making hanky-panky with my husband" all just too plausible to be true.  No, my failure to answer your call MUST mean that I am the mean-spirited incarnation of Rejection Evil, and that, after having seemed so warm, friendly and accommodating at first.

Oh I see I am going to do a lot of ranting on this blog of mine.  Well, I am not anticipating anyone actually reading my blog, so I guess it is a better way to vent than those darn direct emails that have gotten me into so much poop thus far.  Yes, yes, poop.  There might also be the occasional 'Scheisse' or my favourite of all Afrikaans words 'kak' on this blog.  My mom was a wonderful, hospitable lady who loved Jesus with all her heart and left an amazing legacy of faith and poise... yet she said 'kak'.  She always used it in a 3 word phrase "Ag kak man".  Translated:  "I strongly disagree with that statement and believe from the bottom of my heart that it is based at best, on a shaky premise."  or simply:  Ag kak man.  

The Germans use the word Scheisse very loosely (no pun intended) and it seemed to me that it is a socially acceptable word: Gold aus Scheisse.  Translated:  I am expected to produce something worthwhile (gold) from inferior/inadequate raw materials/resources (poop).  And when the socially acceptable word 'Scheisse' is not enough then the stronger 'Kacke' seem to fill the gap.  I also like 'Kacke'.  And the way it is used in some German dialects to sound like 'Gacke' - example "Voll auf d' Gacke gehauen"  Direct translation: "Hit right on the poop" and translation of meaning:  "Fell down/missed it badly/came upon a sudden and unexpected negative outcome."

My introduction into the German use of the word "Scheisse" came ironically in the form a translation of a German story, told by a German Pastor driving 220 km/h on the autobahn in a Mercedes.  He used the English word "Sheet" for shit (which is still a word that I find harder to use than kak/gacke/sheisse).  The story goes like this:

A cat once chased a mouse into a barn.  The mouse ran to a cow and asked her to quickly 'sheet' on him.  The cow did and when the cat came in, found the tail of the mouse sticking out of the 'sheet'.  The cat pulled the mouse out and ate him.  The moral of the story is:  Not everyone who 'sheets' on you is your enemy and not everyone pulling you out of the 'sheet' is your friend.  Words to live by.

We, fresh from South Africa, shook slightly on the inside, every-time he said 'sheet', but as the years went by, a deterioration if you will, of speech took place that we did not even notice, until we returned to South Africa and picked up on that same slight inner shaking by our audience, when we said similar words.  I now find that although I sometimes feel the need to reign in on the toilet-language, I actually dont understand what the big deal is.  What better substance to liken unwanted situations to?  You know.  Substance.  We like to give substance to what we say.  Here is an opportunity to literally give substance to what we are saying and yet it is frowned upon in finer circles.  Ask my good friend Ds. Jaco Strydom!  (Die Vloek Dominee.  Translation:  The Swearing Reverent) whom I find stellar by the way, in every way!!!

My husband feels that I should not write like this.  For the record.  Perhaps he feels that I am going to get into... trouble.