Do You Believe In Angels???

This morning I got to thinking about something that happened to me last year, it crosses my mind occasionally, I don’t know why it just does! So if I tell you about it now it might help me clear whatever it is up.

In February of 2007 my brother and I went over East to South Australia and Victoria to see a good friend. While we were in that area the three of us went to Lake Charlegrark a country music festival that happened there every year.

When we rocked up we went for a walk around, and singing in front of the open microphone crowd was one of my favorite people Dave Prior. A country musician, great poet and radio station guru.

I got inspired to go on stage but I didn’t have a guitar and had a few butterflies. This cute old guy came up to me and he seemed to be one of the organizers so he helped me find a girl to lend me a guitar and he pushed me on stage.

I did two of my own ballads and the crowd loved it, I was so thrilled! It was my first time singing in front of a non Western Australian crowd. Afterwards that guy came up to me and introduced himself as Ray. I couldn’t remember his name off the top of my head so I dubbed him “Ray from Charlegrark”. I gave him my name, address and phone numbers.

He said he liked that I sang in a relaxed Aussie country style like Sara Storer and could he send me some of his poetry for me to turn to song for him. I agreed even though I had never done that before.

Ray called me a few times over the next few months and we chatted a little but I hadn’t done more with his poetry than listened to it. I was annoyed at myself but time kept slipping away.

Nearly six months later we started having this beautiful hawk like bird hang around our backyard. We identified it as a Swamp Harrier, a bird more commonly found in cooler wet climates as they generally live on fish and small animals. I got a great photo of him.

That was one weird thing that happened, the other was that not many people had my home phone number so I hardly used it as a phone and it was permanently in the back of my dial-up computer. One day I bought a fax machine for my home business and switched to ADSL so my phone line was free.

I just happened to be walking past the phone at one point as it rang, normally I don’t answer it in case of telephone marketers but in that instant I did.

I heard “Is that… Anita”? I replied “yes” and the lady nearly burst into tears on the other end of the phone, she was the sister of Ray. Ray passed away a few weeks before hand and she was going through his paperwork looking for poems, she found a note by his phone saying “Call Anita in Meekatharra” that’s all it said but it stood out to her. Judy didn’t know how to contact any Anita’s in Meekatharra and so she started going through books.

In despair she sat down at her kitchen table and her elbow knocked a book off the table onto the floor and the page opened up at my details. In shock she phoned me, and just happened to catch me. We both agreed that it was divine intervention.

During the phone call we chatted for ages about Ray, he had passed away from Liver damage, and years before there was a house fire which burnt a lot of his poems. Judy was calling to see if I happened to have any of Ray’s poems that they might not have had. I didn’t, only the cd he sent me of a radio production which she already had.

She had found a few poems laying around but without any names attached and so she asked me if I thought they were his, they were beautiful talking about women battlers in the Australian bush, everything Ray was passionate about so I told Judy that I believed they were his, that made her really happy as if Ray was talking to her through them.

In the chat I learnt that Ray was a huge fan of birds and was always paying attention to them. That makes me believe that the Swamp Harrier was Re incarnate or a messenger or something, it was definitely strange to have that beautiful bird here in the desert so far from its natural environment.

I believe all this came about to remind me to write the songs in Ray’s honor, I still haven’t had time but I do believe these things happen when they are meant to. I will try and put some of his poems on here at one stage for you all to hear.

Thanks Ray for being a part of my life, even after death!

Hmmm! Before I finish this story, there’s another weird thing happening right now, just as I’ve been writing this it’s been raining! Not a normal occurrence.

Do you all believe in angels???

Developing Art Networks Online

Yesterday I had a visit from Julia, a student from University of Western Australia

Talking with Julia made me realize I could be doing so much more with my art than I currently am. Over summer my air conditioner broke down and so I couldn’t do any art in my house as it was just too hot.

For those people who don’t know where Meekatharra is, we had over 45 degrees Celsius for weeks on end and the months each side weren’t much better as we thought any day less than 35degrees c was a ool change!

So I focused my energy on my garden during the nights and did my studying and computing at night as my comp was overheating badly! My poor little fish were running at 34 degrees Celsius and I lost one big fish that was really disappointing.

Anyway incredibly off track!!! Julia got me thinking that I could be doing a whole lot more arty networking on the net, I have one month left to go on three courses I’m currently studying so when they are finished I will put some effort into developing some online art resources based from Meekatharra.

Meekatharra has a huge underground art community and I guess for travelers you wouldn’t come across it just passing through, so I can put in some effort and get our art out there as well as bringing some attention to artists who came before.

Here is a link to Julia’s UWA page.

Julia Anwar McHenry

Also for those people who are interested, I strongly recommend you make contact with Julia as her network of resources is huge and I’m sure she’d love to hear from you.

I will let you all know when i have done something with art online :)

First Impressions, Definitely Don’t Do These

I found this really good site which lists twenty things you should do if you want to ruin a first impression.

• Interrupting repeatedly
• Dominating the conversation
• Inconsistent eye contact
• Standing too close, invading "personal space"
• Taking a cell phone call or even letting it ring
• Chewing anything, unless you're at a luncheon
• Arriving late
• Being longwinded
• Risky humour
• Wrinkled clothing
• Checking your watch frequently
• Not listening, missing key points
• Poor table manners
• Boasting (I call it "I" disease)
• Looking and sounding bored
• Complaining about anything
• Distracting noises, such as tapping on a table
• Notebook or briefcase needing replacement
• Power Point that won't work
• Cluttered office when someone visits you

We all know people that do these things, aren’t they so annoying! At least I know it’s not just me that finds these people irritating. The site is worth checking out if you are in an organization where you need to be involved in interpersonal interactions.

Growth and Leadership

My Assesment Project

I am studying Effective Management through the Community Broadcasting Association of Australia. I’m about half way through my course and we need to think about our final project.

I have chosen to create an event celebrating Earth Hour @ Meeka FM this coming Saturday. There are a few reasons for it…

Firstly, Meeka FM is in dire need of new members, we are running on so few now, I’m worried that if our current members burn out or leave town then we will have no one and will have to close down.

That’s such a lame reason to stop broadcasting, especially when Meeka FM has been running for over eleven years.

So if I get people down there perhaps I can start a social club or something to get people coming regularly.

Secondly, I need to put all the new skills I’ve learned about management into effect and getting people inspired to participate is the best way to do this.

So we were supposed to have a meeting yesterday but I’m pretty sure only two people were going to come and it started raining really heavy and there was a huge storm throughout the night. So I postponed till Thursday.

I hate postponing meetings, it’s so easy to do, I wish people would just put in a little extra effort to be a part of something good. The problem with being flexible to suit everyone is that everyone will have a problem with what you organize.

So I’ve put in a bit more rigidity and set the meetings for every last Tuesday of each month so people could learn the routine. It was supposed to be yesterday, but walking downtown I learned that one of our volunteers had told everyone it was on Thursday, (thanks heaps!!!)

All the emails I sent to people with the date and time got no RSVP’s and people weren’t sure! I wish people would just play follow the leader for a change.

After all, having a vision and skills to implement that vision and putting so much effort into getting the team to just get along is hard enough without having your own team sabotage it for you.

I won’t let it stop me from being a good leader though, I WILL find a way to get people volunteering and getting along, I hope this course teaches me this lol.

So the plan at this stage is to turn off allt he lights at 8pm and turn them back on again at 9pm, I have lots of little candles and cups to place around the yard for atmosphere. We are pre-loading the playlist to suit the occasion and hopefully it will be a great event and I will pass my course.

I have made a website with notices of things around town which I have placed the Earth Hour celebrations on.

Earth Hour 2008

I have just joined Earth Hour 2008, please go and sign up if you haven't already :)

Give Your Baby A Healthy Obsession For Shoes!

I came across an Australian company selling the cutest baby shoes. As a self confessed "Shoe-O-holic" I am convinced this is a way for me to share my passion with my nieces. They have cute socks, leather shoes, squeaky shoes, comfortable shoes, ballet shoes, Teddy Bear Socks, baby trainer sports shoes, purple pink and white stretch socks. Oh there's just too much! If you want to check the cuteness out for yourself Go Here!

A World Class Friend

I just thought i'd take five minutes to write about my world class friend Robyn. I've known her for nearly nine years. I was living in a Homeswest house in our town and was successful in buying my current house. The day after i moved here i went back to clean up the yard of where i left and dazedly walked up the driveway wondering why there was a Land Rover in my driveway, then why there was a kids trike in my driveway and then... as i opened the back gate, why there was a dog in my backyard.

I was totally confused until i saw the family merrily sitting on the back veranda, and that was my first introduction to Robyn and her family.

Over the years we were involved in the same community groups and later in professional jobs. Recently Robyn inspired me to start my own online business, I had been wanting to for such a long time, I'm a bit of a stickler though when it comes to new territory, i am a follower, not a leader.

Robyn and i went to Perth and attended a Tony Robbin’s Unlimited Power seminar which was very inspiring. It pointed out a lot of things to me that i was stuck wondering why they had happened. Now i know! And i also learnt how to make some things happen in my life.

Robyn and i met again this Saturday a fortnight after the seminar to check if we'd achieved any of our goals and to go over some things we remembered from the conference. We traded music, it's always good to get new songs to motivate you through the day.

So i would like to take the time now to invite all of you wonderful readers to go and check out Robyn's blog and leave her a comment.


OUTBACK SELF HELP