An Unusual Request!

My friend Simon has just asked me to be his 'Bestman'!

I mean a Female BESTMAN or whatever you call it!!!! Simon has refused to call it Grooms Honour Attendant because the word 'Attendant' reminds him of a toilet attendant. Between us we've come up with names- 'Best Woman', 'Best Friend' etc. I'm sure there'll be more (If I know Simon, some not so polite!!!)

I remember back in the day I used to tease Stephen about one day being his Bestman, but I never EVER thought it could seriously happen. (Actually I didn't even attend Stephen's wedding, we had a falling out a few months before, and never really patched things up... long story! )

Simon's been hinting about this for the last few weeks! Telling me about the colour scheme and nagging me about what I'm wearing to the wedding; asking me to help him decide on his suit; sending me links to stag party organisers sites, asking me outright to organise his stag do etc. I guess I should have picked up on it but I'm really slow at these things. Today he sent me a formal request and I was utterly flabbergasted!!! At first I thought, 'It's a bit early for an April Fools Day joke' and expected him to come out with a "Hahaha gotcha!!!"

But no! He really IS serious!

I checked to see whether fiancee Sharon is ok with this. She is!

So I've agreed to do it and was ok....

...until I learnt what a bestman's duties are including the all important best man's speech. This is apparently the measure of how good a wedding is! (no pressure!!! GASP!!!)

And there I was thinking that my job would be to organise stag night, keep the wedding rings safe, sign register, and take photos!

Fortunately the speech won't be that much of a problem. There are plenty of websites including http://www.bestmanspeech.com who for a fee could give me ideas. Here's one of the examples from their website.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. For those of you that don't know me, my name is Kim and I’m Simon's best man. That’s right, I’m a woman. Now, according to Sharon, the reason I’m stood up here in the role of best man is because none of Simons' male friends could be trusted to look after the wedding rings and do this speech without swearing ….[pause]….. or mentioning the phrase ‘sheep lick’ – whatever that’s supposed to mean!

See? Nothing to worry about - I'll just copy and paste from their website!

But then there is the issue of what to wear! Should I wear a suit or a dress the same colour as Simon's suit? But he is wearing black. Hmm that won't do. I'd look like I'm at a funeral! Perhaps a trouser or skirt suit the same colour as the matron of honour - burgundy! I still haven't decided yet!

There's a mixed bag of reactions to the whole Female bestman thing. Some hail it as a welcome break from tradition. Others see it as an aknowledgement that these days it is not uncommon for people to have close friends of the opposite sex. Most of Simon's friends are female!

It felt kind of assuring to know that I won't be the first female best man. Although not sure how Sharon's West Indian relatives will react to this! One of the forums warned 'Expect the photographer, the dj, the priest/rabbi/whatever, and grandma to give you some really confused and almost disgusted looks'

I hope it is nothing more than that!!!!

Job Hunting

The person who was supposed to allocate me work assumed I didn't need any (Don't know what gave her that impression???) So I've been sitting here trying to look busy! This is part of the 'busy-ness'

The longer I stay in this job, the more I realise that I honestly do not give a damn about my company and it's objectives. I see people all around me like my manager who do!
There was a time when I was keen on getting ahead in the company - but my enthusiasm died when I realised that there are no opportunities to move into the sections that interested me. When job application upon application were rejected, I realised that I have become too specialised. Stuck!! There are opporunities within my section to progress, but the last time there was a job trawl, my manager and colleagues could not understand why I did not go for promotion. I'm just not interested in carving out a career path in my current work area.

The time has come to leave my company! There's more to a job than just paying bills. I've got to have satisfaction, fulfiment, a sense that I am making a difference in this world.

Someone asked me the other day 'What is marketable about you?" It really got me thinking. What IS marketable about me?

I can be quite shy, and cannot seem to meet any deadlines that involve writing reports. But I have a pleasant character and build up good rapport with most people that I meet in person. If I believe strongly in something, I can be quite persuasive. And even though I do not often come up with new ideas, I enthusiastically support people who do! I am a good listener and have great empathy for the suffering. I like trying out new stuff - the more extraordinary the more appealing it is to me. I can work in a team or independently - quite flexible really. I am a fast reader, have good memory and learn practical things really fast! I like organising events and bringing people together.

So quite marketable, but WHERE??

Ideally I would like to work either within the Entertainment industy or Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). In my company CSR is closed...really...vacancies hardly come up and I don't know anyone there to start networking. So I have to look elsewhere!

I'll start researching into the different companies. Ideally it would be the corporate social responsibility section of a large entertainment company?
Perhaps I should step up my volunteering activities and work it from that angle?

I need something to hold on to!

I had a disagreement with someone the other week which sent me into a spiral of depression. One of my many faults is that I am deeply sensitive. I get emotional, irrational, suicidal...
Suicide is only successful when you act immediately. If you pause to think about it, or something interrupts the flow you will most likely not go through with it.
I remember the first time I attempted suicide, I tried to slit my wrists but the knife was too blunt. I lost momentum
The second time was almost successful. I tried to hang myself. I stood on a chair, looped the rope around the beam; kicked the chair away, but the rope couldn't take the weight and it broke. My siblings who were in the house heard and came out- saw what had happened and started laughing at me. My mom did not see the humourous side and took me for Confession to save my soul. I was a Catholic then.
I've been reading about the lives of English female writers who committed suicide like Virginia Woolf who put stones in her pockets and drowned herself in the river Ouse, near her Sussex home and Sylvia Plath who took a bottle of sleeping pills and stuck her head in a gas oven.

I know that I will not die by way of suicide.
True, I've thought about it several times, but there's something that always makes me pause and ask
1) Are you sure there is absolutely no hope?
2) Are things really as bad as they seem?
3) Do you want to leave your family and friends with this legacy?

Perhaps it is God speaking to me in those moments? I don't know. What I do know is that the hesitation is long enough to make me realise that
1) My situation isn't the worst
2) There is no such thing as a completely hopeless situation
3) Suicide is selfish

To beat depression Christianity has prescribed confessing positively, citing Scripture, binding demons, focussing on others. But these things take time and I guess I don't have enough patience . Like many, I seek a quick fix solution to my problems. Yesterday on TV, I watched in fascination as, Paul McKenna through hypnosis cured a woman of her 20 year fear of show jumping.

I wish I could wave a magic wand over my circumstances...
In an instant I would become beautiful, popular, significant

But the God that I've thrown my lot in with, does not do 'quick fix' .
Everything has to be worked at, everything takes time - something that my impatient soul finds hard to take