“I can’t help you, if you won’t help yourself” ~ Amy Winehouse
Or, as defined by my dictionary:
Help Yourself (idiom): To serve or provide onself
I get quite creative in my bath. (Not like that, stop sniggering at the back!). What I mean is some of my best musings, ponderings, major decisions, all come from that time of peace and still in the dark, with music in the background, as thoughts drift through my head. It’s no coincidence that nearly all my blog posts have been composed mentally whilst either in the bath or in the small hours of the night when I can’t sleep.
This afternoon, whilst in the bath, I mused for awhile and topped and tailed a blog post on Strength. (Watch this space.) I then read a few chapters of a book that touched on rejection. This blew the post I had been planning in the last 48 hours on Rejection out of the water, if you’ll pardon the pun.
So then I thought about my weekend. Bar phonecalls and interactions with shop assistants (yes, I am old enough to buy this bottle of wine at the self-service till) I have spent the last couple of days alone. Now this is partly through choice so don’t play the world’s smallest violin at me just yet. I like my own company, I like my own space, I like the freedom to do what I want, when I want. This is often very little but then what of it?
But, just at times, I get lonely. Bone-achingly, crushingly, lonely. I live on my own, I have no friends who live that close (like, popping round for a cuppa in your slippers distance – yes, I did used to have this), and I’m single. I’m happy, I have great friends all over, and I’m sure one day I’ll go on another date or two, just occasionally it all gets me down.
Sometime last year there was an article that said you’re supposed to get 13 hugs a day. It makes you healthy. Or something. A DAY??? I don’t get 13 hugs in a week! The point being, of course, that human beings are sociable creatures and pack animals. We may not always like it or want it, but we do need each other and we do need physical contact. In lieu of a hug, I shall hope one of my cat visitors pops round to say hello later.
Anyway, anyway, whilst pondering all this, turning it into a blog post, then rejecting it on the grounds of being maudlin and “I’m only a poor little leopard” the following lyrics permeated my consciousness from the stereo:
“I can’t help you if you won’t help yourself
I can’t help you if you don’t help yourself
You can only get so much from someone yeah
You can get so much from me
I can’t help you if you won’t help yourself”
Well, you do kinda have to laugh at the timing, don’t you? I duly considered myself told by the universe. I will now enjoy my evening in and look forward to all the socialising I have to come. And, hopefully, a hug or two.
Now please share; do you get lonely? Do you get enough hugs? And is 13 unlucky for some? Answers on a comment box-shaped postcard, as always.
Princess
Princess of VP Blog 