Currently The First Discworld Novels: The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic By Terry Pratchett see related

End of exams, celebrations and friends

So yesterday was my final exam for 2009. It was an oral exam, where I had to present my theoretical understanding of my play therapy clients for 10 minutes, and then spend 20 minutes answering gruelling questions from the panel. We were required to submit the written paper a week ago, and I finally put together my Powerpoint presentation over Monday evening and Tuesday morning. This was surprisingly challenging, probably due to the fact that I am feeling a total lack of creativity at the moment, and had no clue how to condense an 11 000 word paper into a 10 minute presentation. Thankfully

a)     Claire, Marle, and other members of my market research company will never have seen to pass judgement, and

b)    Luke and Megan were kind enough to offer some pretty awesome suggestions, which in turn sparked a sense of excitement and creativity in me, so that I actually ended up with a presentation that I was actually rather pleased with!

Later on Tuesday afternoon I practised the presentation on my cat and later my dog (who both slept through the whole thing); and then presented it to my family while they were trying to enjoy their dinner. Apart from the furious debate between my parents over my choice of background (I opted for a camouflage theme, given my child’s interest in the toy army men), which my dad hated but my mom loved, the final practise round went well.  I finally felt okay about the whole thing and was feeling totally prepared – almost like nothing could go wrong.

Until the day itself arrived. First of all the external examiner had somehow been given the incorrect schedule, and was rearing to begin the whole examination process at 8:00, while the schedule the class had been given had the first oral exam scheduled for 8:30. Understandably, this caused utter chaos and panic, until the external examiner graciously decided that he would use the time table we had been given. Maria and I still needed to print out the latest drafts of our assessments reports for final sign-off (hopefully!). We then settled down to wait for our turns. Thankfully I was third on the list of presenters, and Leila was second so the waiting period wasn’t too long, but it was still pretty awful.

Finally 9:30 came, and it was my turn. I entered the room and set up my computer – only to discover that it would not work! It switched on, but it went to a black screen, and no amount of button-hitting or coaxing (note to self: probably not a good idea to speak to inanimate objects in a coaxing tone too often in front of 6 psychologists!) would convince it to do anything else. After Patrick (my supervisor) helped me try turn it off and then again a few times they asked me to present off the print-outs I had provided them. (As an aside, this was quite possibly the smartest idea I have had this year, as we were definitely not asked to provide them with the Powerpoint print-outs, and to the best of my knowledge, no one else in the class had done so)

The actual exam itself went okay, I think. The external examiner was a really nice guy, and told me about how two years ago he presented at a conference to an auditorium packed with his colleagues and his computer did the same thing as mine. My supervisor was also really nice and smiled encouragingly at me throughout the whole process, so that I actually felt strangely affectionate towards him. Afterwards when Leila and I saw the external examiner in the passage of the building he had a few really nice things to say to me about the whole thing, so I am not too stressed about how it went.

The best part was the celebratory feelings that had almost taken over me. Leila and I could barely contain ourselves outside the building and we spent some time outlining various fun activities for the upcoming weeks ahead. With a happy outline of holiday plans in mind, I then headed off to the lab for some coffee that Luke has just brewed. I then went off to meet David for coffee, and then later in the evening headed off with him to meet Paul and Neil for an evening of laughter, pizza, Settlers of Catan, watching Neil learn how to make instant coffee (and in the process learn why a teaspoon of coffee in a tiny teacup is preferable to a heaped tablespoon of coffee) and planning a camping / hiking trip in December. It was a really fantastic evening, which really helped centre me again after a very stressful period.

The thing with Neil and Paul, and other people from that group of friends is that these are people I don’t really have to see very often in order to have a very happy and fulfilling friendship with them. They have always been wonderful and true friends, and I was talking to David about them and shared some of the memories I have with them on the drive over to Neil’s house. The drive over to Neil’s made me realize that one of the things I am most looking forward to over the next few weeks is being able to spend more time with these wonderful people. While I love them, this evening was reminder of just how much so. During the drive over to Neil’s, David told me his plans for the New Year’s period, and the thought going through my mind is I could not imagine better company to spend New Year’s with – the people who have come to mean the world to me.

So, the evening proved to be a reminder of how exceptionally lucky and privileged I am to have some really special people in my life. Now that I have had some time to process the last few weeks and the stress that has definitely defined it, I have an overwhelming sense of gratitude towards the friends who have enriched my life so much, and been there is so many ways. I have noticed every supportive gesture and I appreciate every single one, down to the deepest part of my heart. THANK YOU!

I’m back! J

The last few months have been difficult ones. In fact, this whole year has been a challenging time. It has been a year of ups and down, but the ups have been higher than before and the downs have been lower than ever before (if that makes any sense). For the most part I have coped sort of okay with everything (although there have been some very stressful and intense moments), but there has been one issue in my life that has really stood out in my mind. The situation should never have happened, but it did. I wasn’t really directly involved in the situation, but was affected by it nonetheless. And it made me feel frustrated and angry, although I didn’t realize how much so until yesterday evening, thanks in part to an unexpected and awesome chat with one of my fellow interns for next year which helped me gain perspective on who I am, a heart-to-heart with Dunx, and the therapeutic properties of driving on traffic-less roads whilst singing along loudly to CATS!

Anyway, to cut a long story short, the anger and sense of injustice is gone and I have finally spoken my truth (an act that was incredibly difficult and I really hope is taken in the way it was intended).

And it feels fantastic and liberating. I doubt the situation will change any time soon, but at least my attitude to it can and hopefully things will eventually sort themselves out. This is quite a wonderful realization in and of itself.

Sort of linked to this sense of victory is a conversation Luke and I were having once a couple of months ago when we went to Constitution Hill to visit Thomas. During the chat, he mentioned how he had gone to Anne Frank’s house when he was overseas, and since then I have found myself thinking about her every now and then. Her diary always inspires me to be a better person and dedicate my life to bringing an ideal or dream to life. Having this reminder at a place like Constitution Hill reinforced this thought in me. So to end off this entry, here is one of the quotes from Anne’s book that I have written down to look at every now and then. This is one of those times when it seems to speak to me a lot more than usual:

"People will always follow a good example; be the one to set a good example, then it won't be long before the others follow. How lovely to think that no one need wait a moment, we can start now, start slowly changing the world! How lovely that everyone, great and small, can make their contribution toward introducing justice straightaway. And you can always, always give something, even if it is only kindness" ~ Anne Frank

Currently Garden State see related

The last few days have been pretty much devoted to completing the first of my three exam equivalents for the year. This particular exam consisted of a psychoanalytic view of my client. Which was surprisingly fun to do. To give you an idea of what this would entail, the paper had to include:

·         Full background history (particularly important given the fact that psychoanalysis focuses a lot on early childhood relationships and the patterns of relationships in the child’s life)

·         A mental status exam

·         A provisional DSM-IV-TR diagnosis (where the child gets diagnosed with the relevant disorder, if applicable)

·         Theoretical conceptualization (thankfully I got to use Melanie Klein's theory, who has always been a bit of a favourite theorist – her theory just makes sense, even if her work is more difficult to read!)

The paper is now written, and I have spent two hours trying to shorten the paper by 4 000 words (and failed miserably as I deleted about 350 words, and added 80 words), and 20 minutes trying to disguise the fact that the paper is way too long. I have finally become resigned to the fact that I may get some marks for loquaciousness and finally printed out the paper.

One exam equivalent down, two exam equivalents to go, one oral exam and one thesis. And then:

FREEDOM

In the meantime, here are some photographs from the past few weeks:

The Sick-Leaves performing at Back-2-Basics:

My annual photo of the jacarandas in full bloom from the top of Munro Drive:

One of the reasons why I love Walter Sisulu National Botanical Gardens:

Probably one of the reasons I most love living in Johannesburg – afternoon storms J:

A random thought + some Postsecrets

A few evenings ago, I spent some time catching up on blog-reading. After having read through most friends’ blogs, I started sifting through the Xanga blogs that caught my eye. One blog posed the question:

Can you fall in love with someone you have never met?

Most of the responses to this girl’s blog were something along the lines of ‘You saw the person (who was some sport’s personality on TV) and what you are now feeling is lust, nothing more’. While part of me does agree with the general consensus that in this case that is quite possibly what happened, an even greater part of me is thinking that Yes, it is possible to connect on a really deep level with people you have met, and may never meet. Perhaps falling in love with them is a bit extreme, but I can think of several characters (in books mainly, but also occasionally in a movie or on TV) where I feel an intense connection, either because of how much I identify with them, or how much what they say / do resonates and affects me in some way.

Okay, one can make the argument that these people never lived. But, I frequently feel this sense of connecting with strangers due to a website I follow. Every Sunday morning, I check out a website entitled ‘Postsecret’. Essentially, it is a blog, where people post postcards of various secrets (Hence the title ‘postsecret’). The secrets range from incredibly intimate ones that you can imagine really haunts the author to the really mundane. Every so often there are a few that really touch me for whatever reason, and I save them onto my desktop to look at whenever I feel a need to connect to something again. Because these secrets, for whatever reason, really speak to me, and whenever I glance over the collection I feel a momentary connection with the author/s and have a very real sense and understanding of what they were feeling when they wrote them. I don’t know the author, have never met them, and don’t even know their name or even where they come from. But I know how they felt. Obviously, we are more than our emotions, but if we connect with people in a real way through emotions, how can say they are still strangers to us?

For example, whenever I see this card:

I am reminded of my grandfather.

Whenever I see this card:

I am reminded of how little acts can mean the world to people (a butterfly’s wings...)

Megan (http://theexploringmouse.blogspot.com/) posted about something she had come to notice – that people have developed a sense of entitlement. They feel as though the world owes them something, and they are not really under any obligation to contribute in return. In fact, when I thought about it, my mind flitted over various incidents I have seen where people not only expect the best, but are not prepared to work for it or earn it in any way. They really feel a sense of entitlement. And when I was thinking about this, I couldn’t help but feel that somehow humanity itself has become fractured. It’s almost like we are losing the core of what makes us human.

And I think this may be why the first post has come back to haunt me a bit now. I am definitely not ready to give up on humanity. If that girl felt that she had fallen in love with someone, why is it not possible? Sure, it may really have been that she thought he looked good. But maybe something that he said or a look in his eye really made an impact on her, and that is what she connected with. And I say, why not? Why limit ourselves by saying that only people we have met and spoken with are the people who can have an impact on our lives. Why, when we are so fragmented do we limit ourselves even further?

Here are some of the Postsecret cards I connected with when I first saw them:

So while I may not necessarily agree that you can fall in love with someone you have never met, I do think that it may be possible to forge a strong connection with them. People are emotions. And I think that part of the reason we connect with the people in our lives is the way they make us feel, whether it is joyful, optimistic, angry, etc. They fuel something in us that gives our life meaning. And I don’t think it is a big stretch to think that people we have not really physically met can’t touch us in that way.

I decided to write this post, as I am desperately trying to stay awake until 10 o’clock so that I can try establish a normal sleep pattern again. Today was a rather exhausting day as I wrote my 8-hour assessment paper.

For some reason, the psychology department decided that we had to write the exam, and not type it, despite quite a few very vocal requests on our part. However, it was an open book exam, and our lecturer advised us to take only a few books and rather spend our time compiling charts and summary notes. She told us this during our final supervision session last week, which was also the session where she decided to teach us how to write an assessment report. Because, crazily enough, no one this year has actually ever taught us this, despite us being required to conduct two assessments each!

So, I spent hours on Tuesday dutifully typing up pages of summaries, and compiling hectic Powerpoint charts, and then going went through to Leila to go through our work together. I then spent a hefty part of Thursday and Saturday morning going through my notes again, and making sure that every possible test was included either in my summaries or was suitably bookmarked in one of the few books I had opted to take in rather than summarize.

On Sunday I reached my breaking point, where after an unexpectedly late night out supporting Eks’s band I was feeling miserable and tired and unbelievably worked up and stressed. David phoned, and I managed to have a good cry, which had a cathartic effect. Luckily, this cathartic moment was soon followed up with family lunch, and cake to celebrate my brother’s name day. I had time to go over my notes one more time before I received a message from David saying that we were invited to Luke’s house for tea. Opting to take a short break, I went along, only to discover that it was basically an extended family tea, with us. It was kind of weird, but very, very cool J His sister had the family making origami lilies out of tinfoil as part of a Fine Arts project (my contribution to her project consisted of two slightly odd-looking specimens, but she was kind enough to sound grateful anyway). I had more cake, spent some happy time with David and my Smelting Steele siblings, and had an interesting, albeit short chat with Luke’s mom. I returned home feeling happy and ready to conquer the exam.

This morning my body decided that 4:00 was the optimal time to wake up. I spent about 90 minutes tossing and turning, while my generally beloved cat did her best to keep me awake by kneading my leg or gently tapping my face with her paw. Finally at 5:30 I decided to keep my old tradition from Honours and Research Masters of watching an episode of Frasier before an exam (the logic being that (a) Frasier rocks!, and (b) he is a psychiatrist and hence vaguely linked to my profession).

Eventually I was dropped off at Wits at 7:30 by my mom, and I met up with Leila to complete the first task of the day – finding the exam venue. Our course co-ordinator had cleverly given us a venue that did not exist, so we eventually found a lecturer who took pity on us wondering around, and went to investigate the matter. She came back with the venue, and we headed off to claim our preferred seats and set up our work stations. David sent me a Good Luck message, which helped calm settle me, and we then headed off to purchase bottled water and tea before our exam. We walked passed somene who unfortunately is not my biggest fan, and Leila (who is rather protective of me) took great offense to her ‘sour’ look as she termed it, so I then faced my second task of the day – getting Leila to calm down and refocus on the main task at hand, namely passing the wretched 8-hour exam.

We then went back to our venue, and the lecturers passed out our exam paper. However, the lecturers forgot that we needed exam answer booklets in order to actually write the exam. They sheepishly went and found the booklets and distributed them to all of us.

The lecturers were quite entertaining to watch during the exam. They took turns invigilating, and the two women have very different ways to keep themselves amused. The one spent her time playing some Windows computer game (the winning tune kept playing every 40 minutes or so), while the other lecturer spent her time sitting at the desk set up in the front on the room, with her arms folded, glaring at all of us. I guess they had their own fun...

The exam itself was okay. It was 500 marks in 8 hours, and I managed to finish with one minute to spare! My right index finger is still throbbing from how hard I was pushing it on the pen, but otherwise I survived. About 5 hours or so into the exam I took a short break and headed off to the lab, where I had a quick but strangely jovial chat with Neville (who was quite amazed that I was walking around in the midst of an exam), and visited Luke who gave me a mug of coffee and one of his rather awesome cookies to take back with me to the exam. The lecturer gave me a knowing smile when I arrived back carrying a mug of coffee.

The funniest part of the exam was in the final hour when my lecturer decided I needed some Reiki magic for my finger (reminder to self: never joke with lecturers – they don’t get it and insist on doing something weird like Reiki!)

Luckily, assessment was the only sit-down exam during this exam period. The other subjects all consist of exam equivalents (and one accompanying presentation), which at least mean that I can work on them at my own pace and in my own way, and more importantly, I can type them out. So I am immensely glad that this exam is finally over. I almost can’t believe that my M1 is only three exams equivalents, one exam presentation and a thesis away! Five weeks, until freedom. So tantalizingly close! J

To end, here is a quote I was sent by a friend about the core message of my newest favourite movie, Up. According to the director, Pete Doctor:

“Basically, the message of the film is that the real adventure of life is the relationship we have with other people, and it's so easy to lose sight of the things we have and the people that are around us until they're gone. More often than not I don't really realize how lucky I was to have known someone until they're either moved or passed away. So if you can kind of wake up a little bit and go, "Wow, I've got some really cool stuff around me every day", then that's what the movie's about”