an update -- not as frequent as promised, but here. :)

Aha. Clearly you shouldn't take my promise for more frequent postings too seriously.... Sorry. :S

So, A's still around. We had a review today, with her social worker, and agreed that A should try to cooperate a little more within the community. She's very good at participating when she wants, and shutting it all down when she doesn't. Which I'm not really judging her for -- coming from all the crazy places she's been in, I'm sure it's really hard to adjust to the life-sharing we do here. I mean, it's hard enough for me. Anyway, we'll see how it keeps going (there's another 2 months of the trial period to go). I think I'm at the point where I'm just going to leave it up to her, and not stress myself out over wondering why she's not listening to me/getting up/walking/etc. The bit I still find quite hard is that she doesn't understand my need for personal space. I guess I'll just have to keep explaining why I don't like it when she pats my arm or pets my hair or rubs the back of my neck. Urg. Look: This is my dance space, A, and this is yours.

M's also still here -- until the end of the month, as far as I know. She's still quite lovely -- we share chocolate, and clothes, and movie nights. She vents a lot to me, too....which I half-love and half-don't. I mean, I really like being there to listen for people when they need it, but at the same time Come On. It's hard when the people they're venting about are the ones I live with too. I guess I'll just have to find a balance between being there and taking time out so my views of people (specifically R) aren't too biased.
Yeah.
Still, I'm glad she's here. :)

Also, I've just found Mika (the artist, thanks to Una) and I'm really enjoying him. It's all really happy music that isn't depressive break-up songs or sappy love songs or anything. Just happy. :)

Also, the parents visited this last week -- Dad was teaching ("Celtic Spirituality") in Dingle, on the west coast. They came here for a weekend, then I went to him for most of the week (Mum in Brum visiting Al) and then she came here for this past weekend. It was lovely -- Dingle is beautiful, especially with the sunny weather we had, and the long walk along the beaches with the class (renewed my love for sun and wind and the sea, as a combo), and the aquarium (sharks and rays and a Nemo tank. Mwaha. Lovely. :)). And then I missed my bus back here cause I was looking at the wrong times, so I got to stay another day and went to a traditional music concert with Dad before coming back a day later. And R was fine with me being stuck there (as she'd have to be), and I really didn't feel bad at all. C'est la vie, and it made me really happy that Dad was all excited to have me around for another day. Yay! (And the feeling was mutual, of course) :D
And then I got to show Mum all the little places around Mountshannon that I was sure she'd love -- Woodpark, the harbour, the Aistear (park/maze/labyrinth). It was awesome -- and then we went to a concert here, of a community choir and then a Dublin guitar quartet. Both were lovely, and I love how into the choir Mum was (of course -- she stood up really quickly to see the pianist when the keyboard started. :) And we both listened to the children next to us cry "Mummy! I can see Mummy!" and remembered the good ol' days of Alfred in KW. :)
All in all, an awesome visit -- and lovely because I got quality Dad time and then quality Mum time. It worked out perfectly. :)

But, bien sure, now I'm homesick. I'm trusting it'll pass faster this time, though, because I'm already settled here.

And that's about it. As with life anywhere, the days here swing between really good (quiet communal times in the garden, or outside on the weekends) and not-so-good (conflicts that inevitably arise from people living in close quarters with the same other people 24/7). I think I'm hitting a good balance, though, overall.

So, yeah. 'Tis grand, so.
'Tis grand.

:D

LOVE.

...

Thought maybe I'd update a little more regularly, so the next post isn't, like, three pages long. :)

Two things this time around.
One: we've got another coworker, at least for the next three months. M came just to stay for a few days while she waited for a flight back to Germany (she was trying to do her eurythmy therapy training work placement thing -- observing a therapist at work, but the place she applied to was taken by another training eurythmist, so she was heading back to Germany to find somewhere new. And then she came here, and we mentioned our need for another coworker, and she mentioned her desire to work in a Camphill, and voila.)
She's lovely -- early 30s, with a Swiss/German/French/Australian accent (worldly childhood). We've gotten a bit mired in the drama of the last few weeks, so she's also a nice breath of fresh air. :)
Anyway, she's here now and that's good, cause the second bit of news is a la A.

Had a crap day yesterday -- got really tired and hungry and angry while working in the garden in the afternoon, on top of spending the day trying to suppress the urge to burst into tears. Succeeded at that, for the most part, but it made my head (and heart) hurt. Anyway, I was out of it and just wanted me time when I got back before supper, so I headed up to my room. Stopped in to A's room on the way to announce that supper (including chips...mm...) would be served momentarily, and was greeted with a sad face and voice and the announcement that she'd overdosed on her meds (on purpose). Fuck.
So I got R, who spent the next few hours on the phone to try and sort it out without getting the ambulance. But A called the paramedics herself, and is now in a hospital in Limerick. She didn't seriously hurt herself -- she's done this before, negative attention seeking (done this actual thing, suicide scares, before, actually). The thing that gets me is that I couldn't muster sympathy at the time for her, at all. I was so out of it myself that it was just like, ok. Yeah. Of course this would happen now. Thanks a lot.
Which is crap, because if I can't sympathise or empathise how much help am I to her, really?
It just scared me, that I don't trust anything she says (because of her history of playing with the truth) and then that I wasn't paying much attention to her during the day (she was kind of left to her own devices, which maybe isn't a good thing for her...anyway.)

I shall continue this later, though, as it is lunchtime now.

I hope all is well with all of you (and please don't let this post colour your day. I'm fine, she's fine -- it was just a bad series of events).

Ok.

LOVE.