Life Saver.

Sweets, treasures, recreation, occupation, eternity – all five words hold some sort of common denominator word association answer: life saver.

Growing up, a roll of LifeSaver sweets, in all their rainbow coloured deliciousness, was a treat that could be made to last right down to the glass shard sliver of sweetness, if you did not stick your tongue through the hole and break the circle of sugar. There was something of a competition between friends over who’s was the thinnest, if my memory serves me correctly?

Fast forward and, as us girls grow up, our treasures tend to change from sticky to shiny. 

The discovery, many years ago, of a much admired local jewelry talent, Kirsten Goss, who has gone on to make her mark on the global stage, designed her own “LifeSaver” piece at the beginning of her career in the luxury goods arena. This particular piece of jewelry is something that I covet, in a dream-like way, as I’m acutely aware that treasures such as these are far from life sustaining.

Whilst on our first ever international family holiday, back in the early 2000’s  (we had planned, saved and waited until both our girls were old enough to carry their own suitcase!) we found ourselves on a catamaran day trip adventure to explore the wonders of the Great Barrier Reef, off the Australian coast at Cairns, Queensland.

Since I am not a swimmer, in any way, shape or form, I found myself more reliant than I wish to admit, on the traditional nautical life saver ring that the guide provided, for the likes of my terrified self, to hang onto whilst dipping my snorkel-goggle covered face below the surface of the water in order to catch a glimpse of the incredible aquatic world of wonder. Suffice to say that my family were astounded and amused by my instinctive fear of the water, the ocean and all things therein!

Raise your hand if this global pandemic has required some sort of re-invention? My hand is waving high, at times less enthusiastically than, once again, I care to admit. 

My default personality is one of control, organised routine and order.

My mantra to our girls was always: “everything has a place and everything in its place means that you’ll never have to look for anything.” Queue a new life adventure in a different hemisphere, continent, country, culture and language. That is more than enough to turn most of my control-freakness on its head!

Not only did we leave familiarity, along with family and friends, behind but, it also meant that a large amount of re-invention was required in the workplace: I went from business owner to business cleaner in the blink of an eye!

Add the arrival of the C virus and a new invention was necessary, this time it had to be remote, sanitised and isolated. Thankful for millennial children, who think out of the box as a matter of course, I found myself signed up for a new career which checked all covid-condition work boxes: subtitler & captionist (amongst other skills – CV supplied on request, wink!) 

As I’ve blogged about this little gig before, I shan’t get into details other than to say that a new life saver appeared on my horizon, as a result of this necessity, in the form of Kelly, my tutor, mentor, guide, sounding board, panic averter, corrector of all things subbing, thank you for being my lifesaver!

Added to Kelly, are my dear friends with language skills, readily available to spell, listen, translate and fact check for me, Ka and Tracy, I’d be lost without you both too! Not to mention the hardware supplying friends in Jolien and Sherry who came to my rescue with spare laptops! 

This brings me onto eternity. Without my personal LifeSaver (Giver and Saviour), Jesus Christ, I know for a fact that I would not have been able to get through these past 53 years of life, with the usual pitfalls and panics, pain and petulance that life has to offer us all, in some way or another.

Albert Camus said of his faith in our Saviour: “I would rather live my life believing that there is a God and die to find out that there isn’t, than live as if there isn’t and die to find out that there is.”