Bridget McNulty

We’re ENGAGED!!!

// December 29th, 2009 // 8 Comments » // Decisions, Laughter, Life (and the living of it), Love

I am SO happy! I can’t even tell you. I’ve been grinning nonstop since yesterday evening (yes, all through the night – I hardly slept a wink!)

So here’s how it happened…

Yesterday around 6pm Mark told me he had a surprise for me, and that I had to meet him on the beach in half an hour… We’ve been staying in a charming little fishing village called Amed, on the North coast of Bali (in Indonesia) for the last five nights, and we’ve loved every second of it. Not at all touristy (unlike the rest of Bali), fantastic scuba diving, incredible snorkelling, and superb grilled prawns and Indonesian delicacies eaten right on the beach. Divine.

So I head down to the beach and there’s a part of me that’s thinking, ‘Is he about to propose?’ because it was all so mysterious. But I had a feeling he might propose on Christmas Day and he didn’t, so I didn’t want to get my hopes up.

I walk to the restaurant where he said he’d meet me, and what do I see? No Mark. But the waitress was all clued up, handed me two fresh mango juices (our favourite, unbelievably sweet and fresh and yummy) and told me to wait a few minutes.

Less than two minutes later, I see Mark heading towards shore on a local fisherman’s boat. Looked something like this:

I climb on board and off we go, on a ’sunset cruise’, he tells me. So we’re sitting out there soaking up the view (a volcano, an island fringed with palm trees, an endless horizon in the other direction, the clouds streaked pink with sunset just around the corner, a half moon starting to rise) and sipping our mango juice.

Dusk is my favourite time of day, the ocean is my favourite place to be, I have a thing about endless horizons. And Mark’s all fidgety and looks nervous, so of course I’m wondering what’s up. Then he pulls out a dozen candles and lights them and I start to feel like I know what’s coming up…

After many more minutes of a really magical slice of my life, Mark turns to me and says, “Will you marry me?”
I was so happy I couldn’t even speak – crying and laughing at the same time, honestly it’s the best feeling in the world! But of course I said yes.

And then he gave me my ring – a bamboo ring he’d found in Thailand (and been carrying around for the last four months!) with strips of silver that he’d had a local silversmith in Gili Air (the island we were on last week) put in. I love it! It’s just perfect – I told him once that I wanted a ring I could swim in the sea with. It’s so me.

And now we’re ENGAGED!!! And we are both on Cloud Nine. It’s a lovely place to be.

What can you live without?

// July 27th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Decisions, Inspiration, Life (and the living of it)

It’s a question I’ve been asking myself a lot lately: What can I live without?

Last night I finished clearing and sorting through all my ’stuff’, and I have to say it’s an incredible feeling. I went through my clothes / shoes / jewellery / books / papers / kitchen things and put aside everything I don’t love. I kept asking myself, ‘Can you live without this?’ and most of the time the answer was a resounding yes! I haven’t been foolish, I’m not tossing away things that we’ll need when we get back, but I have done a thorough pruning of the items I own, and I’m left with far less than when I began.

I was saying to my man that I find it such an exhilarating feeling – that I love being less tied down to the world – and he asked me why. The answer I came up with was simple, but it rings so true for me: I want to know that there is less I can’t live without. If for some reason I lost everything, I want to know that I would be more okay (than a few weeks ago, when I had a whole heap more ’stuff’).

I remember when I was a little girl I used to have this fear that an earthquake would split our house in two. Don’t ask me why – Durban has never had an earthquake (ever!) and there was pretty much 100% certainty that our house would never split in two. But I was a worrier as a child, and this was one of my chief worries. It would always reassure me to know that even if our house split in two and my parents, younger brother and older brother were on the other side (because of where their bedrooms were), my middle brother and I would be together. And that meant I’d be okay.

Now I live in a much smaller apartment, and if it split in two odds are my man and I would both be on the same side! But it still reassures me to know that no matter what else I don’t have (as we travel around the world with only one suitcase each), I’ll always have him. He’s the one thing I would like very much not to have to live without.

What about you?

International First Love Day!

// May 15th, 2009 // No Comments » // Blogs, Love, Writing

Today, the 15th of May 2009, is the first official International First Love Day. A day to celebrate first loves, innocence, what it is we first fell in love with, and the beauty of love in all its forms.

Are you ready for a large helping of love?

Check out these blogs from all over the world for their International First Love Day contributions:

* Mold-a-Rama-Rama – http://moldarama-rama.blogspot.com/

* Reluctant Runner – http://www.reluctantrunner.net

* Awesome Fabric from South Africa – http://awesomefabricsfromsouthafrica.blogspot.com/

* The Misinterpretation of Dreams – http://amandasaunders.blog.com/

* Bianca Baldi – http://www.biancabaldi.net/blog.php

* Naturally Nina – http://www.naturallynina.com

* La Vie a Vernelle – http://vie-vernelle.blogspot.com/

* Brendan McNulty – Web 3.0 – http://www.brendan-mcnulty.com/

* Kathleen Ingraham – http://www.kathleeningraham.com

* Being Brazen – http://www.beingbrazen.com

* The Naked Redhead – http://www.thenakedredhead.com

* Rumble – http://rumble.sy2.com/stories/blue_afghan.html

* Sprig – http://sprig.co.za/

* Bridget McNulty - http://www.bridgetmcnulty.com

My First Love:

// May 15th, 2009 // No Comments » // Inspiration, Life (and the living of it), Love

When I think of my first love, I see snapshots of very specific moments. Care to look through them?

In this one, I’m sitting at the Steers restaurant at Musgrave Centre, the local shopping centre, on a Friday night, with four guys – Jono, Gerard, Steve and Anton. A bitchy girl from my class at school comes up to me, looks around the table (counting the ratio of 4 to 1) and asks me who else is joining us. “Oh no, it’s just me,” I say, with a smile, and she stares at me in shock.

I was sixteen. I was wearing stripy knee-high socks. I thought I was hot stuff.

Then, fast forward a few weeks, to this one: just me and Jono, sitting in the office at his parent’s house, playing a computer game (‘Jones in the Fast Lane’, I still remember it) and holding hands. My heart is pounding so desperately hard I struggle to appear calm.

Three days later, Jono moved to Cape Town with his family. I was devastated.

But a month or two after that he is back on holiday. I see us, in the Durban Art Gallery on a Friday night for the monthly Red Eye art event. Jono and I sit on a bench surrounded by a swirling mass of creatively (or crazily) dressed people, holding hands. And then he kisses me, and the swirling mass quiets, just for a moment.

I was in love. I lost my appetite, and the need to sleep. I was boundlessly full of energy.

And then a few days later, the last snapshot: we sit under my tree (my favourite tree, the tree I sit under every night that sixteenth year) and he tells me that we can’t be together because there’s someone else, someone in Cape Town, someone he’s in love with.
And I slap him.

Feisty for a sixteen year old, don’t you think?

I left for Tanzania the next week, on holiday with my family. We spent three weeks traveling around Tanzania and Zanzibar, and a week staying at my aunt’s convent. Slowly, painstakingly, I started piecing together the pieces of my broken heart. I couldn’t imagine ever feeling like that about anyone ever again.

Ten years later? A whole new heart.

Giveaway time!

// May 12th, 2009 // 9 Comments » // Love, Strange Nervous Laughter

I’ve never done a giveaway on my blog before, but then I’ve never had a book published in the USA before, so this is obviously a day for firsts!

If you’d like to win a copy of the very cool, very hardcover Strange Nervous Laughter US edition, leave me a comment below… something about love, methinks.

The most creative comment (as judged by an impartial third party!) will win a copy of the book.

International First Love Day – this Friday!

// May 11th, 2009 // 8 Comments » // Blogs, Love, Strange Nervous Laughter, book launch

Are you a blogger? Have you ever been in love? Do you want to take part in International First Love Day this Friday, the 15th of May?

You might not know it, but this Friday is International First Love Day.
As part of the celebrations surrounding Strange Nervous Laughter being released in the USA (tomorrow!) I thought it was time we had a First Love Day. Strange Nervous Laughter is a book about love, you see. About what love does to us, and how we are changed by being in love, out of love, or on the brink between the two. So I thought it was time we talked about love a little.

This Friday is the first official International First Love Day. It’s a chance for all of us, together, to tell about our first loves, in words or pictures or images or photos. It’s a day to commemorate first loves.
And there’s a logo to go with it! (Isn’t it pretty?)

If you’re interested in taking part in International First Love Day, please RSVP (either in the comments or by email)  with your name and blog address, so that I can compile a list of the blogs who are involved, and post it for all to see (on my blog / Facebook / Twitter etc). If you have any friends you think might like to get involved – forward this to them! International First Love Day is a day for everyone.

And make sure you check back on Friday to see the list of International First Love Day participants!

Wonder-full quote:

// April 23rd, 2009 // No Comments » // Inspiration

I just read this in a chain letter (of all places!) and thought it was uncannily well-timed…

“May today there be peace within. May you trust that you are exactly where you are meant to be. May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith in yourself and others. May you use the gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you. May you be content with yourself just the way you are. Let this knowledge settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love. It is there for each and every one of us.”

Swimming upstream.

// February 25th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // Decisions, Inspiration, Life (and the living of it)

I just had the most delightful lunch with a friend of mine, and we were talking about this recent realisation of mine that life opens certain doors and closes others, and if you can just listen, hard, to where you are being directed, you’ll end up in the exact right place.

What was so interesting, though, is that this morphed into a conversation about stress, and the un-necessity of it. In essence, what we figured out is that when you’re doing what you want to do, what makes sense to you and what you love, there’s no stress. It’s only when you swim upstream and try to force life into the mould that you think it should fit into that things get stressful.

I know this has been written about a million times before, but it just occurred to me and I thought I’d share it with you… Stress is an obvious sign to us that what we’re doing is not in alignment with what is right for us. And if we could just follow our inner voice, we’d stay in alignment more. Instead of seeing stress as a positive (or, at least necessary) by-product of being productive, let’s all learn to listen to it again – and stop doing whatever is causing it.

What do you think? A wise course of action?

So how was your day of love?

// February 17th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Cape Town, Life (and the living of it), Love

What a bad blogger I am! I didn’t even mention Valentine’s Day. My apologies.

I suppose it’s because Valentines has never been a huge deal for me. Which is odd, considering my passion for love and my collection of all things heart-shaped! I suppose I’ve always been part of the gang that thinks you should be loving and romantic every day.
That said, I do think sometimes we need a kick up the pants, and this year’s Valentines was a perfect example of that for me…

My man and I ended up celebrating on Friday the 13th, because my brother and sister-in-law and their adorable baby were staying with us and I said we’d babysit on Friday. So my man cooked me up an amazingly delicious feast – a bacon, baby potato and spinach leaf starter followed by a herb and sticky chicken salad and chocolate souffle. Oh yes. I said chocolate souffle. It was INCREDIBLE.

We had dinner by candlelight and played a fun game called “I love you more than…” which entailed finding things we love, and then saying how much more we loved each other.
For example, “I love you more than you love a bar of 70% dark chocolate that you don’t have to share with anybody.” (Me to him).
“I love you more than you love a ladybird landing on your finger.” (Him to me).
“I love you more than swimming in the sea.” (Me to him, but a stretch!)
It was fun, and silly, and so lovely to spend quality time with each other with nothing else to do and nowhere else to go. I think sometimes when you live together you have to work a little harder to make things romantic.. We have so much fun together, but it’s easy to forget to make things special.

And we exchanged little cute gifts, which was fun. I got two heart-shaped dishes for my kitchen, which I’ve been eyeing out for weeks!

I think what made this year’s Valentines so special was that I didn’t pretend I didn’t want to celebrate. Usually I say it’s not a big deal and we don’t have to get each other anything or make a fuss, and then I end up disappointed when I don’t get anything and there’s no fuss. This year I suggested we have a romantic dinner and get each other little tokens, and I was so happy!

Amazing, isn’t it, how sometimes you just have to be bold enough to ask for what it is you want?

On actual Valentines night my brother cooked us an incredible dinner (think carpaccio, freshly caught fish and calamari and chilli rolls!) and my man and I went to a superfun party and danced the night away. All in all, a day full to bursting with love…

How about you?

The One?

// December 4th, 2008 // 3 Comments » // Inspiration, Life (and the living of it), Love

It’s a question I’ve always been fascinated by – how do you know if you’ve met the One? Do you know instantly? Is it a growing realisation? Is there just one One? Are there a few and it all depends on timing?

No matter how many people I’ve asked, I’ve never felt anyone gave me a satisfactory answer. Some people knew the instant their hands touched. Others took a few years of happiness to realise that this was what they were looking for. Some say there’s one ultimate soulmate. Others say that depending on where you are in your life, you’re better suited to certain Ones. The whole thing has given me a headache any time I’ve thought about it in the past few years.

And then, all of a sudden, it hit me yesterday.

My answer to, “How do you know if you’ve met the One?”

(This is just my answer. I’m beginning to think everyone has their own unique answer to this question.)

So how do I know if I’ve met the One?
I don’t get sick of him.

I’m such a loner, you see, even more now that I’ve been given free rein over my life. I can quite happily not see anyone all day and not notice. The most I’ll do is one social event a day (i.e. coffee or dinner) and I don’t really notice when I don’t speak to people on the phone. I love really intensely, and I’m passionate about family and deep friendships, but I don’t need a lot of quantity with them. Quality does it for me. I don’t see being a loner as a bad thing at all, it’s simply the way I relate to the world. Most of my time alone and then the time I spend with others is quality time.

However.
That said.
I do find it difficult to see people all the time. There’s almost nobody in the whole world I want to see every day. It’s just too much – too much on time, you know? And it’s not that I get sick of them, exactly, it’s just that I start craving alone time. I need a few hours to catch my breath.

With my man, though, that doesn’t happen. We can spend a nonstop weekend together and I don’t get claustrophobic. I can see him every day and I never get tired of him and we never run out of things to say. I said to him last night that sometimes being with him feels like being alone. That’s the highest compliment, as far as I’m concerned.

And at the end of the day, that’s what it means for me to have found the One. Someone I don’t need space from. Someone I want to share my every days with.

What does it mean for you to find the One?