So far about 80 in the past 7 months, I have another 10 arriving this week...but I am greedy....each tree is either edible by humans,insects or animals, or create habitat for all..

I also have a huge carbon footprint to compensate for, in the moving of this house, the renovations...each element of it...so I am not some altruistic saint, far from it!...I greedily want food forests, and to somehow tread a little lighter on the planet.

Mother....the constant..the gentle touch, the soft stroke, the straightening of clothes, the favourite meals, the endless making of dressup costumes from almost nothing at the last minute...the fear as the child strides out into the world...the silent tear as the little hand is released on the first day of school..the bust your heart wide open with pride at their achievements.

I didn't have a lot of that growing up with the familial mother...however, in my lifetime I have had many mothers..

Some appearing in hand knitted cardigans, on a train, sharing their wisdom,others sharing a soft touch and a quiet smile, still others carrying to my door a home made soup when I have been ill..

Mother to me is the gentleness in this world, the nurture and the strength of wisdom...

...with mother's day here in some countries, and just around the corner for many others....what makes a mother for you?

What special qualities does she have, or does/did yours?

Or what qualities of Motherhood, have you discovered becoming one yourself?



My children taught me patience, they taught me to be selfless, when they were tiny and helpless, they taught me kindness and compassion, how to be fully present in the moment, and to live in that moment...they reminded me of the world at my feet...the almost invisible world going on around us.

They taught me expansion of my heart to infinite dimensions, they taught me flexibility, how to laugh at myself, and how to love without condition....they are my greatest teachers, and without them, I would not be the person I am today...I am incredibly blessed to have them call me mother.

I am drawn to the quiet, calm mothers...the gentle and serene mothers...I have learnt through other mothers, humour, and a selflessness that was inconceivable before I became one myself.




What does mother mean to you?

Would it be fairer to say, that fidelity is unique to each of us, and how we view it, and what we require of a partner?

That many people are simply weak, uncaring, or selfish, and others may find themselves in a torturous predicament, duty bound to a committed relationship...but deeply attracted, perhaps even in love with another?


I feel underlying everything is if you, (generalising) carry yourself with respect for your partner, and your self...then being honest BEFORE the act...or the intent of the act, is the kindest way to behave.

Firstly, welcome Jeanne


Also, I wonder if you met a woman say 5 years older than you, who was fun, intelligent, confident and excited about the future, would you find her attractive?...or interesting enough to catch your attention?

I wonder if it is age related, or merely the energy, and the apparent freedom of younger women..

I also feel, statistically, you are dealing with a smaller group of same sex relationship orientated people, so it may appear to be a more difficult challenge to find your ideal partner. In having said that, I don't think at all it is impossible, nor do I find your attraction to younger women at all creepy....you are drawn for whatever reasons, to whomever you are drawn to....same as all of us.

I am sure, somewhere there is a woman who will find you her perfect partner, as you will her...and I can't wait for the giggles over age ending up being completely irrelevant...


and I have $5AU on her being older...

Thankyou....but to be fair...I do wonder if, at the time, had he chosen differently...how I would have felt...and also he had no idea she was pregnant...she didn't want to 'trap' him into a decision, especially when he was married with two children and one on the way...

I saw that as incredible sacrifice...she was a single mother with two children already...she chose to keep the pregnancy...(abortion doesn't have as huge a drama here in Australia)...and to raise that child single-handedly....no child support, nothing.

I have a great deal of admiration for her, as a woman...and as a mother...and as I said in my prior post, people can't help who they fall in love with...and we had all known each other, (her ex was my children's father's best friend, and she, mine)...since we were quite young.

I feel sad for them...it is very possible that if during their first dalliance, they had come to me, and fessed up...(in a really strange twist, their first and only dalliance for years, was the night my first child was born, they were both support persons at the labour...an incredibly emotional time spent together, and I often wonder if it was a human contact thing, after witnessing something so mind boggling, primal, and beautiful....hospitals ejected fathers and birth support persons quite quickly after a birth in those days, I wonder if they simply needed comfort and closeness)...I would have certainly have wished them well..

Understanding of course, I had fairly simplistic ideals of what attachment is, and was..and really never saw love, and parenthood as a life-binding experience between parents...as in they were stuck with each other for a lifetime.



I have also been thinking about Scorpio's comments on monogamy...is anyone truly monogomous...?

In it's purest form....we would all only ever have one love partner, one sex partner....for life, and past their death, if we as a species were monogomous..hence my statement of I don't believe we are monogomous as a species...we don't mate for life...or there would be no dating sites...

I know I fall in love often...with different people...some part of them resonates within me...be it their writing, their ideals, their music...their art, their purpose...


However, I choose, and only I can...on how I conduct myself with the person....and I prefer an open and respectful honesty with an intimate romantic partner.

Oh dear!....big reaction there...one woman makes a statement as to her own beliefs....that's all that happened...one woman, who does not believe that humans are essentially monogomous...one woman who has not been raised in your country with your beliefs....that's all that happened...

I was never told, not made to believe that infidelity is looked down upon as a disgrace, nor to be cast aside..

Neither are many European countries, like France, Italy, Spain, for example....a mistress or lover is quite acceptable societally..


Perhaps it is a more American thing, I don't know...???

My children's father found himself distracted twice by the same woman over a 9 year period....the first time...it had been an extremely emotional night for all of us...(she was my closest childhood friend).

They both appeared to be remorseful in the unspoken language of their bodies....so I let it rest.

The second time was 9 years later, and they had developed a relationship whilst he worked away from home...she asked him to choose...and he did....unbeknownst to me.

Four years later we parted...for reasons unrelated to his attraction to my then friend....which time and distance...(and I learnt after, their affair)...had cooled our friendship and we had become very remote.

I found a card from her to him, a xmas card....and I noticed another child's name added to her children...so I rang her to ask after Tamara...not knowing much of anything...well...you could have scraped my jaw off the floor!!!...seems there is a fifth child of his about....only 3 months younger than my youngest son.


How did this affect me?....I was gobsmacked....but not angry...I knew on some level, of their attraction, I had known of their one night dalliance 14 years earlier..I explained to her that both her and him had wasted 14 years of their lives...14 years of my life...if they cared that deeply for each other, they had only needed to fess up...and would have been free to pursue a life together.

I believe people can't help who they fall in love with...they can help what they choose to do about it...and being honourable and honest is the most respectful way to go about it.

I don't have trust issues regarding fidelity...as I don't see humans as essentially monogomous...I don't have any expectations...and not because I am jaded or so damaged, etc etc etc...

My way of getting about in an intimate romantic relationship is quite different from many others, the incapacity for sexual monogomy is not a deal breaker for me...

But denying one's self their own truth is....so is not being honest and respectful.

it's Mother's Day here in Australia also...

I'll be doing what mothers do...making breakfast for a tribe of 14 year old girls, washing up...feeding the animals, then going to work.

A gypsy artist in your backyard???...on family roadtrips?

Can you be one when your kids are all grown up?

Could it be a delayed gratification dream?...the oldest gypsy artist backpacker in Europe?

Ummm....if you don't have dependent children...you could!

Bry, I can only share my thoughts from an outside perspective...and in some way I hope they help...

With 9/11....the footage was shown globally for days, and the world was horrified....terrified...and saddened.

Is it possible the footage shown of the Twin Towers falling, and the carnage that ensued, was about firstly, informing, secondly creating an empathy, around the world?...did that not happen, even if not intentionally?

Is it fair to say what came from the visual information was an almost immediate 'call to arms' for the US, and many countries to support the US?...in both practical, and then military?

A unification, of many countries, and at the time, an emotional, graphic desire to stand beside the US?




I don't feel the sharing of the footage of the death of Osama would have the same emotional reaction, for other countries.....is it possible this is part of the reason it has been decided to not show it?

The expediency, and the finality of it feels more like a job that had to be done...and an almost quiet dignity in not plastering the media with it.

I understand many in the US have an almost insatiable need to view the footage....so they can then find some form of closure...

I do wonder if it was the wider world views, the perception of concerns of justice versus vengeance...(no trial, no having the criminal held to accoutability, diminished in the witness box, to nothing more than an insane, vicious old man).... over a fast expedient death..... that have been a part of not sharing this footage.

I've had dreams....and some of them I have lived...

I have had one solid dream since I was little...to live on the land, grow food, create food forests, have animals around me...and in an old timber house...included in that, was a table...with many seats either side...and lots of laughter, and joyful faces around it...a family...in whatever form that took...I have all of it now.

I dreamed a life....and now I live my dream.

My purpose?...I didn't know for many years....until I held my first born...then it seemed I dropped into my skin, I fit it...and became fully aware of my purpose...to be a mother...to love with a ferocity and depth I had not know existed.

Thankyou Artlo....and I agree, quite often I do make judgement calls...I am judging...weighing, measuring, and as we all do, from our own perceptions.

I wonder how it would be for a couple of posters from here to visit an Australian site...where the predominant posters are Australian....and enter into the frey..what that would look like...then those couple of US posters stay on that site for a few years...

I wonder if they would feel as lost as I do at times....when attempting to make comparisons is virtually impossible...as my point of reference is quite 'foreign' to the topics I read.

and just to let you know....I took no offence whatsover from your post...if anything I appreciated your honesty.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/video/2011/05/05/3208728.htm

I'm wondering if it wouldn't also be helpful for a mature woman to know exactly the same things?

I read down the list and was ticking them off for myself...

I meant to add....I try to use YOUR people..YOUR country...etc etc...as a way of acknowledging I am from a different country...and generalising about the WHOLE...

If I have written YOU people, usually I am referring to the posters in the thread....

if I haven't, then I do apologise, it was not my intent at the time of typing..

Perhaps I am...perhaps wrapped up in all of it, is trying to understand the common man of the US...the overview....and are you not doing the same with me with your perceptions?


What I asked of mightymoe was why he felt justified in supporting one person's opinion, of if you aren't happy with it...then leave...or kwitchabytching....when he at times has expressed his displeasure.

I'm not bothered by people being proud of their origins...

it's watching the complete condemnation of others that has me trying to figure out what is what.



I am not superior....and like all have my own views and opinions..and get told to butt out as I am not an American and therefore have no validity.

I appreciate that you have little time for my opinions on the boards JB....and understand that it is the differences which show the uniqueness of each other.




I do try to be specific...and also show generalisations...where they are...


You are most certainly entitled to your views of me...and there are times where perhaps I do appear look down my nose at PEOPLE.....irrespective of their country of origin....as I have witnessed you do the same.

A permaculture forum/community....facebook, and here..