Memories

Today is a provincial holiday, in memory of the people who lost their lives in the recent earthquake, and all the people who have suffered in others ways. Lost houses, lost loved ones etc.

Although tens of thousands attended, we didn't, but we did watch all the speeches on TV. To be honest, we've sort of moved on, and I didn't need to hear the facts of the disaster over and over again. I did need to hear what comes next, and we heard some of that that, but not enough in my opinion. But then it was a memorial service and maybe that by default is introspective.

Anyway, we marked the memorial by getting our house back to normal. We rehung all the pictures, decommissioned our earthquake ready packs (in favour of our long term solutions) and tidied the outside, such as restacking all our firewood that had toppled over. It was a great family team effort, and represented a turning point for us. So yes, in some days our own "memorial" worked.

This photo was one I rehung, (whoever did the job last time did a real hack job) and of course it?s now a memory, of a memory. My favourite photo of the kids.

Lots of other memories today though, like TVNZ's 14 minute video of the inner city. Very sobering viewing, however why the hell this was released on a day of morning, when everyone was already depressed, who the heck knows. I supposed it was to "add to the mood", however again, I would like to have seen that several weeks ago, and now be looking forward to the rebuilding.

More humour required, as demonstrated by tomorrow.