The Pursuit of Happiness

Lately I haven been thinking about happiness. Not only asking what it is but is there anyone who is likely to have more than a few months of positive happiness during a lifetime? Let’s assume that most of you are familiar with the full quote in the-declaration-of-independence, that is not what I am concerned with here. For the first time this year I heard of the annual International Day of Happiness on March 20th; this year’s theme is Happier Together, focusing on what we have in common, rather than what divides us. So this is what set me thinking of the rather strange phrase The Pursuit of Happiness, which first of all, brought me to the lines in Philip Larkin’s poem for Sally Amis, 'Born Yesterday'

In fact, may you be dull —
If that is what a skilled,
Vigilant, flexible,
Unemphasised, enthralled
Catching of happiness is called.

Nothing Earth shattering, gut busting, deliriously heart palpitating here, nothing pursued at full tilt, nothing desperately grabbed and held and jealously guarded here.

How can you pursue happiness? Isn’t it rather something that falls to your lot unexpectedly, that catches you unawares; if I were to set out to be truly happy deliberately, I wouldn’t have the first idea how to go about it. I am more likely to follow Emily Dickinson's’ Little Stone, of which she asks:

How happy is the little Stone
That rambles in the Road alone,
And doesn’t care about Careers
And Exigencies never fears —
Whose Coat of elemental Brown
A passing Universe put on,
And independent as the Sun
Associates or glows alone,
Fulfilling absolute Decree
In casual simplicity —

Independence, without a care in the world, not seriously striving but rambling happily, are what set the little stone - and therefore us - on the path to happiness.

Even simpler - and more fun is AA Milne’s John who

          had
Great Big
Waterproof
Boots on;
John had a
Great Big
Waterproof
Hat;
John had a
Great Big
Waterproof
Mackintosh --
And that
(Said John)
Is
That.

Yes, John and that great big puddle is waiting for you and what greater happiness can there be than jumping right in with both feet?

But Judith Viorst, the American writer, newspaper journalist, and psychoanalysis researcher - someone I had not come across before I ruminated about happiness - and what a happy find she turned out to be - sums it up for me perfectly:

Happiness (Reconsidered)

Is a clean bill of health from the doctor,
And the kids shouldn't move back home for
more than a year,
And not being audited, overdrawn, in Wilkes-Barre,
in a lawsuit or in traction.

Happiness
Is falling asleep without Valium,
And having two breasts to put in my brassiere,
And not (yet) needing to get my blood pressure lowered,
my eyelids raised or a second opinion.

And on Saturday nights
When my husband and I have rented
Something with Fred Astaire for the VCR,
And we're sitting around in our robes discussing,
The state of the world, back exercises, our Keoghs,
And whether to fix the transmission or buy a new car,
And we're eating a pint of rum-raisin ice cream
on the grounds that
Tomorrow we're starting a diet of fish, fruit and grain,
And my dad's in Miami dating a very nice widow,
And no one we love is in serious trouble or pain,
And our bringing-up-baby days are far behind us,
But our senior-citizen days have not begun,
It's not what I called happiness
When I was twenty-one,
But it's turning out to be
What happiness is.

None of the poets and writers here has mentioned the one cause of happiness that started me off on my small quest: other people. I may leave that for the next post.

When did I become this irritating old person?

There is nothing easier than becoming a recluse, by accident or deliberately, they say. It doesn’t require action, no effort at all, in fact, it just happens and before you know it, you live in a world of one-and-a-half, the half being an elderly dog suffering from dementia. The dog doesn’t know that she is lacking in mental agility; so what if her circadian rhythms have changed, she is fed on demand and let out on demand.

But nobody feeds me and nobody lets me out when I scratch at the door and howl in frustration.

Back to me, the recluse-in-waiting. Loneliness can kill you apparently. It can cause heart disease and depression. Lonely people are more likely to develop Alzheimers. The UK now has a Minister for Loneliness although there is no pill yet. Just give it time.

So, reading about the dangers lurking in solitude I reluctantly made my way out of the house. It’s been cold and windy, not conducive to being out of doors. Besides, I like my own company. I accepted an invitation to join a ladies’ luncheon club, went to a supper for two at the pub, a birthday luncheon at a very nice cafe which was new to me, renewed visits to the gym, ad hoc chats with neighbours and dog walkers. Fine, all fine. By the end of this mad whirl I was searching the diary for an ‘empty’ day, a pottering day I call them. I am truly my Dad’s daughter, he too found the delights of company palatable only ever in small doses. Still, mindful of the dire warnings, I persevered. The ladies’ luncheon has become a fixture. One has to eat, after all, and not cooking my own dinner one day a week will be a welcome change.

Except, there’s a snag. There I was, having enjoyed eating what the waiter called “Spanish pork casserole” - rather tasty, the Spanish part being black olives in the sauce - I made my way to the cashier. A cane, a bag, my gloves, my purse, all in my hands, dressed in a bulky winter coat, I navigated through a narrow aisle and came to a full stop at the till. Well, maybe not a full stop. Momentum took me a step further than the counter and I tottered uncertainly. This caused me to a) drop the cane, b) my gloves. The cashier came out and picked them up for me. I then opened my purse and took some notes out. English notes are now made of plastic, very slippery. Obviously, I dropped the notes next. There was a fire close by and one of the tenners floated gracefully towards it. I snatched it up just before it hit the flames, again dropping my cane. I had stuffed the gloves into my coat pocket. The cashier didn’t bother to come out to pick it up this time, I imagine he was leaving that until right to the end of my transactions. My bill came to a tenner plus coins. I did that thing that old people in queues always do, I rummaged around in a separate little coin purse to find just the right change, promptly dropping several coppers. Picking them up - with difficulty - and handing them to the cashier he said “sorry, we don’t take coppers, there’s just not enough room in the till for them.” I resumed rummaging for silver, and found exactly the right amount. The problem of disposal of the coppers remained. I suggested he should put them into one of the charity boxes. Unfortunately, they were located behind me, in the narrow aisle, not easy to get at. By now there was a queue, naturally. I am not sure but I may have heard the faintest sigh from the person behind me, who took the coppers, turned and deposited them in the tin, all in one fluid movement. I really need to practice that.

If I had to accompany me out somewhere, I wouldn’t.

Trying to Stay Cheerful . . . .

but it's not easy in the depths of winter, at this late stage in the season. I had a post planned about the turf wars breaking out among the more aggressively territorial birds, like blackbirds, thrushes, robins et al. Every morning before break of day a thrush sat in the very top of the tall conifer in the garden and shouted out her war cry to all and sundry :”this is occupied land, enter my territory if you dare.” The thrush has been absent for days now, not a peep out of her. The icy Siberian winds, bringing heavy snow and the nastiest weather for years, frightened even the hardiest bird species. Instead of heralding spring they have been squabbling on and around and under the feeding stations. Twice every day I went out to feed them and clear some patches of snow for the ground feeders. It’s been a losing battle. Warmer temperatures are on their way. Hallelujah!

This is a country full of weather watchers, The leading news stories have all concerned themselves with travel conditions, weather reports, endless pictures of people stuck on the roads in cars and lorries, on trains halted midway through journeys, unable to move. Surely, if you don’t use winter tyres or chains, you stay at home when snow is falling in such quantities as we had this past week? And if you have to make your journey, surely you take shovels and blankets and hot drinks and other life saving equipment? As well as said winter tyres and chains? Nah, let’s all complain about the authorities not doing enough to stop the snow.

Anyway, I feel better now. Besides, I think I air this rant every winter.

So, staying cheerful. The more I am cooped up at home the less active I become. I’ve been binge watching ancient episodes of The Big Bang Theory, until I want to chuck something at the screen when Sheldon is at his most opprobrious and the others just humour him and fall in with his wishes. Even Penny just sighs and rolls her eyes.

I have also been binge eating chocolate. It feels like my waistband is shrinking. It can’t be my waist expanding, can it? TBBT, chocolate and frequent warming, calorific snacks, hours reclining in a large, comfy chair, occasionally nodding off for forty winks, none of these promote healthy and active cheerfulness. Ah yes, the gym was meant to provide for that. But guess what, I haven’t been to the gym for a good two weeks, partly due to other engagements and partly due to my car being stranded in the garage.

I had started to enjoy the gym, there is something addictive about regular exercise; the thing is if you, for whatever reason, stop going, the addiction wears off and lethargy sets in and you have to fire yourself up all over again. Tuesday and Friday morning old biddies and old chaps go and use the treadmills and stand bikes, medicine balls, weight training machines and lots of other apparatus whose names escape me. There we all are, turned inwards, counting squats, stretches, pulls and pushes, knee bends, etc.; the fitness instructors give you exercises and homework to do, so many of everything, and we perform, silently, lips moving with the effort of counting, breath getting shorter and muscles beginning to ache.  A friend and I were sitting on two adjacent bikes, both pedalling madly, like a couple in a two seater pedalo on a boating lake. Except that we were going nowhere.

Reading has helped to pass the time; there is a pile of unread books awaiting my attention but, instead, I searched for something utterly enchanting on my shelves. Quite unexpectedly, I lit upon the small row of Michael Innes’ crime fiction; I think nowadays these stories would be called 'cosy mysteries’. Innes’ real name was J.I.M. Stewart, he was an academic and serious writer of literary criticism, but his crime fiction is a delightful mixture of crime, erudition, adventure and a charming picture of an imaginary England which, if it was ever real, disappeared between the wars. I chose ‘Christmas at Candleshoe’, an amusing tale, beautifully told, of some eccentric country folk, and a gang of boys prepared to defend the dilapidated manor and its nonagenarian owner against all comers, particularly a group of shadowy thieves bent on removing long buried treasure. The book reads as if it had been a pleasure to write, with Innes indulging himself gleefully. I shall reread the others I have by and by. I am looking forward to reacquainting myself with Sir John Appleby next.

A Week’s Worth of Positive Thought

birch in November

maybe.

Try as I might I can’t find anything good about November, except that it’s nearly over and hasn’t been too onerous a month this year. In fact, it’s been flying by; what happened to it, where did it go? There’s been barely enough time to indulge in proper misery and the trough of despond and I hardly touched sides, although I tried my best. (Any more cliché-d phrases and I shall make myself sick).

Misery and I are good friends, and sometimes I positively relish her. Still, I’m going to try and give her up, at least for a week. The fault for this decision lies with a friend I met in the village yesterday. We were standing in the middle of the roadway - we do that here in Valley’s End, cars frequently have to make their way around gossiping villagers - catching up. It was dark and dank and dismal and I was hoping she would join me in a moan and a whinge about  . . . .  well, anything really. I’m not fussed. But no, she said she had decided to find something to be pleased about in every day, little, unimportant things maybe, but something to cheer herself up. I had always thought of her as made of sterner stuff, stiff-upper-lip stuff, after all, she is a scientist, but there you are, this mania for ‘positive thinking’ can hit anyone at any time.

Alison was particularly chuffed yesterday because she had been making mayonnaise; the mayonnaise had promptly curdled and she was about to throw it out when she pulled herself up, addressed herself in a firm voice and set about uncurdling it. She succeeded and she has a jar of decent mayonnaise to show for it.

So, just to see what it feels like, I too am going to try to find a small pleasure in every day for one week. And shall report on success or failure here.

I do so hope I won’t regret this. 

A Do-Gooding Liberal Goes To The Pub.

The first thing I heard was a woman’s loud voice: “ Oh, he’s gorgeous. What a lovely boy.” She went on and on in the same vein. “What a darling. Look at his beautiful eyes. Just look at them. Oh, you darling, you are a beauty, Here, let me cuddle you.” And more. “You are a sweetie, and so good. Isn’t he well-behaved”.

I was sitting, on my own, at a corner table in the Church Inn in Ludlow, right hand stabbing at scampi, chips and salad, left hand holding my iPhone book.  I couldn’t see who this miracle creature was, but obviously the cutest thing on two legs. Two legs? Surely not, nobody makes as much fuss of a child. Besides, there’s always a ‘coo-chi-coo in it when there’s a baby involved. This creature was not being patronised, this creature was admired as a paragon and petted.

Ah, petted. It had to be an animal, most probably a dog. The Church Inn allows dogs to come in. Children are allowed in too but  not quite as welcome. Finally, the woman stopped shouting and a couple came past my table, making for the exit. They had a large, rather stout and very hairy dog in tow.  He was indeed well-behaved and docile, his lead hanging fairly loose and all three of them relaxed. The waitress, for such she was, followed them for a few steps, stopping at a table opposite me. “He’s lovely,” she sighed and “isn’t he a big boy.”

She had my full attention now that I could see her. Fortyish, a bit buxom, like all the best barmaids, dressed in tight-fitting black clothes, black boots, with dark abundant hair pinned back with combs. A real pub landlady.

The table opposite me was occupied by a middle aged couple, having a sandwich lunch. They were clearly regulars, because the waitress appeared to know them.

“I prefer them to children”, she offered. “You wouldn’t believe the kids that come in here sometimes. Chucking food around, crying and shouting, running between the tables and having big enough tantrums to frighten the customers away. The other day there was a kid who scribbled all over the table with his crayons. Would you believe it?”

“I wouldn’t mind so much if they were regulars. No, they come in once and think they own the place. Think their kids can get away with murder. Tourists are the worst.” November is not tourist season, there was no danger that one of that particular breed of customer was within earshot. Ludlow depends very much on the tourist trade and it would never do to insult a tourist to his face.

“Give me dogs any day". She stopped for a minute to make sure she wasn’t offending the couple at the table. “Do you have children?” The couple shook their heads. “Right, you’re like me. I don’t have kids either, never wanted any. Dogs are less hassle any day.”

“Actually,” she continued, in full flow once again, “I blame the parents. Do they stop the little darlings from creating havoc? Do they, heck. Not likely. It’s all - here her voice attempted a posh accent - 'do stop it, darling; don’t do that'. But they don’t really stop them. Bloody liberal do-gooders. "

Eh? I must have missed something. Where and when did liberal do-gooders come into the picture?

“Bloody liberal do-gooders, that’s who I blame,” she continued. When I was naughty as a kid, I got a clip round the earhole and a smart smack on the back of my legs. Didn’t do me any harm. Nowadays, you’re not allowed to touch them.” The couple agreed with her and all three snorted in disgust.” No, give me dogs any day. No trouble, dogs.”

All this time I kept my head well down and my eyes fixed to the screen of my phone but certainly no longer reading. Would the waitress recognise me for who I am when she saw me? A bloody do-gooding liberal? Finally, she turned away from the table opposite, came over to me and reached for my now empty plate.

“Alright?” she asked in a mellow voice, and much reduced volume. “Everything alright Darling?” Weakly I nodded. “Yes thanks, lovely.”

Mum, I’ve got a Penis

and guess what, you’ve got a China.

When Kelly’s Georgie was six he had sex education lessons at school.  Nothing but the most basic facts and a few diagrams, and, according to Kelly, very little in the way of sniggering, but great excitement. The moment Georgie's dad came home from work he too was treated to this staggering revelation, as was Georgie’s sister Chloe. “Dad, I've got a penis and so have you and Chloe has a China. “ Georgie just couldn’t get over it.

This little gem came up because Kelly told me about an exciting week with Chloe, who is twelve and has just started her periods. Chloe is miffed because she can’t go swimming this week but otherwise she is taking it in her stride. She is annoyed at being the first in her class but Kelly has assured her that she’ll therefore be the coolest among the girls and she’ll be the centre of attention for a while.

How times have changed. We had one lecture in my all-girls-school, for all ages, from 10 to 16 year olds (16-18 year olds were excused, presumably because they already knew the difference between boys and girls and the fun you could have with that difference). A man, he may have been a priest in my catholic grammar school, or less likely, a doctor, stood in front of row upon row of giggling girls in the school’s assembly hall and held forth about the birds and the bees and how kissing was sinful and the first step on the road to perdition. Come to think of it, he must have been the school priest, surely no doctor would have spouted such nonsense even in the unenlightened days of the late 50s?

I was one of the youngest and my knowledge of all things physical and carnal was still zero after the lecture. Menstruating for the first time was a frightening experience for an innocent like me, I was sure I was about to die. My mother, who never made any effort to explain the facts of life to me, blamed the school for not having done so.

Dear Aunt Katie, with whom I was staying at the time, just smiled reassuringly and when my mum came to collect me, told her to speak up, finally. All my mum managed was, “you’re alright, you’re not dying. That’ll happen every four weeks now.” Poor mum, she just never could overcome her inner straitjacket.

SHORTS - Gossip

One winds on the distaff what the other spins. (Both spread gossip). 

Pieter Bruegel the Elder - Dutch proverb

Gossip is idle talk or rumour, especially about

the personal or private affairs of others.

Prudence said we should come and have a coffee. I accepted with alacrity. Sometimes I like to gossip. Problem is, I never know any, so people like Prudence are very useful to me after a long period of abstinence. Before we go, I arrange for a parade of people in my mind’s eye whom I haven’t seen or heard of for a while and with whose current circumstances I need to familiarise myself. Not all the gossip is malicious; Beloved came too and he wouldn’t stand for that, but some bits are just too juicy to keep under wraps. Prudence is an old lady, one of the many in our small village who can be relied on to have her finger on the pulse of public opinion on any delicate matter, like who has offended whom and why, who’s having an affair with whom, whose son is in trouble, etc. On this occasion it was righteous indignation at the shenanigans of an 80+ year old who very recently buried his wife and is already actively on the look-out for her replacement. Well, at 80+ he doesn’t have all that much time left for renewed nuptials; I can quite see the reason for the hurry. All the same, we were united in tutting at such callous bad taste, as well as wondering who could possibly be desperate enough to take him up on the offer.

In a historical thriller I read recently ( one of C.J. Sansom’s Shardlake series - highly recommended if you want something light, fast paced, Tudor, and well researched) the etymology of the word gossip was mentioned. So I looked it up. It comes from Old English gossib, god sibb,  a godparent, close relation, confidant. What an enormous distance for a word to travel,  from something good like a sponsor, a friend and mentor, to an idle tittle-tattler who can cause real grief and unhappiness. 

Beloved must have been quite confused, he left one of his gloves behind, he thought. One glove on its own is an abomination, if you must lose one, make sure you lose both. Having hunted high and low, not finding it, even retracing steps from Prudence’s door to ours next morning, I rang her. Putting the receiver down I heard a voice from the lobby: “It’s alright,” he said, “found it. It was here all the time. Pretending to be a plastic bag.” Do you wonder I need the odd bit of light relief occasionally?

Request for some Sporting Advice from my US Blogging Friends ....

please.

I understand you just had one of those annual events which change the history of your nation and put every citizen into a great excitement. I also understand that the following is something like:

“When they meet there is neither comparing of numbers, or matching of men; but a silver ball is cast up and that company which can catch, and carry it by force or sleight to the place assigned, gaineth the ball and victory. The Hurtlers take their next way over hills, dales, hedges, ditches, yea, and through bushes, briars, mires, plashes and river whatsoever: so as you shall sometimes see 20 or 30 lie tugging together in the water, scrambling and scratching for the ball. A play both rude and rough. The ball in this play may be compared to an infernal spirit, for whosoever catcheth it, fareth straighways like  a mad man, struggling and fighting with those that go about to hold him. You shall see them retiring home as from a pitched battle, with bloody pates, bones broken and out of joint, and such bruises as serve to shorten their days; yet all is good play, and never Attorney or Coroner troubled.”


They did that sort of thing in Cornwall at the beginning of the 17th century. There’s nothing new under the sun.

How To Build A Bomb

Tom McCall as Hans Bethe, John Heffernan as J Robert Oppenheimer and Ben Allen as Edward Teller in Oppenheimer. Photo by Keith Pattison

From The RSC Production

Seeing the same play many times is like re-reading a favourite book: there is always something you missed before;  with Shakespeare’s plays I would go so far as to say you must see them as often as they come back to a stage near you. It will take several productions before you can stop concentrating on every word - and so miss the performance. Only when you know what comes next will you appreciate the depth, colour, drama, the layers of humour and tragedy, the sheer genius of the works, whether written by one man or several.

But sometimes the first performance of a play is all you need to get goosebumps. It happened to me yesterday with a brand new play by a relatively unknown dramatist called Tom Morton-Smith, namely, “Oppenheimer.”  

Synopsis:

1939: fascism spreads across Europe, Franco marches on Barcelona and two German chemists discover the processes of atomic fission. In Berkeley, California, theoretical physicists recognise the horrendous potential of this new science: a weapon that draws its power from the very building blocks of the universe. The ambitious and charismatic J Robert Oppenheimer finds himself uniquely placed to spearhead the largest scientific undertaking in all of human history.

Struggling to cast off his radical past and thrust into a position of power and authority, Oppenheimer races to win the 'battle of the laboratories' and create a weapon so devastating that, with the detonation of a single device, it would bring about an end not just to the Second World War but to all war.

As the political situation darkens, Tom Morton-Smith's new play takes us into the heart of the Manhattan Project and explores the tension between the scientific advances that will shape our understanding of the fabric of the universe, and the justification of their use during wartime, revealing the personal cost of making history.

The play left the four of us rather subdued and in need of a fortifying cup of tea before tackling the long   journey home from Stratford-upon-Avon back to Shropshire. To break the spell I decided to pop into the theatre shop for some cards. The merchandise at the RSC gift shop is undoubtedly overpriced but tasteful rather than tacky, as in so many other gift shops where a bit of additional cash is raised for an attraction.

As I took my purchases to the cash till I overheard one of the assistants say to the other :  “Is Oppenheimer out yet?”  Being a helpful sort of person I butted in and said “ O yes, quite a while ago.”  Whereupon the second assistant said, deadpan and with no discernible trace of irony in her voice or facial expression: “Good, they’ll have had time to build another bomb then.”

Reader, I fell for it. Blame the play and my continued preoccupation with it or blame my natural slow wittedness. All excited and breathless I said : O, do they build a new bomb for each performance?” (a large bomb-shaped object is suspended from girders and slowly appears above the stage in the final part of the play, culminating in darkness and the noise of an almighty explosion)

“O yes,” the assistant said, “of course they do.” She kept her eyes firmly lowered, it doesn’t do to make fun of the paying customer too obviously.

I felt a 'proper Charlie’ but when I stopped being embarrassed the spell the play had cast over me was broken. Which was not a bad thing. 

I Want Dogs' Ears, Please

Last weekend we went to a dinner party, that high point of social interaction. Yes, there are still people who invite us; in case you are wondering why, I keep this blog secret. You know my general opinion of parties and social events, but some dinner parties are great. This one was. A group of bright, clever, articulate people assembled round the table in a convivial house, I really don’t know how we got through the IQ security gates; a temporary wand malfunction? There was a real life published literary novelist (not like so many of us blog scribblers calling ourselves writers when all we do is pen blogposts of questionable quality - yes, you in high dudgeon over there, I am including myself). There was a painter, again real life, a journalist and writer of academic books,  and assorted actors - teachers - singers. All very much real life. And, like I said, us.

A dazzling company. No wonder the host forgot about my food allergy and cooked Coronation Chicken with creme fraiche instead of mayonnaise. He gave somebody who can’t eat red onions a side dish containing lots of them and another guest carefully examined the chicken for bits of mango. Mangoes bring on an asthma attack in him. (Notice that I am handing you an idea for an icebreaker if you ever need one at one of your own lavish parties?  Free of charge. Just make the food memorably inedible for a section of the guests and you’re more than halfway to a successful evening. Provide enough quality wine and the guests will be begging you for another chance to be poisoned by you).

But the conversation was great. So was my food in the end. The host magicked me a delicious omelette in the blink of an eye. I was served before the other diners had had access to all the dishes going round.

Getting back to the conversation - the two gentlemen either side of me were extremely adept socially, each spoke to me in turn.  Just as it should be. You turn to your partner on your left and then, at a suitable break in the conversation, or when the next course is served, you dazzle the lady on your right. And so on round the table.

I  hate it when there are several conversations going on at the same time because I always want to listen to the other one. You could just have four people, of course, but then there wouldn’t be enough different viewpoints. And I admit to liking a rowdy table, particularly as the evening progresses. I noticed that the ladies sitting in the middle didn’t bother with dinner party rules: they just spoke across and to right and left as they pleased. This particular host frequently places me at the top end of the table, thereby putting me at a disadvantage, at least until we are all suitably relaxed and I can lean over, usually into the pudding, to catch what is being discussed at the other end.

This is where dogs’ ears come in. Dogs can swivel their ears independently from each other, helping them to identify and capture sounds from different directions, even pick up sound from far away. They can hear things that haven’t even been said yet. As in thunder, for instance. Mille knows about thunder in the next county when I’m still chewing on the first course and she can hear a doggie biscuit tin rattle while she is deep in conversation (i.e. with her nose up another dog’s bottom) in the field by the river.

Hang about though, I’ve just thought of another, more easily achievable way of not missing out at table: dinner parties with a round table. Then we will all be shouting across at each other! No tops or bottoms involved! In or out of the pudding.

Where Are My Socks?

Or Aunt Josephine’s walking stick?

I don’t know about you but my short-term memory seems to have gone on a long holiday, perhaps it’s even moved out entirely.

So when the nurse taking blood to check for some malfunction or other said: “Erm, we are running these memory tests. Nothing too serious, you’ll walk through them. Would you be willing . . . .?”
I thought, why not, perhaps we’ll even find that mislaid memory stick.

Question 1: “a name and address, to be repeated instantly and then recalled at the end of the process.” John Brown, 42 High Street, West Kensington - easy peasy; I’ll never forget the gentleman and his fictitious address now, not ever. But what about the walking stick?

Question 2: “what’s the date today?” It was lucky that I’d checked the date before coming out to the surgery. It doesn’t do to present yourself when you’re not wanted. Normally I don’t even know what day of the week it is, much less the numerical date.

Question 3: “What’s in the news at the moment ?” Ah, that I do know. The horror of it! So I came back with “apart from football? What’s not in the news: Syria, Iraq, Ukraine, people fleeing impossible hardship, war, hunger and disease, Africa, children dying . . . . . .”

She stopped me, “Yes, but what about London, what’s happening there?” Well, as far as I know London is quiet apart from the insane noises politicians are making. So I nearly but not quite scratched my head. “London? Nothing much?”

“Yes, yes,” she said and clicked her tongue, tick-tock-tick-tock, while batting her hand from side to side.

“Oh, London, Wimbledon, the tennis you mean?”

She beamed at me. "Yes, Wimbledon”!

Friko, get your priorities right!

She asked two further questions, which I answered correctly; sadly I have forgotten what they were.

Aunt Josephine’s walking stick and the socks were found, peacefully cohabiting, on the newel post.

Somebody - could it have been me? -  moved the socks from the rail around the AGA, where they were drying after I’d got my feet wet in the tall grass, and had hidden them under Beloved’s cardigan, which had also found a temporary home there.

I thought I remembered that I had slipped the walking stick inside through the open door, while I took my shoes off and promptly forgotten all about it. When I came to look for it next day it was not to be found in any of its usual places: not hanging from a rung of the ladder in the shed, not slipped over the towel rail in the scullery, not in its proper place in the umbrella and stick stand in the lobby. Somebody had moved it. Or had I lost it on the way home yesterday and never brought it in at all?

It’s my favourite stick, fits into my hand and is high and sturdy enough; Aunt Josephine was as tall as me and the stick saw her through many an arduous hike in the mountains. It’s handy for whacking nettles and fighting off axe murderers. I needed to find it and therefore went out and retraced every step of the walk of the previous day. Nothing.

And then I found the socks.

As for John Brown? He’s still at 42, High Street. West Ken. And ever more shall be so.

We All Love Our Dogs!

From This England, selections from the New 

Statesman column 1934-1968:

Benno

A dog usually possesses those fine qualities in which human

beings are sometimes deficient. If your dog were

suddenly to know you as you are, and not as he thinks you are, could 

you look him in the face?

o-o-o-o

The Hon, Mrs. Joan Barran is one of the famous Ruthven twins
and a daughter of Lord Ruthven.  Her Dachshund, Snoutie, follows the prevailing fashion of single pearl earrings and choker collar, and manages to look most attractive in them. 

Millie

o-o-o-o

In character the Irish terrier is what may be defined as a 'perfect
gentleman’ and moreover one is thoroughly aware of his status. For instance, the one I owned would always differentiate between guests, in whom he displayed a courteous interest, and the servants, whom he treated with polite indifference.

o-o-o-o

A special corner by dogs for dogs will be included in “Calling All dogs”, which the BBC are putting on next Sunday .......
The view in Broadcasting House is that, although dogs do not normally display much interest in the loudspeaker, they will if special material is broadcast for them.

By Way of a Diary Entry

I need a wife. Even a husband would do.

I am old. Like the castle. And like the castle I just want to sit and look pretty. I want to brandish my pension book and leave big decisions to others, younger than me. I want to choose what I do, not have a course of action forced on me.   Enjoyable things. I don’t want to learn new tricks or do jobs which are meant for young people. Or men. Yes, men. Nothing of the feminist about me today.

Yesterday I was hanging out of the velux on the sloping roof trying to clear the channels either side of the window from moss and debris. There’s a new seepage stain in the cupboard in the roof space, which means rainwater gets in somewhere. Three different sets of workmen have looked at the roof, scratched their heads,  rearranged their boys’ bits, fiddled with tiles and sheets of some metal and gone away, leaving a big bill behind. One of these days that window will be the death of me.

I’ve been going into CBT -  Cognitive Behavioural Therapy -  on the internet this morning. There’s this phobia I have about driving up a particular steep lane in Valley’s End. About five years ago I lost control of the car on this lane, rolled backwards into a gate, demolished the gate and wrote off the car; nobody else was involved and nobody got hurt. Since then I have avoided this lane. Unfortunately that makes coming into Valley’s End from the Welsh side a bit of a bummer; either I have to go the long way round, two to three miles extra, or persuade Beloved to do that bit which actually takes no more than five minutes. Beloved no longer has a driving licence because of his poor eyesight.  Making him drive could cause problems with the law. So you see, one way and another it would be good if I could get over this phobia.

I told my doctor and he advised CBT. Really and truly, I would prefer to sidestep the whole issue, ostrich-like (do ostriches really stick their heads into the sand? I must find out); but Knighton is where the poetry group meets and my face-girl has her treatment room. Which do I choose? Give them up or endure the inevitable panic attacks?

A competent wife or husband would take this decision off me. They’d only need to be part-time, of course. The law also frowns on bigamists.


I learned on the website of MIND - for better mental health that CBT can be an effective therapy for a number of problems:

anger management
anxiety and panic attacks *
chronic fatigue syndrome
chronic pain
depression *
drug or alcohol problems
eating problems *
general health problems
habits, such as facial tics
mood swings *
obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) *
phobias *
post-traumatic stress disorder
sexual and relationship problems
sleep problems *

The list awards me seven brownie points, that is if chocolate cravings and a mild need to arrange pills, chocolate buttons, newspapers, spoons and socks in orderly matching pairs, strictly aligned according to length, count.

What happened to those wonderful days when the aged were shoved into the inglenook, or in particularly drastic cases, pushed into a cupboard, fed when someone remembered and otherwise forgotten and left to get on with drooling and gnashing their toothless gums. They never had to make a decision.  Actually, that sounds remarkably like some modern nursing homes, except there you may have the added excitement of being called names and given a slap when the carers can’t force your arthritic arms and legs into your garments quickly enough. 

Tubs, Puns and Holy Men

Black tubs are sprouting all over the garden. Paul came yesterday, then today it was Gardener’s turn.  Gardener still hasn’t twigged about Paul. Neither of them gives me more than three hours, which means that between them they provide the day’s work I need. Paul is very different from Gardener, no doubt I shall have to train him up. But there’s promise; he may appear in these pages and we may all get to know him as summer progresses.

During tea break he was telling Beloved and me that he’d taken a long time getting to grips with his chainsaw. “I was really nervous handling it at first,” he said. Sensible man, chainsaws are not to be operated in jest.

Beloved, not a hard worker, but keen to be part of the labour force, told a story.

“When the Royal Opera took the orchestra to Los Angeles a friend and I went to the beach, Venice beach, I think it was called. We saw two men juggling with running chainsaws. They were throwing them at each other, catching them in mid-air.”

When we’d finished laughing, Paul said : “Look, no hands.” I told you he shows promise. He’s not bad as a gardener either.

St Gregory was another punster. That awful Ambrose Bierce said of punning: a form of wit, to which wise men stoop and fools aspire. I like it; Bierce often pleases me.

Yesterday was St Gregory’s Day. In spite of my catholic schooling I am no expert on saints, I simply have access to an almanac. The Venerable Bede had this to say about Gregory the Great (papacy 590-604):

He was moved to send Augustine to convert the Anglo-Saxons by an encounter in the Roman slave market with some fair-haired English captives. On being told that they were Angles, he replied ‘not Angles but Angels' and on hearing that they came from Deira in Northumbria, he retorted that he would save them from the wrath (de ira in Latin) of God. And finally, when informed that their king’s name was ‘Aella’, the relentless ecclesiastical punster rejoined that Christian ‘Alleluias’ would soon be heard in their land.

Apparently, Gregory was also responsible for Gregorian Chant. Who says the early Church Fathers didn’t have a sense of humour.

I still like Paul’s ‘no hands’ though.

Heads Rolling, Then And Now.

"Any ideas for a blog post? I need something light and easy, nothing that will require research, nothing too serious, nothing too personal.”

Having just finished reading ‘Stoner’ by John Williams, the must-read novel of 2013 according to the literary establishment in the UK, I was still deep within the pages of this bleakly depressing and utterly gripping book; nothing suitable sprang to mind.

“Have you mentioned 'Bring Up The Bodies’ yet?” Beloved answered, metaphorically scratching his head. We went to see the second of the Mantel adaptations at the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon last Saturday.

“I want something light and entertaining. Besides,  the people who read my blog are not culture vultures. A review of a serious play would interest few of them.”

“Yes, I see that; of course, you want to write for your readers. Mind you, the Tudors are absolutely at the top of the tree of current interest. You can’t get away from them on TV.”

Beloved had a point. There’s one more or less populist programme after the other about them; learned researchers and historians strutting their stuff in front of the cameras, not to mention fictionalisations with added cleavage, smouldering, meaningful looks and gruesome executions galore.

Henry VIII went in for gruesome executions on a grand scale. Depending on which source you follow, during his reign between 1509 and 1547, a­n estimated 57,000  to 7­2,000 English subjects lost their heads, and not in a nice, flirtatious way. As soon as he ascended the throne he chopped off the heads of his father’s most influential advisers; he was probably just following the old adage  'start as you mean to go on’.  New brooms and all that. By comparison, his daughter , who succeeded him on the throne,  killed fewer than 300 people during her six years as queen. But she came to be called ‘Bloody Mary’. Talk about double standards. Feminism still has a job to do on this one, even in these enlightened times.

“No, writing about Tudor politics doesn’t strike me as an apt subject for a lightweight blogpost.” I needed to turn the conversation back to the matter in hand.

“Put like that, I agree.”

“Just think though, nowadays, if governments want to do away with politicians who have served their purpose, or others, who have become a thorn in the flesh of whoever happens to be paying the piper, they get the media to do it for them. No blood visible. Public opinion will do the rest. Blood and circuses for the 21st century. In Tudor times, the populace gathered around the scaffold or the executioner’s block, today, we read the Daily Muckraker.

“At least we no longer kill them dead.”

“No such luck, instead they get to ‘spend more time with their families’ “.

“This is all very well, and I’m sure we could go on, but it still leaves me short of an idea for a blogpost. Something light and funny, maybe?”






PS: For US readers: 
“Spending time with one’s family is a metaphor for being sent into the desert politically.

Brain Compost

You know those ideas and thoughts you have which disappear into the great void of forgetfulness?

Not the ones which happen to get lost on the way up the stairs or from one room into another;  the ones when you meant to fetch something, do something, and by the time you got wherever it is you wanted to fetch it from or do it, the whole thing has vanished, and you have to start all over again.

Nor the names of books, films and plays you are just about to throw nonchalantly into the conversation when you find your mind a sudden blank and your face red with embarrassment.

Nor the appointments you miss because you forgot to transfer dates from one diary into another.

Nor when you find you have forgotten the name of the person coming towards you with outstretched hands, beaming with pleasure and loudly greeting you by name.

Nor when you forget the names of people in your own family and you recite them all, male and female interchangeable, all the way through, until the final name you utter is the one of the child/aunt/uncle/other grinning delightedly at your discomfort. My dad was particularly good at that; we used to let him work through the list and congratulate him when he finally matched name to person.

No, none of the above.

I am talking about the really good ideas, the clever ones, the insightful, creative ones. Like when you have a brilliant idea for a blog post. Or, if you are of a slightly higher order on the literary scale, an idea for a short story, say. Or at work, a problem which has irritated or confused you for many months, and suddenly, you have that light bulb moment, and there’s the solution, as plain as the nose on your face.  Or maybe you have a really insightful thought, one of those that should be anthologised, an aphorism destined to be forever repeated by bloggers given to filling their posts with quotations.

I am sure you know the sort of thing I mean.

If you do, and are the person who experiences a flash of brilliance, I advise you to write it down there and then. Somebody, something will interrupt your train of thought and the solution to all the evils of the world will have disappeared for ever. Einstein/Shakespeare/Beethoven never allowed a mere mortal  to disturb the creative muse, that’s for sure.

But now I finally come to the point of this post (the idea for which I’ve nicked from PerlNumquist at his blog Mental Floss) : what happens to that collection of bright thoughts which appear like shooting stars across the night sky, only to disappear as quickly? Where do they go?

Everything on our planet is recycled.

Is there a bottomless pit in the brain where they collect, become a kind of primordial compost heap of thoughts which rots down over the years, only to be recycled as manure for new growth?

Is it possible that ‘wisdom comes with age’ is nothing more than absent-mindedness during middle age?

Musicians - Soloists

Mud From A Scraper

No. 6 In An Occasional Series

An instrumental soloist is a musician who, by virtue of an over-developed technique and an excess of individuality, is unsuited to playing in orchestras. His task is a thankless one, for he is always conscious that there are fifty or more performers behind him watching for flaws in his performance. A solo violinist feels that he is being accompanied by twenty players who have studied the work he is playing in detail, and who know that they could play it better. A cello soloist is more fortunate, in that he rarely performs before more than eight of his critical colleagues.

Pianists are in a happier position as they seem to be divided into two classes: a) sensitive ones, who benefit from comparison with the insensitive ones who ignore the orchestra, and b) those others who are oblivious of any hostility they may arouse.

Singers are judged by different standards. It is an old saw that people are either gifted with musicianship or with a good voice; thus a singer exhibiting the slightest trace of artistic sensibility is welcomed by an orchestra however inadequate the voice may be. The majority are praised or condemned for their intonation and the quality of voice, and except in rare cases will be unfavourably compared with famous singers of the past, not only for their voice but also looks and sex appeal. Players know little or nothing about vocal technique, but refuse to relinquish their prerogative to criticise anything in earshot.

The artistic merit of any soloist can be gauged by the amount of applause afforded to him or her by the orchestra. Most players tap their stands at the end of a concerto or aria as an act of thanksgiving that the piece is over - but it also signifies gratitude for the audience the soloist has attracted. If they continue to tap whilst the soloist is taking his second bow, it means that they approve of the performance. If they are still tapping when he is recalled for a third bow, they think he is really good. However, no player applauds after this, lest the soloist be encouraged to play an encore.

Many orchestral musicians entered their careers under the illusion that they would one day be soloists. Despite this, there is no trace of jealousy in their indictment of concerto players, for they come to realise, after fifteen years in the profession, that though there is no kudos to be gained in their work, theirs indeed is the higher calling.

Calories Off Somebody Else’s Plate Don’t Count

It was too hot to cook,  so lunch at the pub it was.

Four late middle-aged ladies sat at the next table, all retired teachers to judge by their very lively conversation. Three of them were eating the speciality of the house, fish and chips, with a side order of mushy peas and a large dish of tartare mayonnaise; the fourth woman had a salad. As she was also the plumpest I wasn’t surprised when she explained that she was on the 5:2 diet. I’d only recently been told by somebody else that this is a relatively painless way of shedding a few pounds, so I was interested in what she had to say.  I looked over and saw her take a chip (French fries) off her friend’s plate.

“Go on, have another,” her friend said. “O no, I won’t, just the one will do”, the dieter said.

“It’s really quite easy to stick to this regime”, she continued, “I eat what I want for 5 days of the week and on two days I reduce my calorie intake to 500. I’m allowed 200 calories for my lunch today and tonight I’ll just have some chicken. I had a boiled egg and fruit for breakfast, so all in all, I shouldn’t be over my limit."

The four of them continued to eat and talk and I turned my attention back to my own food, also fish and chips. The portions were very generous, too much for me, and I started to wrap up my leftovers to take home for Millie. She loves a bit of fish and chips.

The ladies too had eaten what they needed and pushed their plates away, leaving some chips. The salad lady reached over and took another chip. “Nothing nicer than a well-cooked chip, is there,” she said, chewing. “Here you are,” her friend said, “ take them before they get too cold to eat.” One of the others pushed the half full dish of tartare mayonnaise over. “A bit of mayo to go with the chips?” All four giggled.

“O all right, then,” the dieter said, dipping chips into mayonnaise and popping them into her mouth. “Delicious !” she said, “they really do chips well here."

Parallel . . . .

  . . . . . Parking

at the White Horse Inn.

Drama In Two Acts

Act I

We were off to the theatre. “As You Like It”, one of Shakespeare’s comedies with a silly story and lots of fun.  Our friends were on the doorstep, it was time to go; we had a long drive to Stratford-upon-Avon ahead of us.

Kelly was in the house, wielding a noisy vacuum cleaner and all we had left to do was to shoo Millie back inside and set off. Kelly knew that Jay, Millie’s dogsitter, would arrive before she left the house. Jay’s key and pay was on the kitchen counter. Kelly had her own key which she would leave behind when she finished her job.

The drive was uneventful. It was a pleasant day and after a good two hours' car journey we enjoyed sitting on the terrace above the river, eating our sandwiches and watching the ducks. Absentmindedly I pulled a sandwich out of the bag on the table.  “Something wrong here,” I said, "the filling is cheese, I can’t eat cheese.” Sally and Frank had been watching me. “It’s wrong,” Sally said calmly, “because your hand is in our bag.”

Standing in the long queue for the Ladies is never a pleasure; I pass the time by watching myself and all the other ladies dying for a pee before the show in the tall mirrors, as we slowly shuffle towards the tiny cubicles and relief. Standing in line seems to drain the life out of you, we all have a vacant look, intent on getting to the promised land before the last bell.

Beloved and I had seats in the centre front row, we were close enough to the stage to lean on it and I was sitting directly beside and just under one of the two walkways the actors use for their exits and entrances,
often thundering past me but sometimes just standing quietly, alone, or in pairs, silently watching or performing 'off-stage', while the main action takes place in the centre. At a very quiet moment my phone went off, right under the feet of the banished Duke Senior, whose well-turned calf muscle didn’t even twitch.

I hate the morons who can’t remember to switch off their phones; I had pressed the off button long and hard before the show started; surely, it couldn’t have been my phone. Besides, it was a brand new phone, never used, and only one person knew the number,  Jay. Why would she ring me? The faint ringing stopped. Ten minutes later it rang again, still faintly and for just a few rings. I shifted in my seat, getting uncomfortable. I was sure I’d switched the phone off. Concentrating on the play became an effort. Sure enough, the damn thing went off again, just three rings this time. Theatre auditoria provide no holes to crawl into, nor could I interrupt the performance by creeping out; the whole theatre’s attention would have been focussed on me. Sitting so close to the stage, I would have created a huge disturbance. I was stuck.

When the interval came I shot out, examining the phone. It was on and the display showed a 'locked' symbol. I couldn’t do a thing to it, neither switch it on nor switch it off, check for messages or retrieve missed calls. Apparently, the only thing it would do was to sound the ringtone.  I was desperate now and ready to grind it under my heel, when I had a better idea: I removed the battery, which killed it stone-dead.

Act II

All was calm when we arrived home. Millie was alone, hysterically happy to see us, but fine. Jay had taken only a small part of her pay and left a long, apologetic note to say that there were details she would need to tell us as as soon as possible. Within minutes the landline rang.

Jay had been delayed in getting to our house and when she arrived Kelly had gone. Kelly is a very nice woman but she spends more time concentrating on a constant supply of desinfectant and rubber gloves than lubricating thought process mechanisms. Being a brush short of a broom cupboard, she had left the   door locked and shoved the key back in through the letterbox; Millie inside. As well as Jay’s key. The normal arrangement in such cases is for the person leaving to put the key into a hiding place known to all and sundry for the next person. We are nothing if not trusting.

Jay tried all doors; all were locked except for the small, integral, garage door, which leads into the house via another (locked) door. This internal door was the first one she tried to force. No luck. Ditto the front  and back doors; the conservatory doors were open but the inner glass doors were locked. No luck.

Through the letter box Jay could see Kelly’s key on the mat. She went into the village and borrowed a couple of magnets on a stick, a kind of fishing rod for keys. No luck. Jay is not very strong but she has a friend who is. Jay fetched Linda and took her to the up-and-over garage door to see if Linda could push the inner door open. Linda walked straight into the not-quite-fully-open garage door, hitting her forehead on the metal edge, and briefly knocking herself out. Head wounds bleed profusely, Linda went straight to the surgery where the gash in her forehead was cleaned and glued back together. After that she decided Millie would have to chance her luck without her.

Jay hadn’t given up yet, she went to fetch more help, a man this time. A chap’s brute force might succeed where a woman’s feeble efforts had failed. Robyn tried his best, using burglar’s tools on keyholes, but short of actually causing damage he saw no way of getting in.

Poor Jay was in despair. “ I need a magic wand”, she wailed. Angry and frustrated, cursing Kelly, and worried about Millie, who had been locked in for hours, she grabbed hold of the handle to the front door and rattled it as hard as she could.

And the door sprang open!

Perhaps Robyn’s efforts had dislodged the lock, perhaps the combined heaving and pushing had had some effect; whatever the cause, the door opened as freely as a bank’s door when a rich man enters.

So Millie had her walk - albeit a short one - and her dinner after all.

Epilogue

Things rarely work out the way you plan them but All’s Well That Ends Well. We also now have a specific lock in the house which appears to be badly bent out of shape.

“But other than that, Mrs. Friko,  how did you like the play?” “Not bad, not bad at all, thank you for asking."