Buffeted by high winds

Sitting in the Lounge which we in our more plebeian years, called the Sitting Room,/ middle class people, with time on their hands "lounge about"you see whilst working class people sit ready to undertake the next task their masters have in mind ? The rain continues to pound against the window as the wind picks up strength and the trees stripped of their leaves by winter stand gauntly against a gun metal sky. The wind howls down the chimney emphasising the torment outside and we hunker down for the day, being retired one can turn ones nose up at all the things that one should do and wait for a better day.
These seasons and the savage turn of weather, yesterday was a bright clear sunny day, have their source in the Atlantic. We see on the weather forecast the isobars forming according to the pressure variances over the ocean sweeping in, bringing the weather with them and there is nothing to do but marvel at the complexity of the world we live in.
For someone living on the High Velt in South Africa largely removed from the oceanic turbulence, where every day is much as the last day, warm and sunny, the question of climate takes a back seat in our consciousness and we expect the weekend briaa to be held under a blue sky. Of course the stoic Brit' tries to make a feature out of his predicament, pointing out that in this unpredictability lies natural beauty and awe, as we feel and watch nature teaching us a lesson or two.   Poets, painters, authors, fishermen, farmers, builders, all have a view and add to the spectre of any event concerning our weather. The rain of course brings growth, the lack of sunshine develops the greens to capture what sunshine we have and so we are renowned for this "green and pleasant land" but don't tell that to the holidaymaker battling their way down the promenade buffeted by high winds at the sea side.                  

Emptiness (Buddhism style)

Emptiness in terms of the human condition  is a definition in Buddhism that gets to the root of why the philosophical basis of Buddhist reasoning is so hard to fault. Religions are generally based on faith, a creator, a maker of the world and everything in it. To believe in any of the main religions one has to believe in the permanence of everything having been created by god or by human beings. Everything has a label and we attach labels onto things which come into our conciousness. 
The labels are the result of communication and the agreement of people in general to use the same label so long as the definition we use to describe the object of our thought confirms that we are in agreement.
Language ties us into a convenient school of thought which classifies and categorises everything within our experience. 

If we begin to question this convenience as a man made artefact we then have to re-examine the very substance of the presumption of everything, not deny its existence but question the way we arrived at our our logic. If we question our logic, we question many of our presumptions about life and the labels we attach to the things around us and most importantly to ourselves.
It becomes open season to re-evaluate all our emotions, all our thoughts, all our actions which have occurred through the paradigm of "me" and shift the focus to a place where these labelled events that flow through our conciousness are not of our making, are not of us and have no permanence. In ridding ourselves of all this baggage we become empty with an infinite opportunity to build our own world, not encumbered with thing we can do little about.
Have I got it ??                         

The aged and Christmas

Christmas has been and gone once again as we tidy away the tinsel and wrapping paper for another year. For most it has been good to be forced out of our lethargy and join in the party even if it meant clocking up many miles to see family and friends. Now with only Old Years Night / New Years Day ahead the reality of the payment for our extravagance, sets in and the wild exuberance of the Christmas Present binge sits like a heavy meal on our credit account. So be it, the Chancellor would have us believe that we are doing our bit to stimulate the economy. Pity he doesn't feel the need to chase Goldman Sacks, Google and Amazon to inculcate into them to have the same national zeal to contribute their taxes. 

When you get older many of your friends lie in hospital or sadly pass away around this time, its as if they wait until another signpost, memories of better times, arrives and passes and the thought of another year ahead in ill health is too much. There have been many old people this holiday forgotten in their homes, pottering around eating meagre meals in a poorly heated, dimly lit rooms with only the TV to keep them company. How incongruous the programs are to his or her situation with their forced joviality and excessive focus on family and friends. 

Religion used to be a support, a prop for people who were tied through sickness and old age to their home. The service, the carols, the sight of the congregation, (if you had TV), people like you, a little younger but recognisable as part of the race of human-beings you had grown up amongst, not the souped up celebrity hosting a show which was the brain child of someone more adept at running Jackanory.                

Letter from America

Alister Cook pre-dates the modern blog. His "Letter from America" was a favourite of mine on "steam" radio. His description of everyday America and the people who made up that important country was a perfect specimen of the understated but accurate description of life around him seen through the eyes of a middle class Englishman living and plying his journalistic trade across the States. Sitting in our living room in England his quiet distinctive voice wove a verbal picture of a country so different from our own but which through language we felt an affinity for.
The personalities were front page news, their politicians affected our foreign policy their culture became ours and Alister Cook tried to make sense of it all, seen from the English perspective. From the American Constitution to the racial conflict in the 60s/70s. His description of the wonder of the Fall in Vermont, this attempt to explain the obsession Americans have for Baseball the dignity of Joe Louis. The painful learning process they were forced into about their lack of invincibility, learnt the hard way through the Vietnam War. His delivery was in part whimsical, projected in a measured tone, eliciting an "old world" turn of phrase, comforting in the humanity it touched as he described the texture of a complex society.  Like our enjoyment of big band swing music, the crooning lyrics of singers who's training and diction meant we could actually understand what they were singing about, this assumption that we would stop and listen to gain understanding. Foreign in the hectic "gad fly" life so many people these days call life !!               

Happy Christmas

The car is packed to the brim not an inch of space anywhere, ready for its journey west. The anticipation of Christmas dinner is beginning to take hold and with it the deep pleasure of being amongst family.
Families are flung far and wide these days the regular "must pop over to see Mom" of yesteryear is missing and the route march today has to be carefully planned.
A 25 hour plane journey is no small undertaking and we begin to rely on the phone and the marvel of internet communication with its video link to remind us what the person we are talking to looks like today. This is a virtual world come to fruition. Our lives will pass along a well worn path but never cross the people we love the most, our sons and daughters, our mothers and fathers, our grandchildren, each one now represented by a video image. 
Of course it is so much better than the occasional letter we used to write and the even more the occasional telephone call usually around this time of the year, rather its the scale of the atomised family setting that makes one wonder. 
The accessibility of ones friends and family is important, the arms length conversation, the tactile hug every so often makes us human and draws on the innate bonds established over many years. 

So we settle for second best and count our blessings.

Happy Christmas 

From John Marie Angela & Andrew          

Another crop of babies

This is the season when our TV screens are flooded with tragic scenes of emaciated children dying of malnutrition. Horrible pictures of not much more than baby's staring with huge eyes lost in their own misery of hunger and pain. 

It seems as if the "Maker" an old fashioned term, had felt the need to throw the whole panoply of unmitigated trauma onto a section of the human race for some unknown reason. These little mites were paying the price of man's unfaithfulness. his unwillingness to follow, to the letter, the tenets of the "Maker".   The God of love and forgiveness has another side to him it seems. 

Of course mankind is at the root of all this. His insatiable need to have sex irrespective of whether a pregnancy occurs and a child is born, irrespective of whether there is the food and shelter to support the child irrespective of anything other than a moment of lust. There is no way to stop this sexual explosion other than contraception but when the tribal custom looks on babies as a crop to grow for the future economic sustainability of the tribe then the suggestion that you limit the number of babies falls on deaf ears. And so we will continue to fill our screens with man's in-humanity to man and hope for change.          

The new aphrodesiac

Life is full of hurdles unexpected things happen and it is the way we deal with these things that makes the outcome acceptable. Part of the problem we have is that we assume so much is based on our own view, which is, itself corrupted by our many blind spots as we evaluate everything through a prism of our own making. What is true and what is false depends so much on our reading of events, events which themselves, on the surface seem to be such and such but can be so misrepresented. 

True knowledge is gained from experience and it is life's experiences that emboldens the person to believe they are knowledgeable, until of course a new experience comes along and reveals how inadequate we are, and we start, once again to try to understand who we are and why we arrived at the position we are in. It is common that we take for granted much of what goes on around us and it is only when we no longer have access to something that we miss it. 

Do we miss it because it is important to our lives or do we feel that the change of circumstances has made us realise that nothing in our world is secure, which in its self, makes us insecure.  

If also we allow sentimentality to creep in then we are at risk of becoming ever more focused on what we don't have and forget the positive aspect that a change in circumstance can bring. Unfortunately much of our resilience is dependant on the stage we are in regarding life's journey. With many years ahead and the general assumption that there is plenty of opportunity to rebuild, is different, when one is old and in the last phase of life. 

Re-igniting the desires that one had when younger is virtually impossible, the cause is lost and the spark is gone. This does not mean that one can not undertake an adventure and try to recapture the interest in the world around but youths insatiable yearning to discover new things is very different to the reflective experience when older. 

Of course this power of reflection and the need to "express ones thoughts" in many new and different circumstances could be the new aphrodisiac !!    

Symbolism

Symbolism has a part in our psyche, it represents certain values that we, as part of any society hold to be part of the foundations of who we think we are. 

The pageant of laying Mandela to rest is drawing to its final chapter as we watch the huge military transport plane carrying his body to the Eastern Cape. 

Leaving behind the modern western world in the Transvaal, it will arrive in Umtata and then by road to the village of Kunu. This is the contrast of the modern against the old traditional homeland with its tribal customs, largely held by the elderly with their beliefs of an after world and the importance of according the spirits their respect. 

The young reporter who is reporting on the events in the Eastern Cape for Al Jazeera, the middle east media channel was resiliently supportive of the tribal way of life, describing the importance of the link between the youth and the elders, the elders teaching and reminding the youngsters of their responsibility to uphold the belief and tradition of past generations. 

Like a stone worn smooth by the influence of time, older societies have a lot to tell us and warn us of the dangers of loosing our link with the past. Experience has the value of revealing the good and the bad by the evidence of the result. Too often we choose a course of action by looking at what we expect the end result to be, not mindful that things often don't turn out as we would expect with a spin off which can be disastrous. Children learn from their elders before discarding the lessons to follow their peers and the manipulative industries (cometh the ad'man) which to our shame we all fall foul but, over time the old values re-emerge.The ANC under the influence of Zuma have not extended the opportunity, usually given in an African  burial ceremony to welcome anyone who wishes to make the journey. This is particularly hurtful to the local tribesman who can't understand the fact that Prince Charles will be there but not Joshua Nicobie from the village. 

How the "great and the good" squeeze us out in all manner of ways throughout our lives, even in death. 

I see that Bishop Tutu has also been excluded.   His opposition to the ANC particularly to Zuma has produced the backlash but the slight to Tutu has caused many to think about the kleptocracy that has grown from the ideals that Mandela spent 27 years in prison for.      

          

IPSA

The issue of the increase in pay for Parliamentarians is crying out for common sense.
The body who were given the task of deciding the rate of increase IPSA have based their findings on the salaries paid to people doing comparative jobs.
I am reminded of the adage, "two wrongs don't make a right", If one looks at both commerce, industry and the public sector there has been an accelerated gap opening between the ordinary worker and the upper end of the job market.  Right across the board the executive class, including specialised groups have such as the medical profession have voted themselves substantial increases such that trying to evaluate the MP with a horse that has bolted is virtually impossible.
The job as an MP is like no other and whilst the work is judged by the voter at the ballot box, the MPs work is not judged by a peer group, such as  a board of directors perhaps (although the directors are under pressure to vote the increase through because of this very peer pressure) and any regular evaluation is impossible. 
One can not equate the work an MP does with people in industry or commerce, like the clergy it is more a calling.  IPSA, in my opinion have failed to understand this and therefore they were working on a false premise.
Representatives  of the public should be evaluated in the same way the Chancellor evaluates the general public. His message to "all of us" is that we must "tighten our belts and deflate our expectations in tune with the countries financial circumstances".
I can think of no finer epitaph for current and future Members of Parliament to have above their door.             

A misty evening

Its 5 o'clock in the evening and I have just walked up to the post box to post some Christmas cards. Its very damp, the wet mist clinging to everything, foreshortening  the world around to a ghostly indistinct image of street lamps and garden hedges. It brought back memories of my youth, setting off for a night out, dressed up in suit and tie with my posh overcoat on to stay warm (its still in use) ready to go dancing. 
Before the use of a car we always had to trudge up the road to wait for the trolley bus to take us into town. Often the weather was as it is tonight foggy and wet but it was all we knew and we accepted it as normal. Through the mist the faint light of the mud

spattered bus would emerge and we clambered on board up the stairs to the top deck. The reason for seeking the sanctuary of the top deck was that in those days the young were expected to  stand and give up their seat to any women older than themselves.   Well trained, we complied with societies notion of good manners but were able to bypass the issue by going upstairs where it was illegal to stand when the bus was in motion. 

The downside was that upstairs was also the domain of the smoker and the smoky atmosphere plus the nicotine dripping off the ceiling was unpleasant. Its funny how it took a campaign to outlaw smoking for us to really realise how obnoxious the smell of smoke is. 

We were tied to the routine of the bus timetable, last bus home, 11.00 otherwise a long, wet, 5 mile walk home. 

Our world was so different then, our aspirations were like our acceptance of the weather it was what we had grown to know. The dance was the focus of our night, the weather never stopped us, be it a Sunday out riding our bike or meeting friends to walk and talk in the evening. 

This evenings walk in the mist brought it all back.          

In memoriam

Was the rain symbolic, were the heavens weeping, were the gods unhappy at the passing of Mandela and wished to show ordinary mortals that the occasion had a wider dimension.
The so called great and the good were gathering, walking through the heavy rain into the austere environs of the FNB stadium. Leaders and past leaders, people who had been involved in the freedom movement people who had supported the anti- apartheid movement from the safety of distant countries, rock stars, fund raisers people who, we who lived there, felt were totally misguided and had been brain washed not to understand the other side of the political coin.
The white man's contribution was air brushed out, brushed aside, in fact vilified in favour of ideology. We continue to be nonplussed by the virtual silence the media brings to the mis-governance of the country !!
It was interesting how, when the various South African dignitaries were announced the crowd cheered. Winny Mandela, and the previous president Thabo Mbeki received the loudest cheer, even De Klerk had a strong acknowledgement but President Zuma when announced he was greeted by boos.
I was also intrigued by the blessing given by the four faiths Jewish, Muslim, Hinduism, and Anglican. For me the one which rang true was the Hindu in his simple description of life's journey without the complexity of the story of the Old Testament, the New Testament, and the Koran. The Jewish rabbi went into great detail quoting passages from the Old Testament much of it highly problematic and indulgent of his faith. The Muslim preacher was more to the point but was hardly inclusive. The Anglican Bishop of Cape Town was very measured, very dignified but of course also relied on biblical structure which in the end raises more questions than answers. No, I liked the Hindu who's feet were on the ground who's message was about the insignificance of our desires and the inevitability of the circle of birth and death.
I was very impressed my Mandela's wife Grace Machel. She was clearly deeply effected by his death but she was so serene and looked the picture of a First Lady, she was never caught by the camera in anything but a deep sombre mood. The speeches were, as when ever you give a politician an opportunity and a platform to practice his trade, repetitious and coming from some of them, hollow.
President Obarma made a significant appeal to keep the spirit of Mandela alive to be inclusive of the opposition view point to keep in mind the whole of society and not purely the interests of the influential. Of course the American President holds court over a political system that encourages massive influence from "special interest groups " and has done little to dismantle Guantanamo Bay, one of the most public hell holes, where a man's human rights defined by the American Constitution is flouted by sit'ing the detention camp on foreign territory.
I wonder when he pronounces on his ideals does his conscience trouble him or is that a political oxymoron ?                             

Madiba

Madiba has passed away and the world’s media is full of his life and times.

A truly iconic figure, he seemed to have gained a messianic following fed, not only by feature writers but by a list of world leaders as varied as Fidel Castro to Bill Clinton all impressed by his innate ability  to be anchored in a set of beliefs that were part of his very fibre and not the usual political make over. He was extraordinarily stubborn in his commitment, initially to the African cause and then amazingly he absorbed the whole nation in his humanity.  

If there was a moment it was when he embraced the winning South African rugby side and won over a crowd of mainly Afrikaner’s as he shook hands with Francois Pienaar the captain, who was plainly in awe of this charismatic man wearing a Springbok jersey sporting the number 6.

Behind it all, we who lived there have our own memories of living in the country during the Apartheid years, watching the events unfurl, having our fears assuaged by a largely Government controlled media,  being convinced we were an important part of a "cold war" conflict that the Communists were waging in Africa.          

South Africa was a bulwark of the West for many years, Simonstown an important base for the Royal Navy and the South African Army carrying on the fight into communist controlled states to the north.   

The Township troubles were cast as part of the communist onslaught and a fight that had to be fought. The issue of race was all around but was cast in this ideological conflict rather than the moral issue of the treatment of people based on the colour of their skin.

We employed black people and housed them in tiny rooms with the barest of amenities. We didn’t really consider them or their families in the same way as we thought of our own families, we came to a pragmatic acknowledgement that our own needs were pre-eminent and our life style was something we were not prepared to give up.

Watching a program, put together by David Dimbleby last night, we were reminded of the events that earmarked the passage of time from John Vorster through the Botha years to De Klerk. The Rivona Trial and prior to that, the arrest of Mandela, the Soweto uprising, and the reports of troubles in townships we had never heard of, as the State tried to keep the lid on the growing disharmony. We went to work and had our briaa, we gobbled our garlic prawns and glugged our Castles Larger, but had little real interest in what was happening just over the horizon.

The ANC were demonised and the leaders were persona non grata. There were rumours that certain business leaders, Anton Rupert, members of the Anglo camp had gone up to Angola to talk to these terrorists with the government blowing icy threats in their direction  of  cowardice in the face of the enemy.

We continued to party and were surprised when De Klerk announced the release of Mandela, Mandela who, oh that guy who we locked up years ago.  I visited Victor Vester Prison (trying to sell them medical packs containing sterilised equipment )  where he had been moved as part of the secret negotiation which was taking place between the ANC and President Botha. 

His release and the inter-party negotiations at Kempton Park were fascinating, even more so because we, the ordinary public were able to watch the meetings on TV, so different from the acutely secretive Afrikaner government who had always known what was best for all of us. We were now watching black men tying our heads of government in knots as the sentiment for a settlement took hold and the inevitable became clear.  

Ceril  Ramaposa was the lead man. How could a black man be so eloquent, looking the part, making the current ministers seem parochial – even dim !! Behind it all Mandela and De Klerk manoeuvring, trying to ensure their electorate had a fair share of the cake. It was a last cause for De Klerk, given the enormous disparity of the vote and the fact that the voters were lined up in terms of colour rather than the normal party promises.

Mandela the statesman who emerged from prison was a phenomenal in that he captured the world’s attention and was claimed by statesmen from all corners of the world, of all ideologies as the person they most wanted to share a platform with. Was he a terrorist, was he a freedom fighter was he a friend or did he bring our affluent house of cards tumbling down. Would we whites  have been better without him or was he inevitable and were we simply lucky to have had this peaceful giant on hand to guide us through the potential turmoil.                         

Don't knock it.

Today we turn into the month of December and close onto the celebration of Christmas. Christmas means different things to different people, ranging from sadness to happiness, from inclusiveness to exclusion, from hope to despair. Why is this season, culminating in a few specific days in which there is a collective expectancy to be rewarded by some sort of emotional happiness so important to us. The issue of Christmas, apart from its religious cogitation, pre dates the media/business hype that we are used to these days where we are now conditioned to enjoy and to spend. Our very economy is dependant on the purchasing splurge as people buy gifts for family and friends and of course the stimulation to get out to the shops brings a focus to the high street and the people shopping there. There is a happy glint in the eye, as we think of others and the things they might like to receive on Christmas Day, we move out of our own bubble and think of these others, its therapeutic in a good sense.
Of course for many, when times are hard it is difficult to find the means to fulfil the expectation and it is this expectation and our sense that we are valued by the ability to match up to society around you is the Achilles heel of this time.
It is not an easy time for the individual, the lonely, the excluded and of course, it is difficult for people remembering  past, happier Christmas's which, no matter how hard one try's, can not be recreated.  
The mawkish sentimentality of the Christmas festivity as it effects a fictional American family on TV is recreated every year ad nauseum and makes viewing nearly un-watchable,  (along with the forced conviviality of New Years Eve and peace to all men malarkey !!) But having said that I feel that the effort mankind makes to acknowledge mankind in general is worthwhile, so I won't knock it !!            

Cocoon

A cocoon is a protective covering to keep the occupants secure.
Mankind has evolved its own cocoon mentality as we, as individuals move through the various stages of our lives but it is not always a surety that the format which we anticipated would resemble a cocoon as we grow old, will come to fruition.
Life has a knack of throwing up the curved ball and just when you thought that your innings was assured along comes the hitch, the unexpected, the unplanned. How we react to being out in the cold again is a measure of character and a realisation that the best laid plans of mice and men are nothing other than "plans", reality is something different.
The resilience of a person depends on many things not least age and opportunity. When young life stretches out into the future, today's let down is simply the mechanics of of ones existence, changing gear and there's always tomorrow and the day after. The middle years are creative in that marriage and children bring a perspective that we had no inkling about and much was made, on the hoof, learning as you go.
The cocoon was the family and the security one gained by the love you gave and received during that time. Of course the cocoon was based on an assumption that all parties were buying into the experience and that the bonds formed were indestructible.
People come in all shapes and sizes and on many emotional levels. Some are pragmatic, some sentimental, some evolve some dissolve, some find their reason for emotional growth, to be the result of having wider responsibility from the narcissism of youth, some find responsibility difficult particularly personal responsibility when it comes to blaming others for their own short-comings and we all have plenty of those !!
The cocoon is at its most vulnerable when old age arrives and the reality of failed dreams becomes apparent. The instinctive care and the hand holding we all need as we begin our decline, is held as reflecting our journey through life and the friendship that should be there as the bond that kept a couple, a couple.
Too often the bond has been hollowed out and the reason to keep the cocoon in-tact is, in some ways lost or questioned. Of course at a time when the individual is at their most vulnerable the intricate support people lend each other is thrown away with little to put in its place.           

Who will throw the first stone.

Once again we are conflicted with an issue that draws acutely differing opinion, dividing society into the Idealist and the Pragmatist.
The case is the murder of the injured Taliban fighter by his captor, the British Marine soldier. Clearly the soldier was guilty of murder and the argument has been on whether he should be granted anonymity to guard his family from retaliation.

As an aside.
I find it difficult to reconcile the idea that when the State orders you to kill its acceptable, even if the conflict is born of the filmiest political reason and yet deeply held animosity based on genuine ills between people have the full weight of the States Law brought down on them, but I digress.
  
There are a number of issues which arise. The first is the context. Whether we fully understand the distortion that war brings to a persons understanding of what is right or wrong ?
1. The Idealist would say that there are no conditions which condone violence particularly the killing of an unarmed man and we often use the term in "cold blood" to differentiate a crime of passion whereby the act of killing is deemed to be due to a person who has become unbalanced and therefore they are not in control of themselves.
2. The Pragmatist would point to the battlefield condition, particularly when the war is fought against unidentifiable contestants where every man and women in the street is a potential foe. They would suggest that the soldier through combat is pushed into a mentally unbalanced state, especially if he has just witnessed the killing of a friend or colleague or seen the dismemberment of other troops as warning. When life or death is all around, when the civilised world has become grotesque, who will be the first to throw a stone ?

The second issue is the danger the family it is claimed, are under by supporters of the Taliban in this country. What a sad state we are in when we have to acknowledge that the danger lies within as much as without and that our national concept of homeland and the intrinsic security that being at home should bring, has been demolished by our obsession of being all things to all people.               

Writing a blog

Many people and I am sure you are amongst them, have fairly fixed views on a number of subjects.  Opinion and the understanding of how we feel about a certain issue is of course bound up in upbringing and how we traversed the cliff between youth, when we are at our most narcissistic and maturity when we should be able to call on a lifetime of experience to see the other persons position. Of course as we get older we find that we miss the surety of youth and become confused by the wealth of diversity we have to cope with each week. The talent people have for crystallising their pet project, religion, socialising, sport or exercise, shopping or saving the planet, they are committed often to the exclusion of much else. The diversity of race, the standpoint gender brings to most subjects, the experts and the statisticians all colouring every issue, make for rich pickings if you enjoy writing a blog.
Writing a blog has the calming effect of blowing off hot air or applauding a point of view, behind the safety of ones keyboard in the silence of ones own mind. The exercise of thinking about a whole raft of things going on in the world around, of having an opinion and not having to risk that opinion with the raw contempt of the expert.           

The family interest

Having listened to Alex Salmon of the Scottish Nationalist Party who is speaking to journalists about the separation of Scotland from the rest of the UK, one is left with the impression that the Scots would be better to go it alone.
One of the problems we have with our current set up is that the structure of Westminster was built on the grand old days when we had an Empire and responsibility across the world. Our politics were as much focused overseas as within the country and because the participants, the politicians, were were from the grand old families with business connections affected by overseas trade the need to keep the trade sweet was a priority over the conditions within the country and therefore the needs of "the people" were often overlooked. Much has changed and a wider democratic mandate has meant that a wider audience has demanded a say in the governance and the benefits that that governance bequeaths.
The Scots are by nature and by geography a separate entity and their views on the social aspects of their constituency is very different from the "Nobel Structure" we have in Westminster.
One often witnesses the social divide in the Mother of all Parliaments, the wealth and the educational assumptions that a certain class of people are born to. The Scottish Parliament seems on the other hand to be made up of the rank and file of the people they represent and therefore their policies are more in tune with the majority. The democratic deficit has long been evident where the working class have returned the Socialist year in year out but only to be defeated by the entrenched political class (representing all parties)  in the South of England.
I would go so far to say that Politics is a game in Westminster whilst it represents the "families interest" in Scotland.            

Silence is deafening

Its  a characteristic of our modern day society that the social fabric that used to hold disparate people together is gone.
We are naturally a collective species in the sense that we share our experiences with others around both giving and taking, part in communication with family and friends, people in the bus queue, people at work and so on. We take it for granted that there will be someone to talk to, someone who will listen and understand someone who comes from  the background from where our experience is gathered and the environment from which we draw our experience.
People are getting up this morning with no hope that anyone will ring or pop around to visit. They are house- bound and sad, unable to understand how their lives came to this impasse, totally unable to comprehend how after a lifetime of interaction they are now lonely and forgotten.
Esther Rantzen, a local TV celebrator has fastened her talent for publicity on the plight of the old. She has set up a Silver Line, a telephone contact for old people to speak to, a friendly voice when they feel the need.  
One can't turn back the clock and, with the dispersion of neighbourly contact, families spreading across the globe, people, who eventually disconnect from the workplace into retirement and are removed at a stroke to waking up with nowhere to go and no one to talk to. If coupled to that, they have lost a partner with whom the every day event is shared by a comment or an opinion even if not always complimentary then the silence is deafening.        

A world of "rules".

We have been beating ourselves up in our usual fashion over the sentence handed out to a member of the Marines who was found guilty of shooting a wounded prisoner. Today's rules of engagement governed by the Geneva Convention are clear and the guy is guilty. The rules are the rules and we must obey them otherwise society falls apart.
The question of who formulates the rules, Parliament, greatly influenced by pressure groups and people of influence, Case Law and the decisions of Judges who themselves are the product of special interest through the home and private school education.
Rules by and large are handed down from above and in many instances seem to favour people who have the money to argue why the rules do not apply to them. In the case of the marine, as in so many actual incidents, the surrounding conditions often make a mockery of the rules which in themselves are founded in the contemplative atmosphere of a civilised setting.
Due consideration is thought to be given to the setting of the offence (the breaking of the rule) but in actual fact no one can understand how the human being will react under continual stress particularly in modern day combat where the enemy is not in uniform and appears as a civilian and ones life is at risk 24 hours a day.
The woman or man who breaks after months of bitter condemnation and ridicule, hits out, sometimes with  terrible consequences.
The rules do not generally make exceptions although the sentence can be commuted, the sentence, "guilty" indicates that there is only one factor at play, the impeachability of the rule.         

Out of season.

Holiday resorts are obviously dependent on holiday makers as the grist to their mill. Even without sunshine it is the energy that people bring to a place which in some way breathes life into it and so descending on Filey at the start of Winter was a gamble. 
The residents of these sea side places, even including those who make their living out of the trade, are often in two minds about the influx of people who come, generally keyed up to have a good time, come what may. They are used to the dreadful sight of intoxicated people staggering around, looking for still more to drink and the next party, their shrieks of drunken laughter make the sober citizen flinch. I suppose its simply the contrast between society out having a good time and the rest of us getting on with our boring lives. 
Margate and much of the South Coast in South Africa had the same influence out of season, the closed shops and arcades with the ghosts of the holiday maker flitting about behind the shutters. 

Filey has its grand front, a crescent of stately houses curving sedately around the line of the beach, once the homes of the great and good they now include a hotel or have been made into up-market apartments. Taking the air is a pastime, strolling along the prom gazing out to sea and wondering when the next mealtime is due is a sensible, if dull way to pass the time but not for me, well not yet anyway !! 


Having reunited with my cousin,  sitting through a few cine films of when we were truly young and trying to remember who that was standing behind uncle Herbert. We genuinely had a good time reminiscing, finding that 50 years, although weathering the exterior had preserved the inner remarkably well.

All too soon it was time to turn for home and the dash down the A1.                

Relationships

Going to Scarborough tomorrow I am reminded of the song made famous by Simon and Garfunkel (those of a certain generation will be familiar with it).  The song and the words go back to the Middle Ages. They speak of a conflict between lovers who ask that impossible tasks are completed by the other before they are willing to take the other back.

Are you going to Scarborough Fair.
Parsley,sage,rosemary and thyme.
Remember me to one who lives there.
She once was a true lover of mine.

Tell her to make me a cambric shirt.
Parsley, sage rosemary and thyme.
Without a seam or needle work.
Then she will be a true love of mine.

Tell her to wash it in yonder well.
Parsley, sage ,rosemary and thyme.
Where never springs water or rain never fell
And she will be a true love of mine.

Tell her to dry it on yonder thorn.
Parsley sage rosemary and thyme
Which never bore blossom since Adam was born
And she will be a true love of mine.

And so the song progresses with equally impossible tasks set this time by the girl for the man to fulfil before their love can be complimented.
It marks the difficulty in any relationship, the often impossible task of finding a course of action that finds acceptance by each party. The will is there but the actions seem to fall short.
Its another example of how we misunderstand our ability to communicate.
Our intentions are clear, in our own mind and we issue, usually through words, a set of ideas or proposals, in a language that is common to both and yet these words are received with completely different meaning by the other party. Emotion also either enhances or clouds the intention and the confusion increases the discontent of both parties. 
It should be easy, language is usually unambiguous a word or a sentence has only one meaning the only thing that has to be accepted is the genuineness of the person speaking but without trust or without a willingness to accept the words on their face value then the exercise is futile, worse it is destructive.       

Washing away the sediment.

Its always an interesting point of view, whether the world around us is of more value than the one within, so to speak. 
We observe a sometimes ridiculous set of events and are often frustrated by the actions and the rulings that the people in power make. We lose our belief in the honesty of people and institutions they represent, institutions that were considered the pillars on which society at large was built. Parliament, the Media at large, the Legal profession including Judges,  have all lost the confidence of the public at large. 
So why, if we have no confidence do we engage with them in terms of considering the information they pass on to us in the public domain. Why don't we blank them out of our consciousness, turn off the news program, stop listening to the current affairs programs stop reading the news papers and so on. If the information we receive is corrupted why corrupt ourselves with this information ? If we followed this method of isolating ourselves, what would be gained and would it be beneficial to us as human beings.

.Our world is made up of the immediate events which happen to us in the course of our day. Relationships and interactions our the grist of our life and the external worldly events are on the periphery, having little or no impact on our daily lives. All this is true but in many cases it would be a bleak life if our only interest was in matters that only effect us.
As human beings, since the invention of the written word and more importantly the printed word, man has come on in leaps and bounds as this "other world" has made him/her aware of what happens outside the box.
One way way of handling the "potential" for the mental corruption that can flow through our ears and into our brain through our eyes, is to recognise this noise is unhealthy and, through meditation, we can turn inwards and recognise the potential of the self. Your world then becomes a system of analysis and contemplation as one seeks clearer identification with a set of "ideals" that take into consideration mankind at large, of which we are a part.

Buddhism is a philosophy that persuades people to contemplate a life which takes in the meditative practice to skill ones self in moving away from the busy, noisy, humdrum life we all lead to find sanctuary in a set of values which we appropriate from the humanistic values that the Buddha set down centuries ago. 

Of course, like a lifestyle balance one has to recognise that we are "not" isolated and seeking isolation has its dangers. 
Measuring those dangers and understanding that for fulfilment, we must expose ourselves to things, the excitement of danger on a rock climb or a gallop over the fields on a horse, the exposure to low level microbes in the farm yard which builds up our immune system and so on, that we also gain by listening to a debate or reading a book.
Cleansing the mind of its clutter has the drawback that we loose part of our former self and are in danger of washing away the sediment that makes up the character.     

A seat next to the pretty girl

November has arrived and with it the cold wind and today for the first time this year I felt cold. Admittedly I had wandered out in a short sleeved shirt, walking a hundred yards up the road before noticing that Summer was off and Winter had arrived. Being the good boyscout (?), Saturday was spent pressure washing the trailer-caravan on the driveway, a constant reminder to hook up and set off somewhere but it somehow  never materialised and we went nowhere. This could be a trend, through inertia and procrastination one puts off everything until tomorrow which, as we all know,never comes.
I'm off to Filey in Yorkshire on Thursday hopefully to reunite with a cousin I haven't seen for 50 years. I had tried a couple of years ago to find out what had happened to her but had drawn a blank and it was only through a conversation I had with a friend in the pub, that his wife offered to have a try at tracing her. Within a few days she had traced Valerie and her daughter Heather and Heathers daughters, Debra and Shelley so when I went to Bradford a couple of weeks later I managed to locate Debra and the rest is history.
Filey, Bridlington, Scarborough, and Whitby were the seaside resorts we used to visit when I was young.

Butlins at Filey was famous for its holiday camp. Inexpensive chalet type accommodation regimented in identical rows all leading to the central entertainment block and an Olympic sized pool. Dancing, bars, the Butlins Red Coats the variety shows and the "wakey wakey campers" blasting out through the tannoy.
A far cry from today's individualistic holiday pursuit, in those far off days the working class had simple, collective pleasures. Groups, sometimes whole villages used to board the charabanc (the coach in its distinctive livery) and set off for a days outing to the sea side, Blackpool was a favourite with its Tower, ballroom and a multiplicity of fun and frolics to take part in. But in reality the major ingredient was that the bus was a community, the people drawn from similar backgrounds, uncomplicated, with little regard for de rigueur. They were out to enjoy themselves, their camaraderie was part of their knowledge of each other and their ease in each others company. There was no hierarchy and little competition, other than a seat next to the prettiest girl on the way home.                         

Double standards

I am at a loss. As the “hacking” case against Rebecca Brooks and Andy Coulson opens and the country is made to feel repulsion because of their  intrusion into the phone and email communication of a number of people who were deemed to be of public interest. It seems we are engaged, yet again in double standards.                                                                                                                            

Brooks and Coulson are appearing in Court having been accused of breaking the law. What I ask is the difference between their actions and those of the “Security Services”, both here and in the USA. The surveillance of private communication is deemed ok when undertaken by the State but illegal when carried out by a member of the public?

We are asked to”forgo” our sense of right and wrong by invoking the call of National Security which it seems, trumps all our engrained belief in the Law and its supposed equality of treatment for all people within the national boundary .

Double standards are rapidly becoming the norm and in so doing, they destroy the fabric of trust that is vitally important for society in accepting its governance and the bodies who are elected to carry out the task.

Letter to my MP

Dear Mr Prisk

Thank you for your letter in which you acknowledge the terrible lack of guidance from successive governments in matters of training and investment and suggest that we can still slow the decline.  The root of our problem seems to me to be an almost chronic lack of a long term strategy by all the partners in GB Ltd.                                             Business leaders are constrained by their “shareholders” to think short term. Governments are likewise constrained by the pressure of the next election. Banking is in terror of its book, having forgotten what its founding purpose was and likened its self to a hedge fund, it went along with the criminal extortion of all that the market had to offer in near illegal trading practices. The list goes on but it is no good looking back to the past, what can we do now to protect the future.

Investment in people and in infrastructure, in technology and in the means of production, these are the goals to pull us through.

There is a role model in the German experience which, with few exceptions we could emulate to our advantage.

In Germany Industry and finance are tied at the hip. Projects are collaborative, each party sits on the Board and decisions are made with all parties in agreement. It’s not a, them and us arrangement as in this country. Proper training is a responsibility of the respective industry and not a political football as it is here.

It strikes me that when we need money to build a questionable high speed rail link we seem to have it (50 billion) but when we need money to build a nuclear power station (15 billion) we don’t. Why ?

Perhaps the national 70% holding of Nat West could be a precursor to funnelling funds to new and vital piece of national kit such as a power station?                             

Before cries of “Nationalisation”, that’s exactly the source of the Chinese money.

The French fund their nuclear and aero industry; with government financial support and as a result we have to go to them for assistance.   

Placing one’s self strategically at the whim of the Financial Markets is total madness.

So much ideology gets in the way of a National Long Term Plan and we are bound to continue with short-termism unless we form a strategic, non-political body, made up of experts in all aspects of business who are allowed to construct a plan for the future.

A 20/ 30 year project that the politicians of all parties have to work with.            Dream on !!              

A weather report

Its a measure of the country we live in and the need to stoke up the population from its lethargy that we have been inundated on the news channels with a tale of carnage due to be served up as gales arrive on our shores this weekend.
Of course as a seasoned jurno', (well blogger) I can't help but tempt fate to write a piece whilst we are all in one piece, before the lines come down and communication is disrupted. 

Candles have been purchased and extra fruit bought to carry us through whilst the power is down.  I am resisting the urge to fill the sandbags, (that sounds like hard work) but it all reminds me that we are not in a tsunami region or troubled with huge forest fires, at worst, we might have to put up with a relatively tranquil rain shower to dampen our spirits.

As I look outside the trees are hardly moving but there is still time. I could ring my weather outpost in Wales for a report but she might have been out on the town and there's no storm known to man like the wrath of a daughter plucked out of her beauty sleep.    

I wad some power the giftie gie us To see oursel's as others see us. It would from many a silly notion free us !!

We try hard to understand how our children seem to have such short attention spans especially when it comes to reading a book. Their need for immediate gratification means that the slow unfurling of a story line, as we read and turn page after page, is out of character with today's young.
Of course they are hardly to blame given the incomplete messages that today's news media project, each hour, on the hour. Stories of blight and corruption across the world, set in gory detail only to be replaced by "another crisis" from somewhere else within 24 hours.
Our view of the world, through media reportage, is one of on-going trauma which makes us all feel complacent as we sit in the chair behind the double glazing.
The human race is clearly connected genetically but we celebrate our own ethnicity and consider the difference between us.   Much of our problem lies in this mental condition, of how we visualise ourselves and build a platform of self indulgence, ignoring the wealth of diversity that identifies the rest of the world.
People from other countries bring, through the life experience and the environment they grew up in, a different complexion to virtually every aspect of our own set of opinions. Whist the complexion differs, as you talk, you discover you have much more in common than you could imagine, given the distance and the cultural or political differences of each others background.
There are generally many common values, yes tainted by the pressure of each persons way-of-life and up bringing but remarkably similar in their root values.
We should learn to celebrate our commonality and recognise we all have so much in common, value these similarities and down grade the difference.        

Power and the danger it brings

Under the heading of national security the right wing Conservatives are hot foot, mounting an orchestrated onslaught against the Guardian Newspaper.
In a debate held in Westminster Hall, an adjunct of the main debating chamber,the Tory's had obtained time to debate the matter of the the release of information to the Guardian by David Miranda and Glen Greewald, journalists living in South America.  Greewalds partner had been held for a number of hours at Heathrow Airport at the behest of the security services in line with the American attempt to hold  Edward Snowden, another whistle blower with sensitive information who eventually fled to Russia.
I have rarely seen such misuse of  parliamentary procedure in that, normally debate is held under the rules of debate whereby the right of questioning the debater is nearly always given, the only constraint is usually time when the person standing , giving the debate wishes to proceed with the points he is trying to put across and refuses to be interrupted.
In this particular debate the Tory members were scathing in their complaint against the Guardian Newspaper but their blatant refusal to allow the Labour members to stand and offer alternative views was a sad, unhealthy sight. The debate was ruled by the rules of debate but the concept of "Parliamentary Democracy", where all views are heard, was totally disregarded. Each Tory member was allowed to stand and have their say, each New Labour member was told to keep quiet !! I found this one of the most distasteful meetings I have ever witnessed in the Houses of Parliament and would hope that it is not a preview of things to come.
There is a strong danger that open debate in society at large on such issues as Race, Religion, Sexuality, and now Security matters becomes very difficult as powerful elements in society seek to blanket comment and discussion.
The fearful condition of our Economy, not withstanding the good news stories released about recent marginal growth, has given Parliament the opportunity to enact draconian measures including the fire sale of the Post Office at a share valuation which enable massive profit for the City investor. The privatisation of the National Health, handing the Medical Practitioners  the potential to push prescriptive dugs onto the patient whilst the same Practitioner (now running a business) is enabled to trade with the suppliers of the drug. The danger that such a position of power brings is obvious.
The judgement that the ordinary man and women in society shall be the main conduit for finding firstly the funds to prop up the failing banks with taxpayers money and now to reign down on the heads of the poorest members of society with such as the bed-room tax is a trend that makes me very sad indeed.              

It will get worse

Its a bit like watching a slow motion car crash. Slowly the wheels are coming off the economies of the economically established countries, it seems that the world has changed in such a way that national parliaments, representing the ordinary man and woman in the street are rapidly becoming irrelevant.
The concept of democracy and the way people elect their representatives to fulfil the electorates ideas of fair play and good governance is becoming powerless.
As we go into the future, globalisation and the control the Financial Markets have over all nations, has shifted the power firmly towards faceless, unelected people who have little regard for the masses, other than an opportunity to exploit them.
The divisions between the rich and poor are widening at an astronomical rate and will continue to do so. Our politicians have let us down as we were encouraged to spend and become our own worst enemies through cheap credit. The doom sayers were ridiculed as the financial giants told us that they were in control, that the boom bust phenomena which had wrecked previous societies was a thing of the past. How wrong they were !!
The sad thing is that they "now" hold all the cards, having persuaded governments to max out the national credit card by borrowing up to the hilt and then some.
With the trillions owed as debt we will never be in a position to square the books, to be solvent again, we will always be beholden to countries that are based on the petro dollar swilling with huge cash funds looking for a mug to lend to.
We will continue to teeter around the edge of our affairs, trying to square the circle of our commitment to our society with  our inability to gain freedom from our creditors. The call to austerity is the solution of those who will never be asked to share the austerity. Joe public having been asked (sorry we weren't consulted) to bail out the Banks, are now asked to forgo their standard of living, their children's standard of living and that of their grandchildren.
The controls are gone, the new boys on the block are without a constituency. Recognised by their cars, their homes, their yachts and all the bling which is their trademark they, with the help of their political bedfellows are currently set on dis-mantling all aspects of our national endeavour to provide equality in the services we receive.  
Privatisation, the other buzz word, is decreed across all aspects of our collective, social responsibility to the ordinary people who live here. There is money to be made and the Market Makers will exploit every opportunity, irrespective of the true cost to the individual.

Make no doubt about it, it will get worse !!!      

UK Ltd remains a joke

Today it was a rant, not a reasoned debate, not a dissertation but a rant against all the things that I feel are wrong with the UK, particularly its leaders and their short sighted, self centred agenda.
What started me off was the news that China will soon be the "owner" of our new nuclear power station when its built.  China a communist, one party, dictatorially controlled society which must be the absolute antithesis to our so called, democratic,freedom orientated, legally centred country would now be the paymaster, the decision maker of one of the most critically, fundamental elements of our industrial environment. We will be on the slippery slope of no longer have any control over the capacity to provide energy to drive our industry or even heat and light our homes. 
We are exposed to Russian gas producers. We rely on French technology for the nuclear power stations. There are no ships of any size built here any more, instead we rely on Germany,France Italy, or the Scandinavians. Once the greatest shipbuilding nation we now can't produce one ship on our own.
The railways were invented on these islands and now we have to rely on the Germans and French to produce our rolling stock. The bridges, the iconic buildings, the steelworks are all foreign owned or foreign built. We have little or no industry.  
The Europeans continue, (as we "out source" everything to the Far East to maximise profit) , to have their leaders, Siemans, Philips, Renault, Fiat, Ferrari, Gucci - what totem do we fly - "Tesco" !! We have sold everything but the kitchen sink, Bentley, Rolls Royce are but typical of our race to the bottom.
We listen each day as we pull ourselves to bits and pieces attempting the impossible to be all things to all men. Ringing our hands about the past wishing to submerge ourselves in a daft game of supporting everyone but ourselves. Priding ourselves on our inclusiveness but in doing so, ignoring the fact that we have lost our identity. 

This tragedy stems from our leadership. The quick return on an asset sale, reinvested in the nano-second transaction conducted by a Hedge Fund of a trade based on some artificial differential between competing stock markets is where we are focused.  Why invest in the long term prospect of a healthy economy with a workforce re-contributing to the economic health in their own spending power.

We are poorly served because of the divide that exists between the people who have their dividends and much more and the massive bulk of the population who are descending, with the not inconsiderable help from George Osborn into penury. There is no sense of a one nation. The schooling system takes care of that, the jobs for the boys, the self perpetuating boardroom shuffle, a civil service drawn from the ranks of the debating society with firsts in Greek and Latin ensure that the administration of "UK Ltd" remains a joke.  

I think I might have a fry-up

There was a time when on dragging myself from the warm clutches of my bed I would hurry on down stairs to the kitchen, take out the bacon and eggs from the fridge, heat up the frying pan (no health fanaticism here) and start a good old fry up. The aroma of bacon cooking is one of those smells to die for, at least it is if you are the one to scoff the food. Marie forever complains about the smell as she opens the windows and doors even in mid winter to emphasise the point. Fried bread sprinkled with salt and pepper, sit the egg on the bread and lay on the bacon, what a creation !! 

That is all in the past. The future is bleak, now, I enter the kitchen and head for the fridge to search for a carrot, yes a carrot, a carrot for breakfast would you believe it. No more bread, no more sugary tea,, what is there left to live for. I find myself wandering into the kitchen and wondering why I am here. The routines are gone the frying pan sits unloved the sugar bowl empty their place taken by carrots, apples and a juice,r its just not the same !! 
Everyone talks of this mode of healthy living as if it were a passage out of the Koran, life depends on it. But who's life and what sort of a life are we talking about.

Life is a concept and all concepts should be taken with a dose of salt which nicely brings me back to the joy of fried bread. 

I think I might have a fry up ????        

By the grace of god.

There are moments when you are forced into seeing the world in a new different way and often it can come through the chance hearing of a radio program that brings to the microphone an experience of someone who has grown up in very different circumstances from ones own. 
Our prejudice is built in the emotional hot house of our environment when growing up and we are fixed, as in aspic to a set of values that form as we learn from our parents knee. The issue that was being discussed was whether it was right to take children away from parents who couldn't cope and don't care.
The adults who came on air were either from the hang em and flog em brigade or were people who had grown up in an unloving environment and had, on having their own children found it hard to offer their own children love and care. The articulate deeply sincere explanation of how they were unable to comprehend the needs of their children, would as time passed, slowly begin to understand their shortcomings was really moving.
We have our opinions, we base our thoughts and comments on our own experience and find it incomprehensible to see how these parents could ignore their children in virtually every way. Like any disorder, be it physical or mental we find it extremely difficult to put ourself in their position since it is so far from what we would call our own "normal"experience but remember "we" have been blessed with the security that allowed us to project our love onto our children.   

But for the grace of God !!!