Events dear boy

Its a new year, with all that the phrase entails. To some its the opportunity to start or complete a project that has been ongoing and engaging ones interest for some time. The intellect is there, the time available and one is looking forward to the advantages the changes will bring.
For others the time ahead is littered with uncertainty and anxiety as the months unfold. Each day is a trial as one hopes to avoid unemployment and the unpaid debts. The family are in their own cocoon each wrestling with their own dilemmas, the boyfriend, the school work, exams, bullying.
For some the issue is of getting old and being drawn inevitably into a conversation about ones own mortality. The need to fill the day with meaning.
Events dear boy, events. These events are what we crave and value. They make sense of the time-line which is our life's path.They are a milestone not the signpost, they carry no directional element other than that we were in such and such a place at such and such a time. Like a bubble diagram much beloved of the teacher to gather events into some sort of cause and effect sequence, events that are in step with other events but not linked.
Milestones,where you were when Kennedy was shot, are generational, a group of people tied by birth year progressing through a field of relevance, stimulated by current history, the era of tin pan alley and pop music, without that milestone you wouldn't belong to that particular pack.

As I close my eyes and think about my experience today I have to ask myself what part of me took part in the experience. When I visit the shops and integrate with the people there, their actions were part of my world of experience but they were acting out their own world of experience of which my being a part was just a matter of chance. I was not fundamental to their state of mind, nor they to mine.
If the world we call ours is made up of actions and interaction which are separate and unconnected other than through observation, what is it, of my world that is mine that I own individually. 
My mind alone has the power to recognise and provide conjecture as to the why and wherefore of the world around me. My mind could read any one of a number of conclusions to the scene and the interactions I have with all these inputs,visual,audio,smell which can be interpreted by me depending on my mental state. If my mental state is good then the events around me will be deemed good. And so in part we are brothers and sisters of a family called the 40/45ers, exposed to events over time that coloured our perspective on life. We are not alone with our troubles or our prejudice we have come through a life span in good company and we have a story to tell. 
Happy New Year

Overseas - Blighty

OVERSEAS                                          BLIGHTY

It was hot last night in bed                                                I was comfortable, with a little help from the blanket                                                                                                    

   
There's a noise in the garden, it might be a ***                 The noise last night was benign, no threat, go to sleep.

 Parked in the street, will it be there in the morning.         The car has been out on the street for weeks, not a scratch.

Those taxies are a law unto themselves.                             Thanks for letting me in.
  
Gosh it’s too hot, I'm sweating wish we had air con.           It’s cold today, turn on the heating, where’s  the sweater.

 The shacks makes me wonder how much longer.               The gardens are lovely.

The thing coiled up in the shed moved!                               The thing coiled up in the shed is used to water the plants!

That's the 3rd power outing this week.                                Not yet.

Bloody Government. corruption, nepotism,and theft.          Bloody Government. Sack him, he called the policeman a pleb!

 Mosquitoes. flies, and fleas.                                                 Cats fighting and snails that get under the feet.

The local radio/TV is largely irrelevant.                               Undoubtedly, the best in the world!!

The papers, for  advertisements, not the editorial.              Double undoubtedly, the best in the world!!

The food, we score highly, especially the steak !                  Improving and very varied. Our food reflects the population.

Shops, the experience is excellent.                                       Practical but not an extravaganza.
   

Omar Khayyam

There is a rumour in this house that I put off for tomorrow, what can best be done today !
 
Now the rights or wrongs of this statement ( I’m sure I don’t ) lead me to contend that we are all in too much of a rush, particularly after retirement, we carry the habits of a lifetime on into old age !
 
Usually the pressure was derived from within the working environment by another party who wished to develop their own career in some way or another.
 
As the doors of paid- employment bang shut behind us and we are cast out to pasture it seems very unfair that another sort of hierarchy is imposed.
 
The dreadful sound of a repeated mantra “what are you going to do today” or the equally dreadful, “have you looked at the *** yet“. There is no peace in the world.
 
Even the garden shed has a path to its door - there is no refuge.
 
Why must we be so busy. The weeds continue to grow, the paint will continue to peel as we poor souls draw closer to the final act.
 
These last years should be spent watching football on the tele, reading a book chatting to friends in the pub, relaxing, letting go - big sign DO NOT DISTURB !
 
Were all those years spent, confirming, there is no peace this side of the grave?
 
Old khayyam had it sussed
 
 
Awake for morning in the bowl of night
Has flung the stone that puts the start to flight
And low the Hunter of the East has caught
The sultans turret in a noose of light
 
Dreaming when dawns left-hand was in the sky
I heard a voice within the tavern cry
Awake my little ones and fill the cup
Before life's liquor in its cup be dry
 
And as the Cock crew those who stood before
The Tavern shouted open-then the door
You know how little time we have
And once departed may return no more
 
Come full the cup and in the fire of spring
The winter garments of repentance fling
The bird of time has but a little way to fly
And lo the bird is on the wing
 
A book of verse beneath the bough
A jug of wine, a loaf of bread - and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness -
Wilderness were Paradise enow.
 
How sweet is mortal sovereignty - think some
Others - How blest the Paradise to come
Ah, take the cash in hand and waive the rest
O the brave music of the distant drum.
 
The worldly hope men set their hearts upon
Turns ashes - or it prospers and anon
Like snow upon the desert's dusty face
Lighting a little hour or two is gone
 
And we that now make merry in the room
They left, and summer dresses in new bloom
Ourselves must we beneath the couch of earth
Descend, ourselves to make a couch - for whome
 
Ah make the most of what we yet may spend
Before we too into the dust descend
Dust into dust and under dust to lie
Sans wine, sans song , sans singer and -sans end
 
Alike for those who for tomorrow prepare
And those that after some tomorrow stare
A Muezzin from the tower of darkness cries
Fools your reward is neither Here nor There
O come with old Khayyam and leave the wise
To talk, one ting is certain, that life flies
One thing is certain and the rest is Lies
The flower that once has blown for ever dies

Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and saint, and heard great argument
About it and about : but evermore
Came out by the same door as in I went.

With them the seed of wisdom did I sow
And with my own hand laboured it to grow
And this was all the harvest that I reap
I come like water, and like wind I go.

Into this Universe, and why not knowing
Nor whence like water willy-nilly flowing
And out of it, as wind along the waste
I know not whither, willy-nilly blowing.

What without asking, hither hurried whence
And without asking, whither hurried hence
Another and another Cup to drown
The memory of this impertinence !