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.