Colonialism by another name

Subject: Colonialism by another name.

With the sudden removal or Evo Moralise from the governance of Bolivia, in an election campaign which bares the hallmark of outside interference we once again are led to the conclusion that American colonialism is at the heart of it all. The overthrow of Saddam Hassain in Iraq was dressed up as overthrowing a tyrant and ushering in western style democracy whilst evidence leads us to the conclusion that American avarice and the control of Iraqi oilfields by Dick Cheney and his friends was nearer the truth. 
Cuba a county which had broken the Munro Doctrine rule by which no country on the South American continent is allowed to pursue any radical ideological deviance from that demanded by Washington, was brutally castigated and forced into economic  isolation through the confiscation of trade routes and their ability to obtain financial assistance in the worlds financial markets, which incidentally are controlled by America. Venezuela, Chile, Columbia and Peru, the concern that radical left wing governance of these countries invoked the right of Washington to interfere in what ever way it chose to unseat those legitimate governments which had won their way to power through the ballot box was part of the doctrine, America First. The revolutionary, Che Guevara in Argentina and then in Bolivia was the synthesis of all America feared in a leader, a leader who rejected the exploitation of the people through foreign held investment and who played havoc with the US insistence on the tidy symmetry of the external plunder of a countries natural resource, practiced by the USA.
The Soviets also in overrunning independent countries on their borders after the Second World War and now the current Chinese, almost silent assimilation of the capital resources in so many countries around the world (including our own) are examples of the colonialism for which only the British have so far been derided. 
Self preservation has a sensible ring to it and one could perhaps use the case to justify the Jewish aggression on their boarders but the exploitation of the countries in South America, or the brutal Satalinisation  of the Balkans and countries adjoining, such as Estonia, Lithuania, Moldova, Poland and the Ukraine have no cheerleaders these days, other than their own sense of entitlement. The case against China is still out as to whether it is benign or could turn aggressive but the wholesale buying up of the 'means of production' leaves the financial invader in a powerful position for the future.
We in this country on the other hand divvy up the few billions we have in an effort to secure votes knowing that in the "first past the post", "winner takes all" system, where democracy is a misunderstood concept and leaves millions of people unrepresented by the political system. Swathes of people are effectively  disenfranchised, locked out from political representation  until a fresh election comes around  in five years time by which time not only the hideous buying of votes on promises which bare little or no hope of coming to fruition is resumed but which, in the same timescale, the lives of millions may be ruined.

The waterproof robot

Subject: The waterproof robot. 

As the digital age impacts on our vision of the real world, creating instead an avatar existence on a smart phone in direct competition to the reality around, our young, head down in a gaming room or engaged in a digital interaction with a friend they have never met  is the position many young people find themselves today. Link that with online bullying and the intense personal criticism which goes far beyond what one would expect to face in face to face communication, is it any wonder that many people are seeking help as they suffer some sort of mental impairment. 
The trend in some countries has seen the young withdraw into their bedroom rather than go out seeking relationships outside. Their world exists on the web where the impact of boy meets girl can be be made much more plausible by ensuring that the flesh has no chance of being corrupted by passion and the susceptibility to romance is handled on ones own terms by never turning up for the date. 

It's argued of course that the worlds population will plummet if we all followed the Japanese example where young men are reportedly turning real relationships aside for imaginary ones found on the internet and that their intimate sensibilities are under the control of which ever digital platform you happen to be tuned into. With a lack of intimacy the chance of babies falls way drastically as does the economic model for a balance between the workforce and the aged. Perhaps this will be no bad thing in a place like Japan where the development of robots to do work and act as surrogate companions in the nursery relieves this burden of needing people to do the role of making things or tasked with the job of carer for the elderly.  
In our own society where we are far less imaginative as how we are going to handle the changes needed in the workforce through robotisation, where the uneducated will be permanently forced out of the work  and even the middle class will find that Artificial Intelligence will make the work they do redundant. Only the super-rich will benefit as the rewards a work force generate  won't have have to shared out as wages and the phenomenon we know as AI will eventually take care of itself. 

Perhaps that is the final solution to global warming and the real reason why world leaders seem not to care, they have in mind a heat resisting, waterproofed robot, impervious to climate change, beavering away to fulfill what ever the investment buffs considered appropriate.

I haven't the slightest idea

Subject: I haven't the slightest idea. 

When I was growing up it took weeks between the time a letter, written overseas, was being read by its reader, weeks in which the background to the letter might have changed, in the most extreme case the writer of the letter might have died. In other words the connection as to what was written and what was read was tenuous. Reading the letter the reader short-circuited the time it had taken to arrive and mentally presumed it was fresh from the pen, was in fact a realtime communication.
Today when we hit the send key on our internet connected computer a second later, or less it's half way around the world plopping into the email box, a signal that it's there inviting us to open it immediately. 
The reason why I mention this is that our communication has become instant, we tumble over ourselves to be in touch, we use the video links over the internet to be at that place of a friend or a family member, arriving as an uninvited guest who from time immortal was a difficult event, disrupting us and interfering, as it did with the state of mind you were in at the time, perhaps undermining your equanimity, interfering with the plans you had made for yourself that day. In other words we have become too accessible, not only to friends but to the blow by blow conflicts which are going on outside our immediate world in the crazy world at large. 
We overdose on the calamitous nature of the confrontation in Hong Kong or in Chile we are inundated with the private lives of people we will never meet, we are shocked or in some cases traumatised by the potential for harm we are doing to ourselves as a society  with global warming or the dangerous that exist from others who are more powerful than ourselves which makes us feel vulnerable. Vulnerability is perhaps the most invidious form of self harm as we read of the post Brexit trading arrangements with Donald Trumps America or the sly infiltration of our security by the Chinese takeover of critical elements of our means of production like a nuclear power plant that apparently can only be afforded by the Chinese. The sense that our nationalism, based on a sense of community values could be eroded by a Chinese parent who's strictures are born of fundamentally different ethics to our own is something to give pause and reflect. 
Do we need the goodies dangled in front of our eyes or are they simply baubles which a sensible  upbringing would have us reject.
The political aspiration, to remain in power is converted by the clamour for our vote to offering the things not many months ago would have been unaffordable. Billions for the NHS, more billions for education, pensions, infrastructure, mental health the list goes on and on. 
Does this immediacy of presentation, the swift replacement of one thing with another dull or brains in this card shuffling trick "now you see it now you don't". The media flood us with figures and few facts. The people we used to rely on to call out the charlatan are silent or at least muffled beneath the noise. 
Our brains which relied on the news, many months out of date from a friend far away can now not rely on the news given in a press conference a minute or two ago. We are trapped in a welter of misinformation and false news, we are asked our opinion and our vote built upon the quicksand of speculation and lies. We are asked to continue, as we did in the past, relying on the maturity of events which proceeded slowly and grew in your mind as a course of action to approve or disapprove but one in which there was enough evidence to make a decision.
In this political fairground where the clown and the juggler hold sway, where the trapeze artist risks their life on a new death defying act safe but in the knowledge that the safety net will protect  them if things go wrong we are now privy to an act under which no safety net has been placed and the stars of the show haven't yet practiced how to proceed with their act.
Alice was asked the riddle by the Mad Hatter, "why is the raven like a writing desk" Alice gives up trying to figure it out and the Hatter admits "I haven't the slightest idea". 

Traveling in the 60s

Subject: Traveling in the 60s

One of the things about the supposed romance of travel is the ambiguity of who you are and what you stand for. Released from the straight jacket of social conformity you are transparent to others as you pass through the sights and sounds of a great city or pause before some natural beauty. You have cast off that cloak of social respectability, so important back home now superfluous in a land of strangers. 

Casting off from the quayside the ship inched slowly away from the land, separating you from the strictures which had tugged at you daily.  Now released, the ship swings around under the guidance of the fussy tugs, a mournful blast from the fog horn as the hawsers drop into the water to be drawn quickly back on board the tug boat. "Slow ahead", "two degrees to starboard" comes the command from the pilot and repeated by the man at the wheel as he flicks over the engine telegraph to slow ahead, replicated by the telegraph in the engine room. The. Throttle is eased on the engineers platform down below to acknowledge slow ahead and compressed air released into the cylinder to kick the piston over and create the compression which fires the fuel.
Out on deck the farewells and the streamers part as the gap between the ship and the people standing on quay widen. There is a tension in the air as loved ones part, sometimes for ever, those on the ship looking to new experiences, those on shore content with what they have. Slowly the ship begins to pick up speed as the wake becomes more pronounced and she heads out through the breakwater out into the open waters of the sea. The tremble of the engine as it picks up speed, full ahead is mirrored by the pitching motion as the swell begins to exert  its force. The navigating officer lays a course to our destination and we go happily in search of our cabin.
The ship for three  weeKs or more is our oyster, our world of isolated irrelevance, no bills, no cooking, no traffic, other than the stalwarts walking their daily routine around the promenade deck. You can practice your sloth or search around for things to do and people to do them with.  The famous shipboard romance starts from here as you eye the pretty girls stretching out around the pool deck, laying on their towels each fully aware  of their attractiveness,  like a coming together of seals, they gaze doe eyed, attentive to their next catch, who knows, it might be you !

The era of the dance band

Subject: The era of the dance band.

Of course it's a question of age and ones life experiences but watching a short film on the Talking Pictures Channel, a channel which shows many of the old black and white movies as well as promotional films made when we were all far more naive and gullible more innocent more accepting of the ordinary event and the ordinary people in them.
In years gone by when we were growing up the influences on our minds were local not international. No TV to disturb our tranquility no online gaming, no false news from 24/7 newscasts to confuse our very understanding of the local world, a world which we knew pretty intimately.
Just now I tuned by chance into a program depicting Eddie Carroll a 1930s band leader who's music depicted the swing and melody of that period. He along with The Ambrosia Orchestra and The Henry Halls Orchestra, were contemporaries, who we often listened to on the radio. The Pictures (the cinema) which we visited perhaps every other Saturday in the form of Pathe News were our only other contact with events across the world, events usually depicted in a bland, straight laced way so as not to disturb the horses.
The music of Eddie Carroll was a loverly blast from the past, musicians who could play their instruments without the need of an electronic synthesiser to heighten the effect. The clarinet, trumpet and saxophone led the melody, the guitarist, bass and drummer provided the rhythm. The music was racy or melodic, the songs sung with crystal clear diction, every word, every phrase, clear as a bell. 
Where did it all this adult 'music making' go. A whole industry taken over by the teenagers craving to shock the older generation. Little Richard, Elvis Presley, Lonnie Donegan, a whole host of beboppers became our staple diet. The simplicity of dance music with its structure and strict timing was replaced by the garish exhibitionism which young people demanded. Popular Music has from that time on been the province of the young, the old rarely getting a look, in other than through a nostalgic look back, through the marvel of Spotify, associating  many of my musical tastes with a bygone era "when men and women valued the difference".

The passing of friends

Subject: The passing of friends

It's strange to think of a world without Seamus or Bill, without Garrick, all people who's lives whist so different they never the less lived those lives in somewhat the same way.
 It's a trial this life of ours, a trail littered with more or less the same debris, the ups and downs, trials and tribulations which we are all prone to,  yet each seen so differently by the participant, each with different ideas, different objectives. As they scraped and bumped along the stream of life, carried this way and that by the eddies and currents sometimes close to an objective, sometimes far and getting further they each experienced that individuality which for them made them feel special. 
Each had a vision of themselves, a sense of who they were as they conjectured themselves in the eyes of those around them. Sometimes the vision was distorted and inappropriate, sometimes it glorified an aspect of their lives and and they brushed under the carpet the rest, not in any wilful disagreement of a duty but in a sort of blindness to reality, as if reality was too hard.
The frustrations that man is heir to in this life of starts and stops, of hopes and disappointments. Looking back one sees the pivotal points in the journey the pinch points and the helter-skelter moments when all was good and attainable, when ones energy and indefatigable self belief were enough to blast aside any obstruction and of course those other times when you descended into yourself to nurse your bruised ego.
Most mornings were sunny and full of upland promise, there was enough positivity to see you over the metaphorical bumps, even the traffic jam and being late was treated phlegmatically the event seen in the round. Perhaps the view that events would progress without us was an omen for the time when we are not there and things could go on without our input. 
Perhaps the self centred importance we create around ourselves must at all times be tempered with the knowledge that we are not indispensable and in fact sometimes just the opposite when we offer little more than the dull thud of our presence.
Hamlets soliloquy "To be or not to be". Is best imbibed over a strong cup of tea or something stronger. The bard gets right down to the nitty gritty of a life of struggle, or rather the struggle with life in his reflective speech of a disconsolate prince. To fight or give in to sleep but there's the rub, who knows what dreams may come.
I'm lucky I don't dream much and with my blog my day starts by describing  my troubles or achievements in the form of the third person which is very cathartic. When I read or hear of something I feel is important I can't wait to put my own take on it and therefore seem, in some way to be engaged. The more one engages, even if only mentally, the reward of staking out your territory, making your views known and feeling stronger for doing so, is invariably good.
Much of ones opinion is based on your own life experience and the events which have formed your life have given what many of us living in a similar emotional geographical area thousands of miles apart, still how similar our lives have been. The confirmation that you often speak for many gives you the optimism to carry on. 
Logged into the archival continuum that is 'cloud storage' these words will be around for a long time, like the diaries of old, which the historian sifts trough to better understand antiquity. Today's event, ancient by tomorrow soon becomes irrelevant. 

Brave New World

Subject: Brave New World.

It's been a blow to Corbyn and the Labour Party to hear the announcement that Nigel Farage has decided only to contest Labour held seats and not to put up candidates from his Brexit Party against the Conservatives.
It's a heavy blow to Labour who felt that the Brexit voter although diluting its potential vote would do the same for the Torys and in many cases might let in the election of a Labour MP to an otherwise safe Tory seat.
The announcement that Farage was fielding 600 candidates from his party must have sent shivers through the Boris camp since both Farage and Boris were contesting for the same vote, people those who unequivocally wanted us to leave the EU.
So now we have a further crystallisation of this unusual general election, an election predominated by one specific policy decision and the continuing demonisation of Jeremy Corbyn as a communist, terrorist sympathising anti-Christ who's sympathetic humanitarian policies which focus on the plight of the ever increasing plight of the poor and the needy, and with a fundamental swing away from the neo-liberalism of the past years towards a State involved, investment led consideration that the State is us and we should have some say in the way the main Service Industries like Water and Gas, the Trains and the Care Industry, and some Infrastructure  Projects away from London, should be run with strong State involvement. This electoral race which is stupidly promising everything to everybody is electioneering at its worst and whilst for instance under the Tory's, wages in the Public Sector have fallen to levels last seen 10 years ago in 2009, the productivity and the skill base in many of our industries has been allowed to diminish making us uncompetitive with those nations we will soon be competing with, including the Europeans. An interesting example of Britain's reluctance of the private sectors unwillingness to take over the ailing British Steel. First a Turkish and now a Chinese company have offered the cash to modernise the plant and make it competitive. It's the all too often image of a British company which has not kept up with reinvestment in the plant preferring shareholder dividends to putting part of the profits back into the company infrastructure. The others reason British Steel has failed is because of the extremely high cost of electricity and the equally high business rates which compared to its competitors overseas where in industries such as the steel industry subsidies are provided. I have no doubt that now British Steel is no longer British the government will make the requisite subsidies available.
I can't see how Corbyn's stature as a future PM can survive given the unabated onslaught against him by the right wing press. Every morning the headlines are the same, a demonisation of his character and his political belief. It's an orchestrated barrage of innuendo the like of which has not been seen since the castigation of Micheal Foot, another left wing politician who's image was demolished by the same press. 
Our whole political system needs an overhaul with the disproportional 'first past the post' method of deciding how the votes are allocated leaves many voters disenfranchised since, irrespective of how popular a party is countrywide, unless the voters are corralled into one electoral district their political preference is obliterated by the weight given across the country to the two main parties.
Anyway it looks like the ideological dislike of the EU whipped up over the years by the press and the equally vernal distortion of what Corbyn stands for, with the added caveat  that the press has a stake in the continuation of the status quo, seals our fate.  
Its presentation of what Corbyn's ideas regarding the inadequate provision in the schools and the squalid living conditions for many of the electorate are ignored in favour of the publics appetite for good old character assassination. 
Personality politics is at play.  The serious politically left leaning, people caring man versus the clown jester. With a population of gullible, short attention span, pleasure seeking people, the news papers and the media in general are having a field day with fake news outweighing real news by a factor of five to one.
A dystopian view no doubt but with the revelation  of a 'AI' data base on all of us, bonding and manipulating us in true Orwellian fashion, guiding our preferences into silos where like cattle we are fed just the right amount of propaganda to keep us happy.
Brave New Wold indeed.

Getting old

Subject: Getting old.

The implicit advantage of growing old on a desert island must be that you do the ageing bit in isolation far from the prying eyes of those who would have an opinion.
Getting old is never a reassuring sight especially for ones children who have from their early years seen you as some sort of pillar to lean on, some sort of surety and strength to rely on. Now as the physical strength clearly dwindles and in their eyes we become not only doddery but also that dreaded thing, a liability something else to worry about in their busy lives, the world has turned full circle, then we fretted for their safety, now they fret for ours. 

Our mind usually races ahead of the body searching out corners of endeavour which the sluggish body is loathe  to venture and this is especially so when we get old. The mind, as fresh as a daisy doesn't pause to think that the old braggart the body is struggling to keep up, not only keep up but even start out on the journey. As the knee or ankle joint begins to give a twinge of pain, making us hobble around a bit and start to look like that old person we used to see in the street.

The self image of old age is not attractive. We don't visualise that the person who walks slowly down the stairs or limps between the supermarket isles was once someone's dance partner or belonged to a team kicking a football around but now struggles to use  the TV control. 
The mind is continually at play, skipping reality and professing amazement that others don't understand our own self image of what is real to us. Oldies can still drive a car and make their way to appointments, they can still engage  in everyone's idea of what the world is but somehow there is an intolerance of the older person wishing to be there. They imagine and yearn for the oldie to be safe and sound in bed, secure from any imagined crisis, tucked away like a museum piece, with a fragile sign, 'don't touch'  on the end of the bed,
Our struggle is to make everyone realise that the stereotype of old age varies from person to person. In some, whilst the bones ache, it's only an inconvenience not a reason to close us down, to assume they can do rather than can't,  to ignore the gait not close the gate, to know that the intention as always is to be in the present  not the past.

The Impeachment Hearing

Subject: The Impeachment Hearing.

Watching the testimony of two participants in the attempted impeachment hearing of President Trump, US Ambassador to the Ukraine Bill Taylor and George Kent a senior State Department Official were questioned for over 4 hours by both Democrat and Republican Senators as to the veracity of their statements. A deeply polarised American public are being asked to evaluate on what constitutes actions which can prove or otherwise, whether president trump used his executive position to seek the President of Ukraines connivance to smear Joe Biden's, the Democratic Parties front runner in the race to contest the Presidency next year. Biden's son  Hunter had become mixed up with a Chinese Fund Raising Company operating in the Ukraine which is politically questionable, given the sensitivity of Chinese and US relations. 
The question of 'hearsay' and 'interpretation' were the main line of attack from the Republicans whilst the Democrats relied on the testimony  of these two senior American representative in the Ukraine.
One would normally say that a diplomat of the standing of Ambassador Taylor would  be heard and acknowledged as truthful since the diplomatic service, unlike the politicians are supposed to be without bias or rancour. What the Ambassador heard and what was said is usually thought to be the substance of truth or at least as close as a human can get to that elusive paradigm.
Enter into the fray the aggressive, legally trained Republican Senators who tore into the two witnesses like attack dogs disputing the opinion of the diplomats with their own highly prejudiced political opinions. Of course the ferocity and legalistic bent of these men played to the Trump bandwagon, their rapid fire questions, the answers seemingly irrelevant in their quest to exonerate the president, was a prime example of a courtroom trial (which this hearing clearly wasn't) where the prosecution seek to persuade the jury that the witness is untruthful. 

So on the one side the democrats respectfully heard the Ambassadors testimony placing it as a true representation of what had happened whilst the Republicans did all they could to question the events as described. The problem to my mind is it's easier to sow doubt by aggressive language, since the words and the hostile nature of the delivery leaves a far deeper impression on the mind of the listener. 
The theatrics of Republican bile versus the measured reasoning of the Democrat is not in favour these days in a society daily degrading itself with caustic and aggressive tweets (President Trump comes to mind) which seems to be the only method these days of any sort of discourse.
We seem to have returned to the Roman Amphitheatre where the spectacle of hurt and pain is valued over that of companionship and love.

Friendship

Subject: Friendship.

People are the most fertile,  most important ingredient in our lives. The majestic views, of Niagara or Victoria Falls, the beaches or the sunsets, the hotel experience or the night out under the stars all are indifferent to the impact people have made on us in our lives. The friends we had when we were young and the ones we were more intimate with later are the warp and weft of our lives as we integrated  and differentiated between them, as we seek favour and deny favour, as we measure our own actions against them and sometimes, found wanting, we feel jealousy or an anguish that we had not made a better job of cementing that relationship. 
Too easily we withdraw into ourselves for sake of trying and, in the act of trying, we fear the thought of a rebuff and begin to fear fear itself yet how often we are surprised and heartened by the response we receive when we put ourselves out and say hello, good morning how are you today.  Friendship is an asset we too freely squander, taking it for granted and not understanding the opportunities we encourage our greatest fault, that of thinking too much of ourselves. It's a vail inside which we surround ourselves, creating an opacity which we use as a defence.
If we could be more open and see where life takes us in our relationships. If we could loosen our prejudices and become a little less narcissistic.  If we could try to seek new ground on which to build our opinions, then we would all be much better informed.
It should become a habit,  looking around and seeing with our eyes and ears what is going on outside our bubble. If we could evaluate a kindness or a willingness to help as an important interlocutor between people, if we could slow down and not be in so much of a hurry, reflecting more and planning less.
I'm only too aware of how Kiplingesque this is beginning to sound but as one gets older the 'If'  factor becomes like a tolling bell reminding us, in this closing passage in our lives, of so much to do but with little energy to try. 
Our lives are a clutter of objects picked up over the years, sitting on the mantel piece or taking valuable space in the attic but what of the friendships, where are they. When will you write of telephone an old friend, out of the blue to say hello how are you. These people who meant so much in years gone by, who made you laugh or cry, where are they now. 
Take out that old address book, dig out the phone number and try to reconnect as much for them as for you. Do it this Christmas you might give (and receive) the best gift of all, the re-connection with a friend. 

Taking part not the winning

Subject: Taking part not the winning.

How do you cope with waking up the morning after the evening before when your dreams have gone up in smoke. We have all been there, a girlfriend has told you to get lost, a wife to clear out, a boss to say you are no longer wanted, the death of someone you cared for, the list goes on. But how about a dream of winning the World Cup a dream which in the making you have endured hours and hours of hard physical punishment and a dedication, a dream which ruled most of everything else you did since you were young. Of course we mustn't forget it's also a highly paid job being an international rugby player these days, it gives you kudos and fame, and raises your public profile when, apart from the talent to be a good athlete your attainment in other fields  is much the same as all of us, pretty limited and certainly not the claim to celebrity such as a world famous rugby player brings.
So the desire to win the accolade of being the best has avoided you and as you troupe out across the tarmac and onto the plane to return home it must all feel pretty hollow without the cup. If on Monday or in a fortnights time the training regimen is started again to build up for another tilt at the title in four years time, one must overcome the barrier of knowing that this was perhaps your moment and that these moments don't usually come around twice.
The stoic face of Eddy Jones said it all. His tactical planning which had been perfected by the players in the match against New Zealand was disjointed from the get go by the injury to Sinclair and threw such a huge spanner in the works of ball to hand dominance. He more than the players had to watch from the sidelines, as we all did to see our team trounced in virtually every phase by a team who bulldozed their power in scrum after scrum making the vaunted, second rate. How will those prop forwards feel this morning knowing they were the instruments of the torture the team must feel today.  
Of course it's only a game but a game where the team collective is vital, more than in soccer where a showy  bit of genius from the centre forward, or in cricket a stand of one individual can win a match. In rugby it's a team game like no other and the players who performed so brilliantly a week before were found wanting in the main event.
Heavy hearts and muted praise when they return home. No champions bus ride for the adoring fans to show their thanks, rather the stoicism (for which we are past masters) of the stiff upper lip and the claim that " it's the taking part that's important, not the winning".

Being the best in the world

Subject: Being the best in the world.

It's a funny old world. In a matter of just over a week the tactical game which made the England match against the Kiwi's a legend was now reversed by the Springbok and used against us. The scrum on which so much depends became a nightmare for England as the Boks of old, that tough fierce combative side fought for every scrap of ball and bundled England out of the game. Their domination of the scum was nearly complete forcing England into errors and penalties which the Springbok capitalised upon. But not only the pack but the defence, the speed at which they rushed the English players causing them to be on the back foot much like the English side had done to the Kiwi's.  There was little of no slight of foot from the backs on either side, it was positional play dictated by the ability of the Springbok forwards to maximise their presence. The game became a game of penalties, territory was what it was all about, being in the right part of the pitch to give your kicker a chance. England were out played by a Southern Hemisphere team who played, as of old, powerful and brutally clinical rugby.  They deserved to win from the moment Sinclair went off with concussion, Dan Cole was not able to provide the balance in the scrum and repeadly they were pushed around to concede penalty after penalty from which Handre Pollard said thank you very much. 
So the hopes of a nation, England, were once more relegated to all so runs, once more questioning what went wrong. There had been a moment when the Northern Hemisphere thought they had found a way to beat the best in the Southern Hemisphere and, given the overwhelming display in the semifinal, England were clear favourites to win this game. All the skills were there, the coach was a master of his trade but somehow the Kiwi, the Australian and today the Springbok bring an extra dimension. 
How do England rebuild their hopes and desire after having such a good tournament  only to fall at the last hurdle. The time and the total commitment to your sport has been found wanting.and given the dedication you put in it must come as a tremendous disappointment having to climb out of the pit of disbelief and despair which must always accompany losing a World Cup.
The South African side return to a broken crime ridden society at home, England return to an equally tormented country which has willingly decided to inflict economic pain on itself. The sight of Cyril Ramaphosa, like his predecessor Nelson Mandela, wearing the number 6 on his back, the position the first black South African captain Siya Kolisa plays is seen as a healthy progression in that remarkable but racially divided country. Will it be enough to end the poverty and the unemployment, no, but for a day at least all South Africans can feel proud to be the best in the world at rugby.

The passing of friends

Subject: The passing of friends

It's strange to think of a world without Seamus or Bill, without Garrick, all people who's lives whist so different they never the less lived those lives in somewhat the same way.
 It's a trial this life of ours, a trail littered with more or less the same debris, the ups and downs, trials and tribulations which we are all prone to,  yet each seen so differently by the participant, each with different ideas, different objectives. As they scraped and bumped along the stream of life, carried this way and that by the eddies and currents sometimes close to an objective, sometimes far and getting further they each experienced that individuality which for them made them feel special. 
Each had a vision of themselves, a sense of who they were as they conjectured themselves in the eyes of those around them. Sometimes the vision was distorted and inappropriate, sometimes it glorified an aspect of their lives and and they brushed under the carpet the rest, not in any wilful disagreement of a duty but in a sort of blindness to reality, as if reality was too hard.
The frustrations that man is heir to in this life of starts and stops, of hopes and disappointments. Looking back one sees the pivotal points in the journey the pinch points and the helter-skelter moments when all was good and attainable, when ones energy and indefatigable self belief were enough to blast aside any obstruction and of course those other times when you descended into yourself to nurse your bruised ego.
Most mornings were sunny and full of upland promise, there was enough positivity to see you over the metaphorical bumps, even the traffic jam and being late was treated phlegmatically the event seen in the round. Perhaps the view that events would progress without us was an omen for the time when we are not there and things could go on without our input. 
Perhaps the self centred importance we create around ourselves must at all times be tempered with the knowledge that we are not indispensable and in fact sometimes just the opposite when we offer little more than the dull thud of our presence.
Hamlets soliloquy "To be or not to be". Is best imbibed over a strong cup of tea or something stronger. The bard gets right down to the nitty gritty of a life of struggle, or rather the struggle with life in his reflective speech of a disconsolate prince. To fight or give in to sleep but there's the rub, who knows what dreams may come.
I'm lucky I don't dream much and with my blog my day starts by describing  my troubles or achievements in the form of the third person which is very cathartic. When I read or hear of something I feel is important I can't wait to put my own take on it and therefore seem, in some way to be engaged. The more one engages, even if only mentally, the reward of staking out your territory, making your views known and feeling stronger for doing so, is invariably good.
Much of ones opinion is based on your own life experience and the events which have formed your life have given what many of us living in a similar emotional geographical area thousands of miles apart, still how similar our lives have been. The confirmation that you often speak for many gives you the optimism to carry on. 
Logged into the archival continuum that is 'cloud storage' these words will be around for a long time, like the diaries of old, which the historian sifts trough to better understand antiquity. Today's event, ancient by tomorrow soon becomes irrelevant.