My PC (Post-Christmas) Blog

Crisp, cold mornings - how we love them! Revel in their bright, inviting, deeply motivating energy. Let's get out there! A brisk walk, healthy, invigorating, blowing away the cobwebs, exercising our weary limbs, nudging our jaded metabolism into action, bringing a rosy warmth to our cheeks and a sparkle to our eyes. A healthy lifestyle for the taking - who needs the gym? Actually, it's raining today, so maybe I do!

Some years ago (well, actually, quite a lot of years), living in a small rural community, I remember those bright, chilly days, walking to work in the crisp, early morning, delighting in the sunlight, the white, frosted rooftops, the wintry gardens, full of orange rosehips and red-berried holly trees, tall, bleached pampas grasses and dark green fir trees. I would arrive at work breathless and glowing, my cheeks matching my warm, red, woollen scarf and my matching red hat pulled down over my frozen ears. "You look like a little carol singer" my friend, Gill, would tell me as I peeled off the layers of clothing and tried to thaw out beside the radiator.

Now Christmas is over for another year! That glorious post-Christmas feeling! Freedom from all the rush, the pressure, the present buying, the food shopping, the parties, the baking and basting and the eating and drinking... Time to put your feet up and enjoy a well-earned rest! Christmas! It's been a strange one this year. There are global problems - and not only in the eurozone. After two thousand years plus of revelling, a growing multi-culturalism and an obsession with political correctness, things are turning on their heads a little.

This year our Muslim friends from Turkey sent us warm greetings and wished us a 'Merry Christmas'! Another friend wished us 'wonderful holidays' and a 'holy 2012'. Another wrote from Australia, calling for us to banish 'winter festivals' and put the 'Christ' back in Christmas trees - a reasonable request considering the origins of the festival they celebrate! The British prime minister, uneasy at the state of the nation, has been urging us all back to 'Christian values' and the Queen herself, in her Christmas broadcast, called us all gently to account and surprised us all by recommending us to consider escape from the excesses of that 'recklessness and greed' that trouble us all by opening our hearts to the Christian Saviour!

These are desperate times and may call for desperate remedies. Time to find a balance between the relentless demands of the material world and spirituality? Doubtless there is a touch of political point-scoring involved here and definitions of 'Christian values' come in a variety of shades of colour, but there are interesting developments afoot in our weary and ailing world.

It's nearly 2012 already! Time to cast our minds back over the past year and evaluate. Maybe a brisk walk in the wintry weather is the first step towards clearing the head whilst we consider the options... Happy New Year everyone!

A baby's eye view...

What is this thing we call Christmas? We do it every year - devout Christians, atheists, agnostics - nearly everyone in the 'Christian hemisphere' does it. We've always done it. It's like cutting the tail off the Christmas goose before you put it in the oven (poor goose). Once upon a time the oven was too small, so you developed a strategy. Now, well, now no-one can remember why but they do it anyway.

Modern Christmas is like that! Crazy, crazy, crazy! Stress, migraine, mounting debt and still we do it. Shop till you drop. Party till you're pissed. Stuff till you're... well, stuffed!

So what would be the baby's eye view on all this? After all, it all started with a baby, didn't it? A manger full of straw, a draughty stable, a few rustic shepherds... what would Jesus do? WWJD? Words fail us - what would Jesus do? Things seem to have got a little out of hand these past two thousand years. I guess the wise men have something to answer for, starting us off on all this decadence. They came late to the party, we're told, but they brought gifts - gold, smelly stuff, cosmetics - high class stuff! And now we have to bring presents. And that's when the trouble started...

What shall I buy for Aunt Flo? Would Granny like a tin of biscuits? Can I have a mini-fridge for my bedroom, mum? But I wanted a playstation...! I think maybe Jesus is a little bemused right now. The heavenly host too are still waiting for that elusive peace on earth to start and singing their midnight song in the clear night air. Come to that, I'm confused too!

Mind you, when you ask people what they are hoping for this Christmas they often come up with expectations for the season of peace and goodwill that don't sound too much out of line with the original intention - warm, loving family gatherings; chilling out over a good meal and taking time to share some precious moments with your loved ones; a protest against rampant materialism outside St. Paul's Cathedral (WWJD?); helping out at a shelter for the homeless, serving a Christmas meal and a warm smile to those who have nothing in life; inviting the bereaved, the lonely and the oddballs to share a Christmas Day meal with you in your own home; an armistice in the midst of wartime hostilities... Maybe we've forgotten the baby, the donkey and the wise men, but perhaps there's still hope for our poor old human race. There's still some warmth and cheer to be found and still a bit of room at the inn... "Jesus would be with the St. Paul's protesters this Christmas" says Dr. Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury. Maybe he's right.

Jingle bells, Batman smells!

Parodies! We love 'em! Why do we do that? Why do we take some perfectly innocent song, rhyme or Christmas carol that someone has spent hours lovingly creating and deliberately ruin it - just for fun! We just can't resist, it seems. It has to be something well known in order for others to get the point. It seems it has to rhyme. (So if you don't want anyone to parody your poem make sure it doesn't rhyme!) It is often something poignant, romantic, maybe a little 'naf' and then we have just the material we need to work on. Bing Crosby's 'I'm dreaming of a white Christmas' would be eminently suitable...

Christmas carols are the perfect choice. Endowed with centuries of powerful meaning, romantic imagery and the stuff imagination and dreams are made of, Christmas carols provide the perfect medium for us to practise our art or maybe our art-less skills on. You don't have to be quite so artless as 'Jingle bells, Batman smells' but you can if the mood takes you!

One of my favourite parodies of all time is probably the Spinners' rendering of that famous tried and tested carol 'While Shepherds Watched'. At school we giggled and tittered through school singing lessons and assemblies as the most daring amongst us bravely sang out the latest version of this carol, about these rustic chaps washing their socks in the fields at night whilst the angels entertained them with heavenly melodies (tub rhyming with scrub). But the Spinners (in my opinion) did it best when they pictured the shepherds huddling in the wintry fields around a giant television screen (a drive-in movie?) and the angel of the Lord seizing the moral high ground and switching their harmless amusement from ITV to the more educational and cultured BBC (rhyming with ITV) emissions. As far as I know, ITV never won any law suits against them as a result. Sounds a bit tame recounting it like this but to its first audiences it was hilariously funny (really!).

At school in the '70s, parodies featuring the Beatles were the obvious choice. 'We Three Kings' (of Liverpool are) was transformed for us by the substitution of 'John on his scooter, blowing his hooter, Following Ringo Star'! Remember that one? We were simple folk in those days and easily pleased.

Of course, all these reminiscences and ramblings are somewhat culturally defined so probably most of my readers from Russia, Singapore and Nairobi (I wish!) have no clue as to my meaning, but I am sure there are many out there for whom this rings a bell or strikes a chord. More than one music band has made a fortune out of simply parodying someone else's material. They say nothing is original - all creativity stems from something someone else has said, written, painted already so there's no shame and no blame! Plagiarism - no! Parodying - why not?

December again - already!

December: the final month of the year. The end of the run! We made it! For me a month of white lights, frosty mornings, red candles, baking extravaganzas, present wrapping, choosing of Christmas cards, shopping and a hundred and one last minute tasks. A month of chilly starts, Christmas tree sellers under draughty railway bridges, bright red poinsettias on the window sill, shopping, visits to family and friends at home and abroad and, hopefully, some surprises! For my Australian friends I guess it's a month of beach barbeques, swimming pools, T-shirts and shorts and, on the down side, worries about bush fire alerts. Isn't our world strangely wonderful? Christmas pudding on the beach??

Here in the northern hemisphere we're on our way (dragged screaming and kicking, many of us) towards the thick of winter, desperately hoping to avoid the excesses of last year's snow and ice. There are some, I know, who are passionate about all that cold white stuff - I know there are a few of those eccentrics about and not all of them under ten years old - but I am not among them! In the south, the temperature is on the way up, the fire hazard warnings will be out, the sun is shining, the sea is warm and yet it's still Christmas! I never could get my head round that...

Of course, not all of us celebrate Christmas. I'm going to a 'Winter Fair' tomorrow, a title which acknowledges that fact. Living in a multi-cultural community, with neighbours from hundreds of different racial and cultural backgrounds there are no assumptions made. Not 'Christmas', just 'Winter'. But still the romantic associations are there - winter, ice, snowflakes, husky dogs, warm woollen sweaters and furry boots. It's that time of year and for me that includes Christmas! I'm a sucker for seasons. I'm so glad I live in a part of the world that has clearly defined seasons (even though current climate changes seem to have confused things for us a little lately). Actually, it's been a strange autumn, so mild, and I have roses, fuchsias and forsythia blooming in my garden at present, but I still know it's winter - and they shouldn't be! This time last year, in this same season, we were up to our ears in snow.

So to all of you who celebrate Christmas, I'm getting in early to wish you a happy one with as much peace and goodwill and as little hassle as possible! If you celebrate winter, I envy you (my passion is for summer!) but enjoy it. If you're heading into summer right now, enjoy! And for everyone alike, happy December! It's come round again!

Happy Feet... Happy Meat!

I am a little worried about how this thought of mine, which has started meandering around the channels of my mind, will be received. I am reluctant to share it because it touches on a subject about which many people feel passionate. These days free-range, Fair Trade, organic and, of course, vegetarian products are popular and widely available. They raise awareness of vital issues in our global society and they encourage a healthy consideration of our fellow beings, both human and non-human. The fine tuning of these questions and the deliberations that go on around them (concerning use of chemicals, carbon footprints, light pollution, healthy eating and so on) can become complex and labyrinthine. However, through them all, a healthier, juster way of living is placed before us for our consideration and action. Not everyone reacts in the same way and there are many varieties and shades of response.

One of the valid responses to this question has been the development in a number of countries of so-called 'happy meat'. One can consider all the issues and decide to become a vegan or vegetarian; some of us simply draw the line at eating veal, battery chickens or foie gras; others decide, after all, that life is too short, the issues too complex and plough doggedly on, enjoying their diet of steak, veal or cheap hamburgers, with no questions asked. Alternatively now one can choose a careful mid-way point along the line of argument and opt for happy meat, meat derived from animals whose albeit short lives have been deemed to be happy: well-fed, well cared for, free to roam in the fresh air and the green grass. A happy solution for all concerned. Or is it?

I am one of those people blessed with a rather quirky, inquisitive approach to things, an interest in linguistics and logistics and a penchant for pulling things apart and asking 'why?' I've always been like that. Some find it irritating, others endearing. Take your pick - I am at the mercy of my readers. Anyway, the question that keeps meandering around my head is a simple one really but it may have consequences. It may be flippant; it may be a touch politically incorrect, but I will ask it all the same - just to raise the question and keep us all on our toes, and if I make anyone cross with me then I apologise...

"Why?" I am asking. Why is it better to kill and eat the happy heifer who is busy minding its own business, chewing the cud, enjoying the open fields and the sunshine, than its neighbour, cooped up in indescribable conditions in a dark, cramped barn, miserable and waiting to die? Why kill and cook the blissfully happy pig, wallowing in soft mud and happy as a 'pig in clover', and not that other miserable specimen hurtling up the motorway in its overcrowded lorry, fighting for even a breath of air through its little pink nostrils? Euthanasia for pigs? A happy release for force-fed geese or turkeys? Why not? Why eat the happy pig and leave its miserable neighbour to suffer? Why not leave the free-range turkey gobbling in the farm yard this Christmas and gobble its unhappy relative from the factory farm?

I am missing the point, you all cry. You are right but I am loathe to spoil the fun of all those happy animals. The point, of course, is to encourage all farmers to strive for happy herds, delighted ducklings and cheery chickens. It's a fine cause and I'm all in favour. But it is a long process and, in the meantime, should I really choose to eat the happy ones and reject the rest? What sense does this apparently worthy choice make?

Not on the menu

People watching! I'm doing it again. I think I'm incurable - not that I'm looking for a cure - it's too much fun! The cafe has a double aspect so I get the best of both worlds: a view out the front to the market square with all its brightly coloured, canopied stalls, bustling with people on market day and, at the back, a view over the canal, the shopping street opposite and the rows of bikes leaned up against the railings.

There's a winter chill in the air, the first of the year really, which somehow inevitably turns my thoughts towards bright, crisp mornings, Sinterklaas and Christmas. The market stalls are so reminiscent of those colourful Christmas markets, so popular in northern Europe, their stalls overflowing with wooden decorations, toys, candles, hot chocolate and gluhwein! But for the moment I'm content with my mug of hot coffee - it's too early still for all that.

A couple of women are sitting by the back window, relaxing together over a cup of tea and catching up on the gossip. The conversation is animated and I do my best to eavesdrop. But they are speaking in Dutch and it's too difficult, so after a while I give up and let their words drift over my head, blending with the soft and innocuous music that fills the air, typical of cafes everywhere. Nothing to get excited about musically, but it covers the silence and provides the gently chilled-out atmosphere we're all looking for. 'Gezelligheid' (a kind of cosiness) the Dutch call it and for that there always have to be candles and soft lighting, together with the music.

Snatches of conversation drift over to me and I catch the word 'lekker' repeated over and over. 'Gezellig' (cosy), 'lekker' (delicious, good) - such familiar words - just a few of those Dutch cliches we joke about. 'Hartstikke leuk!' (fantastic!), 'Uitstekend!' (outstanding!), 'Fijne dag verder!' (enjoy the rest of your day) they exclaim. I am building up a stock of these handy sayings; there is one for every situation. My Dutch is poor but my ever-growing treasure store of cliches ensures that I have something to say on every occasion!

I joke about it, but these are the things I shall miss when one day I return home to my native country. I shall also miss the coffee, the 'patats' (chips) and the cheese (I won't miss the windmills and the clogs). It's a game we play at home: "what will you miss when we go home?" I will miss the market. I will miss the way passers-by wish me 'eet smakelijk' (enjoy your meal) as I tuck into my picnic. I will miss my favourite bars and the cafes where the owners recognise me as 'the English lady who writes'.

The waitress has just arrived with a little tray full of flowers in simple glass vases. A white freesia and a purple iris for each table. She smiles and we exchange a few words. I'm a regular here. I shall miss that too. But, for now, I just drink it all in because there's so much to see and so many stories to invent about the people around me. People watching is not on the menu but it's free of charge.

The Refrigerator Fringed with Joy

My house is full of the smell of freshly baked bread! It's an intoxicating aroma. I haven't baked bread for years but a recent holiday in Wales, staying in a tiny rustic stone cottage with a bubbling stream running past the kitchen window, awakened memories of previous years and got me in the mood. In those days, living in a more laid-back country location, I had embraced the joys (and occasional disappointments) of home baking, arts and crafts and home grown veg. In Wales this last summer we bought home made Welsh cakes and Bara Brith (a mouthwatering, dark brown, fruity tea bread, sliced and spread thickly with butter). We visited craft workshops and admired the work of local potters, artists, weavers and jewellers. We enjoyed the slower pace of life and the more 'grass roots' life style that we found there and hankered after the past.

In my enthusiasm I returned home, armed with strong white bread flour, stone ground wholemeal wheat flour and little bags of yeast, ready to recover my lost skills and try my hand at 'country living'. For that's what it's all about really. Nothing like this is ever just about 'the thing in itself'. We're all such romantic dreamers. So the smell of fresh bread in my kitchen conjures up pictures in my mind of scrubbed pine tables in a big country kitchen, of bright, shiny pots and pans hanging from racks and freshly-picked herbs drying on hooks, suspended from the ceiling. All at once I am in one of those 'Escape to the Country' dream homes where the show's latest participants, a retired couple, are drooling over their ideal kitchen: gleaming white, Shaker-style cupoards, fitted from floor to ceiling, with a handy 'island' in the middle. It's the focal point, the hub of their home, where they are going to entertain family and friends to their mid-life experiment in community living. Everything in life has 'associations', capturing our imaginations and transporting us to places we would rather be.

One of my favourite books* opens with a scene in which Mrs. Ramsay, her husband and her youngest son, James, are together in the living room of the country house where each year they spend the summer months, close to the sea. At six years old, James is portrayed as a sensitive child. He is easily affected by moods and atmospheres and by the words and unspoken inferences of his parents. Virginia Woolf describes in careful detail how James belongs to 'that great clan which cannot keep this feeling separate from that, but must let future prospects, with their joys and sorrows, cloud what is actually at hand." James sits on the floor, cutting out pictures from a catalogue. He is busy with a refrigerator. His mother tells him of the proposed outing they will make tomorrow, in a little boat, to visit the lighthouse keeper, if the weather is fine. At this news, the refrigerator picture, for James, is endowed with heavenly bliss. It is 'fringed with joy'. "But it won't be fine" pronounces his more down-to-earth father. He was incapable of untruth, Woolf tells us, "never alterated a disagreeable word to suit the pleasure or convenience of any mortal being, least of all his own children." In his intense disappointment, James's world crumbles and he is filled with feelings of hatred. So the refrigerator becomes the target for the little boy's emotions, first joy, then hate and his mother quickly tries to find another picture for him to cut out to distract him from life's harsh realities.

Life is all about associations. Some things are fringed with joy. Others have more upsetting connotations. We love home made bread because it embodies some perceived country idyll. We hate the name 'Eric' because of the little boy who sat next to us in class and pulled our plaits when we were five. "It is what it is" my ex-boss used to say. No it isn't! Things are rarely just themselves.

* To the Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf. Published 1927.

Save it for a Rainy Day

I visited a friend the other day. We exchanged pleasantries. I asked about her new baby. She asked about my holiday. The baby was fine, except for the usual sleep problems and unpredictable bowel activity. Then it was my turn. After I'd waxed lyrical at some length about the lake, the mountains and the autumnal foliage in the vineyards she looked at me quizzically. "You two really are outdoors people, aren't you?" she asked. She's known me a while; she reads my blog; she edits my submissions to my column on an expat website. I thought about what she had said and had to agree. Sporty? No. Fit? No, not particularly. But outdoors - yes! "I guess you don't mind about the rain, then" she said "living here."

Actually I do mind. I'm not the hardy outdoors type - battling it out in all weathers. I don't ride my bike in the snow like the Dutch do - I don't even have a bike! But I love being out of doors. Keep me cooped up in the house for more than a day and I go crazy. I love to walk; I love to observe the passing seasons; I love to sit in cafes; I love just to see what's going on in the outside world and what my neighbours are up to. The first thing I do in anybody's home is go to the window and look out. The garden always seems more interesting than indoors; so does the street. I like to admire the trees and spy on the neighbours. The next stage would be to examine the bookshelf. You can tell such a lot about people from their books.

But on holiday we go out. We make contingency plans like everyone else - we take DVDs with us, or a jigsaw, we look up local museums and shopping malls and tell ourselves we'll go. We save them up 'for a rainy day'. But when the rainy day comes, what do we do? We go out! We walk. We go to the beach or the park - just in case the sun comes out - we don't want to miss it. We go to the beach or the park. We huddle under trees, we shelter in cafes, but we save all those other worthy occupations, those cultural indoor pursuits, for 'tomorrow' - in case the weather really gets bad.

Simply a matter of taste

We stopped the car in a tiny village, high above the lake, and stepped out into another little world. All around us the hillside glowed with variegated greens, browns and yellows in neat rows, like an experiment in Pointillism on a backgrond of regency stripe. The little vineyards ran in between low grey walls and imposing villas. Brown signposts announced the 'Domaine due Chateau' and 'Domaine de la Chasse', pointing the way to the slopes where landowners had been cultivating their special vintages for centuries in this warm sunshine along the shores of Lac Leman.

'Degustation et la vente' - first taste, then buy. No neon signs, no gaudy publicity, just a handful of ancient establishments with excellent but understated service and outstanding wine. In the local village 'auberge' Madame served us with a small carafe of sweet white wine 'de la region'. She made no comment as we helped ourselves to a pack of peanuts to ward off the worst effects of wine on an empty stomach in the middle of the day. Probably not the best of accompaniments to her fine wines, but needs must - we had left our lunch in the car and the opportunity to taste and see was too good to waste. We struggled with the peanuts - tried to pull the top apart in vain, tried to find the cunning spot the manufacturers had prepared for easy opening, battled with instructions in French, and failed. Mademoiselle appeared silently at our elbow with a little dish for the peanuts and a pair of scissors.

There was something about the wine, politely served in its carafe, so lovingly poured, that told us, even in our ignorance, that here was something you do not buy in your local supermarket. It was gentle, light, sweet and delicate and yet so wonderfully unassuming. The auberge, at first sight, had seemed expensive and we were doubtful whether we would be acceptable in our casual attire and just before lunch, tourists simply asking for something to drink. But for these people it was just ordinary life. On closer inspection, we discovered a room full of locals, eating, drinking and taking no notice of us beyond a cursory glance, accompanied by a friendly smile from Madame.

Yet to us the occasion was steeped in history: a whole community whose life revolved around those neat little rows of vines with their gnarled trunks and autumn leaves. Here and there a little tractor drove by; amongst the vines men wandered along the rows, checking this and that. The main harvest was over but a few last bunches of grapes still hung from the lower branches. Small areas of the vineyard had already been cut down, their twisted black branches lying in heaps and their trunks roughly hacked off, close to the ground. Another world where a community lived and worked, centred on the planting, the pruning, the harvesting, the bottling and the final, all-important 'degustation'. To us it was fascinating, novel, exotic; to them simply 'vin ordinaire'.

More than one way of killing a moggy

Actually, I like moggies. Growing up with a cat-doting mother, I soon learned to love these cuddly bundles of fluff and vividly remember attending another little girl's birthday party, where I stubbornly refused to join in any of the party games, preferring instead to spend the entire party cradling a tiny black and white kitten in my arms. The kitten subsequently came home with us, being almost ready for being parted with its mother, and spent the rest of its spoilt, happy life with us, under the name of Badger, a name chosen to reflect the elegant white stripe down the centre of its tiny nose and its sleek black fur.

So I wouldn't dream of killing a cat. However, I was reflecting today how times have moved on and how, in many areas, our views of life and our ways of going on have become so much more varied and diverse. A friend came to lunch with me yesterday. On entering our living room (for the first time), she exclaimed on how tidy it was - and indeed our whole house and garden. It's true - I like things tidy. I also find it difficult to work in a cluttered environment and feel constrained always to tidy things up before embarking on any new task. This can be a curse, as it means I achieve less than others whose tolerance for mess and chaos is higher than mine, but at least it means I get to live my life in the kind of surroundings I enjoy and feel comfortable in.

My friend is different to me. Leaving me, after lunch, she announced that she was going shopping. Her husband was returning home from abroad; the book club were visiting that evening and it was her turn to entertain and to provide drinks and snacks; she was playing tennis at 5 o-clock. Her lifestyle is different to mine. She confesses that she is always in a hurry, always late for everything, that her house is muddley and untidy. But her agenda is full and her life hectic. Why not? My early upbringing had a huge focus on 'right' and 'wrong' - there were rules for everything. So in those days one of these options would have to be 'the right way' of doing things. These days there is room for all points of view. Well, no, (let's be honest) for many of them, although current fashions in British politics may have a decreasing list of what is considered to be 'the right thing'. However, one of us is untidy and a bit disorganised and achieves a lot, the other is tidy and enjoys the resulting peace and calm. No problem, we're all different.

Last week we visited family: two days' drive to stay with our daughter and son-in-law. Times have changed since the days when my own mother used to come to stay. For days before her visit I would torture myself with a hectic round of cleaning and tidying - if I didn't she would run her finger along the surfaces with a look of disapproval on her face when she found the hidden corners of dirt! She was no dragon, just a normal, caring mother of her generation - houses must be clean and tidy: it was just an accepted fact of life. Another non-negotiable fact was that the cake tin must always be full and meals on time. Again, her dutiful daughter did her best to oblige and still does - old habits die hard!

However, my daughter and son-in-law work very hard at their jobs. There is little time for extra housework in their busy schedules. Abandoning my mother's traditions, I told them in my very best 21st century enlightened mother's role: 'Don't you dare clean the house before we come - we can help with that if necessary when we arrive - you have enough to do already. Don't worry about special meals - we can help cook.' Hurrah! The age of tolerance has come and we are not all expected to live in the same way! There is more than one way of killing the poor mog!

When we arrived, we found - guess what! A spotless house, homemade cakes, a fridge full of our favourite things and a pre-planned menu for the week! My daughter is even tidier than I am! The only difference was the meal times - son-in-law now works so hard that dinner is served just before bedtime (well, ours anyway). But these days who cares?

Peaceful Protest

I watched a news item relating the growing surge of protest outside St. Pauls Cathedral, in the heart of London, close to the Stock Exchange and financial hub of the nation. I was fascinated to see hundreds of enthusiastic protesters camped in little domed tents on the pavement. It was reminiscent of the 60's, CND marchs and the like - the good old days of protest! The same phenomenon seems to be repeated in other financial centres - in Frankfurt and New York - and in numerous other high profile centres of population in the modern global village we call our world today. The activities began in New York, Wall Street, so the media tell us, and have spread into a large scale movement of (so far) peaceful protest.

Another news item showed marchers from the North East of England, repeating the historic Jarrow to Westminster march of a bygone age, anxious to highlight the injustices of unemployment and hardship in their region, one of the hardest hit of any in these days of economic crisis.

I was both intrigued and shocked. Intrigued because for many years, it seems, the voice of protest has been dormant, if not dead. Since the heady days of the 'winter of discontent', when half the British population seemed to be united in protest at economic conditions, growing costs and dwindling pay packets, the unions have been quiet, the strikers and protesters silenced, hounded into resignation and submission through government measures and public opinion, social pressures too hard to resist.

Suddenly protest is on the increase. What's happening? As an advocate of freedom of speech and the right to protest I applaud this development. The battles won by our early trade unions and political reformers cost too much to abandon now. Are we simply seeing a ground swell of complaints and grumbling at the current public measures to recover from the economic crisis we all face or are we witnessing a movement of radicals, similar in kind to the 'flower power' radicals of the '60s, who are sick to the back teeth with materialism and 'corporate greed' and want to see a paradigm shift in the way we conduct our lives?

A part of me is shocked that protest comes in so many unwelcome forms. In the last few months it has been expressed in riots, in looting, in the form of violent and anguished demonstrations in Greece, in Portugal, in Spain... And what are we protesting against? It's all about money! Too much money in some hands, too much power in the hands of some, too little money in the hands of others and too little power to change things. The campers are protesting about capitalism and greed; the rioters and the marchers are protesting about unemployment, poverty, rising costs and a decreasing benefits safety net. Long live protest and the right to protest! When we are fighting for survival we understandably lose some of our polite veneer and our tone becomes aggressive and urgent. We have seen a lot of excessive violence and a minority of people stirring up social unrest and criminal behaviour on the pretext of economic need.

But peaceful protest is a wonderful thing and I must confess a large part of me is impressed that there are people in the world who are prepared to stand up and be counted and say 'enough is enough'. Maybe there is another way to live which can cut through all this focus on getting and spending and find some more worthy things to live our brief lives for. Corporate greed has a corporate solution.

On Location

I have always been the kind of person who falls in love - with places as well as people. To me, places have personalities. They evoke atmospheres. They get under my skin. Places are individuals, with their own peculiar characters, idiosyncracies and lovable qualities. Some places are unforgettable and they make me homesick. At a certain time of year which, in my thoughts, is connected with a particular location, a vision of that place will drift into my mind and I hear it calling to me, tempting me to return, to savour it again at just that season, when the almond blossom is out or the roses are in bloom.

On holiday I love to visit local art galleries. There are so many ways of depicting a place that you love. Local artists excel at this. Not all paintings are pictorial representations. Some artists select images or motifs from a well-known place and group them together, realistically or maybe with a dreamlike quality - a lighthouse, a clock tower, a Martello tower, a shop front or pavement cafe or a church spire. A kind of artist's shorthand, expressing the essence of that special place or favourite beauty spot in a way that is often more evocative of atmosphere and mood than can ever be captured in a detailed drawing or photographic image.

Painting 'en plein air', as they say, was all the rage once, catching that special quality of light, the sun glinting on the sea, the wind rustling the leaves. All captured on canvas, preserved for posterity. So with writing: a sense of place, a love affair - painting pictures in words. I came, I saw, I captured... and then again, much later, the best part of all: I remembered. This piece was 'shot on location'!

Use it or Lose it - the wisdom of Steve Jobs

"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life." (Steve Jobs)

A few sentences arrested my attention the other day when I was half listening, half day-dreaming, in front of the BBC news programme. They were showing a clip of Steve Jobs (recently deceased co-founder of Apple) addressing a room full of students at their degree ceremony, sharing the benefits of his wisdom, learned painfully from fighting the cancer which would eventually kill him. Jobs' point seemed to be that during his serious illness he underwent a reassessment of his life that caused him to realise that much of the course of one's life can be misdirected down a hundred and one paths that do not reflect the true nature or 'calling' of the individual. Life is too short, Jobs seemed to be saying, to waste it on things that are peripheral, trivial or just out of tune with the life for which one is suited. It is important to follow the heart and to follow one's intuition, which will lead to the fulfilment of one's own real potential and individuality.

We often hear of Job's patience (long 'o') - or the 'patience of Job' if you aren't sure where to put the apostrophe! Only recently have we heard of Jobs' wisdom (short 'o' and the apostrophe after the 's'!). Following my own heart and intuition does not lead me to buy an I-pad or I-phone - I'm impressed with the creativity which produced them but am not particularly attracted to the technological world. We are not all the same. However, I am heartily in favour of the man's philosophy of life. 'Use it or lose it', I have only one life and, as Steve made clear, only a limited time span to develop it, so I am resolved, before it is too late, to live my life as creatively as possible in the hope of becoming that unique (and annoying!) individual that I am destined to be! Watch this space...!

Volendam Parking Lot

Recession? Spending cuts? Economic crisis? Have you been down to Volendam harbour lately? It's buzzing. In the early autumn sunshine the rich are enjoying the last of the year's sailing opportunities and making hay whilst the sun shines.

The harbour is dripping money! It's a show and the boat owners are milking it for all they're worth (which is evidently a considerable sum). Eating and drinking al fresco are the favourite fashion accessories - wining and dining at leisure on board their designer yachts, while the groupies gape and fulfil their purpose in life by loitering, admiring, inflating egos and standing in awe, whilst routine tasks are performed with panache - tying knots, adjusting floats, polishing brass and tinkering with engines, ropes, rigging and anything that's not tied down.

Out there on the ocean it's a serious business; it's a life and death sport with rigorous rules that must be observed in the battle against the elements. In port it's a different story. It's apparently one big game, requiring only a chilled glass of Chardonnay, a few nibbles, a ton of money and a cool, cool attitude. There have been winners and losers in this recession - it's the same in every game.

Holiday Romance

During the summer holiday I fell in love! I got it bad and now, a month later, I am still showing all the danger signs. I can’t stop thinking back to the events of those few short weeks and running it all through my mind. I picture myself walking along the narrow road behind the boatyards, with glimpses of the harbour, on the day it all began and continuing on, never dreaming of what was about to unfold and the happy memories it would leave in its wake.

Before you wonder, I am talking about a place, not a person. My holiday romance occurred during my holiday in Wales this summer. I am still happily married and have not been engaging in flights of fancy or a mid-life crisis! The romantic interlude to which I am referring was indeed a holiday romance and an unexpected one, but it was not what you think.

The road in question led from Porthmadog harbour where we had parked the car, up a steep hill, past cottages and gardens. On the brow of the hill we stopped, wondering if we were wasting our time. There was still no real view of the sea or mountains, as we had been hoping. Maybe we had wasted our efforts and should have tried a different path. On impulse, we stopped a passerby walking her dog and asked her where the road led. It turned out to be one of her favourite walks, leading down to the pretty bay of Borth-y-Gest, only minutes away.

Sure enough, from the top of the hill an idyllic little bay awaited us, complete with wooded hillsides, an array of coloured boats on the sand, a stone harbour wall and, oh joy, a tearoom! I fell in love! The cove opened out onto an enormous vista of sandy estuary and a breathtaking backdrop of misty mountains. All around the cove seaside cottages nestled against the hillside, each of them with a stunning view out over the bay. What a place to live – a small slice of seaside heaven! The smell of seaweed, the scream of gulls and a view to die for right outside your front door.

There is an old Donovan song which I occasionally find myself humming during times of extreme, carefree happiness. It is a simple song, with a gentle melody, and it embedded itself firmly in my mind and heart on the day, back in the ‘70s, when I first heard it. “Happy I am” it begins. “All on the new day… People and flowers, Are one and the same” (a burst of subtle ‘flower power’ lyrics!)…”All in a chain, At the beginning of a new world.“ “Someone’s singing and I think it’s me” it goes on, “Someone’s singing and, oh gosh, it’s me!” There are many times in life when you anticipate happiness in the future: ‘I am so looking forward to our night out – I shall be very happy’ or reminisce about happy times in the past: ‘It was so wonderful being there’. But the times when we are conscious of being happy in the present are few and far between. We are less adept at stopping the clock in a moment of happiness and reflecting on it, it seems. But it happens. For me, our time in Borth-y-Gest was one of those rare times when I found myself humming Donovan’s tune and only a song of the heart, Donovan style, can record it:


Song for Borth-y-Gest

Smooth as can be
Slatey-grey rock,
Green-browney-green
Velvety moss.

Yellow bright flowers,
Hummocky hill,
Clover and plantain
Grow where they will.

Shoreline below
A vista of mud,
Gold-coloured lichen
And rock pools in flood.

Wait for the tide
Like the boats on the sand.
Tide’s in no hurry,
Got nothing planned.

Find myself humming;
A song’s in the air.
Find myself whisper
A thankfulness prayer.


The best thing about a holiday romance is the way it stays with you, lighting up those dark corners and turning up unexpectedly in your thoughts, allowing a smile to form on your lips, a lightness in your step and a moment of joy to brighten up your day before it fades away into the mists of time. Love is like that.

One of those golden, autumnal days...

Autumn! The very thought of it is enough to bring out the writer in anyone! As I turn over in my mind those evocative autumn words, the creative juices start to flow. It’s like a brainstorming session for Year 5’s creative writing assignment. The words and phrases, those perennial words especially reserved for this time of year, bubble up to the surface of my mind and hover there: russet red, bronze, amber, burnished gold, rustling leaves, ripening fruit… smoky bonfires, deep drifts of dry, crackling leaves and a range of special colours – red, gold, brown, yellow and crimson. They fire my imagination and make me long to pick up my pen.

I am seated in my garden on one of those golden autumnal days, just soaking it up, enjoying the peace and calm and the last rays of sunshine before winter sets in. The past week we have had storms: dark, threatening clouds, heavy downpours, gusting winds – real ‘autumnal’ weather. But today we have seen the other side of autumn – the roaring lion has vanished and the lamb has appeared: mild, soft and full of balm.

I look around me and am once again surprised by nature’s knack of colour coding. The creeper on the wall is already turning colour. The big three-pronged leaves that cover it are beginning to curl slightly as they dry out and lose the sap that has kept them green and vigorous through spring and summer. The edges are turning crimson and then vivid red and it’s spreading. The show has begun. The pyrocanthus we have so tenderly cared for and encouraged these past two years is showing (at last) a huge crop of bright tangerine-coloured berries. We have tied a criss-cross of garden twine across the pergola to prevent the pigeons from landing on the shrub and systematically gobbling its berries. As time goes on and winter sets in in earnest we may take down our makeshift ‘net’ and allow the birds to plunder them – but not yet. I want to enjoy their rich colour for a little longer.

There are rust-coloured chrysanthemums in a pot, with glowing yellow middles. The oregano is turning to shades of pinky-red. The begonias, in full flower ever since late May, are still a glorious scarlet and the two fuchsia bushes dangle their graceful fronds of crimson/purple blooms over the edges of the flower beds. The hydrangea in the corner is in tune with the theme too, showing off its huge, faded, red flower heads, which must stay there till February before they can be pruned. Even the oleander is struggling to give us a few late blooms, although it is getting far too chilly for this Mediterranean plant which has so tempted us. It stands by the wall, basking in the late summer’s reflected heat, and offers up its handful of deep red blossoms. It is not suited to our north European climate but we cannot resist its charms.

I think back to the spring, when the garden was filled with another of nature’s colour schemes: yellow for forsythia, polyanthus, primrose and daffodil; blue for ceanothus and grape hyacinth. Pansies, iris and crocus seem to come in both shades. But the seasons have their special colours, it seems. Autumn is the colour of sunsets, which seems appropriate somehow. The fire is being extinguished from the year and also from the skies.

Metaphors abound for this time of year. The ‘season of mellow fruitfulness’ applies equally to the year’s end and to the more whimsical ‘autumn of our lives’. However, autumn, so glorious in its display, turns slowly to winter; vivid sunsets fade into the dark, dark night; and the autumn of our lives turns inescapably to death and decay. Such is life; such is its end. Soon, in the garden, we shall be looking at bare twigs, piles of dead leaves and an empty grey wall, relieved only by whatever berries the pigeons have left us.

Have I depressed you with this talk of death and decay? It happens. Autumn cannot help but run into winter. But, in the meantime, I will enjoy autumn’s beauty and colour: its own special richness and vitality, and I will take care to remind myself that, after winter, comes, once more, the re-incarnation of spring in that ever-turning circle of life.

Chicken!

Yesterday, walking down the road, as large as life, I saw a man with a chicken on his head! I was driving past in the car through a housing estate, on my way home from a walk in the local nature area. We had been to a small café in the course of our walk and stopped to look at the small kinderboerderij, as they call them in the Netherlands – a little enclosure with a few goats, a pony and some chickens where the children go in and stroke them or feed them handfuls of grass or grain. There were some exotic-looking chickens, with half a dozen young ones, all pecking in the grass and running about in the undergrowth. They had feathers everywhere and huge ruffles of pretty feathers about their legs. However, that was a nature reserve and this was a housing estate!

I turned my head as we drove past and looked again, just to make sure. Sure enough, the man was strolling coolly along the street, together with a woman with a shopping bag. They evidently hadn’t noticed anything wrong! He was wearing a jaunty hat on top of his head and perched on top of that was a brown hen. “Did you see that?” I asked my husband. “What?” he asked, manoeuvring along the narrow street with cars parked on either side. I explained, but had to repeat it a second time before he got it. “Are you sure?” he said… “a chicken? Was it a real one?” “Yes” I assured him – it was a real one. He tried again: “Was it alive?” “Yes” I said “a real, live brown chicken – sitting on top of his head.” Unbelievable!

I’m reading a book at the moment – I’m always reading a book! My current one is called Keeping Faith by Jodi Picoult. Faith turns out to be, not a religious dogma, but a little girl who, following the divorce of her parents, acquires a new friend she calls her ‘guard’. Faith develops a relationship with this ‘friend’ who seems to take have characteristics of a divine, female guardian (God – ‘oh my guard!’ – get it?) and she is the instigator of a string of miracles apparently performed by seven year old Faith. As a result, Faith and her family attract the attention of a number of psychiatrists, Catholic priests, Jewish rabbis, religious fanatics and newspaper reporters, together with a struggling author, celebrity and ‘teleatheist’, who is trying to kickstart his waning career by inventing a road show which travels around America, investigating the claims made by religious believers concerning a variety of miracles, healings and visions and attempting to ruthlessly disprove them by scientific means. Ian is the ultimate cynic, with a history which he keeps well hidden. There are reasons for his vehement denial of faith. The story hinges on the theme of belief versus cynicism and the fight, by Faith’s mother, to protect this little girl from becoming a vulnerable child celebrity on an insensitive, intrusive and cruel world stage.

The road show host challenges his audience: “Name one thing – other than the existence of God – that we take on blind faith.” But there are hundreds every day! We believe in the existence of far-off exotic places, even though we have heard of them only by hearsay, or through TV programmes with photos of a place we are only told is what it purports to be. We sit on the sofa, watching the TV, believing that this particular sofa will hold us up when we sit down, but only because other people’s sofas have done this okay so far. But will ours? Where is our proof? We still go to enormous expense and effort to marry after a brief interlude of romance, despite the statistics which tell us that this will probably end in tears. Many of us simply believe that for us it will be different. But will it? On what do we base our faith? So the list goes on. We use electrical appliances, computers, lifts, airplanes, knowing very little about the technology which goes to make them work, keeps us safe, keep us in the air, and so on. We have no real proof that we can put our trust in them. But we do. Without this basic faith our lives would fall apart.

Those who suffer from anxiety – and many do – are only exhibiting a loss of some of that very necessary faith (often unwarranted) in the reliability of things, the friendliness of dogs, the innate trustworthiness of our neighbours, our animals, our appliances… But it is not so unreasonable to believe otherwise – there is plenty of proof that when we go out thieves will break in; plenty of proof that our marriage may fail; plenty of proof that our car may break down or that next door’s dog may bite. But we choose to believe (hope?) otherwise. That is what makes the world go round.

Keeping Faith? Believing in acrobatic chickens? Trusting each other? Can we do it? It’s an interesting question. Did my husband believe me? Should we have faith? Are we being hoodwinked by politicians, salesmen, priests, partners? Should we keep faith – or is that just counting our chickens before they are hatched? Still, the chicken was real…

Retreat!

It’s been a while since I blogged! If you want to know why, read my profile! It says I’m a “quiet, reflective thinker and writer… lover of sunshine, colour, flowers, countryside, the sea, holidays, family and friends, beautiful things, the great outdoors...”

It’s in my genes – I’m an escape artist! Every now and then I have to get away and escape to my natural habitat. What’s that? Well, look closely at my profile photo! Everyone has a natural habitat and for me it’s the big outdoors – the sea, with rocks to clamber on, the cliffs and the sound of screeching gulls, winding country lanes and bubbling streams… I found a lot of those things these last few weeks.

When I escape I revert to type! I’m a peace-loving person. I’m slow; I can’t be hurried. I’m a meandering stream; I never go anywhere without making detours. And I’m not contactable except in emergencies. Infuriating! But if you want to escape you have to do it properly. We have Wi-Fi at home. It’s very useful, both for us and for our guests. We have a cordless phone too. But when I escape the range is far too small to reach either of them where I left them – at home!

I wrote a lot on my holiday – a way of maximising my enjoyment of what I observe. I live it and I relive it and I take it home with me along with my photos. I love nature and I love people-watching. I hate crowds but my ideal habitat is never totally deserted. I need company. ‘Holiday Snippets’ records my enjoyment of that habitat and my appreciation (mostly) of that company:


A couple of Holiday Snippets!

1. When you just have to get away!

One of the things I crave more than anything else on holiday is peace and quiet. A beach, a few fishing boats or a view of he mountains plus a quiet spot to sit is bliss. Add to that a peaceful tea room with a terrace overlooking it all and I’m in heaven! Today we found all of that! We were just settling down contentedly to choose what we wanted from the menu and congratulating ourselves on our find when the trouble started…

We were on a tiny terrace with only a few tables and in the front row with nothing to block our view. What could possibly go wrong? And then she started! “I’m just down by the beach” she yelled. “I just had to get away” she said. “You know how it is when you just have to get away – I just had to be by the sea.” Not for the peace and quiet, I thought. I knew instinctively that she was on the phone. No-one yells that loud at the person sitting next to them. What is it about mobile phones that make people shout? Perhaps it would only be a quick call and peace would be restored soon, I thought. No chance! “I just had to be by the sea” she said again. Me too, I thought. “I just had to get away.”

By this time getting away was looking like the only solution. We shifted restlessly and discussed our options. Finally, we got to our feet, gathered our belongings and decided to admit defeat. “I’m just going” said the voice behind us. “Really – don’t go. I’m very sorry.” Now I was really embarrassed. Had she heard us? “I’m sorry” I said. “It’s our fault. We’re just a bit hyped at the moment and needed some peace.” She brushed my apology away and repeated her own. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to be so loud.” In the end we decided between us to blame mobile phones and parted on amicable terms, she to her seaside quest (with mobile phone) and we to our peace and quiet (without one).


2. Dietary delicacies

Eavesdropping again – I just can’t help it! Sat in the same picturesque little café overlooking an idyllic seaside cove and munching my tuna melt baguette, I overheard the order on the neighbouring table. A large woman sat close by, perusing the menu, whilst the waitress waited patiently, notepad at the ready. She chose with care: “scones, jam, cream, hot chocolate with whipped cream, no, maybe with the marshmallows, no cream… well, alright then, with both… and” (as an afterthought) “oh, and a diet coke.”

We looked at each other silently, smirking, and looked away again quickly in case the helpless giggles that were developing should break out and embarrass us all. A diet coke after all that? Why bother?!

Old Man's Snoring

Did I say ‘the perfect summer’s day’ in my last blog? How wrong can you be – now look at it! Today the weather is getting its own back for my foolish mistake. It’s pouring! ‘It’s raining, it’s pouring, The old man’s snoring!’ floats into my mind – an old nursery rhyme from my childhood which is linked inseparably for me now with this kind of wet, windy weather. Well, the sunshine was nice while it lasted.

'He bumped his head and went to bed, And couldn't get up in the morning.' We used to sing it in the school playground while playing skipping games. It’s time for the summer holidays. The children have broken up from school. We’re tired and we need a rest. Nowadays we’re all short of sleep and having trouble getting up in the morning! Working hours for most people seem longer than ever and the weather here has been sticky and humid lately, making us sleep restlessly. A friend from Turkey writes that it is too hot there and she misses the Dutch rain! Not me! A gentle shower is one thing and the gardens love it, but today there’s a real gale blowing and the rain is coming down in torrents. But maybe it will clear the air and bring us some relief from the stickiness.

‘Rain, rain, go away. Come again another day.’ Another rhyme from my childhood, proving that the rumour that the English are obsessed about the weather is probably correct. Then there’s poor old Doctor Foster who ‘went to Gloucester (pronounced Gloster) in a shower of rain’. The rain evidently got worse because the rhyme informs us ‘He stepped in a puddle right up to his middle, And never went there again!’ What rubbish we are told when we are little and so gullible!

Let’s finish then with a word or two from e.e. cummings whose world is ‘mud-luscious’ and ‘puddle-wonderful’*! His wonder at the natural world is infectious, even though his use of language is sometimes confusing:

'i thank You God for most this amazingday: for the leaping greenly spirits of treesand a blue true dream of sky; and for everythingwhich is natural which is infinite which is yes'**

which, I guess, has to include the rain too!


* e.e. cummings ‘in Just-’
** e.e. cummings ‘i thank you God for most this amazing’

You don't know what you've got till it's gone

It’s a long time since Joni Mitchell immortalised those words – and that concept – forever with her hit song ‘Big Yellow Taxi’. ‘They took all the trees, put ‘em in a tree museum and they charged the people a dollar and a half just to see ‘em... Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got till it's gone? They paved paradise and put up a parking lot!’ This was her outcry at the steady onward march of the city planners, filling the green spaces with concrete and the fresh air with exhaust fumes.

As a city dweller I often long for the day when (at least in my imagination) I shall retire to a country cottage with honeysuckle and roses around the porch and, with a bit of luck, the sound of the sea breaking on the shore not too far away. But sitting here, taking a pause from shopping in the pretty city where I live, I reflect for a minute on today’s checklist of pros and cons and do a reality check. This is Holland – the land of windmills and clogs! But even here in the busy city it’s market day and the bells from the church tower ring out reassuringly over the modern day shoppers intent on getting this week’s fruit and veg at the best price and filling their bicycle panniers with giant cauliflowers, ‘garden beans’ (broad beans in England) and fresh strawberries. The flower stalls are ablaze with colour and I speak severely to myself to avoid bringing home more lupins, roses, campanulas and exotic tropical flowers than one small patio can possibly take. I feast my eyes and turn away. Our garden is full already!

The cafés are full of retired couples, holidaymakers and solitary housewives, rewarding themselves for their labours with good Dutch coffee and apple cake. There’s a festive mood in the air. ‘You are my sunshine, my only sunshine. You make me happy when skies are grey…’ chime the bells. But today the skies are blue, with fluffy white clouds and a stiff breeze tempering the heat of the sun. A perfect summer’s day! It’s not always like this here, of course. But it stops me in my tracks and makes me think: ‘You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone!’ Time at least to enjoy the present day ‘plus points’ before moving on to my country idyll. Living for the moment is a hard discipline, but it may have advantages.

Clean Slate!

A brand new exercise book! All those fresh, clean, crisp, white pages just waiting to be filled: with new possibilities. At school one of the delights of the new term was the handing out of new books. Full of excitement, I would resolve all over again to fill the pages with neat, beautifully formed letters – my very best handwriting. Unlike my previous book, the covers would stay pristine, the inside full of neat, cleverly written stories, pages of sums (all correct) and lots of red ticks. Halfway down the first page the dream would come apart with my first spelling mistake and crossing out. Never mind, today I’m starting a new one again, so there’s still hope!

A clean slate! Harking back to those days when children sat on stools at high wooden desks, literally writing with sticks of chalk on pieces of grey slate, this phrase is multi-layered, firing our imagination with its multiple meanings and connotations. Visions of Victorian schoolrooms dissolve, giving way to ideas of debts paid, sins forgiven and fresh new starts. “Shall I put it on the slate for you, sir?” probably dates back to a time when shopping credit and the daily pint at my ‘local’ were also recorded on a slate behind the bar or the grocery counter.

For me, my favourite kind of clean slate is a house move! At one and the same time, it gives me the chance to sort through the accumulation of ‘things’, to discard what I no longer want, to pack up my treasures and move on, to clean in all the corners and to start again! I can rearrange the furniture, change the colour schemes, buy new things and do it all differently. It’s a new beginning and a glorious new opportunity. A Dutch friend asked me “in England do you like to do special cleaning in the new year?” ‘Spring cleaning’ she meant. ‘Me – like cleaning?’ I thought. “No” I said, to her amazement. “I like to move house!”

But a new home is also a new phase of life. I can reassess my lifestyle too. I can try new things, meet new people, develop new routines, abandon old ones. We all need a new slate sometimes. I’ve had a lot – I can no longer remember how many houses I have lived in. I love the sense of familiarity that comes with time, but I still get a buzz from that sense of newness and opportunity that beckons to me from the future when it’s time to move on.

To do or not to do...

Why is decision-making sometimes so hard? As we grow older it seems to become more and more difficult. Whatever became of ‘older and wiser’? Children, it seems, dart here and there on a whim, grabbing one toy, discarding another, crawling purposefully across the room after that carelessly abandoned shopping bag, cooing delightedly as they pull everything from the bag, strewing purchases all over the floor, spilling cream from the carton, shaking the egg box with no thought for the consequences, emptying the muesli, digging little fingers into juicy, fresh strawberries, howling with rage when these treasures are snatched from their grasp.

For us ‘big people’, life is so much more complicated. There are so many considerations, so many factors to weigh up, so many people to please. Children know what they want. So did we once. Now decisions are not so simple and over the years we have so often been disappointed, frustrated in achieving our goal, that we have learned to adjust our behaviour.

So what do I want? What shall I do? Shall I say yes – or no? Who will be disappointed? Who will approve? Will my plan succeed? Will it rain? Will it cost too much? On the one hand… but on the other hand… I must consider this carefully.

Stop! I want to become a child again. I am tired of pretending that I don’t want to do it because it will cost too much. I am tired of telling myself I don’t want to go when really I do but I don’t have the energy. I am so good at pretending that I don’t want to try because I suspect I will fail. I’m tired of pretending I am excited at this new challenge when I’m tired and want a rest. At least I need to know what it is that I want … even if in the end I can’t have it! To dare to dream… to dare to chase those dreams… to dare to do – or not do – and take the consequences!

The strawberries look so good – so big, so juicy, so red, so tempting... I’ll do it! Hang the consequences!

Summer Solstice - June 21st

Mid-June and already summer is feeling tired. The early spring growth is over and the fresh spring greens have turned dark and the woodlands are overgrown. The drought has taken its toll this year too and everything is looking dry, dusty and worn out.

I’m tired too. I love to be in tune with the rhythm of the seasons but at this time of the year it’s hard! At ten in the evening I start to pull the curtains, load the dishwasher, draw glasses of water to put on our bedside tables and amble slowly off to bed. It’s an early start in the morning and I like to be prepared. But nature thinks differently. It’s still light outside. I pull the blinds in our bedroom, draw the curtains and try to eradicate those chinks at the side of the window where the light still creeps through. In the morning, it’s worse. 4.30 a.m. in the morning and the first light appears. The blackbird is already singing outside my window. I turn over, pull the covers over my head and try to go back to sleep. At the weekends it’s worse. I need a lie in! Doesn’t nature understand?

Years ago, friends who were older and wiser than us used every bit of sunlight to their best advantage. In March, dressed in their overcoats, they sat on their front doorstep, with steaming hot mugs of coffee, welcoming the first rays of sunshine. Crazy! We shivered indoors and turned the central heating up. In June we welcomed the onset of real summer. They, in turn, started to lament the onset of winter! The solstice, for them, marked the beginning of the end and the long, depressing descent into winter and darkness! We laughed at them in those days and thought their world was upside down. Now we are beginning to understand. But we are also looking forward to getting some better sleep as the solstice passes and the hours of daylight start to decrease to manageable proportions.

Summer in northern Europe doesn’t last long. In a few short weeks it will all be over and we’ll be getting our thick sweaters and winter boots out of the cupboard again. Still, take heart! We can soon snuggle down under the covers and catch up on our sleep and, come mid-December and the winter solstice, we can get ready for summer sunshine again and rejoice that the days are 'drawing out’! It’s a topsy-turvy world!

Easy as Pie!

It’s been a while since we tried to decipher any brain-teasers, so perhaps it’s time to consider. As I was explaining recently, creativity has taken an interesting and unexpected turn in our household just lately, after a trip to Majorca renewed our gastronomic interest in the good old-fashioned pie. The Spanish seem to be masters of pie making and their empanadas excite all my creative and gastric juices! However, I have found over the years that pie making is by no means straightforward.

As a young ‘newly-wed’, the art of pastry making was a mystery to me. After moving in with my mother- and father-in-law for a while, ‘between houses’, I was forced to upgrade my rather scanty cooking expertise and try and rustle up a few more recipes that would hide my woeful ignorance of the culinary arts. On our arrival, anxious to impress, I had informed my mother-in-law that I would, of course, do my share of the family cooking. It was only later that I realised just what I had signed up for. So far I had a repertoire of just about enough tried and tested menus to last the week before returning to the beginning and starting again. After a while my mother-in-law started tactfully to offer me some hints. We began with pastry! What a struggle! Paddington Bear had fewer mishaps than I did when it came to pastry. It was too wet and stuck to the work surface, my hands, the rolling pin and everything else; it was too dry and fell in pieces before it reached the dish; it was too heavy and tasted like cardboard after I had rolled it out unsuccessfully a dozen times before cooking.

Strangely, one day everything just fell into place – just like Joyce said it would. I did nothing different, as far as I could see, but suddenly the mystery solved itself and although I’m not sure I can lay claim to perfection, or even to have reached mother-in-law’s high standards, I am satisfied with my efforts and so are my family. But ‘easy as pie’? I don’t think so!

Since our visits to Majorcan bakeries I have been experimenting with a few of my own variations on empanadas, inventing recipes and working out what to cook them in and how to cut out the pastry to the right size. Here are the results:

Empanadas (small savoury pies)

I discovered muffin tins make excellent pie tins. For a cutter I used a small round plastic storage box as I had nothing the right size and for the pie lids a round fluted pastry cutter. The larger rounds of pastry have to be eased gently into the muffin tins, filled with meat or vegetables and then covered with a small pastry lid, brushed with milk and baked in the oven for 20 – 25 minutes at no.6 or 200 degrees C. If they begin to bubble and the filling threatens to overflow turn the oven down a bit. The pies can be most easily removed from their tins when cool. It took some trial and error to discover this! The failed experiments still taste good even though their marks for presentation might be a little sub-standard.

Some suggestions for fillings: the amounts of ingredients can be adjusted according to personal taste – this is art not science!

Mediterranean vegetables
Chop onion, courgette, red, green and yellow peppers and aubergine and fry gently in oil. Drain off excess oil and add some chopped tinned or fresh tomatoes, salt, pepper, rosemary, thyme and marjoram and a teaspoon of tomato purée. Simmer gently for a few minutes till most of the liquid has evaporated. Leave to cool before filling the pies and covering with pastry lids.

Chicken, bacon, mushroom and onion
Put chopped bacon in a heated pan and fry gently until some of the fat from the bacon is released into the pan. Add mushrooms and onions. Remove from pan when soft and golden. Fry chicken fillet in remaining oil. Chop everything small and mix together. Make up mushroom sauce from a packet and simmer for a few minutes. Mix together with meat and vegetables. Add seasoning to taste. Allow to cool before filling the pies and covering with pastry lids.

Sausage and onion
Fill pies with sausage meat or strip skin from sausages and use this to fill pies. Chop a small amount of onion and place on top of sausage meat. Season with salt, pepper and mixed herbs. Smear with a little tomato purée. Cover pies with pastry lids.

Now my creativity is back on track – I can diverge into culinary creativity and then translate it into writing again to satisfy the readers! Wow – multi-tasking again!

New!

We all like new things! Some of us like them more than others but human beings seem to be made with inexhaustible wells of creativity – for creating new things! Sometimes it seems as if the well runs dry. Writers get writers’ block. Musicians search desperately for the inspiration they need to finally perfect the song lyrics that elude them. Architects are defeated by attempts to branch out into the new and innovative design that they can see in their mind’s eye but cannot get down on paper. Artists, engineers, cooks, teachers, tour guides, gardeners, poets, parents – the list is endless – all rely on the necessary functioning of their creative juices. Whilst creativity is flowing we take it for granted. When we experience a block we start to falter, to doubt ourselves and to despair.

Sometimes, however, creativity has not failed; it has simply changed course. We are not machines. We need stimulation and input or we just get bored. I love to write. Usually the words flow fairly effortlessly. The results are not always good but the well rarely runs dry. I am a creative person. Many people think that they are not creative because they don’t write poetry or paint watercolours. But creativity comes in so many shapes and sizes. Creative thought is invaluable. People who just sit and think change the world. They invent new things. They dream up the worldwide web. They solve global problems, using their innate creativity.

Creative cookery is a gift! Recently I have been inspired by a visit to Majorca where we were enticed by empanadas – simple little pastry creations, filled with meat or vegetables and flavoured with mouth-watering Mediterranean herbs. I am no ‘foodie’ but for once I was inspired and, on my return, have been inventing my own creative recipes for filling the freezer with a whole variety of these wonderful little pies. Packed lunches and picnics will never be the same again!

I love my garden. I plan green leafy bowers and explosions of colour. Sometimes they work – sometimes they don’t! But in this wonderful spring I have been tempted away from my computer to the great outdoors to create and to sit back and enjoy Nature’s own creativity.

Temporarily the creative juices have been diverted and my blog has faltered. Maybe you’ve missed me! I’ve not been so inspired to write just lately but the creative urges are still there. They just took a holiday to a different location! Why limit myself to only one particular brand of tried and tested creativity? Why not branch out? I’m not really single-minded. I don’t have one passion that excludes all others. I’m a multi-person! I like new things…

Fault!

I had an appointment today. It took me 45 minutes altogether: a walk, a tram ride and a further walk to get to the house. I rang the doorbell, ready to offer my friendly opening greeting - an admiring comment on the colourful bedding plants laid out ready for planting on the flowerbed next to the front door. However, I was taken aback when the door was opened by a rather confused cleaning lady instead of the person I was expecting to see. "I have an appointment" I said "at ten o'clock." "Lady is gone" she replied in broken English. She made it sound like the house had been sold and the people moved out. "What do you mean?" I asked, bewildered. "Where has she gone?" The cleaner didn't know. She simply repeated that lady was "gone" - in the car with a friend who was staying with her. OK, she hadn't moved out. Together we rang her mobile but got no answer - just the voicemail. "When is she coming back?" I tried. "I don't know." I persuaded her to let me in to use the toilet, as the situation was becoming a bit desperate if I had to go straight home again. She looked doubtful about my request but in the end seemed to think I wasn't much of a threat and apologised that she had not yet cleaned it.

I gave up on my appointment and went home - 45 minutes: first a walk, then a tram ride, then another walk - all good exercise. Later in the day a distraught email appeared on my computer screen. "I can't apologise enough!" It made me smile. In fact, strangely, I'd smiled most of the way home. I had had a wasted journey across the city. I had achieved nothing, except a little exercise and a bit of reading on the tram, all morning. It was a silly mistake. She had forgotten to put our appointment in her diary. But, do you know what, it made me feel better! Not worse, but better! "She does it too!" I thought with happiness.

It's so much better when the errors you make, the stupid mistakes, those problems you create that look so insurmountable, are made by someone else too! Faced with her mistake I could view it rationally. I could see it for what it was. It was just a slip-up - an administrative error. Some errors have bigger consequences than others, but in the end the size of the error is the same.

My sense of humour held up today. I'm so glad it did. It saved me a lot of frustration. If I, however, had made the same mistake as my friend I would have felt the same as she did - hopelessly guilty and unable to forget the trouble I'd caused: "I can't apologise enough!" But the error would have been the same. If a similarly small administrative error had resulted in my hotel room being double-booked and my holiday ruined I would not have been so forgiving. But again, the error would have been the same. It just depends on your point of view, who makes the error and the quality of your sense of humour when faced with the consequences! Isn't life strange?

Garden of the Senses

Nine o’clock. I sit in my garden, sipping a cup of tea (so English!) and savouring the results of the past weekend’s gardening achievements. The bushes and shrubs we have shaped and trimmed wave softly in the breeze. The sun shines through them, making delightful patterns of sun and shade on the freshly swept stones of the patio. A soft breeze moves through the branches of the lilac, setting up a gentle motion across the garden, not restless but a calming influence, a restful movement, beckoning me on to contemplation and enjoyment of this moment before work begins.

Fronds of honeysuckle break free from the archway where we have tried to entwine them, defying our attempts at neatness. A blackbird flies low across the garden, settles in the bird bath and flutters in the shallow water, preening itself and splashing until, satisfied with its ablutions, it flies up into the lilac tree and perches there, shaking the glistening drops of water from its wings. A painted lady drifts across the foliage and busy bees dart here and there, their work already begun.

Soft pink petals quiver and fall to the ground as the gentle breeze moves softly through them. I watch the star-shaped patterns of the oleander leaves, dark on white, against the sunlit, painted wooden shed, subtly rearranging themselves as the wind ripples the leaves. The jasmine shifts in the breeze and releases a waft of its heady perfume. And I realise that this movement: sometimes fierce, sometimes gentle like today, is an integral part of the garden, scattering showers of leaves and petals, spoiling the tidying we have done, but a part of the garden’s glory. It’s alive.

All my life I’ve had a love affair with colour. The rich red and soft pink of the roses; the bright spurs of purple lavender, standing up straight and reaching for the warm sunshine; the bright pinks and oranges of the nemesias and the creamy white of the pyracanthus blossom. As the wind blows, the hydrangea scatters clouds of yellow pollen everywhere. All these things have delighted me. After the grey Dutch winter, the world comes alive for me when the sun shines, the temperature rises and the landscape is suddenly drenched with colour.

But today it is the movement that touches me. The stirrings of the leaves in response to this gentle wind, which one is rarely without in this land of wind. Even here, in my sheltered garden, the wind creeps in, over the wall, over the fences, through the gaps in the foliage and it creates this green well of life – not static or stagnant, but alive, acting and reacting, changing, impressing itself on me, catching my attention.

I get up and wander slowly through the garden, stopping to admire the beauty. I run my fingers through the leaves of the thyme, sage and rosemary, so that each releases its own special aroma, and turn to identify the source of the sudden blasts of perfume from honeysuckle and jasmine. I reach up and bury my nose in roses climbing high on the pergola, inhaling their gorgeous scent, and I gaze up into the clear blue sky.

In the background, I hear other noises. A neighbour is vacuuming, with the back door open to enjoy this lovely morning. A murmuring of voices in the distance seeps into my consciousness and a school party, maybe on a trip out, herded along the pavement by watchful teachers; then sounds of traffic from afar. They disturb me, these sounds, here in my peaceful garden, but they remind me that the rest of the world is alive too. Without them I would be alone. Their noises mingle with the garden sounds – the cheeping of baby birds from next door’s fir tree, the buzzing of insects, the rustle of leaves. The world is alive in so many, many ways and I am here, with all my senses, to taste and enjoy it.


*title inspired by a visit to the ‘Jardin des Cinq Sens’ in Yvoire, France.

Life in the City

Sipping a coffee – the biggest one I can find – I sit, contemplating the world around me. Jostled, bumped, elbowed, squeezed, I sink back into my basket chair and am thankful to escape, at least for a while, from the busy city streets I have just battled my way through.

The whole city seems to be in competition. Like a tall green forest (something I understand better than this) - the trees straining upwards in competition for the sunlight – the entire city seems to be conspiring together, in a deadly ongoing struggle, not towards harmony, but towards securing the basics for life – light, heat and, above all, space. The tall office blocks and elegant church spires (new and old in tension) reach together for the sky and for recognition. A power struggle, masquerading as a ‘beauty’ contest, encouraged by the city authorities, has been inaugurated for the highest building to dominate the skyline, the weirdest design, the most innovative building materials. Steel girders, giant cranes, scary glass buildings, reflecting their surroundings but giving no clue to the secrets concealed inside, all jostle with each other for pride of position. Humanity follows suit. I must adapt.

In the old days, living in the quiet English countryside, I used to stroll through the centre of the little market town where I lived, greeting my neighbours, stopping for a friendly word or offering up a ‘half-smile’, the one we reserve for strangers, and stepping aside to let a harassed mother with a pushchair through, anticipating the polite dance that the oncoming ‘traffic’ and I would need to do in order to pass each other on the pavement. Those were the innocent days! Life was gentler, not so intense or focussed, and there was time for the niceties of life.

In the city, years later, life has moved on and it is a rude awakening. Nobody knows me. Nobody has time to know me or even consider me, or the small and very modest amount of space required by one small person, simply trying to make room for herself and her life in an alien environment. Everyone is intent on their own business. Each one has a purpose, a time scale, deadlines that must be strictly adhered to. In the process the relentless army mows me down.

As I sit contemplating the way life has gone over the years I reflect after all that maybe life in the city is not so different. Nowadays, my street is my village! In the city, it is true, I am still a stranger. In my street, after five years, I can exchange greetings with the neighbours. Now they know that, though foreign, I am here to stay. I have been in the street longer than many Dutch people now. On the street we chat about the weather; I search in my garden for lost footballs kicked over the wall by the neighbours’ children; I rescue a neighbour’s dog which has escaped and strayed into the busy road. Occasionally we even share a meal together or make arrangements to look after the neighbour’s cat or house plants at holiday time. Here, at last, I am a part of the community, even though I still struggle with the language.

Just lately, the weather has been like an early summer and, warmed by the sunshine, we smile at each other instead of hurrying on by, hunched against the cold and battling against the wind and rain. Why are we all so much friendlier when the sun shines? Why do we seem to undergo a complete personality change when we feel the warmth of the sun on our shoulders and relax in the soft, balmy air? It’s a miracle! Suddenly the whole city is transformed into a big village. Friends are laughing and drinking together in the pretty pavement cafés, urgent tasks are put off until tomorrow and there is a sense of well-being and community in the air. We are sharing this wonderful weather together! Tomorrow it may rain and we will retreat into our private worlds, but for now we smile happily and believe again that we are loved and life is good.

Cold, hard and unstoppable!

I saw a trailer today – yet another one – for The Apprentice. The latest development in the Dragons Den story, Lord Alan Sugar is out to do a bit more recruiting. A fun TV programme? A little game? A challenge we can get excited about? Surely just a joke? Sadly not. This stuff is helping to set the scene for the modern business world and even for some sectors of society.

Imagine the scene. It’s the latest family wedding. Everyone’s gathered – young and old. Uncle Bert is entertaining his favourite nephew. He’s struggling a bit because the wedding speeches are dragging on. “What do you want to be when you grow up, Jo?” A pause… “Cold, hard and unstoppable” comes the serious reply. Wait a minute, is this what really what we want to hear from our seven year olds? “Wouldn’t you like to work with animals, Jo? Become a vet? Or perhaps drive a train?” Apparently not. Jo has his eye on his future, his bank balance and probably his pension – already.

Do I exaggerate? Well, yes, probably, but is this what we really want? Imagine two of these cold, hard, unstoppable people striking up a relationship together, moving in together, sharing a house, sharing the chores, and even bringing up children together… What is likely to happen? A great formula for making money, perhaps – although I wouldn’t personally want to do business with Mr./Ms. Cold, Hard & Unstoppable. But imagine climbing into bed at night with him/her! Imagine sharing your old age with this latest streamlined, souped-up business model of humanity. When do we get to go on holiday, switch off the lap-top and settle down together on our sun beds?

Are we on ‘self-destruct’ – out to destroy the human race or what? Well, no need to get over-intense – just a couple of idle thoughts I had whilst wasting a few seconds of precious money-making time…

April in Majorca

The door bangs. I wake with a jolt. I lie still in the darkness, rigid between the faintly damp sheets, staring at the pattern of light filtering through the wooden shutters and disturbed by the gleam of light under the door from the hotel landing. Noisy neighbours; an ill-fitting door – typical hotel stuff! Each time they shut the door there is a loud scraping noise. The whole floor must be able to hear it. They seem to need to open and shut it a lot. It seems to go on for hours. In between I drift off to sleep, only to be rudely awakened by the next bang. In the end, too stressed for further sleep, I lie there, miserable, stomach tensed, fists clenched, waiting for the next one. These things always loom so large during the night hours. Later my habitual anxiety problems escalate into full-blown gastritis, spoiling the holiday and requiring a Spanish doctor to be called out on her bank holiday weekend. But for the moment it is just one of those holiday hazards.

In the morning, after our eventful night, the hotel receptionist promises to send a ‘technician’ to look at the offending door. He looks, but it cannot be fixed! However, we set about planning our day. Our holiday weather started well. We enjoyed two whole days of sunshine – almost as warm as the heat wave we left behind in northern Europe (!), but with a chill wind that leaves you never sure what to wear, what to take, and staggering out each morning with a bag packed with alternatives to cover all eventualities. Just like home!

After two days of sunshine, the hotel desk admits, after persistent questioning, that the weather doesn’t look good today. That can’t be fixed either. We pile on layers of the thin summer clothes we brought with us and shiver in the wind and misty rain. As usual, Spain is ill-prepared for bad weather and so are we. There are heating controls in the hotel bedroom and we eagerly fiddle with them, hoping to gain some temporary relief from the damp and cold. But however many knobs and levers we press the temperature remains the same. In summer it works fine as air conditioning but apparently there is no need for heating the rest of the year.

At breakfast the hotel’s beachside terrace, with breathtaking views, is again available to us. In the warm sunshine it is magical. But now? Inside the hotel the tables are also laid up for breakfast but the doors onto the terrace are wide open as usual and a gale blows in. In the evening it is the same: scantily clad diners attempt to enjoy the romantic setting in this stunning waterfront restaurant in temperatures that at home would call for winter clothes and central heating! Viva España!

Majorca does not disappoint. The island never does – only the weather and the broken infrastructure of this magical isle are sometimes frustrating. “Es roto! Es España!” one defeated restaurant owner in Southern Spain once told me, in a rather sad display of national shame (“it’s broken – this is Spain!”). I had simply politely mentioned that the toilet seat was broken and the door didn’t lock.

But the sea is still sparkling in a variety of shades of turquoise, the palest of greens, aqua-marine and indigo – all of them so totally unbelievable and yet so totally true! The olive groves are such a wonderful shade of grey-green, so twisted and gnarled, so ancient and so gloriously restful! The orange and lemon trees are still laden with both fruit and blossom! The air is filled with a hundred-and-one exquisite aromas and the mountains are alive with the sound of twittering birdsong. Who could ask for more?

‘Un Hiver à Majorque’ (A Winter in Majorca), the famous volume that is now a by-word in tourist Majorca – on sale in all the best bookshops, tells the story, not of a tourist paradise, but of a winter of discontent. In 1838-39 French novelist, George Sand, spent a miserable season in the Carthusian monastery of Valldemossa in the mountains of northern Majorca, together with her then lover, the composer, Chopin, and her children. Although the book describes the scenery, flora and fauna and customs of the island at that time, it centres on the discomfort and deprivations, the cold and the rain, of their disastrous stay there, which exacerbated Chopin’s pre-existing condition of tuberculosis. Ironically, the book has helped to make the island the famous and much-loved tourist destination that it is today.

After repeated visits, frustrating weather, sleepless nights in draughty, damp hotels and broken toilet seats, I understand where they were coming from. But just wait till the sun comes out! Wait till the orange blossom appears. Wait till the swifts start to wheel in the vivid blue sky overhead, high above the bell tower of the monastery of Valldemossa and a soft warm breeze wafts the aroma of the blossom down through the whole valley. A deep sense of joy and well-being floods through even the most discontented traveller, wiping out, almost without trace, all thoughts of sleepless nights and winter chills. Nothing matters any more. ‘Summer in Majorca’! What a different book that might have been!

'Interlude '- time for a bit of romantic nonsense...

Do you ever get to the stage where life is just a bit too much? Time to escape, to recharge: time for indulging in a bit of relaxation and for hiding yourself away from the busy, busy world where no-one can find you! 'Interlude' was written about one of my favourite places...


Dapple soft sunshine
Filter through the leaves,
Glisten on the water
Where the fishes weave.

Willow fronds cascading,
Gentle in the breeze,
Hide me where I lay
So quiet beneath the trees.

Bubbles in the water,
Fishes in the deep,
Glide between the lily pads
Where the bullfrogs leap.

Where the water ripples
On a summer’s day,
By its soft reflections
I will gladly stay.

Watching, waiting, dreaming
Where the willows weep,
By the sparkling river
Let me softly sleep.

Solitude, sweet peace at last,
Here I take my place,
Where the willows hide me
In their fond embrace.

Rest awhile and ponder,
Find new strength to face
All that life demands once more
In the human race.

I don't do yoga!

Someone said to me the other day: “You must spend a lot of time sitting looking at nature.” I guess I do. I guess when I think about it my blog is crammed full of birds, hares, butterflies, lambs, frogs and flowers! She’s right - I love to look at ‘nature’!

Why? Why do we do that? For me, it’s relaxing: balm for the soul, as the phrase goes. I love to just sit. “Sometimes I sits and thinks; sometimes I just sits”, my mum used to say. I don’t do yoga, but I do meditate and I love to do it out of doors. Life is busy. The city where I live is noisy, achievement-orientated, dusty and dirty and, although it’s vibrant and stimulating sometimes, it’s also exhausting. My garden is a haven. Right now it’s a mini ‘Keukenhof’ (that famous Dutch garden) – full of tulips, narcissus and grape hyacinth. Red, yellow and blue – primary colours. It’s not subtle, but it’s bold and beautiful. Even in April the birds and butterflies love it, and so do I. Out in the countryside it gets even better and I can stop on a walk and watch hares racing across the fields or crested grebe bobbing up and down on the canal in their annual mating ritual. It’s all around us when we stop and look.

Why is nature so restful and relaxing? I guess it’s so at peace with itself. It just ‘is’. Nature doesn’t struggle or strive. A friend of ours said “you never see an apple tree straining to produce apples”. They just come, regular as clockwork, every year. It’s an intrinsic part of the tree’s ‘apple-ness’. It will never produce pears (without some very smart, human intervention). Life can be such hard work for us humans. We need to achieve – and be seen to achieve – such a lot. So sometimes a long hard look at nature can be so refreshing.

“Consider the lilies, how they grow. They neither toil nor spin. But I tell you, Solomon in all his glory did not clothe himself like one of these”.* The Bible puts it very picturesquely but maybe if we stare long enough at nature and meditate on it, some of that natural radiance will rub off and we can stop rushing around so fast and lay back a bit – stop thinking and just sit, like the lilies!

*Luke’s gospel: chapter 12, verse 27