The curse of me and my friend Elsie

I've decided there are some conditions - or is it some forms of conditioning? - which amount to a kind of curse. Nothing as bad, you understand, as having everything you touch turn to gold, but annoying nonetheless. This morning it was the book I'm enjoying. I may well blog more about the book as a whole when I'm done reading it, but for now I'm at the stage where the narrator is becoming recognisable, so that I begin to care what happens to him; the historical setting is enjoyably unfolding in such a way as to convince, and the grounds for the story are beginning to be laid in a way which promises further involvement. In other words, it's becoming a book I'm enjoying, in the classic manner of a summer read which won't over-tax the brain but is at the same time intelligent and engaging.

So where does the curse come in? Well, towards the end of Chapter four, actually. At the bottom of a page, where I read: "Most, like you or I, are content with the hope of salvation, and leave matters in God's hands." And I feel immediately discomfited. I know people have bothers with "like" and "as", and tend to use "like" as a conjunction - in fact, I'm almost used to that in direct speech. But this isn't even that. It's just one of these sloppy moments - and I feel the writer ought to have been more assured. In fact, I feel it ought to be impossible for him to write that. And it clearly isn't.

But then he didn't have my upbringing. I knew from regular repetition that "like" wasn't a conjunction from such an early age that I can't remember not knowing. I think I used to say "like I did" for devilment. But even devilment wouldn't have me write "like I". See what I mean? It's a curse. And I can't switch it off.

I'll tell you about the book in a bit. As long as there aren't more infelicities.

She's been away, but ...

No posts for a week - a week spent in Herefordshire, very close to Wales, with lovely friends who clear out their lives for us and let us talk, walk, eat and make no decisions at all. But we came home last night and thought has returned with the experience this morning of Morning Prayer.

Now as I explained to the good people of Dunoon in my write-up for this week's paper, we have Morning Prayer these days of interregnum (better not say Vacancy - it makes us sound gormless) when we haven't had a priest for a couple of weeks and therefore don't have the Reserved Sacrament. As you will see if you follow the link, there are all sorts of hedges put around the use of Reservation, for all sorts of very proper and careful reasons. However, I have found that it is in a strange way extremely galling to be told these reasons by a priest - because priests never have to put up with not having the Eucharist. At the moment there is quite a discussion going on in Scottish Pisky circles about this, and about the way in which the laity are getting above themselves and seem to think they don't need ordained clergy, but there is an aspect which doesn't often get mentioned.

Perhaps no-one says this because it's so blooming obvious: Morning Prayer is such a let-down as a service if it's all you're going to get in the day. It's fine as the start to a day on retreat, when there will also be a celebration of Communion, and Evensong, and Compline - but on a Sunday, as a stand-alone, it's not fine at all. And to anyone who tries to tell me that if it's reverently and thoughtfully done it should be just as good, all I can say is: it isn't. Especially not if you were brought up in a tradition which didn't have weekly communion, and fell into Anglicanism precisely because it did.

So what does a church do when it doesn't have a priest? Try harder to find stand-ins? Only have a service when a priest can be present? Make an effort to recruit locums for a mid-week and then reserve? And whatever the answer - and I suppose I'm saying this for the benefit of any clergy who may stray into blethers this week - just remember that if your answer matters, it's going to matter to people who actually care about this. Passionately.

And don't, whatever you do, suggest that we should enjoy chanting all these canticles to Anglican chant, without a choir, with an aging congregation. It disnae work.

Psausages and Psalms - a BBQ with a difference

sausages. Bet you never thought of spelling sausages with an initial P, but it seemed quite the thing to do when coupling the psausages with psalms for last evening's bash at Holy Trinity church, Dunoon. When you take a fine musician, a fine evening, 5o or so sausages and a jolly group of people you have a recipe for success.

A singing workshop in the church saw a good proportion of the congregation learning three ways to sing psalms - plainsong, Anglican chant and plainsong with a refrain - as well as a couple of canticles, along with a bit of background history which began with the haunting sound of the earliest Jewish psalm singing realised for contemporary listeners and played on that most contemporary of instruments, the iPod. A considerable degree of unanimity of sound was achieved before the mass exit in the direction of the Rectory.

Here the Marthas had set up and lit two barbecues - who said this was man's work? - on the patio, where a non-singing Vestal had tended the flames till the workshop was over. By now they were classically white and glowing, and in no time at all, thanks to the prescience of the sausage-providers, there was a great quantity of suitably charred and well-cooked sausages - enough even for the chaps who felt they needed ...er... 4 of them.

The great secret to all this was actually fairly minimal preparation in advance. A few people earmarked for the vital components - sausages and the fabby rolls from Blacks the Baker, butter and relish - and the ample supply of wine which is a feature of gatherings at HT; the freedom to set out other things like salads and paper plates indoors; the big black bag for all the rubbish at the end - that was it. The BBQs kept the midges away far more effectively than when in the past we'd set up under the trees on the lawn, and their heat, reflected off the walls of the house, kept the patio warm well after sunset.

And when all had gone save the Vestal not-actually-virgins and the organist, the roof fund was £60 better off and it was hazily felt that perhaps we ought to do this again. Fun, huh?

Footnote: I have to report that the Ayrshire pork sausages from The Codfathers were just wonderful.
Postscript: There's a new link on the blogroll to a good site for meditation; the most recent is, coincidentally, on a psalm.

Summer reading, but not light

JUst finished reading A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. It's as well I have managed to be sufficiently summer-holiday-minded to sit reading in the garden, for if I had pursued my normal practice of doing most of my reading in bed I doubt if I'd have had much sleep recently. This story of the intertwining lives of two women - Mariam and Laila - is so gripping, so heartbreaking and so demanding that I would find myself resolutely laying it aside at 1am and turning instead to something dull - or to the traditional sheep.

Hosseini, an expatriate Afghan, writes of his country in a way that is both matter-of-fact and perceptive. He tells without obvious judgement of the treatment of women, the status of wives, the Taliban and the Communist, but does it in such a way that you know how to react in the way that his heroines do. The inevitability of Afghanistan's history means that you are not surprised by the bigger picture, but wait instead with a kind of dread to see how it will affect them. The glimpse of the woman doctor at a Caesarian delivery performed without anaesthetic in the dilapidated hospital that was all the Taliban would allow women to use told a huge tale of denial and survival, and the heroism of the women in their determination to survive was all the more remarkable in its portrayal by a male writer.

The title of the book comes from a farewell ode to Kabul by the poet Babi:

One could not count the moons that shimmer on her roofs,
Or the thousand splendid suns that hide behind her walls.

I shall never feel the same again when I hear of the war in Afghanistan, or the people of Kabul.

Ur Beatha Dhan Dùthaich - A Highland Homecoming

Ever since I became a member of the Scottish Episcopal Church, in the early ‘70s, I’ve been aware that it is regarded by many native Scots as The English Church. “What do you want to go to a church like that for? You’re Scottish!” In Dunoon, it helps the visitor to tell the taxi driver to go to the English church, and in Mid-Argyll certainly you’ll hear at least as many English accents as native Scots ones.

But yesterday was different, and for the first time in my church-going life I felt that I was in a truly native church, with a history and an ethos that was entirely Scottish – and Highland at that. Not the fakery of the dressing-up-for-a-wedding tartanry, but the deep-seated faith of an area which had survived persecution and emerged somehow in the 21st century with much of its tradition intact. The occasion might have been dismissed as mere tartan-for-tourists. But “A Highland Homecoming”, part of the government’s Homecoming Scotland programme, took the form of a celebration of the Eucharist in Gaelic, in St John’s Church, Ballachulish, in the presence of the assembled, international ranks of the Clan McInnes. And from the opening words - Ann an ainm an Athar, agus a'Mhic agus an Spiorad Naoimh - I was hooked.

So why was I there? And why did I feel the power of this mass, given that I have about 4 words of Gaelic and none of them were used yesterday? The first is easy: the mass setting was John’s Kilbride Mass, in Gaelic, and he was playing the organ for the service. And the music suddenly sounded as if it had been written for the Gaelic words - A Thighearna, dèan tròcair oirnn. A Chriosda, dèan tròcair oirnn. A Thighearna, dèan tròcair oirnn. The second? Was it the resonance of Emsley Nimmo’s Gaelic, or the haunting beauty of the final music from the choirs – Gleann Bhaile Chaoil? Or was it because Mr B pulled out all the stops (you might say) from his distant roots and moved the entire congregation with his playing of traditional airs á la McIntosh? or the wonderful strangeness of hearing a mass setting I know by heart to words which were completely unfamiliar?

Actually I think it was a mixture of all these things, and more. And the more was symbolised, I realise, by the presence on the altar of the Appin Banner, a replica of the pale blue and gold flag which was rescued from the carnage after Culloden and returned to the area of Portnacrois and St John’s, the only banner not to be taken and burned. And the chalice used was the Appin Chalice, reputed to have been carried by the Appin Stewart Regiment in the uprising of 1745. How could I not feel the tie to the past, the essential roots of our church?

Afterwards, there was an incredible bun-fight. I don’t know how we managed it, but despite the teeming rain outside and the two portaloos in the grounds it was accomplished that people got tea and scones and cakes – and the most wonderful clootie dumpling I’ve ever tasted. The politicians – Mike Russell, Culture Minister in the Scottish Parliament and Charles Kennedy, the local Westminster MP – posed for photos and chatted amiably; Bishop Martin was interviewed for the telly – a camera had woven in and out throughout – and the Dean of Aberdeen & Orkney, Emsley Nimmo, fortified himself with a scone.

This, I realise, reads like a mixture of piece for the magazine and personal blog post. This is because my last blog on a diocesan event was transplanted wholesale into the diocesan mag, and must have confused anyone who didn’t know of its provenance. So here’s the wee blogger’s coda…

When we emerged into the rain which had been gathering in malevolence during the service, we were both shaking with knackerdom. We still had the drive home to Dunoon, through the looming and more or less drowned Glencoe, and I had a picture of us sleeping by the roadside. I even thought longingly of sailing into a hotel and ignoring the lack of a toothbrush. But whether it was the adrenaline of a successful gig which kept Mr B at the wheel, or the recounting of the interesting contacts I’d made during the afternoon, we kept going and made it in 2 hours flat.

Personally, I think it was the clootie dumpling …

Note: Photos from the event can now be seen here

Grandma's noisy night

From our bedroom
Originally uploaded by goforchris.

During our Italian holiday, the cough that had plagued me for a week in June returned with a vengeance, encouraged, I believe, by the air-con in the car. This cough was - and is - of the variety which becomes more insistent the moment you go to bed, and gave rise one night to a sequence of events which I can only imagine as belonging in one of Catriona's picture-books.

Scene: Dark bedroom, dark courtyard outside open window (in picture). Second frame: loud coughing from inside window. A dog appears round the corner. BARK. BARK. WOOFWOOFWOOF.
Silence.
COUGH. COUGHCOUGH. WHEEZECOUGH.
WOOFWOOFWOOF.
A cat streaks round the corner past the barking dog.
MEEOWWWWWSCREECH
The dog gives chase, by now WOOFWOOFing uncontrollably.
Another cat joins in, then another.
SCREEEEEECHOWWWW.
The low-slung, slow-moving, roly-poly dog waddles into the courtyard. Inside the room, there is the sound of cursing, followed by another bout of COUGHCOUGHCOUGH.
The roly-poly dog joins in. GERWOOF. GERWOOF.

By now the night is hideous with the sounds of battle. An unknown number of cats have joined the fray - remember, there are 15 of them in the vicinity - and both dogs. Their paws make a drumming noise in the echoing confines of the courtyard. There seems to be no reason for any of them ever to quieten down. And no chance of sleep. It is 2am.

Suddenly a light comes on at the top of the stairs (look at the photo again). A door opens and a silhouette appears. It is la nonna - Grandma. A high-pitched torrent of Italian abuse is hurled at the miscreant beasts and a door slams.
WOOF?

And then, miraculously, there is silence. The cats slink off to their nocturnal prowlings, and the dogs retreat to wherever it is they sleep at night. And behind the ornamental bars, behind the geraniums, behind the mosquito mesh, I attempt to be silent, to avoid further barking, to refrain from talking to the dogs.

Now, I need an illustrator ...

Linguistic creativity

Very ladylike
Originally uploaded by goforchris.

Our recent holiday in Italy brought home to me what incredible creatures small children are. Catriona, who at the moment speaks more French than English, nevertheless seemed to know that she had to speak to us in English - so would demand "book" of her Grandfather every morning before breakfast, leading him by the hand to the sofa in the morning sun which streamed through the door. And by the end of the week she had learned to say "Ciao" to all the Italians who greeted her as "bellissima bambina", though her preferred greeting remains "Hi!"

But the most memorable of her words is one which is all her own. Catriona hates having sticky hands or a dirty face - indeed, does not like anything to be messy, wet (mouillé - including the pool!) or untidy (brings on the need to "rangé" - arrange - the books, toys or whatever). Because of this urge to be clean, she is always demanding a damp wipe, like the one which which she is daintily dabbing ice cream off her face in the picture - in a cafe in Colle di Val d'Elsa. The French word for these wipes is "lingette". But usually she uses them for her hands - "mains" in French - and so she demands a "maingette".

I love it. In fact, whenever I feel my fingers sticky - like after picking up jam in Tesco - I feel the urge to wail "maingette!" Perhaps we ought to patent the name for future use. Ciao!

Apero time

As I sit languidly on the patio waiting for the chef to bring an aperitif and the footman to deal with the parasol - currently drooping over the table like a dead pterodactyl - I observe a life and death drama by the pool. The cat in the photo has just despatched one of the swifts which dart over the pool - heaven knows how he caught it - but is now sulking because a second cat has now snatched the bird and run off. I shall dwell on death no longer. Paddock calls..

Sun gear

This blogette/bloguette/whatever is really for Mrs Tosh, who provided the excellent anti-sunburn garment worn by Catriona in the photo. It's a while since I had a summer holiday here: the sun is truly fierce. There is the problem of persuading Catriona that it's ok to get it wet, but it's reassuring none the less. (Is that one word? Phone spell-check likes it not. And while being pedantic: the title of the last post was an echo of Wind in the Willows rather than anything more erudite. It's hard to be accurate in tanto discrimine rerum.

Dulce domum

This is the back of our house, with a few of the 15 resident cats in attendance. After a post prandial walk through Colle di Val d'Elsa I've realised how different the Italian experience is with a very small, attractive and sociable toddler holding your hand. And I have to report that Catriona did a great job testing the acoustics of the mercifully empty cathedral. And I'm not cooking tonight. Bliss.

Summer's lease

I'll not be blethering much over the next week or so - off to Tuscany with Mr B, as well as the Edublogger family. It's been so hot here this week that I'm looking forward to having an air-conditioned villa and the pool at the foot of the garden, The Blethers possessing neither of these amenities. I'm also looking forward to revisiting the area where we had our last foreign holiday en famille, before our weans turned into families themselves, if you get me; we stayed in this part of Tuscany during a World Cup in which Italy did rather well, and ended up in a neighbouring apartment whose inhabitants had rented a telly specially. This, you will understand, was not my choice, but was done in the spirit of bonding.

Anyway, it's arrivederci from me for now, though you might catch a blogette from my phone if there's a signal (I'm not holding my breath; it's very rural) Should I be taking "Summer's Lease" for holiday reading? Probably not. I seem to remember it cast doubts on the stability of the water supply to a holiday villa, and might induce gloom and despondency.

And that would never do. Ciao!

Wallowing in nostalgia

I had a lovely wallow in nostalgia today, courtesy of Bill, who sent me this link to a film of the last day of the Glasgow trams. This was in the early 1960s, but my memories of trams are set in the 50s, when I caught the Number 10 (blue) tram from the terminus at Hyndland Road, along Great Western Road to Hillhead Primary School. I had occasion sometimes to travel on the No. 5 (pictured) though I have a feeling it was less convenient - did it come from Byres Road?

I've been looking at some of the other films flagged up on that site, and was amazed to see how fast some of these old trams were - they fairly rattled along Great Western Road west of Anniesland Cross, where they had the central reservation all to themselves with the lines running in the middle of the grassy area. I can't for the life of me recall how people boarded them there - were the stops in the middle of the road too?

And how quaintly narrow they were - especially the older ones like the one pictured. The seats were so narrow that two adults must have been very squashed; as a skinny child I was always pushed into a corner by anyone sitting on the outside seat. The best place to be, however, was upstairs at the front, where you could shut the door on the small compartment there and - as I did when small - stand at the front window looking out and down at the street, the view completely free of obstruction, and pretend to be driving the tram. The real driver was immediately below you in this position, and could be seen if you peered down the spiral metal staircase which came up into the compartment next to the double, side-facing seat. The rest of the seating was a continuous bench round the curved front of the tram, but if I sat there I would tend to feel sick as the view was intermittent and the angle odd.

And now Edinburgh is grinding to a halt in the effort to reintroduce trams. If I live long enough (that is, I hope, sarcastic) I shall have to ride one, though I doubt if they will be quite as excitingly bereft of any health-and-safety features. I doubt if the fare will be a pink ticket for tuppence, and the Edinburgh clippies probably never said "Come oan, get aff."

And I'd better not try to stand at the front and pretend to drive it. Sadly, I think I'm a bit old.

Gone is that music...

How strange to realise that in the past couple of hours I've heard more Michael Jackson songs than at any other time in my life. I recognise the strange figure of the recent court case against him, and the cheerful child with the prodigious talent and the absurd costumes - so where did the other appearances go? And now, of course, I realise that the cheerfulness on stage was the product of a deprived childhood - deprived of childhood itself.

And in between? All the other stuff that filled my life, I suppose - other music, performing, bringing up a family, teaching, demonstrating, public speaking - and very little room for anything that wasn't my kind of music. But I can remember the effect the star had on the kids I taught - and their amusement at my not knowing why anyone would wear only one glove.

And I suppose what I think of is Elvis, whom I loved from the first movie I was allowed to go to on my own, with friends, without an adult. The movie was King Creole, and I was eleven. I moved on when Elvis changed into the fat freak of the rhinestone suits, but when he died, also too early, I remembered the young singer in denims who first showed my generation what sexy meant. I can still sing all the words of some Elvis numbers, but tonight I realised I couldn't have identified a single song of Michael Jackson's.

Interesting.

Blast from the past

DGS Wind Band 1989
Originally uploaded by goforchris.

This has to be a record for me - I put this photo on flickr this morning and already it's had 93 hits: a tribute to the power of tagging?* It's a bit extraordinary how time passes; this feels like a foray into another era on the one hand, aided by the terrible quality of photo reproduction in the local paper at the time ( I'm happy to say this is hugely improved), while on the other I can recall it so well that it could have been only last year.

Life is, in fact, incredibly short - a brief candle indeed.

Note: The band members look incredibly well-dressed; they were in fact more uniform-conscious than many of their contemporaries outwith the band.
*No. It's the power of Twitter, actually.

Simple pleasures?

This morning over breakfast I was catching up on an essay in the Sunday Herald on the subject of consumerism. The writer, whose name eludes me at this late hour, was calling for a return to a less demanding lifestyle, where we rediscover the pleasures of the open air, the countryside and so on. He made the point that the pursuit of possessions rules the lives of far too many people today, and repeated the idea that if everyone on earth made the same demands as us in the West, we'd need three planets to sustain us.

I've just had an idyllic day. The weather helped, of course, and we used a car to transport us to the wonderful seaside meadow in the photo - though we could fine have gone on the bus. But the pleasure came from walking in the sunshine among wild flowers, between clumps of sea buckthorn, to the white sand of Ardentinny, and drifting back again after a paddle and a blether (of course). We ignored the nuclear submarine facility on the far shore and concentrated on the heron walking like an aged dominie through the shallows of the outgoing tide, while a blackbird in the tree behind us urged us to go and leave him alone. And it was all free. There wasn't a shop in sight and we didn't have a penny with us - just a bottle of (tap) water.

So the next time I spend money on new walking boots or a new cagoule, I'll remind myself that by so doing I'm saving myself from the further excesses of consumerism. And it would be even cheaper if the sun shone more often as it did today - wouldn't it?

Taking precautions

Sometimes there is an incongruity about the things we do in public. Take worship, in these times of pestilence. An edict was spread abroad some weeks ago about how to conduct public worship if a pandemic should be declared (I'm aware of writing in a cod-mediaeval style here: must be the subject-matter which has affected me) and we noted the contents, smiled and let the files languish on our hard-drives. (Nothing mediaeval about our communications, I assure you)

But of course we now have a pandemic, and Dunoon was, until very recently, a hotspot. And so it came to pass that we unearthed the prescribed precautions and applied them. Communion in one kind only, or by intinction. No physical contact during the Peace. And antibacterial handwash everywhere you turn. This morning we bowed, smiled sweetly at one another, fended off the ignorant, and obediently dipped our wafers in the proffered cup. (Incidentally, this leaves a great deal of unconsumed wine in the chalice - just as well the visiting cleric didn't have to drive afterwards)

And what made me smile was the sight of this congregation, almost all of whom are old enough to fall into the category of those who seem not to be at risk. Young people may be falling like flies, but we don't see enough of them to know. We'll go on doing as we're told, however. Peace, peace.

Grim occupation

What a powerful drama Occupation (BBC1, this week) has been - and what good actors we have in this country. I don't know which aspect of the three-parter struck me most forcibly - the edgy, hand-held camera work, the bleak realism of the scenes set in the UK, the evocation of emotion kept under control until that control snapped under the tension - but the overall result had me gripped, tearful and shocked at what we do to people.

I thought for the umpteenth time how impossible it is for soldiers to return to what the rest of us call normality, how unreal civilian life must seem, how difficult it is for their families - in fact, how impossible it is that soldiers should have families at all, given the lives they have to lead. And it makes no difference where or when that soldiering takes place - after reading Conn Iggulden's excellent "Emperor" series I felt that the soldiers who served with Caesar in Gaul must have felt lost among the back streets of Rome.

Much of my recent thinking has been about the volunteers in the trenches of World War 1, but I can't help wondering if all soldiers see and experience things which make them different for the rest of their lives - if they survive. I always knew there were things my father never told me about his war in the Western Desert, and by the time I was sufficiently mature to ask the questions he was no longer there to answer them. But I feel the questions returning after this week. Can I find a soldier who will anwer them?

Learning by experience

I’ve decided on a new approach to life, that of viewing everything potentially unpleasant as A New Experience. And they don’t come much more unpleasant, do they, than root canal treatment? For that, O Best Beloved, was the experience which dominated this wet and windy morning – or at least one hour, twenty minutes of it. And the couple of hours beforehand spent in dismal contemplation, and the couple of hours after till my jaw thawed out, by which time it was afternoon and the sun had come out.

But to the treatment. I’ve had this before, of course, over the years. But today was the first time I’ve had it done with what felt like a latex hanky draping my mouth. It was, apparently, tucked into a metal clamp round the tooth to be treated and arranged in such a fashion as to prevent any gubbins from the procedure going down my throat, while – and this was the important bit – preventing any of my bacteria-laden saliva from contaminating the growing canal in my tooth.

At first I thought, in a tragic sort of way, that I might suffocate. The smell of rubber was not reassuring, and as it sealed off my mouth I forgot that I had a nose which would still function. But I have to admit that in the end it was easier, once I had learned the spasmodic but miniscule movements which would enable swallowing while still breathing. I didn’t have to worry about what was going down with the spit, and my tongue was tucked away from the horrors of the “hot instrument” which was going to “burn away” the surplus rubber filling protruding above the nerve-canal when he’d filled it. (“He” is my 16-year-old dentist)

Ok, maybe it was my fault for asking to be kept informed of what was going on. As I said, it was my tooth. But the hot thing and the smoke and the smell did worry me somewhat, and I did have a brief over-imaginative moment wondering what happened if his hand slipped. Too much hot rubber in the mouth – the mind, dear reader, boggled. And now I've found this video which shows me just what it all looked like - except that my rubber dam was, I think, fawn.

However, all is, so far, well. My jaw is returned to me, and I am as yet drug-free. Next appointment will involve the green gunk, the impression-taking stuff – but it’s not for over a month. Much can happen in a month. And here’s to the child-dentist of Dunoon…

Rampant hypochondria?

It’s strange what a mix of hypochondria, selfishness and what might pass for common sense under the circumstances does to one’s life. Living in swine-flu mecca Dunoon and with trips to London and Tuscany in the next few weeks, I would prefer not to be ill – not till the holidays have been taken and enjoyed. So I find myself shopping anywhere but the worthy Dunoon Co-op – because it is currently the only supermarket until you get to Greenock (east) or Lochgilphead (north, and then down a bit) because Somerfield is undergoing a lengthy gestation as Morrison’s and won’t be open for over a month. As the Co-op is somewhat small, it tends to be hideously crowded, bringing about an unsought intimacy between customers – so I avoid it like the plague with which I imagine it overflowing.

And it’s as well it’s been fine weather, for we have been able to disport ourselves in the great outdoors where the bugs, presumably, are dissipated in the ether. Today, f’rinstance, we walked along Loch Striven for a couple of hours without meeting a soul – and only one car, miraculously. We continue to hope, of course, in the purity and standoffishness of Episcopalians, whom we expect to be bug-free because of not mixing with football supporters and their rellies, though in these egalitarian days you can never tell. Choir practice for tonight was cancelled, because we reckoned that if one of our choristers had newly had the flu and others were connected with schools that had been closed because of the bug, it was silly to meet when we didn’t have to.

In fact, it’s all been a bit anti-social. However, if I can get off to London for a visit in the next coupla days, and if we can all go on our Italian holiday in July, it will have been worth it. Then, maybe, a party. With the afflicted and their loved ones. A cough-in, in fact. Cheers!

Bows and cheesy grins

Yesterday the Diocese of Argyll and The Isles had a ball. Not the kilts-and-ballgowns type of ball, but the exuberance of a Diocesan Festival which had all the hallmarks of this diocese at its best. With Bishop Martin as MC, Richard Holloway as the preacher at the Eucharist, and some imaginative planning that gave ownership of all the action to everyone present, it was far and away the best festival I’ve ever attended (and I’ve seen a few, believe me).

The culmination of the event was undoubtedly the Eucharist, but the Singing Workshop which occupied everyone between eating and worshipping was a highpoint for many who had not previously experienced Mr B’s take on singing. With their rib-cages high, two imaginary shopping bags in their hands and their face muscles hooked over their ears, the congregation learned John’s Kilbride Mass and sang it with enthusiasm and accuracy – a congregational choir in the best sense. The Cathedral choirs – from St Johns, and the St Maura singers from Cumbrae - sang their own small offerings, but this was a communal effort and all the better for it.

Bishop Richard preached a powerfully relevant sermon on the flawed, broken people of God, reaching the figure of Columba by way of Graham Greene and Paul Tillich. I don’t know how many of us were as struck as the people around me by the image of those who had broken their own hearts and who were yet afforded grace when they least seemed to expect it, but it would have been worth making the journey just for that moment. And there was a hair-raising prayer in Gaelic, and a beautiful Gaelic sung meditation which touched us all, even if we had to read the translation.

But the abiding impression of the day was of joyous interaction and friendship, as Bishop, Dean and preacher cracked jokes at/about one another, as the Dean instructed us how best to exchange the Peace when there was the threat of The Plague (you can give a Buddhist bow – Bishop, demonstrate – or a cheesy grin), as we all greeted one another with added enthusiasm as if to make up for the lack of handshaking or were hugged in complete disregard for the possible contamination from Dunoon people. (If you have been on another planet: Dunoon is currently the swine flu capital of Scotland, if the meedja are to be believed).

This was the diocese at its crazy Argyll best. People had travelled absurd distances to be there, including Tim, temporarily relocated to Argyll and at the festival because I tweeted it, and there were bizarre conversations – Your jacket is from Skye Batiks (mine, and it was) – how do you prepare a sermon? (have a meeting. It makes you feel better) – Is your accent from Hyndland? (mine again. Yes) – have you seen their kitchen-in-a-cupboard? (fabby idea: must copy). We were totally knackered by the time we left, and we still had two hours’ driving before home and dinner. But, for all my misgivings when it was first mooted, I had enjoyed a day in which every moment was filled with what felt right. And for all the problems of this tiny diocese, it was a day when I would have belonged no-where else. Slainte!

Note: you can see more photos from the day here

Cool!

It certainly is a distant land, this Eastern realm. We left Dunoon yesterday in 21º of warmth, and two hours later the car said 13º in the shade. (OK, Mal's sheltered garden was really warm, and after a glass of bubbly I wasn't caring - happy birthday, Mal!) And today it's greyish and still cool, so that coffee and croissants in Ocean Terminal seemed a safer bet than sitting outside. (I learned the French for greyish quite early in my career - there was an old horse called Grisatre in a book we had to read in S2, Jean Bonnard, Petit Ecolier)

And talking of French, it's fascinating to watch the development of a bilingual child. At 21 months, she counts un, deux or one, two, apparently depending on who's listening. She knows all her features in French, and nose in English (it's running just now). She was trying to say mouillé about her damp face, but I'm afraid I corrupted this by saying mingin' (her mouth was rimmed with jam at the time) and now she's saying mingin' with glee. And she says mine firmly in a passable Edinburgh voice and clutches the desired object equally firmly, just in case there's any doubt. And I expect her to break into the Marseillaise when we set off on a walk, though so far she shouts marcher rather than marchons.

All great fun, and totally knackering. She's just fallen asleep and I feel a little peckish again. A spot of lunch, I think, before la petite wakens again...

Loud twittering

Is Twitter the big thing these days, then? Yesterday a media job was advertised through Twitter and the applicant twittering about his success later on in the afternoon; the BBC website advocates using Twitter to keep up to date with Swine Flu news and advice.

In education, of course, we have the fear factor – the recent furore over the twittering teacher is proof enough of the success of the medium – and it remains for twitterers in educational circles to make the breakthrough that everyone else in the know has made already.

Over a year ago I suggested that Twitter would be a great way to keep us up to date with the peregrinations of our bishop, only to be told that there was no time for such stuff. (Sadly, many teachers still think this. And cooncillors.) It’ll be interesting to see how persuasive the communications people (pity they’re using a Twitter virgin as their advocate) at the SEC Synod will be this year. But I shall be in the Big Smoke - I shall have to rely on Twitter to find out.

Sweltering and swine flu

Well, well. Or, if you like: ill, ill. Swine flu has arrived in Dunoon, not in single spies but in battalions. Ok. I exaggerate. 18 Dunoonites do not a battalion make. But it's a fact that Dunoon hit the ten o'clock news tonight in a way it hasn't since the American navy left. It looked lovely, actually - nice shot of Kirn under a Mediterranean sky, the Western Ferry ploughing bravely across bringing reinforcements for the Royal Bank so that it could open again. I was interested to realise the subconscious calculations going on - that queue outside the surgery when I passed this morning: were they ill, or frightened - and did I pass too close to any of them? Shall I do my shopping in Edinburgh this week instead of the over-crowded Co-op in Dunoon? (our other supermarket is closed for renovation)... and so on. And of course there's the hypochondria: is my throat sore? or is it simply hayfever? (the Met Office man with the whimsical manner said the pollen count was affecting him ...)

But actually the weather is too good to worry for long. It's hard to feel threatened when you can spend the afternoon sitting on one of the world's most wonderful beaches, paddling in warm sea as it slides over the hot sand, then exploring a hitherto unknown track and finding the beautiful bay in the photo. The car thermometer - sitting in the sun - read 31º at 6.20pm, and even in the shade it was 23º by the time we were home again. The promised cold air is going to feel arctic on the sunburn, but the S3 pupils who were sent home for a week to prevent the spread of infection have certainly chosen a good time for it.

Except that now they're spreading themselves over Dunoon ......

The problem of ...

Been a bit obsessed by teeth recently, largely because mine have seen better days and are beginning to complain about my treatment of them. Mistaking an olive stone for a sultana while eating an interesting salad in Tenerife was only one of the mistakes for which I am now paying - both in trauma and, I suspect, in cash.

But it was while I was reclining, somewhat alarmingly, with my head lower than my feet at the behest of the charming 16-year-old who came to the rescue during today's emergency dental appointment, that I began to consider once more the age-old problem. Not, as you might think, the problem of pain, for by this time I'd had so many injections that my entire face felt as if it belonged to someone else. No, the perennial problem in this position - head back, mouth agape and full of implements and gloved fingers - is the problem of spit.

No matter how assiduous the dental nurse with her wee hoover-thingy, the moment she has to turn away to mix minute quantities of some tooth-filling substance I feel that I will shortly drown in spit. The front of my mouth may feel like a dust-bowl, but somewhere around the memories of tonsils there is a sudden rush of saliva - and I have to swallow. Only I daren't, because I have become convinced that stuck down there under my tongue is a lump of filling/tooth/debris which to swallow would mean a slow death. But swallow I must - there is a kind of convulsion, a gagging sensation .... oh no....choking ...

And the twelve-year-old (he's younger by the minute, this one) asks brightly: You all right? And continues blithely to fill, scrape, buff, do unimaginable things with tiny bits of cotton wool (apparently I have some stuck inside my tooth right now) as I make a huge effort to relax and think of the absurd Simpsons poster stuck to the ceiling above the chair. Surely the torment cannot last for ever.

I just wish this child genius had a better taste in music...

Been thinking some more about the Twittering Teacher. The Oban Times piece is so hysterical that the first reaction is still to laugh, to damn Argyll and Bute Council, and to carry on Twittering like mad. But if you read what this hapless teacher has twittered, you see why there was a stushie. Only thing is, it’s nothing to do with wasting time, indulging in nefarious online practices or anything else of that nature. No, it’s to do with her being just a bit silly.

Once upon a time I spoke to the Synod of the Scottish Episcopal Church about blogging as a means of keeping people connected – you know the sort of thing. And the reigning comms supremo buttonholed me afterwards to pooh-pooh the whole blog thing because of its association, in his mind, with hapless American adolescents who dumped their every thought online and left it there. This was obviously not what sensible adults did.

Sadly, this teacher – who seems to be a PT – is really doing the American adolescent thing on the even speedier forum of Twitter. And instead of someone pointing out, quietly, that really she ought to be able to differentiate between what is suitable to share, and what is in fact hurtful or a matter for professional discretion, the council representatives go nuts and say

‘Social network sites are blocked in all schools as policy. Any member of staff found to have breached council policy will face appropriate disciplinary action.’

And so other professionals are told they can’t tweet for ideas, assistance or professional input, all because one teacher lost it. But she didn’t lose it as badly as the Oban Times suggests here:

There is also a shameful admission of a lack of interest in teaching.

‘Hello…where I am stuck in a maths cover lesson, at least the sun is shining.’ 10.01am May 11.

The teacher concerned would not be teaching at this point, but would be stuck in the classroom of an absent colleague, supervising a class in a subject not her own. There is little to do under these circumstances but watch the time pass and keep order – you don’t teach. It’s boring. And all the time you think of the work you’re not able to do because you’ve lost a precious non-contact period. People perhaps don’t know this – and maybe they should. Maybe it’s a good thing for the general public to know how a teacher’s day is really spent – so why not twitter this?

Back to blogs. There are still people who put unwise comments on their blogs, remarks thrown out carelessly which have the power to wound and offend. But blogs exist, and social networking sites exist, and there is no point in damning the technology because people are just as silly as they ever were. The Scottish Episcopal Church embraced blogging a couple of years ago, and this year the Synod will take a tentative look at Twitter – again, a couple of years after I first suggested it’d be a good way to keep track of one’s Bishop. And nothing Argyll and Bute council can say will make any difference.

When teacher's away ...

It’s such a relief, such a good feeling, when old friends find in each other what they need to make progress. Such a feeling as this morning’s, when three of us lay people who have to preach on a fairly regular basis met to break the back of the next three lay sermons – one apiece. We’d all done our homework, reading the Lectionary readings for all three days, thinking about the themes involved – thinking. Real thought. And so when we met we were able to listen constructively, to question, to demand a little more, and to appreciate one another.

It is a while since we’ve had to do this without the teacher, but we found ourselves slipping comfortably into our role, able to express appreciation of the work of another without constraint. And perhaps there will be less theological depth to our preaching, but for now this will suffice. The confidence gained by having one’s colleagues on board for an adventure is priceless – as were some of the jokes and rabbit holes down which we wandered.

I used to have a book at school called “Physics is fun”. I never found it so – but on today’s showing, theology is fun. A good thought as we await Pentecost.

Twittering Argyll and Bute

I've just picked up (via AB) on an interesting wee story set in my own local authority and involving some outrage over the Tweets of a teacher. You can read the original tale here. We have the obligatory angry parent who "knows half the pupils being commented on", and the local councillor who doesn't think teachers should be wasting their time on such sites - he thinks it is a drain on public resources.

If the reported tweets are representative of this teacher's crime, then the angry parent is either psychic or has been indulging in extensive research through her child. Maybe she spends her days on Twitter herself. And both she and the councillor seem to think that Tweeting takes up a lot of time, while anyone who knows anything about it is well aware it is the work of seconds to tweet a comment. No, what people don't like is the sudden insight into the life of a teacher, this well-paid paragon who always feels enthusiasm for even the most disruptive class, never blanches at the paperwork she has to fill out every time a child swears, never, ever complains about the lovely children whom the complaining parents have dispatched for the day and whose behaviour and work will always be the very best they can manage.

Teachers have always indulged in this sort of conversation, with each other, with friends, with anyone who cares to listen, on a bad day. This teacher's tweets seem not to name names, and to be, frankly, pretty bland - and two out of the four quoted were made outside school hours. What will Argyll and Bute do to the defiant ones who dare to tweet again? How wonderful if there were to be a deluge of @Argyll&Bute posts - the system might well grind to a halt, given past form.

Goodness, am I glad to be free. Are other councils run by such ignorant technophobes? I feel a Keatsian moment coming on: Tweet to the spirit ditties of no tone....

A guided journey

One of the lesser-known benefits of religious practice is to be found in Spiritual Direction. While many Anglicans know that this is something they would expect their priest to undertake, on the understanding that every priest needs someone to talk to about their own spiritual development, far fewer realise that the benefits of this practice are open to all, lay people as well as ordained. They are missing a great deal.

It's easy to assume that because you talk about matters of faith and practice to friends or fellow-members of your congregation that you don't need anything so esoteric or - to the inexperienced - so scary as one-to-one conversation with someone who would initially be a stranger, but this would be to miss the point. You cannot experience the full benefit of this exercise with someone who is involved with your ordinary day-to-day life, let alone a friend: there will be too many extraneous considerations - such as the maintaining of a relationship - to get in the way of honesty. And the benefits are incalculable, with the resultant self-knowledge and assistance with spiritual growth far beyond what is achieved by the more comfortable discussions with someone on your own patch.

This is where organisations such as Cursillo can be of great value. By laying strong emphasis on the benefits of direction and by providing assistance with finding a suitable and experienced director for those who wish one, Cursillo can take anyone interested past the initial and sometimes daunting stage of asking someone to join in a fascinating journey.

And it's a journey infinitely worth making.

A strange Resurrection

I've just finished reading The Resurrection of the Body by Maggie Hamand. It was sent to me by a friend whose recommendations I trust, but for a while I wondered why I was reading it. Beginning with an apparent murder on Good Friday, this short novel explores belief, incredulity and loss of faith in the course of investigating a mystery, and is written in the simple, direct style of someone recounting a story they have gone over so often that all artifice has gone.

I read the greater part of the book today, having reached the point where I couldn't bear not to know what the outcome would be. I had grown accustomed to the dry style of narrative, to the short chapters with their artless titles. And now that it's done I find myself wishing it wasn't, and wanting to go on - except that the end of this story can't be written in twentieth-century terms. For how would we cope with the Resurrection? Would we not all be like the first century sceptics who said the disciples had hidden the body of Christ to prove a point? In giving us this very ordinary Anglican priest with all his flaws and hangups, Hamand has given us the chance to look again at our own beliefs - and perhaps our own deepest needs as well.

Songs and a poem

I've posted a poem today, over at frankenstina. It's one I began on the bus home from France, and only today got down to deciphering the wobbly writing in my notebook.

I never thought I would find myself singing It's a long way to Tipperary but it seemed entirely appropriate when the time came, and the subsequent transition to the folk songs which are so much a part of our heritage came naturally. The Braes of Killiecrankie, one of my personal favourites, goes as well with the last of the sun in France as it does in Scotland, and I'm grateful to Max for knowing all the words!

Unprepared

In Delville Wood
Originally uploaded by goforchris.

I had to preach this morning. I was relatively unprepared, for I only learned about it last week, while I was in France - in the very heart of Delville Wood, to be precise. Not having a bible or lectionary with me, I wasn't in a position to do more than fret, briefly, and put all thought of sermons aside until I was home again. By the time I was on the coach driving through England, I knew I'd be preaching about my experiences in France, whatever the readings for the day.

In the event, the Gospel was ideal - greater love hath no man, that he lay down his life for his friend. What a gift. And because it was Morning Prayer, the response to the gospel reading: Death is swallowed up in victory. So for once I didn't write a sermon. A page of bullet points served to remind me of the order in which I wanted to arrange my thoughts, and a poem I'd just written to finish off with. And from the moment I stood up and looked at my hearers I felt that this was what I needed to do on this day.

I spoke of the question which had troubled many of us as we looked at the inscriptions at the foot of the gravestones: where was God in all this? For on every stone where a soldier was named, there was this additional line supplied by his family at a cost of 31/2d per letter, to a maximum of 60 letters. On the stones of the countless unknown soldiers were the words "Known unto God", but on the others? Not cries of anguish and loss, but words of hope and faith and belief.

And I spoke of the lack of preparedness on the part of these soldiers - for who could be adequately prepared to walk uphill, carrying a 60lb pack and rifle, slowly, into a hail of machine-gun bullets? To watch the first rank of their comrades fall and then hear the whistle and go over the top to share their fate? Why did they do this?

I recalled the title of a book I saw in a museum shop: You can't shoot a man with a cold. This chimed so wonderfully with the thoughts I'd been having, the notion that just as it seemed important to feel well to go on holiday, to cope with the rigours of travel, so it would be important to feel in top form to fight in the trenches - which of course the soldiers emphatically did not. They were cold, wet, muddy, suffering from trench foot and diarrhoea, with no respite at the end of the day if they survived - just more of the same. Not in a fit state to die, really.

And it came back to the inevitability of God's love, in which our lack of preparedness makes no difference. No matter what circumstances distract us or make us feel unworthy, no matter how unready to face God we may feel, God's love is constant. Nothing we can do will change it.

Written like that, it looks bald and abrupt, and part of me wishes I had a written copy somewhere. But I couldn't have read this sermon; it needed to be spontaneous and alive. I'm glad that despite all the distractions and metaphorical minefields I didn't back out of delivering it, and I'm humbled by the response from my listeners.

And at least one of them thought my poem was by someone well-known!

Officers' Billet

Interior decoration
Originally uploaded by goforchris.

An integral part of our visit to the Somme was our billet. Yes, that's what we called it. Don't snigger. Look at the picture. The whole place was redolent of the Great War, from the rifle, complete with fixed bayonet, hanging ready from a beam to the recruiting posters on the bedroom walls (I dropped off to sleep under "Women of Britain say go!") It did occur to me that if any of my companions were to have a bad dream after all our battlefield visits it might make for an interesting scenario. Sleepwalker with bayonet wipes out party of pensioners - that sort of thing.

The rooms were basic, with just about enough room to swing a very short-tailed cat. Ours didn't have any en-suite frills, but we had the advantage of being next door to the shower-room/WC. Another room had en-suite facilities, while yet another - under the roof - had a basin and WC but no shower. Downstairs, at the back of the kitchen (very French) there was a loo and shower - and a wonderfully hot towel rail. It also had a mouse. We sang as we entered, to give it time to vamoose.

Our bedroom door had warped, so that closing it required either great effort or a loud slam. After winning a prize for the loudest door-slam-in-the-middle-of-the-night I made Mr B get up and shut the door quietly after a 2am expedition. He wasn't very pleased. But we had to shut the door because of the strange smell which emanated from the cellar and seemed to be related to the central heating.

And then there were the cockerels. One night, having eaten too much cheese (and croissant, and butter, to say nothing of the smoked eel and the rabbit with prunes and a goat's cheese salad at lunchtime) I was awake at 2am. And that is when the most thuggish cockerel decided to start. His raucous crowing went on till 7am, and I heard every last tonsil-tearing moment (do cockerels have tonsils?) Several inebriated plans were hatched to do away with these birds, but they live still, as does their less noisy but still irritating friend along the road.

Seriously, though, Snowden House in Longueval was great. The atmosphere was terrific and we loved it - especially the night we lit the log fire and the candles and sat talking for hours. The wisteria at the back door was in full bloom, and in the garden to the front there was an extraordinary pile of shell cases and lead shot, just sitting there. We were ten minutes' walk from Delville Wood, and at the crossroads there was a new Pipers' Memorial - stark reminders of the hellish battle that was fought just up the road. Somehow this mix of the lovely and the awful seemed just right for the trip we were part of.

On another note: I did in fact write a poem when we were there, but it's not going to appear for a bit. I'll flag it up when I'm ready.

Songs and Sacrifice

Cross of Sacrifice
Originally uploaded by goforchris.

I find myself almost unable to start blogging about the Somme trip which has just ended. The emotions roused by contemplating the sheer numbers of dead, the ubiquity of the cemeteries - these contrast with memories of laughter, company and singing and my first reaction is to feel discomfiture. Where do I start? And then I reflect that the men who went into battle and died in their thousands sang those self-same songs, and that they enjoyed each other's company and laughed at the daft jokes of their pals, and I think: just start.

So this is where I begin, with the things which hit me first. The songs, for example. When I printed out the guide to the trip, complete with WW1 song words, I thought I'd never sing along on the bus. I couldn't imagine doing anything at once so naive and so insensitive. But I was wrong. For after walking through the rows of graves - the photo is of the first we saw, near Ypres - and travelling by coach through the map of the Western Front, it seemed somehow fitting to sing, to recall how the soldiers would keep their spirits up. And we raised the roof, that first night in the village of Longueval where ten of us were billeted.

That first evening, after dinner, four of us walked up the road to Delville Wood cemetery. The sun was setting, red behind the dark trees, and it became harder to read the inscriptions on the stones. But one of them caught my eye. Private G.A. Pain of the London Regiment, Royal Fusiliers, was 16 years old when he died on 19 September, 1916. He would be sitting his Highers right now - or maybe just his Standard Grades. He died in a battle for the wood which is described as one of the most hellish on the Somme, and I couldn't begin to imagine what reserves of courage he called on. Maybe he didn't. Maybe he simply realised that, once there, there was nothing else to do but go with his mates and last as long as he could.

It was dark by the time we walked back to the billet - and that seemed right.

The Gordons' Dump

In the past two days we've visited so many sites on the Somme battlefield that my soul is saturated with sacrifice and words are inadequate. We have placed crosses on the edge of a huge mine crater and found the graves of men whose names we know. This scene is typical of all we journey through; in the middle distance you can see the small crescent of graves at Gordons' Dump, once an ammunition dump and now the grave of Gordon Highlanders who died nearby.

At the billet

An unlikely company has assembled on the Front Line close to Delville Wood, on the Somme. We're about to go foraging for dinner, but meanwhile the sun is still warm and the scent from the wisteria is intoxicating. A la prochaine!

Passionate pedants

A wee discussion on pedantry vs passion almost got going t'other day but was stifled by circumstances. I'm frequently accused of pedantry in language, though my dear ami Fr Kenny enjoyed coming the pedant over my choice of the phrase 'a big ask' in a recent public utterance of mine. But in a way that moment illustrated something. Both the reverend father and myself knew what we were about in that moment, and that was right and proper in two educated people. Both of us are perfectly capable of linguistic accuracy, and both of us enjoy the humour (to us, anyway) of straying from the path.

As an English teacher it's been my job to be accurate, to be a role model for my students and to correct their errors - to reassure them that once they knew when to use "I" and when "me" they should stick to it even if their parents tried to correct them. (This has happened - several times.) I've also been able to show them how it's fine to begin a sentence with "But" if they know why their early Primary teachers told them not to. So you could say that my passion* is for the pedantry that ensures accurate English, and for the clarity of expression that accuracy can bring. Someone else might have a passion for singing in tune - and might be accused of being over-pernickity for insisting on it.

I just hope the next doctor I really need is keen on accuracy too ...

*Actually I have several passions. We'll not go into that, shall we?

Dog Whisperer in Argyll

It’s official. I am a secret Dog Whisperer. I was reading in yesterday’s Guardian about the Dog Whisperer beloved of Sky watchers and owners of troublesome pooches – Cesar Millan, who has made his fortune changing the behaviour of dogs who drive their owners nuts. And there they were: his Top Training Tips.

A brief summary will give you an idea. You begin with no touch, no talk, no eye-contact with the dog. This, apparently, honours the canine way of getting acquainted.
[I never look at dogs. I pretend they're not there. Even ones I know well]

You mustn’t begin a relationship looking for a soulmate. Apparently this shows if you give the animal a name too soon.
[That's easy. I would never own a dog, so other people have to call them names. I like human soulmates, myself]

You mustn’t attempt to humanise the dog. It’s a dog. It won’t listen to you.
[Golly, do they listen to me. I just say "no" and they listen. Great]

Doggy fulfilment is based on exercise, discipline and affection – in that order. Too many dog owners feel that if they practise the authority figure bit then their dog won’t love them. This, apparently, is all wrong.
[The dogs I practise my skills on with greatest regularity appear to love me, despite my best efforts. I hadn't read this stuff when I met them]

You shouldn’t approach a dog on first meeting. You wait. Apparently this makes the dog respect and trust you.
[I never, ever make up to a dog. It's a pity they're not human, as they don't reciprocate]

You mustn’t talk up a walk before you go. The walk is, apparently, about bonding and creating a pack experience, not going to Disneyland.
[And did you know that dogs can understand spelling? Even W-A-L-K sends them into paroxysms of awfulness]

So there you are. I've been a dog training expert for years and not known it. But you know, it does work, all this stuff. Mrs H's dogs charge to the door, barking madly, see it's me and skid to a halt. They never, ever jump up on me. I just need to work out how to get them to avoid me altogether when we're indoors ... Anyone?

Sine qua non?

It’s interesting, in the wake of Ewan’s visit to S3 pupils at his old school, to consider what attributes are most desirable in different areas of work. For some professions/jobs/careers/vocations – take your pick – there are, of course, ‘givens’, like being literate if you think you might want to teach English - though I used to cringe when fellow English teachers mixed up their subjects and objects in a sentence involving personal pronouns. To say nothing of these careful souls who, hopelessly muddled as to why they are doing it, say “whomever” regardless of grammar simply because, I suppose, so few people ever get it right that they choose the harder option in a sort of blind faith.

And that brings me neatly to other apparently obvious attributes, for one would expect anyone going for ordination to the ministry/priesthood to have faith. Wouldn’t one? But what else besides? Education? Leadership qualities? Empathy? What other attributes make for an outstanding pastor – or even a good one? Are there particular qualities without which a ministry will fail? And is that something that can be said of other callings, such as teaching?

I suspect there are actually several answers to the above, but I’d love to hear what others think. There might even be a resurgence of the Mars Bars prize…

Not waving but drowning

Regular visitors to this blog must be wondering if I've gone off. You may very well be correct in that supposition, but the truth is that since the Cursillo weekend I've been too exhausted/busy/preoccupied to do anything but do all the things I have to and stagger to bed. Today, for instance, I've been assisting in a flitting - all these boxes! - and earlier in the week I was too busy dealing with the fallout from a bit of thoughtlessness to be writing about it.

But I shall return - and there's surely a post from all this experience. Meanwhile bed seems very inviting ....

Mission accomplished

We survived. Don't be fooled by the excellent, jolly cake, supplied by Black's of Dunoon - all the food was of the highest quality and nothing like survival rations - but the experience of serving on team at a Cursillo weekend is not one you can repeat too often, and one which provides an example of the sheer stamina and determination of a bunch of people in late middle age who might be expected to sit around over the weekend, enjoying the Spring sunshine and congratulating themselves on not having to work any more. But goodness, do you pay for it!

And was it a success, this weekend? I think so, for the majority of the participants. It's not actually possible to evaluate the experience immediately. Some people can find the effect of the weekend overwhelming and need time to reflect. Others are overjoyed by what they find and can't wait to serve on team themselves, to fill in the other side of the experience. And still others feel distanced, alienated even, from what happens in the course of the weekend, only to show in their subsequent lives that something has changed. I know that we had participants who fall into the first two categories, and only time will show if we had the third.

But through the total exhaustion that engulfs team members - usually when they are halfway home and feel a bit as if they've been let out of prison - one thing stands out as the reward. For if only one participant tells you, maybe in a quiet, personal moment, that they have had a wonderful time, or been helped to cope with the difficulties of their ordinary life by the support they have received over the weekend, then it is all worth it. Every last, aching, sleep-deprived moment of it.

And that happened on weekend #57.

Cursillo weekend

The car is packed. There is room for only two people, and the back seats are folded away. The curious might assume we were going on a camping trip, but in fact we're off to Millport, to a Cursillo weekend at The College. The contents of the car are, in microcosm, a good representation of the kind of planning and detail that goes into these weekends: only one small suitcase each for our own possessions, with the rest of the space going to everything from tartan tablecloths (carefully ironed) to piles of music. For we are serving on team, and self becomes very much the afterthought as we strive to make everything flow smoothly for the participants.

And when it's all over we'll be exhausted. I know that now. In fact, just thinking about all we have to do before then makes me tired now. But I know that once the participants arrive, once the team is really working hard, there won't be a moment to feel tired, or daunted, and that on past form we'll probably find ourselves surprised once more by the joy that took us there in the first place. Here we go ...

Calling all ostriches

Sometimes I'm struck forcibly by the choice we make in deciding whether or not to watch/read/listen to the news. Today I read in some detail of the resurgence of Nazism in Austria, in a piece accompanied by the photos of ancient Nazis in bits of wartime uniform celebrating Hitler's birthday. And this evening I watched President Ahmadinejad of Iran denounce Israel as a racist state, and heard the comment that the situation between Iran and the West could become "very serious indeed".

Suppose I had simply read a book at lunchtime, had watched something else or - just as likely - fallen asleep in front of the telly this evening? I would not have any of these stories to ponder, not have anything to trouble my sleep other than the organisation of the imminent Cursillo weekend. And yet it is possible that I am more concerned about the latter right now, simply because I can do something about it - in fact, I have to do something about it tomorrow.

Back in the '80s, my desire to do something about the presence of nuclear weapons on my doorstep got me into all sorts of bother. At the time, I wondered at the ostrich mentality of many of the people I doorstepped for CND. As I become older, it's easier in a way to stick my head in the sand of unknowing - until I think about my grandchildren. And I begin to wonder what might yet lie ahead.

Maybe I'd better just read that book ...

Nectar in a tin

I'm indebted to Neil for reminding me of the drink that was the mainstay of my childhood. Creamola Foam must have been a cheap alternative to the red cola and fizzy orange that appeared at parties and on holiday visits to cafés, but my main memory of drinking it is very clear - so clear that I can taste it now - and strongly linked to one place. That place is on Arran, at a point in North Glen Sannox (not to be confused with Glen Sannox, but a less-well-known glen slightly to the north) where huge slabs of pale grey granite jut out into the very middle of the North Sannox burn. This is still one of my favourite places on earth, and will forever be associated with what would be a typical 1950s picnic: Macvitas, triangles of Dairylea cheese, floury muffins with strawberry jam, slightly flattened from their sojurn in a rucksack - and Creamola Foam, preferably orange flavour, made in a plastic tumbler with water scooped precariously from the burn.

This was Creamola Foam at its best, and it's easy to see why it was a winner for whoever was carrying the drinks: a small tin and a spoon make for much less of a load than a bottle of diluted squash. Perhaps the location explains why I recall it with such fondness, for I am now convinced that in my childhood we never drank anything like enough water and at the end of a muddy walk we'd be parched with a thirst that made this chemical concoction into nectar.

To the best of my recollection, we never bought this stuff for my own kids - though I'm open to correction if they ever read this - because I have a feeling I tasted it in later life and realised my tastes had moved on. Just as well, really - it doesn't seem to exist these days.

Update: Neil assures me I did indeed buy it for him - he wouldn't have mentioned it otherwise.

Talking with the gardener

Is he real? and can I trust
the joy which sears across my soul
with such delicious pain?
The light is white, a curtain sparkling
so that I can barely look, can
hardly see the face I love.
Am I remembering? But the voice
which said my name – my given name –
it is the same, the cadences
which bring my heart to song each time.
My tears still well, the picture flows
and changes as the light refracts
– why do I weep? He asked me that
and yet I cannot bear to say
that what is joy for all the rest
is not enough without the touch
which now I know I cannot have.
I would not have run, that night
of horror when the others fled –
not while he still breathed and stood
and spoke and suffered with that kiss
which I could never give.
So what is real? Is this enough
to share with joy and tell the world
that death can have no final word?
I cannot say. I need to hold,
to smile, to talk, to love, to be –
the shadow moves. The joy recedes
becomes more patient, calmer now
and I, alone among the trees
must share my moment with the rest
and know it is no longer mine.
But I was here. I loved. I lost.

©C.M.M.

Good Friday reflection

PASSION

Does it feel real? Crouching
in the evening chill while
leaves overhead silver in the breeze
I struggle for wakefulness
even in this cold. He is not asleep
but staring in the dark closes the eyes
on my blank mind. A sudden cough
startles but the numbness returns.
A lone insect whirrs and in the city
a child calls for its mother
as the feet stir the dead leaves
and the torches come
and the kiss betrays. Lord,
I whisper, I should have watched.

Is it real? The weight of wood
is real enough, but my bearing it
seems beyond bearing and cannot be.
The slow steps seem not mine,
but made by someone
I cannot bear to inhabit. The nails
oh the nails
hotly sliding through the jolt
the hammer makes
in my body in my body
in my body in my body
two strokes each
the strokes of an expert -
it is done. Up, up – lifted up and over
the heads of the crowd I see
the city in the noon light and know
this eternity will not last long
but is it real?

It is finished. Is it
accomplished? Your words, Lord.
The emptiness is there still
as the untimely darkness covers
my failure to attend. The cross still
stands, but empty now. Empty.

©C.M.M.

Gethsemane

Altar of repose
Originally uploaded by goforchris.

Midnight. The church is quiet, dark. The sacrament is gone from the altar of repose, and shortly the candles will be extinguished, though already it feels as if the light has left Gethsemane. It is cold. The disciples have fled in disarray, and the night moves towards the new day.

The watch is over.

Not rolling stones then

It is the Wednesday of Holy Week. The day before Maundy Thursday, when for the hours before midnight the sacrament will rest on an altar decorated with moss and tiny trees and candles, many candles. But today it is only Wednesday, and two women are to be seen heading up the hill opposite the gates to Benmore Gardens. They are accompanied by two rampant spaniels, and their pockets bulge strangely.

Some way up the hill, they pass a fallen tree and come to an abrupt stop, exclaiming in delight. The tree is draped with curtains of moss, and it is this which has caught their attention. Moments later, they have produced plastic carrier bags from their bulging pockets and filled two of them with the moss. They then continue uphill. Later, they can be seen scrambling precariously up a steep bank to reach some particularly succulent sphagnum. It seems to matter little that they are not in their first youth, nor that they are rapidly becoming somewhat dishevelled. They press on, each now burdened with two bags. They are laughing as they speculate what any passer-by might think. Escaped lunatics? Eccentric campers with their shopping? But in all the years in which they have done this, they have never met a soul. No-one has ever had to wonder.

This day, however, is graced by fleeting sun. It is, after all, April. The schools are on holiday, and there are trippers in the land. People who have come to Cowal to walk the forest paths, in these straitened times, rather than flee to the Canaries. And so it is that a host of such travellers appears on the path. The first four pass quickly, perhaps because they have dogs who may become entangled with the rampant spaniels. But the remaining two greet the women… pause …and then it comes.

“What have you got in the bags?”
“We thought it might be shopping.”

And they laugh. And so Mrs Heathbank and Mrs Blethers – for our mad women are indeed the writer of this blog and her pal - have to come clean, for the first time in ten years. And the great thing is that it is a joyous moment, that the strangers think it sounds a wonderful thing, that they regret that they are only visiting for the day. We tell them that they are the first people ever to ask about the bags of moss, and the woman tells us:
“Don’t mind me – I’m just a nosey bitch.” And then she gives us a hug, for good measure, and we part as if we had known each other for years.

A good day, I think.

I wonder slightly about the change in person at the end of this account, but it doesn't work if I keep it in 3rd person. Purists can save their comments for another time...

Out of the deep?

A quick post to show I'm still alive, as I set off in the rain for Cumbrae and Choral Evensong, for which we haven't yet begun to practise. Practise as a group, that is, for I've just been singing through my own alto parts with Mr B playing/singing bass. And the joy is that as we ran through Boyce's All the ends of the World I could hear in my head the wonderful suspensions, the resolved crunching moments in my own part, and felt that perhaps after all I was entering into my own Holy Week. And then there is the psalm - Out of the Deep - to that great dark setting by Walford Davies. I can't wait.

And yet I can't help reflecting how that whole week, as Jesus headed towards what he knew was to come, ordinary people were busily doing their thing all around him. Maybe the disciples felt stressed by the crowds, the fuss, the carry-on in the Temple, the approaching Passover. Busy, busy, busy. Just like the rest of us. But today I shall switch my life off and concentrate. Just got to travel there first.

To see the object

There's a poem over on frankenstina which I wrote a while ago while thinking about a friend who had died. However, it seems to have become as much a meditation on faith, for that is how it communicated with several people who were unaware of the original stimulus.

An interesting exercise in "seeing the object as in itself it really is": my first essay in Ordinary English at University dealt with the necessity of considering only the text and not muddying the waters with background information. I don't think I wrote a very good essay ...