Reverie about life

I have just read a review of a new play in London based on the life of Jacqueline du Prey, the greatly gifted cellist who was struck down with MS at a young age.  

The play asks the central question:  how do you live when what you are living for is taken away?  The question has been haunting me all day, because it seems to be a question so many of us must ask.  And in some stumbling way, answer.

Sometimes the question is stark and violent – the parents whose child is abducted or lost or stricken down;  the gifted athlete paralyzed by a freak accident;  the Vietnamese refugee medical doctor I met once in New York working as the school janitor.

Often the question is more commonplace.  Sometimes a couple must decide which of them will pursue his or her career.  Sometimes it is a divorce, or the unexpected responsibility of aging parents or personal illness that change forever ones life’s goals.  

Most often, I think, the question is posed by old age.  Some people are angry when they are forced from the work they love and think they can still do.  Some people  wonder why they are still alive when no one needs them, and they have nothing to contribute that anyone wants.

How do you live when what you are living for is taken away?

The people who learn how to answer that seem to me to be very wise.  To understand that life is a value sometime beyond anything we ourselves contribute to it, beyond what we accomplish, beyond even our generosity or kindness or any virtue.

After the above, readers of this blog may be relieved that I will be away from my computer for the next three weeks.  

It runs deep

We were in a bookstore in Cambridge this morning where I saw a series of children’s books on display titled “Mr. Men and Little Miss.”  I found this mildly annoying as I wondered if this kind of thing was not frowned on in one of the great educational centres of the Western world how women would ever be respected as equals.  Or even learn to respect themselves as equally intelligent and responsible adults.

Then I opened the Sunday papers.   There are reports that the Taliban have been responsible for poisoning the girls in at least three different schools in northern Afghanistan.

It does put things in perspective.

Survival technique

I was discussing some of the more preposterous expense claims some of the MPs have submitted with a friend today.  In their wonderfully dry English way, commentators and comedians are already saying some devastatingly funny things.

We were relating various anecdotes to each other, when D said “well, all joking aside…”  And then he broke off and said “Wouldn’t that be awful?  no joking allowed.  We would never have made it through the war.”

Parliamentary convulsions

I doubt it is making the front pages or top of the news in the U.S., but here in England, Parliament is convulsed with quite possibly the most wide-spread scandal it’s faced in centuries.

This may be hard for the American mind to comprehend, because the individual sums of money involved are relatively small.  I say relatively, although sums between perhaps $5000 and $500,000 are not personally small.  But to discover that a great number of  U.S. Congressmen had fiddled their expenses to the tune of $100,000 would probably not threaten to unseat the government.

Over here it is.

It started some years ago when Parliamentary members thought that they should have a pay increase but that the electorate would not tolerate it.  So they instituted a lavish and covert expense system, whereby MPs (that is, Members of Parliament) could claim tax-free living expenses for a second mortgage, property tax, food, household furnishing and services, taxis, restaurants.  The list of possibilities seems to be limited only by the imagination of MPs, which, in this case, did not appear to be limited by anything.  One MP even claimed for the cleaning of his moat.  (Yes, a moat is that medieval body of water surrounding a castle or manor house to protect it from marauding attackers.)

About a week ago a national newspaper got hold of all the expense claims that have been submitted by every MP in the last five years.  They have been publishing them in a kind of water torture every day since Sunday, and they aren’t finished.  

After the scandal of the bankers’ bonuses paid from money provided by the taxpayer to keep the banks from facing bankruptcy, and with 2.5 million people presently unemployed,  the general public has exploded with a fury that even experienced journalists say they have never seen in their lives.  MPs are paying thousands of dollars back, but people are not satisfied.  The police are investigating whether there is any actual criminal fraud, and the tax authorities are inquiring whether any tax fraud has been perpetrated.  They say it’s so bad that some MPs are on suicide watch, though this might be an exaggeration.

Several MPs have been suspended, and party leaders are scrambling to convince the public that their party is getting a hold.  The Tories have agreed to post every expense claim made from today on-line the day it is submitted.

Nobody thinks it’s over.  We’re watching the news as live entertainment.

A bit of holy history

When the United States purchased Louisiana in 1801, the residents predominantly spoke French and were often Catholic.  American firms, seeing an opportunity, began to send shipments of statues of various saints to New Orleans.  Because they were breakable, the packages were often  labelled “Fragile,” and “Expedite.”

But the people didn’t understand English, and concluded that “Fragile” and “Expedite” were the names of the saints contained in those particular shipments.

I’ve never been introduced to “St. Fragile,” but I heard yesterday that someone had recently posted a thanksgiving prayer to “St. Expedite” for answering her request.

I’m not sure though.  If either of these saints were as popular as they claim, I would expect children to be named “Fragile” and “Expedite”.  Do you know anyone by either of those names?  I know I don’t.

Well, not seriously.  Not like the name you get at the baptismal font, as compared to what your mother says when she’s telling you for the fifth time to pick up your toys.

All the best places in Singapore

Publishing a book as an academic compared to writing as an independent individual are two completely different processes.  I know because I’ve done both.

The book I enjoyed writing most, by far, is the one I finished two years ago, The Big Bang to Now.  I wrote it because it was a topic I wanted to research, not because I was an expert in the field.  But when I was ready to publish it, I was in for a surprise.

As an academic, publishers were always knocking on my door.  Getting a contract took barely more than a nod of assent.  But authors writing for the general public aren’t just expected to write something publishable.  They are expected to market them.  In fact, along with any book proposal, publishers expect a full marketing plan.  I strongly suspect that the latter is more important in the final decision than the former.

I am not naturally given to effective marketing.  I don’t enjoy doing it, and my husband would enjoy my slogging around to book fares and book stores even less.  Besides I live in England, which makes marketing in the U.S. fairly challenging.  So although I have given talks on my book, I haven’t made a lot of effort to increase sales.  Except on the internet, where I have a website, and maintain a supporting blog to accompany it.

So it was with some delight and great surprise that I learned that the Singapore Library has a copy of my book on its shelves.  

The library is on Nan Yang Avenue, and the book is on Level 4 of the library.   Should you ever be visiting Singapore.

Royal Greetings Refried

Every year Queen Elizabeth II sends a birthday card to each of her subjects (which is what citizens are called in a country that has a King or Queen) who are 100 or older.

One woman, however, who is now 109, wrote to the Queen complaining about the cards she’d been receiving in recent years.  She wasn’t complaining that the card always had a picture of the Queen.  But she did object to the fact that for the last seven years she’d been wearing exactly the same yellow dress.

So the Queen sent Prince William (that’s Diana’s and Charles’ eldest who is in line for the throne after his father, currently Prince Charles) to the rest home where the woman lives to visit her today.

Among other things, he promised her that his grandmother would wear a different dress for the photo that’s on the birthday card she receives when she’s 110 in November.

Only in England.

Flushed with success

My post yesterday was concerned with existential angst over whether I would be happier than I am now if I won the lottery jackpot.  Apart from the fact that the infinitesimal likelihood of winning a big lottery draw is made even smaller in my case since I do not buy lottery tickets, I want to restore my credentials for practicality.  Hence, the following toilet issues.

Ten days ago one of the toilets in our house would not stop running.  I understand the basic idea of how toilets work, but this one completely fluxomed me, and in the end, I stopped the constant run of water by tying up the float with an old shoe lace.  Today the plumber arrived.  Given its ten day rest, the toilet worked perfectly on the first flush.  And the second and third and fourth…

Under the circumstances I felt I should give the plumber some sense that he was needed nonetheless and I asked him if he was acquainted with the new sink/toilet arrangements where the grey water in the sink runs automatically into the toilet tank, thus saving water.

He hasn’t installed one yet.  He did say he’d read that one of England’s water companies is setting up a project to convert sewage sludge into pellet fuel power plants.  They are already using sewage gas to run 53 of their power generation units.

Apparently it’s been done before.  In the 1930’s, sewage gas powered the public transport systems in several German cities, including Munich.

Given all the ingenious ways people have thought of producing or saving energy and water, wouldn’t you think we could solve this global warming and pollution problem with a little more alacrity than we’ve show thus far?

But then, sometimes the old ways work best…

Is there something I’m not telling myself?

I read a research report today which found that if people have enough money to take care of their family’s basic needs plus about $20,000 for additional non-essentials, getting more money doesn’t make people happier.  So basically, a little more money makes people happier, but a lot more money doesn’t.

Okay, I buy that.  I’ve made big decisions in my life that put money into second place instead of first, and I don’t regret them.  On the contrary.  And I have enough money for the basics plus enough to do or buy most of the things I really want.  In any case, there aren’t any gaping holes that I desperately want money to fill.

And as I look around, it looks to me as if getting money is more often than not destructive of a person’s relationships, sometimes of their talents, and closes out opportunities and enjoyment that people who are spending less time and effort in pursuit of money take for granted. 

So why do I think it would be so exciting to win the lottery or some other fortuitous source of some fantastic amount of money?  Do I seriously think I’d be happier?

Seriously:  No.

Asparagus patch

Admitting to not growing vegetables is close to an unpatriotic statement here in England.  Perhaps it goes back to the war when every square foot was planted with something to eat.  I think even people who are too young to actually remember the war have a reverence for growing things.  People who live in apartments often grow a pot of salad greens on a window sill, and thousands of people have what they call allotments.  

Allotments are usually rows of patches of earth each with a small shed for keeping gardening tools, and which sometimes have been cultivated for as long as the eye can see.  We have a neighbour who is so committed to growing his own food that along with his personal vegetable patch on his own land, he also leases an allotment from the village authorities.

Personally I don’t like to garden very much.  I’d much rather clean, although what I mean by cleaning is usually closer to organizing things than actually cleaning them.

But I do find eating an enjoyable activity, and it seems only fair that I should make some contribution to the vegetables that grow in our garden and eventually make it onto our plates.  

Last month, Peter ordered 24 asparagus plants to be delivered by post.  I was enthusiastically supportive not only because I like asparagus but because the ad said that once the plants got started, they would produce for as long as 20 years.  It was an act of faith because there is a two-year wait after planting before one can pick the first crop.  But I thought you only plant them once every twenty years and at that rate, I was unlikely to be around to have to plant them a second time.

I was wrong.  Yesterday in the post another box of asparagus plants arrived with a note of apology from the producer saying that they were sending us new stock because one third of original stock we had received was inferior.

We had noticed this, but I was willing to ignore the evidence.  Planting asparagus requires digging a trend about a foot deep and a foot wide, planting the root, and then gradually building the soil up around it as the tip appears.  Once every twenty years seemed enough work.  Now we were being told to do it again after a mere four weeks.

Cambridgeshire is one of the asparagus-growing capitals of the world.  Road signs are even now appearing inviting you to “pick your own.”  The supermarket, however, is selling bunches at outrageous prices with little tags that say “grown in Peru.”

So this morning I dug out the trench and planted 8 more asparagus plants.  Check in again in 2011 to find out if we’re eating it yet.