Man's Search For Meaning

Celebrated Austrian psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl, was born on March 26, 1905 and remains best-known for his uplifting 1946 psychological memoir “Man’s Search for Meaning”— a meditation on what the gruesome experience of Auschwitz taught him about the primary purpose of life: the quest for meaning.  His wife died in the camp and he endured the unimaginable but managed somehow to convey magical moments in the midst of pain and loss that speak to the heart. 

Where can you run to?

With whom can you take refuge?

To whom will you look?

What country shall you live in?

In what direction shall you go?

At what hour shall you find rest?

What will become of you in the end?

To what will you be faithful?

If you find the truth will you be obedient to it?

“Woe to him who saw no more sense in his life, no aim, no purpose, and therefore no point in carrying on. He was soon lost. The typical reply with which such a man rejected all encouraging arguments was, “I have nothing to expect from life any more.” What sort of answer can one give to that?

What was really needed was a fundamental change in our attitude toward life. We had to learn ourselves and, furthermore, we had to teach the despairing men, that it did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life — daily and hourly. Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual.”

Viktor Frankl

If the fire of the love of God is ignited in your heart

You would neither rest nor relax,

Nor be distracted or held back from divine nearness, sanctity and beauty.

Your longing soul would weep as one bereaved

Longing to determine the truth you would find no peace

Until, God lays bare the divine path before you.

“We were at work in a trench. The dawn was grey around us; grey was the sky above; grey the snow in the pale light of dawn; grey the rags in which my fellow prisoners were clad, and grey their faces. I was again conversing silently with my wife, or perhaps I was struggling to find the reason for my sufferings, my slow dying. In a last violent protest against the hopelessness of imminent death, I sensed my spirit piercing through the enveloping gloom. I felt it transcend that hopeless, meaningless world, and from somewhere I heard a victorious “Yes” in answer to my question of the existence of an ultimate purpose. At that moment a light was lit in a distant farmhouse, which stood on the horizon as if painted there, in the midst of the miserable grey of a dawning morning in Bavaria. 

“The light shineth in the darkness.”

For hours I stood hacking at the icy ground. The guard passed by, insulting me, and once again I communed with my beloved. More and more I felt that she was present, that she was with me; I had the feeling that I was able to touch her, able to stretch out my hand and grasp hers. The feeling was very strong: she was there. Then, at that very moment, a bird flew down silently and perched just in front of me, on the heap of soil which I had dug up from the ditch, and looked steadily at me.”

Viktor Frankl

PS Words in itallics are paraphrased from the Baha'i Writings

Heroes and Kittens

Was down town trying to keep up with my mother.  She sets a blistering pace with daily tasks to be achieved and an attitude to life that is productivity focussed.  Gardens, houses, clothes, bathrooms, cupboards, carpets, bills, financial papers read, letters to be written etc.  Boredom is not something she has ever experienced.  That is probably why she refuses to wait for anyone or anything.  Abundant with all sorts of virtues patience is not one of them.  Her name Emily means industrious and by name and nature she epitomises that word. 

So when I hear a small kitten crying I have to quickly draw her attention before she is miles ahead of me on the pavement.  Stopping, we both listen attentively – nothing but the normal traffic noises around us.  But when I make that wishwish sound, one does to cats, the kitten cries again loudly in response.  The sound is coming from under the bonnet of a red Fiesta parked with a disabled sticker on its window.  Tentatively approaching the vehicle we hear the piteous cry again.  It is definitely coming from under the bonnet of the empty car.  We peer under wheel arches, crouch down to look under the car but see nothing. 

A couple of ladies join us listening intently and, in response to the tiny fur balls squeals, agree that it “is a kitten stuck somewhere in the engine”.  Into this now growing crowd of well-wishers comes more people including the owner of the car.  She hands over her car keys, so one chap could pop the bonnet.  With that achieved most of us lean over the engine and peer into the innards of the car.  There deep down under spark plugs and hoses etc is a tiny fluffy kitten howling its distress and looking up hopefully at us.  First the man and then each of us tries to reach down past cables to pull the kitten us but to no avail. 

One stranger goes into a nearby supermarket and returns with a box of dried cat food to try and entice the kitten down to the ground from the engine frame.  This does not work and by now the crowd on the pavement and road has grown to a critical mass.  People are now flocking to the scene because there is a sufficient number of people to cause curious stares and interest.  All have their own ideas to share, “Shall I call the police?” “Whose is it?”, “There is a garage down the road!”, “How long has it been in there?”  Every newcomer is rapidly filled in by those in the know and all the while the piteous cry of the kitten urges action on us all. 

A tiny thin girl appears from the supermarket in her blue uniform with tattoos down each arm.  She leans forward and her matchstick arm does the impossible, she reaches down through the tiny convoluted spaces and pulls out the frightened kitten.  We are all relieved that a rescue has been engineered.  I look around at all the well-meaning faces and know that these people are those who could not walk past without expressing concern and taking action to help.  So many good souls on a pavement ridiculously pleased that with all the pain and loss in this world, a tiny furry kitten has been saved at least.  I suddenly wanted to celebrate the inherent unspoken goodness of all these strangers and savour this moment but my Mum is off.  No time to stand and stare, there are things to do, no wasting time she is off, an unstoppable force and I race to keep up.

End of Days Scenario

I remember having an “End of Days” conversation with my brother.  I studied physics and he Biology.  Naturally, I reckoned that it would be due to nuclear detonation leading to catastrophic loss of life as we know it.  

He was of the opinion that some pandemic, biological in nature, was by far the more deadly and more likely culprit for wiping out huge sections of the population.  

You may be dismissive but Chernobyl had just happened and I felt pretty secure in my argument.  In addition, The New Scientist of 6^th July 2013 provided worrisome evidence that the earth itself has made its own nuclear reactors 2 billion years ago.  While mining in the Oklo area of Gabon (West Africa) for uranium the French alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission discovered evidence of 16 natural fossil reactors between 1.5 and 10 metres across. These, it is thought, ran on and off for a few hundred thousand years until they exhausted their supply of uranium. Strangely disturbing that the earth could create its own nuclear reactors isn't it?

Meanwhile, my brother could counter with the 1918 flu pandemic (January 1918 – December 1920), which was an unusually deadly influenza pandemic, involving the H1N1 influenza virus.  Sounds worryingly familiar today doesn't it?  It infected 500 million people across the world and killed 50 to 100 million of them—3 to 5 percent of the world's population at the time. 

Because it involved the immune system response, this pandemic targeted not those with weak immune systems, like the very young and very old, but instead the fittest and most vital of the world’s population.  In my Grandmother’s home they lost two young men of the twelve in that family within a week of each other.  I can remember my father saying that he was told they had to carry the coffin of one son through the bedroom of the dying second son.  These horrors do lodge in the mind, they happened once already and who is to say they may not happen again? 

My third brother who is a professor of  psychology was silent during our “End of Days” debate.  It is rather perturbing then to discover that  about one million people die annually from suicide according to the World Health Organisation.  In fact rates of suicide have increased by 60% in the last 45 years.   It would be terrible indeed if the “End of Days” was neither due to biology or physics but took the form of a growing cull taking place silently in our midst each year.  Now, that is scary!

In the fog of change, you kind of lose stuff

When did it become so tricky to be a parent?

Somewhere after they hit adolescence

But before they gain independence

There’s a rough, rough patch

When they do all the wrong things

When you react in all the wrong ways

In the fog of change, you kind of lose stuff

Lose sight of how much they mean to you

Because you are so scared of all that’s out there

You question your parenting performance big time

Almost as much as your offspring do, but not quite

Bewildered at the pace of change you see in them

Blinded by a life time of holding this responsibility

Reluctant to let go of this precious trust

Shaken by their demands for freedom

But knowing that you have no choice to hold on

When does it become tricky to be a parent?

When they no longer need you to be around

But want you to see, they are transforming

And to embrace with joy what they have become.

The beauty of this world depends on your flourishing

Am really loving being in Balymoney with my Mum.  One enters a bubble universe in which the garden is the centre of everything.  Garden centres become havens of flowers and soil, which are then replanted in bigger pots, or shady spots perfect for their growth.  My mother is frustrated at how pot bound plants from the garden centre are, roots entangled and repeatedly shows me a victim, tangled roots almost bare of soil as if demonstrating a torture victim for crimes against humanity. 

She takes these cramped life forms and frees them, water, fresh soil are lavished and then she monitors their progress.  Such kindness is only for a certain time. If, after all due care has been shown, a plant does not thrive she makes a call and they get short thrift.  The plants seem to sense they live on the line and put incredible effort into growth and petals. 

I myself have no interest in plant life and routinely kill everything that comes into my sphere.  Not deliberately but by total neglect – even watering.  But living in my Mum’s universe I begin to see the nurturing that is going on every day in a spiritual vein.  All is done to create growth to encourage progress and much effort expended to this end.  Combined with a rigorous monitoring and checking of leaves, soil for new shoots.  Infestations are fought tooth and nail, and minor discolouration of leaves is a major cause of concern.   Even tiny progress is celebrated and the previous wilting specimen that perks up is congratulated and smugly appreciated. 

I enter a world that is totally foreign to me but sense that these rules apply to all aspects of our own life on this planet.  Would that we daily examined ourselves for growth, new shoots, infection etc and were more aware of our soil  and the effect of environment  on the end product, us.  Learned from the day before what leads to the betterment of our soul or to its degradation.  Worked to make an environment for us all that calls out for achievement and excellence.  Consulting honesty on progress made or deterioration in our lives. Because nothing stays still in the garden of our hearts.  We grow and we die, that we cannot change.  But everything in between is up to us.  May this find you not pot bound, free of infestations and filled with the water of life.  The beauty of this world depends on your flourishing, I have no doubt of this.

A salve to their hurts

It was a drawing class and you were excited by your first nude.  The art college had arranged for a sitter and the entire class of art students were ready for this new challenge.  I remember being amused by your description of the reality of that first session.  Into the art room walked a large rumpled middle-aged woman whose flesh folded in creases, varicose veins in abundance, cellulite tricky to catch on paper, puckered like her upper lip.  What a shock you all had from the much-expected smooth pink stained cheek with velvet youthfulness on display.  A real lesson in drawing and in life that day, two hours of detailed depressing preview on aging for those just beginning their youth.

I have happy memories of you sitting on the carpet, leaning against your Dad’s knee as laughter ran out in the home in St Austell.  Family should be like this, I thought all the faces filled with smiles and huge gales of laughter.  More tales shared, music ever present and food, abundant tasty food.  Your Mum weaving everyone together with her smile, letters, visits and love.  Do you remember how she screamed in delight when a son or daughter appeared on the path outside the house.  Arms held wide open as if to greet and thank the universe at this magical spectacle. 

You moved to London and had two jobs.  Even this did not dampen your enthusiasm or serve to exhaust you.  Youthful energy drove you on and when you moved to Northern Ireland with a bunch of friends we delighted in your company.  Having you close by was a treat we took for granted.  Your generosity was constant and how many lovely meals did we have from your hand.  You bought my sons, toddlers, tiny cute judo outfits and they delighted in wrestling you to the ground.  Your home a designer’s dream of grey and chrome and the air full of fresh ideas, business ventures, painting and friends. 

Then your own kids arrived in abundance four bundles of love who gravitated to your side and I remember you lying on the floor covered in small toddlers and babies clinging joyously.  Jostling for the best position.  I watch as you have continued to draw people to you, kindness is such a rare commodity in this world.  So not surprising to find you, even now, years later with a large extended family of friends, neighbours and associates. Your home is fortunately large enough to accommodate all these people. 

I sense the load has grown as of late and the glow of kindness is still there but a price has been paid.  Is it ever so that gentle kindly souls are burdened beyond endurance?  I reckon all of us, on rare good days can cloak ourselves in the array of kindliness and goodwill.  Smiling benevolently at this world, wishing all in it well.  However, certain rare individuals seem to have kindness imprinted to their core, like a stick of rock.  Even when worn down, weary to the core they continue to impart love and service to those around them.  It is such a privilege to know such souls and they remind me of that high standard we should all aspire to.

“Should other peoples and nations be unfaithful to you, show fidelity unto them; should they be unjust towards you, show justice towards them; should they hold aloof from you, attract them to yourselves; should they disclose enmity, be friendly to them; should they poison your lives, sweeten their souls; should they inflict a wound upon you, be a salve to their hurts.”                                     

Baha'i Writings 

Raised Eyebrows and Demented in Dubai

Was in Dubai airport on route for South Africa this summer and, apart from finding Emirates Airways great for providing a plentiful supply of food in the plane,  I discovered that if you have a long lay over (mine was nine hours)  the airline also provides food vouchers.   I took advantage of the vouchers to eat my way through the long night hours at the airport.

 

After looking at all the expensive crap for sale at the airport I gradually grew tired of all this commercial excess. I discovered that in Dubai airport there are free showers in the ladies. Immediately, I hastened to a supermarket to buy toiletries and then spent probably two hours in the shower. Travelling makes you feel so grubby and this was the perfect way to renew body and spirit.

 

Refreshed, I then noticed a weird thing about women's eyebrows in the airport. It may have been tiredness, fatigue can make you see things in an odd way. After all, there is a reason they use sleep deprivation to torture and break people!  Women seemed to have done crazy stuff with their eyebrows here.  They look as if they have been shaven off and then drawn on again in ludicrous positions on their face.  It can be forgiven in the elderly, after all mistakes can happen but this seemed too common and widespread to be explained in terms of creeping senility.  No, this appears to be deliberate.  The eyebrows are square and horizontal as if underlying their brows or shaped like demented brackets over the eyes.

Perhaps this is thought of as an artful way to draw attention to a perceived asset?  The more I encountered the more it felt like every female in the airport had contrived to frighten a tired and sleep deprived Colette.  This was surely the way madness begins.

  

I can remember wandering the corridors of Dubai airport in the early hours finding each weird eyebrow feeling like a physical assault from zombie creatures.  I began to want to scream, “What the Hell is going on!”  Now, well rested and at home I can look back with vague amusement that it disturbed me so much.   

Thoughtful bits

I have no energy to write so I shall merely quote others!

"I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he alone among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance. The poet's, the writer's, duty is to write about these things. It is his privilege to help man endure by lifting his heart, by reminding him of the courage and honour and hope and pride and compassion and pity and sacrifice which have been the glory of his past. The poet's voice need not merely be the record of man, it can be one of the props, the pillars to help him endure and prevail."

William Faulkner: Nobel Prize Speech
Stockholm, Sweden
December 10, 1950

“Think about what you thought college would be like, and what you expected yourself to be like. Now look at yourself. I'm going to hazard a guess and say that things totally didn't turn out like you expected. This process will repeat itself ad nauseam throughout your entire life.” 

Adam Savage (Host: Mythbusters): Sarah Lawrence College, NY

“Remember that despair is never the solution. Remember, hatred is never an option. Remember that hope is not a gift given to us, hope is a gift that we give to others." 

Elie Wiesel

Lost in the Trees but grateful

I went to a talk on trees here in Malta this week.  It was interesting to hear and learn about what is happening here and to listen to people from Malta passionate about protecting their environment.  Inspiring to be surrounded by those who really care in a world where it seems so many don’t have time to.  Not, that the rest don’t care, it is just that everyone seems to have more than enough on their own plate as it is.  So I was delighted,  that the room was packed with over a hundred, all there to make their feelings for their environment clear. It was with reluctance I left, slightly early, to make my way home by bus.  Proceeded in the dark, to catch the wrong bus heading not to Sliema and home, but in exactly the opposite direction.    So after a 45-minute bus journey (it always amazes me that on a small island,  picture a square with a side of 12 km, journeys can last so long) the bus came to a halt in the darkness of an isolated village.  The bus driver turned the engine off and then turned to me in the empty bus and said in an exasperated tone,

“Where exactly do you want to go?”

I told him where I wanted to go and he told me that I was an hour from where I should be.  Despair must have filled my face because he was suddenly anxious to help.  I asked if there were taxis anywhere around and was even more disturbed to find that there were none at all.  This was a pickle, indeed. 

He started the engine of the empty bus and told me that he would take me to Rabat and there might be taxis available there.  I was shocked that he would go out of his way, bus and all to take me closer to home.  He dropped me off and I was able to catch another bus homewards.  By this stage, it was dark and the only other person on the bus was a Canadian woman.  We started talking and she turned out to be a financial advisor and photographer from Canada who works from her computer here in Malta for a firm abroad.  A lovely person and we exchanged mobile numbers before we parted.  As I waited for the final bus home another young Maltese teenager told me she was studying for her final exams, she wanted to be a chef.  It was sweet hearing her discuss her plans to have her own restaurant one day.  It is impressive how hopeful young people are and how passionate about their futures.  When you reach my age, finding the right bus home is enough of a major challenge for the day! 

But as I staggered up to my flat exhausted and falling asleep from the long day at work, I was suddenly grateful for it all.  Grateful for the many who came to the Tree meeting, thankful to the benevolent bus driver, happy to meet such warm and likable travellers on a cold lost night and aware that every moment of life is special.  Even the absolutely exhausting ones.

Proof of God in Chairs

It was a small gathering in our home of around a dozen people and the discussion for debate was the existence of God.  My youngest son had become bored with the whole tenor of the conversation and was finding it hard to control his temper.  It is a general rule, I’ve found when discussing religious subjects that if heated arguments develop it is not worth continuing as the outcomes rarely lead to enlightenment.  They usually end with a fall out of hurt and aggrieved feelings.  In my experience it is not wise to tell a friend that their nose is exceptionally large.  It will be taken as truly offensive not an objective assessment.  Worse still if you tell someone their child is misbehaving, they will rise to their loved one’s diffence and hate you for a lifetime.  But on a sliding Richter scale past personal slights, insults to their offspring comes challenging religious views.  These classify as 9.2 on the Richter scale of damage fall out.  Only the foolish, brave or stupid expose themselves to such danger zones. 

So it was with some concern I noted the rising voices and heated tones as the discussion developed.  Susan, a rather large lady was an agnostic and had been belittling the Christian and the Islamic Faiths with some fervour.  How could any sensible person believe such twaddle.  As most of the rest were religious people from a wide range of backgrounds, hackles were not surprisingly rising.  The small flat was packed every seat filled and we had brought in plastic garden chairs.      There is an advantage in uncomfortable seating, visitors are not likely to over stay their welcome.  The quiet Quaker gentleman to her left launched into a detailed metaphysical proof of the existence of God.  Halfway into his piece Susan leant over and sneered

“Who are we kidding here?”

My youngest son, Daniel had had enough.  There was no escape in this tiny flat from such challenges, he just had to endure what came and went.  There were no private spaces to withdraw to and obviously he’d passed his own personal limit of patience.  He asked Susan,

“Do you want me to prove to you the existence of God?”

Coming from an adolescent in obviously bored tones this silenced even the loud Susan.  But not for long she recovered quickly and extending her arm to him said, challengingly,

“The floor is yours!”

Frankly, I was more than a little concerned.  Daniel has many qualities but subtlety was not one of them and I knew we had entered dangerous waters with a rather articulate adolescent thrown in the mix.  He’d had enough of Susan dominating the evening and was determined to put on a good show.  Pushing himself out of the stool in the corner he walked to the middle of the room and looked at everyone around him soberly.  He then dramatically lay flat on his back on the floor and stared at the ceiling in silence.  There was an uncomfortable but dramatic silence in the room and it filled with all the tensions of the religious disputes that had dominated the evening.  Those who had been offended had time in that short silence to nurse their hurts.  It was an angry silence not a nice one.  I wondered what on earth was about to happen.  Suddenly, he stood up and said to Susan,

“The reason you don’t believe in God is because you don’t feel Him.  You are trying to understand Him but you can’t.”

Susan started to speak, but Daniel held up his hand,

“Let me finish”, he advised

“It’s like expecting the chair you are sitting on to understand you.  It can’t because it is only a chair.  So when we try to understand God we are like a chair trying to grasp what a person is.  It is beyond us.  But we like the chair can feel things.”

Susan had been silent long enough and interjected with her sarcastic cry,

What exactly can the chair feel?”

Daniel approached her and pointed to the splayed legs of the plastic chair beneath her and said,

“The chair cannot understand you but it can feel you, look at the way the legs are bending.” 

here he dramatically pointed out the straining plastic to all in the room.  There was a horrible intake of breath as the significance of that remark was digested.  Mute horror followed, but Daniel was in full throttle and took the silence as appreciation of his point.  We all stared in consternation as Susan’s face blushed a crimson colour.  He elaborated,

“It means the chair knows you are sitting on it, well not knows, it feels, responds to your weight, right?”

Susan blinked twice and looked at Daniel with growing discomfort.  He took her silence as agreement,

“So even though the chair cannot grasp what kind of person you are, it knows exactly what weight you are, because it supports you, all of you.”

This was becoming painful in so many ways I cannot begin to bring to life here in print.  Daniel however was well into his Attorney for God’s defence mindset and extremely focussed on the argument in hand.

“So even if we cannot understand God, we might be able, like the chair, to feel Him?  Right?”

Susan sat, appalled by the turn of events and yet like us all, strangely gripped by the theatre of it all.  She was still blushing in her role as the magician’s assistant and not at all sure where this was heading.

I wanted to start serving tea and coffee, or press a fire alarm, anything to break the growing tension in the room but sat as horrified as the rest, spell bound by just how awkward this all was.

Susan for the first time, that evening said nothing, just nodded at Daniel, as if playing along would lesson the present pain.  Then out of the blue came a small voice from Susan, more of a cry than a statement,

“But I cannot feel Him!” She looked at only Daniel and there was a desire there, a genuine desire to be understood.  There was a truth in that cry and my heart missed a beat.  Gone was the aggressive argumentative woman and in her place was a gentle soul, bewildered at the turn of events.

Daniel spoke quietly in response,

“The reason the chair feels you is because it is under you, the reason it can carry the weight is because it bends.  If you want to feel God you must want to be near Him, and you must bend.”

A magical moment in a very long and uncomfortable evening.

blank

I used to have lists of things to do, written on crisp white sheets in a fine jotter.  Then as each job was completed I'd score it off with satisfaction.  A list of accomplishments to mark the passing days.  Being a productive a measure of my purpose in life.  Progress tallied on each fresh page.  but now I spend ages searching for a pen, I had a second ago.  If only I could find my glasses I'd stand a better chance.  My new skill seems to be able to make things disappear instantly.  Vital pieces of paper, phones, purses can all be magically transported.  It's not restricted to material things either.  My thoughts too have begun to delete themselves, like a hard drive wiping out sectors at a whim.  I've begun to doubt myself, forget why I've entered a room and names have evaporated as well.  I am being positive about the whole affair.  I choose to think it is all about reaching a stage of detachment.  Removing oneself from all without and even that within.  Perhaps, I'll come full circle and will end up being the crisp blank sheet I once wrote on.

Justice Falling Flat

Funny things happen on islands regarding the justice system.  Perhaps it is a feature of living on a tiny restricted area, where a lot of people know each other, that intimacy breeds a rather skewered attitude to the whole concept of justice.  If our civilisation is reared on two pillars reward and punishment it is scary to see that concept toppled.  Let me give an example that gives me cause for concern.

On Rhodes, in 2000 a British tourist fell from a balcony and after a 45-minute wait for an ambulance was taken to the local hospital.  There a junior doctor was unable to contact a senior doctor on duty and so merely transferred the patient to an orthopaedic ward. Where he subsequently died.  It is now thought that a simple procedure could have saved Christopher Rochester’s life had he received the correct treatment in a timely fashion.  Accidents happen and medical mistakes can be made, but what happens next in this case highlights for me the weird workings of justice on a small island.

The body is repatriated and once home the British doctors are surprised to find that a kidney is missing.  They contact the Greek authorities and subsequently another kidney arrives.  There is more horror, as this kidney is not believed to be Christopher’s, the DNA does not match.  Meanwhile, after lengthy court battles, in  February 2008 a Greek doctor, Stergios Pavlidis, was convicted and sentenced to 15 months in jail, suspended for three years.  A good eight years have now passed since the original death with no one really being punished.

The nightmare continues, for the British family, as the Greek courts insist on an exhumation of Christopher’s body to check the DNA again.  This, despite other sources being available for DNA (hair etc) without such a traumatic intervention.  So eleven years after losing their son needlessly, the family have to observe their son’s body exhumed for testing in Belgium.  At this stage, obviously an impartial laboratory is called upon independent of both Britain and Greece.  At last, you are probably thinking, as did the family, that some justice will be served.  And indeed the results are completed and ready.  But no, the Greek Government, who insisted on the testing have still, not released the results.  In June 2012, a family member claimed that any official confirmation that the kidney did not belong to Christopher would only spell more problems for the Greek authorities hence the delay. If you wrote it in a book of fiction no one would believe it. 

work

Got a job
No time to write
to walk to cafes
to chill at the seaside
think thoughts
just spend so many hours
getting ready
working late
then early start
the bus passes
my cafe
someone else drinks my coffee
sigh
I stare through bus window
glad I have work at last
but oh, feel so very tired

Against every principle

In this new technological world we must change.  It is inevitable like evolution that we adapt or die.  I too have made adaptations I swore I never would.  Thought I’d die rather than capitulate, let me explain.

All my life I have looked on in amazement at human activities that I see as a perversion of the soul.  What are these?  It is a huge swathe of stuff from crosswords, to jigsaw puzzles, includes pub quizzes, Suduko, word search books (Find Wally for Adults), Mastermind, Who wants to be a Millionaire, the list goes on.  To me, these are all a complete waste of life.  Those who indulge in such activities have little to expend their mental energies/time on and so indulge in this displacement activity.  I regard them all as that ritual behaviour regularly observed by animals in captivity denied the freedom to express their real nature.  In despair, I observed it in a university staff tearoom where a book on such questions as, ‘who was King of England in 708AD?’ is used to while away the valuable free time at breaks.  I mean what the hell? 

My opinions have brought me into conflict with a wide range of nice people.  Our neighbours would regularly sit and do 10,000 piece jigsaws on carefully constructed boards.  I felt like I had walked in on some masochistic ritual they felt obliged to subject themselves to.  Those who contend that they are good for the mind, please show me the evidence.  I suspect many will, at this point, wheel out the new brain tools hailed as useful in preventing senility.  To which I reply, use it or lose it.  Like your legs, which if immobile in a shockingly short space of time, become incapable of supporting you.  So too, your mind was designed to be active, to achieve, discover, create, engage and progress.  I’ll admit doing something is better than nothing and for those isolated and deprived of viable alternatives activities are needed.  But surely, crafts are a better way to go.  Or hobbies, or travel, or meeting new people, or being in contact with those you already know?  The sad thing is that we have become so socially isolated that we are less able to cope with anyone.  The more we reach for that soothing crossword to keep us company to while away the remaining hours of life. 

But I must confess to doing Suduko this week.  Yes, it is against every principle I choose to cling to.  Let me explain my mother in Northern Ireland is addicted and spends ages doing these bloody things.  People buy her books of the cursed squares.  I once had a colleague in college who pulled open his drawer in our shared office, full of Suduko puzzles.  If he’d shown me a drawer full of dirty underpants I would have not have been so disgusted.  He could tell from my reaction I was not a fan.  He harboured a resentment towards me for some years, probably all my fault.  His hostility only changed the day I asked if he had any deodorant.  I’d come to work in haste having slept in and showered but had omitted to apply deodorant and after a taxing morning with goats in the school animal room could not stand the smell of myself.  I asked my Suduko-liking colleague for deodorant and he opened the cupboard above his desk and showed me a chemists shop of goodies, elaborating on the benefits of each.  I was grateful and he was ecstatic.  Obviously sharing toiletries takes relationships to a deeper and closer level.  Our differences over Suduko forgotten in a haze of Brute deodorant.  If only I could have known that all it took to declare peace and make friends was to ask for a favour.

While on holiday this Christmas I challenged my mum to Suduko.  I liked the way competition threw her into a sweat and spoiled the usual tranquillity of her Suduko hours.  Instead of relaxed contemplation there was panicked filling in, nervous checks of her opponent.  The occasional defeat sharpened her desire to wipe the floor with me.  Having returned to Malta my mother in the evening regularly now comes on Skype and we pick an online puzzle to tackle.  Once we have taken it down the clock is ticking and silence reigns until one of us completes the bloody thing.  Despite my hatred of Suduko and such things, that half hour of shared competition brings my Mum into my day in an immediate and companionable routine.  It may be against every fibre of my being but I must choose to make space for the oddities of someone as sweet and dear as she.

Pokey and the fact that shit floats

Sarah said they came in angry and armed.  They had pushed past her mother at the door and they now stood looming over her in the living room.  The smallest long nosed man held a revolver and the tall red-faced lad had a rifle.  She knew their names, they were all from our village.  The nervous red haired one was called Stan, the long nosed one was nicknamed Pokey and the third Dave had been our class at primary school.  Stan held his rifle embarrassingly as if not comfortable in the tidy living room with it.  Sarah’s mother was terrified and wept at the doorway crying “what’s happening?”.  Pokey began,

“You’ve been going out with the other side”, he told Sarah, “that’s not allowed”. He continued with venom, “If your father was alive he’d have sorted this but he isn’t so we are here to do the job”.

Pokey stood, his lower lip puckered and he was nipping it repeatedly between his finger and thumb in a nervous gesture.  The revolver in his other hand swung from side to side with the same nervousness.  Sarah thought she was going to die in her small tidy living room aged seventeen never having lived at all.  Pokey continued, “You’re going to stop seeing him right”, he looked at her mother, “and we mean business, if we have to come back…”  He let the silence hang and all the time Pokey squeezed and released his lower lip so hard it stood out white and proud.  Sarah thought her heart would explode with fear. 

Even the next day when she told me of the event at school she cried with the memory of it all.  Her mother hadn't slept the whole night and Sarah had reassured her that everything was settled.  It was all okay.  The three men had taken her word that she would end the relationship and she had.  Since her father died, Sarah felt it her duty to support her mother and even now facing this trauma she felt shame that she had brought such terror to her widowed mother.  I listened burning with rage that three such idiots could inflict such damage on innocent people.  Personally, I felt that if her father had been alive they would not have dared knock on the door.  But a young widow and teenager was obviously fair game for the local thugs. 

That’s the thing about when society breaks down, it is not the local doctor or friendly street cleaner that suddenly turn toxic.  When the police and the army withdrew from our village it was the vicious and malignant that came into their own. Intimidating at will and feeling themselves the village heroes by targeting the vulnerable.  The very worst of society suddenly feel empowered to do what they want.  I met Pokey shortly after and told him exactly what I thought of him and his friends.  We had a heated conversation and I informed him that I would be going out of my way to date every single person from the opposing community on sheer principle.  This seemed very noble and righteous at the time.  I was on a crusade and informed Pokey I would much rather be dead than be dictated to by a little shit like him.  It was weird how empowered you can be but also very foolish at the same time.  

After all, it is one thing to announce you are going to date across the cultural barrier and quite another thing doing it.  I had never had a boyfriend of any sort so was not equipped for the task I had set myself.  In fact, four years passed without my having any romance whatsoever and gradually my heart went out of the whole affair.   With each year that passed I felt my failure anew as only teenagers can.  Total humiliation was reached at the five-year mark.  Sarah met and married Dave, our classmate and villain!  I began to suspect that the whole thing had not worked out well for me at all.  It could have been my imagination but I felt that Stan, Dave and Pokey and probably both sides of the community were sneering at my failure.

I went to university in Coleraine, eventually married, had kids and moved abroad.  Decades passed and then this year I returned to Northern Ireland, for a holiday, and was watching the TV in my Mum’s home when there on the screen was Pokey.  As thin nosed as ever but now thick set, dressed in a suit and tie and being introduced as the elected representative of the community.  He was being interviewed and as he listened to the question he pulled at his lower lip before answering.  Suddenly, it was as if it was yesterday and my anger returned as raw as before.    I tell you all that there is a truth in the saying shit floats, and in the words of Forrest Gump, that is all I am going to say about that!

My father was upset about the library being burned

My father was upset about the library being burned.  He tried to be stoic but I could tell he loathed the destruction of knowledge it represented.  I was at primary school and fancied myself as an amateur detective.  My main suspect was William McCartney, a boy in my class.  The evidence was circumstantial but clear.  I had discovered him defacing a library book at school.  He had drawn two huge breasts on the cover of a book on Cookery.  Instead of a prim, apron clad April Summers displaying cakes in each hand, William had constructed huge breasts incorporating the cherries on top of the cakes as nipples.  I was convinced such vandalism spoke of his disrespect for the written word.  

In our household books were everything and everywhere.  We devoured them like bread and water and whether it was by Henry Miller, the collected plays of Shaw, or Steinbeck we consumed them and then hunted for new fodder.  No folding down corners or scuffing the cover and no underlining of texts or notes in the margins.  Books had to be respected like people.  Even the crappy ones.  So Ms Summers added breasts offended my sensibilities.  William’s violent tendencies were shown clearly when he brought to school a black bin liner full of dead birds he had shot with his own air rifle.  When the American Constitution stipulates the right to carry arms, they must never have had classmates like mine.  I could honestly say I wouldn’t have trusted any of them with a firearm.  So there you have it.  William was violent (bag of birds – exhibit one) and he took pleasure from the defacement of literature (cookery book – exhibit two).  That made him in my mind a strong candidate for the burning of the library.  For a whole year I seethed with resentment towards William and blamed him for the book, the birds, the library and for bringing sadness to my father’s heart.

It came as something of a shock to discover later that my father was referring to the burning of the Great Library in Alexandria which happened around two thousand years ago.  A crime William, however vile, could not have committed.  Through the following years my father continued to mourn the loss of this great library and filled in the details of this catastrophe. 

When Alexander the Great died in 323 BC his kingdom was divided up into three pieces: Antigonids ruled Greece, Seleucids ruled Asia Minor, Syria and Mesoptamia while Ptolemis ruled Egypt.  Wanting to gain supremacy and legitimacy Ptolemy stole Alexander’s body and took it first to Memphis and then to Alexandria.  This was a blatant attempt to create a political and dynastic link with Alexander the Great.  Creating a museum “Temple of the Muses” was also a part of this goal.  After all, Aristotle who had taught Alexander, had a wonderful library and so Ptolemy and his line created the greatest library of the ancient world.  It was their intention to collect all the books in the world and works from India, Persia, Babylonia, Georgia, Armenia and far a field were gathered.  The works of poets, philosophers, historians etc were carefully obtained and kept in the library.  

There was a copy of Epidemics belonging to the physician Mnemon of Side, ancient scrolls and books from all over found their way to the library at Alexandria.  Even when a ship entered the port it was searched and if books or scrolls were found these were seized and copied.  The copies were returned but the originals were stored in the library.  The greatest fruits of human endeavour flowed to Alexandria and were collected and collated.   The arts and sciences were represented and so many were not only original but unique and priceless.  The fame of the Great Library of Alexandria spread far and wide.  It was an incredible search for knowledge all carefully gathered from the four corner of the earth. 

So what happened?  Well, as one has probably suspected by now, some idiot burned the library down.  After centuries of careful collection and cataloguing the works of great minds it took small minds a few days to dispose of the Great Library.  The disaster was of epic proportions.  We don’t know, even now, the scale of the loss.  But there are hints.  Callimachus, a poet and scholar, had created a catalogue/biography of the contents of the library called Pinakes.  We only have a tiny portion of this Pinakes (table of contents) left but there is enough to make you howl in despair at what went up in flames.  

Now, I understood why my father took the burning of the Great Library in Alexandria so personally.  So should we all!  But on further reflection I didn’t feel so bad about blaming William McCartney for the crime.  It turns out blaming those we dislike for despicable crimes they have not done is a theme common in history. For example,  Caliph Umar was blamed for the burning of the library and there is even a nice little tale told to explain why. , "If these writing of the Greeks agree with the book of God, they are useless and need not be preserved; if they disagree, they are pernicious and ought to be destroyed". It was, the story continues, thereupon, decided that the books were contrary to the Quran and the whole library was burned down without even opening the books.  Totally rubbish of course, the Great Library was lost much earlier probably in 47/48 AD perhaps by Julius Caesar who was burning ships around that time in the harbour.  Mohammad and the Quran did not appear for another five centuries and so Caliph Umar is in the clear.  There was another library in Alexandria called the Serapeum (daughter library) but this was burned down in 391 AD under the decree of Archbishop Theophilus.  Edward Gibbon (writer of the  The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire) described Archbishop Theophilus as "...the perpetual enemy of peace and virtue, a bold, bad man, whose hands were alternately polluted with gold and with blood." Not a great way to be remembered in the history books.  

But some people really do say and do such stupid things that they need to be remembered for posterity.  Like Pope Gregory’s famous line "Ignorance is the mother of piety." Following this principle to the letter, Gregory burned the precious Palestine Library founded by Emperor Augustus, destroyed the greater part of the writings of Livy and forbade the study of the classics. The Crusaders destroyed the splendid library of Tripoli and reduced to ashes many of the glorious centres of Saracenic art and culture. Ferdinand and Isabella put to flames all the Muslim and Jewish works they could find in Spain. 

Library burning has not gone out of fashion.  The library of Leuven, Belgium was burned in 1914 and then after being rebuilt was burned to the ground once more in May in 1940 by the Nazis.  In case you think this fetish for library burning has run out of steam one need only look at the American invasion of Iraq in 2003 when the National Library of Baghdad was burned and priceless ancient antiquities and manuscripts were lost. 

Knowledge is like a light that illuminates humanity and ignorance is the opposite, darkness.  The burning of libraries serves to show the bigoted, the fanatic and the stupid at work.  Such a shame to destroy what is really the birthright of the human race.  We should all sorrow over the loss of the Great Library at Alexandria.  It reminds us that ignorance is too dangerous to be permitted and the search for knowledge and truth is the only way ahead.

Coffee time in Malta

There are a wealthy couple sitting with friends at a nearby table in this café.  The man is complaining about the delay in the delivery of his new Porsche to Malta.  Later, they move on with relish to discuss their forthcoming holiday in Moscow where they hope to visit the Winter Palace and are twittering on in a fashion fit to annoy anyone.  They have that peculiar plumy English accent that sets your teeth on edge.  He is babbling again at the top of his voice,

“Life is still fun and worth living”, the sixty odd year old proclaims. 

“The economic situation has not touched me, thanks goodness.” He follows in smug tones. 

I believe fate places such people nearby to annoy and test me.  Now, he is complaining about his computer system’s inability to respond to his commands.  I find myself strangely comforted that PCs, at least, do not jump to the beck and call of that “rulers of the empire” tone.  Computers are democratic and as such equally rebellious to all.  It’s weird that in Northern Ireland I’ll  be specific about coming from north of the border but when on an island in the Med I morph into Irish for fear of being associated with these colonial types.  My father always claimed that there was something about ruling an empire that damaged emotions.  He would name them one by one, tapping on each finger in turn, pausing at each tap to raise his eyebrow as if exhibiting another proof of his argument.  His reasoning was, if you had to keep the locals underfoot it required you to be missing on certain wavelengths including for example compassion, empathy, humility, modesty.  It has taken years for recent research to prove that keeping a nation or people in subjection is as damaging to those who rule as it is to those who are abused. 

It stands to reason then that keeping women in a lower state will have equally negative effects on both men and women.  Injustice is evil, not just because of its unfairness but also due to its long-term damage on all concerned.  In India 50 million girls are missing due to abortion of unwanted female babies.  In that culture boys are preferred.  The end result of this tragedy is that girl abductions/rapes are common.  How horrific that following the quiet death of millions of female girls, young women who have survived this first cull are being singled out for yet more violence.  Of course India is not alone, violence against women crosses all borders, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Yugoslavia, South Africa, Afghanistan and one of the highest rates of domestic abuse is found in Papua New Guinea.  So much of this violence is under the radar despite its horrific nature.  Violence against females in our midst is a world problem and not limited to any one nation. 

Whatever the realities that lie beneath the statistics you can be sure that both men and women are being damaged in this process.  I look forward to the day when we realise that injustices such as prejudice of race, religion or gender damage us all.  Sense that the growing gap between rich and poor is another unsustainable trend.  Otherwise the corrosion eating into the vitals of human society will continue, I fear.  

Time to leave, my one coffee has lasted an hour and a half and the staff are becoming increasingly restless round me.  At least I outlasted the plumy toned fellow on my left.  Obviously, I have prejudices of my own to weed out! 

PS Proceeded out of the café and walked a good half hour along the coast only to be brought up short with the dreadful realization I had forgotten to pay for my coffee.  Walked back guilt ridden, apologized and paid.  This growing older business is embarrassing at times!

I seem to have been born not fitting in to my culture and then got worse with age

Am back in Malta after soaking up family and friends for three weeks in Northern Ireland over the Christmas holidays.  I didn’t get to see many friends and am amazed how the time flew in.  I also realized that I am a foreigner in my own country and find it perversely difficult to blend in.  Let me explain an incident that occurred which crystallises what is tricky to put into words.

My mother and my son were having coffee in a small café in the Whitehouse in Portrush.  It is a shop that sells everything from bedding to pots, clothes to furniture and on the upper floor there is a café overlooking the street.  I don’t shop there as when I once lifted a blouse to examine it I found that it was priced at a ridiculous price of ₤165 reduced to ₤99 and that put me in a foul mood.  Even looking around at the ridiculous ornaments, no one would want, costing hundreds, has me muttering, “Is this a joke, or what?” in outraged tones. 

It does serve reasonable coffee and that was why the three of us were having cappuccinos in the café high above the street.  A lady at the nearby table leaned across and said to my mother,

“That is a lovely colour of jumper.” 

Before I could stop myself I replied,

“Yes, shame about the face!” 

In our family we do routinely tease each other and my mother was not surprised.  The lady however was offended and her husband asked me, in cold tones,

“Have you been drinking?” 

Realising, I had offended these polite folk I tried to explain,

“No, it is just that I’ve spent years being asked if my mother is my sister and it has made me sensitive to people complimenting her.” 

My mother and son laughed and so did I.  My Mum’s recent holiday with her sister visiting me in Malta was typical.  Everyday we would walk miles along the coast and each day someone would ask, “Are you three sisters?”  We do have similar colouring but there is a thirty-year age difference, so you can understand my sensitivity.  As far as I was concerned the neighbouring table’s angry response was funny but also strangely admirable.  They felt I had offended my eighty-year-old mother and were stiff with fury!  Oblivious, the three of us enjoyed our coffees.  On my way to the toilet, I passed the nearby table and the man instructed me,

“You should swing by Spectsavers! (a local opticians)”. 

His upset was tangible and again I admired their heated defence of my mother.  After all, if an elderly person was being abused verbally, these people would not sit idly by and let it happen.  Surely, a good thing?  I returned to my mother and son and we collected our coats and began to leave.  My mother, always goodhearted and even tempered, wished the neighbouring occupants a merry Christmas, as did my son and received a warm response.  However, when I wished them the same, all three carefully averted their heads, stiff with distain, and ignored me pointedly. 

I found it all vaguely amusing but by now my son was irritated and wanted to go back to the table to speak to them.  I restrained him with a warm hug and said, “It’s not them, it’s me.  They belong here and I evidently don’t.”  At such times you identify how foreign you are, how much of an outsider you have become.  The worrying thing is, I seem to have been born not fitting in to my culture and then got worse with age!