Pen friends, foes and the rest

Like many who enter a marriage of convenience (in this case ‘blogging’) I am disenchanted. Not that I expected much in the first place. The upside being that I have made friends (at least in my own mind) with people who will pass my litmus test, the ultimate. What’s the litmus test? One of you knows the others may sleep well. Don’t worry your pretty little heads.

I read few blogs, I “follow” even fewer. Quality over quantity any time. However: Just like an itch you need to scratch or that scab on your knee, when your ten year old self fell off the bike, wants to be picked to prolongue the healing process, there are bloggers who I visit because they irritate the hell out of me. Say, two or three. They don’t know it. Yes, I know when to keep shtum.

Today I dedicate my thoughts to, and reserve my venom for one who has me not so much in the first antechambre of hell as quietly roasting her on my spit. She is exquisite in her art. And the most foul mouthed woman I have ever come across. It’s as much her trademark as is Lorna’s way to sublimate her life’s experiences into the divine.

So far SO WHAT? So nothing. A friend of mine who is hot on labelling everything and totally uncalled for, will mark her as “passive aggressive”. Since, when necessary, I prefer to be aggressive and not passive I am not quite sure what the term means. I can only guess that it’s attacking others without actually “coming out”. Now I know that I can be pretty vague but when I really have to say something to someone’s face I say it. Not leave my scent mark and then slink off into the night and groom my whiskers.

A long intro to a simple question:

What makes us engage with another person? Intrigues us? Why do we like? Why do we dislike? Don’t ask me. I have few ideas on what is a fascinating subject. Reminds me of chemistry lessons. Try and make water and oil into an emulsion. A lot of oil may just about be able to absorb a drop of water. A lot of water will always show up those little pearls of oil on the top. No, this is not a cookery class. This is wondering how and why people click. Or not.

U

Landscape

News on the blot front: It’s no better. A mirror has become an instrument of torture to me. In absence of veils I am considering a fringe. I don’t want a fringe. I don’t even like curtains. Which is why we live in a gold fish bowl.

My own flesh and blood, in a last ditch attempt to keep his mother happy, has turned to lying: “No, Mama, it doesn’t show.  It’s not noticeable at all.” Thank you, so kind. I am not blind yet. To keep things in perspective I remind myself of a long held conviction: Any of our blemishes are only magnified by ourselves, unnoticed by others till drawn to their attention. That excludes warts. If ever I had a wart I’d emigrate.

U

Feeds and facts

Further to yesterday’s tits on air please look no further than good old Totsy who can always be relied upon to find that angle round an unforeseen corner.  Like a true Southern Belle she doesn’t mince her words. A bit like me, only better. And no, I don’t give a damn. Praise where it’s due. I am just a blogging slapper dasher without Totsy’s sublime refinement.

So let’s dive into Ghana and discover a whole new meaning of  ”Mummy’s boy” http://totsymae.com/2012/01/09/the-public-privacy-of-intimacy/

U

Drawing a line

One of the blogs I frequent (sorry, can’t link since momentarily forgotten which one it was) recently mentioned crystal balls and the future.

Don’t. Go there. I did more than twenty years ago. I was waiting, at some boat show cum fairground, for Fiona, a colleague. She phoned and told me to see a woman in a tent to while away the time till her arrival. Why did I listen to her? Five pounds later (1989 prices, UK) my life changed. Not that I realised it at the time. Everything went well. Time passed pleasantly, till my fortune teller set eyes on a particular line in my right hand. That was it: She dropped my hand, looked at me aghast, wished me a happy life and asked me to leave NOW. Since people often look at me either aghast or bemused I didn’t give it much thought. Till years later: When one of my many assignments’ briefs was to look into palmistry. I do not know who to curse more: The editor who assigned me. The palm reader. Or myself.

I, naturally, bloody studied the subject from the wrist up. By way of comforting you now: Don’t believe everything you find on the map: By rights I should have had as many children as I had (in truth) miscarriages. Which suits me fine – since both I and my son are “only” children by nature. Which makes us both more compassionate to other humans than a lot of those who had to fight not only for daily survival in the midst of siblings, but their fair share of affection from their parents.

Yes, so that was brilliant and has confirmed my view that, in order to ensure your anxiety has something to feed on, you may as well go and see a palmist. Tarrot readers (and, yes, you guessed it, Fiona sent me to one of those as well) are harmless by comparison. Though how the old woman knew that the most beloved woman of my life (my maternal grandmother) had died when I was eight beats me. How is that possible? And no, I did not give out any clues. And no Fiona didn’t brief the clairvoyant beforehand because she knew nothing about me other than that I like Sauvignon Blanc, a grape which will go with everything, even Thai or Chinese.

U

Dr King Con – Psychiatry and Neurology Department

Let’s start the day how I mean to go on: Oh, Jean, I can’t begin to tell you how much Con has just managed to make me laugh. He is SO predictable it makes me snort (not with derision but delight at his usual folly).

This is with reference to Con’s comment on Ramana’s girl in the park and her attachment to her mirror. He says, in one of his usual fine summing-ups of anything that doesn’t quite fit his picture of the world “Pathological and sad”. Con, let me address you direct since I find it tasteless to sneak around behind people’s backs and foulmouth them: What is it with you and ‘pathologizing’ everything? Are you sure you are an expert on things “sanity”? Particularly since quite a few of your CONsortium’s members freely admitted between last Friday and now that they consider themselves anything between “crazy and insane”, possibly even ‘mad’ (Have forgotten now). Con – as you know – I am confident, even when not quite sure how best to deal with dung beetles,  but I would never have your audacity to label people as you keep doing. Where do you actually take that impertinence from? Even someone trained and experienced in matters of the soul will – professional ethics – go a little more easy than you when slapping on a diagnosis.

Now, Con, there is no need for your blood pressure to rise at reading the above. A little friendly pointer more a cooling compress to a feverish forehead. NONE of us, not even you, Con, is above putting their foot into it, making an arse of themselves. If there is one difference between you and me, Con, and I pride myself on it, that I will freely admit that I get things wrong, that I don’t always manage to get my message across.  That, as much as I hope to please, I also upset. You DON’T. You appear, please note I said “appear” so there is some room for error on my part, to have certainties I think – actually, let me think for a moment – border on the, I know, pathological. Good stuff, isn’t it, when the oversized boot is on the wrong foot?

Kiss, kiss,

U

28 Dec

If you don’t like a spot of feeling VERY sorry for myself go away now.

Am not afflicted like Ramana. Don’t have a double chin to conveniently disguise in oversized collar. However, at 0410 I find myself curled up in foetal position. gaelikaa may save her breath: I am not a case for the Samaritans. I am ready to be carted off to the looney bin. No not yours, Looney. Even if you did find me there I wouldn’t take up much space. Take note, gaelikaa, losing weight as you desire is, when getting older, not all it’s cracked up to be. Shows in your face – of all places. Wish they’d bring veils back into fashion.

Am a wreck. Which is befitting since I live round the corner of the Titanic’s shipping office. I am in so much pain I not only could cry, I do cry. That comes from refusing to subsidize profit of Bayer and Pfitzer. Am now convinced that I will lose my left arm by amputation. Had accident 6 Nov. Let’s leave aside that I have lost two months; K-wires were drawn two weeks ago; new plaster cast applied. That cast is so tight it drives me up the wall.

Have warned Son that I’ll be rubbish at getting older. How BHB copes with three hip replacements is beyond me. My supply of patience would dwindle faster than you can say: “Move”. On the other hand I might be reincarnated as one of Conrad’s dung beetles. Gender as yet undecided.

Where was I? Worrying about Magpie who appears to be hibernating. Did you know, Jean, that there is a charity for hedgehogs? The BBC being such  hive of information I learnt this two days go off their website. Am fond of hedgehogs: Prickly on top, soft underbelly, full of fleas.

Added anxiety: Hope I am not repeating myself.

Once I am out of current shithole will devise and patent the FIVE finger blind typing system. Just don’t expect speed.

Also have cough worthy of a Swiss sanatorium catering for tuberculose poets (say, Rilke). Luckily, with son being away for a couple of days, I can cough to my lungs’ desire without immediately being asked to limp to doctor’s surgery.

You haven’t even heard  third of that which bugs me this minute. So don’t say there is no good side to being one handed.

Miffed yours

U

Pissed off big time

It’s getting worse. What date is it today? 6th of May?  I don’t know. Normally my nemesis is the month of November.

Displacement activity has now reached levels hitherto unknown, even to me. Drowning couldn’t be worse. Still, not to keep the happiness and self help book industry in quagmire must keep smiling in face of shit hitting the fan evenly covering all the magnolia in my life. In the olden days they called it ‘denial’.  I am falling down a hole and with no one in sight to lend me a hand I, like the mad baron, will have to pull myself out of the morast by my own hair. Newton would  have had to say something about probability of that. No matter: Everything will be just fine. Pull the other one.

U

Alive, kicking and screaming

Am really annoyed and disenchanted with myself this minute. Have to meet bloody deadline (four hours). Haven’t written one word yet. Instead of which I surf the blogs of my near and not so dear, leaving clever comments. I think it’s called  ’displacement’. I call it, amongst many worse things,  ’warm up’  and, more accurately, ‘procrastination’. I recently, Cheerful Monk and Marianna take note, read a book on procrastination. Whilst illuminating, and a fine way of losing the best part of an afternoon, I realised that ALL I was doing was procrastinating that which demanded urgent attention.

That’s the power of books. They keep you rooted to the spot.

U

Silence

How does that absurd Victorian saying go? “When you don’t have anything NICE  to say, say nothing at all.” Fair enough. If you are so inclined DO bite your tongue – and those of your children; to bleeding point if necessary.

I prescribe to “If you have something to say, say it”. Not for the first time in recent months have I been silenced by a crowd of self congratulatory blogging hypocrites (and other authors), the likes of which will sooner or later make my warrior of truth seek refuge in a quiet desert devoid of personal blogs; grounding my Robin Hood, resting his sword instead of fighting the middle class smug who wouldn’t know what real hardship is if it hit them right into the stomach, the heart or between the eyes. I am in despair over ignorance; our world being condensed into soundbites of  communication.  And before any of you say anything: There is nothing wrong  with being in despair. It’s as much part of the human condition as are rainbows. Of one thing all of you can be certain: Whenever I resurface from the sticks I am  so much happier than pedlars of permanent luke warm happiness ever will be.

This is not a personal attack on anyone. It is an attempt to bring reason to those of you who protest TOO much.  And my god, PROTEST you do. And I do have a strong stomach – as you know.

Nick, on his blog, drew my attention to the assertions of a French scribbler on whose shrine half of Europe appears to worship. I nearly puked after reading a critique of his book in The Times. I cannot believe it, in fact I am furious at how self centered we have become as society: This guy, forgotten his name already, seriously recommends that we “choose” friends according to “how happy” they are. Is this guy a lunatic? He’d be dead happy, wouldn’t he, following his own advice, if all his friends – in the desperate pursuit of their own measly happiness – would drop him should he ever slip up and be down in the dumps. Has the world gone mad? Have I gone mad? Happiness is a by-product of our existence, to be cherished as and when it arises; whether it lasts as short as a day, or as long as a moment. Not an aim in itself. It’s like saying we should never feel hungry. What bollocks.

If  I were Beethoven, which luckily I am not since my main interest does not lie in putting music  on paper, I’d write “My fury over the happiness industry having lost the plot” set to his ”Die Wut ueber den verlorenen Groschen”. 

I am so disenchanted I could cry. In fact, I am crying. As good for the soul as is laughter.

I have had it.

Has it ever occurred to any of those who relentlessly go on and on and on about about THEIR marvellous outlook on life  and pursuit of happiness how you might UNDERMINE those who are in the grip of some grief or other? Of course not. Mustn’t rock the rosy boats of your self delusion.

If any of the above sounds bitter: IT IS. I am sick and tired of people using pastels on the canvas of life when stark colours would be so much more honest – and life enhancing. May all of you dust yourselves down and brush off all that is wrong with the world as long as it does NOT touch you – PERSONALLY.

Remember when, as a child, you were afraid of the dark? How grateful you were when a kind adult left on the light in the corridor and your bedroom door ajar? What if the fuse blew and the light went out anyway? 

The trick to life is to remember where the torch is and not to worry whether the battery will last till dawn breaks once more.

U

On the psychiatrist’s chair

Just came across a marvellous cartoon:

A  Sigmund Freud lookalike sitting on a chair; in front of him – on the couch – a skeleton, a bit down in the mouth, dressed in a long black hooded gown with the tool of his trade, a scythe, parked next to him: “I do feel so unappreciated”.

And we thought we had problems.

U