"You can get help from teachers, but you are going to learn a lot by yourself, sitting alone in a room."
("Dr Seuss")
I wrote the poem "Because You Are Loved" over a year ago, when a couple of my friends were dealing with illness, loss and disappointment. Those friends are, thank God, "better", having indeed risen taller than their shadows. I really do believe that when we stumble, we get the chance to greet the stones in our path. I have other friends who are now ill, sad, feeling lost: this is now also for them. Or for you, if you've stumbled here on your way to somewhere else. Now, I appreciate that it is for me too; love yourselves.
"Because You Are Loved"
May you rise taller than your shadow
that the sun may greet you halfway.
Walk with your head as high as hope itself,
and know that when you stumble
you meet the stones that pave your way.
Let your heart sing the day long
that Peace will know where to find you.
Then may you rest,
still and small as the most precious diamond
in the dreams of those who love you.
Gigi
"Don't Give Up (You Are Loved)" Josh Groban
"Ordinary riches can be stolen, real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you."
"To love yourself can be the start of a lifelong romance."
"Mary is the safest, easiest, shortest and most perfect way of approaching Jesus"
(St Louis Marie de Montfort)
"Who Is She Ascends So High?" (from the Roman Catholic Breviary) Who is she ascends so high,
Next the heav'nly King,
Round about whom angels fly,
And her praises sing? Who is she adorned with light;
Makes the sun her robe?
At whose feet the queen of night
Lays her changing globe?
This is she in whose pure womb
Heaven's Prince remained;
Wherefore in no earthly tomb
Could she be contained. Heav'n she was, which held that fire,
Whence the world took light,
And to heav'n doth now as pire:
Flames with flames unite.
She that did so clearly shine,
Our day once begun,
See how bright her beams decline,
Sitting with the Sun.
As a convent schoolgirl, I grew up with a fascination for the traditional Catholic devotion to Mary, the Virgin Mother of God. As a "Child of Mary", I joined with other bustling little girls to decorate the chapel with flowers during the month of May, all of us proudly wearing our blue sashes. I still have my little rosary from my First Communion; the cheapest, mass-produced plastic, but sugar-pink and precious. Family holidays to my Dad's homeland would always incorporate a trip to Our Lady's shrine at Banneux: I can still picture the rows of souvenir Blessed Virgins; a regiment of serenity with celestial blue cloaks and rose-cheeked inclined heads. These days, I belong to the Catholic Women's League, where each meeting starts with The Rosary. I now have a frieze of The Black Madonna in my living room: I managed to paint the alcoves there almost the exact same shade as her vivid red cloak; I only wish I had found my blue sash before the family home had to be sold...
Why do we so love Mary?
Yesterday, 15th August, was the feast of The Assumption, celebrated across the Christian churches; a Holy Day of Obligation and also a public holiday in Austria, Belgium, France, Greece, Italy, Malta, Spain and many other countries. The word "assumption" is literally from the Latin for "taken up": we celebrate that Mary was assumed into heaven, body and soul. Many Catholics do believe that Mary died physically before she ascended to heaven, but this aspect of The Assumption is not fully defined in the theology of the Catholic Church. It's a beautiful and joyous feast: Mary's Assumption is seen as a divine gift to her as the mother of Jesus; but also serves as a reminder of the saving grace that awaits us all.
Christian "Mariology" (the study and theology of Mary), explores not only her life but also the veneration of her in our own daily lives. The Virgin Mary has been a divine muse for artists, musicians, composers of hymns, sculptors and architects throughout ancient and modern Christianity. Non-Catholics have often accused the Roman Church of "loving Mary too much": deifying her in fact. However, now that I'm no longer the awestruck child with an armful of unruly roses, I appreciate that most Catholics feel a strong personal relationship to Mary because of her essential humanity; she is effectively, mother to all. As a woman, I also feel that Mary is Eve redeemed; femininity and loveliness without treachery, artifice or blemish. We feel that Mary is our intercessor, "Our Lady": when something seems too trivial to place directly before God, Mary is there to support us through our trials and irritations and small but poignant hurts. Just as a child might run to a mother for comfort with a grazed knee, we feel Mary is accessible in this way. The emphasis is actually on her being fully human rather than any notion of deity. She is a figure of warm hope, sympathy and compassion.
Mary's selflessness and compassion as a human being are seen as ultimate. She acceded to God's wishes; a bewildered and guileless young girl, at a time when being an unmarried mother could have catastrophic consequences. Later, this very real mother would willingly sacrifice her child for the fulfilment of the scriptures and, therefore, our own. In a very practical sense, Mary supports the role of women in what is all too often viewed as a patriarchal "firm". Although Mary obeyed the word of God without question, I've never thought of her as subservient. She may be a vessel without sin, but she is far from empty: "full of grace", she is the embodiment of God's love at work in us, she gives birth to Christianity and Catholicism. Far from dismissing her as a meek, blindly following virgin, I rather believe she was only too aware of the enormity of what was before her and what would come after. Her selflessness actually required courage and resolve: this combined with her immense tenderness makes her uniquely powerful and important within our faith.
The Catholic priest, Trappist monk and poet Thomas Merton wrote many devotional Marian poems, although he felt that her greatest glory was her "nothingness": I love that he compares her freedom from all egotism to the purest glass of the cleanest window, but I've always felt that Mary the woman and mother had a great deal of substance to her! I believe that our devotion to Our Lady is flamed by her innate preciousness, which she carried with utter humility: this is what makes her complete. Sadly, I don't have a daughter: if I did, I would be thrilled to see her set aside her magazines of teetering, collagen-tampered WAGS and wannabes to don a blue sash for a real Lady.
"Mare Mia" Diana Navarro
"Because my will is as simple as a window
And knows no pride of original birth,
It is my life to die, like glass, by light:
Slain in the strong rays of the bridegroom sun."
("The Blessed Virgin Mary Compared to a Window" Thomas Merton)
This little blog is now six months old - give or take a few hours, a couple of expletives and some typos. Sitting up and rolling about a bit, grumpy with teething problems and probably needing to be winded; my little blog is on it's way to becoming a toddler.
No-one is more surprised than me that it's just notched up 8,000 page views, although many may have stumbled on it whilst looking for something else! I already know that somebody landed on it while they were looking for a Brighton teashop; I love teashops and Brighton, so this seems quite reasonable to me.
I hope some of you who didn't really intend to be here will come back. I do believe it does what it says on the tin: I am a slightly quirky Catholic woman living by the sea who scribbles poems, loves treacle tart and sometimes gets quite ratty about a variety of things. Your comments, stories and humour are also very welcome.
There are several stunning versions of the traditional song "The Water is Wide" and I thought it was time to share another. The performance in celebration of Pete Seeger's 90th birthday, at Madison Square Garden in 2007, featured the sublime Emmylou Harris, Teddy Thompson, Martha and Rufus Wainwright, The McGarrigle Sisters and James Taylor...
"As the family goes, so goes the nation and so goes the whole world in which we live."
(Pope John Paul II)
"Know you what it is to be a child? It is to be something very different from the man of today. It is to have a spirit yet streaming from the waters of baptism; it is to believe in love, to believe in loveliness, to believe in belief"
(Francis Thompson)
I wanted write something respectfully dedicated to the memory of Tia Sharp and all the children who have suffered physically, mentally or emotionally at the hands of those they should have been most able to trust. A couple of people have warned me off doing this, particularly as those charged with or bailed on suspicion of Tia's murder must be afforded the due process of the legal system. But one thing is irrefutably clear at this stage: the death of twelve year old Tia was concealed by members of her own family. When I read that Tia's mother had been told her own mother was implicated in Tia's murder, I wanted to weep for her.
I was very fortunate: I had both my parents until I was sixteen and my mother lived through to her late eighties. My Dad was very much a father-figure and I was still my Mum's "baby" even when she herself needed cajoling to eat and support to get to the bathroom. Whatever the political, social or even geographical distances between my only sister and myself, we are bound together as "family" due to my parents' devotion to each other and to us.
Sociologists will tell you that, in human terms, a family is basically a group of people linked by consanguinity, affinity or even co-residence. In many societies, it's the principle institution for the socialisation of children. Cloning aside, we are unable to choose our families as we do our friends: close ties formed voluntarily and independently can often prove stronger than blood.However, when affinities are cultivated within domestic familiarity but without Nature's biological safeguarding, the picture can sometimes become very distorted. Today, there is an apparent disintegration of the traditionally structured family: due to the devaluation of marriage and longterm, formal partnerships, the kind of procreational vagrancy that seems to permeate some sectors of society, and the horribly premature sexualisation of children. Tia's grandmother was pregnant with Tia's mother when she was only two years older than the tragic schoolgirl at the time of her death. When I was 14, I was dreaming about ballet and still plaiting my hair everyday.
Recent research in the United States has estimated that from the year 2000, there would be more "step-families" across America than traditional nuclear ones; one in every three Americans would have step siblings or parents. I have no wish to offend anyone whose family is comprised of "step" or "half" relatives; I have several friends in such situations where the well being of all the children is paramount and where love and respect are natural perimeters. Yet it's alien for me to grasp how Tia's mother could accept her own ex-partner, the now-accused Stuart Hazell, as her current step-dad; or indeed for Tia to suddenly view her mother's former partner as her new step-grandfather. One of my friends recently explained to her son that they were going to meet his "new Daddy", to which he smartly replied: "How did he get to be my Daddy without me knowing anything about it?"
I recently asked a Catholic priest if I should invite some people who were in need stay in my home, knowing that they would be unlikely to respect my privacy and property or the sacredness of my late parents' things. I admit that I was devastated when he suggested this was the ideal, God-given opportunity to throw open my front door as well as my heart. I was relieved when another priest, who I consider to be a friend, advised that it wasn't uncharitable to protect my home if I felt at all unsafe. God doesn't want us to be capricious about who we invite into our homes or our hearts. He bids us to respect and cherish the precious gifts He's given us, to keep them safe; nothing can be more precious than the innocence of a child.
"Innocence is lucky if it finds the same protection as guilt."
"So hand in hand they passed, the loveliest pair that ever since in love's embraces met -- Adam, the goodliest man of men since born his sons; the fairest of her daughters Eve."
("Paradise Lost" John Milton)
Thank you to John Richardson from Australia for the following facts about the amazing human body, with the additional "Adam&Eve-it" from Tilly!
It takes your food seven seconds to get from your mouth to your stomach.
One human hair can support 6.6 pounds.
The average man's penis is two times the length of his thumb.
Human thighbones are stronger than concrete.
A woman's heart beats faster than a man's.
There are about one trillion bacteria on each of your feet.
Women blink twice as often as men.
The average person's skin weighs twice as much as the brain.
Your body uses three hundred muscles to balance itself when you are standing still.
If saliva cannot dissolve something, you cannot taste it.
Women will be finished reading this by now. Men are still busy checking their thumbs.
"Because God took one look at Adam and said, 'Wow. This guy's gonna need all the help he can get.' And here we are."
(Nancy Mehl)
"Ever since Eve started it all by offering Adam the apple, woman's punishment has been to supply a man with food then suffer the consequences when it disagrees with him."
(Helen Rowland)
"If Adam and Eve were not hunter-gatherers, then they were certainly gatherers. But, then, consumer desire, or self-embitterment, or the 'itch,' as Schopenhauer called it, appeared in the shape of the serpent. This capitalistic monster awakens in Adam and Eve the possibility that things could be better. Instantly, they are cast out of the garden and condemned to a life of toil, drudgery, and pain. Wants supplanted needs, and things have been going downhill ever since. " ("The Freedom Manifesto" Tom Hodgkinson)
Today is the Christian feast of the Transfiguration of Christ: the Transfiguration was a pivotal event where flesh and blood and human nature were seen to combine with God, with Jesus Himself bridging heaven and earth. The Transfiguration is also one of the major milestones in the Gospel narrative of Jesus' life, included with His Baptism, Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension. The transfiguration of Jesus, traditionally on Mount Tabor in Israel, into a being of blazing light and translucence has been seen as a confirmation of Jesus as the Messiah and also of the truth of a living God. It may also be viewed, now as then, in anticipation of resurrection. Malcolm Guite has written a simple but emphatic poem about "the sudden blaze of long extinguished hope".
"Of the thousands of others, nearer the centre of the explosion, there was no trace. They vanished. The theory in Hiroshima is that the atomic heat was so great that they burned instantly to ashes - except that there were no ashes."
(Wilfred Burchett, Australian journalist; the first to enter Hiroshima after the bomb, on 2nd September 1945)
Today we also commemorate Hiroshima Day, when flesh and blood and human nature decided to assume the role of an aggressive and violent god. President Truman ordered atomic bombs to be dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on 6th and 9th August 1945 respectively. He later publicly regretted the loss of civilian life, still maintaining that Hiroshima was a key Japanese military target - it wasn't. He went on to state that: "When you have to deal with a beast you have to treat him as a beast." Unfortunately, the collective "beast" in August 1945 proved to be hundreds of thousands of civilian men, women and children. To all those who defend the use of atomic weapons as a deterrent, I would stress that the real beast of war has raged savagely and undeterred across the continents over the past sixty years or so. The "deterrent" is now cultivated or stockpiled by many potentially volatile forces.
I have no wish to offend anyone reading this, particularly my lovely American friends, but there is now released documented opinion which throws more doubt on the prudence of Truman's decision. The Japanese may have been trying to negotiate a surrender at least a month before the atomic bombings. A feature of any surrender would have had to ensure the safety and retained status of the Japanese emperor, to salvage some "honour" from the situation. This was not agreed and the order to bomb was given. It is a hugely bloody irony and bitter futility that the Emperor's status was indeed preserved as the fatal dust clouds cleared over his shocked nation.
The Reverend Jennifer Phillips wrote a short but powerful Collect for Hiroshima Day and the Transfiguration a couple of years ago; I find her depiction of an "Incendiary God" particularly poignant: He gives us the potential to blaze and we scorch and vaporise in an abuse of glory.
"Collect for the Transfiguration and for Hiroshima Day"
(Rev. Jennifer Phillips)
Incendiary God: In the scalding light of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
"For now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then shall I know even as I am known." (1 Corinthians 13:12)
Mirrors can be funny things sometimes.You often overhear (mainly) women in changing rooms in clothes shops, complaining that mirrors make them look fat, skinny, gawky, just "not like them". Sometimes mirrors distort, more often than not they show us what we don't quite expect to see. I met a mirror the other day that answered me back before I had even said anything.
One afternoon last week, I went for a quick cup of tea in a nice breezy bar in Brighton - most pubs and bars in this city serve tea and coffee all day without the raised eyebrow that would accompany it in London. The bar's been decorated in a pseudo Speakeasy style. This only compounded my surprise when I came out of the Ladies to the washstands and saw that someone had scrawled "At least you are Free" across the central mirror, and therefore also across my midweek, world-weary little face. I think the person, presumably female, had used a kohl or other eyeliner pencil. I wondered what had prompted her to write this. Freedom may seem like a lofty subject for pub-toilet philosophy, although I've learnt that you do tend to encounter a deeper-thinking type of grafitist in Brighton.
I am indeed free. I had been mentally listing my grouches and deficits that day: not merely financial, but the demise of my career in Social Services, my subsequent apparent lack of prospects, my lack of a husband or children, that my little house is deteriorating rather faster than I can fix it, that I am probably deteriorating faster than I can fix me. I may never now get back to Australia, I may never get to do hands-on work with kids, I'm certainly never going to wake up and find I've turned into Kylie Minogue: I may never get to the ball, I may never get the happy-ever-after. I left the word "Free" scrawled on the mirror; yet the insolence of it followed me as I walked back out into the light and airy bar and a welcome day of sunshine in Brighton.
I was devastated when I lost my job in adult Social Services in London. I've worked since I left school and I felt it defined me. Now, I know that no-one should ever be defined by employment: being known by your abilities or gifts is something quite different. If I was still leaving the house before 7am and returning in the dark, I would certainly have a more healthy bank account but my own health would probably have continued to decline alarmingly. I probably wouldn't have discovered just how resilient and canny I can be; the old pots and ornaments in my garden would not be customised; I might not have considered renovating or painting old pieces of furniture; I probably wouldn't have set aside time to customise dresses or jewellery. I might not have collected and sorted through generations of photographs, so that my history decorates my walls. I probably wouldn't have started this blog! Maybe I wouldn't have been so sure that either I or God know the real me. Often, the threat of being released from tried and trusted routines and well known ways of being blinds us to a freedom of opportunity.
My house does indeed still need patching up and nailing down, but it has evidently benefited from a little TLC, and it is very much my home. And having a home, far from being tied to bricks and mortar, gives me immense freedom. It's true that I have no husband or children, but I have friends who I nurture and am nurtured by: even a concerned, caring text can be a dressing for a perceived slight or any feeling of isolation. I may never return to Social Services but if I were ever yet to work with kids, disadvantaged or otherwise, then certainly Brighton is a tarnished mecca for youngsters. I did get to Australia, several times, and the memories I have of there and of the other places I've visited are souvenirs that don't need to be dusted or explained to visitors. I'll never wake up looking like Kylie Minogue, but at least I still wake up in the morning; and hell, even Kylie doesn't wake up looking like Kylie Minogue! Being freed from what you've been tied to before, even ostensibly for your own support, leaves you wobbly; but there's giddiness to it. My happy-ever-after may now never involve forcing my foot into a glass slipper, but that would be darned uncomfortable attire for scampering about on a pebbled beach or pruning the jasmine. The perfect fit is more about sitting easy in the niche you've whittled and finally being comfortable in your own skin. Before, it seemed I didn't have time to see people, to read things, to relax. Now, I might argue that I have the time but not the money; but that isn't relevant at all. There are interesting folk and sights all round me in this city and the library here is one of the coolest places to be. The seagulls ensure that I don't oversleep and I still have two strong legs to get me back at night from the pier in less than half an hour, with a safety that was long-lost to me in south London. Faith brings it's own sense of freedom: I know that where I've walked in error in the past won't condemn me or prevent me from getting to where I need to be, which is waiting for me as it's always been.
You have to recognise freedom in all it's reflections. It isn't always about the largess of tangible struggle; I would never be dismissive or disrespectful enough to claim that this little post was intending to address such struggles. Freedom, like God, can be in the details, the little things. One of my favourite quotes about being free isn't by Martin Luther King, John Kennedy or Nelson Mandela, but from a young, skittish Joni Mitchell:
"I want to have fun, I want to shine like the sun; I want to be the one that you want to see.
I want to knit you a sweater, want to write you a love letter, I want to make you feel better; I want make you feel free."
I hope the bar staff have left that legend on the mirror in the Ladies' loo. I'm pretty sure it will help someone else re-calculate their apparent shortcomings as they wash their hands and blot their lipstick.
On the subject of mirrors, I took two rather nice but surplus-to-requirement mirrors to give to a lovely friend of mine last week. She's a vibrant, pretty and funny young woman, bringing up her children while her young man is imprisoned; awaiting trial for something awful. I share her belief that he is guilty of being with the wrong person in the wrong place but not of what he's been charged with. Her resilience is astounding and her resolve about this situation has been an inspiration to me. John Paul Sartre defined freedom as being able to choose what you do with what's been done to you. I won't name her or her man to preserve their privacy and the children's, but this post was most definitely written with them in mind and in heart.
"For to be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others."
(Nelson Mandela)
"Flashing for the warriors whose strength is not to fight, Flashing for the refugees on the unarmed road of flight, And for each and every underdog soldier in the night We gazed upon the chimes of Freedom flashing." (Bob Dylan)
"The Chimes of Freedom" Bruce Springsteen (version)
"Tolling for the aching ones whose wounds cannot be nursed,
For the countless confused, accused, misused strung-out ones and worse,
And for every hung-up person in the whole wide universe:
"Three things will last forever--faith, hope, and love--and the greatest of these is love."
(1 Corinthians 13:13)
I'm indebted to Chantal for reminding me of the simple energy of Gandhi's Prayer for Peace. Chantal wouldn't mind me saying that she may not be a fan of organised religion but she is an ardent supporter of the power of Spirit, of souls and of angels at work amongst us. Whilst I'm happy to call myself Catholic, I feel fortunate that life has introduced me to good people who are Anglican, C of E, Buddhist, Jewish, Muslim... One of my Brightonian friends, actually a lapsed Roman Catholic, describes himself as a "paranormal physicist wizard"; as comedian Dara O'Briain would say, he might just be seen as a particularly bad Catholic! Echoing another good ol' Oirish comedian, Dave Allen used to say he was "...an atheist, thank God":I have friends who define themselves as "agnostic", but they're loving, hopeful agnostics. Therefore, I cheerfully believe they actually have faith that the proof they feel they need exists. I believe that where there is Love, there will be Hope; where there is Hope there must be Faith.
Remember the old saying that as long as you get to the destination it doesn't matter who's driving the bus? I'm always heartened to see people return or commit to the Catholic Church, but I would also rather live in a city where I can see a spectrum of faiths at work daily, rather than stark disbelief or spiritual atrophy. For me it's simple: if you have faith in the universe, you have faith in God, if you have faith in your fellow man or yourself, you have faith in God. If you have faith in God, by whatever name, we're on Common Ground; fertile, supportive and open to all.
Mahatma Gandhi stated that he believed in the truths of all the great world religions: "All the religions of the world, while they may differ in other respects, unitedly proclaim that nothing lives in this world but Truth". As a committed opponent to the convenience of "communalism", basing political standpoints or initiatives on religious tenets, he was able to reach out to diverse religious groups and gain the audience of the politicians. The name bestowed on him by his supporters, Mahatma, literally means "Great Soul". Gandhi often said he disliked the name: his simplicity was his strength and resolve. Sometimes, labels are merely like washing instructions or a list of ingredients or components: they speak nothing of struggle, joy or worth. Simplicity of purpose and as acceptance can be much maligned in today's world; instead of bemoaning insufficient complexity as though it were embroidery, bask in the clarity and purity. We're all the same in that we're all different: beyond this, further division is obsolete. If I wander into your church to light a candle and you don't recognise me, don't dwell on where I might be from or even where I'm going. Let's just share the warmth of the flame.
"Simple Soul" Eddi Reader
"Out of clutter, find simplicity. From discord, find harmony: in the middle of difficulty lies opportunity".
This post all started with another joke from Leigh of Lymington! A blonde lady arrives at Heaven from Australia. A concerned St Peter meets her at the Pearly Gates.
"I'm so sorry," says St Peter, "but Heaven is suffering from an overload of goodly souls and we have been forced to put up an Entrance Exam for new arrivals".
"That's fine," says the blonde coolly, "What does the Entrance Exam consist of?"
"Just three questions" says St Peter.
"Firstly, which two days of the week start with the letter 'T'? Secondly, how many seconds are there in a year? And thirdly, what was the name of the swag-man in 'Waltzing Matilda'?"
St Peter tells her to go away and think about the answers and wait to be called.
So the blonde goes away and gives the three questions some considerable thought.
The following morning, St Peter calls her to him.
"Well then", says St Peter, "Which two days of the week start with the letter 'T'?"
"Today and Tomorrow" says she.
St Peter ponders for a while and decides that indeed the answer can be applied to the question.
St Peter continues: "How many seconds in a year?"
"Twelve," says she, "the second of January, the second of February, and so on, making a total of twelve!"
Bemused, St Peter shakes his head and says: "I'll allow the answer to stand, but you need to get the third and final question absolutely correct to be allowed into Heaven. Now, can you tell me the name of the swagman in 'Waltzing Matilda'?"
The blonde replies; "Of the three questions, I found this the easiest".
"Really?" exclaims St Peter, "What is the answer?"
"It's Andy," says the blonde triumphantly: " 'Andy sat, Andy watched, Andy waited 'til his billy boiled, Singing Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me?' "
And so the Australian blonde entered Heaven...
As a natural blonde, I can assure you that we lighter haired souls are merely characteristically lacking in eumelanin pigment polymers, not brain cells! As a lover of many-things-Australian including the late, great bush poet Banjo Patterson, I would like to confirm that the swagman in "Waltzing Matilda" actually has no name. The bush ballad was written by Paterson in 1895; the title is Australian slang for travelling on foot, "waltzing", with one's worldly goods in a "Matilda", which is a type of sack bag, slung over one's back. The song is now traditionally belted out at rugby matches and other huge gatherings: it actually narrates a literally haunting tale. A swagman, an itinerant worker in Australia, sits at a watering hole making tea in his billy can when a young sheep stumbles by. He promptly captures it to eat. He's then arrested for the theft and commits suicide, drowning himself in the watering hole; his ghost subsequently haunts the site, calling "Who'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me?" Always fascinating how popular culture is retained but reinvents itself.
Banjo Paterson died in Sydney in 1941; I managed to visit his grave in the northern suburbs of the city on a holiday there a few years ago. "Waltzing Matilda" remains Australia's best known and most widely sung song; frequently referred to as the unofficial Australian national anthem. The title and some of the lyrics are reproduced in "And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda", written by Scottish-Australian singer and songwriter Eric Bogle in 1971: in my opinion one of the most accessible and moving anti-war songs ever written. It describes the experiences of an Australian soldier injured in the devastation at Gallipoli during World War I; it's also been named in Australia's top fifty songs of all time, and The Pogues' version is a true tear jerker.
There are so many rousing versions of "Waltzing Matilda" I would like to recommend, from the late folk singer Slim Dusty to the more recent authentically "waltzing" version by Dutch violinist and conductor Andre Rieu (much loved in Australia). But surely Leigh's joke deserves a touch of Kylie? I love Kylie Minogue: essentially a blonde, modern Aussie icon, she has a naturally sweet sensuality that's very difficult to knock. After one too many Jack Daniels and cokes (which is actually only two), I have been known to go into Kylie Minogue mode, complete with little dance routines; possibly best left for another post. The clip here is from the opening ceremony of the Sydney Paralypmics in 2000, still five years before her own gutsy battle with cancer.
There: I knew there must be a way to get Kylie Minogue, Banjo Paterson, The Pogues and St Peter into my blog!
"Waltzing Matilda" Kylie Minogue at the Sydney 2000 Paralympics
"Change your opinions, keep to your principles; change your leaves, keep to your roots"
(Victor Hugo)
For a quiet man of small physical stature, my Dad had a big, raucous laugh, ala Sid James in fact. I've inherited this sudden and often totally unsolicited guffaw: my poor Mum would frequently choke on her veggie lasagna when something random had suddenly tickled me. My Dad also had a big heart, a great wit and a vast conscience. Today would have been his birthday: he would now be quite an old man if he hadn't died a relatively young one. I watched my Mum weather the seasons of her life, but to me my Dad remains a man in his prime, looking out for us. He died unexpectedly and quickly just a month after my sixteenth birthday; I've been without him for more years than I physically "knew" him, but I feel my Dad's presence grows stronger each year as I grow more accepting of myself.
I share Dad's sense of humour and of the absurd; watching clips of Dave Allen or early Billy Connolly, I can hear Dad's belly laugh clearly. For the black sheep of a wealthy conservative Belgian hierarchy, he had a fine collection of Irish rebel songs and socialist literature. Quiet time in his study was for poetry and his beloved Gregorian chant. All these things now have their place in my home and in my heart. I fancy that I share his affinity with animals, although I'm a veggie and Dad would always readily tuck into a rare steak like a true blood Belgian. I've most definitely inherited his love of food; the cooking and the eating of it. Chips with real mayonnaise, homemade soups and dark chocolate... possibly not all at the same time, unless it's been a particularly trying day.
My Dad was rather partial to Brigitte Bardot, Bernadette Devlin (McAliskey), Agnetha from Abba, Mother Teresa and Nana Mouskouri: he maintained that Mum was everything he'd looked for in a woman! I now see my Dad as a wonderful blend of Hercule Poirot, Jack Lemon and more than a dash of Desmond Tutu: in fact Dad helped Bishop Tutu improve his French when he stayed in South London; Dad said he was one of the naughtiest adult pupils he'd ever taught; they got on brilliantly. For all my inherent Irishness, my mother's colouring and many of her traits, I see more of Dad in me with each passing year. To Dad, I owe my sense of injustice but also my faith, most of my political leanings and some little eccentricities that even I find amusing. Now that the old family house is long sold, it's probably safe to admit that Dad did all the electrical wiring himself with a book from the library and a lot of expletives; I've just proudly packed a hole in my old lathe and plaster wall with papier mache whilst singing along to Lady Gaga.
I acknowledge all this with delighted surprise and a huge sense of comfort. I've often said that Mum was my anchor and Dad my compass in life. My mother was initially dismayed that I seem to have inherited her own mother's Celtic "spookiness", but it rests easily with Dad's very earthed spirituality. My father's Catholicism was devout but still somewhat customised! As a man who'd wanted to become a monk before he met my mother, he would rattle off letters to The Catholic Herald about the viability of clerical celibacy long before it became "fashionable" to do so. Yet he would still place causes before the saints, taking us on annual family holidays to Our Lady's shrine at Banneux near his hometown of Liege in the hope of curing my sister's chronic bronchitis and later my dreadful short-sightedness. My sister's bronchial troubles did indeed clear up suddenly one year, never to return. For my own part, one of my eyes mysteriously converted to long-sight while the other is still steadfastly near-focused: trying to identify the number of any approaching bus is always a bugger of a job for me.
Whenever I did something beyond her ken, Mum would tut that I was my father's daughter alright: now, I know that she said it with bemusement but also affection. I used to say that I was at that surly, unsure age when Dad died and that he was just getting to know me as person. I felt very robbed. All these years later, I feel I truly know my father; I hope he likes me. The echo of the quiet man is a fine act to follow.
"...in history, where goodness is a rare pearl, he who was good can take precedence over he who was great"
(Victor Hugo)
"Kyrie Eleison" The Benedictine Monks of Santo Domingo de Silos
