Early Warning System

I'm currently reading Marcus Berkmann's "A Shed of ones Own" - Brilliant - very well observed & written. Very funny too.

One of his ideas which caught my fancy is that we oldies of middle age & above are an early warning system for the young. We tread the path which awaits them & could, if asked, give them pointers of what to expect & what to avoid. We have gone through the conveyor belt of life, & although we haven't quite reached the endgame & seen the bright shining light at the end of the tunnel, we have experienced most things. We know what getting "past your sell by date" really means.

We understand that we cannot control the deterioration of mind & body, although some of us do try, in varying degrees, and at huge variation in cost, both in time & money terms. I don't think this is the time or place to burden you with too much detail. If you want to know, you have only to post. It just seems a pity that the huge resource of age isn't recognised & utilised more. 

Ageing is, like so many things, something which each generation avoids until it's too late & seems to imagine won't happen to them in the same way it has happened to their parents. Sorry - Wrong. Broadly speaking, it will be identical. However, much like having children, I think that if you knew what you were in for, you would probably avoid it at all costs. Indeed, there is an argument for being able to get off the conveyor belt when the going gets too tough.

But, again like procreation, the drive to live is very strong. So most of us potter on to the bitter end in varying degrees of happiness & comfort. For most of us the physical & mental decline is slow & symbiotic. So, hopefully, we become less & less aware of what we can't do anymore.

We are the silent, grey, majority & we are multiplying. So beware!

Nepal - Tickets.

The tickets and info about the taxi pick up arrived this morning. So it's really happening. Can't quite believe I'm doing this, given all the reasons why I shouldn't. I've just realised that I've unconsciously been sorting out my life in case I don't come back in one piece! I've sorted out my Tax and Lasting Power of Attorney. I've left detailed information for my daughter in a "Life Book". I've arranged direct debits for my credit cards & got enough pills & prescriptions for all my meds.

On a lighter note I'm in contact with the other two women who are going to Samata school as well & the one who will work in Naxal orphanage. Four middle aged women setting off into the unknown as volunteers. It is quite remarkable really. I wonder how much we have in common apart from age & an obvious intrepid spirit & wish to do something meaningful. So far the common theme from us all, as well as volunteers who went before us, is how poor the communication has been from Saga's Charitable Trust which operates this placement. It feels as if we have had to keep asking questions & prodding action.

I now suspect that this might be a box ticking enterprise by Saga. The big clue was when we sent off the visa form & were told to put holiday not volunteering. I will be disappointed if our skills aren't utilised properly. It has been difficult to prepare for the actual work in the absence of a reasonable amount of information about the facilities & set up of the school & orphanage. Looking at emails & blogs from previous volunteers they don't seem to have been too impressed with how their placements worked in practice either. Maybe that's something I can do, suggest what could go in a proper briefing pack for volunteers.

Three weeks tomorrow I'll be setting off - How exciting is that. 

Computer Life

My computer contains my life & is my life line. I can remember being very scathing about how pointless & time wasting a computer was. Now I doubt I could function without it. I have a desktop, a laptop & a Tab!

I keep in touch with friends & family via email. I blog regularly - Blogging has kept me sane since my husband died. I don't actually care if anyone reads my blog, although amazing numbers of people do. I do it because I spend long periods on my own & I'm an opinionated person without anyone to share my thoughts with. When I'm gone there will be a permanent record of my views on almost any subject for posterity! Communicating is important. I'd rather have someone to talk to & share ideas with, but the reality is I don't. So I blog.

I use my computer for research a lot. I can sit at my desk & find out about almost anything. You just have to be careful about the reliability of the source. I book holidays on the computer. It's especially good for booking independent holidays & checking out hotels & transport. I buy clothes, books, presents all sorts of things from the internet & don't have the nausea of actually shopping. I also don't have to schlep into town & queue in a bank anymore - I do all my banking on line. I've also sold stuff on Ebay. When I'm really decrepit I won't starve to death because I can order food from a supermarket & get it delivered.

I catch up with TV I've missed on my computer & download music to my MP3. I also download my photos & photoshop them. There are probably lots of other ways I could be using it, but I haven't discovered them yet. I also haven't yet got to the watershed of boredom where I am prepared to play games on my computer & I certainly haven't tried internet dating!

I love my computer. It's always ready to play. It doesn't answer back. It keeps my brain active, but probably hasn't improved my backside! It does have tantrums occasionally, but I have the lovely Steve at my beck and call & he always gets it back on the straight & narrow. I do probably waste time on my computer, but that's something I've got plenty of.

To Be The Best

I have always been competitive & driven. I was incapable of doing anything half heartedly, I always did my best. Without fail. Whatever it was. I think I always felt that I was good at what I did, whatever that happened to be. The cockiness of youth maybe.

So, at school I was a Senior Prefect and House Captain. When I started teaching I was never satisfied with being just a class teacher. I systematically went for promotion & always knew I wanted to be a Head. Arrogantly, I did actually think that I could be a better Head than any of the Heads I worked for. For a huge part of life I achieved everything I set out to do and never experienced failure.

I still believe that I can achieve anything I set my mind to do. Even now when I am swimming lengths I do actually compete with the person in the next lane! How sad is that.

There is a price to pay for trying to be the best if you are comparing yourself to others or trying to meet the standards & demands of someone else. In my case my mother, who never seemed satisfied with anything I achieved. I paid a high price in terms of the chronic health problems I now have.

So what best does it mean to be the best? With the experience of life & age now I think that it just means to be the best human being I can be now. Never mind what anyone else is doing. Never mind if I fail, so long as I have tried & so long as the goal was realistic & worthwhile. I do now accept that I may well fail, because I don't have the same capacities as I used to. I also finally recognise that failures usually actually teach you something.

We humans need a goal, something to aim for. Challenges often bring out the best in us. We rise to the occasion or the expectation. The Olympics have been a prime example of that. But we can't all be Olympic athletes, we need to make our goals achievable.

Wouldn't the world be a wonderful place if we simply all tried to be the best person that we can be?

The Elasticity of Time

There are times of day I really enjoy - going to bed knowing I have a good book to read, going for a swim first thing in the morning & knowing that however awful I felt on waking, I will be revived & ready to face the day, for example. There are also times I dislike - first awaking & wondering what the point of getting up is going to be, eating solitary meals.

When you live alone you become very aware of time. Sometimes, if you don't have anything in particular to fill the time, you are almost aware of every minute that passes. Other times your "to do" list is so long you simply don't think you can fit it all into the time available.

I have always been active & busy. Now that is constrained by physical limitations, so there are things I can't do anymore. But I need to feel there is some point to my existence. I need to feel that I have achieved something each day. I also enjoy meeting friends & good conversation.

I watched a TV programme about the isolated & lonely elderly & it brought home to me how easy it must be to go out less. To become a virtual recluse in your own home. To have eons of time stretching before you with nothing particular to do & no one to talk to. Unless you have huge inner resources that must be a slow living death. Perhaps we should all make a little more effort to interact with lonely people we know.

It takes quite a lot of effort to go out, to engage with other people, to be interested in other people's lives. It's also quite daunting to do things on my own when I have been used to being part of a couple. But if I don't continue to make that effort I will lose contact with people & I too will become isolated.

Variety is the key I suppose - some time enjoying the peace of being alone & choosing exactly what I do or don't do. Some time enjoying the company of friends & neighbours & doing things together. When time hangs heavy I just need to remind myself how blessed I am to not be struggling simply to live.

Olympic Legacy

I have come through the last fortnight without watching any of the Olympics apart from the news. You couldn't avoid it there. This isn't going to be a gripe or a rant though.

My belief in the basic goodness of the human spirit has been reinforced over and over again by everyone taking part in any way whatsoever. The athletes deserved the cheers & encouragement & medals if they were lucky. Their effort and dedication puts most of us to shame. The organisers delivered a stunning location & largely glitch free infrastructure. I can't begin to grasp the complexity of the organisation & the number of people involved. The thousands of helpful & cheerful volunteers proved that not everyone looks for monetary reward or kudos of some sort. They did it simply because they wanted to contribute & take part. Finally the crowds of supporters - as far as I could see good humour prevailed. No fights, no drunkeness, not even any pushing & shoving. Just simple enjoyment & evenhandedly cheering the winners & the losers.

It is just so refreshing amidst the continuing news of financial wrongdoing & greed resulting in almost meltdown of the entire system. It's so different to the self aggrandisment & colossal over remuneration of people like footballers, "celebrities" & bankers. Hooliganism at football matches & bad behaviour by so called "role models" off the pitch couldn't be more different than the behaviour of all the athletes.

For a "buttoned down" nation we proudly wore our hearts on our sleeves. I thought it was really refreshing to see such genuine emotion on the faces of so many - athletes & onlookers alike. We shared in the victories & defeats & we admired the effort. Most of us knew that we couldn't aspire to reach the heights of skill displayed, but we wanted the athletes to know that it truly was the taking part that mattered.

In our generally negative news media there was a universal celebration of good news, apart from the glitch in the first week before the medals started rolling in. I suppose old habits die hard. Let's hope it lasts. Let's hope that in future there is a better balance between good and bad news. We should celebrate good news as well as be well informed about bad. Good news obviously does sell newspapers - hopefully the media moguls will remember that.

Infidelity - Unfaithfulness - Current Partnerships.

Interestingly, different names for the same thing & I think the meaning changes subtly according to which you use. Infidelity to me is definitely about actions & sexual betrayal. Unfaithfulness can cover much more - I do think you can be unfaithful in thought as well as deed. The modern euphemism, current partnerships, seems to imply all sorts of loose & varying relationships & is much less perjorative than either of the others. It seems to allow many different liasons at the same time, including sexual ones.

I have never believed that there is only one person that you can have a deep and meaningful relationship with. Given the world population there must be many people you could fall in love with & have a lasting relationship with. It's only the long term success of that relationship which varies. Being "in love" is very different to loving someone. I doubt the former can be maintained over a long period, whereas the latter can. The main point of a long term, stable, realtionship between a man & a woman is to procreate & rear children in an optimum environment. We are animals & that is what we have been programmed to do.

The question is how much does it matter whatever you call it? I think it does, but I imagine that is quite old fashioned to many younger people. One of the reasons I think it matters is because of the harm it does to the people within a broken relationship. Even the adults may have their confidence destroyed. Worse than that though, the children will almost inevitably be unable to really understand & will suffer divided loyalties & their world turned upside down. Some separating parents handle things extremely well, but many don't & let their own emotions dominate.

We have enormous freedoms in our society today. People can, by an large, chose to work, to have children, to marry, to separate & divorce. The worrying thing to my mind is the seeming lack of real understanding of or caring about the consequences of actions for everyone involved & our permissive attitude to some basically selfish behaviour. Although everyone can make a mistake and should be able to learn from it and move on.

I just think that we should take more responsibility. Being faithful is important, not just to our partners, but also to our family & friends. I also think we should be faithful to a moral code of behaviour which allows people to live together in harmony in a society. We are losing that worldwide.