Issue 118
I promise to go wandering (part 5)
Ian had called and suggested that an outing would be very lovely indeed, so I arrived at his home with my little map only partly coloured in. In a way, the delicious anticipation of deciding where we could go was almost as good as the going itself.
By Matilda Mother
Good Housekeeping
"Dear Emily, we need you to help the people of the world come together and...yadda yadda blah blah blah..". She'd scrubbed Ronan pretty hard, but he still had the word "come" on his upper torso, and she didn't like the unpleasant connotations.
By Ian Anscombe
Christmas Haircut
It was early evening, and all was well with the world. The girl had given me my food, then she had give me some of her food, and then I had rolled over and over on the carpet and to show her how happy was, and I was all ready for a quiet evening tearing apart my favourite toy.
By Belle
Here is the news - but where did it come from?
Many journalists and reporters are also so heavily briefed by government and military press officers that they start to see the government or military line as the objective , balanced one.
By Duncan McFarlane
Record review : Interstellar Autumn - The Chemistry Experiment
the luscious flutes, interlaced with dramatic strings sweeping and gliding and interweaving melodies that tug on your heartstrings and match the pained, regret laden lyrics do perfectly, and the timing of the release is perfect
By Johnny Mac
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I Promise to go wandering
Part 5
part 1 ¦¦ part 2¦¦ part 3¦¦ part 4
If I wrote out these adventures sequentially, you’d have a load of stories about going to work all over the Yule holidays and that would never do. So, instead, let’s return to Lughnasadh and one of the nights that, of all these wanderings, I count as amongst the most special.
Ian had called and suggested that an outing would be very lovely indeed, so I arrived at his home with my little map only partly coloured in. In a way, the delicious anticipation of deciding where we could go was almost as good as the going itself. It literally could have been east, south, west or north and neither one of us had a preference. I loved that feeling, that before this day was done, I could either be looking at sea or mountain or urban streets, anywhere in England or Wales. We noticed Berkshire sitting there unvisited, home of our friend Bobster, from Between Planets, so it came down to him. If he was free to play, we would visit him; if not, we’d disdain the south completely. I think that either the Welsh Valleys or Yorkshire were in the frame for a plan B.
Berkshire, Swans and a Festival.
It took a surprisingly short amount of time to reach Reading. I always imagined Reading to be about five hours away, across a dimension or something, but an hour and half after setting out, we were surprised mid-cant about the complexities of Buddhism by a sign informing us that we’d arrived.
There was something very… Wolverhampton… about Reading. The High Street is like any British High Street anywhere, entrance to the shopping centre, usual suspects on the shops. But there’s only been Cardiff and Reading that made me wonder if I’d actually gone anywhere, despite the distance travelled. One of these shops was the massive John Lewis store, which was significant, because it was here where the lovely Bob was meeting us… ages ago. We’d strayed and found an alley to explore before the ‘phone rang to find out where we were. Before Ian could shepherd me back to the front of the store, I saw the man himself and ran for a hug. The John Lewis store is HUGE. He was standing at one entrance and we’d been at the other, looking out for each other! LOL
Hugs done, we went for a tour of the city. There was the park with the huge lion (sculptor committed suicide when he realized that the lion couldn’t have stood in life, the way he’d created its stance) and the place where the lovers loved and the druggies drugged. There were also the ruins of an abbey, which we were inspecting quite merrily, though perhaps a little curiously at the sudden plethora of people in Regency costume. They didn’t look like ghosts. It turned out that we’d wandered backstage at an open air performance of ‘Romeo and Juliet’ and they were starting to suss that we weren’t part of the cast. Fortunately, we managed not to step onstage, which is a blessing, as I can only remember bits of that play off by heart, ‘I see you have met Queen Mab?’ ‘Who is she?’ ‘She is the fairies’ midwife…’ and all that. We hurried on.
You know how there are some things that you know individually without ever having put the two together? I had that around the time that Bob was introducing us to the Oscar Wilde Memorial Walk,
…I never saw a man who looked
With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
Which prisoners call the sky,
And at every wandering cloud that trailed
Its ravelled fleeces by.
~ ‘The Ballad of Reading Goal’ by Oscar Wilde…
It was starting to rain by now, only lightly, but enough to have us looking in pubs. Several were inspected and rejected, until I realized that they were looking for one in which I could smoke! That was so sweet of them both. We ended up not in a pub at all, but in a café owned by one of the stalls that turn up at the Glastonbury Festival every year, whose name I will recall any minute now… The menu promised Belgian Waffles! I’d been craving Belgian Waffles since that very same festival two months before. It had become a mission then, as I was thwarted at the 11th hour by them running out, so we all cheered as I finally got to get some… ish… The waitress returned five minutes later to tell me that they’d run out too. *sniff*
From the café, it was decided that Berkshire had been significantly got, but it was still early and there are many counties bordering it. Hampshire looked significantly big, so we could just cut across the border, have a pint in the nearest pub and there would be two done. Instead, we drove around for a bit, utterly lost, until we found ourselves in a business park that Bob recognized as near Reading again. One big circle! But enjoyably done. He suggested a walk up the Thames instead.
This surprised me. I didn’t realize that the Thames was anywhere else but Kent, London, those sorts of counties. He reliably informed me that not only did it cut through Berkshire too, but, as the crow flies, they aren’t a million miles from London. More surprises awaited down the sedate river; first a massive squall of swans going completely yampy as a huge boat turned around. It looked like one of those steamboats you see in films set on the Mississippi river, so I was impressed. The swans however weren’t. There were hundreds of them chasing it or swimming in protest around it, until it turned and went on its way. Then silence, the swans gracefully retreating. Surprise number two was much bigger. No-one had mentioned that there was a sodding great festival going on beside the river! It was Womad and we could peer across, from our vantage point, seeing the flags and marquee tops so beloved of our June days. It wasn’t sad, it was almost like being there, particularly since that stretch of the river bank was dotted here and there with street performers, jugglers and all the people you’d find in some far-flung field of any festival. We settled into festival mode again, meandering up amongst them, being there.
Eventually though, all things end and, as we weren’t staying and it was knocking on 3 am, we slowly made our way back to the car. We dropped Bob off and thought that we were going home.
We were, indirectly.
Bedfordshire and the Green Man
Ink polaroid:
The pre-dawn dusk lightens the countryside imperceptively, but the chorus of the birds can't be heard over the hum of the car. Ian turns to me and asks, 'What is the difference between the Green Man and Herne the Hunter?' I tell him that the Green Man is the natural world personified, while Herne is human beings as part of that world, but in our wildest aspect. In Herne, we too are animals, stripped of the veneer of civilization (which we foolishly think makes the distinction between them and us). We drive on.
We enter Woburn, a village still sleeping, and the dawn is almost upon us, unseen through a cloud grey sky. Stretching our legs - doing something 'significant' in order to colour in the county of Bedfordshire on our map of counties visited - we cross to Mary's Church, discussing Mary the Mother, Mary the Goddess, and compassion. Encircling the church, we notice that the battlements of the tower have a figure at their four corners - a life-sized Pan... or the devil, maybe. Ian remembers a promise made to Pan, at his temple in Greece. We dance, singing softly 'The Lord of the Dance'. 'Can you do a jig?' asks Ian; 'Yes', I reply, but in trying I'm losing too many things from pockets and bag. I stop instead, looking back, and realize that the watching Pan is framed now by a Yew tree's branches. I click to take my photograph just as a raven flies through the scene.
We drive on, down the road towards Woburn Abbey, still singing 'Lord of the Dance' to the awakening world. A corner, a gasp, as a tiny deer starts at our appearance and leaps off into the hedgerow. Ian and I stare with incredulous eyes at the beautiful creature and at each other. Green Man, Herne, Pan and now the doe. It seemed to settle it. Whatever 'it' was. We drive on, 20 or 30 yards at most and stop. Eyes wide. Staring. The landscape has opened out on both sides, a broad plateau of grass, and upon it are 100s of stags. 300... 400... their antlers rising a foot above their heads. A handful in the road before us or standing at its edges.
Long minutes pass in awed disbelief, photoing more for evidence when this story gets told than anything else, but mostly watching with the song ringing through our minds. Wondering.
We carry on along the road and, after a few minutes, I say, 'By the way, happy Lughnasadh.' And something in my heart is dancing its jig.
I could tell you about Northamptonshire as well, as we ‘got’ that county too that dawn, but there’s more Northamptonshire to come, with charging bulls and all, so I’ll tell it all together another day.
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Good Housekeeping
Emily had hoped the phone would stop before she got to it.
".....Emily?"
"Yes."
".....Emily Wright?"
Why did he do this every time? He knew it was her. What's more, he knew she'd know he knew it was her. Or something.
She took a deep sigh, and sipped her Ovaltine.
"Its....Kofi.....Kofi Annan."
"I know. Not today, thank you.".
She removed the phone line from the socket. A Coronation Street triple bill. She didn't want to be disturbed, and she knew he'd persist. He'd had to, in his time. She wanted a quiet night and a long sleep. Aware that this wasn't going to happen, she'd settle for being left alone to find out the secret to Deirdre Barlow's mysterious rash.
Of course, it wasn't that easy. She knew someone had been in her house this morning. It wasn't just the way her "Forever Friends" Calendar and Snoopy slippers had mysteriously vanished.. in fact, that was a minor annoyance in comparison. It was another bloody message from the Dalai Llama that was the problem. Particularly given that he had scrawled it over Ronan Keating's nipple.
Not the real Ronan Keating, sadly. She'd known they could never be together. But she treasured her life-sized cut-out and kissed it every night. It wasn't the same when some representative-of-divinity-on-Earth had scrawled all over it in green pen (why always green pen? She wished he'd try and be more conventional).
"Dear Emily, we need you to help the people of the world come together and...yadda yadda blah blah blah..". She'd scrubbed Ronan pretty hard, but he still had the word "come" on his upper torso, and she didn't like the unpleasant connotations.
She hadn't noticed the television until now, lying on the floor. Of course, they'd left a note. A mistake, apparently. They had been overwhelmed with the beauty of her spirit that exuded every corner of her dwelling, so they said.
The honesty annoyed her. Why did they have to be so damn reasonable about everything? They had replaced it with a golden statue of the Buddha, twelve feet in total, but how this was supposed to allow her to watch Will and Grace re-runs was beyond her. And without them her night felt empty, devoid of purpose, somehow. She'd have to work hard at avoiding thinking about things tonight. Tomorrow, she'd get the man at Rediffusion to drop another one off. They were pretty understanding, knowing how things were.
Still, at least there was this month's Good Housekeeping. A recipe for upside-down cake. It all seemed so pleasing, and so simple. She sank into the sofa and felt the quietness, sneaking on her and enveloping her until she felt warm and her eyelids drooped and..
Jesus appeared before her.
Not again.
"I'm sorry, but I'm busy tonight. I just want to be left alone. I have a long day at Marks and Spencer tomorrow and I'm going to need some rest"
He smiled, in a manner she assumed would be described as beatific.. although she didn't quite know what that meant. He didn't speak, just stood there in front of her, beams of love and compassion flowing from the Sacred Heart.
It bugged her.
"Look...what? Just get it over with, I'm reading about Jane Asher's lovely hair."
He smiled again. A ray of infinite peace bounced off her fireplace and hit her. She tutted and wiped her cardigan.
"Emily... you have a precious gift..."
"So they keep telling me. Is this going to take long??"
"We need you. The world needs you. Only you can save them."
"Look, Jesus, don't misunderstand me. Of all the Biblical sorts, I like you. I used to go to Church every week until the statues started moving. You're so much more sensible and...clean than some of the lot I get visiting me. Especially the Greeks. It took me three runs with the Dyson to get the stains out of the carpet after they'd gone back to Mount Olympus. It is nice when you come and visit, especially when you bring your mother, but you can't just drop by unannounced."
A smile. More beatificness.
"So..if you don't mind, me and Delia Smith have an appointment."
"Delia..... Smi...who?"
"A new form of divinity. She bakes cakes, and is very powerful."
"Emily, I've warned you against dabbling in cults.."
She sighed. He obviously wasn't going to go away. "Would you like a cup of tea, Jesus? I've got herbal, if you prefer."
A nod. Emily briefly considered giving him the nice biscuits, before dismissing the idea. Hobnobs would only encourage him to stay. She put a couple of custard creams on a saucer, sighing as she stirred his nettle tea. She sniffed, and pulled a face, hoping he wouldn't turn it into wine again. He always got maudlin when he drank wine. Said it reminded him of old friends.
Then, remembering, she reproved herself. In the back of the cupboard was a box of Mr. Kipling's French Fancies She had been saving it for a special occasion, but this probably counted.
He picked at the lemon fondant with a quizzical expression. On reflection, she regretted the musical candles- but he seemed to like them.
"What's this tune?" with a smile.
"Its...erm...the BeeGees..... they were a disco band in the.." She let it tail off, knowing he'd be up, and flicking through her CD collection given half a chance. Allowing him to gyrate around the room to "Stayin' Alive" wasn't conducive to her getting an early night. She'd made that mistake with Gloria Gaynor.
She smiled at the Son of Man, wishing he'd finish his cake and leave.
"Look, Jesus, Happy Birthday and stuff, but it really isn't a good time."
He was licking the squidgy bit from the top of the cake.. "No, it never is.... " A smile, and a flash of the halo-
"Did you get me a present?"
"Err...." She looked down at her Tote's Toasties, feeling a little bad, knowing he'd be hard to get rid of now. Change the subject, then.
"So...you want me to save the world.."
"oh...err...yes"
"I'm only doing this for you"
"No, Emily, you're doing it for every man, woman and child on this Earth"
He had an answer for everything. No wonder he'd got into trouble. Nobody likes a smart-arse.
She hoped this wasn't going to take long. She wanted a bath before bed. She dodged another ray of hope as it shot towards her and nibbled on her custard cream..
To be continued...
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The Christmas Haircut
It was early evening, and all was well with the world. The girl had given me my food, then she had give me some of her food, and then I had rolled over and over on the carpet and to show her how happy was, and I was all ready for a quiet evening tearing apart my favourite toy.
The girl it turns out had other ideas.
"Come here belle" she said.
"What's in it for me?" I thought and sat where I was.
The girl got up and went to the cupboard with all my food in it. I got very excited. Had she forgotten that she had already given me my food? Maybe she would have forgotten that she had given me some of her food too. I ran after her to see what she was up to.
Instead of getting out more food she got out something just as exciting - my brush! I love my brush. Me and my brush play a game - I try to catch it and it tries to get as close to me as possible without getting caught. The girl gets jealous of our game and tells me to "just sit still and let me get all the knots out" in a sort of angry voice. Today though girl also got out the sharp silver point things.
"It's time for you Christmas haircut" she said to me.
The girl made me sit down and stay very still. Then started to cut my hair.
I always sit very still when the girl cuts my hair because I'm a little bit scared off the sharp silver pointy things. I remember the first time she had cut my hair the girl had said:
"You could stuff a duvet with all of that" and she showed me all of the hair that she had taken from me. I was very surprised because my hair is quite firmly attached to me and I didn't even feel it leaving me. I licked the hair to see if it had really been mine and it was. So between you and I, I happen to believe that the sharp silver pointy things must have strange powers. I am quite sure that if I don't stay very still the sharp pointy things would take away my whole ear, or my whole leg and I wouldn't even know it!
I sat watching the girl and concentrated very hard on sitting still. But after a while I started to wonder about things.
Had the girl really eaten all of her food?
Was next door's cat running around outside in my garden?
Was that dot on the floor a crumb of toast?
And as I started to wonder about things I stopped staying very still, and before I even knew it I was no longer even sitting but running to the back door to look for that cat.
"Belle, I'm not finished" shouted the girl.
I looked at her. I looked at the sharp silver pointy things and then ran under hid under a chair and hoped that the girl would forget about trying to cut off my hair for a while.
The girl sighed and said:
"Oh alright belle" and then went and put away the sharp silver pointy things.
The boy as tall as a tree came downstairs and looked at me.
"Belle what happened to you ear?" I started to panic a little bit. Had the sharp silver pointy things removed my ear without me knowing?
"This ear is half the size of that one" he laughed.
"I knew those sharp silver pointy things were magic" I thought to myself. "Oh well it could be worse, I wander if they will give me some extra food to help my ear grow back to its full size" I thought and ran to the food cupboard.
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Here is the news - but where did it come from?
The report that a Pentagon propaganda unit has contracted a company to hire Iraqis to translate its claims into Arabic and sell them to Iraqi newspapers while posing as freelance reporters has caused little concern in the US - despite the fact that the Bush administration also bought the support of American television presenters and newspaper columnists for its domestic policies and the Republican party hired a male escort to pose as a journalist and ask questions about why the rest of the media was so "biased" against the administration during White House press conferences.
In fact much of the news reports on American television and in American newspapers is pre-packaged public relations videos or columns created by government departments in the style of a news report. Since these reports cost the news companies nothing they frequently show or print them without any mention of the source. Viewers or readers are left with the impression that what they've just seen is a balanced report than a government public relations video.
The story may then be seen by people in other countries who have satellite TV - or picked up by the media in other countries and repeated.
Alternatively, to get round US laws which ban the Pentagon and the CIA from distributing false information to the American media they began distributing it to the media of other countries - and in this way much of it eventually ended up being picked up on and reported by the American media.
Many journalists and reporters are also so heavily briefed by government and military press officers that they start to see the government or military line as the objective , balanced one. This leads to stories about issues which are supposedly 'confusing' - and certainly end up seeming confusing due to the way they're reported but which are actually fairly easy to understand if reports didn't try to follow the press officers' line.
For instance in coverage of the issues of 'extraordinary rendition' (i.e the CIA kidnapping people in one country and flying them to another for interrogation and/or torture) and US Senator John McCain's bill to outlaw cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of prisoners by US forces much has been made of the supposed dispute over the definition of torture. Many commentators and reporters re-produce the official line that the US and Europe have different definitions of what constitutes torture - or even that there is no agreed definition of what practices are outlawed.
In fact since the US government and EU governments have ratified the UN convention against torture and other forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment they all have exactly the same definition of torture - and the same treaty outlaws all forms of 'cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment' whether these constitute torture under the treaty's definition or not . Senator McCain's bill (which President Bush has finally agreed to support after threatening to veto it) also outlaws cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of prisoners. In practice it merely incorporates the US government's existing treaty obligations into US law.
The only difference of opinion on which forms of treatment of prisoners are illegal and which aren't is between the Bush administration on the one hand and the rest of America , international law and the world on the other.
British and American journalists are also forced by the very real threat of being shot by their own military to be attached to a military unit. The result is that they come to identify with this unit, want to avoid criticising it and are limited in what they are allowed to witness and to report.
This is not a problem restricted to the US - many British reports are unduly influenced by government or military propaganda - such as that put out concerning food aid supplies to Afghanistan during the 2001 war.
In Italy one man - Silvio Berlusconi - now effectively controls every television station in the country - some through his previous ownership of them and the state RAI news service through his position as Prime Minister.
This is of course not to suggest that all the news we read is mere propaganda, but it does suggest that governments and media reports cannot always be taken at face value without checking other sources.
Yet what has been the reaction of some people who've found out what's going on ? Many of them think that their governments and the militaries are justified in using propaganda and misinformation as they supposedly have to do so to counter 'media bias' against the government and the military. Why do so many people think the media's biased against the government and the military? In many cases because much of the media - talk radio programmes, statements by members of the government and military or their spokespeople on the TV news and columnists in newspapers - have been telling them so.
Now that's a level of indoctrination which the communist governments of the Soviet Union would have been envious of.