Time - what has changed?

 "What if God was one of us?

What if God was just another guy on a bus, trying to find his way home?"

A song, an 'ear worm' as they say and it started me thinking - well, it was a baking day.

What has changed in two thousand years? Is the human race more human, less violent, more tolerant of others, less judgemental? 

And to where (or from) would he be travelling? 

 Would he do what he did then? Telling people to be kind to each other, quoting from scriptures, standing out as educated, a do-gooder. That didn't exactly end well, did it? Resulting as it did in torture and death.

Perhaps He would be one of the heroes who work with the homeless, displaced, ignored peoples of the world who reluctantly depend on the Charity of others. A health worker, shelter volunteer, a packer of food parcels. One of the silent aide workers who see the worst of humanity and try to make it better, if only for a short time.

Tired, physically, mentally, spiritually, on a bus, trying to remember the way home.

momento vivere

 There have been no posts here since the pandemic because it felt as though life was on hold. Nothing happened but sickness and death. No news except how dire it all was and how we all had to stay home, not to travel, work from home, home schooling for all children and no visiting anyone. Even if you had elderly relatives in care or hospital - even if they were near death with covid - stay at home. 

Worry at home, celebrate at home, grieve at home. 

Skype faded and Zoom dominated.

The world has shifted and now society is moving again. Life is upping a gear.

Beginning again.

a little quietude....

                       

Sitting in the afternoon sunshine, watching the frogs splodge about in the pond (well, more of a wallow, really), various insect life flying in, out and around the garden. A hot drink in hand.  Retrieving two sweet, plain biscuits from my pinny pocket, I wonder if we all have a little Granny Weatherwax lurking in our psychi.
It is coffee in my cup, not tea and no sugar but I think the great TP would forgive me.
                 

Changes

Growing, changing, turning left or right. Life is constantly moving, altering, sometimes with us hardly noticing at all. People leave us and new ones arrive.
Last week it might have been summer. Sunny, warm, a time for gardening and walking beside the sea. This week a storm has blown in with rain, hail and a wind that is cold. Meals have gone from salads to stews, ice cream to rice pudding.
A familiar place becomes unknown by events. A group become a rowdy crowd shouting, hurling hurtful, harmful abuse in to air around us all. A dishevelled woman rushes in from the street and stops, distressed, tears on a grimy face. Are you okay? No, no, I've just been sexually assaulted. 
Bemused shoppers stare, shake their heads, move away.
Is it true? What to do? and who should do it?
The world feels a darker place.

Where is the light?

Luminaries

Is it true that the more dire the times, the more frivolous the people?
There are boringly common trees along the main road which have been blushing with embarrassment since the start of November. Switching On The Lights is suddenly the Thing to do in your village/town. The Community is encouraged to contribute to the cost of street decorations. Eager to be seen to partake, generosity prevails.
Market Street looks like Blackpool.
It's all very nice.
I remember walking to Brownies at this time of year, looking out for lighted Christmas trees in peoples windows.
Now there are so many outside lights (garden trees, random reindeer, icicles hanging from roofs - even some ghostly projected santa images on one house) street lighting seems superfluous.
It is all very nice.
We are encouraged to have a smart meter (which, contrary to the adverts, does NOT save you money, only tells you just how much energy you are using) and recycling is promoted widely. I have heard there are new ways to enhance the efficiency of solar power.
This may be useful in the coming year.
To 2019 - may it contain only good times!

not quite there, yet....

It's 7am, driving to the Market. I know it is still September, but I also know it is autumn.
Last night a huge and bright, full  harvest moon floated in the clear night sky.
This morning skeins of geese honk as they streak across a milky pink sky. Mist lies two foot deep over river-edged fields, horns of Highland cattle just peeping through the top.
Seasons used to drift gently, one in to the other but this year has been decisive, positive, dramatic.
Snow, cold, cold snow in April, smothering the brave spring flowers, as incongruous as snow on orange trees in Cordoba.
Then a hot, dry summer, the kind we all think we remember from our school days. When plants that didn't wilt rushed to flower,  set fruit and then die back.
There is a second, super-abundant fruiting on fig trees; bean pods hanging from wisteria; holly hedges splattered liberally with blood-red berries.
There were Ink cap fungi pushing through the grass at Whitbarrow at the beginning of the month. Now windfall apples, crab apples and quince cover the ground.
Not quite October yet the newly swept and lined chimney is warming with a log fire.
Is it time to change the quilt? Draw the curtains in the evening? Hunt out the winter woolies?
Discard the salads and brew up some tasty stews and soups?
It is now lunchtime and I am glad I chose a shirt, not a jumper. The previously frost-rimed roses are now glowing in the sun, with a hint of fragrance in the air.
The jumpers can stay a little longer in the cupboard.

is evolution always good?

Words are wonderful. Language is colourful, expressive, a delight to hear.
Which is why some things really grate on the ear.
I enjoy watching 'Only Connect' but then one week there was a question about the position of chess pieces on the board - and they spelt 'knight' with an N.
'Pointless', that tea-time favourite, had a chemistry question and I have to ask, when did they begin spelling 'sulphur' with an F?
I have kind of got used to railway station being train station, but then on the radio a presenter was talking about 'plane rides'.
Isn't that a 'flight'?
Or am I an old stick-in-the-mud?