Sometimes life appears to be standing still. Dullness, boredom and turgidness rule, it is all tepid tapioca pudding with condensed milk. Everything is seen in its worst light. Success gleams like aged pewter, rain falls on any parade and minor problems loom like icebergs in a Titanic night.
Sometimes life gallops past in a welter of activities. These may not be all pleasant or even exciting but everything seems to be moving swiftly in the right direction. Even tragic events have a meaning and mitigating factors. Life as whole has a purpose. Things, that at the start had no foreseeable ending, finish so swiftly that the years between disappear into the time taken to strike a dry match.
Take the burdens of the modern man; mortgages and school fees. The weight and the longevity of these remind me of the scene at the end of The Magnificent Seven where the Charles Bronson character is being hero worshipped by two small village boys. How brave he is and how unfavourably their own peasant farmers compare with his stature as a gallant gunfighter. Angrily he whips them with his hat and tells them in no uncertain terms that their fathersÆ passive long term courage in fighting the elements to bring in a harvest so that the families can eat requires much more than irresponsible blam blamming with a pair of six guns. Middle aged middle class man/woman feels like those farmers as the years of struggle take their unremitting toll.
The eventual dropping of these burdens happens so suddenly and their weight is so immense that it takes months to straighten up and look around. This relief does not mean that expenses are cut completely but at least they may be reduced.
The ending of school fees coincides with the ending of schooling; this means exam results. In our household, like countless others, we had results as each child marked a stage in their education. The Doctor had Pathology finals, the Archaeologist had mid course exams to determine whether he continued on an honours course and the Expert on the Premiership sat Common Entrance to enable him to move to his next school.
Happily all did well and the day when fees finally cease drew one step nearer. On the very morning that the Expert got his results his Grandfather died, just half an hour before he could be told the good news. Needless to say this put a severe dampener on any rejoicing. But more so it was a lesson in life that even things that seem immutable change. Life is a series of beginnings and endings. One year you are top of the school and a kind of minor God, the next year in your new school you are a worthless worm at the bottom of everything.
This cycle of events may continue throughout life. Now that careers are few and far between and jobs or contracts are the most secure positions that any one can hope for, this shifting of position in the job hierarchy is more apparent. The ubiquitous term consultant covers a multitude of sins but it is only when the position of chief executive is swapped for that of a consultant that one discovers 75% of the respect is for the job title not for the person who holds it. The mood swings mentioned above fit to an extent with the cycles. No job or a dead end one contribute hugely to an individuals morale.
When one is in the pink each week seems like a day, each day an hour. Simple home admin to say nothing of the great tasks, writing a sequel to War and Peace for example, get neglected. The brain whirls, the body spins, thereÆs hardly enough time for a glass of wine. ThatÆs where Brittany comes in. Just the place for slowing down in the right temperature with delicious food and drink. Au Revoir.
Back to the London Mall