What A Wonderful World

Optimism: hopefulness and confidence about the future or the success of something

Glass half full or glass half empty? 

I’m not entirely sure how full or empty my glass is, I’m just glad there’s something in it.  On reflection, I think I’m probably a grateful optimist with pessimistic tendencies.  In other words, as I’ve probably mentioned before, I’m a terrible worrier.  Although my default setting probably leans towards optimism I can soon be blown off course by a random thought, usually a totally ridiculous one.  Sometimes optimism can set me off on a bit of a roller coaster.  

Optimism and pessimism start a conversation in my head. 

O: He’s out late but he’ll be back soon. 

P:  There’s been an accident two streets away, what if that was him, on his way home?

O: Why would he be on that street?  It’s not on his route.  Anyway, he’s always careful.  Won’t be long till he’s home.

P: Two people injured! Two males! Must be him.

O: Any minute now I’ll hear his key in the lock.

P: OMG one's got grey hair, it's him!

And so it goes on. 

When my uncle became seriously ill a couple of years ago his wife wrote emails to the family, detailing his condition and his future treatment. Reading between the lines it was obvious where the illness was heading. My mum, the eternal optimist, was convinced that her brother would bounce back to his previous healthy, funny, entertaining self.  I tried, gently, to warn her to expect the worst. I thought I had maybe got through and she would not be shocked at the final outcome.  We visited my uncle a few weeks before he died. I was extremely upset to see him so ill. My mum was still convinced he would recover.  When he finally passed away my mum couldn’t believe it.  We were all sad, but she was devastated at this unexpected loss.  She told me she thought she’d been naive.  I assured her that she’d remained optimistic throughout, and maybe that was her way of coping. 

My mum is now 91.  She’s a had a rough fourteen months, physically and emotionally, since my dad died.  On the whole, she’s remained optimistic about the future, if not always her own, certainly that of the rest of the family.  Desperately wanting to alleviate my mum’s grief, I realised, for the first time in my life, that this was something totally outside my control.  I remained optimistic that things would eventually - very gradually - get better, but I had to accept that grief couldn’t be ‘cured’ or hurried or ‘solved’.  We sat with it, talking, crying, laughing, hugging and let time pass.  And then let it pass some more.  

Although my optimism has sometimes taken a battering, I don’t think it’s a bad trait to have (even mine, with pessimistic tendencies).  Having suffered from severe depression in the past, I know that optimism is the first thing to go.  It just doesn't exist in a depressed state. Pessimism fills that void perfectly. However, in my normal state of mind, like my mum, I have an unswerving belief that I can sort out any problem - totally unfounded, I hasten to add - although we are both pretty practical people.  Give us a roll of sellotape, a needle and thread, a couple of inches of velcro, a spanner and a screwdriver and all will be solved.  Throw in a cup of tea and 'job’s a good’n.'  

I apologise for so many references to sadness and death in a blog about optimism, but I must finish with these lyrics, beautifully sung by Louis Armstrong, as played at my dad's funeral.  Family was everything to dad, and I like to think he chose this as an optimistic look towards the future of all those left behind.

                           What A Wonderful World by Douglas George  

I see trees of green
Red roses too
I see them bloom
For me and you
And I think to myself
What a wonderful world

I see skies of blue
And clouds of white
The bright blessed day
The dark sacred night
And I think to myself
What a wonderful world

The colors of the rainbow
So pretty in the sky
Are also on the faces
Of people going by
I see friends shaking hands
Saying, "How do you do?"
They're really saying
"I love you"

I hear babies cry
I watch them grow
They'll learn much more
Than I'll never know
And I think to myself
What a wonderful world

Yes, I think to myself
What a wonderful world

Oh yeah

Thanks for reading........Jill 

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Truth - Be Honest

I overheard something at my mother’s funeral. Fifty years have passed and the words still hurt.

“Poor Sheila, so young. Still, she lasted longer than we thought.”

My auntie, dabbing her eyes, was holding court with other relatives outside Carleton Crematorium Chapel. I can’t remember if it was before or after the service, not that it matters. Nothing mattered, except the deep deception that cut through my very soul. All these people, family and friends of the family had known that my mother was terminally ill, yet they had spent the last however many months speaking to me along the lines of, “When Mummy’s better…”, “When your mum is better…”, “When Sheila gets over this…”.   At nearly fourteen years of age I was old enough to ‘be grown up about all this’, but not considered to be old enough to be included in what was happening or given a chance to say goodbye. I was shattered. I had believed I was secure in a close-knit family. Everybody was hiding the truth.

Well, not quite everybody. My nanna was honest without actually coming out with the words. She was looking after us, my sister and me. Our family ran pubs and we were staying out of town at their pub, rather than ours. I adored my nanna, she was my rock. I wouldn’t usually have stepped out of line with her for the world. There was much love, respect but also a tiny bit of fear because I expected she could be even angrier than my mum if she was cross with me. I don’t know where it came from, but for the one and only time in my life, I gave her a glimpse of my 'stroppy madam' mood and I answered her back. I don’t remember what was said between us or why but I regretted it immediately and braced myself for a slap. It didn’t come. Instead, she hugged me tight and I cried. Tears for being rude to my lovely nanna and tears for worrying about my mum.

“Where there’s life, there’s hope.” Nanna’s words spoke volumes. Sheila, my mum was her daughter. Nanna had already suffered the loss of a daughter, a child, before my mum was born. I wish I had half of her northern grit.

What I overheard at my mum’s funeral taught me about truth and about compassion. My relatives wanted to protect me, though deceiving me into false security was the outcome. It was with the best of intention, I can understand that. My importance of honesty in life-threatening situations is borne of that experience.

 My husband was very ill when our son was about twelve, maybe thirteen. The illness seemed never ending. He was in hospital for months, no diagnosis, no improvement. I’m sure our son thought long and hard before asking me if Dad was going to die. The situation was on his mind more than I realised.  I told him with total honesty, that until it was discovered what was wrong, we didn’t know what would happen, but we hoped Dad would pull through and I promised, I would always tell him the truth. My husband recovered, eventually, thank goodness. My children appreciated the truth.

 

A poem from Muhammad Ali,

 

The face of truth is open.

The eyes of truth are bright,

The lips of truth are ever closed,

The head of truth is upright.

 

The breast of truth stands forward,

The gaze of truth is straight,

Truth has neither fear nor doubt

Truth has patience to wait.

 

The words of truth are touching,

The voice of truth is deep,

The law of truth is simple:

All that you sow you reap.

 

The soul of truth is flaming,

The heart of truth is warm,

The mind of truth is clear,

And firm through rain or storm.

 

Facts are but its shadows,

Truth stands above all sin,

Great be the battle in life,

Truth in the end shall win.

 

The image of truth is Christ,

Wisdom's message its rod;

Sign of truth is the cross,

Soul of truth is God/

 

Life of truth is eternal,

Immortal is its past.

Power of truth will endure,

Truth shall hold to the last.

 

Muhammad Ali  (1942 - 2016)

 

 

Thanks for reading, Pam x

 

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Strange but True - Amsterdam Funeral

I was trying to find something different to fit in with the theme of Strange but True when I came across this, I think it was in a ‘100 Strange but True Facts’ article.

“If you die in Amsterdam with no next of kin and no friends or family to prepare funeral or mourn over the body, a poet will write a poem for you and recite it at your funeral.”

I was impressed and wondered where to apply for the job…

     I must visit Amsterdam.

I’ve laughed and I’ve cried reading ‘The Diary of a Young Girl’.  Anne Frank wrote witty and amusing accounts to ‘Kitty’, with honesty about her feelings as she coped with her family’s situation and truthful about her mixed up moods and personal concerns as she emerged from childhood into puberty. For two years, summer 1942 until summer 1944, the Frank family were in hiding from the Germans with another Jewish family in the top floors of an office block in Amsterdam.

This is my real reason to visit Amsterdam, just to see for myself the place known by the family as ‘the annexe’ that Anne Frank called home and learn more about how they managed. I believe it is tiny and I’m told it’s much commercialised but I would like to see for myself and show respect for their hardship and later suffering.

One of my father’s pubs had a live-in barman. He was an elderly gentleman known as Old Joe and he had lived there for many years. The only family he had was a nephew who came to take him out on his day off. He worked in the pub, played snooker for the team and always had toffees in his pocket for me and my sister. He blended in with us like family and even had his favourite ‘tripe and cow heel pie’ made for him by my mother or our housekeeper once a week. He was very deaf and had the tv on full volume when he sat in our living-room to watch the sport on a Saturday afternoon.  According to my father, he’d heard a rumour that Old Joe had a drawer full of unopened wage packets. Joe had free board and lodgings with us, the locals kept him in beer with a pint or two and his nephew treated him to lunch and whatever else on their days out. My dad was concerned and thought that if Joe really did have so much money around, it would be safer in the bank. Apparently, Joe neither confirmed nor denied the rumour, just laughed it off and told my dad he was alright, there was no need to bother. Joe lived a few more years into his nineties. There was no significant amount of money in his room. Strange, perhaps, to some, but true.

 

My chosen poem, I'd love to believe it's true.

 

 

The lost Lost Property Office

 

‘On buses and trains you wouldn’t believe

The crazy things that passengers leave

 

A ventriloquist’s dummy mouthing a scream

Two tickets (unused) for Midsummer Night’s Dream

 

Handcuffs, chains and a spiderman suit

The tangled remains of a failed parachute

 

Rucksacks, tents and rolled-up beds

If they weren’t screwed on they’d lose their heads

 

Two bull terriers and a Siamese kitten

Suicide note, hastily written

 

Garden forks with broken handles

A birthday cake with four candles

 

A file with TOP SECRET stamped in red

(Inside a card, April Fool, it said)

 

Safe and secure behind a locked door

Priceless works of art by the score

 

Paintings by Hockney, Warhol and Blake

Two Mona Lisas (possibly fake)

 

Magritte’s bowler hat and Van Gogh’s chair

Duchamp’s urinal and a paint-stained pair

 

Of trousers belonging to Toulouse Lautrec

(short in the leg, black and white check)

 

A painting by numbers of Rembrandt’s head

Dirty sheet and a pillow off Tracey’s bed

 

Jigsaw by Rodin, of two lovers kissing

Damien Hirst skull with the diamonds missing

 

Am I overworked? Of course I am

The list goes on ad nauseam

 

A shot putter’s shot and a pole vaulter’s pole

A partial eclipse and a Black Hole

 

A bucket of toenails and a wooden plank

Two air-to-air missiles and a Russian tank

 

The Statue of Liberty and an oil slick

Mountains of mobiles and an old walking stick

 

Lost any of these? Bad news I’m afraid

The Lost Property Office has been mislaid.’

 

Roger McGough, CBE, FRSL

 

 

Thanks for reading, Pam x

 

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