Calendars - It's A Date

 
“Thirty days hath September,
April, June and November.
February has twenty-eight alone,
All the rest have thirty-one,
Excepting leap year, that’s the time
When February’s days are twenty-nine.

I’d be lost without our calendar. It hangs on the wall in the back room, telling us what we’re doing and where we’re doing it, year in, year out. Everything is there, birthdays, appointments, football fixtures, holidays and all manner of notable events. I tried a ‘Filofax’ once but found it completely unsuitable for my needs. I wasn’t jetting off round the world, just travelling the North West of the UK by road in my first Nissan Micra and the journeys were infrequent, so a lot of the features were wasted on me. My husband logs everything into his phone calendar. I haven’t bothered to teach myself how to do it. I prefer pen and paper where I can flip over one month to the next. Some aspects of modern technology I’m happy to do without.

I found some interesting history and discovered that the Ancient Egyptians were the first civilisation to use a solar calendar, to help predict the River Nile’s annual flooding. The information failed to state how accurate it was.

From Wikipedia, “Roman Calendar and Julian Reform: The Romans developed the Julian calendar, introduced by Julius Caesar in 45 BC, which was a significant step in organising the solar year. Gregorian Calendar (1582): Pope Gregory XIII introduced the Gregorian calendar as a refinement of the Julian calendar in 1582, which is now the internationally accepted civil calendar.”

Based on a true story and with a strong cast of ‘A’ list actors, ‘Calendar Girls’, released in 2003, was awarded the British Comedy Award for the Best Comedy Film. It gives a light-hearted insight into serious illness and a brilliant idea to raise awareness and boost funds for charity. A stage production is currently on tour and there is a musical version.

My childhood spent with my mother’s choice of music from her rack of records included Neil Sedaka. We would dance to Happy Birthday, Sweet Sixteen and Calendar Girl.

If I was fortunate enough to be given an Advent Calendar on the run up to Christmas, it would be a pretty, sparkly addition to our decorations, covered in a fine glitter that left shiny dust behind each time it was touched. Behind each tiny door, numbered with the date, a symbol of Christmas waited to be found. No sweet, no chocolate, yet magi

The Good Old Days

Pity the poor children
Of today, with their calendars
Stuffed with chocolates,

Never to know the thrill
Of opening a small cardboard door
And discovering behind it

A picture of a bell.

Brian Bilston

Anyway, we’re off to one of our ‘notable events’ that has been on our calendar since last year and carried forward to the actual date this year. John Lodge ‘Days of Future Passed’ concert at the Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester. Tuesday, 8th April. I just need to breathe slowly, not get too excited and I’ll be fine.

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Days That Changed the World - WWW

30^th April 1993, a very significant date that I was unaware of until I looked it up. CERN, which is the French acronym for the European Council for Nuclear Research, put the World Wide Web software in the public domain. Since then, we’ve all been just a click away from more or less everything.  A day that changed the world.

As the level of technology progressed, the equipment for its use gradually became smaller in size. Computers nearly 60 centimetres deep and needing a massive processor, both filling a purpose built desk and taking up lots of office space – or half a room in our house – has reduced to the average smart phone. We have the whole world in our hands.

I love books and our house is full of them, but I can’t help but feel a bit sorry for a shelf full of pristine volumes of Encyclopaedia Britannica when I’m ‘Googling’ things. The information I want is right there, with links to connected interests. I can’t imagine being without the internet, or my mobile phone, not now.

I wasn’t going to bother having a mobile phone. I didn’t need one for myself. My husband got one and we’d share it while we were away. We could let family know we had arrived safely after an epic drive to Pembrokeshire and we were settling in nicely. That phone turned out to be a God-send, keeping us in touch with family when my mother-in-law, also away on holiday, had taken ill and was in hospital. It was just a phone, what else would you want? Soon, the sky was the limit.

I did get my own phone, a basic phone, oh, I think text messaging was possible, too. I wouldn’t leave home without it. The next best thing was a camera on the phone. Digital, of course. Easy to download snaps of a day out on to the PC or laptop – yes, I’d got one of those by now. It wasn’t long before I’d agreed to a mobile contract with an all singing, all dancing phone, with camera, internet data, bells and whistles. Me, who didn’t want all this ‘crazy stuff’, to start with, now had up to date modern technology in my handbag, at my fingertips.

I missed it when it wasn’t there, though it was good to ‘click off’ for a while. There was no internet and no phone signal where we regularly stay in Scotland – until recently. We would stop the car at the top of the lane, last chance for a signal, before going down to the lodge. There would be no more contact until an early morning dog walk back up the hill to check for messages. It was good to relax, no interruption. It is different now. WiFi arrived. The lodges have upgraded to smart televisions and internet routers. We’ve all moved with the times.

I send emails to the USA with immediate arrival when previously a snail-mail letter would take days.

It is all good until there’s the dreaded system failure. When this happened at work, those of us who remembered how we did it before technology sharpened our pencils and our wits and got on with it. Not easy in a fully computerised dental practice. Fortunately the occurrence was rare and promptly rectified.

World Wide Web changed the world, brought it closer, and changed the way we do things. It is the way we are.

I found this poem by Dr Wayne Visser,

Change the World

Let’s change the world, let’s shift it
Let’s shake and remake it
Let’s rearrange the pieces
The patterns in the maze
The reason for our days
In ways that make it better
In shades that make it brighter
That make the burden lighter
Because it’s shared, because we dared
To dream and then to sweat it
To make our mark and not regret it
Let’s plant a seed and humbly say:
I changed the world today!

Let’s change the world, let’s lift it
Let’s take it and awake it
Let’s challenge every leader
The citadels of power
The prisoners in the tower
The hour of need’s upon us
It’s time to raise our voices
To stand up for our choices
Because it’s right, because we fight
For all that’s just and fair
For a planet we can share
Let’s join the cause and boldly say:
We’ll change the world today!

Let’s change the world, let’s love it
Let’s hold it and unfold it
Let’s redesign the future
The fate of earth and sky
The existential why
Let’s fly to where there’s hope
To where the world is greener
Where air and water’s cleaner
Because it’s smart to make a start
To fix what we have broken
Our children’s wish unspoken
Let’s be the ones who rise and say:
We changed the world today!

Wayne Visser © 2018

 Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Don't Let The Balloon Burst

Believe me, you don’t know the meaning of the word 'stress' unless you have taken a buggy, a large suitcase, a backpack, a handbag, a carrier bag full of snacks and games, a comfort blanket and three children under four on a two hundred and fifty mile train journey (with, not one, but two changes). If you haven’t wiped noses, hands and bums at least thirty times on that journey (and this before the advent of convenient baby wipes), picked up off the floor, crayons, half eaten sandwiches, squashed grapes and the sausage roll that nobody wanted; taken those desperate children several times to the fascinating (smelly) toilet, so that they can tell you they ‘don’t need to go now,’ as you sit wearily upon the lav, and watch in slow motion as they fight over pressing the button that quietly opens the door to reveal you in all your glory to the suited and booted businessman waiting in the corridor.  No, unless you have done that journey, under those conditions, please don’t tell me you know what stress is. 

Alternatively, if you have no children and are feeling pretty smug about it, then ponder for a moment on technology.  Just last week, as I was attempting to upload a couple of hundred images to my Mac, it first flooded  the screen with yellow triangles, warning about misdemeanours I’d committed and mishaps that would befall me (none of which I fully understood and some of which were downright baffling), and then, very dramatically, froze before displaying a language consisting entirely of question marks. After a few moments of puzzled frowning, and muttered expletives, I tried to restart the machine. The screen went black and despite several attempts to coax it back into life, it refused to do anything but remain defiantly dark. I knew this day was coming. I’d been chancing my luck for the last few months, overcoming problems on a wing and a prayer. Things weren’t looking good. The next few days were filled with the kind of stress that comes with panic.  I was desperate not to lose images and documents and programs and apps.  When I got a (very short) window of opportunity before it all crashed again, I frantically moved everything possible onto the External Hard Drive.  I won’t go into the details, mainly because I can't remember them, but suffice to say, I had three full days of stress and anxiety over that Mac.  By some miracle, I managed to pull it all back, but by that time I was not only stressed to the point of feeling ill, but also exhausted through hours of trial and error. 

A Novel Screen?

There was only one thing more stressful than dealing with my own technological problems, and that was sorting out my 92 year old dad’s.  He did so well to even get on the computer at his age, not to mention sorting bank transfers, writing essays and emailing friends, but if anything went wrong he was flummoxed.  As he lived over two hundred miles away and didn’t know his archive from his El Capitan it was an afternoon’s job, requiring supreme patience.  There were times when my stress levels were through the roof, as I saw time ticking away and heard my dad saying for the third time, ‘but which one is the address bar?’ or ‘how do I move onto the next line?’ And once, woefully, ‘but now the screen’s gone sideways!’  I always kept my patience and didn’t let him know I was stressed but it was an effort - and my poor husband got the brunt of it once I came off the phone after a couple of hours.

I’ve always been a pretty stressy person. I’d love not to, but I worry about almost everything.  I’m convinced there’s some sort of cavity in my head that is there exclusively for problems. No sooner do I get rid of one worry than another takes its place. That Problem Cavity must always have to be filled, and believe me, that’s one problem I don’t have - filling it. I’d love to be one of those laid back people like my husband, who floats along, batting away worries like annoying bluebottles. I’ve decided that I now take on his worries as well as my own. I’ve also realised, as time’s gone on and the family has grown to include children, grandchildren, great nephews and nieces, that the bigger the family, the more stressed I become.  I love my family dearly, and we’re all extremely close but there are more and more people to worry about.  I put it down to a vivid imagination.  Somebody only has to be five minutes late and I’ve got them kidnapped by a knife wielding maniac, under a bus or down a ravine, and I’m ordering wreaths for their funeral. 

That’s extreme, and I’m happy to say that these days I do try my best to keep my stress levels under control.  When I was really ill with depression and anxiety several years ago, I visited an amazing psychiatrist, who, I would say, saved my life.  One thing that  sticks in my mind, is the balloon analogy, and although it didn’t work instantly, it’s something I always think about if things start getting too much. 

There comes a point in all our lives when we need to let some air out of our balloons.

Here's my poem:

Don't Let the Balloon Burst

He looks at me over half moon specs

Fleetingly, I think 

he looks like a caricature of what he is

A psychiatrist 

Kind eyes, no real humour

but then none here either

‘Your head is like a balloon,’ he says 

in that calm, quiet voice 

I would laugh in other circumstances 

‘The air going in,’ he continues

‘is the stress’ 

I don’t have the energy to nod 

‘If you don’t let some out…’

I stare at a mole on his face

waiting to hear what could happen

‘The balloon will burst.’ 

I nod

I don’t want my balloon to burst

‘No more air in - let some out,’ he whispers

I drive home, my balloon still full

Imagining the bang.

Thanks for reading, Jill

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Reading: The Next Generation

Like any aspiring poet I love books. Real books. The ones with spines and pages which discolour over time. The ones given as gifts with their personalised messages. The ones carrying signatures of the writers/poets I’ve met.

Within our tiny basement flat these books own a large percentage of the available space: crammed on bookcases, double stacked on shelves, piled on top of wardrobes and tucked into nooks. There are designated areas for poetry, fiction, art and the academic; hundreds of books decorating our home and filling it with words, imagination, knowledge, beauty and inspiration.

When I was little, after visiting a National Trust property, I dreamed of a house with a library, with bookcases so tall I’d require a ladder like Belle’s (from Beauty and the Beast) to reach the upper shelves. Despite neither of these things materialising the books did. They’ve accumulated in great numbers over the years, and I can chart some of the most significant times in my life by simply looking at the books around me. Therefore, the idea of storing away future markers inside a shiny electronic ‘book’ has never really appealed.

A few years ago when e-readers started to appear, and quickly became a must-have gadget for any avid reader, I stood strong. In fact I was almost Luddite in my thoughts towards them, refusing to own one and ranting that they could never substitute a proper book. However, I’ve finally relented and now find myself in the midst of books in 21^st century format.

I wish I could say I absolutely hate my Kindle Fire, to say otherwise sort of feels like I’m cheating on the paperback. But I’ve (perhaps a little too speedily) fallen in love with this shiny rectangle. I can buy books without worrying about where to store them. I can read in the dark, and even change from white ‘paper’ to black ‘paper’. With just a single press on a word I can look up its dictionary definition, I can highlight without vandalising, make notes and store interesting quotes. I don’t need a makeshift Rizla bookmark because it remembers my page, and can even calculate my reading speed.

 I’m currently reading The Passage by Justin Cronin – in paperback form its 1008 pages means it has a 6cm spine and weighs over 700 grams, however, in e-book form this book’s difficult-to-hold size is reduced to the dimensions (186 X 128 X 9.0mm) and weight (303 grams) of my Kindle: so light and manageable I can hold it comfortably with one hand.

So, I guess you could say this traditional reader has been converted, but not completely…  I will never get rid of the books I currently own and I won’t stop purchasing real books; I’ve already vowed to only buy poetry in hardback and paperback form. And while the new way of reading has its advantages, the old way will always have its place - no amount of free e-books will ever fill me with the same excitement as a second-hand bookshop (however hard they are getting to find).

Thanking you for reading,

Lara

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Memento Moribund

*Contains words which some people (probably not my friends and for reasons which I've never really understood) may find offensive*

Last week I killed a cat.  So my teenage daughter tells me.  I took a popular image of a grumpy cat and added some text.  It was a political comment.  It required a bit of thinking.  It wasn't funny.  Contemporary humour - I'm doing it wrong.  It's an age thing.

This week an old lady phoned my workplace and told me about the trouble she was having with her new phone.  You're thinking about the difficulty in adapting to the Android platform after using iOS arent you?  No - she was struggling with a new touchpad phone...On her landline (remember those?).  For her, this was a mammoth leap.  Not for her trending buzzwords or memes.  And not for me either it appears.  I don't have the necessary inclination, or youth, to keep up with that shit.  I only just figured out how to copy and paste on my tablet.  It took me 2 weeks.

And now, with a hop to the right, a shuffle backwards and an undignified lurch into a ditch, here are some vaguely comedic offerings which grew out of the awkward theme: Child's Play. 


Vicky's Very Helpful Guide to Register 
(or How to Paint Your Personality a Likeable Shade of Puce)

Describing Your Manager's Job Description

To your colleague: I accept that what she does could be described as challenging.
To your mother: It's child's play mum, seriously - even you could do it...Ow!  What was that for?
To your friend: What she does right, it's a fucking piece of piss...A piece...of...piss.


Declaring Your Sincere Gratitude

To your colleague: Ahhh.  You know what, you make a really great brew you do.
To your mother: What? I can't hear you.  Hang on a sec.  Right, what were you saying?  Oh yeah - thanks.
To your friend: Without you, I wouldn't even be here mate.  No, I mean it - you are a hero to me, a bloody hero - you know?  Hero...Like Gandalf or something.


Apologising

To your colleague: I might not have sent that e-mail after all but it really doesn't make much difference if you look at the big picture.
To your mother: Well if you'd said you wanted to leave at 11am, I'd have been here at 11am.  One of us must have got it wrong.
To your friend: No, no, it was me.  Don't you apologise - it's all me.  I'm a right moron.  Here, take my first born in compensation.


Asking a Favour

To a colleague: Ooh, that's going to be awkward....Oh no - I can't believe that's happened...Eek - what am I going to do now?....Ah, seeing as you asked...
To your mother: I'm taking the black dress with the slit up the back.  Remind me to bring it back will you?
To your friend: Right, I'm up the shitty river and I can't roll my sleeves up any further.  What have you got that's paddle-shaped and useful at S&M parties?


Responding to Political Controversy

To a colleague: I'm sure you're right - it'll be good to have a bit of a change.  After all, how much damage can they do in 5 years?
To your mother: I don't care if it was in the Daily Mail - it doesn't make it true in the real world.
To your friend: Cunts.  Creepy, cretinous, clownish cunts.  Huh?  Feminism?  OK...Cocks.  Creepy, cretinous, clownish cocks.

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Our Hunger for Tragedy

This week’s theme is ‘Tragic or Comedic’(note the choice of conjunction), which I’m taking to mean (given the lack of an ‘and’) that I’m allowed to write something that is either tragic or comedic – and that I most definitely don’t need to write something that is both. So, as the dark and depressing seems to flow more naturally from my fingertips than anything with humorous value, I’ve decided to opt for the tragic...

People love disaster, if it does not touch them too nearly – as we run to see a burning house or a motor crash – and also it gives occasion for passionate speech; it is a vehicle for the poetry. ¹

The Four Stages of a Modern Tragedy

One half of the motorway is closed,

the other half has been brought to a crawl –

by our need to see past the smoke; swirling blue lights;

crumpled metal objects, like the devoured carcass of a wildebeest.

They watch, stretching their necks through turned down windows,

dropping their mouths in awe and disbelief: primal instinct taking hold

as phones are sent out into the night

to record the scene and preserve it in pixels.

Within minutes, the videos are uploaded to YouTube.

Facebook newsfeeds full of links tempt us, wave tragedy

beneath our noses like sweet, freshly-spun candyfloss – and we bite,

lick our lips and wipe the guilt from our mouths.

Millions of hits from a single crash, and somehow we forget –

lose ourselves in the blurred blue smoke.

Unable to count on our fingers: to add, calculate –

we forget that tragedy involves subtraction.

Thank you for reading,
Lar

¹ Jeffers, “Poetry, Gongorism and a Thousand Years” from Twentieth-Century American Poetics: Poets on the Art of Poetry, ed. Gioia, Mason, Schoerke (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2004), p.88  

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