So This Is Christmas

I recently remembered a relative from childhood.  You know how sometimes an event or person is entirely forgotten until something jogs your memory?  Well, this was a great uncle.  

As a child, he was very puzzling to me.  I knew he had lived with his mother but she died when I was a toddler.  (I have no memory of her other than the gates of the hospital where she died - an enduring memory which I cannot account for at all.)  He had stayed in their home and we would occasionally be taken to visit.  The house was a small terrace and I remember mostly just perching on an uncomfortable scratchy sofa while I waited for my parents or grandparents.  Although he was a bit of a hoarder so any rogue trips upstairs were always filled with danger and fascination.  Piles of stuff to clamber over even to reach the landing.  Stacks of empty margarine tubs in the bedrooms.  That sort of thing.

At Christmas times, however, this great uncle would become a very different presence.  He had a physical disability with one leg.  This had been exacerbated by poor treatments, I believe.  I remember issues with getting him in and out of cars, which chair he would have and so on.

But it was his personality which endures in my memory.   There were long-festering resentments towards my grandparents.  He said awful things to everyone.  He was rarely pleased to see us children.  There was always tension in the run-up to a visit.  What mood would he be in?  Would he come at all? (He specialised in last minute decisions, to try to spin the attention out.) Would he behave if he did come?  I recall being ushered upstairs with my brother whilst the great uncle was dealt with.  I seem to think he once even physically went for my grandfather as grandad was driving him home after another disastrous lunch.

He was one person.  A person who had chosen his own path yet still preferred to blame everyone else for its direction.  Yes, he did have problems and he did have a disability.

Yet somehow he dominated family events like Christmas.  It is important to welcome family members at such times.  But bad behaviour should not be tolerated if there is no reason other than sheer bloody-mindedness.  In our busy lives, all family time is precious. 

Later we discovered that one of my grandmother's mental health problem 'triggers' was her brother.  And thinking about him now, I am not surprised.  I completely relate to it.  It is surprising and upsetting just how much damage one person, determined on being 'difficult', can cause.  He could have been grateful for so much.  So many people have nothing and no-one.  Just yesterday, I met a homeless man who was sitting on the street in freezing conditions.  I stopped to talk and give him food.  His manners were impeccable.  He even wished me a Merry Christmas as I went guiltily away, back to my warm home.

I wish you the best of Christmases.  We all have things and people to deal with at these times.  'Tis the season to be kind and inclusive.  But not at the expense of our own peace of mind.

See you in 2018. xx

Happy Holidays

Not blogged for a few weeks (apologies to my regular reader!).  Been trying to write a satire based on Brexit but since the situation daily becomes more farcical ‘in real life’, this has proved to be rather difficult (as I write, I think we are up to £57 billion for the ‘privilege’ of leaving).  I also wrote a ‘tall tale’ for my writing group - about Melania Trump being a robot.  Only to find, two days later, that it was not so tall - the press were speculating on her use of a body double.  What the hell is happening to the world?!!

Anyway…  just over twenty years ago, I was working for an American investment bank.  My first Christmas there, I received a package from the partner in charge of our department.  As did everyone else.  The label said ‘Happy Holidays’.  I remember commenting on it to my boss.  She and the partner were both American and she explained that he was Jewish and that in the US, this was the more inclusive way to wish people ‘Merry Christmas’.  

[I also remember being told to take down a small picture of Chandler from Friends from the wall of my cubicle.  She said if I was allowed to have that, it would encourage men to have scantily clad women on their walls.  Still not sure what I think about this.  The feminist me agrees.  The me which had to live with the awful things she said and did to me thinks ‘you always were a mad cow’.  Sorry.]

But in the last week, Trump has begun to make a big deal out of not using ‘Happy Holidays’.  He claims to be be restoring Christmas.  It was apparently a campaign pledge - a defiance of politically correct language.

And I think, in essence, this action sums up what we are dealing with in the White House.  It is petty in the extreme.  It immediately announces a complete lack of inclusivity for anyone who does not celebrate the proscribed Christian festival.  And it is designed to appeal to the section of the electorate who gave him the presidency.  Trump believes that as long as he keeps his core supporters happy, he can disregard the opinions of everyone else.

In the UK, we haven't adopted ‘Happy Holidays’ in the twenty years since it first puzzled me.  But maybe we should.  Maybe we should all be tweeting it to @realDonaldTrump  It is not a new phrase.  It is a well-established part of US inclusivity.  And it may seem like a little thing but as I have discussed before, the Nazis started with the little things and look where that led...

Leaving A Dent

Helen Dunmore, who sadly died this year, wrote an afterword for her last novel Birdcage Walk in which she talks about her interest in how very few people make any mark on history.  History as future generations will know it is written by a privileged few who all have their own spin to put on events.  The vast majority of us will have to be content with having been a part of the big picture, despite huge output on social and other media types.  Hardly any people stand the test of time and are remembered.  Even people who may have been mildly famous (or infamous) for a period often are forgotten by the next generation.  Wouldn't it be interesting to see, in a century, if anyone knew what Instagram had been?  Who Beyonce or Taylor Swift were?  Tom Hanks, Meryl Streep?  Which books had stood the test of time?  And as for politicians, well, each UK Parliament has 650 Members.  How many of those will leave a dent where they sat?  Even in their constituency's history?

There was an article recently about the imminent return of Peaky Blinders - can't wait - and apparently a new major character will be a female trade unionist and political activist named Jessie Eden.  She was a real person.  Who achieved amazing things.  But how many people will have ever heard of her before now?  Well-known and influential at the time.  But part of a much bigger picture of discontent and unrest in the Twenties and Thirties therefore consigned in accounts of that period to a footnote if she is lucky.

Banding together is more powerful in any situation.  That is not to say that one person should not do or say what feels right to them.  Look at Rose McGowan recently.  Someone has to start each ball rolling.  But if we are to make a real mark, leave a proper dent, it seems to me that the best way is to find like-minded people and work as one.  

The Language of Women

I have been wanting to write about the Harvey Weinstein scandal and its implications since the news broke.  But it has taken me a while to consider what I thought I might add to the debate.  There has, understandably, been a huge amount of comment around the revolting behaviour which has finally been made public.

In discussion with a friend last week, I was saying that I had no experience of such treatment.  But then as we talked, we realised that we both could name many times when our gender had been used to make us uncomfortable or afraid.  For example, I worked on London trading floors in the Nineties.  Barely a senior woman in sight and you were forced to push between lines of blokes to deliver any message or file.  They would push back on their wheelie chairs to intimidate you.  My friend and I could both name times when we had been groped at bars, shouted at in the streets, felt unsafe to be somewhere, etc.  Imagine if a woman grabbed a man's crotch whilst queuing for a drink or screamed about his trouser bulge from across the street?

Earlier this year, I blogged about Naomi Alderman's book The Power.  It tells of a world where women are in charge and I commented on how shocking the anti-male violence seems in the book yet the author is describing little that is not, in our world, being perpetrated against women.

And I think this is one of the most telling points with the Weinstein scandal.  Men like him - and lets be fair, he is hardly even the tip of the iceberg - have felt able to continue their activities because the world is still so skewed towards the idea of the inferiority and subjugation of women.

Last week, I watched a documentary about the suffragettes.  It really struck a chord when it talked of the disgusting language which the press and politicians of the time felt able to continually use about women.  Many of us know of the force feeding and other violence towards the suffragettes but I had not realised quite how appalling the anti-suffragette campaign had been in other ways.

We live in a world where the press cannot be as overt as they were then about their hatred of equality for women.  But every day women are written about and spoken of as inferior to men.  It is completely ingrained.  Criticism for working or for not working.  Comment on signs of ageing, shapes of bodies. The deification of motherhood but the insistence that you should snap back into physical and mental health after giving birth.  After I watched the documentary, I looked at the Daily Mail website - a loathsome place but I braved it for research purposes.  Here are some examples of the language used about photographs of female presenters and actresses going about their daily lives:

'putting on a leggy display' - wearing shorts in a hot place

'packing on the PDA' - giving their partner a peck on the cheek

'flashes a glimpse of' - a photographer has managed to get an upstart or down top picture

'steps out in racy...' - wearing a strappy top

'showcasing her...' - dressed in something figure hugging, short, etc.

And so on, ad infinitum.  It is considered acceptable to comment on female presenters' or journalists' ages, outfits and bodies even though they are doing the same work as their grey-suited, ageing male colleagues.  No-one takes to exception that we have only ever had two British female prime ministers and language is used about them which would never be used about males.   Look at the questioning suffered by female politicians about their life plans and intentions.  And as for women in business or positions of responsibility?  Can open, worms everywhere.  And these worms are not turning.  We are not breaking the ceilings because they are not glass.  They are institutionalised, conditioned, brainwashed steel.  In other blog posts, I have mentioned to need for us to stay angry.  The Women's Marches were a start, the brave women speaking out about Weinstein and others are another step on a long road.  But a road which must be travelled if we are to do right by the next generation.  Our ancestors fought for the vote, for equality.  They achieved a lot.  But so much more remains to be done.

It Could Happen

Did you see Who Do You Think You Are? on BBC1 last week?  Fans of the series have been waiting for this last episode for a while but it was worth it.  Unbelievably moving.  Very stark.  None of the happy chat with relations before or after the search.  But it was perfectly pitched in this respect.  Ruby Wax has suffered from mental health issues for twenty years and her search was very much to look for answers about the parental behaviour which she knows damaged her.

Ruby had never been told anything about her parents' history or their families.  She admitted during the programme that only her continuing medication was at that point keeping her calm about what she was finding out.  If you haven't seen the programme, please do click on the link above.  I don't want to spoil it by saying much more except to say that there are both Holocaust and mental health links.

And on a connected note, last week my daughter came home from school in quite a state.  They had been reading The Boy In Striped Pyjamas in English at school and her teacher had decided to show them a film about Auschwitz.  My girl was terribly affected by it and said she had cried in the lesson.  She is only eleven.

If you have read this blog before, you will know that I try to link history to current events and trends.  I am very much in favour of learning the lessons of history, of not turning away from difficult subjects, of fighting back against inequality and so on.  However, the tearful questions which arose from my daughter's experience last week really tested me.  Let me give you a taster:

1)  'The really skinny people were smiling in the film.'

'Well, I think those people were probably being filmed by the American and British liberators.  It sounds like survivor photos.'

'But why didn't we do anything sooner?  Did they know?  How could they not help?'

Can open, worms everywhere.

2)  'Why do I need to know this, to see this stuff?'

I'm sorry you got such a shock and I don't agree it was the right time to show you a film, but it is important that everyone knows about what happened.  It mustn't ever happen again.

'But this wouldn't ever happen again!'

We don't know that.  That's why we should stand up for what we believe in, for what's right.

'Is this to do with Donald Trump? Could he do this?'

What the hell do you say to this, other than try to be comforting whilst worrying about Trump, Putin and the rest.

And so on and so forth.

I do not agree with how this teacher has handled the subject matter and I have told the school so.  However, in some ways I was glad to see the connections being made.  I wrote the other week about not just looking forward in our own lives and the Holocaust is probably the most horrendous example in history of something which should never be forgotten.  The Nazis manipulated public thoughts and feelings in ways which should provide a terrible lesson to us all.  If they could achieve such control using relatively primitive methods of propaganda, what could  - are - those in power doing today?  With all the modern communication methods available to them?

The world is becoming a nastier place for all sorts of people and all sorts of reasons.  And the gaps between the haves and have nots are becoming larger.  A world like that is not why we fought the Nazis.  It will soon be Remembrance Sunday.  Remember those who fought and died but also the reasons why.

No More Guns

Just to say that each time I tried to write a post today - Monday as usual - my phone pinged again with more news from the Las Vegas shootings.  And I just could not seem to find the right thing to whitter about in the light of the awful news.

So I am not posting fully this week.  But I am going to add my small voice to the pleas for gun controls in America.  I just do not understand how anyone can want to live in a place where it is legal to carry a gun openly, where anyone can own a machine gun or worse, where no real checks are carried out on those who own guns.  I understand that you cannot stop people who are very determined.  But I don't think there is any reason to make it easy for people to get hold of whatever they feel like having in their gun cabinets.  

It would take a mighty federal effort now to change the US and it would take a long, long time to change the culture.  But someone needs to be brave and take the initiative.  And I am not sure it is Trump, if you look at his supporters' priorities, backgrounds, etc...

In San Diego last year, we went to a 'sporting goods' superstore, looking for particular trainers for my son.  To our amazement, there was an enormous area devoted to guns and their accoutrements.  Just there, in full view.  Never seen anything like it in the UK and hope never to do so either.  I would not like my children to think such display of killing machines was normal.

As someone said on Twitter today, 'less thoughts and prayers and more action needed this time'.

Look Both Ways

A little while ago, someone said to me that their life was always about going forward.  They didn't understand why some people either want or need to understand certain events from their past or why those people might still have fears generated by those situations.

I have thought about this a great deal.  Do people focus too much on what has happened to them previously?  Is it self indulgent to do so?  And I must say  I really don't agree.  Whatever has happened to you or around you (especially in childhood) is what has shaped you.  For better or worse. If you think have the ability to only look forwards, then that in itself, it seems to me, is a learnt skill.  A decision not to be affected by events or others.  Single minded yes, but necessarily helpful to those around them.

But if that's how you roll, good for you.  However, I think many (most?) of us have things from our past which we know affect us still.  Whether familial or professional.  Over the years, I have spent a fair amount of time with therapists.  Post-natal depression turned out to be a bit deeper and becoming a parent raised all sorts of questions about my own upbringing.  Even this year, I went to a therapist for a few months because there were things I needed to work through.  I felt I needed to learn in order to go forwards. 

This blog has often tried to think about how the wider past affects us.  I have regularly written about  learning from history.  Quite recently I wrote that I was seeming more political than family history orientated on the blog but that I felt it was justified in these uncertain times.  The thread of family history runs from the past to the future and I feel we have a responsibility to our descendants when it comes to the threat of nuclear war or to the implications of Brexit, etc.

In fact, as I write the news channels are full of the breakthrough of the Far Right in Germany's elections.  Buoyed no doubt by the refugee crises and by the racist, sexist White House occupant.  If ever there was a reason why we must keep looking back in order to move on, this is it.  These people feed on discontent and on each other's bravado and they spread disinformation.  I don't believe we should simply face forwards in our personal lives and I definitely don't believe it in our political lives.  Learn from history.

[By the way, on a lighter 'the past affects us' note, I still have flashbacks to the vile boss I had at one City job and to certain amateur dramatics humiliations, to name but two.  What about you?]

Weather He Exists

As the rolling news coverage is showing, our planet is undergoing, once again, extreme weather to say the least.  And as ever, Donald Trump's commentary language is about as simplistic as it gets.  The use of the words 'bad', 'good', 'very' are his go-to descriptives for everything though, aren't they?

However, even a greater intellect than Trump (no comment on how difficult it would be to find a person of more intellect - other than 'try the nursery') would struggle to describe something so extreme which they completely deny should be happening.

What puzzles me about the American Right is how you align extreme Christian religion with the denial of global warming.  If you are Creationist, what do you think is happening to the planet?  If you believe wholeheartedly - word for word - in the Bible, you must, for example, believe that Noah was told by God to build the Ark to save the animals 'two by two' (hey, there's a song there) while He flooded the place.

If it is not global warming, what is happening to our weather, our temperatures, our sea levels?  Is 'God' doing this?  And if so, why?  What are we being punished for?

Personally, I think the writers of the story of Noah were telling - a long time after the event - of a situation caused by a some kind of planetary issue.  And in another example, the plagues described as descending on Egypt were to do with extreme weather.  More likely explanations surely?

As a teenager, I was very involved in the Methodist Church.  Many of those who I went to youth events with subsequently entered the ministry or worked for the church in other capacities.  For me, I did greatly enjoy my time and I hope I took a moral compass from it.  I did believe in religion to an extent.  But it was not unquestioning.  And I have never thought that God created the world in seven days, etc etc.  To me, these tales are clearly a way of making sense of history passed down to the writers, of the world around the writers, of the unknown.

Or is there something we, the little people, are missing here?  There is film called 2012.  It is a disaster movie based on the idea that extreme sea level rises cause catastrophic flooding on the Earth. The only humans to survive are those who have places on giant space-ship-like vessels which have been secretly built.  And the places on those ships go mainly to the wealthy and those in government.

I am sorry if this is all getting a bit David Icke for you.  But having now watched fires, floods, hurricanes, earthquakes in the space of a week, I am even more terrified by Trump and co's refusal to believe in the need to mend out ways.  By their actual reversal of the measures which have so far been taken - and which never went far enough in the first place.  We, and not God, are most definitely killing our beautiful and bountiful planet.

Educating Everyone

And here we are.  September and back to school.  Only a day late with my first blog...  Hope you have had a good summer.

With the start of the new term, I have been pondering education.  My youngest starts secondary so we are entering a new phase.

Last week, in The Times, there was an article about the three brothers who head up the Harrop Fold Secondary School featuring in the new Educating Greater Manchester documentary on Channel Four.  It was a thought-provoking piece.  Not least for the admission that a school which has been turned around in a remarkable fashion over the last decade - it was once labelled 'the worst secondary school in the country' - is now being held back (strangled) by a £1.5 million debt.  It is not alone in this issue, thanks to the Private Finance Initiative.

Since I had just returned from Carfest, the BBC Children In Need money-raising festival, I was particularly struck by the disparity of expectation in our country.  At Carfest, we had a great time (lucky to be able to afford to participate) and no doubt, millions have been raised over the two festivals this year.  But the enterprise revolves around (duh!) cars.  And most of them are exceptionally expensive cars, owned by billionaires.  Just one of the Ferraris we saw is worth more than that debt at Harrop Fold.  Even if the festivals make a still-amazing £6 million or something, the entire proceeds could not purchase more than three or four of those Ferraris, McClarens, etc.

As I have written before, we do not live in a poor country.  We live in a country where choices are made for us about how our money is spent.  We are then 'persuaded' that these are the right choices and much is made of government debt, 'austerity' needs and so on.

We may talk about the decrease in services, read about the debt in education.  But we are conditioned not  to protest too much.  For example, Harrow Fold is in Greater Manchester.  Where there are two of the richest football clubs in the world.  Each with weekly wages bills that far exceed the strangulating debt of that school.  Indeed their wage bills probably could probably wipe out Greater Manchester's education debt with just one week of donations.

But somehow we believe it is acceptable for these situation to co-exist.  Fans whose kids are at struggling under-resourced schools are paying to watch overpaid, over-privileged footballers and not really questioning the differentials.  And it is not just them of course.  We are all conditioned to believe there is nothing wrong with this gap.  Trickle down economics?  More like 'build a dam' economics.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------And speaking of gaps, I was lucky enough to go got Singapore and Bali this summer.  Apart from the staggering scenery, one thing which struck us was the vast number of Chinese tourists.

We have been consistently informed by the Brexiteers that our route to financial and trade salvation after Brexit lies in the East - China, India, etc (Mr Trump's war not withstanding).  Well, our education system is not even remotely on this page yet.  Our children are still usually given a choice of French or German, possibly Spanish for 'modern languages'.  No thought has been given, on a mass scale, to Mandarin or other such languages.

The amount of people and money flowing from China would seem to mean that our future should indeed be facing East, regardless of whether we are in the EU or not.  But we - and more importantly our children - are definitely not prepared.  Even if we rely on the Chinese to be learning English (a typically arrogant assumption and one of which my small snapshot of well-off Chinese this summer saw absolutely no evidence), there are huge cultural lessons to learn.  We really struggled just on a small tourist scale to deal with the differences in manners and attitudes.

Of course, many UK private schools are apparently teaching Mandarin....

Partition Stories

I started this blog after an increased interest in my family history.  I wanted to write something a bit different to the ‘how to’ family history blogs.  Lately my posts have taken a different turn, according to how I have been feeling about the world in general.  However, my own family history is particularly relevant at the moment.  And in a far more direct way than usual.  It is seventy years this week since Partition in India.

This anniversary has led to a flurry of articles and documentaries, many of which are making use of testimony from the dwindling number of eye witnesses.  These testimonies have attested to the previous reluctance to discuss what happened during Partition.  But over a million people died and at least fifteen million were displaced. Due to arbitrary lines drawn on maps by the escaping British.

My own paternal family were (are) Anglo-Indian, as mentioned on previous posts.  Their community existed on the fringes of ‘real’ British society.  Mostly Christian, mostly European-dressed but not white, they had developed their own way of life.  (The photo, which has appeared on this blog before, is of my grandmother - in white - at school.)  Their numbers were substantial at this point.  A distant relation of mine, Sir Henry Gidney, had even managed to represent them at the independence negotiations in the Thirties.

But when Independence actually came and Partition happened, the British had little sense of what was about to be unleashed.  The terror, the violence, the frantic movement of millions of people.

Anglo-Indians were endangered by their positions as ‘assistants’ to the British.  But on a day to day basis, they were endangered simply by having to live in a country where random and terrible violence could break out at any time.  Watch some of the documentaries currently on iPlayer and you get a glimpse of hell. 

Some of my family left almost immediately.  My grandfather stuck it out until 1949, two years after Partition.  But then he upped sticks and took flight remarkably quickly.  He, my grandmother, her mother and brother and my father were all on a ship within days of being caught in a riot, by all accounts.  Presumably, in waiting, he had had the relative luxury, not afforded to so many, of being able to plan a little as regards money.  They were not supposed to take much out of the country.  I don't know if he planned the destination but since his sister-in-law was already in the UK, it seems there was a choice not to join his own parents and siblings in New Zealand.

Since my father subsequently married an English girl, I clearly have reason to be grateful for this move.  Who would wish themselves from existence after all?  But in reading the many accounts being published at the moment, I can see that my family were terribly fortunate in many ways.  Although I am sure, in leaving everything they had ever known, it didn’t feel that way.  Their lives in India were comfortable and their position was one of relative privilege in some ways, despite the discrimination and resentment against them.

Partition is a word which has been used thoughtlessly for seventy years now.  It makes it sound like it was a kind of natural phenomenon that a country was summarily split by civil servants.  And as the current wave of comment is finally admitting, the event is still not given the notice or importance that should be attached to it.  Younger generations are barely aware - if at all - that Pakistan is only seventy years old.  You could wonder, for example, how much the arbitrary agreement to  Muslim state in India has contributed ever since to the ideas of Caliphate which fuel Islamic extremists.  If it could happen there, why not elsewhere?  State sponsored religious sectarianism, anyone?

I hope you will take the time to read or watch some of the anniversary pieces.  And take a moment to explain it to your children.  Independence was long overdue but its accomplishment was an appalling example of the kind of governmental arrogance and gung ho which still exists in our world today.  The actions of these ‘players’  reverberate amongst ordinary people for generations.  Just ask those desperate people still trying to escape across the Mediterranean.

The Power

A while back, I posted a picture on Instagram of a book chosen by my book group.  It was The Power by Naomi Alderman.  I didn't make it to that group discussion unfortunately but I brought the book on holiday with me and ever since I picked it up, I have been reading frantically.

It tells of a future where women hold the reigns of power in the world.  Where this is normal.  Where men are assumed to be the softer sex.  And of how the world may have become that way.  I won't go into the story - it would spoil it for you.  I am not a book blogger and I am unused to writing reviews.

But occasionally on this blog, I have recommended books and I cannot recommend this one highly enough.  It is a hard read in some places, with descriptions of violence both sexual and otherwise.  But then you remember that in describing the women's violence against men, the author is simply describing the violence perpetrated against thousands of women on a daily basis in our own world.  And suddenly you wonder why we read or watch so many reports of such treatment without being angrier.  It has become commonplace to hear of rape, sexual slavery or women being trafficked.

I wrote, at around the time of Trump assuming power in the US, of the need to stay angry.  For us not to allow the women's marches and protests of that time to fade away.  This book should be read by all women - and preferably men as well.  Not as a vision of what a matriarchal world should be.  But as a call to continue the protest in our own time. 

We are living in a world where Trump can still be elected - and even worshipped by many - despite his distain (far too polite a word) for the female fifty percent of the population.  We are living in a world where an immensely successful female singer can be groped in a public place and then have to go to court to clear her own name (an experience shared by thousands of women of course).  We are living in a world where women are still routinely denied the capacity to choose when to be pregnant.  And so on, ad infinitum.

Read The Power if you have the opportunity.  And then think about what needs to be done now.

[If you can't get the book, look it up on The Writes of Woman.  There is an excellent synopsis plus an interview with Naomi Alderman.  The book won the Bailey's Women's Prize for Fiction 2017 in June.]

Summer Is Here

My social media streams are full of parents bemoaning the start of the the school holidays.  Don't get me wrong, I have joined in with this despite looking forward to the end of term.  And it doesn't get any easier as they get older.  You move from needing to entertain them all day every day to them not wanting you around but at the same time, somehow, being unable to let you get on with your own stuff.  For example, I have just done my last solo supermarket trip for a while.  Yes, we can all have everything delivered these days but I quite like to mooch and decide on meals, whilst listening to Audible on my phone.  Goodbye to all that.  For the teen and pre-teen, a supermarket trip is a multi opportunity.  Fleece mum for stuff they don't need, persuade her to buy unsuitable food they don't need.  And to try to kill each other in the aisles, using trolley/bare hands.  Ending with the embarrassing mum at the checkout in whatever way comes to mind.

The same goes for writing undisturbed at home.  Despite a notice on my 'office' (for which read dumping ground) door, my two claim the right to enter and whitter at me whenever they like.  They never do this to their father when he works at home, I might add.  I wondered if he is fiercer but I suspect they just know which side their financial bread is buttered on.  

So, I will only be posting sporadically for the next few weeks.  I know I only post once a week but I do like it to be current and - if you can believe this - give the matter some thought (!).  And my ability to do this during the holidays has previously not been good.  Although this year, both of my children are far more keen on sleeping in than previously whilst I still have to get up for the dog!

I wish you a happy summer, with or without children in the mix.  I will still be posting regularly on Instagram @debcyork and Twitter, again @debcyork.

For the dog's take on the summer, follow @missbonniedog on Twitter!

Persist and resist

As any regular readers will know (if there are any!), I didn't post last week.  I just couldn't seem to summon any energy.  As the summer approached, I had begun to feel I was running on empty.

But then I saw a post by Alan Cumming on Instagram (@alancummingsnaps).  It was in relation to the recent Pride events but his post talked of all the struggles going in the world at the moment.  The racism, sexism, religious intolerance.  Here is a little of what he said:

We live in scary times.  It's hard to maintain the level of outrage with so many outrageous things happening daily, hourly, and the fight can seem exhausting.  the other day a wise woman posited that 'persist' is as important, if not more, than 'resist' as a mantra.

This really strikes a chord with me.  And not just for persistence in the political and social struggles.  I have struggled for many years with depression.  Relatively low level but enough to cause me periods of real difficulty.  I know far better now when these are upon me but it can be hard to regain the upper hand.

But when you hear about the everyday struggles that so many people are dealing with, you feel bad for not coping better with your own somewhat cushy existence.  For example, in The Times magazine on Saturday (15 July), there was a piece about the Fitzmaurice family.  The headline was My husband can only communicate with his eyes, via a computer.  If that doesn't put teenaged tantrums, constant clearing up woes and general 'being fed up' into context, I don't know what will.  Ruth Fitzmaurice has a husband with Motor Neurone Disease and five children under twelve.  (I will definitely be reading her book I Found My Tribe.)

Persistance is something which we often forget we have.  We in the developed world often have such comfortable existences that when we see refugees on the oceans, people displaced in war zones,  people dealing with extreme poverty or illness, it is hard to believe that we ourselves could ever survive such ordeals.  We wonder aloud at the resilience of others.

Because the need for persistence and resilience has been taken away.  We don't have to hunt or gather.  Our problems are of a different nature.  But we, as humans, do have the resilience.  If pushed, we would all do whatever it took to survive for the longest possible time.  Our ancestors performed miracles with a lot less creature comforts around them.

So how about we channel some of that dormant persistence and resilience into continuing the fight for a better world.  And for myself, I will also be channelling some of that into feeling better and into counting my blessings a bit more often (even whilst arguing with the teen and the tween!).

Ping Off

Recently I saw a Tweet about  'app-piety'.  It has stuck with me.

Appxiety (n): sense of dread you feel when you reach for your phone in the morning to see if some horrendous news has happened overnight. (@StigAbell)

This weekend, I was camping with my family and my phone died on Saturday afternoon. I didn't bother trying to charge it until I got home last night.

It was less than twenty four hours but it was lovely. I regret not being able to take photos on the rather windy beach yesterday but other than that, it was a blessed relief.

Generally I like social media. As previously blogged, I have, for example, been learning to use Instagram properly. And I love Tweeting as my dog! (Long story, loads of people all over the world do it so I don't feel like a complete solo nutter (well not much). 'Twitfur' is a hilarious place, I assure you...)

But in a world with so many stresses, I have realised that I need, at the least, to turn off the pinging notifications which come seemingly from every app unless you actively seek out how to stop them. The BBC News app theme tune was beginning to strike dread into me. And I was becoming a bit too interested in how many 'Likes' I had for my Instagram posts.

So many awful things have happened recently. And continue to happen. Bombs, fires, wars, to say nothing of the endless political and social problems in more and more countries. It's not that I don't care. I hope you can tell from browsing my blog posts that I do care. Many things matter to me - probably too much! - and I try to be consistent in my views. It's just that I think we are all suffering from the twenty four news cycle. If you have more than one news source on your phone (as recommended in a previous post, I do admit), you get the same information many times over when it is perceived as important breaking news.  

Clearly we do want/need to know about matters of national importance. But I can't help thinking sometimes that the days when everyone listened to the news at six or at ten but had little access to bang-up-to-date news at other hours must have been quite restful.

Or maybe our ancestors would say they would have loved to have had more news at their fingertips. Imagine how much more of a scandal Henry VIII would have been if his doings were available on a gossip app. Or how different the Home Front would have felt during the Second World War if people could have watched battles live, Tweeted about the Blitz or Facetimed their evacuated children.

We are of our time, I suppose. Our descendants will be laughing at how slow our news cycle is, most likely! But at the moment we all need a break from the ping. A break from the reality of our world at large in order to live in the moment.

This summer, let's switch our phones off at the beach or the park or on a hike. Let's take cameras for photos and compasses for directions. Check your phone at six in the evening while you are on holiday. And turn off those pings so they are not stacking up when you do switch on!


[Excuse the language below but I believe it sums up a lot! And should wish to Tweet my dog, she (for it is her) can be found at @missbonniedog]

A Normal Family

I really don't know where Monday has gone this week and I don't like to not post anything.  So I would recommend reading a current article from The Guardian as it says quite a lot that I agree with and would have mused on further if I had not been too frantic to sit and get it onto the screen!  Click on the link to see the article.

Zoe Williams is writing about Prince Harry's wish to either not be royal or to have the royal family altered substantially.  I think the debate also makes you wonder what constitutes a modern family these days, whether you are royal or not.  We camped at the weekend with eight other families.  All long term couples but not all married.  One divorce amongst us and sadly one spousal death too.  Children ranging from seventeen to five, all with different outlooks and abilities.  But we all consider ourselves fairly normal.  Mainly, I think, because we are relatively like-minded.  Our normal is not 'normal' for others though.

I am sure Prince Harry would not consider being on benefits or queueing to use NHS facilities as what he would want from 'normal' for a start....

Normal blog 'service' resumes next week!

Kensington Revolution

This week we have been dealing, in the UK, with the awful tragedy of the Grenfell Tower fire.  I send my heartfelt sympathies to all who have been affected in Kensington and huge admiration to all who have helped in the rescue effort and the continuing aftermath.  

If you look online, there are hundreds of articles and reports and comment pieces about this appalling event.  Many have excellent insights and background information.  I won't mention anything particular but following last week's post about getting out of our informations 'bubbles', I would highly recommend reading press and comment from all sides of the political spectrum.

Interestingly, none have attempted to deny that lack of funding is a major cause of the situation on such estates.  (And even the most virulent Right wing papers appear to have slightly toned down their anti immigrant rhetoric, given the backgrounds of many of those who have died or been affected.)

Back in April I wrote a blog post called Doing The Numbers in which I looked at the huge money amounts which are bandied about when referring to football, films etc whilst we in the UK are constantly being told that money for hospitals, schools and housing is not available.

I argued that we are not a poor nation and that lack of funding for services is a political choice not a necessity.  Tragically, events like this tower block inferno bear this out in graphic detail.  Underfunded hospitals and emergency services are left trying to rescue some of society's poorest people from underfunded and clearly dangerous housing.

There is no excuse in a country like ours for money not to be spent where it is needed.  Our health  and social services, schools and emergency workers are looking after all of us in some way.  Only a tiny percentage of the population have a private GP for example.  No-one, to my knowledge, has a private ambulance, fire service or police force on private 24/7 standby.  And even if you could prove that you never touch public services in anyway (impossible but hey, give it a go if you have the money.  Good luck with rubbish collection, using the roads, etc.) who do you think looks after and educates all the people who you rely on to serve you, clean for you, blah  blah.

It took until 1918 for even most of our male ancestors to get the vote to say nothing of the women.  Austerity is a political choice which has been forced upon us.  It is not a necessity.  Hopefully the Grenfell Tower will begin a chain of events which will result in people finally understanding this.  We should not just accept what we are told.  The increase in the young vote was heartening earlier this month.  We need to keep that momentum. 

Kensington Popular Front*, anyone?

*with apologies to Citizen Smith fans!

Democracy In Action

I had looked at the UK exit polls in disbelief before I went to bed on Thursday night and was amazed by the result on Friday.  I won't witter on about it.  But I would like to say how bizarre our British electoral system is.  To see such a massive change in Labour's fortunes and still be so far away in terms of seats in Parliament is, well, absurd to put it politely.  Yet it is so much better than feared, I can't bring myself to moan too much about even that.  I had feared we would not have a change of government again until my eldest was old enough to vote!

Anyway, at the weekend I attended the Democracy Focus Day at York Festival of Ideas.  It had been planned well in advance of the General Election being called but of course could not have been more timely.  They already even had the [now re-elected] York Central MP Rachel Maskell on a guest panel.  Impressively, she still made it.

The first session was fascinating and involved threats to democracy.  It was terrifying.  The ways in which modern warfare now includes use of social media and so on to shut down protest or to stir it up.  The Russian takeover of Ukraine was used for many examples.  But Trump and his ilk also figured, as did the possible breakdown of the EU.  (Comment if you would like more details.)

The second session was centred more specifically on how social media influences democracy.  And much of it was very close to things which I have mused on in blog posts over the last twelve months. 

So I would like to share with you a 'Post-Truth Survival Kit' from the keynote speech by David Patrikarakos, a writer for The Daily Beast and Politico amongst others.  He referred, as I have, to our increasing tendency to be in a news bubble.  Surrounding ourselves with news and views from people who we are generally in agreement with.  And having this reinforced by social media like Facebook which start to push more of things which they have noticed you already Like.  This is David's advice:

1)  Go out of your way to friend of follow people that don't necessarily agree with your worldview.

2)  Go directly to the websites of trusted news sources - or better still, buy the newspaper itself.  Read all its reporting.  Don't cherry pick articles with a slant that appeals to your pre-existing beliefs.

3)  Read articles from publications whose political views you DON'T agree with.

4)  Read books.

5)  Mistrust the mob.

6)  Log off!!!

How do we get more people to follow this advice?  It is hard to engage with those we disagree with, even if it is just reading.   But actively engaging brings the fear of trolling and abuse.  We must be brave though.  Social media played larger part in last week's election than ever before.  And as another panel member said, it is just the beginning.  It is not going away.  It will just get more sophisticated.  We must make it work for us.  

(And by the way, when I advise you to 'Log off!!!', I mean after you have read my blog and checked my Instagram obviously...)

For The Many Not The Few

This weekend we have once again, in the UK, seen the best and the worst of humankind.  Another appalling attack but amazing stories from those who helped with the aftermath.  Along with a wonderful concert organised by Ariana Grande to benefit those hit by the previous attack, just twelve days before.  It is hard to find the words to describe how this rollercoaster of events makes us feel, isn't it?  

We want to know what happened during the attacks but we are scared and upset by the media coverage.  We enjoy the concert but feel dreadful about the reasons it has been put on and guilty that so many will not have seen it because they've lost their lives.  We know that those who carry out the attacks must feel angry and desperate in order to do such things but we cannot condone their methods.  We want to be tolerant of all religions and sections of society.  But it is difficult not to be fearful of what might happen next.

And on top of that, we have to vote in an election this week.  An election which has been called on the back of another kind of huge division within our country.  With an electoral system which does not make most of us feel that our votes count.

I believe we must still very definitely vote for the benefit of the many and not just the few, though.  We must not vote for a party which will destroy our health, social care and education systems just because they might appear to talk tougher about security in the wake of the recent tragic incidents.

These hideous attacks are carried out by the very few and they affect relatively few (although that is not to in any way lessen the awful suffering, I know).  The emergency services are already stretched by such incidents.  What will it be like if the NHS has been allow to crumble and we are still dealing with such events?  And how will we begin to talk to the coming generation of disenfranchised and frustrated young men and women who will carry out future attacks if they cannot receive decent education, social support?  To say nothing of the funding needed for community policing - not just firearms.

Now, more than ever, we need a cohesive and supportive society.  One which benefits as many of us as possible.  It is ordinary people who are bearing the brunt of the attacks, it is state-funded services which are dealing with the aftermath.

I sometimes include an element of family history in my blog posts.  This is not one of them.  But it is, once again, about the world our descendants will face.  And we must take that responsibility seriously.