England Expects That Every Man Will Do His Tea

Ah, that's better! A nice hot cup of Earl Grey at 3.10 on the last Sunday afternoon of British Summertime, after a satisfying siesta. What better way to pass the Lord's day, I ask myself?

There's a sacredness about this time of the week like no other, I find, equalled perhaps only by the cosiness of Sunday night, when it's become domestic practice for my brother and I to have our main Sunday meal settled in front of the telly watching Hertbeat or some similarly familiar but undemanding fare. The meal, meanwhile, is the best one of the week. With apologies to my veggie friends, tonight it will be the roast beef of Old England, doubtless with all the trimmings and washed down with a glass or three of a decent red. I used to be rather partial to a nice Corbieres after an early duty-free excursion introduced it to my palate, but haven't had this particular wine for a while so tonight will be the chance to return to an old friend in a glass.

MEANTIME IN GREENWICH

Trafalgar 200 week brought for me a much-needed break from the stresses, strains and mistakes of my labour which have been giving me some grief of late and are still causing me worry on a Sunday afternoon when as I said above, my thoughts are normally far from my workaday woes. However, this is not the place to go into them.
I have been careful in these blog postings not to name my employer although there is an early clue for those that want to go looking for it. Be a code breaker if you like, and if you're a new reader of this blogspot interested enough to read more of these thoughts, see if you'd agree with the final school report comment of one English teacher of mine which has remained with me, yet inspired me, through close on three decades of adult life:
"Mark could do very well, if he tried. He remains an enigma".

Quite possibly I am, still, Mr Duggan-but cracking the enigma code was a vital contribution to the winning of the Second World War! I thought about those words again as I passed through Bletchley earlier this week on my first trip on the finest ship of the rails of Richard Branson's fleet, the Virgin Pendolino. My destination was Manchester, that hub of all that was both good and bad about the industrial revolution just beginning as Nelson took to sea.
Ever since the autumn reunion retreats I'd hitherto enjoyed in Wiltshire with my ccompanions from a 1990 Holy Land pilgrimage came to an end, I'd been at a bit of a loss of how to fill this too long a period between the summer holidays and Christmas with an alternative way of re-charging my batteries before the dark evenings draw in and November nothingness takes hold of the soul with it's depressing greyness for another thirty days.
Step forward then the North-West of England with all its delights, from the cosmopolitan metromix which is modern Manchester, to the awe-inspiring serenity and natural, timeless beauty of the English Lake District. Yes, the Lord is my shepherd, and he leads me beside still waters [where] he refreshes my soul indeed, but from time to time he uses places and people to do it. This week, the comfort and counsel of treasured and trusted friends in the North were just what the doctor would have ordered, had he seen me- and indeed did when I was suffering from stress in an earlier period of worry about this time of the year.

No Lake District this year, though after honing my 'brand awareness 'and taking in the beers and other tangible delights of Greater Manchester, I also managed to fill up on a spot of spiritual refreshment beside two very different bodies of water this week. Thursday saw me in Disley, a pleasant village in the High Peak area of England's first national park, marred only by the peace-challenging artery which is the A6 trunk road between Manchester and the historic spa town of Buxton (where I must go some day). The still waters through here include the Peak Forest canal, a lovely discovery for me where I sat down on the banks where horses once pulled the cargoes of industry and brought my own burdens before the Lord. It could have been a million miles from that other metropolis I currently have to commute to five days a week and my soul was in another realm far beyond the affairs of men.

Friday brought my departure from Manchester, and a thoroughly enjoyable and impressively prompt journey back down South on another Pendolino, aurally punctuated by one of the best episodes of Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy courtesy of the on-train audio system and a spot of rolling radio. More on the permanent way anon, although my own permanent way never leaves the rails, alleluia!

En route to my "must be there" destination on Trafalgar Day itself, I had my dose of enduring the misery line, much beleaguered this last month due to the failings of the fiasco which is the Private Public Partnership [sic] on the London Underground Northern Line. At Bank, I was glad to decamp onto an altogether lighter railway for my first journey on the recent extension of the Docklands Light Railway south of the river down to the home of time and an afternoon in Greenwich.

Most of the day's big ceremonial events of course were reserved for royalty and today's great and good, so I did not even attempt to go to Portsmouth nor to buy ticket costing a Nelson's arm [ and a leg] on board the senior service's senior ship. However, Greenwich as the home of the old naval college and the world heritage sites where Nelson's body lay in state on return from battle, was the next best place to be to discover more of his heritage and toast his memory with a pint of Fuller's special brew in honour of him, Nelson's Blood. A pint of rum, to which this nickname usually applies, would have rendered me even more senseless than some might say I normally am!
Before the beer though came the sightseeing, and quite apart from another due tea in the cafe, surrounded by naval memorabilia and the white ensign, given dispensation to be flown everywhere this weekend, I had looked round the extraordinarily beautiful Hanoverian masterpiece which is the chapel of the Old Royal Naval College, now leased to Trinity College of Music.

The sound of sopranos wafted across the air as I walked across the quad to the chapel, and the sight of the gilded altarpiece which was St Paul's escape from death on Malta drew me to my knees in prayer. Having enjoyed the architectural landmarks of the temples to industry of Manchester earlier in the week, here at last was man meeting with his creator in the skill of his hand touching the everlasting arms of the one who made him. Does it say something about contemporary man that so much modern architecture owes nothing to worship of God yet everything to idolising the "triumphs" of consumerdom?

Finally, my watery celebration of Trafalgar Day told me I must go down to the sea again, so it was off to Eastbourne for the Ceylon Place house group, another beer and an overnight stay in my other home

BATTLES AND BOTTLES
It was Adnam's Broadside to end my Friday night in Eastbourne, and Shepherd Neame Spitfire with supper and Casualty back here in Feltham last night.Drinks a plenty will have been supped up and down the land this weekend in honour of the man of the moment, Horatio, Viscount Nelson. Let's not just lump him in with the lesser league of Lords, please: the title he died with acknowledges not just Britain's but many navies' recognition of him even two centuries later as the C in C, fleet to excel them all. Even a pacifist like me is moved by the victory he secured for liberty from Napoleonic oppression off Cape Cadiz in 1805, but the more so by the man's humanity and humility which have been much trumpeted in this bi-centenary year of the Battle of Trafalgar.
A cossetted 21st century man like me could have no cognisance of the dreadful conditions of service life of 200 years ago, were it not for the history books and the museums and now the websites which tell so much of the life of the sailor or indeed the ordinary toiler of that time. In an age of cruel discipline and marked disregard for the failings and frailty of man, Horatio Nelson gave those who served under him -including a few closet women, actually!- a reason for respect far removed from the savagery of so many of his contemporaries, yet which even in another millennia is the lot of so many souls in other conflicts, other countries, other cultures.
The Battle of Trafalgar may have been our triumph, and France and Spain may now be our allies in a very different Europe to that of the early nineteenth century. But let nobody pretend the battle for the human soul has yet been won, although victory is actually foretold. Evil stalks in so many guises in contemporary society throughout the world, and modern media bring it so close to our attention that nobody can turn a blind eye to it, even if it be the blindness of convenience which caused Nelson to put a telescope to his sightless eye to ignore the signalled orders of his superior and thus win the Battle of Copenhagen.

Wretched events no better than the ruthless ones witnessed by our forebears are so close at hand on both land and sea so often in this infant century. Let nobody pretend that the liberty Nelson toiled for or the Victory he won has brought us freedom from the prison of our own selfishness, pride and apathy. Great though he may have been, seeing the battle won before his death and ever-lauded for his heroism, Horatio Nelson's sacrifice aboard a vessel of oak is as nothing compared to what was given up for all humankind by one man's broken, pierced, blood-spattered arms on a cross of crude wood twenty centuries ago.

So what a sad homage today is then to Britain's greatest naval hero, the son of a country parson and a devout Christian all his days yet in his private life so obviously a flawed human, On this Lord's day, fewer folk will have gathered in churches and houses of prayer to honour the man who is the Son of God, than will have huddled in pubs and ships with a gill or two in these last days to honour a much lesser man. Would the Nelson whose prayer on the eve of battle has been described by some as a masterpiece of English prose, have fought so valiantly had he known what a sorrowful, sacreligious nation we would become:

May the great God whom I worship Grant to my Country and for the benefit of Europe in General a great and Glorious Victory, and may no misconduct in any one tarnish it, and May humanity after Victory be the predominant feature in the British fleet. For. myself individually I commit my Life to Him who made me, and may his blessing light upon my endeavours for serving my Country faithfully, to Him I resign myself and the just cause which is entrusted to me to Defence - Amen Amen Amen

These were the words quoted just two days ago over the spot where the great man fell on his flagship, and doubtless repeated countless times over this weekend in the numerous ceremonies and special events to mark this momentous moment in history. Yet I'll wager a ha'porth of tar that Horatio Nelson would put aside all his great victories, all the glory of the moment and the defeat of an alien foe, to see the land that he loved come back to the Lord of all and the Saviour of the world. To that fact and that redemption indeed, sealed in blood and born again in the victory of the Resurrection, I cry this Sunday AMEN, AMEN, AMEN- so be it! Amazing Grace indeed: time for another tea and Songs of Praise counting down the nation's favourite hymns.

Samuel Peeps

Do you like being like Mr Nosey when you read books? Do you feel like you want to spy on the author's life and see who means the most to him, or perhaps her? Some writers are very secretive, others say a great deal about themselves. Guess which type I am? What type are you. A bit of both, maybe?

When I buy a new book, often the first bit I turn to is what used to be called in the olden days the "frontispiece". That's the bit where the writer or their publisher has sometimes got someone else famous to say nice things about the new book- especially useful if nobody has ever heard of the writer before and they want to sell more books: I suppose even Roald Dahl had to start somewhere, after all! It's also often called a preface or a foreword.

However, that's not the bit at the front that arouses my curiosity the most: it's the "dedication" or "acknowledgments" that I like to look at. You don't have to include it in a book of course, but doing so says more about you than good reviews ever can. It's where the writer names all those people who have helped them with the book, taught them important lessons in their life,given them advice or maybe just amused them. But just as often too, the Acknowledgments are where you will find out about really special people who the author just wants to mention because they love them!

Thinking all this through today on a historic day in British history, I thought it was high time I dedicated one of these blogs to somebody. Who will it be, you ask yourself? Will it be my favourite teacher? Mr Weir's probably long gone, but who would be yours? Or a relative- my grandma perhaps, who used to love reading my stories of what I had been up to on holiday? I suppose you could even dedicate your blog to a favourite pet- but we've had so many lovely cats, it would be unfair to single any one of them out.

So perhaps I should choose a figure from history. Now, who could that possibly be today, Friday 21st October AD 2005(only just as it's nearly over!)? How about a certain Admiral Horatio, Lord Nelson? Surely on the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar that might be an appropriate choice, and what a day it's been for followers of England's greatest man of the sea and the hero of the moment those two centuries ago.

I wish I could even dedicate these words to my secretary ( I wish I had one!) or to other people who have helped me as I've written these little bits and pieces over the last seventeen months or so. But apart from the encouraging comments that my friends do make, which boost my confidence no end, there aren't any little helpers out there, or even any much bigger ones. I haven't got any gnomes who come in and eat all the brain waves inside my head every night (do you think that might be what dreams are all about really?) and then scamper around like little ants on my computer keys so that you too can feed on my thoughts, for what they're worth.

If I did have Marky's little helpers like this, then maybe you'd have seen a bit more writing from me at this web address over the last month; so sorry, dear reader, if you've been disappointed that the Anyway cupboard's been bare for a while. Truth is I have either been too tired or too weighed down by other cares to say very much in my blogs lately, though I have been very keen to.

However, I couldn't let this auspicious (love the word, but still not sure exactly what it means, are you?) time pass without dedicating this latest posting to one special little boy out there in computer land who had his own great celebration today. I'm going to be Top Secret like the best special agent and not tell you all his name. But he must have a mention, because today remembers the day he battled his way out of his Mummy's tummy back in the late nineties, so now he's celebrating his EIGHTH birthday no less, and days don't come much more special than birthdays, do they!

I was very happy to have a bit of an early celebration with my junior friend Sam this week, along with my (very!) old friends his Mum and Dad on a flying visit (well, by train really!) to the North West of England where he lives. He's a great little guy and such fun! The lad's getting on very well with his sums, is good to his baby brother most of the time, and he even told me some great poems about the seasons.

Mind you, I don't know whether Sam likes keeping a diary or not, like the very famous man of the same first name who wrote so much about the Great Fire of London and also worked for the Royal Navy, I discovered today while visiting a navy museum in South East London. One thing's for sure though: Sam doesn't miss a trick at all and I wonder whether when he's playing hide and seek, Samuel Peeps?

Many Happy Returns of the Day, and God Bless, little man from a rather bigger one!

Summer leaves

Now, you looked twice at the title of this posting, didn't you? Poet and painter from time immemorial have tried to capture in their respective mediums the glories of the Autumn, particularly the deciduous delight which is known in the US as the Fall and when leaves turn every shade of red, brown, amber and orange, before they, well, leave their branches and once again the perfectly-rounded cycle of nature turns.
However, that's maybe a subject for six weeks or more hence here in the South of England at least, just before the gloomy nights of November set in once daylight saving time (BST) ends. Instead, I'm focussing in this late night blog on the thoughts and emotions that the departure of the warmest, lightest season of the year brings tonight. The summer of 05 has now gone in the Northern Hemisphere; it's the Autumnal Equinox and although the mild temperatures bely it, the last season of our Northern year is with us again. It's all downhill twixt now and Christmas :-( Summer leaves, hopefully to return again in nine months time. Well, it was good while it lasted!

For my part, I've had a last gasp of summer and sea air at my "other" home here on the South Coast tonight where I came to support the poorly-attended house group I was a regular at while I was working and living here full time during the week. The downside is that means an early start tomorrow as I head back to London for the last day of the working week, but at least I'm guaranteed a seat and a snooze, noisy commuters and manic mobiles not withstanding, on the 90 minute or so journey to Victoria.

Not that I mind rising before dawn; my employer has been holding a conference all this week for 32 delegates which has really kept me on my toes and working from before 8.30 in the morning til 7.30 at night one evening, without even a lunch break. But moaning, moi? Not a bit of it: I love it, and I've been well fed too, both spiritually and literally.
Somehow, like the seasons getting into gear with the bursts of energy and change each three months brings, I've been in my element! In fact, it's been one of the most enjoyable parts of my working life since my BBC days, which seem a very long time ago now. The course finishes tomorrow, and I shall miss the delegates, every one of them. Here's to the next one in March, as Le Printemps puts a spring in our step and a not so young man's fancy once again turns to hard work! God hallows the seasons: it's Harvest Festival in many churches including my Feltham this weekend, and we're reminded that "Thou visitest the earth, thou crownest the years with thy blessings". Amen to that!

The Dark Side of the Monday

Dawn attempts to break out over Feltham, thwarted by cloud cover and a reminder that "the summer's gone" rather than being in the meadow that the lyrics of the "Air from County Derry" so poignantly convey.
There's always a touch of the melancholy about this time, and yet the Summer won't actually be gone for another nine days yet when the autumnal equinox beckons the start of the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. But the great yellow presence in the sky has been struggling to put his hat on these last couple of days- and in so doing may just have been the salvation of English cricket!

The final test against the old adversaries from Oz, where Spring's about to begin, has put a spring in the step of eleven good men and true who may today fly from the wicket as phoenixes, and seal their place in the annals of cricket as the side that freed the ashes from the prison of Australian stewardship for the first time in sixteen years. With England in to bat on their second innings, the run race is on to meet their target and show themselves invincible.

Can they do it? Can those feet in modern time walk across Vauxhall's outfield green, up to the wicket and shine forth upon the crowded bails? Well, cricket's the sport of the clergy- the late great David Shepherd, former England cricketer and later Bishop of Liverpool- proved that. But The Independent, going against the trend of harmless jingoism which has filled the press and inspired the masses as eyes focus on the Brit Oval these last few days reminds us that God is impartial: he sends his sun on the righteous as well as the unrighteous.

Whatever side wins, this has been widely recognised as perhaps the greatest test series against the Australians ever. Even sporting simpletons like me who can't tell a silly mid off from a slip have been thrilled with every nuance these last couple of matches particularly. And Channel 4 has surpassed itself with some gripping and insightful coverage of every match. What a cruel irony it would be then if England were to snatch victory, only to find the jaws of defeat hold the false teeth of an Aussie-born media baron who is set to darken terrestrial screens to the glories of the game forever. The sky may save our side; Sky must not be allowed to steal our view.

Fire from the Madding Crowd

In England, holiday time draws to a close. Not just for the denizens of desks but for thousands of others who after the last Bank Holiday of the Summer at the beginning of this week, now face the long run downhill to Christmas.

Endings and beginnings, starts and finishes. The dawn of September can so often seem like a sad conclusion to the lazy, hazy days of Summer although I've discovered this year that I'm not the only one who feels a certain melancholy even after the passing of the longest day back in June, which seems so long ago already. Of course, strictly speaking, it's not over til the fat lady sings, or should I say until around the 21st of the month when the autumnal equinox really prepares us for the mists and mellow fruitfulness to come.
This year though, unrelated to weather or almanac, but intimately linked with mood and feeling, it seems as though the summer stealers have had a field day. The horrific events of July 7th and their consequences robbed us of some of the joyous highlights of the best season of the year, and even London's glee at securing the 2012 Olympics was violently blown apart by mindless maniacs intent on disproving that two wrongs don't make a right.

Even now, on September 2nd as pupils and students fill their backpacks with harmless pens,pencils and books ready for the return to a term of mind-planting, the merciless fools who would water seeds of hatred and maim and kill with the same innocent-looking bags are allowing their festering manifesto to find outlet again. This time it's through the posthumous release of a video supposedly recorded by one of the 7/7 suicide bombers. Foreign secretary Jack Straw is wisely treating this latest affront to deceny with the scepticism it deserves.

Meanwhile, 4000 miles across the Atlantic Ocean, the richest and most powerful nation on Earth somehow seems rendered impotent in the face of the natural disaster which was Hurricane Katrina. The scenes on the news pictures these last 24 hours almost defy belief: can this really be happening in the land of the brave and the home of the free? What freedom is it that fails to bring thousands the basic necessities of life- food and water- for days on end while the federal government gives every impression of being totally unprepared for the devastation that ensued? Hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico are hardly unique, yet the poor souls (and many of them are economically impoverished even in good times) who are now witnessing death, devastation and utter lawlessness on streets that once rang to the music of jazz have no voice left now to sing the blues, only breath enough for tears.

But New Orleans has jazz, it also has soul. Somehow in the midst of the latest apocalyptic events to engulf a small corner of the globe, the song of hope and joy can still be heard over the clamour of anger and desperation. Music is a universal language born as much in adversity as celebration and my hope and prayer is that New Orleans and its people will rise again from the miry pit of the 2005 floods with hope and a new song and, somehow, life from death.

Death's pitiless face has put in so many appearances this week, both in actual events and in memory. In Baghdad, hundreds died not from the usual horrors of insurgent action which have become so commonplace in Iraq, but from a stampede caused by the mad effects of a vicious rumour. These were pilgrims, Sunni Muslims endeavouring to celebrate one of their most holy festivals and ending their lives in a grim jumble of bodies and limbs. Once again, the sacredness of life has been stolen by the mindless actions of a few, just as it was for hundreds of precious, innocent little ones a year ago this week in the slaughterhouse of a Beslan schoolroom. From the ecstacy of celebration came the agony of destruction. Scores of young minds untutored in the horrific excesses of the so-called human race were brutally assaulted literally and psychologically by the bloody hand of terrorism once again.

How can people ever recover from these horrors? Can any mind, let alone the gloriously inventive,imaginative, creative powerhouse of potential which is the brain of the under-18 ever live and love again when life robs them so cruelly of what should be their birthright, a normal loving home and the security of schoolroom and family?

Remarkably, because we are made in the image of God, we can and do recover from even the most unimaginable of horrors. Events like we have seen this week, this season are not the place to launch into hunts for theological answers, as if these could be found like the treasure at the end of the rainbow. They are instead the time to seek the Kingdom of Heaven, where the compass needle points to love. For everything, there is a season. A time to laugh, a time to cry. A time to weep, and a time for every purpose under Heaven. This season of awfulness will have its end. What is sown in sorrow will be reaped in joy. Man wherever he lays his head will find rest and restoration.

It was with these thoughts in mind that earlier in the week, I sought to make the most of my last leisure of the summer, or at any rate a few brief days of respite from the 9 to 5. I certainly chose one of the best weeks to have off from the daily run up to Oxford Street, as the temperature on Wednesday topped 32 Celsius, or 90 Fahrenheit in old money. My brother and I chose that day to seek our fun in the sun down in one of my favourite English counties, which some say is the most beautiful of all of them. Dorset was our destination for a day out at the annual GREAT DORSET STEAM FAIR, which Matthew has been attending for many years but I have not had the chance to get along to before now.

After facing the usual expected though relatively minor hold-ups of the South's motorway system, we got to our destination at Tarrant Hinton around lunchtime, just in time for a very welcome pint of the sponsor's brew, Badger Best. Tanglefoot, their other justly famous product, is not the stuff for a lunchtime session, tasty though it is but rather strong at 4.9 per cent alcohol. Who should we just happen to encounter in there but a contingent of our local stationary engine buffs who were spending the week there. I'd say given the fact there were over seventy thousand on site that day, the chances of that happening were almost as improbably as Matthew bumpting into our cousin and his son at the same spot a few years ago!

The Great Dorset Steam Fair is quintessentially English and all the more a tonic to a jaded mind and body for all that. It's a reminder of our ingenious past,from the nation which managed to harness the elements by combining water with the black gold of coal and oil to produce the multi-amped mobile megabeasts which are the traction engines. Or rather, the road locomotives of Burrell, Fowler and Foster et al, not a firm of office-bound solicitors but the champions of mechanical power whose finest works have been preserved or restored for a new generation to enjoy more than a century after they were first assembled.

The fair is also a reminder that we are, still, essentially a nation under the plough. As a teenager, I found it hard to understand all the prophets of doom who complained about how much land was being lost to housing and other developments. The English countryside at harvest time, at any time, is still a wondrous sight, and the fields and hedgerows of Dorset are surely among the finest of examples. I've had a soft spot for this county ever since boyhood holidays on its coastline, now a World Heritage site as the Jurassic Coast. Years later, though struggling through literary criticism was a chore I'd rather ignore, the school set texts of Far from the Madding Crowd and later Return of the Native, only re-kindled the flame of desire for this historic corner of Wessex which Thomas Hardy so immortally capture in his works.

Somehow, there is something about these places and events which is an escape from the perils and the trauma of modern life, as restorative as a pint of liquid nutriment which is the brewer's masterpiece. It's something which we do so well, and with two heritage weekends giving the chance to visit some of the country's finest homes this month, maybe there's still something to sing about in September.

The Baguettes of Wimpole Street

Alright, I know it's a terrible pun, but at least it makes a change from quoting or parodying song titles, doesn't it? I was beginning to think after my last posting's title that I ought to rename this blog "Name that tune...". However, Tom O'Connor's already nabbed that one so I think I'll stick to Anyway... for the time being, anyway!

Unless of course, anyone's got a better suggestions. A prize of my lunchtime fare today, a cheese and onion baguette and a fruity scone complete with jam and butter from what has to be the West End's best bargain for whoever comes up with a new title for these musings, though you'll have to come and join me to collect it. Or buy it for yourself. Believe it or not, there really is a sandwich bar called "The Barrets of Wimpole Street" about 300 metres from where I'm now sitting, but I don't choose to offer them my custom. Rather, Vita's the place around this time every weekday for a torrent of West End workers who know how to make the most of their daily bread. I'm not on commission, but I thoroughly recommend them. These mid-day mega mouthfuls really are a bargain for the meagre sum of £1.35!

THE SPIRIT IS WILLING...
I'm sorry it's been a month now since I last posted on here, but it's not been through lack of interest. I've just been either too tired or too busy to actually get down to writing, despite the creative juices eagerly lubricating my brain cells.

"Citizen journalism" as it's known has been really coming into it's own these past few weeks, especially here in the capital where the horrendous events of early summer may have passed and the city attempts normal life, but the fall out remains. My last posting pre-dated the events of 21st July, when fear power came up against the un-nerving experience of potential fire power in London once again. As if enough blameless civilians had not already felt the impact of the events of 7/7. tragically on 22nd July a young Brazilian lost his life to the momentary but fateful mis-judgment of the Met.

As a consequence, today Sir Ian Blair, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police but no relative of that other more senior public figure, has nevertheless become equally controversial with calls for his resignation. Does this ring any bells? It certainly did for that great cleric and poet John Donne, who wrote so famously that we should not send to ask for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee. Death whether by the ballistic force of bullets fired, apparently, at the wrong man or by the sad effects of bodily illness diminishes us all. Today brings news of another sad loss to British public life, as Mo Mowlam passed away after her long, brave fight against the effects of her previous illness. Coming so soon after the loss of Robin Cook who was lost to a heart attack, it's been a summer so far of constant reminders of just what a fragile case contains the miracle which is human life.

ANGELI MINISTRAMUS

In a world which seems to be increasingly losing its sanity as well as its sanctity then, you would think that more people would be turning to religion for the answers to these great questions of life. Spiritual life and enquiry ought to be thriving right now, but the reality appears to be rather different according to today's Christian Herald. Of course, you can do anything with statistics and they are famously unreliable as a source of truth.

The Way, and the Truth, and the Life is found now, as it has been for two millennia, in the life,death and resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Because he died, we live. And because he lives, and cares for each detail of human life, even the most miniscule matters, we can have Hope in an often hopeless world.

And I know that there are angels standing guard over us. I often miss the benefits of a classical education, even if my two days at Eton College in 1975 were a help. Even with my flimsy grasp of Latin, though, I can work out that the insrciption above the stunning pair of celestial beings in a window above me right now are angels, and they are ministering to us. Even the cynical secular world has a fascination with these most prevalent of biblical figures. May they watch over you now as you return to whatever you do, and may the peace that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. Or maybe cause you to meet him, if you haven't already...

A Nightingale Wept in Berkeley Square

Regular visitors to this page may well have wondered why there has been no comment from me so far on the events of 7th July 2005, or 7/7 as has inevitably become the shorthand for referring to the horror of that day which London now so tragically has to add to its collective history.

Some may even have wondered if I was safe myself. Mercifully I am, but only by the grace of God and not being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was touching to find many of my own friends trying to find out if I was OK on the day of the atrocities, as so many thousands of other friends and family were doing at the same time, even if they were hampered by the mobile phone system going into major emergency mode and being deliberately blocked to non-priority users of the service.

What anguish flowed through the hearts and minds of not just Londoners but millions of ordinary, civilized, thinking, feeling human beings around the world that dreadful Thursday morning. A flood of tears which might even refresh the rain-starved Thames, the watery vein which flows through London's heart and gives it the symbol for the 2012 Olympic games so euphorically celebrated just 20 hours before four young men with poisoned, de-humanised minds turned our dancing into mourning.

One reason I haven't written, is because it is so difficult to know what to say. Should there be any need to say anything? Actions do speak louder than words: the actions that spoke of the real effect of this cruelly calculated act of barbaric disdain for the sanctity of human life recognised by all major religions were thousands of silent but live human bodies standing as one at 12 noon on 14/7. Taking two minutes out of a hot summer day in a great city whose heart with sorrow is torn was the most moving collective act of remembrance I have ever experienced, I think.

The Eye has it!

The British gift for understatement and restrained emotion was much in evidence in the West End today. When I took my lunchtime stroll down to Regent Street, I was totally unaware that about half an hour previously, the nation's capital had been awarded that most glittering of prizes, the 2012 Olympic games. Yet look at the expressions on people's faces, or listen in to passing comments, and you'd never know. I was convinced that once again we were the nearly men (and women) of the world. Only a hastily scribbled "We've Won!" across the newstand poster, where the earlier edition was still on sale, liberated me to hear this wonderful good news!

The awarding of the Olympic games to London of course offers the greatest potential the city, and indeed the nation, has had to show off to the world and to re-brand for years. The mud of Iraq and Britain's controversial involvement there still sticks. Yet seven years hence- another jubilee year, funnily enough, should her maj live to the grand old age of 87- will our nation really rise to the challenge? My hope and dream is that it will also herald a renewed spiritual passion in the UK, that the historic Christian traditions of this island can really be celebrated with renewed vigour as much as the best the human body and mind can offer in competitive sport and culture. Vivat Londinium, Christus regnet!

Where the streets have no shame

Back at work in the West End after a hectic schedule but a largely very pleasant week off. More on this no doubt in another post, because there's plenty I'd love to share. Journalists are normally stuck for stories at this time of the year, but this has to be the heaviest summer season for news we've encountered in many a decade. The week just gone had enough of them, and now there's just time for a brief pause before 6th July brings probably the most important and significant events of the year to Britain, as the G8 Grandees gather in Gleneagles and Britain's Olympian hopefuls gather in Singapore to learn tomorrow whether after all the hype, London will finally get the games for 2012.

The last days of June brought the Trafalgar 200 celebrations, with the biggest fleet ever assembled in English waters to commemorate our great man of the sea and what was billed as the biggest fireworks Britain has ever seen. Funny, there was me thinking they were going to be happening in Scotland from tomorrow as the jaw jawing starts all over again, but there you go. Meanwhile, the first weekend of July saw the thrilling climax to Wimbledon fortnight, with both the men and the women giving a thrill a minute.
Lindsay Davenport literally jumped for joy at the end of the longest ladies' singles final ever, while the unstoppable Federer Express once again de-railed poor Andy Roddick. A great shame really, as I rather like the US fall guy, and fall he did a couple of times. It certainly looks though as though the young Swiss could go on to be up there with the greats- he's certainly proving himself to be one of the most astounding talents ever seen on a grass court.

And yet I've managed to get through three paragraphs already without yet mentioning the media drowing in a Saturday Sea of Superlatives, as Live8 took place, billed as "the biggest worldwide event ever". However saintly Bob Geldof KBE may be to some, he shouldn't be called a "Sir" as an honorary knight, and neither should grown up journos who ought to know better be trumpeting a mega musical concert, however worthy, as anything other than that. The biggest worldwide event ever was clearly the creation of this terrestrial ball, and none of us had the advantage of satellite to see that, but we do have the eyes of faith to see that the only thing maybe worthy of a an even better "audience figure" is the death and resurrection of God's only son, our Lord Jesus Christ.

U2 headlined Live8, with Bono proud to sing alongside "Macca", Sir Paul McCartney, on what was apparently his first ever live performance of "Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", hard though that is to believe. Strange to think, really, that these worldwide megablast attacks on one of the greatest evils in society owe so much to two Irishmen, viz Bob and Bono, who sound like a pair of dogs to me. For the origin of the song I allude to above, look no further than the lyrics and interesting story behind its genesis by clicking on the title above. Genesis, by the way, were one of the few ancient rock acts, it seems, who were not persuaded to reform for Live 8. Meanwhile, The Who and Pink Floyd seem to have seen no harm done to their own record sales by their show-stopping performances in Hyde Park.

Another year older!

...and deeper in debt? Sixteen Tons is a song I've always liked for some reason, and yet it has a rather cynical ring to it which doesn't reflect the the kind of guy I normally am at all, really. If you've ever wondered about the history of this song and its complete lyrics, just follow the link above. Fascinating- and there was me thinking it was a genuine old time folksong, rather than one written in 1947 for Tennessee Ernie Ford!

Sixteen tons? Now, would that be metric tons or good old imperial? Hey pal, we haven't got room for none of that Napoleonic rubbish round here with them SI units. Good old avoirdupois and pounds, feet and pints, that's the measure of this man.

"What is the guy going out about?", I hear you cry. "He's finally lost the plot!" OK, I know I go off at some rather unexpected tangents during these blogs at times but rest assured I am not going senile at the grand old age of forty-six (thank heavens they haven't metricated age yet!) which I turn today. It's just I'm thinking about work, rest and play- with preferably more of the latter than the former today.

Sixteen Tons is what I sometimes feel myself, and I've generally considered myself overweight for many years. And yet, according to the latest piece of scientific research, I'm probably better off staying the weight I am rather than trying to lose it as that can do more harm than good! According to the researchers, you see, constant dieting weakens the body- something which will decidedly not be music to the ears of the Atkins advocates and the Low Carb Lecturers or even the GI Groupies, the latest fashionable dieting craze supposedly being one that really works. Now, where have we heard that before.

Listening to and following advice can be pretty hard, because there is so much of it about and so often it seems to conflict with what you hear and read elsewhere. It often seems to make it even harder to make decisions for yourself and to make up your mind about what really matters to you in life. Hard enough for the man in the street maybe, but even more so when you really want to follow God's leading and guidance, as this MAMWAM- Middle Aged Man with a Mission- would most long to do.

Decision making is not just a problem in matters of the mass either- you are what you eat say some, but you can't reduce the wonderful complexity of the human condition to a few hundred grams -sorry, I mean a few pounds- of proteins, carbohydrates, fats and fibre, surely? The brain needs its food, but it also needs food for thought. It needs to look at all the variables, the "what ifs" and the "maybes" if it is to make sense. It needs to use that uniquely human attribute of imagination.

It certainly isn't easy at times though to combine imagination with practicality, whether you make a far-reaching decision in the heat of the moment, or whether you ponder something for days, months, weeks, years even in the hope of getting it right. Maybe dieting's a bit like that too: could someone invent a procrastinator's diet, please?

HALF-YEAR ANALYSIS
Or is it half-life analysis? Now I'm no accountant, although some of my best friends are. Most of the uni results are now out, and I recall it was around this point fifteen years ago that to my amazement I became Mark Savage, BA (Wales). A decade and a half later, I'm still a bachelor, and I'm still more of an arty (farty?) than a scientific saint. Unlike William Wales, however, aka Prince William, I've never aspired to be something in the city or even to get much involved with money in my daily working life. The realm of creativity and communication, and serving people has always been much more my forte and I've always supposed and aspired to use my skills in that realm using this wonderful tool of language we human beings both adore and abuse. In fact, I've often thought that my motto for life should be a line from one of my favourite Charles Wesley compositions which I've always thought should be the hymn of the would-be or actual writer:

My every sacred moment spend
In publishing the sinner's friend

In whimsical manner, that hymn always sounded to me like an advert for an eighteenth-century fore-runner of the Sally Army's The War Cry, though I didn't spot The Sinner's Friend on the magazine racks in WH Smith at Waterloo last Thursday. Computer Active had to suffice instead.

WELLINGTONS AND WAVES
So what was I doing in a newsagents at Britain's busiest railway terminus last week then? Trying to keep my cool in the middle of the summer's first real heat wave, that's what. Boarding a packed metal cabinet on wheels with hundreds of other human sardines in temperatures exceeding thirty degrees is not my idea of fun, indeed it seems like Midsummer Madness to me. Even with the blessed relief of the new air conditioned rolling stock which makes up the bulk of South West train's fleet now, there seems little sense in enduring such cramped conditions if you can avoid it. I'm not one of nature's natural commuters and would far rather have a fifteen minute walk to work than a fify minute combination of train and tube any day. And yet, apparently well over fifty per cent of the nation spend more than an hour on a train, tube or bus each day to get to and from work and would rather do this in pursuit of a job they enjoy than be nearer home.

Yet, last week I became both a West End boy and a commuter again, the latter for the fist time in five years. Choosing the hottest June week for years to start my new job in Central London may not have seemed a well-considered move, and I confess that for me the ideal summertime is one where the living is indeed easy and I could spend June to September every yearjust doing what I like, when I like. It must be something to do with being born in the hottest summer of the last century: I love this season, but I hate working in it! I'd far rather immerse myself in the cooling waters of azure seas and gaze on heavenly sunrises and sunsets and just contemplate the miracle of life at its finest which this month of June seems to crown for me every year.

But down comes an angel and pricks my bubble, and tells me to get on with my work- even if I have got another week off to enjoy summer leisure this week! I worked- or rather trained mainly- last week though as a favour to my new employer, because the current postholder leaves on the first of July. Thus it was I found the week of Midsummer and the time when the sun appears to stand still did at times seem to go on forever for me at work, and there were times when I thought "What have I done? I'm not a celebrity-get me out of here!"

But my angel and my friends soon bring me down to earth and encourage and advise me to hang on in there and try my new job out. And on balance, I think they are wise, unlike me at times. It's a watershed in the year- it's halfway point- and another in my life. If I so chose, I could drop everything and give up work altogether by realising my various assets- but would it make me happy? Would I really enjoy being a full-time beach boy accompanied by the sounds of summer?

Of course I wouldn't! Birthdays come and go, Summer comes to an end. The Bible writer is wise indeed when he tells us there is a season for everything. This may well be the season for flooded festivals and gooey gigs, for barbecue bashes and princely pomp- but it is just that, a season. Without an end to summer, where would be the room for the enjoyment of autumn colour, or a world in white with winter snow? God who brought order out of chaos knows our need of these things, though I've often wondered how people in the equatorial regions without proper seasons adjust. So, come next Monday morning I've to roll up my sleeves again and get working in my new role without the welcome hand-holding of another.

What God asks of us most is not that we constantly analyse everything, although of course it is important to ask sensible, intelligent questions about most situations life presents us with. My new employer offers such questions and some answers to these for Christians attempting to make sense of their faith and present it as relevant to an increasingly secular and cynical world. As such, I think I am going to enjoy working alongside them and playing my part in this- as long as I learn to cope with commuting again and somehow recognise that my own peculiar ways must seem just as strange to others as theirs do to me!

But at the same time, what God needs most is our co-operation and our simple trust. The spiritual man of the moment is good old Rocky, Cephas or Peter as Simon became and how often I feel I am just like him. It's "Petertide", when new ministers are ordained and the Methodist church holds its annual conference with plenty of analysis, talking, consideration and debate.
Peter, the man who one moment would go anywhere for his Lord and the next was denying him out of fear and self-interest hours before his best buddy died the cruellest death imaginable. It makes me weep to think how I too can be like that, and Peter's denial of Christ followed by the look in the saviour's eyes was surely the most powerful moment in Mel Gibson's masterful Passion of the Christ for me. Yet marvel of marvels, Peter became the great man of faith who began the church, equipped for works of service and healing, evangelism and teaching and so much more. What would we do without him? Perhaps the best advice on any birthday is to rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say rejoice! Summertime, and the living is Godly!

First Service, Second Service, Third Service...

Tennis has some quaint terminology. Until I began to understand it's Anglo-French derivations, I used to think that the call "deuce" was a command to the man holding the bottle to get serving the barley water at Wimbledon. (think about it...). Thirsty work, tennis, especially if the 30 degree plus temperatures of this weekend continue into the solstice on Tuesday and beyond. No, it's bound to rain- the clouds have just been gathering especially for the start of play on Centre Court.

And as for the various services, what's all that about? Like any activity with which you are unfamiliar, the esoteric rules,ways and parlance of a new pastime, job or office can seem daunting at first. Such thoughts are much on my mind today, as I enjoy a lazy Sunday afternoon before settling down to paid work again- at least for a week, but that's a story for another post- bright and early tomorrow morning. Will I be able to pick up all the new skills and information I need to learn or apply in this job? Can I format the weekly e-mails correctly? Will I get my figurework right? It's both an exciting and a daunting time as I contemplate these things, but on balance I'm looking forward to this new opportunity even if it does mean a daily commute. I'll keep you posted and tell you more about the job as the weeks go on and my confidence builds.

This morning though it was divine service for me, as I substituted on the elder's rota at Christ Church for another member who is on holiday at present. I have to admit that the elder's tasks of a Sunday morning or evening at our church are not particularly taxing, normally limited to such tasks as putting the hymn numbers up on a board and "furnishing" the lectern with water and books for the preacher, and placing cross, offering platter and bible stand on the altar. All these things are small but necessary tasks to remind us of the majesty of the one we serve and that we gather to worship.

However, this morning there was a little bit more involved. It had been designated as an elder's dedication service, partly due to me coming back into this important role in the United Free Church of Feltham. It was an opportunity for leaders and congregation together to celebrate and recognise an office which, within the United Reformed tradtion which forms one half of our bi-denominational congregation, is an "ordained" ministry. So from that point of view, I'm already wearing the dog collar some would love to see me carry as my professional badge of office. Personally, I prefer to think of whatever shirt I am wearing as including a God-collar, for Christ is for life, not just for Sunday morning. That was something we are reminded of every time we sing "O Jesus I have promised", one of the hymns this morning.

After the dedication came the response of love and remembrance which is the proper function of Holy Communion. This service always means so much to me, as I contemplate the Lord's blood shed on the cross, and his body broken for me, that all my shortcomings, weaknesses and deliberate disobedience, selfishness and plain Sin might be forgiven once and for all. Holy Communion is an important time to reverence the Lord and remember him again, every time we celebrate it, until he comes again.

Today however, I was more than mere partaker of the bread and wine. Just as Our Lord washed his disciple's feet on the night he was betrayed, as a demonstration of what true servanthood means, today it was my task to serve the bread and the wine to our minister, and then to offer the small vessels of communion wine to the congregation. This was the first time I recall doing this, or certainly the first time for many years, but it was a very humbling and worthwhile service. Who knows whether the Lord actually still wants me to try for the full-time ministry ultimately? I don't know, and neither does anyone other than The Lord himself. Certainly not the hideous example of a God-substitute to whom the Daleks were beholden in Dr Who. I do know, however, that whatever the rest of my life brings, it needs to be offered humbly and obediently in his service. Of course, my talents, skills, graces and aspirations matter- God gives us our personalities for a reason, But what matters most is not what we are given, or how much, but how we use them.

That was the underlying meaning of Jesus' parable of the talents. Today as I type this, the community of Feltham has been given another rare and special gift with the opening of a new church. As I type, the Riverside Vineyard Church are holding their first official service, a Community Opening celebration, in the former factory just yards from where I slaved over a hot exam paper thirty years ago. But Riverside are not the usurpers of the all too small community of faith in this place. Far from it. If we look at it aright, God is giving a whole new group of brothers and sisters with whom we can share the great work of serving him in this needy town. Exciting times, and I wish them well and hope to go to a service there soon. However, just not today. Three services might well have been the pattern for some believers of old and even more so for their ministers, but I need some r n'r now for an hour or so before going to the potentially poignant Memorial Service at St Dunstan's, our Anglican parish church. Along with the other recently bereaved, Matthew and I will be remembering our dear Mum, taken from us nearly three months ago now and of course never far from our thoughts. On this Father's Day, alright a commercial creation but still one when with those with paternal ties still will celebrate them, we will remember no doubt those two dear souls who served us selflessly for so long. For can there be a better act of devotion and service than parenthood? Surely not. And can there be a better memory of our dear Mum than to think of her today, as I contemplate a new job and many new opportunities. God is good, God is love, God is forever. He is for life, not just for Christmas OR midsummer.

Great Expectations

Charles Dickens is more commonly associated with Christmas and the wonderful characters of Pickwick Papers. However, we do our great novelist a dis-service if we do not recognise he's a cheery tale of Old England for all seasons. One of the Pickwick stories does, I believe, feature a cricket match, but hardly one of test match standards. Perhaps our cricketophile readers would be able to tell me which book it comes from?

The "phut" of rubber on catgut (OK, it's nylon these days but who's checking!) will be the satisfying summer sound dominating TV screens for the next two weeks as Britain once again becomes a nation of armchair or deckchair tennis fans. Once again, poor old Tim Henman- and at 30 he is starting to seem old by the standards of the youthful professional game- carries the expectations of the nation on his shoulders of our first Wimbledon Men's win for goodness knows how long. Can he do it? Who knows.

Well I expect he does, at least the Doctor of that ilk would. Think what a bookie's nightmare would be the last surviving Time Lord if he happened to pop into a Cardiff branch of Ladbroke's next time he's passing through in the Tardis. He'd have it made, knowing in advance the result of every single sporting competition for the next 200 millennia plus. With all that dosh, he might even be able to upgrade to the GL version of the Tardis, you know the one, with its plush leather interiors and built in policeman. Fat chance the law would have against the Daleks though, and even the venerable Doctor himself nearly met his match last night in the thoroughly satisfying "season finale" of the resurrected Dr Who.

The BBC had high hopes of this resurrected classic series, and they have not been disappointed. Last night saw the latest re-generation, and with the transformation of Christopher Ecclestone into David Tennant, somehow you could tell this wonderfully realised sci-fi saga was in a safe pair of hands. Do you think the Doc though might turn his sonic screwdriver to tightening up our Timbo's racket strings? Then, perhaps, he might actually stand a chance against the moving monsters of his opposition in the shape of Messrs Federer, Hewitt and others. The speed of their delivery, the lightning pace of their reactions and their phenomenal footwork seem determined to exterminate British hopes in the wonderful racket game we invented once again. But I hope I'm proved wrong...

If you can't stand the heat, get out of the bedroom!

Boy is it hot! "So what do you expect?", I hear my unsympathetic critics in sun-starved Antarctica cry this month as they read this, "It is 'flaming June' after all"

Alright, I take your point and I've also taken a break of over a fortnight, I know, since my last posting to Anyway. But I can assure you, dear reader, that my absence hasn't been due to soaking up the sun, because until this weekend we've seen little enough of our celestial life-sustainer to rave about, nor have the temperatures been anything to write home- or indeed write blog- about for quite a bit of June which is now nearly two thirds gone, already and sadly.

We Britons are such a strange breed when it comes to the weather. When the sun doesn't shine,And it's cloudy all day,
And it's only the beginning
Of the Wombling day,
And you've got to do the washing up
For Madame Cholet .

Oh dear, I seem to have stumbled upon a Wombles website and entered into silly mode. Perhaps I've got Wombledon, or rather Wimbledon, on the brain with the prospect of another fortnight of glorious tennis starting in London, SW19 tomorrow, even if I can no longer laze and enjoy it in the afternoon since I start a training week in mh new job in London, W1 tomorrow. No, I think my remembrances of those furry "greens" of my teens ( I can't quite admit to them being from my childhood!) is more likely due to the heat. Excuse me while I leave the bedroom and go and do the washing up not for Madame Cholet but Matt and me, and have a nice cup of tea, the refreshing British answer to everything. Well it is heading towards three after all, and everything stops for tea.

June is Busting out all over

Well she'd better buy a bigger brassiere then, hadn't she! Sorry, I couldn't resist that: it may be thirty years this month since I took my O'Levels but the schoolboy humour in me fairly does bust out every time I hear that wonderful Rogers and Hammerstein song, and particularly when we get to this grandest month of the year from my perspective. Here's how that familiar refrain was introduced in Carousel:. I trust Richard Rodger's estate will not be sueing me for copyright infringement, but I have lifted it from "Jenn's Blog" which comes out fairly high on Google:

March went out like a lion, a whipping up the water in the bay.
Then April sighed, and stepped aside, and along came pretty little May.
May was full of promises, but she couldn't keep 'em quick enough for some.
And a bunch of doubting Thomases kept predicting that the summer'd never come.
But it's coming by gum. I can feel it come.
Loook around, look around, look around.

June is busting out all over--all over the meadow and the hill.
Buds are busting out of bushes and the little river pushes every little wheel that wheels behind a mill.

Because it's June. June. June. June.

Just because it's June, June, June!

You can just feel the vibrant summer hopes in those lyrics can't you. Well, it may be the case that "flaming" June- it's other most notable adjective- did that regularly in 1940s New England where the memorable musical is set, but in Old England we've not seen much sign of the sunshine in these first 34 hours or so of the mid month of the year. Bit more like the gloomy winter our friends in Oz and NZ are now commencing, I guess.

I hope the weather will soon improve, and particularly when it comes to the last week of the month when I celebrate my birthday- hence why I find this month so special. Blessed is he who expects nothing, so I won't tell you the exact date and you won't find it in my profile any more. It seems the only way you can get Blogger NOT to feature your "starsign" is to take out your birthday, a rather bad piece of programming in my view.

Many people view astrology as harmless fun, but it takes more than inanimate celestial objects to determine the future. Rather, the loving, compassionate, supremely intelligent One who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, God in three persons, celebrates every birthday, every life and every passing. His care for us is so great that he takes an intimate interest in every detail of our lives- not just our feeble efforts to offer him our thanks and praise on a Sunday morning or in a mid-week meeting, or even in our private thoughts and moments that nobody else sees.

But this God is in no ways an interfering tyrant, which seems to be so sadly the way some have portrayed him. God gives us free will to make both good and bad choices each day, whether at work, rest or play. He doesn't need a Mars bar or a far star to determine the fates of individuals and nations for with a paradox our finite minds will never quite grasp, although we have free will "He's got the whole world in His hands" to quote a classic spiritual song which is just as joyful to sing in June as any other month of His year. Alleluia!

I'm grateful to my Ozzie friend "Lynn345", who you'll often find in the Friends Reunited Connections chat rooms, for pointing out the error of my ways in keeping a starsign reference up and prompted by her I took steps to remove it. Christians don't need to be self-righteous, but they should always be self-evident: the self in this case being God's very self as revealed in His Son, Jesus Christ.

Of course, the paradox does not escape me that Jesus' birth was heralded to wise men from afar by a star, but this like all of scripture needs to be read with intelligent discernment, which the Holy Spirit helps to give us. An alternative viewpoint of the Magi's appearance of course- and I'm aware that I'm at the wrong end of the year here but, hey, we've been talking about Australia where the seasons are back to front, after all- is that Jesus's coming into the world was of such cosmic significance that it brought even the sages of old, the wiseacres who went west, to their knees. Even they could not have known just what this most important event in the whole of human history was to signal for their age and the age to come- but they knew it merited the finest birthday presents going for the finest man ever to have lived!

Maybe it's because I'm a Middle-Saxon

Mmm, well we may be in musical mode today, but I think we'll stick to the original 1944 title of Hubert Gregg's homage to his hometown which has been "covered" by the most unlikely of singers since it first brought cheer to the blitz-beleagured citizens of the capital over sixty years ago. It scans much better for starters, even if I may respectfully point out that London was once actually part of my native county of Middlesex, rather than the other way round when Greater London subsumed this historic bit of England forty years ago.

According to the Daily Telegraph obituary of the late songwriter and popular broadcaster last year, Maybe it's Because I'm a Londoner took Gregg just twenty minutes to pen while on leave from the Lincolnshire regiment. It's since been recorded by everyone from comedian Arthur Askey (a Liverpudlian) to Kirk Douglas- and even the Omsk Siberian choir, who sang it in Russian!

Gregg's contemporary Noel Coward, whose eulogy to a flower London Pride was another metropolitan melody which brought comfort between the bombs of those dreadful years of the Second World War, said in one of his plays "strange how potent cheap music can be". How right he was. It can also come in very handy however, when you're suddenly asked at a German wedding reception, fifty years after the war's end, to "do a typically English turn" on the spur of the moment, as I and several of my friends were challenged to do a decade ago this week at the wedding of one of the "Walker brothers" I mentioned in my posting on 20th May.

German wedding receptions are not for the faint-hearted! I can't now remember too many details of the earlier ceremonies, though this has little to do with the copious quantities of food and, of course, beer which were on offer throughout the proceedings. What I can recall though is that the festivities started around 3 in the afternoon in the pleasant surroundings of Glueckstadt, near Hamburg, and continued til around 1.00 the following morning (which happened to be Whit Monday in the UK). Eating a further feast at that time of the morning certainly seemed like a true "wedding breakfast", though the happy couple's first meal as man and wife had been consumed some time earlier. German law, for instance, requires a civil ceremony to take place before a church service- which often provides the opportunity for yet another celebration!

So what of our impromptu entertainment challenge? We were stumped! I am reasonably fluent in conversational German, but coming up with something everybody could join in with and yet reflected our party's own English roots was a tall order. In the end, all I could come up with was to suggest that we offered a rendition of Maybe..., even if there was a slight bit of dramatic licence since not all our party came from the capital. At the time, it probably sounded like a typically eccentric English idea, particularly given the circumstances and the time in which the song was written. Knowing now though that even the Russkis have warbled their way through this capital ditty, perhaps it was actually more of an inspired choice.

Well, we did our best to teach our German brothers and sisters and the happy couple the words of this simple song and it seemed to go down well. However, in a moment of madness at the end I decided it was time to inflict on the assembled guests my impersonation of the Westminster Chimes followed by the most famous "bongs" in the world, better known to one and all as Big Ben. Goodness knows why, but this brought the house down, though thank heavens it didn't bring the Houses (of Parliament) down. Perhaps it was the memory of this affront to his dignity though which silenced the mammoth bell for no less than ninety minutes last week, though the engineers say it was more likely due to the effects on Ben's aged inner workings of of that all too rare event of a London Summer, a hot day.

Not that I am wanting too many hot days this Summer, mind, even though pundits have been saying for weeks that we are likely to have a repeat of the astounding temperatures reached in 2003 here in the UK. I hope not, personally: it's fine if you are bathing in the rare, balmy waters of the Channel, as I was at Eastbourne when the 100 degree fahrenheit mark was breached in August 03 at Faversham, Kent - my dear late Mum's birthplace- but not if you are about to become a London commuter for the first time!

Yes, the biggest news of this week for me is that I have been offered a new job! I still don't want to say too much about it until I have actually started, but it is with a Christian organisation based in Central London, just off Oxford Street, and seems to have many components which are "made for me". I can't pretend that I relish the prospect of a twice daily trot up to town, or rather the rattling of the rails, which is a commuter's lot even in these days of air-conditioned Desiro rolling stock on South West Trains. Nevertheless, the thought of once again having a regular income coming in, through my own earned efforts rather than my debt to a card company, and working with folk who have a genuine interest and commitment to the practical application of the gospel, fills me with anticpation and delight.

Not only will I have access to some fine Christian minds, the nation's top shops will be but a hop away -though I don't intend to indulge too much in those- and all the delights of the capital's world will be my Oyster (card) to flit between the sights after work or even at weekends. God moves in mysterious ways: who knows where this will lead? Have I made the right choice? These are never easy questions to answer. So many of life's decisions have to be taken on trust, but with so many choices open to us these days it is so easy to wonder whether you have made the right choice.

The plenty we enjoy in our present age, in our wedding feasts, our church suppers for Wesley day, or our weekend fare on our supermarket shelves are the dividend of our freedom- and yet it is easy to forget that those we fought in World War II knew the privations of war and the sacrifices of rationing far more than my privileged post-war baby boomer generation are ever likely to. Sitting downstairs in the kitchen at the moment is a seven pound, three ounce iced fruit cake, made by a former naval chef for the benefit of the fete I mentioned in Monday's posting, which was great fun. Much to my amazement, I won it, and collected my prize yesterday afternoon. How am I and my little brother possibly going to eat it all by ourselves? The answer I guess is we are not!
Today mind you could be an appropriate day to eat it, as apparently it's the anniversary of the Queen's coronation back in fifty-three when the eyes of the world and his wife were on London, as Queen Elizabeth the second brought the hopes of a war-ravaged nation and commonwealth to the altar of Westminster Abbey. Liz Windsor's Westminster World is a very challenged one right now, particularly as the politicos grapple with the ramifications of now two nations- the latest being Holland- voting against the new European Union Constitution.
Once again, Europe is at a crossroads, as it was sixty years ago, and in some ways it is a worrying time. I've never quite been convinced by the argument, to be honest, that a united Europe would once and for all prevent the prospect of further war in Europe. That's a lie furnished by idealism rather than the realities of the selfish human heart. At the heart of London, alongside the glacial megaliths and giant gherkins which house the world's financial supercorps, lies the splendour of St Paul's Cathedral, Christopher Wren's masterpiece which stands sentinel to the real victor of all war, Jesus Christ our Lord. "When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life", remarked Dr Samuel Johnson, doyen of the dictionary and celebrated on a new coin in this 250th anniversary year of the publication of his first volume. I've never been one to disagree with him on this point- as I've already mentioned, I love my country's capital with all it's delights. As someone who just short of forty-six years ago was born in a London postal district, I can truly sing "maybe it's because I'm a Londoner", and mean it most of the time.

But more than that, I recall my first thoughts when attending my first German wedding: "We were at war with these people: why?". Of course, the reality we should never forget is that Britain was never really at war with "Germany" between 1939 and 1945, but with the evil regime of the Nazis which had supplanted most decent human values and compassion within that great swathe of Europe. So then, I'd be more prone to say, as a Christian, then as now "when a man is tired of loving, he is tired of life"

Here are a couple of photos for posterity just so you can see what an ugly mug your correspondent really has! I say for posterity, because what I did hear you can no longer get away with as far as The Passport Agency is concerned: smiling is not permitted! By the way, the glasses have changed since this was taken four years ago, but the hair hasn't- there's even less of it now! 

Oh for a thousand words to bring

Or should it be "The Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak"? I may have had some aspirations to work in the world of publishing, but I'd probably be bankrupt by now if my publication dates for a hard copy magazine were as erratic as these "regular ramblings"! I'm sorry if you've visited here at all since reading my last entry ten days ago, expecting something more, but it's only on this Bank Holiday Monday afternoon that I have managed to get round to doing it: a busy but enjoyable few days have been spent flitting between Feltham, the capital and the coast which I may well touch upon in this latest helping of Savagian prose or in the near future. Oh, I've had the inspiration to write, all right, and even the quirky titles- but my mind and body have just not quite managed to connect with the keyboard long enough to get my thoughts down in print and committed to the blogosphere.

Never mind, here we are now and I hope you find today's read interesting. To my surprise and delight, I know that readers of this blog are coming from the most unlikely of web searches and from all corners of the globe. I guess there's a vain self-publisher in all of us, really, residing in the same part of the brain where that book that is supposedly inside everyone is supposed to dwell. Adding the site meter to this page a few months ago has been very enlightening and encouraging, particularly when I see the length of time some of you are spending on this site. Fair swells one with pride it does!

On the other hand, you may find my waffly ways just a bit too prosaic and it may have you instead reaching for the Prozac, though I certainly hope not. Coming back to the title at the head of this posting, I don't know whether I should feel proud or ashamed that some 21 thousand words have already appeared here through Google's good offices since a modest beginning on that memorable Saturday morning last August when Great Britain carried home another record gold medal in the coxless fours in Athens (that posting was entitled "Matthew Row the Boat Ashore"). Incidentally, the awesome previous performance at Athens was re-created this weekend at the international rowing regatta not a million miles from here at Dorney Lake, near Windsor. I'm rather ashamed to admit though, I don't even know who won! I guess perhaps I am being rather too much of a "dry bob"- the Eton College term for non-rowers, though in fact I'd love to be messing about on the water even though I'm useless with an oar between my fingers and thumbs.

The beauty of blogs though is that there are no rules, apart obviously from the usual ones of the law and good taste. I hope nobody ever feels I have offended against the latter as it would be the last thing I would ever wish to do. There is more than enough of that about in the dross that passes for entertainment on British TV screens these days. Maybe you will have guessed from that, I shall NOT be glued to the bedbound antics of the Housemates in Big Brother VI, which has just started on Channel 4. What is the world coming to, indeed, when a Crazy Frog, genitalia covered by a fig leaf on the orders of the Advertising Standards Authority, tops the singles/ringles charts with what many regard as the most irritating sound ever to make it onto a CD? Surely there are far more important issues for our troubled world to be dealing with right now, as the future of the "European project" is thrown into chaos by the informed democratic decisions of some other amphibiously-linked citizens the other side of the channel. Vive la France, Vive la difference?
Meanwhile, for those unable to muster enough money for a square meal, let alone an emetic ringtone, the hope has to be that as the summit of the world's political heavyweights on these shores draws ever closer, and "Saint" Bob Geldof attempts to garner the true great and the good of the music world for Live8 (very good!) twenty years after that astounding July megamoney, charitychampion event which was Live Aid took place, we really can see poverty made history.

Well, we can have our ideals, but even Jesus knew that some ideals will never become reality while they rely on greedy, selfish humans. Sorry, Sir Bob, but "the poor you will always have with you".

HOORAY FOR HOLIDAYS
However, I guess I should not be too much of a killjoy, because that is the very opposite of the kind of guy I am. Indeed, these last few days I've had a great time enjoying some of the numerous events that provide great entertainment in what passes for an English summer, while still remembering the most important person in my life- in any life- who literally inspires me, breathes into me. Jesus Christ was the friend of sinners, but boy did he know how to have a great time and enjoy good grub! His first recorded miracle, in the gospel of St John chapter 2 was to turn water into wine at a wedding feast, while among his last appearances to his friends was the charmingly down to earth breakfast of bread and fish beside a lake in Palestine.

I suppose you could say that last appearance was the great Bank Holiday picnic to trump them all. Today's holiday, which I know in the US honours veterans of many a conflict, is here in England and Wales now known by the rather uninspiring title of "Late Spring Bank Holiday". However, those of us of a certain vintage will still call it Whitsun, because it was originally the Holy Day to celebrate the feast of Pentecost, or "Whit/White Sunday" in recognition of the new converts baptised in white garments on that day both in Biblical times and in the later church. Although it is a sad bone of contention in some sections of the church, undoubtedly those events changed the world forever and should still be restoring us and re-creating the world today. This is where we can truly make history.

Pentecost was Jesus delivering on a promise- that he would not leave or forsake his loyal followers, or indeed anyone who would believe in him, even though they saw his face and touched his body no more. Instead, here was the church freed up to serve all mankind, whether Jew or Gentile, slave or free, Oriental or Occidental, Turkish or English, Greek or Roman. Even in our secular age, our European brothers and sisters- with the exception of France this year, which perhaps contributed to yesterday's shock referendum verdict- will still have celebrated this great feast a fortnight ago, and long may they continue to do so. I'd rather have the spirit of love, joy and peace within me to enjoy, than a spirit of cynicism any day!


OPEN HEART SURGERY
Twenty years ago this month, and indeed as I recall on another Pentecost weekend, I knelt at the simple altar in my home church here in Feltham, and confirmed before God, clergy and congregation, my belief that I am a wretched sinner saved only by His grace and the awesome sacrfice made by Christ on the cross. I've made many mistakes in my life, and the older I get the more I recognise them rather too late, but this was definitely not one of them! Through his free gift of faith, making the simple decision to follow Christ without doubt was the most joyful, life-changing thing I have ever done. I know that I can trust in him, and him alone, for "salvation" and "life in all its fulness". Christian Barnaard may have given a renewed lease of life to many cardiac patients nearly forty years ago, but only Jesus can offer a life transplant. Alleluia for that! A hole in the heart is replaced by a heart "strangely warmed".

I used double quotes at the end of that last sentence, for I am quoting from the words of one of my spiritual heroes, who has been much in mind this last week and which inspired my main posting title today. Last Tuesday, marked a day of great celebration for all "the people called Methodists" worldwide: it was "Wesley Day". This commemorates the same date in 1738 (though pedants will point out that the subsequent calendar change should, strictly, change the date of its observation), when John Wesley was converted, and a movement which many believe saved Great Britain from the political revolutions which swept Europe and North America in the late eighteenth century was set alight. However long I blog on, I don't think I will ever compete in stature with such memorable words as these in his journal for that day:

"In the evening I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street, where one [ i.e the preacher] was reading Luther's Preface to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, Christ alone for salvation. and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death!"

Elsewhere, Wesley had remarked that he felt his heart "strangely warmed", and no wonder! Like his younger brother Charles, writer of an unknown number of timeless hymns which are nuggets of sublime theology, he had discovered that burning reality of Christian faith that actually however wretched our lives and our world, it can be changed. Perhaps in a year when politicians prattle on about "respect" in one form or another and "celebrities" of all shapes and sizes attempt to bring a new world order about, the real "author of peace and lover of concord" - nothing to do with Anglo-French aviation projects gone the way of all steel here- it' way past time to devote more attention to the humblest celebrity of all who is the only one who will really change things forever. It's time to Make Unbelief History!

Happy the man whose hopes rely
on Israel's God: he made the sky,
and earth, and seas, with all their train;
his truth for ever stands secure,
he saves th'oppressed, he feeds the poor,
and none shall find his promise vain.

At which point, I'm off out to practice a little bit of local charity- at a village fete in East Bedfont, near the famous topiary peacocks of St Mary's church which some believe were first cut to prick the vain pomposity and worldly thinking of those entering the church. Proud as a peacock, maybe, but pride cometh before a fall. Nevertheless, whatever you are up to this Whitsun week, happy holiday- and I am sure I will be back here again soon. If you're you're a new reader, welcome. If you're one of my regulars, whether in Adelaide or Tucson, Germany or Glastonbury, may the Lord bless you and keep you, the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and give you peace. Amen!

The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore

Dreadful grammar, classic Neil Diamond song particularly in the original version by The Walker Brothers. Not a manufacturer of potato crisps, nor of a famous scotch whiskey, but the jokey nickname ascribed to two of my friends who though sharing the same surname are unrelated. John and Philip are they, and the first coining of this particular name-pairing was many years ago at an old rectory in Warwickshire, where they were mistaken as siblings while staying with another mutual friend at a bed and breakfast there- while I opted for the rather cheaper option of my cousin's spare room in the county town.

The occasion of this trip to Shakespeare's county was not a bardic pilgrimage to nearby Stratford-on-Avon, but the shared blessing of the famous Stoneleigh Bible Week at the huge National Agricultural Centre twixt Coventry, Warwick and Leamington Spa. For a decade, these were the highlight of the summer for around thirty thousand Christians from all over the world, attending to share in vibrant, joyful worship and listen to often dynamic, sometimes life-changing but always helpful preaching and teaching from many of the big names on the "charismatic scene", including the founder of Newfrontiers (or New Frontiers International as it was then known), Terry Virgo. Many would even claim with fervent belief- and who am I to doubt them- that by God's amazing grace, they were !healed at Stoneleigh. Books, music and testimonies still bear witness to the power of God working in them at these significant occasions in the life of the late twentieth century church.

The fact that enjoying such wonderful Christian fellowship for six days also meant enduring floods, heatstroke, the pungent aroma of cowpats from the recently vacated cattle sheds where meetings were held, and a long queue for early morning showers while camping, never seemed to put many of these happy, clappy souls off. However, with a couple of exceptions I and my friends much preferred our home comforts and a decent cooked breakfast before launching into the satisfying spiritual and physical exercise of the day ahead.

Many friendships were no doubt forged at Stoneleigh, many happy times remembered, many the seed of spiritual growth planted in hungry, holy hearts. But life is about endings and beginnings, change and growth, no less for the Christian than for any other soul. The Bible Weeks are no more-though some might think this owed more to a massive hike in site fees by the Royal Agricultural Society around the turn of the century than any wider move of the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, that same Holy Spirit lights a fire which can appear spontaneously, marvellously and spectacularly even when the sun isn't shining, whether you're in a cow shed or comfy bed.

You wouldn't know it in most churches in Britain today, but this has been the week when Christian believers say "Happy Birthday to Us"! Pentecost, celebrated last Sunday but originally observed fifty days after the Jewish passover, is generally recognised as when the church came into being, when the promised "comforter, advocate, helper", depending on your translation of the Greek paraclete came down from Heaven to birth and a movement which would move and shake the world for ever was born. When people start hearing and comprehending in their own language words audibly spoken in a dialectical form otherwise quite alien to them, something quite remarkable and surely of God is going on. What Babelfish and Alta Vista among others still sometimes hilariously fail to do in the 21st Century, the Holy Spirit of God could accomplish effortlessly in one memorable gathering in 1st century Jerusalem. People could hear and understand the very word of God in their own tongue, whatever it might be- but the paradox is that such a divine occurrence almost defied description. Even the learned Dr Luke, saint as he is to us now, struggled to give full expression to the mystery and wonder of this fabulous event in his account of the happenings in the second chapter of the book of Acts. Simile and metaphor instead came into their own, as talk of tongues of fire, rushing winds and descending doves excite the imagination of the modern reader and filled the hearts of the Jerusalem hearers.

This was the party to end all parties, bringing the best present of all to the ecclesia and new life to the assembled believers and astounded observers from every corner of the ancient world. What a pity then that modern man seems to so neglect, even doubt, the power and meaning of that great event, promised to the motley crowd of disciples and followers just days earlier by their saviour as he left them in his earthly form.

So much of society today and worst still even the church, seem to treat Pentecost, or Whitsun as it is also traditionally known, as little more than another day, whereas in reality it is one of the great Christian festivals. For the Holy Spirit it is which breathed life and still does into all the great teachings, doctrines and truths of the Christian faith. He- for the Spirit is regarded as a person as much as Jesus- it is that I believe enables me to write these words which express something of the hope and faith I have, and why I write it-even if this last fortnight, my own spirit has been willing to "blog", but my tired flesh has been too weak! And so as we approach another Sunday of celebration, when the church remembers that great mystery which is the union of God in three persons, Father Son and Holy Spirit, we pray, Come Holy Spirit

DREAM, DREAM, DREAM
Another great song from the sixties, especially in the Bobby Gentry and Glenn Campbell version with its wonderful harmonies. By gum, I must be in nostalgic mode today. Perhaps it's got something to do with the return of a grand old name of the airwaves, Big L- Radio London-, which is now back on Medium Wave. No, it's not a dream: they are there, mabye not always loud and clear but on the air nonetheless, through a clever way of avoiding the UK broadcasting acts which prevent them being either landlubbers or broadcasting the ocean wave for more than 28 days at a time.
Although the studios are in Frinton on Sea- once famed for being the town with no pubs- for no logical reason other than the rosy glow of reminiscence (Frinton has a big place in the heart of pirate radio lovers, or is that lubbers?)- the transmitters are based in Holland, which in itself is another memory of the pirate days of yore.

Although I have some memory of the pre-67 pirates- Harold Wilson's Marine Broadcasting Offences Act silenced most of them in August of that year- for me the golden age was the early seventies, especially of Radio Nordsee International who sent me my first ever "QSL", or acknowledgement card. I've very fond memories of lsitening to them in the garden shed in Feltham of a summer school holiday afternoon, which I guess was the closest I ever got to a "shack" back then. I listened in practically every day as I recall,sad radio anorak that I am.

RNI too have had their try at being legal and yet still being all at sea, but so far at least have not followed Big L on the sea path over to Holland. However, they are coming through with a weak but interference-free signal here in Eastbourne, where I am sitting once again mid-afternoon though this time with four walls around me rather than weatherboard-style painted timber. 1395 is worth a try if you are in Eastern England or anywhere in Europe, though with only 20 kW being pushed out of Holland it's hardly a powerhouse.

For many of a generation just before me, this might seem like the fulfilment of a dream, with a station they loved so much back in those halcyon, hopeful days of the sixties kissing the eardrums once again. But how will Big L fare in an age dominated by big names, like G-Cap and Clear Channel? They might have one for the moment, but whether they can keep their bank balance in the clear remains to be seen.

ANYWAY
You may well be wondering by now why I have called this blog by the title its got. I wish I could offer a clever answer to that, but the simple one is it was the best I could come up with when I started it way back last August! If anyone can come up with a new title, whether quirky or conventional, I'm open to suggestions! However, it does tend to reflect a word often seen in my e-mails, and maybe in my conversations as well. I've got the mind of a grasshopper, which loves jumping from one topic to another, in case you hadn't noticed. "Dream..." was supposed to be telling you about my illustrated nocturnal narrative of early this morning, where I suddenly found myself back at Stoneleigh, but rather lost though desperately trying to get out of the camp by checkout time at the end of the Bible week. Though I had been there many times during the week, I could not for the life of me find the tent or other accommodation I had been in throughout the week, and I was worried about the consequences about not being able to find my way home. Ooh, watch out Mark, you're nearly into another song there, with Jon Anderson lurking in the corner with a little help from Vangelis.

What does it all mean? You tell me: I'm no Daniel nor a Joseph, who were the great interpreters of the dreams of even a pharoah in Biblical times. Was it Joe or was it Dan- ashamed to admit I forget for the moment- who stuck his neck out to tell the great one what his strange visions of cows both thin and fat meant? There you go you see, bovine imagery again and more of Stoneleigh? Or am I lost? Don't think so, but I hope my dream doesn't mean I am in for a lean time of it, anything but.
As a friend remarked to me this morning, yes it has been a tough year for me with all that has happened, but I feel that with the Spirit's help and my all too muddled prayers, things are starting to come together. I should not say too much here, perhaps- it's been Christian Aid amusingly counting their chickens in their advertising theme this Christian Aid week, along with a few moo cows too- but next week I have an interview with another Christian organisation I am quite keen to work from and from whence come many other prestigious names.
I'm feeling that I am finally "back home" in Feltham, even though I'm still a bit clueless at what to do with my home here by the coast. These occasional excursions to Eastbourne are very enjoyable. And, though I've dreamt about her alive from time to time recently, even dear Mum is now back home as we have collected her ashes. Somehow about me right now, despite the indifferent weather which still makes summer seem a long way off at times, I am at my most vital again, enjoying life and its social opportunities, and hopefully at last making the most of my abilities. As long as no thin cows are lurking behind the next bedhead....

UNDERNEATH THE SPREADING CHESTNUT TREE
Walmington on Sea calling... Do you know how it is when no matter how hard you try, you can't get a particular tune or sometimes the pictorial associations it brings up out of your mind? That's how it's been for me for much of May everytime I've walked under or driven past a fine specimen of Aesculus hippocastanum, I can't help but recall a classic episode of Dad's Army which was actually supposed to be set in this part of Sussex- even if it was mainly filmed in Norfolk! In my mind I'm singing those classic words, and seeing the great assemblage of immortal characters which made the wartime comedy so unforgettable and such a gem amidst the dross which passes for television entertainment these days. The latest offering from ITV1 is so crass it doesn't even merit a mention here.
I guess it must be the combination of the VE Day 60 celebrations and a particularly fine display of blossom by the horse chestnut this May which makes me think of that little love song. Apparently, according to no less a source than Time magazine, it was this song performed in a spontaneous "royal command" at a boys' camp (Scouts, maybe?) complete with actions which impressed George VI in those dark days early in the war. That was long before the US came in to join the fray, and set up their headquarters, along with the rest of the Allied Expeditionary Force, in the leafy glades of my native county. D-Day owes as much to the clay soils of Bushy Park as to the sandy beaches of Normandy, it's easily forgotten.

Chestnut Sunday on the 8th May celebrated the calendrical coincidence which brought the commemoration of the sixtieth anniversary of the end of war in Europe, and the annual celebration of the cheering sight which is Sir Christopher Wren's famous avenue of Horse Chestnut Trees in one of London's smaller Royal Parks. This year, my brother and I paid it a visit and great fun it is too. Though rain punctuated the latter part of the day, the parade of horses, vintage cycles and vintage military vehicles was witness by a splendid crowd and blessed by weather which showed the tres at their finest, as was the intention. I don't know about being in England now that April's here, but May has been a lovely one for tree huggers and historians alike, whatever the weather.

Horse Chestnuts also abound in another part of the Royal estate, this time in Windsor itself. Yesterday saw me taking advantage of the rare opportunity- only available on six days a year to the general public- to visit the burial place of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and to enjoy the relative peace of the sublime grounds which surround the mausoleum, surely one of the grandest Victorian buildings of all. It speaks of another age indeed, when at least on the surface, reverence and respect were the order of the day. It speaks also of the mere mortality of man, and yet of the fine things of creation and eternity which divine "digits" have designed.

Tony Blair, currently suffering from a slipped disc poor chap, has made the restoration of "respect" a key part of his post-election platform. It featured strongly in the Queen's speech, delivered on Tuesday at the State Opening of Parliament. I watched this spectacle with all its ancient splendour, pageantry and esoteric moments with a mixture of enjoyment and puzzlement. What on earth is the "Cap of Maintenance" all about? Despite the efforts of Huw Edwards and the excellent though soon departing BBC Political Editor Andrew Marr, I am still none the wiser.

Nevertheless, for all that some of the trappings of monarchy and state in Britain seem to fulfil no useful purpose, isn't that part of the elusive quality of "Britishness"? Whatever it is, I am somehow proud of it, and felt especially so yesterday when visiting Frogmore, or when traipsing past good old Buck House while in London on Wednesday, or visiting our National Archive- the former Public Record Office- for the first time the same day. We've much to celebrate, much to respect, much to commend, much to conserve. So why can't we get it right, why can't our young people go out on the streets wearing hooded garments without somehow being seen as a threat, or our war heroes walk the streets at night safe from the threat of gun crime or knife attack?

As in all things, of course, the media probably paints things much blacker than they really are. Despite that, there has surely been a loss of those fundamental virtues so much associated with Britain by our neighbours and visitors, and of which really we should be justly proud. Ask any foreigner what they find most quaint about British life, and like it as not you will hear "Queuing, politeness, a nice cup of tea".
And yet, even those who lived through the war supposedly to defend our freedom to enjoy such things seem to have forgotten this at times. Never mind the young losing their respect, what have the older generation done to conserve it. Yes, my friend Dave and I had to queue patiently and politely to get into Frogmore grounds, to the museum and to get our nice cup of tea yesterday-but we did so without complaining. Why should we, we were waiting for something well worth seeing, and as it turned out we were helping those less fortunate than ourselves by doing so (proceeds from yesterday's opening, ironically, were going to the Chichester Diocesan Association and the Sussex Deaf Association). Yet all around us, all I could hear were elderly people complaining about poor organisation, not enough catering facilities and having to wait too long. I appreciate the infirmity of a few maybe, but where is the blitz spirit of the rest? It's sad to see the generation that saw their own sovereign's home bombed and their daughter join the war effort unable to wait just a few more moments for a cuppa while they seem to forget they waited six years for peace. Is it our young that need educating, or our old. Or is it all of us? "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those that trespass against us". Maybe what we really need to do is to learn once again, whether under a beautiful display of "candles" on the humble horse chestnut, or under the candles of a mausoleum altar, to remember the Lord our God. Respect Him,every day, and the rest should follow suit.