Things going swimmingly...

Not been on here for a while - busy busy busy, away in The Toon, and feeling generally uninspired as to what to write about. Not sure I'll put that on my CV when it comes to my aspirations to best selling author-dom, but hey it's true!

My last post inspired quite a few comments - thanks to those who posted on here, on Facebook, or sent me an email. I really enjoy the feedback so please don't be shy. And don't be guilty either - I definitely wasn't saying that electronic communication is bad, or even a poor substitute for the face to face kind. It's an added extra that many of us are grateful for and couldn't imagine being without nowadays.

My post was prompted by and more concerned with the mystery of not always knowing when you are seeing someone for the last time, and how so often it is times of sadness that force us to renew contact. Family funerals are the obvious example - all those aunts and uncles, distant cousins, and promises to meet up again "another time, let's not leave it so long..."

I was pondering this on the tube today - as you do - when I found myself glancing over someone's shoulder at an ad in Metro. If I'm honest I can't quite remember what the ad was for - but I do clearly remember it showed a group of swimmers. Swimming in lanes in a swimming pool. A whole load of thoughts crowded into my brain and I missed Waterloo Station in the rush to find a pen and make some notes. Fortunately I was getting off at Southwark today ;-)

So what profound offering do I have to share? It goes something like this...

Before my surgery I used to swim. Proper swim - like 50 lengths at a time, a couple of times a week at one point, swimming swimathons, raising loads of money, keeping fit and loving it.

Except it could be quite lonely at times - and the picture in the metro brought back memories of hacking up and down the lanes, counting strokes, lengths, fit guys (ahem...), to pass the time till the hot shower. I took stroke improvement lessons, learnt to breathe properly, bought goggles, a swim hat, speedo swimsuit - things got pretty serious.

How different it was from my experience of swimming as a child and young person. Back in the day you'd jump in without noticing the chill, splash around with your friends, pick up tips from others who could swim better and learn to breathe from being dunked. I learned to dive by copying someone who knew how to do it, as we whiled away many a happy afternoon in the pool, not in the least bit bothered by the time or the cold or promises of hot chocolate.

Crazy how comparisons can hit you at times - maybe it's me that's crazy but if so I blame my brain. Whatever it is I was suddenly struck by how for me this sums up a lot of life today. Many of us are oh so busy ploughing our lonesome furrow, counting the hours, days, weeks till the next treat be it the weekend, a holiday or just an evening out. If we need to learn a new skill or how to do things better we seek out professional advice, take lessons, search online. Google is our friend.

Sure this makes us efficient. We use time well, multi-task, upskill. But what do we lose in the process? The joy of living in the moment maybe? Learning from friends who've been there, done that. Messing around, having fun, enjoying a laugh.

Of course we do still learn from friends - we have mentoring schemes. We live in the present - after we've been on a course or attended a seminar on how to. We mess around and enjoy a laugh - the comedy night or drinks in the pub are in the diary (but if we're honest maybe we're going 'cos we feel we ought to - actually we're so tired an evening on the sofa in front of reality TV is way too tempting).

Yesterday - even before I saw that advert and thought about all of this - I was on the brink of closing down all my social networking accounts and taking a hammer to my hard drive. The frustration of email "outage", the news that even when I am logged out Facebook's cookies are tracking my every move, the annoyance you feel when you need something from someone and they don't respond. A whole new power game - or shift - that never existed in the days when we splashed around with our colleagues in the typing pool.

I can pretty much guarantee some of you reading this reckon I am a dinosaur. But I'm not sure that matters to me any more. Perhaps that comes with being sufficiently aware of the benefits and pitfalls of SNS to see them like any other tool - useful but dispensable. We proved that last week and frustrating as it was we got by - even talked to each other ;-)

There are evenings when I sit and check my email, Facebook account(s), Twitter, Google Plus and texts. I don't always have time to reply to - or even read - all the messages. I'm engaged and entertained to a certain extent but often miss that programme I meant to watch, don't get around to that job I meant to do, that call I meant to make. Or I find myself going to bed wishing I'd read another chapter of the book I am currently enjoying. Sometimes I can't sleep - my brain won't switch off and it's impossible to relax. I never felt like that when I'd spent an evening at the pool. Even if I had swum my 50 lengths on my own.

Whilst I've been writing this TweetDeck has alerted me to perhaps 80 new messages. Each one of them interesting, valuable. A communication from someone known to me whose opinion I value. I've also had several emails and carried on a text communication with my mum! I've not checked Facebook but can pretty much guarantee there will be a dozen status updates since I last logged on! I don't know what to say to that - it just feels like communication overload.

This post has been too long and there is more to say but time to leave it for tonight - need to switch off and get back to Jane Eyre ;-)

Friendship and Gary Barlow

The email system in the office is still down. Obviously there is work we can do - meetings to attend, reports to read - and write, phone calls to make and of course the ubiquitous desk tidying. Paperless office? I don't think so quite yet.

Working from home it's slightly more problematic so having pretty much cleared today's priorities I reckon it might be time to take a few hours flexi. The shops are open, tea and scones are calling, but before then there's time to blog.

So - friendship. Been thinking a bit about this lately and in particular a quote from Kahlil Gibran's The Prophet

"And let your best be for your friend. If he must know the ebb of your tide, let him know its flood also."

Years ago a dear friend gave me a copy of the book, with this inscribed inside it. I'm so sad we are no longer in touch as he shared a very low ebb and I'd have loved to share the floods with him over the years. Perhaps by the miracle of the internet he'll find this and get in touch - I am sure you know who you are!

I can't remember the last time I spoke to him. We definitely didn't say goodbye. I don't suppose either of us knew that our last meeting would be the last meeting for what is now thirty years. If we had known then what might we have said to each other?

Think back to your last day at school, at college, when you left a job. All those "not going to say goodbye" conversations and nowadays "we'll keep in touch - see you on facebook".

Years ago of course there was no such option. It came down to a phone number and a house address. Someone moved, you didn't hear or lost the details and that was that. If you felt brave enough you might phone their mum - in those days you seemed to know your friends' mums as a matter of course - but so often time slipped by and the friend became someone you used to know.

Going back to that quote now, over the past couple of years life has again been at a pretty low ebb and I've shared a lot of that with my friends. I'm grateful for people's time, attention, love, care, support. Now that I can feel the tide coming in again I'd like to do the same but how to do that?

Hospital visiting can be harrowing - for the patient and the visitors. Of course when someone is unwell our instinct is to want to go and offer support and company. But I'd like to start a campaign for Well visiting - though I don't see that particular name catching on.

Lately I've thought about dropping in on friends just for an hour, for a chat, for a cuppa. But each time I find myself thinking "they'll be busy, the time won't be convenient, they'll be at work, making dinner, bathing the kids, watching TV...." I might text or FB instead but what if we didn't have the technology that enables us to do that? We tell ourselves it's a good thing - we can keep in touch so easily - but isn't it touch without the touch?

Think back for a moment over your friendship group - are there those that you haven't physically seen for many months or years? The last time you saw them did you realise it would be so long?

I'm going to explore this a bit more later - I've heard it said that for many people friends are the new family. If that is the case how does friendship work, who are our friends and how do we manage the plethora of friends that social and job mobility bring into our twenty first century lives? If life were Google Plus who'd be in which circle?

For now I need to move on - and of course Gary is there in the title. (Not just because hits on here have dipped and I know he'll attract some attention...) But because he's one of my dinner party guests and I'm starting to think what I might ask him to kick start the conversation as I introduce him to the others. The general consensus from a straw poll seems to be he's undergone something of a transformation from being the chubby one in Take That to the Elder Statesman of pop music - and that he is seriously hot. Agree? Disagree? Post your comments and what you'd like to ask him!

But for now - to friends old and new - if we've not spoken for a while I'd love to see you, let's make it happen!

Dinner Party!

Saturday night and yet again we've been enticed into ITV's televisual offering. Under the guise of the X Factor a parade of hopefuls have appeared on stage and screen, hoping for their fifteen minutes - or perhaps their lifetime - of fame.

I do find it entertaining - no question about that. Sure the music doesn't showcase new songwriters but I quite enjoy the covers. Every now and again a song will bring out those goosebumps and you realise just how gifted someone is.

What I don't like is the way in which some make it to perform in front of the judges even though they are clearly not gifted or talented. Not sure how many people know this but there are several rounds of auditions before you actually get to appear in front of Gary, Kelly, Louis and Tulisa. I know as I met someone who made it to Bootcamp.

So why do the people behind the scenes allow someone who clearly does not have the X or even the Y Factor on that stage? Well obviously - for entertainment purposes.

The cruelty involved here really does bother me. Anyone making it to this stage surely must believe they are in with a chance, and some are. But others are simply here to be held up to public ridicule - with family and friends waiting in the wings oblivious to the humiliation hovering alongside them.

Sure it's manufactured music - look at last year as a classic example. Five lovely lads were rejected, reformed into a band, came third in the competition and tomorrow they will be number one in the charts with the fastest selling single of this year. Who am I to say they don't have the x factor - but I can't help challenging the process!

All of which brings me back to what I had planned to write about originally!

The last couple of posts have, by my own admission, been a tad heavier than I ever expected or planned them to be. The tax campaign and situation in the middle east don't make for easy reading - I know that. So I'm thinking back to a comment from a dear friend a few posts back - suggesting I blog about my perfect dinner party. Six guests - who would they be and what would we talk about? I guess what we eat might be of interest too?!

Not much time tonight to fill in all the details so I'm going to start at the beginning - put together a guest list and maybe over the next few days and weeks I'll fill in the menu and the conversation.

So - who to invite? I'm assuming guests can be here on earth or passed away so at the top of the table I'd simply have to have Martin Luther King. All this stuff about his life and loves the past week - how does that make him feel? How can it possibly take away from his amazing achievements and how does he feel about the possibility that it might?

On his right it has to be a lady - keeping the male/female dinner party protocol going! So how about Beyonce? Since I saw her live a few weeks back I have been in awe of her beauty, her talent and her graciousness. Something tells me she has more to offer and since the demise of Michael Jackson is there another global superstar of her calibre? I doubt it.

Moving round the table we need another guy and of course it has to be Gary. Mr Barlow is becoming something of a national treasure - following his success with Take That and more recently the X factor (see above...) he used to be the chubby one but his newly chiselled cheekbones are taking the nation by storm - look out for more about him in the coming days.

Another lady - and moving away from the world of music to that of film it has to be Meryl Streep. I waivered for a millisecond there as there are some English Dames that I did consider. But "The winner takes it all" won it for Meryl - and so much to ask about life and love and Mr Bond before Daniel Craig ;-)

He of course was a candidate for the third male seat - I make no secret of my admiration for his fine acting abilities (not to mention that body as he emerges from the surf in Casino Royale...). I hope he will forgive me but I feel the need to diversify the guest list and bring in someone who will add a different dimension to the conversation. I've spent a fair bit of time thinking about this one but all things considered I reckon I will go with Usain Bolt. Don't suppose any of you saw that coming and in looking to the world of sport I was of course drawn to David Beckham (obviously for his views on family life), to Jonathon Edwards to discuss things from a faith perspective, and Gary Lineker in the hope of some cheese and onion freebies. But Usain Bolt's battle with scoliosis and achievements in spite of it inspire me and I'd love to talk to him.

So who joins Martin Luther King, Gary Barlow, Usain Bolt, Beyonce and Meryl Streep for dinner? Another female naturally and I am going to opt for Aung San Suu Kyi. I don't pretend to begin to understand what her life must have been like, but I want to know more.

I'm actually quite excited at the thought of this gathering - thanks to Fang Fang for suggesting I put my mind to it. I'm looking forward to imagining what we might talk about so watch this space!

xx

.

Breaking the Silence

Two days since I posted - can't let this go on and yet really can't think what to write about.

Not that there aren't a zillion possible subjects. It's more that any which one of them would unearth a whole heap of issues, and identify those who may at this point in time truly not be ready to be outed in a blog. Even a blog such as this with a relatively small number of followers and page views, highly unlikely to be featured in the tabloids or glossy magazines.

Which of course is one of the reasons why I'm hesitating about writing my best selling novel. I've said this before but budding writers are told to write about that which is real to them. About friends and family, about things that make us laugh and cry, about issues we worry about or cause us to lose sleep over.

How do you do this without someone reading and realising that actually that person is them? Flattering maybe to recognise yourself as the leading character - but what if you don't like them much? Or perhaps to see in a supporting character aspects of your personality that you are less than proud of - does that encourage you to accept them? Or make you more determined to sort them out - and does it matter?

There must be a skill involved - a way of using life's experiences to construct a story that won't cause offence to anyone. But perhaps the more you worry about that the harder it gets. Maybe the thing to do is keep on keeping on, writing what you will and worrying less about how it sounds to others. Don't hold back and keep quiet, instead Break the Silence ...

And having said all of this there is now little time to write about anything of any consequence. Except - today - I heard someone talk about this very subject - Breaking the Silence.

This guy was an Israeli soldier. He spoke honestly, openly and vividly about what it was to control the Palestinian people by force. His admissions made my blood run cold.

It made me think - as did the conversation I had on the doorstep yesterday - that sometimes we don't take the time to explain things simply enough.

It's not as though no one has heard about the Middle East. About the rocket attacks, suicide bombs, settlements and security barrier. But how many people understand what's going on there? I find it hard to explain and I've not only worked at Christian Aid for 8 years but visited the West Bank myself.

I'll write more later but for now all I want to say is this. For four and a half decades, over four million Palestinian people have lived under military occupation. When we talked about people being "pro Palestinian" at lunchtime today this ex-soldier challenged us bluntly "after four and a half decades, where are the pro Palestianians"?

To my mind nothing can excuse an act of terrorism. But how can we ever begin to understand what it is like to be constantly harassed by an occupying force; to be separated from our land and family by an 8 metre high concrete wall; to be stopped and searched at checkpoints including flying checkpoints that spring up at random places; to not be allowed to use certain roads; to have your water supply under the control of an occupying force; I could go on - and I am sure that I will do another time.

The ex Israeli soldiers who are Breaking the Silence and speaking out are putting themselves on the line. Risking the disapproval of friends and family, way beyond that you could expect by writing an amusing story on a blog. Lots to think about, talk about and perhaps even to pray about.

And then to better understand and share with others; as the lovely lady on the doorstep yesterday said "if ordinary people knew about this then governments would have to take action"

Amen to that.

A Taxing Day...

Today was frustrating, that I cannot deny.

After the sterling overnight efforts of our ISD staff some semblance of normality was briefly restored this morning. First the intranet and then email were available; the enforced coffee breaks, meetings, visits to garden centres and other diversions were brought to an end as staff took up their usual positions in front of laptops and PCs - hallelujah!

Our joy was to be short lived however as after an hour or so all was not as it had seemed and it became apparent we were offline for another day.

We worked around - as you do. We still had Skype, personal email - not for sending sensitive information obviously, and, of course, the phone! I found myself apologising to our amazing receptionist who had to transfer me to all my colleagues - their extension numbers being on the intranet - but her buoyant upbeat cheerfulness was an example to us all.

All of this however is simply by way of preamble and has nothing whatsoever to do with why I am angry. There's really no point worrying or stressing over things we have no control over, so my main thoughts have to be with those colleagues who are charged with putting things right.

My anger is directed elsewhere and needs some background.

A lovely lady came to collect a little red envelope today. For another charity obviously, but a very good cause and we fell into conversation as I asked her to wait whilst I gift aided my donation. After all, I had time to talk ;-)

We chatted about the highs and lows of house to house collecting, my employment with Christian Aid came up, she said how much she loved our slogan "We believe in life before death".

I introduced the concept of Poverty Over, Christian Aid's vision that the scandal of poverty can be eradicated in our lifetime. We moved onto taking action as well as just giving, to the ways in which campaigning can make a difference and is necessary to achieve our ambitious vision of a world without poverty.

And somehow, quite naturally, the Trace the Tax campaign came up and I explained how multinational companies don't have to declare how much profit they make in each company they do business in. So for example mining companies in the Philippines don't pay the tax which could fund education or health care for many children and families living there.

The lovely lady was aghast. And so was I. Sometimes it is only as you explain this to people who didn't know it before that the injustice hits you again. I was really really angry.

We talked some more and I'm almost embarrassed to admit what she went on to say. "If ordinary people knew about this and did something then the government would have to take action - I never knew".

I thought of our marketing, our advertising, all that we do to get the word out. What are we doing wrong? But it's oh so easy to think what "we" can do and not what "I" can do. My blog's been getting a lovely lot of attention lately so maybe by popping this on here a few more people will know about it and join the fight to end poverty.

About £160 billion a year is lost to developing countries every year through tax avoidance. That's almost twice the amount they receive in International Aid.

So a taxing day, and I am angry about this injustice. But if it made me share with you then it was worthwhile.

Down Day

I hope I haven't come across as critical today.

I really appreciate the work my colleagues in ISD are putting in to get our systems up and running again tonight. If I were in the office tomorrow I would bake them a batch of cupcakes to say thank you. It's hard to imagine a more stressful situation to be in - struggling to put right a situation that is affecting the productivity of countless colleagues, all of whom have deadlines to meet and a mountainous workload as they seek to do no less than eradicate worldwide poverty - no pressure then.

But - maybe - it is time to pause. And breathe...

I find myself asking the question - again and again - have we become too dependent on technology?

But I'm not sure if we have, after all if something works for the common good, is accessible, available, affordable - why not make use of it at every given opportunity and hey - why waste time backing up with handwritten notes (for example) if actually the new reality means that all our work is available wherever and whenever we find ourselves.

I don't want to be laying blame as I don't doubt for a minute everyone in ISD does their darndest to ensure situations like this don't arise. What I do want to do however is try and unravel how the rest of us can ensure we are prepared for days like today. The sense of frustration has been aired on Facebook and Twitter but I don't see anyone angry at the organisation or colleagues - rather there is a general sense of concern that we should find ourselves in such a situation.

So I'm interested to hear from all you IT geeks and nerds out there. WWJD? What would Jobs do? Dropbox has been suggested to me as a way forward - store any documents I need to work on urgently in a folder and access from anywhere in the world.

If you are in the office on a day like today then of course you can hold impromptu meetings; catch up; tidy up; make good use of the time networking and doing all those things you have been meaning to do.

If you are working from home - having opted for peace and quiet to finish work on an important document - the situation is more complex. Clearly no point in travelling to the office to sit and do the above - but no opportunity for those actions either. I had a pleasant enough day at the garden centre but of course I am now seven flexi hours (that I hadn't budgeted for) down ;-(

I don't have the answer - just a whole load of questions. And I find myself thinking back almost thirty years to when, sat at my desk with a dictaphone, I would mutter "letter to Mrs Jones...." and send the tape to the typing pool....

Times have indeed changed. For the better I'm sure ... but for the best?

To work or not to work...

I've started to write this post without a title - which is unusual for me. Generally speaking the subject comes to mind, I might put a quirky twist on it (Catching Butterflies being one - hello to the person who obviously hadn't actually read that post when they commented on it...), and out pours the stream of conscousness...

Today is different. I am simply unable to compose a subject line that adequately expresses my frustration with the situation without over dramatising it. After all, no one has died.

What has died however, is the internet connection to the office. Having woken up early and settled in front of the laptop to crack on with a serious piece of work I first spent an hour faffing and fixing, thinking it must be our connection here and silently cursing Virgin media and their promises of 50 megabytes a second.

A couple of unanswered emails, a one sided Skype chat and a phone call later I discover the problem is at the office. No internet. None, zilch, nada.

The document I need is on my desktop at work. I emailed it to myself last night so that if "anything happened" it would be in the system and retrievable from any computer. Only it isn't.

Setting aside the frustration - guess it just means working this evening or whenever things are up and running - there is now the moral dilemma. Working from home until a meeting at 1pm how am I supposed to use and account for my time?

If I were in the office I'm sure I'd be making good use of the time tidying up, reading, chatting to colleagues. Sat here I'm seriously considering popping on a load of washing and getting to grips with my roots!

Technology is a wonderful thing - as we so often say. But this absolute dependence on it is not without its issues, and for the sake of my blood pressure I think I need to get away from the computer and into the bathroom ;-)

And hey - suddenly we have a title!