Which reminds me.......
When I was travelling in India once with the Missus, we visited a Buddhist monastery. Quite a famous one.
We were shown round by a brown skinned, round faced monk - a refugee, I believe, from Tibet, and a follower of the Dalai Lama.
He gave us quite a tour, and quite a lecture. Especially, as I recall, on the subject of attachment. He urged us to free ourselves of attachment. Not bad advice, I thought, so I asked him if he wouldn't mind giving me his watch.
"I'm sorry," he said, "I can't. My mother gave it to me."
Friday, 24 January 2014
THE MONK WHO SOLD HIS FERRARI
I haven't been reading this book.
If he was a monk, why didn't he give it away?
If he was a monk, why didn't he give it away?
Sunday, 12 January 2014
INTERSTICES
My Dad used to joke that he was a collector - a collector of Fivers. In my lifetime he was not a conspicuously successful collector in that field.
He more successfully collected words. Odd ones. Arcane ones. Obscure and interesting words. Thus, at an early age, I learned of numismatics, graticules, micrometers, interstices and many more. This collection was housed in scraps of paper and notebooks, written in his beautiful, artistic hand.
He also collected small memories, often also written up in his notes. Recordings of the ordinary things in life around him, which he found, by dint of his own survival, shimmering and remarkable - the amount of raspberries or other crops yielded by his garden; the way a particular view looked on a particular Wealden evening; a sound of this or that bird, the taste of a toffee. Not big things. Small things. Small things noticed, though. Small things appreciated. Interstices, you might say, between the big ups and downs of life, the big happenings, the triumphs and disasters. An appreciation, and a contented awareness of what is happening when nothing is happening. What is going on, all the time, if only you stop to notice it.
These were his collection. Perhaps, too, his collection had a greater value than any collection of Fivers.
I find, as I return to this blog after an extended, indolent Christmas and New Year absence, that, if I have a New Year wish for others, and for myself, it is to be able to look at the interstices, the gaps, between notable events in our lives, and to collect with wonder and gratitude the million, million tiny spurs to contentment which are happening, every minute of every day just, in fact, as we think nothing much is going on at all.
May we notice, appreciate, collect and treasure.
He more successfully collected words. Odd ones. Arcane ones. Obscure and interesting words. Thus, at an early age, I learned of numismatics, graticules, micrometers, interstices and many more. This collection was housed in scraps of paper and notebooks, written in his beautiful, artistic hand.
He also collected small memories, often also written up in his notes. Recordings of the ordinary things in life around him, which he found, by dint of his own survival, shimmering and remarkable - the amount of raspberries or other crops yielded by his garden; the way a particular view looked on a particular Wealden evening; a sound of this or that bird, the taste of a toffee. Not big things. Small things. Small things noticed, though. Small things appreciated. Interstices, you might say, between the big ups and downs of life, the big happenings, the triumphs and disasters. An appreciation, and a contented awareness of what is happening when nothing is happening. What is going on, all the time, if only you stop to notice it.
These were his collection. Perhaps, too, his collection had a greater value than any collection of Fivers.
I find, as I return to this blog after an extended, indolent Christmas and New Year absence, that, if I have a New Year wish for others, and for myself, it is to be able to look at the interstices, the gaps, between notable events in our lives, and to collect with wonder and gratitude the million, million tiny spurs to contentment which are happening, every minute of every day just, in fact, as we think nothing much is going on at all.
May we notice, appreciate, collect and treasure.
Saturday, 11 January 2014
OTHER MEN'S FLOWERS
HB
Thursday, 9 January 2014
EMOTION MAP
Participants in a study were asked to map where they felt different emotions - which part of the body was stimulated (red/yellow/white) or deactivated (blue). One of the more interesting things I've seen recently.
Monday, 9 December 2013
BLACKOUT BLUES
I took matters into my own hands during the recent power failures due to storms.
Frustrated that two very fine sirloins from Messrs Laveracks would go to waste mouldering in the defunct fridge, I decided that the house’s only form of heating -the open wood fire in the sitting room - would also have to act as makeshift hob. I got the frying pan on, put in a tiny spray of oil and shoved the steak in. The flambé effect due to spitting fat very nearly set fire to the wallpaper.
With the Missus away on business, I was hopping about, frightened that I would burn the bloody house down, and trying to extinguish the fat fire by blowing on it. It was the only thing I could think of in the emergency. Amazingly, it worked.
I ate my steaks by the fire. Albeit rather well done on the outside though a point on the inside. It was then that I realised that the sitting room was filled with a blue meaty smelling smoke, which also would fail to impress the Missus upon her return. So I had to have the window open for about an hour, during which I occupied myself by swishing about a copy of the Sunday Times to clear the steak fumes and after which I was hypothermic in the now icy room, and frankly in need of another steak. I had a smallish glass of wine instead. Then another. I was thinking about reaching for the Highland Park when I realised that alcohol in fact provides only a false sense of warmth to the hypothermic, and also that, sitting by an open fire, there was a distinct chance of spontaneous combustion.
Frustrated that two very fine sirloins from Messrs Laveracks would go to waste mouldering in the defunct fridge, I decided that the house’s only form of heating -the open wood fire in the sitting room - would also have to act as makeshift hob. I got the frying pan on, put in a tiny spray of oil and shoved the steak in. The flambé effect due to spitting fat very nearly set fire to the wallpaper.
With the Missus away on business, I was hopping about, frightened that I would burn the bloody house down, and trying to extinguish the fat fire by blowing on it. It was the only thing I could think of in the emergency. Amazingly, it worked.
I ate my steaks by the fire. Albeit rather well done on the outside though a point on the inside. It was then that I realised that the sitting room was filled with a blue meaty smelling smoke, which also would fail to impress the Missus upon her return. So I had to have the window open for about an hour, during which I occupied myself by swishing about a copy of the Sunday Times to clear the steak fumes and after which I was hypothermic in the now icy room, and frankly in need of another steak. I had a smallish glass of wine instead. Then another. I was thinking about reaching for the Highland Park when I realised that alcohol in fact provides only a false sense of warmth to the hypothermic, and also that, sitting by an open fire, there was a distinct chance of spontaneous combustion.
Saturday, 7 December 2013
Wednesday, 4 December 2013
Tuesday, 26 November 2013
Saturday, 23 November 2013
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