Last week some 250 friends gathered in my study. Until then they had been sitting on tabletops or in dusty cabinets or variously packed away in suitcases, boxes and plastic bags. We had been separated for anything from weeks, to months and years. But on that Friday morning we (that is, me and my elephant collection)…
The kindness of strangers
Receiving kindness is warming, not to say enriching, provided of course that it is welcome. It is not so nice when an act of ‘kindness’ is unwanted or perhaps even a threat. Real kindness occurs between friends or workmates and is based on feelings that are mutual. It can also be part of relationships with…
Every crowd has a silver lining
Something special happens when we gather in crowds. Look no further than the emotions aroused in an audience at a theatre, stadium, or political meeting. People who, as individuals, might be shy or retiring, in groups, can become part of a powerful mass that is greater than the sum of the parts. This new power…
Font of wisdom
There are two key givens in employment. First, it is the employer who pays; second it is the employer who decides what is to be done. Well, that is the theory. When we employed a local engraver, things did not go exactly to plan... During our first holidays in Tréguennec, goods, guests, and even letters…
Funny thing, laughter
Laughter is one of the great pleasures in life. It is also complicated as in addition to its traditional role in humour, it sometimes takes on a social role when it becomes an altogether more serious matter. In the world of humour, laughter is probably at its most pleasurable when it gets out of hand.…
The child within
To passers-by I would have appeared a normal adult, but for an hour or so I became a reticent school-boy dragging his feet. I just did not want to go to school. The immediate background to this metamorphosis was straightforward. Some weeks earlier my wife had asked what I wanted for my birthday. I plumped…
Second guessing
After 40 years I assumed I could read my mother-in-law’s mind. By then she was in her late eighties, had become vague and forgetful, but her sense of the absurd was undiminished, possibly even enhanced. We went out for lunch and after our hors-d’ourvres and main courses, we negotiated to go halves on the pudding…
Questions that rock
Sometimes I get a question that rocks me back. I got one last week. On the bike that morning, I had been puzzling over Shakespeare’s seven ages of man. Mine came to four – ‘development’, ‘reproduction’, ‘consolidation’ and ‘decline’. I presented these over tea and reproduction-going-on-consolidation man asked declining-man (me) - ‘if you were offered…
The constant hammer
For years three questions have haunted me but now I am down to two. I still do not know why the chicken crossed the road; I have not resolved whether it was the chicken or the egg that came first (based on Aristotelian principles I am told it is the chicken) but I do agree…
A risky business
Many see risk-takers as silly and foolhardy, as lacking insight. Others portray them as brave, adventurous, and praiseworthy. My position is rather different. I see risk-taking as a normal part of our behaviour, moreover one that is a necessary component of our lives. Indeed, risk-taking is so important to human-kind that, without it the human…
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