Sunday, November 10

 In the Main Street of Longford, on the footpath just outside the Real Estate Agent's, there's a cupboard with a sign reading Longford Community Pantry.  Every day, people put in any surplus food they have, extra fruit from their apple tree, the last few loaves before the bakers shuts its door, and so on. The idea is that, if you're struggling or waiting for your next bit of dole money, you can help yourself to what's in the pantry.  We put bits and pieces in there from time to time.

 Locals are very proud of the initiative and it's well-supported.  Every now and again, though, somebody goes too far and the Community Facebook Page is filled with outrage.  One time, somebody from Cressy, the next town, was seen emptying the pantry and driving off.  Or, someone complains that they put in 2 dozen eggs and somebody took the lot.

I'm following the latest scandal with interest.  On the other side of the road from the pantry, outside the Commonwealth Bank, is a seat, put there for weary travellers.  Some women have been observed sitting there, 'all day', watching the pantry.  When they see someone making a donation, they hurry across the street and 'take the lot'.  What makes it interesting is that the women in question are Pacific Islanders, the partners of men from Tonga, Fiji, etc, employed to work at the Meat Works or as pickers at the local farms.

So, in sleepy Longford, we have a genuine Racist Scandal brewing. I'll be watching its development with interest.

Friday, November 8

Well that's it.  Don't expect me to put myself through that again.  I couldn't fault the staff at Launceston General Hospital; they were all that could be expected, and more.  They even found me a serving of sticky date pudding when I finally emerged from the theatre. But the whole rigmarole is demeaning and unpleasant, and I don't see why I need to put myself through it.  Even if I get a personal letter from the Prime Minister, I'll just politely say, No, thanks!

I haven't thought of Arthur Clough for years but I remember he wrote a poem which said:

Thou shalt not kill; but need'st not strive
Officiously to keep alive:

That's a philosophy I can relate to.  Who needs well-meaning individuals making decisions on your behalf?  Just because I’m 81, doesn’t mean I’m ga-ga.  I am perfectly capable of making my own decisions and I don’t need some well-meaning dill in an office deciding what I should be doing.

Having said that, I certainly feel better.

 

Thursday, November 7

I'm showered, shaved and dressed, ready for my trip into the hospital.  I can't have breakfast but I had a litre of some concoction to ingest which has taken away my appetite, anyway. Check-in time is 11.30 and Jamie will drop me off.

But that's not the important item on today's news.  The real big issue of today is that Donald Trump is, once again, President of the United States.  Words fail me.  One report I read said that it was the smallest turn-out of voters in years.  Many people were either not interested or too lazy to vote.  The ones who did make the effort were the enthusiastic followers of Trump.  The story of Trump just keeps on giving and it's not over yet.

Wednesday, November 6

 I'm afraid my project to feed the birds in our garden has failed.  Marilyn commented that I would need to formulate a plan to clean up the increased incidence of bird droppings on the concrete driveway and that was an issue I hadn't considered.  It was going to cost me about $10 for a bag of bird seed and there was no way of predicting how many bags I would need in the future.  

The final straw, though, was when I saw the lady next door tying plastic bags to the corners of her clothesline.  I was flummoxed at first but realised that this was a primitive bird-scaring device to protect her washing from being stained by the errant droppings of passing blackbirds. My kindness may have the unintended effect of encouraging more feathered passers-by to visit.

There are always unintended consequences, so it's time to think again. 

Today is a fasting day in preparation for tomorrow's exploratory operation.  I can have black coffee, jelly and not much else but I've survived it before and I will survive it again.  I think they wrote a song about it.

Tuesday, November 5

 I don't know which is the more important event happening today: the Melbourne Cup or the US election.  They say that the Cup is the 'race that stops a nation' but I suspect most of the world is holding its breath to see, instead, what results from the idiocy that has overtaken the USA.  How 'the world's greatest democracy' as they like to call themselves could seriously consider Trump as an appropriate leader is beyond me.  There was a movie years ago called The Gods Must be Crazy. Maybe it's time for a remake.

Marilyn is meeting up with other Ladies Who Lunch at the Carrick Hotel today and is rummaging around in her wardrobe to find an appropriate fascinator to wear. Apparently, it's de rigueur to wear something on your head at a Melbourne Cup do.  Who would have thought!

My heart sank when I found I had to write about A Tree in a Meadow but here is the result

A TREE IN A MEADOW                                                                                      24 March, 2023

If you saw it for the first time, you would say it was a tree, just a tree, a nondescript tree in a meadow.  It would be surprising if you paid this particular tree any unusual attention but that’s because very few people know the story of what makes this tree special.  I know because I’ve lived in the house across from this same meadow and I know the true story of why this tree in this meadow is different from other trees.

When we were kids, this tree was a favourite place for our games.  It wasn’t a very big tree but little kids could still hide behind its trunk and play tricks on their friends.  On warm days we had picnics in its shade and, when we were older, we climbed into its branches and tied ropes to them to make swings.  We used whatever we could find to make cubby-houses around its base and, in our imagination it was a stagecoach, a World War II destroyer and a racing car.  There was no end to the ways in which this tree became the focus of our games.

One day, soon after my 16^th birthday, I carved a heart into the bark of the tree and inscribed the initials of the girl whose face filled my dreams.  I took my courage in both hands and invited her to walk with me through the meadow and contrived to wander beneath the branches of the tree until she was confronted by my clumsy scratchings.  I don’t know what I expected; perhaps, that she would squeeze my hand (in my imagination, we were holding hands as we walked along), simper (I thought I knew what simpering was) and say how lovely it was that I had expressed my feelings in that way.

However, it didn’t work out exactly as I had hoped.  She didn’t even see the carving even though I had stopped directly in front of it, and I was forced to point it out to her.  To my horror, she burst out laughing.

“Oh, William,” she giggled.  “How ridiculous. What were you thinking?” And she laughed.  Yes, she laughed. 

I was shocked at her reaction and even more upset when she went on to say how disappointed she was that I had desecrated this glorious tree.  Desecrated?  What I had done was a gesture of my affection for her and an expression of my hope that we could possibly have a life together.  There was not much hope of that now.  How could I possibly have anything to do with someone who threw my expressions of love back in my face?

We didn’t speak much on the way back to her home; in fact, I said goodbye to her at the corner and let her walk the last hundred yards on her own. 

The next day, I borrowed some of Dad’s tools from the shed and erased as much of the heart from the tree as possible.  It made a bit of a mess and I felt a little bit guilty but I was determined that there would be nothing left to remind people of my embarrassment.  I avoided the tree after that.  At 16, I was involved in other activities and I’m sure I never even ventured into that meadow again.  That is until the day after my eighteenth birthday. 

I’d had a few drinks with my friends the night before and was resting my sore head by sleeping in when I was awakened by the sound of police cars in the street outside.  I staggered to the window and saw the revolving lights on the roofs of the police cars and heard the shouts of what seemed like dozens of police officers running across the meadow.  They surrounded a tree - my tree - and shouted at something, someone (?) in the branches. Soon, a dishevelled figure dropped to the ground.  He was quickly overpowered, handcuffed and led away to one of the cars.

I watched the TV news later to get the details of what had happened.  Apparently, this fugitive had held up a local service station at gun point, and escaped on foot.  The police were called and given the information that he was hiding in the branches of what some of the locals, apparently, had taken to calling the Lover’s Tree.  The police spokesman said they could identify the tree because of the damage to the bark caused by a disappointed lover who had his romantic advances rejected.

I’m older now and the feeling of embarrassment has faded but that tree will always be special to me, for a whole host of reasons.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monday, November 4

I suppose it would be possible to work out how many days I have been on this earth .. it's only Mathematics, after all.  81 years x 365 days is 27565; add 20 to include leap years, which would mean 27585 up to my last birthday; 9 months from February to November (9x30=270) but February is only 28 days and others have 31, not 30 .. and it's all too complicated for me this morning!  Let's say it's close to 28000 days that I've been taking up space.

I didn't work for the first 18 years of that and I've been retired about 15 years.  That's 33 years when I was unproductive.  And I'm probably fairly typical.  I wonder whether there is some government department somewhere who are calculating this level of cost benefit analysis.  It would be interesting to see the results and I wonder what governments would do with the information.

Sunday, November 3

 I have to go in for a colonoscopy next week.  It's a regular check-up and the last one led to an operation which reduced my bowel by several metres.  Not much fun.  Before the event, I have to be careful with my diet and make some changes to my medication.  So, this morning I had to plan out everything for the next few days leading up to the hospital visit on Thursday: removing certain medications from my routine, making sure I had Rice Bubbles available for breakfast, and so on

On the Wednesday, I have a very carefully-explained procedure to follow, including drinking various preparations.  The last time I went through this nonsense, I vowed it would be the last time but, in fact, here we are again.

The good news is that the new bird feeder is a roaring success.  It took a while for the dopey creatures to find it but this morning there were 4 or 5 blackbirds and several sparrows fighting for access.  I've just brought in the tray for washing and refilling.  I think we can count this as a plus.