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FWIW - musings of a webmaster: index to musings old and new
Thank you for the music 9 March 2008
I have a confession to make.
I haven't been to church since Christmas. I've been going through one of those phases that I experience from time to time when 'church' doesn't help. In fact, it becomes a source of stress and a catalyst for depression. Far from being nurturing or uplifting it feels like yet another demand in my life, which already feels overburdened. Rather than seeing the good things about the place, everything is a disappointment. I feel angry with people for no good reason. I anticipate being asked to do things and expect that people will be negative, critical and nit picking about the things that I have done. So I stay away, because I find it impossible to hide how I feel, and attending in that frame of mind is unfair on other people and unhelpful to me.
Closed for the season? 20 January 2008
There is something extraordinarily melancholy about a seaside resort out of season. Blackpool's promenade in a late afternoon, mid-January drizzle has had its soul washed away. Souvenir shops, amusement arcades and fish and chip cafés are hidden behind slatted shutters. Roller coasters and big wheels stand hulking and motionless in the mist. The few people to be seen are the year round dwellers of serried bungalows, huddled grey shapes that seem lacking in hope. The tacky illuminations advertising McDonalds, Doctor Who and a local radio station are dead. The Golden Mile is closed for the season and what's left behind is an air of desperation, a vestige of a summer life.
Morningtown Ride 28 October 2007
It's amazing how many of these pieces have their origins on a motorway somewhere. Last week I was driving along the M42 listening to Terry Wogan (OK, you've got me - I'm a 'TOG' - and what is more I've reached the age where I don't feel inclined to apologise for it!) when he played The Seekers singing 'Morningtown Ride'.
Outside the comfort zone: responding to the challenge of our Local Ministry Group 14 October 2007
A sign on the M66 proudly proclaims that it is "the highest motorway in England". Last week I was driving along it in thick fog, and thinking that I would like to write something for this 'FWIW' column. But my ideas were as murky as the morning. So I murmured something along the lines of "OK, God, have you got any bright ideas?" Well, maybe it was the high altitude and hence the relative closeness to Heaven that the M66 enjoys, but communications must have been pretty good because "Local Ministry Groups" flashed into my mind with the resulting feeling of "ah yes, of course". A more charismatic Christian might use the phrase "God told me to write about Local Ministry Groups" - but I'm not in the least charismatic and feel uncomfortable with the idea of God addressing me so directly. So I'll limit myself to saying that the idea came from somewhere and it felt important to follow up on it. So here goes.
Hung out to dry: a short story of international relations and clothes pegs 2 September 2007
Clothes pegs have many uses beyond hanging your T-shirt on the line. I have known for some time that they are handy for re-sealing a bag of crisps; they are ideal for attaching Christmas cards to a length of string; they are also a useful tool for holding a sheaf of papers together. Indeed, the BBC have an entire webpage dedicated to alternative uses for the humble clothes peg.
Moth of the moment 29 July 2007
Scarcity value is sometimes dependant upon location. I recently found the smart fellow in the big picture above resting on my geraniums. I know nothing about moths but I couldn't recall having seen one like it before so I took his picture and e-mailed it to a colleague who knows about these things...
Fleeting yet eternal 15 July 2007
We all have them, these moments. They are hard to define, yet easy to identify.
I started thinking about such moments a few weeks ago, without being able to put a name to them. I was travelling between the Isle of Wight and Portsmouth on the Wightlink ferry. The boat was not crowded, and I was able to sit right at the front looking down at the prow of the boat. Suddenly something caught the corner of my eye. Focussing more carefully I saw that we were being guided towards Portsmouth by several dolphins, leaping from the waves in perfect arcs and easily keeping pace with the ferry.
Hearing the wisdom of Solomon? 4 June 2007
"Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad."
This little gem came to mind last week as I was perched on top of a ladder painting our kitchen ceiling. It was not the act of decorating that caused it to surface from the depths of my memory, but Handel's lavish oratorio "Solomon", which I was listening to at the time. I admit, when Handel wrote the piece he probably didn't have in mind that it would be enjoyed by some guy up a ladder with a roller in his hand. It would probably also be a bit of a surprise to Sir John Eliot Gardiner whose dazzling recording I was listening to. But "Solomon", however and wherever it is heard, is much more than wallpaper music.
Easter Eve people Good Friday 6 April 2007
The ceremonies of Easter Eve are some of the most powerful in the Christian Calendar. There is a palpable sense of anticipation: something extraordinary is about to happen.
The service begins in a profound darkness. That darkness just glimpsed on the horizon at the start of Holy Week, but which has been rolling relentlessly towards us, becoming all enveloping and extinguishing hope as the brutal events of Good Friday unfold.
House of the rising sun 18 March 2007
On Wednesday morning I watched the sun rise.
This wasn't a leisurely contemplation of the new day being born. As I was heading north on the M5 at the time it was a case of glancing to my right periodically to follow its progress from a red line appearing on the horizon, through a glowing rosy disc, to all the glory of a dazzling gold that set about burning the shroud of mist off the fields.
Henry's Goat's Blog - a reply 5 March 2007
Dear Goat
I do love your poems, they really are magic. To give you no feedback would surely be tragic. So here’s a short story, not written in prose, About a day out, and the things that arose.
Learning to jump - living the message of Velvet Elvis 18 February 2007
We live in a cynical world. Indeed, the world we live in can condition us to be like that.
When we see things done and said in the name of God, things which we abhor and believe that our God would want nothing to do with it, is a natural enough reaction. We doubt the validity of our faith, the righteousness of our church, the integrity and worth of our fellow Christians. Our faith is corroded by the bitterness and hatred which surround us in the world at large and before we know it we too are becoming jaded and hard. We lose our sense of commissioning and empowerment. We lose faith, we lose hope, and we lose each other.
But here is the good news. It doesn't have to be like that.
Depression: is church part of the solution? Or part of the problem? 28/01/07
I find this a difficult time of year. As someone who has a tendency to depression I find that life is a particular battle around now. I feel overwhelmed by the demands. Everyone seems to want a piece of me. Temporarily increasing my low dose of medication doesn't really seem to help.
Gliding down the runway... or slip sliding away? 14/01/07
With apologies to Paul Simon for mis-quoting his lyrics, this nevertheless sums up what quote a lot of people would have been asking themselves last weekend.
Last Sunday I was due to fly (with about two dozen other people from the company I work for) from Bristol to Edinburgh to attend a conference. On Friday morning the news broke that most airlines had cancelled or transferred all flights too and from Bristol airport because the runway had been resurfaced and was too slippery for planes to get a grip.
Downtime 31/12/06
We are, for the most part, frantic creatures. We are so busy doing that we rarely allow time for our spirits to catch up with us.
This is a personal as well as a general observation. Most of the time I feel driven to 'do'. If I am not achieving something I tend to feel guilty. It's as if I have to validate and justify my existence through activity.
Benvenuto alla nostra chiesa Why the church should be more like an Italian restaurant 03/12/2006
"I'll meet you anytime you want, in our Italian restaurant."
Singer songwriter Billy Joel wrote a great and memorable song about an Italian restaurant. "Scenes from an Italian Restaurant" is actually three songs fused together: it's a slice of life song - about friendship, love, marriage and divorce - bracketed within gentle, reflective lyrics about an Italian restaurant frequented, we assume, by Brenda and Eddy the rise and fall of whose relationship is charted in the core of the song.
Calling problems blessings 26/11/06
"There are no such things as problems, only opportunities."
Yeah, right. What a heap of corporate b... well, you get my drift.
It's a platitude usually used to try to justify some poor customer facing functionary having to sort out the horrendous mess created by some inept senior executive. The "customer care associate" takes the flack from the customer for the lack of forethought by the same highly paid corporate geek who is currently hiding in his office on the top floor, drinking real coffee and not answering the phone.
The new religion 12/11/06
Consumerism, they say, is the new religion. If that is true, shopping malls are its cathedrals, and advertising its liturgy.
I was in Manchester last week and, having an hour to spare, went to worship at a state of the art cathedral, The Trafford Centre. If you are not familiar with it, it's like The Mall near Bristol, but about five times the size. It has 280 stores, 30 restaurants, a 20 screen cinema, leisure facilities and a prayer room. Being a true cathedral to consumerism it even has a dome!
Mind your language 29/10/06
So writes Simon Parke, author of Forsaking the Family which is being read by a number of people at St. Andrew's at the moment. It seems to have caught people's attention, and that's not surprising because reading it is like a someone throwing a bucket of icy water over your head. It may leave you shocked, but it sure as heck gets your attention. Simon is about as far from a sentimental expounder of family values as you can get. Behind the veil (continued) 22/10/06
When I began writing this weekly column a short while ago I had no clear idea of how it might be received. So it has been great to learn that some people are not only reading it, but that they enjoy it, or find things of interest within it. So thanks to those of you within St. Andrew's who have encouraged me to continue with this.
My piece about the Muslim veil last week had its roots in my own wish to know more about the background to recent events in the news. I am delighted to learn that I am not alone in this, having today received an e-mail from Vanessa, who lives in Hampshire, and found my article as a result of a web-search.
Behind the veil
Logging in to the BBC Homepage this morning (15/10/06) the top news headline was "Veil teacher 'should be sacked'". The story concerned a Muslim woman, Aishah Azmi, who has been suspended from her role as a classroom assistant at a Church of England junior school in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, following her refusal to remove her veil when teaching her class. She had been asked remove it because of claims that children had difficulty in understanding her in English lessons - a claim that Ms Azmi denies, whilst clarifying that she will remove her veil, but not in front of male colleagues.
Goodbye to buried treasures (for now) 08/10/06
Have you ever noticed how the things that you really enjoy in life can sometimes get displaced by the humdrum? So it is for me with allotment gardening. After a number of happy years cultivating my own vegetables, and quite a lot of agonising over reaching the decision, I have finally informed our allotment secretary that next year I will not be continuing with my plot. Life seems too busy and full of demands at the moment. Maybe, in the future, I can go back to it, but for now it has become a stress rather than a pleasure - just another thing to do.
We too are one 01/10/06
I spent nearly all of Monday in a traffic jam. Well, several traffic jams to be precise. Traffic jams on the M4, traffic jams on the Edgware Road, traffic jams in Regent Street, traffic jams on the M25. Welcome to London – bet you wish you’d left the car at home!
Look at the Child
Just occasionally when preparing the website a theme seems to appear naturally, and this is one of those weeks. The theme seems to have grown out of the Archbishop of Canterbury's interviews on the Good Childhood Enquiry, and you will find a number of excellent pieces about children and childhood on the site this week.
Even Christians deserve a day off
I find that holidays provide the space and time for mulling things over. It's sometimes only when you put some distance between yourself and the quotidian stresses of work, church and home that new perspectives and priorities can emerge. For me, this is rarely an intellectual process of planning and prioritising, more, allowing things that have been submerged to bubble to the surface in their own time. This seems to happen quite naturally when the most important decision to be made is whether to have red or white wine with the next meal!
"Bedtime reading it's not"
The Financial Services Authority (FSA) publishes a handbook. This handbook must be complied with by all banks, building societies, insurance companies, financial advisers, investment houses - almost anyone, in fact, who has anything to do with financial services.
The handbook is available on-line on the FSA website. This is just as well - if you printed it off it would form, I'm told, a pile of paper 12 feet high. The interesting thing about it is that there are relatively few rules in it. For example, this week I have been studying one section (as part of my job - I'm not that sad OK?) which is called Systems and Controls, known to its friends as 'SYSC'. It runs to a positively slim 70 pages but has only about half a dozen rules in it. All the rest is explanation of how these rules should be considered and applied by financial organisations.
The Season of glad songs
The voice of
my beloved!
I first heard this reading from the Song of Solomon at a wedding many years ago. The thought of the bridegroom "leaping upon the mountains, bounding over the hills" brought a smile to many faces in the congregation. Those of us who knew him well had no difficulty imagining him gazing hopefully in at the window - almost certainly the kitchen window in search of a snack!
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Page updated 08/03/2008
