Why can't more meetings be held

in the park?
I had to talk with a young mother yesterday. She has a problem with her eldest school going child and she wanted to talk to me. She does not work because she needs to be available at short notice to get this particular child from school.
"I need to get out of the house, even if it just for a short time," she told me, "Can we meet for coffee?"
I thought of the lively two year old and said, "What if we take Tom to the park instead?"
"Oh, he'd love that!"
So, we head for the park. There are swings, a climbing frame and a rocker shaped like a duck.
Released from the stroller Tom heads straight for the rocker, climbs in, rocks for a bit, climbs out, pushes a swing, climbs the frame, runs around and around the big tree. We watch and call out approval. He comes backwards and forwards.
His mother talks and talks. I make some suggestions. I try to keep them very simple and make them things that the family can follow through without major changes to routine or singling out of one child.
All the time Tom is busy. He has found out the blocks on one side of the climbing frame can be rolled over to make "X" and "O" for noughts and crosses. He is too young to play the game but he recognises that they change. He 'hides' from us and comes back laughing.
"You know, I never brought Chris to the park. He would have loved it too. Somehow I never made the time. I've only been here a couple of times with Tom. We used to come all the time when I was a kid. Kids don't seem to use it much now. I suppose it's all the mothers working thing."
It's not too late. We add visits to the park as something they can do. I just hope it is fine enough on Saturday for Chris's father to push his son on the swings.

What has she achieved - anything?

Jessica Watson is sixteen. She will be seventeen about a week from now. If she is lucky she will spend her birthday with her family.
As I write this Jessica is sailing up the eastern coast of Australia. It is some of the roughest water in the world. She is not just tired, she is exhausted - both physically and mentally. She has spent the last eight months at sea - on her own.
Jessica has sailed around the world in a little, very little, pink boat. Or has she? Jessica has crossed the equator and the Pacific and gone around Tierra del Fuego and across the Atlantic and around the Cape of Good Hope and across the Indian Ocean. She has managed to right her little boat at least six times. She has replaced the mast.
Jessica has battled gale force winds and thirty foot waves. She is battered and bruised and she still has a week or so to go.
I think her parents were totally crazy to let her do it - but they did. I think Jessica is mad to even want to do it - but she did. I think she is going to find it tremendously hard to settle down again and accept the external discipline of the rest of the world. Let's face it, after all this time at sea, even crossing the street is going to be something she has to get used to again.
Despite all that I admire Jessica. I admire her courage and her tenacity and her will power, her maturity and strength of character. There are very few teenagers, indeed very few adults, who could set out on a much less dangerous and demanding solo adventure and make it to the end.
If Jessica makes it into Sydney harbour about a week for now I am not going to try and say she did not achieve anything because she has achieved a lot.
But now, as she comes into the last few days of her voyage, there are a raft of critical comments being heard in the media. There are claims she has not actually technically sailed around the world (because she did not go 1,500 nautical miles above equator) even though she has sailed 23,000 nautical miles. Some fancy sailing organisation says she cannot claim the record because of this and because she is - wait for it - too young. She apparently has to be 18 to claim the record - so Jesse Martin gets to keep the record.
All these comments are coming to light now - at the end of her voyage. They were not given media coverage at the beginning. Why now? Why do it anyway?
It seems we love to knock achievers but this is more than knocking one achiever. This time it is knocking an entire generation of young people. This is saying, "It does not matter if you do go out and pursue your dreams. It does not matter if you succeed. We are not going to acknowledge that. We are only interested if you do not achieve and we can speak about you in the negative."
Does it matter or doesn't it?
I think it might matter a great deal more than we are willing to admit.

You are what you feel or

what you eat?
There is a piece in this morning's paper which suggests that people are defining themselves by illnesses, syndromes, intolerances and other medical conditions. They say something like, "Hi I am Don (or Donna) and I am lactose intolerant (or I have high cholesterol)" instead of "Hi. My name is Don (or Donna) and I am Aquarian or Capricornian" or perhaps, "I come from Mars (or Venus).
It is fashionable to have a medical condition - whether you have one or not - for which you must (a) take medication and (b) avoid certain foods and (c) generally make yourself miserable while doing so.
Now, I am not suggesting that there are not people out there with problems. I know there are people who have genuine, life threatening allergies. I know there are people who need medication to stay alive. There also seem to be a lot of other people who say they are intolerant to this or that or that they no longer eat this or that because....and then comes the vague and wandering explanation which sometimes has the words "the doctor says I am" or "the doctor thinks I might be..."
Right. Maybe.
Then we get the free advice in the press. Last week our state newspaper was advocating that people should eat more papaya, blueberries and sweet potato because the food value of these things was slightly higher than some of the commonly available and cheaper foods we have always thought were actually good for us. Papaya and fresh blueberries also happen to be very expensive. Sweet potato, in season, is a more reasonable price but many people have no idea what to do with it. Quite simply most people will ignore this advice because they cannot afford to buy those things. If they do buy them it will be because they particularly like them or they will be curious enough to try them. Most people will never buy them on a regular basis.
Was it good advice? I doubt it. It is more likely that if someone said, "Mandarins are currently in season. They make a good buy right now" then people would actually go out and buy mandarins.
Now someone will probably tell me that mandarins are not good for you!
According to the dieticians though we should be eating soy, we should not be eating soy, we should be eating dairy products, we should not be eating dairy products, we should be eating eggs, we should not be eating egg yolks, we should not be eating eggs. Some say we should not be eating carbohydrates, others say we should only eat wholemeal or multigrain, some say we should have one slice of bread and others two, four or six. Then there is sugar - pure, white and deadly. Icecream - sugar, fat and all of that. Chocolate - well perhaps, maybe, sometimes you can have a little, less than a tiny square of the darkest variety and only if you do not have an allergy to it. Alcohol - no but then maybe a single glass of red - except that any at all could lead to a variety of nasty side effects. (Okay, so alcohol does make me feel itchy all over. I avoid it but other people can enjoy it sensibly.)
What is there left to eat? I know someone who has tried to take on board all these possible bits of advice. She is very, very thin. I do not know what she eats for breakfast (if she has breakfast) but her lunch is always a single pot of 'biodynamic organic plain yoghurt' from only one source. Her evening meal appears to be those vegetables she is 'allowed' to have - always 'organically' sourced. She eats precisely six almonds each day - 'because that is what they say I can have'. There is actually nothing wrong with her. Her daughter tells me that her mother doctor shops and that nobody can actually find anything wrong. She has no allergies or syndromes or conditions that need to be treated. Nevertheless she is on a 'strict' diet and she is making herself miserable. She has convinced herself that she has serious problems.
Hers is an extreme case but I rather suspect that, despite the wide variety of wonderful food available to us, many of us have similar problems. We no longer eat certain things in the belief that they are 'bad' for us. We do not enjoy food. We feel guilty when we break out and eat icecream or a bun. Unless it actually makes us ill because we have a genuine, life threatening allergy, we might do better if we felt less guilty about it. We would probably eat less of it. It is because we are told it is 'forbidden' that it becomes particularly desirable.
I am wondering if there is something that might be called a "Syndrome of Excess"?

I picked a new book off the library shelf

yesterday. It had one of those nice little orange dots on the spine, the colour that denotes 'murder, mystery and mayhem'. I like a little light reading before going to sleep at night and that sort of thing can be good.
This was not. I glanced at the first page. It was written in the first person present tense - always awkward unless handled by the best of writers - and there were no less than eight profanities on the first two pages. The story line was also negative in the wrong sort of way. It felt - dirty. I put it back wondering why the library had bothered to spend the all too limited funds for new books on that particular book.
I rather suspect that the problem is what is known as "central buying"...the system whereby the books for the state's municipal libraries are chosen by a central committee rather than individual libraries. This means that they buy multiple copies of fiction at reduced prices and then distribute them. Non-fiction is handled slightly differently but a smilar problem applies.
Yes, it is a problem. What we read depends on the committee and their views and interests not on what the general public might want to read.
Of course they say that what the public wants to read is taken into account and I do not doubt that it is but the committee has the final say. Even if individual libraries bought their own books there would still be a need to choose.
Naturally we do get books at the library by a wide range of authors and we can be fairly certain that the latest books by authors like Alexander McCall Smith will eventually appear on the shelves. People do read those.
What we also get are books - often in multiple copies - that some critic has decided is worthy. There were multiple copies of a book by an award winning Australian author. They sat on the shelves and were eventually dumped in the annual book sale. They sat there too until someone bought them for an overseas mission school where the kids were studying the novel for English literature. There are twelve listings for Patrick White. Both the audio-copies of Voss are out at present. I happen to know that this is because they are 'required' study for the students in question. The other ten items have been sitting there for years but the library is required to keep them because he is the Australian who won the Nobel Prize. Is it a waste of shelf space? I do not know although I know I am not going to try and read any more. It bores me.
There are other supposedly good writers who bore me as well. I find much of their "remarkably insightful" work nothing more than self-indulgent navel gazing.
I do not have a lot of time to read for pleasure and I want it to be for pleasure. I do not want drivel. I do not wish to preached at. I do not want a soul searching 'artistic' non-story. I do not want needless profanity.
Is it too much to want both good writing and a good story?

Want to take a risk?.

That got you over here didn't it? I have been thinking about this because my friend Nicola Morgan has a new novel out called, Wasted". Here she is talking about part of it:
http://talkaboutwasted.blogspot.com/2010/05/risk-and-your-life.html and it got me thinking.

There is a floor covering in the entrance to our State Library which has words on it written in binary code rather than letters.
I suspect most people walk over it without even noticing. Those who do notice the floor covering probably do not realise that it has any significance. Those who do realise what it is probably cannot 'translate' it into letters. There may be a tiny, tiny minority of computer geeks who could actually 'read' it.
I am told it says, "State Library" but it could just as easily say, "Do not walk here" or "Danger, bomb underneath" or "Beware, sleeping dragon".
Despite not knowing what it says, indeed knowing it says anything at all, people walk on it. It could be said they take a risk. How big a risk? If there are other people around and they observe them walking apparently safely across the floor covering then the risk would not seem to be a large one. If there is nobody else around then experience says something like, "This is a public place. The floor covering is not cordoned off. I can move across it." The risk still does not seem at all great - if indeed it is seen as a risk at all.
Crossing the road outside the library presents a much greater risk. There are traffic lights. Experience tells us that, if these are working correctly and people obey them, then it should be possible for most people to cross the road without harm - note I say 'most people'. There is still the possibility that you could trip over a shoe lace or the dog's leash, wobble on your stiletto heels or be knocked over by another pedestrian or a skateboarder - or, like me, not get to the other side before the lights change. (It is a risk I do not take.)
Despite the risk it is likely that the vast majority of people cross the road without consciously thinking about the risk involved. They will also catch the bus or drive their car without any thought there might be an accident. They will turn on the light switch with no thought they might be electrocuted and light a match under the gas with no thought they might go up in flames. The list goes on.
Looked at like this we all take risks and we all take risks all of the time - but some risks are greater than others and some risks are greater for some people than others. There are also what we might call "calculated" risks or risks based on knowledge and experience - like crossing the library floor - and risks, like climbing Everest, taken on for the sheer thrill of the obvious danger involved and the sense of achievement which follows. I have no desire to climb Everest, sky dive, bungy jump, white-water raft or any number of other things...I am a physical coward.
It seems to me though that, for all this risk taking, there has to be some degree of certainty - a "more likely than not " that allows us to take risks without being too concerned with the possible consequences.
The interesting question surely has to be "what is more likely than not?"

"I know, it might be

useful - one day," my father tells me. He is holding an ancient work shirt with a frayed collar and a second tear in the back. The first tear was mended by my mother so the shirt has to be more than ten years old. It is probably more than twice that.
My father keeps his clothes. (He still has the Harris tweed jacket his father made for him before he married.)
He keeps everything else too. I tend to keep things as well. We are hoarders. My clothes may not be quite as old as his but some of them have lasted well. Clothes are not the problem though. I can throw those out when they reach the unwearable stage - although what I consider unwearable around home others might consider should have been consigned to the dust bin long before then.
Our problem is books - and timber. We collected both yesterday. We went to the local library sale of unwanted, pre-loved, otherwise designed for the scrap heap books and rescued several books that pleaded with me. There was a gardening book Dad was looking for and that is out of print, a theology book (new but obviously unwanted by owner) that he wants to read and a book about
drawing Japanese style cartoons (for one of my nephews). I also had to have a book about Chinese (a language I know almost nothing about) and a book of quotations (because I collect those). I did not rescue any fiction. I try not to do that unless it fills a gap in my collection of children's books. That seemed like a fair contribution to the library coffers - and they have a long list of books from me and others that they might like to consider buying so the money will be useful.
On the way back there we collected an unwanted chair. The owner was just about to throw it in a skip. My father recognised it for what it is and asked if he could have it instead. The owner looked slightly surprised. "It is cedar," my father explained.
This obviously meant nothing to the owner. He shrugged and said, "You can have it." My father managed to balance it on his gopher and, slowly, bring it home. It is now in pieces in the shed and, I am assured, "very good timber indeed". I know cedar is precious but this is apparently particularly good.
What is he going to do with it? I have no idea. That does not matter. It has been rescued and it might be useful - one day.

I do not really know anything about hummingbirds

but my friend Roger sent some photographs yesterday of the tiny birds hovering and sitting on the hand of a woman. If I was a little more technically savvy I could reproduce them here but you will just have to take my word for it - they were lovely.

I do know that these birds do not weigh more than a few grams and that they can fly long distances. They are colourful - although I assume that the males claim ownership of the red chest feathers - and an extraordinary mix of both strong and fragile.

I saw the photographs after listening to a news item about the global importance of the discovery of a deep, strong, cold current in Antarctic waters and reading an article about Stephen Hawking's belief that there may be aliens. No, Hawking is not saying "aliens exist". He is saying that "the universe is so complex and so vast that we cannot say they do not exist." That is altogether something different.

Someone else I know has just seen "Avatar". If you want to know what she thought of it go and read the posting "Faith" on Catherine Hughes "Daily Improvements" blog in the right hand column. Another person I know does not share that view and you can read her comments below what Cat has to say.

I am more with Cat though. I am ceaselessly amazed by the complexity of our world and our universe and, above all, the inter-dependence of everything for existence. It seems to me that there is too much order in the chaos for it to be there simply by luck or by chance. I do not know how it comes to be that way. I do not want to know "all about everything". I do want to go on wondering at the never-ending 3D jigsaw puzzle.