Wednesday 8 October 2014

The turning year.

The seasons are moving....Summer has now finally given way to Autumn...extra jumpers are needed and it can only be a couple of weeks before I shall have to start wearing tights again!

Most of our visitors have gone now but laying up is usually timed for half term...at the end of this month..

Laying up is the term used for taking boats out of the water and mothballing them for the winter....

A traditional laying up supper where everyone eats and drinks and plans for the beginning of the next season used to be obligatory at the end of October but this year has a different feel to it...

Widespread anxiety is apparent about all sorts of things...the current state of the world is not giving any of us much complacency about the future....so the dinner party season has begun...

Last year David and I did not take part in this tribal custom...the only time we went out was to the hospital.

This year very kind people are "rescuing" me from my own company....which is lovely so I have accepted invitations and last night was the first of several looming.

Obviously the main topic of conversation was IS and the disturbing images and threat of Sharia law in this country.

The women were much more pragmatic than the men...we all agreed that we were glad to be old...that our future was secure.....death was better than what might be about to happen!

As a topic of dinner party discussion it was not typical...but the women were all in agreement....we are glad to be old, to have lived our lives without any of the current threats...

When you then realise that we had all been children during the Second World War you realise just how appalling the present situation is...

We are the tough generation, the survivors of orange juice and cod liver oil...we grew up without our fathers, some of whom died in the fight for freedom...

Now with all the glorious advances in science and technology here were a group of people all glad they are not going to be around for what ever happens next.

I fear for those younger than us...and I pray....that all today's anxieties will be replaced by some good news....soon. The year is turning...let's hope for the better...it's going to be a long hard winter...

1 comment:

UKViewer said...

To be honest, I'm a baby boomer, so perhaps don't have the experience of the WW2 generation. But I feel much the same as your generation about the state of the world today and the various threats posed to us from Is and Ebola and the general breakdown in world order.

We in the UK have been through out own trauma's, some of which are ongoing. Republican violence, while much reduced, remains an issue in Northern Ireland and the more recent stirring of Scottish nationalism also gives us food for thought. There is war and all sorts of destructive disorder and breakdown of countries and communities across the world. If I were to read anything into it, I might fear the end of us all. But when we look at our human history, it's full of such stories even on grander scales of conquests and empires rising and falling, while the people struggled to live to the best of their ability.

So, my thoughts and worries are best described as in the back ground, concern for my spouse, family and friends, but outwith my control and in God's hands, not mine.