I have always relished an impromptu rally. I mean, who doesn’t! Unrehearsed and unscripted, the dalliance captures the wayfarer in us all. Though it seldom happens, today’s serendipity clashed with an earlier blueprint. It was a unique occasion on which we were reluctantly obliged to decline the snap invitation. When my erstwhile physician telephoned this morning to initiate the proposal for brunch at his country seat we were at that instant leaving the golf club having only recently breakfasted. My breakfast order – to be perfectly frank – shamefully shows on the caterer’s cash register as the “Chapman” breakfast consisting of three eggs, sliced tomatoes, American cheese, double-bacon, sausages and black coffee. Exhaustion of appetite is but one of several assured predictions of that particular formula! Nonetheless our host was not defeated. In a flash he regrouped and instead invited us for a late morning swim and lounge by the pool.  The weather today while not as stifling as it has been in the past several days was however exceedingly pleasant with a hint of autumn in the fresh north wind.

Continue reading →

It would constitute flagrant disregard to fail to mention what a magnificent day it was today. Even better it was one of those days when seemingly nothing can go wrong. Every particle of my activity today from the moment I awoke has been coddled by a fresh north wind, blazing yellow sunshine and a beautiful azure sky with fluffy white clouds. What was also remarkable was that I got out of bed before eight o’clock.  My  sleep routine is not what I’d call a success. Probably because I haven’t a routine. Almost each day in the late afternoon I have one – and often two – cups of strong espresso coffee. Both the diuretic and caffeine components of the roasted beans perform their expected function. Initially I dismiss the collateral damage of this cavalier behaviour on the theory that there are no limitations – the fallacious point of view that habits and procedure no longer count. When however I get the régime right as apparently I did last night, it works very famously – especially on a glorious day such as this!

Continue reading →

If you’re at all like me you wouldn’t normally think there is anything peculiar about what you think or say.  I mean, we seldom if ever think of ourselves as whacky or deranged. Now don’t get excited, I’m not warming to an incendiary revelation concerning my private rumination (not of course that there’d be any ingredient of popular interest). But what I’m getting at is this: lately I’ve remarked that I get these sudden images of places we’ve been, always pleasant images many of which are “in colour” so they’re full fledged artistic impressions.

Continue reading →

If any one of us knew with certainty that we we were related to some of the Kings and Lords of England in the 17th century we’d be ashamed to admit it. The British long ago surpassed any horror of capital punishment which is now current among educated people throughout the globe. Public executions were common; sometimes the gibbet was mounted on the street before the victim’s home. The further disgrace is the utter inadequacy of the legal system both then and now to impose liability for even disgraceful conduct. The passion for vengeful death is all too familiar to this day. Time and again it has proven to be an ill-founded objective and one guaranteed to rebound. Why I wonder are humans the only ones among the animal kingdom to behave so poorly – especially when it is evident time and again that no one of us is spared either the obloquy or the indignity.

Continue reading →

It is a soggy cheerless Sunday. I have just arisen languidly from an uncommonly deep nap on the green leather sofa. Already it is late in the afternoon approaching the dinner hour. The yellow hue of the declining sun gleams through the blotched grey clouds like an advancing Chariot of Fire. The light is otherwise mercurial and lacks the vibrancy of blue and gold. In keeping with my undying religious necessity I expiated my guilt earlier this morning in the gymnasium on a stationary bicycle or what qualifies as an “indoor cycle” on my Apple Watch. It is an experiment which I doubt will succeed my passion for outdoor cycling.

Continue reading →

There is a wide gap between those who love and those who hate ceremony. Ceremony is the more detectable blueprint of social custom and etiquette and thus affords a common basis of disunion. By virtue of its imperative prescriptions the topic engenders the most fundamental rejoinders. It doesn’t matter whether the ceremony is religious, military, pedagogical or otherwise. The underlying theme of ceremony is control.  It is not however that feature that causes the riff. Rather it is an objection heralded by “Get over it!” that captures what essentially is a recommendation to cut to the chase or perhaps more astutely, “Get to the point!”

Continue reading →

It was an odd subject to arise when one was, such as I was, languishing in a swimming pool in a meadow beneath a blazing sun from an azure sky amid overwhelming radiant heat above 32°C. The subject? Civility – that recognizably sublime word for formal politeness and courtesy.  Parenthetically I emphasize “formal” because I recall the quip that, “Manners are only required when the going gets rough!” or words to that effect.

Continue reading →

This morning when withdrawing my bicycle from the garage storage cage we saw with instant dismay that the front tyre was flat. Again. This is the third time this summer – reportedly all the result of some obstruction on the road. This minor dilemma – or should I say this singularly annoying disruption – caused an eruption of ideas. Instinctively I got into the car and drove. I hadn’t either my driver’s licence or a credit card so the journey was devoted solely to the percolating concepts regarding this latest challenge and its internal rivalry. The flat tyre precipitated a review of the growing competition between bicycling and other possible exercise.

Continue reading →

Today is Tuesday the 24th day of August, 2021. Lately I find it desirable to be explicit touching that casual though basic information. Otherwise I risk careless misstatement. Just as importantly it reminds me of the speedy exhaustion of time. Not only the day and the month are relevant; the year as well! While today is an ordinary balmy summer day under an azure sky in Mississippi Mills, the word “mardi” has in this part of the world acquired a celebrity assured to erase the root meaning of the word.

Continue reading →

Dissolution and distillation – melting and filtering – the natural processes of aging and maturing. The unfolding like anything directed to decomposition and purification is as though by hidden imperative limited and refined in its ultimate expression. Basically, we discover unwittingly the truth of the sometimes disturbing adage that, “Less is more!” All that we’ve been given or allotted by any measure, privilege, entitlement or projection is systematically reduced to a whisper of its former colloquial. The liquefaction and condensation are not however mere cessation and extraction. There is inherent in the proceedings an uncanny impeccability; a voyage to a universe once unimaginable to us. After all, how could we have envisioned it?

Continue reading →