Last night I had a most perplexing dream.  It was intriguing because of its uncommon verisimilitude. Indeed so entrancing was the sensation that I was grateful upon realizing its dream state and slowly recovering from the experience.  As with so many of these hallucinations I can recall only sketchy detail.  The tale is notable for its colour; namely, dark green, shadows. There were cobblestone walkways and narrow alleys.  And drizzling rain. The  object of the fantasy has naturally either evaporated into the night or was never a recognizable feature. The dream was governed more by foreboding than calculated purpose. What lingered was the indisputable contest with people whom I seemed to know. There were strong reactions on both sides; and when the argument was over, others joined me in recounting the contest and uniting in agreement. It did however leave a sense of division and isolation, partly welcome by the default of having removed oneself from perpetual angst; partly worrisome by the paradoxical punishment of withdrawal.

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“But then, even in the most insignificant details of our daily life, none of us can be said to constitute a material whole, which is identical for everyone, and need only be turned up like a page in an account-book or the record of a will; our social personality is created by the thoughts of other people. Even the simple act which we describe as “seeing some one we know” is, to some extent, an intellectual process. We pack the physical outline of the creature we see with all the ideas we have already formed about him, and in the complete picture of him which we compose in our minds those ideas have certainly the principal place. In the end they come to fill out so completely the curve of his cheeks, to follow so exactly the line of his nose, they blend so harmoniously in the sound of his voice that these seem to be no more than a transparent envelope, so that each time we see the face or hear the voice it is our own ideas of him which we recognise and to which we listen. ”

Excerpt From: Marcel Proust. “Swann’s Way.”

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With the precipitous advance of winter and the consequent evaporation of our cycling outings we’ve chosen to go for short walks. It is by any standard a moderate exercise but nonetheless a refreshing one particularly on a day such as today; viz., pellucid sky and indescribably fresh air. After but a moments inhalation of the frosty atmosphere and the rejuvenating extension of my limbs and crippled ribs the erstwhile dormancy fizzled. Today’s adventure took us closer to home than the last one on the Ottawa River near Crystal Bay.  Instead we conveniently visited another bay this time the one in Metcalfe GeoHeritage Park at the bottom of Bay Hill where stands the Brian J. Gallagher Generating Station on the Mississippi River here in town.

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You know, for instance, how tiresome Robert is about his food. Well, last night the mutton, I am bound to say, was a little underdone, and Robert was beginning to throw it about his plate in the way he has. Well, my Guru got up and just said, ‘Show me the way to kitchen’—he leaves out little words sometimes, because they don’t matter—and I took him down, and he said ‘Peace!’ He told me to leave him there, and in ten minutes he was up again with a little plate of curry and rice and what had been underdone mutton, and you never ate anything so good. Robert had most of it and I had the rest, and my Guru was so pleased at seeing Robert pleased. He said Robert had a pure white soul, just like you, only I wasn’t to tell him, because for him the Way ordained that he must find it out for himself. And today before lunch again, the Guru went down in the kitchen, and my cook told me he only took a pinch of pepper and a tomato and a little bit of mutton fat and a sardine and a bit of cheese, and he brought up a dish that you never saw equalled. Delicious! I shouldn’t a bit wonder if Robert began breathing-exercises soon. There is one that makes you lean and young and exercises the liver.”

Queen Lucia, E. F. Benson

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The term “cucking-stool” is older, with written records dating back to the 13th and 14th centuries. Written records for the name “ducking stool” appear from 1597, and a statement in 1769 relates that “ducking-stool” is a corruption of the term “cucking-stool”. Whereas a cucking-stool could be and was used for humiliation with or without ducking the person in water, the name “ducking-stool” came to be used more specifically for those cucking-stools on an oscillating plank which were used to duck the person into water.

The term cucking-stool is known to have been in use from about 1215. It means literally “defecation chair”, as its name is derived from the old verb cukken and has not quite been rid of in many parts of the English speaking world as “to cack” (defecate) (akin to Dutch kakken and Latin cacāre [same meaning]; cf. Greek κακός/κακή [“bad/evil, vile, ugly, worthless”]), rather than, as popularly believed, from the word cuckold.

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At 72 years of age I feel I’m entitled to extol the athletic accomplishment of a half-hour walk in the park. There must come a time when it’s acceptable – maybe even preferable – to give up the pretence of youth and immortality. Today we punctuated the end of what has been an historic Christmas 2020 with a short but invigorating stroll along the Ottawa River.

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Since Christmas Day I suspect millions – both children and adults – have been toying with their new electronic devices. Defining myself as pragmatic is not a mark I would instinctively attribute to my personality.  A  closer and less airy characterization might be simplistic or blunt or narrow. I mention this because it is easy to become flummoxed by the legion of options on any one of the apparatus. It is as much a part of the set-up process to be guided by the principle I heard enunciated years ago in a comic death scene in an old black-and-white film, “You say to me, darling, What is the answer? and I say to you, What is the question?”

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Shamefully this morning at 2:00 am – while listening to an unfamiliar and dynamic rendition of Handel’s Messiah conducted by Barnaby Smith – I twigged I had hitherto overlooked nearby Village of Clayton in my recent reflections upon the secrets and mysteries of Mississippi Mills of which the Village of Clayton is an important historical slice. Oddly enough on this Boxing Day 2020 it was two recent arrivals (who now live in the same building as we) from the Village of Clayton to the Town of Almonte (part of the conglomerate Mississippi Mills which includes broadly speaking the Townships of Ramsay and Pakenham – each about ten square miles – of which we all form a part) who awoke me to the oversight by sending me the link to the exceedingly fine chorus.

“Barnaby Smith is Artistic Director of the internationally renowned vocal ensemble VOCES8, Live From London digital festivals, and the UK and US arms of The VOCES8 Foundation. He is in demand as a conductor, choir trainer, countertenor and arranger. Barnaby completed his studies in Specialist Early Music Performance at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis where he was a pupil of Andreas Scholl. Barnaby is also an alumnus of the Britten-Pears Young Artists Programme.“

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It is a superlative privilege this morning to awaken sans regret, sans hang-over, sans malady, sans disquiet, sans preoccupation. The only consequence of Christmas Eve (apart from having drunk too much coffee too late in the day) is a modest protuberance after last night’s plentiful and very acceptable meal. Already the shiny Christmas cards accumulated upon the mahogany desk have begun to lapse like wilting flowers, their erstwhile nutrition all but drained. Soon we shall tuck away the fluffy Teddybear into a drawer, behind an envelope carton or other more compelling provision no doubt for riotous discovery in June or July next. The evaporation and purge will linger until tomorrow, Boxing Day, while for some inexplicable reason we observe the decency of a funeral cortege.

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Forgive me if you will the cultural presumption that Christmas is on your agenda. I am further guessing that those for whom the religious experience of Christmas has all but vanished nonetheless continue to participate in the ritual of Christmas to some extent.  The event has so insinuated society that it is no longer a precondition of its celebration to be either Christian or among the faithful.  Christmas is for many people now submerged in the larger scheme of the “Season” or a “Winter Festival” and as such is merely a holiday whatever your practice.  You can be assured that most of the country is shut down on Christmas morning.  You can also count on a pervasive sentiment of good will and merriment frequently punctuated by gifts.  What however isn’t quite so standard is what people will be doing on Christmas morning. It is no longer safe to assume that people will be in the family home much less gathered around the decorative tree.  There are people who insist upon dismissing Christmas entirely and who make a point of insulating their children from what they consider the overwhelming vulgarity of Christmas.  But even they must be doing something on Christmas morning.

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