We’ve all heard it said, “If you’ve got it, you don’t talk about it”.  It is a comment usually applied to people with money.  And from what I can tell, it’s true.  Upsettlingly true I find. Modesty was never my strong point and I admit to begrudge it in others.  Especially when it comes to money.  Artistic talent is something I can tolerate, but people who have money outdistance every other virtue as far as I’m concerned.  Which isn’t to suggest I couldn’t care a fig for the real virtues of living, I do of course.  It’s just that on the social scene money is the trump card.  It’s such a patently measurable quality, so readily discernible, so capable of quick assessment.  It is for example all you need to know about someone whom you’ve just met.  The other more complicated details about the person’s character and philosophies of life can follow in due course and will be the result of a fluid and natural evolution.  Besides it’s hard to imagine someone going on about being a philanthropist or any other long-suffering altruist.  It rather defeats the point.

There are as many levels of financial comfort as there are people who enjoy it.  For those who have vast amounts of the stuff, I hardly need bother myself.  They are of no more than statistical interest. The vicarious pleasures of the wealthy are easily achieved through books and the movies.  If however one wants to keep their feet on the ground, a dose of common sense is required. What I prefer are those with a small private income.  It is a level of distinction which while clearly self-sustaining never robs the person of his humanity.  I’m afraid I can’t say the same about the very rich.  Likely based on purely anecdotal stories I have decided that people who are excessively rich are the most precarious and least to be envied.  All that business about people jumping out of windows on Wall Street in the 1930s for example.

Though we know we shouldn’t do it, we attribute a great deal more pleasantness to wealth than we should.  Primarily the objection isn’t that money isn’t a nice thing, rather it’s that we incorrectly imagine how different we’d be if we had it ourselves.  That’s the myth of lotteries of course, all that hype about what an exciting person you’d become with millions of dollars. What little I know about people who have won lotteries (from many thousands to several million dollars) I can only conclude that little changes.  The sobering truth is that we’re the same person the next morning and for that reason alone the modification is disappointing even disheartening.  Nothing propels us faster to an examination of our inner reality than the admission that the material world is merely an extension of the decay that is the fate of every one of us. I’m sorry but I’m not terribly moved by the prospect of a private jet or an island in the sun.

But a small private income is hardly objectionable.  It has besides such a gracious ring to it.  It’s like an old Harris tweed jacket, a statement without being a pronouncement.  It further has the advantage of being on the right side of outright Bolshevism.  It wouldn’t likely attract much attention in the Revolution.

I enjoy writing. It’s unfortunate my productions are resounding nothings. Writing isn’t a labour for me.  It’s instinctive. Like my piano playing. Though that isn’t saying much either.  It’s an appetite whose measure is its own satisfaction whatever the insipid result.

It’s all very well to say there are limitless choices about what to write. That never makes the task a breeze.  Sticking to hard facts is no easier a path than creating a fantasy.  I do however steer clear of vulgar details. At least those calculated to attract prurient interest.  I’ll leave that to others.  I’m still not comfortable sacrificing any possible literary skill to the accommodation of mere amusement.

The edict to write about what you know is far more effort than implied.  I guess it’s because what we know and what we say we know are not always the same thing.  And we seldom express it in the same way we think it.  Opening the doors to the private rooms of our mind requires the same trust and enthusiasm as entertaining others in one’s own home.  I admit I’ve always been bedevilled by the need to put on a good show when entertaining others. But of course the preoccupation can render an otherwise pleasant communion stilted.

So you’re back to being yourself.  I accept that the prescription is valid even though swallowing it isn’t a snap.  Somehow I understand that as dull as any one of us thinks he or she is, we’re really quite singular. Our stories are far more unique and intriguing than we may give them credit.  It’s a challenge to resist the temptation to make the account more than an historical record. But that immediately defeats the purpose.  Designing what one says is destined to be dull.

Reading improving books is motivating. But listening to a great concert pianist will not impart the same talent. One has to accept the inherent limitations upon talent.  Some writers have brilliant minds and a vast personal experience.  To say we’re not that person is not helpful.  In nature there are some flowers which are more glorious than others but each of them shines in their own way.  And not one of them will transform themselves into anything different.  I guess it’s just disappointing to be a roadside weed instead of an orchid if you see what I mean.

Original Version 1
Jack and Jill went up the hill
To fetch a pail of water.
Jack fell down and broke his crown,
And Jill came tumbling after.

Thesaurus Version 2
John and his sweetheart betook themselves onto a naturally raised area of land
To bring back a bucket of one of the four elements in medieval philosophy.
John toppled and fractured the top part of his head
And the young woman came headlong afterwards.

Thesaurus Version 3
The former king of England and his lover went to an elevated position of the earth’s surface not covered by water
To find the essence of life.
His Lordship was overthrown and split the government in the process
And his mistress was beheaded.

Thesaurus Version 4
The Crown and his junkie went where there was no life
In search of it.
The Supreme Power was unseated and divided the upper administration.
She who was particularly skilled was separated from her intentions.

Thesaurus Version 5
The government and its bureaucracy sought in desolation
For strength.
God was disturbed and apportioned control
With experienced calculation.

“While the true origins of the rhyme are unknown there are several theories. As is common with nursery rhyme exegesis, complicated metaphors are often said to exist within the lyrics of Jack and Jill. Most explanations post-date the first publication of the rhyme and have no corroborating evidence. These include the suggestion by S. Baring-Gould in the 19th century that the events were a version of the story told in the 13th-century Prose Edda Gylfaginning written by Icelandic historian Snorri Sturluson, who stated that in Norse mythology, Hjúki and Bil, brother and sister (respectively), were taken up from the earth by the moon (personified as the god Máni) as they were fetching water from the well called Byrgir, bearing on their shoulders the cask called Saegr and the pole called Simul.  Around 1835 John Bellenden Ker suggested that Jack and Jill were two priests, and this was enlarged by Katherine Elwes in 1930 to indicate that Jack represented Cardinal Wolsey (c.1471–1530); and Jill was Bishop Tarbes, who negotiated the marriage of Mary Tudor to the French king in 1514.

It has also been suggested that the rhyme records the attempt by King Charles I to reform the taxes on liquid measures. He was blocked by Parliament, so subsequently ordered that the volume of a Jack (1/2 pint) be reduced, but the tax remained the same. This meant that he still received more tax, despite Parliament’s veto. Hence “Jack fell down and broke his crown” (many pint glasses in the UK still have a line marking the 1/2 pint level with a crown above it) “and Jill came tumbling after”. The reference to “Jill”, (actually a “gill”, or 1/4 pint) is said to reflect that the gill dropped in volume as a consequence.

The suggestion has also been made that Jack and Jill represent Louis XVI of France, who was deposed and beheaded in 1793 (lost his crown), and his Queen, Marie Antoinette (who came tumbling after), a theory made difficult by the fact that the earliest printing of the rhyme pre-dates those events. There is also a local belief that the rhyme records events in the village of Kilmersdon in Somerset in 1697. When a local spinster became pregnant, the putative father is said to have died from a rock fall and the woman died in childbirth soon after.”

The days for wearing short pants are numbered.  I felt the first cool breath of autumn this morning.  We threw open the windows of the apartment and turned off the air conditioner which had been humming ceaselessly for weeks. The real air in the apartment smelled good, the floors were naturally cool. The sky was no longer sultry.  I caught a glance of the red Hudson’s Bay blanket on the top shelf of the closet as I removed a fleece to wear.

Capitalizing upon the morning sunshine we went to the Golf Club for breakfast. There is a rush of the patrons to golf as much as possible. The catering staff is already planning its seasonal demise, the frost of change upon their minds.  The cook wonders whether she can do this another year, work seven days a week to choreograph luncheons and dinners; the servers need a job for the winter (but will ensure their reapplication is on record just in case, hopefully it won’t be needed but the cooks knows the strategy so she’s in limbo). There’s always change.

We passively chew upon our breakfast, glancing at the burgeoning River after yesterday’s downpour, contemplating only whether to bring the emergency radio to South Carolina when we leave in November.  We’ll bring the shorts. We know winter’s coming but we don’t care at least not for the usual reasons but we keep it to ourselves.  Younger people have important things on their mind and they don’t include old people with no hair or grey hair and protuberant bellies going south for three months.

This afternoon on my routine and lonely bike ride along the rural fields I hear the cicadas buzzing furiously in the late summer heat.  Do they mate at this time of year? The sun isn’t so high anymore at this hour of the day. The children are back to school.  The roads are quiet.  The open deck at Cedar Cove would have been pleasant today and likely not crowded.  We will have time yet to relish it, the changing leaves on the other side of White Lake, maybe even a fire in the dining room.

O, it offends me to the soul to hear a robustious
periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to
very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings, who
for the most part are capable of nothing but
inexplicable dumbshows and noise.
(Hamlet, 3.2)

Lately I spoke on the street with someone who had recently retired. She told me that as a consequence of her retirement – or at least in step with it – she had developed an interest in politics, something she said was for her a new endeavour. I concluded that the leisure of retirement had afforded her the privilege of dwelling upon what for my entire life has been the inescapable though frequently negligible babbling of political pundits who chatter with about as much interest as the drone of a television advertisement. It may however be that the cultivation of a curiosity in politics is less the product of indolence and more the result of refined absorption, the sort of vaporization which one expects might only come with age and maturity. Even if I am wrong in attributing any sophistication to the dalliance, it would appear that politics is at the very least mildly more entertaining than staring at wallpaper. My companion in fact led me to believe that there was some intellectual value in the undertaking.

Whether the political arena is federal, provincial or municipal (a succession which is normally trotted out in order of diminishing interest and credibility) it is inevitable that the events precipitated by the respective actors are destined to provide considerable fodder for something approaching a stage production. Indeed in many instances the drama incorporates traditional theatrical themes of influence, greed, bias, comedic relief and, on a good day, maybe even scandal. In spite of their commercial attraction, it is undeniable that those same politicians are regularly held up to ridicule by the very observers who fuel their notoriety (and who are even likely to have voted for them in the first place). It would be a truly vain candidate for public office who imagined that he or she should not at some time or another suffer vilification. Alas this is part and parcel of the gory detail of show business.

It is too platitudinous to acknowledge the well-deserved pleasure of the populace in the diminishment of those who hold themselves out as potential leaders. The abuse is almost a rite of passage and anyone who pretends to have what it takes to act on the political stage must be prepared for the repercussions of any recruit before an audience.

I understand that in the good old days the enactment of a Shakespearean play was characterized by far more than today’s standard of polite involvement of the audience. Apparently the spectators of yore consisted of classes which on the one hand echoed the wealth of its patrons but on the other were metaphorical for the closeness of the observers and the pretenders. The “groundlings” (as those closest to the stage were called) were boisterous, loud and hot-tempered. Those who were removed by complacency from the fray of this association were nonetheless equally delighted by the activity when viewed from afar. If nothing else politics has such a wide and indiscriminate appeal and is so completely ambivalent that it enables almost anyone of whatever qualification to weigh in upon its merits. Politics is at once harmless and venomous but always gripping as any good show must be.

It will come as no surprise for me to relate that some of the happiest times I remember were spent with friends at the trough, putting on the nosebag so to speak.  A case in point is my friendship with John “F”.  John is a well-read man with a Master’s Degree in Education and a native intellect. He has that ease of expression and analysis which only comes from inherent ability and a good measure of worldliness. In addition John favours the good life and the two of us dedicated a considerable amount of our spare time to devising ways of pursuing that very goal but thankfully always bestowing upon our evil enterprises the mantle of intellectual propriety. So for example in 1999 we roosted in a large suite at the former Four Season’s Hotel (now part of the Omni Hotels & Resorts) on Sherbrooke Street, Montreal not far from the Musée des Beaux-Arts. From that well appointed springboard in addition to a tour of the local art galleries we visited “The Neuvième” restaurant at Eaton’s which, as the name implies, was located on the ninth floor of the old department store on St. Catharine’s Street.  The restaurant, for those not familiar with it, was an historical venue and the subject of an in-depth journalistic review for television. It was created very much along the lines of a stately dining hall on the Titanic, being long and relatively narrow, very high ceiling, and decorated with deco wall sconces of the era. There was an elevated area at the far end of the dining hall on which was located a grand piano. On the Saturday we lunched there a very accomplished musician, whom we later met and who informed us he was a music student at McGill University, was performing the finest of classical pieces amidst the clatter of silverware and chatter of the diners. In keeping with what was an obvious custom of the regular patrons we enjoyed martinis before tucking into the regular fare of chicken pot pie, salmon in a cream sauce and the like. The linen service, the  attentive staff and the exuberance of the scene made for a thoroughly memorable luncheon.

I cannot however say that all dining engagements were so successful. Years ago when I attended Glendon Hall, and even before when I had been at St. Andrew’s College, I had on several occasions dined at what was then one of Toronto’s better known private dinner clubs, “Carmen’s” on Alexandra Street off Yonge near Carleton. Though I had heard that the Club was no longer private, when John and I made arrangements to visit Toronto for an exhibition of the Barnes collection of impressionist paintings at the Ontario Gallery of Art I not unnaturally suggested we go to Carmen’s. I had after all celebrated my 21st birthday there when I was 18 and  had nothing but the fondest memories of the place, the thick smell of garlic bread literally dripping with butter, the mouthwatering steaks and delectable lobsters displayed in mahogany cabinets behind leaded windows, the quaint fireplaces all housed in a grand old Toronto home, copper pots shining from the ceilings of the sumptuous rooms. Accordingly I called ahead from Almonte, made the reservation by telephone and confirmed it in writing.  John and I stayed at the Royal York Hotel.  In keeping with a tradition which John had established on previous outings we enjoyed what he called “dressing drinks” of whiskey and soda then headed off to Carmen’s, appetites whetted, full of anticipation. From the very moment we arrived at the restaurant, things got off to a bad start. When we materialized in the front hallway there was no one there. When finally the hostess appeared her unforgettable opening words were, “The name?”. This uncaring and unprofessional introduction practically put me through the roof but rather than make a scene we advised her of the reservation name, after which, without so much as an invitation to follow her, she headed off in what we surmised was a direction we were to follow, which we did with stifled complaint. There then ensued an unduly long time before we were even asked about a cocktail, and during which, being thus undistracted, I was able to observe to my horror that we were surrounded by people who were clearly not dressed for dinner as I remembered it at Carmen’s, but more for a bus tour. Even this, however, I was able to submerge, more, I am sure, because I did not want to draw John’s attention to it though I would have been a fool to think he hadn’t noticed. Nonetheless, the evening proceeded. The next many minutes were painfully elongated by continuing slow service. When at last we got through our hors d’oeuvres and the main course of filet mignon arrived, we thought we might be in for some smooth sailing.  Alas such was not to be the case. When the waiter brought our bottle of wine he dropped it onto the candlestick in the middle of the table. There was no great mess other than the smashing of the glass candlestick but it was disruptive. Then when I looked over John’s shoulder I noticed two fully clothed firemen standing behind him. At first I thought the firemen had come as a result of our incident with the candlestick but then I saw to my complete astonishment that they were pitching a stretcher which they managed to expand in the limited space between our table and the one behind. They began loading the lifeless body of an elderly woman onto it. She must have suffered a heart attack. It was all too much! The whole evening had acquired a none too pleasant dream-like quality nursed along as it was by the numerous drinks John and I had consumed in the pregnant pauses between courses. So you can imagine when it was all over and Carmen himself drew up a chair at our table to ask “How was dinner?” I was more than prepared to tell him. Actually I think he had asked John first and John rather politely side-stepped the issue. I however let him know that I was only too willing to complete the survey. When I began with the problem with the hostess, Carmen interrupted me to ask if I would care to tell her to her face. John, I could see from the corner of my eye, knew this was not a good idea but I plowed forward. Well, to make a long story short, the evening ended by Carmen and the girl bolting abruptly from the table amid cries that he had one of the best restaurants in Toronto and invitations that we needn’t pay for our dinner, which, to John’s horror, I rebutted as an unnecessary charity. We stormed out of the dining room, halted long enough in the corridor to slap a wad of money into the hands of the waiter and found ourselves once again on the wet autumn streets of Toronto wondering what that had been all about!

Recently a girl-friend of mine let it slip that she had started smoking cigarettes, an odd occupation I thought, first because she never smoked before, and second because we live in an era when as everybody knows it is more fashionable to quit smoking than to take it up. While I initially excused the lapse as the product of her sister’s recent medical concerns, it turns out that my friend began smoking over five weeks ago, long before her sister had developed any problems. Clearly the impulse was not motivated by sympathetic response. My friend has promised to explain to me what precipitated this unusual conduct, and I own that I anxiously await to know the cause. For the time being, however, what is patently clear is that my friend (let’s call her Jane for ease of reference) is enormously enjoying this singularly untrendy and – for the most part – unpopular habit. Indeed it took no provocation at all to excite her to an extremely animated state when describing the venture which is for her nothing short of uplifting. Listening to her, I oddly found myself vicariously and similarly titillated. There immediately sprang up within me the recollection of years of pleasure which I too had once derived from the evil tobacco and its many accoutrements. Jokingly I suggested to Jane that I would now know what to get her for Christmas – not a carton of cigarettes (as she posited), rather a cigarette holder (Jane tends to the flamboyant under most circumstances). Affectation is of course not an inconsiderable part of the attraction of smoking. Given the history of media advertisements for the product, it is beyond dispute that the swank people of this world have indulged themselves in a similar pass-time, as jaundiced as one may be inclined to be about the posture.

Naturally my apparent condonation of the undertaking is to be met with the violent reality of the science and “numbers” which have evolved over the years to squelch anything but an academic or nostalgic interest in the subject, which currently has about as much attraction for most people as the spittoon. Nonetheless the allure of the wickedness and its attendant thrill are there. Perhaps comforted by the knowledge that it takes as much as forty years to succumb to the effects of smoking, Jane insulates herself from the consequences of her actions by reasoning that she is now approaching fifty and plans to be dead by ninety. In the meantime, its all about being naughty. Who knows how long the exhilaration will persist! At a certain point in life, after each of us has endured our own share of disappointments and catastrophes, the proscription of delinquent conduct may require more substance than merely being bad for one’s health. There comes a time when one feels like snapping one’s fingers at dilemma! Even without such obtuse behaviour, simply relinquishing oneself to the flippancy of social abandon has its own shallow and, in this case, private rewards.

It has been so long since I have been in an enclosed space where someone has been smoking that I cannot imagine how it would be accomplished. Quite apart from the persistence to self-destruct, the governor of our primal deportment is still the over-riding sense of social responsibility which has been cultivated over the past quarter-century. Even within the territorial confines of one’s own house, I imagine the inclination for all but the most egregious is to respect the now constitutional right of others to breath clean air. Take it outside onto the porch! And yet, in spite of the relegation, the knowledge that one has adopted something akin to being a gypsy assuages the otherwise revolting endeavour. Admittedly there is also the element of pathos.

If one doesn’t allow oneself to become too entirely macabre about the subject (as I suspect is the position taken by those young enough to ignore anything adult), there can certainly be a modicum of fun in the proceedings. It is after all a fairly inexpensive (though not completely innocent) indulgence. It affords sufficiently large berth for a show of extravagance, the nonchalant tossing of the head while exhaling, the prayerful positioning of hands to shelter a match from the wind, the carefree flicking of an ash into a crystal tray. Sometimes we’re far too serious about life. Goodness knows we have enough readily at hand to bring us down if need be. Until then, Que Sera, Sera!

I have always held it to be an unalterable truth that every home should have both books and a piano. Admittedly the dictum is somewhat an affectation as it is more a drawing room quip than a fact. Besides while I have always maintained a small library of books, I privately remind myself that there are so many of note that I haven’t read that it seems almost artificial to press the point.  The piano on the other hand is a more sustainable pretension for, although I cannot claim to be a highly accomplished player, yet I am hopelessly dedicated to the piano as an instrument of personal expression. I began playing the piano at the age of ten years.  It is regrettable that my acceleration was such that I abandoned formal study of the piano when I succeeded to Grade VIII Toronto Conservatory at the age of fourteen years. The combination of my ear for the piano and my native adaptation to the instrument afforded me the mistaken privilege of letting go the lessons.  Nonetheless for the next 50 years I continued to divert myself on the piano though unquestionably with diminishing returns. As my circumstances allowed I graduated from a Mason & Risch upright piano (our family piano appropriated by me when I got my first home in Almonte) to a seventy year old Heintzman (bought by me from the estate of the late Mrs. Annie Johnson widow of Dr. Johnson in Carleton Place) and finally to a new Steinway L-Grand.

The Steinway was a bit of a deceit because the quality of my playing hardly merited its unsurpassed performance. But on a cloudy day with which to match my sometimes gloomy sympathies and given enough caffeine to stimulate my dexterity with the arpeggios I could rattle off some tolerably inoffensive pieces.  When however we recently underwent the cataclysmic reduction of our four-bedroom two-storey house to a small apartment the Steinway – or any piano for that matter – was off the order table.

No longer having a piano I occasionally satisfied myself to play the pianos of my friends or of my sister (who had since regained the family Mason & Risch now hopelessly neglected and out of tune).  The orphaned experience harkened back to my days as a student when I was accustomed to discover the whereabouts of the University grand pianos.  The point is this:  I never allowed myself to go long before uncovering a piano.  In my days as an articled law clerk on Sparks Street for example I would insinuate myself into the ballroom at the Château Laurier Hotel for like purpose (once unwittingly performing for the wife of renowned photographer Yousuf Karsh who then lived in the Hotel).

I omitted to mention that the project of downsizing to an apartment was contemporaneous with my retirement from the practice of law.  As such the undertaking was more than a mere relocation; it was a paramount readjustment.  Everything about the move was calculated to step away from the past and begin anew.  And I have to say that the effort was not unrewarded.  Indeed as I have since discovered the undertaking has been accomplished to such perfection as to prohibit any accommodation of the past.  In addition to abandoning whatever doesn’t go in the dishwasher we have let go of anything for which there is no foreseeable promise (a surgical choice which at times demanded some frank admission).  Among the discarded elements of my life was my erstwhile affection for the piano, a hobby which unquestionably had declined to a distinctly forgettable level or at the very least was highly repetitive.  Knowing this I sought to replace the creative feature of the hobby by strengthening my only other hobby of writing (though that too came under some close and critical observation).

As the commotion of the move began to subside I found myself imperceptibly revisiting the subject of the piano though this time with a variation.  Instead of contemplating a pianoforte I canvassed information about electronic keyboards.  What little I knew of the subject did not recommend it to me. Only a year ago I had stumbled upon an electronic keyboard while visiting people in Montepulciano (the lady of the household was bent upon learning to play the piano).  As usual I engineered my way into playing it though frankly without great satisfaction.  The device was no match for a percussive piano.  In spite of this unmoving experience I persisted in my researches by trolling the internet for further information.  By coincidence I unearthed a local emporium which stocked the latest models of the contraptions.

I shall not try my dear reader’s patience by becoming the equivalent of a travel writer for the music industry. Suffice it to say that after an examination of a number of these instruments I came away more than a little impressed.  As in all matters of commerce there is a direct correlation between price and quality.  So often people who are “thinking” about a piano (usually for their children) make the error of starting with an affordable model which of course flies in the face of the entire point of a piano; namely, the sound quality.  The same applies to the electronic keyboards; some are little more than gimmicky toys; others are marvels of technology.  My interest in the device was pointedly heightened by the knowledge that I could connect to it using a headset (a feature I considered a positive advantage in an apartment).  In addition the keyboard was transportable (it came with a collapsible table and bench and a traveling case).

You would think that would be the end of the matter; that is, that all considered, the electronic keyboard was a good and viable choice.  But not so fast!  As reluctant as I am to say so, the overriding question was where to put it?  As I mentioned earlier the transition from the house to the apartment was accomplished with enormous refinement.  In summary the furnishings we had retained were so judiciously chosen and placed that there was positively no room for anything else.  A random paper clip would have been conspicuous!  It naturally offended my finer sensibilities that the elevated subject of artistry (a notion I now liberally attributed to my fading piano talent) should be subjected to the indecorous competition of household furnishings.  Yet even a casual glance about the apartment reinforced my undiluted pleasure in the place before having considered the encroachment of an electronic keyboard (which hardly qualified as mahogany cabinetry).  If this were the sole source of contention the debate may have resolved itself without prolonged argument. Something might have been pushed aside to billet the device.  However a further and as yet unresolved point was more prickly.  The issue remained whether the time had passed to contemplate even playing the piano, electronic or otherwise.

One often hears of those who, upon retirement, placate their burgeoning sense of worthlessness by taking up some fairly weighty matter, things like getting a college degree or learning to paint or flying a plane. Cajoled by the supreme reasonableness of the electronic keyboard I had reasoned that I would at last revisit the subject of learning to read music, an industry I had succeeded in convincing myself I could assert even in the middle of the night with the aid of my headphones (which the merchant charitably advised he would “throw in” with the deal).  Yet as innocent as the ambition was, there lingered a possibility that it was all misguided.  One has to confront some hard facts in these matters.  Perhaps it was time to retire with my book and my bottle instead.

There are some for whom life is a predictable trajectory, who are propelled by deep-seated family coercions for example, who effectively haven’t anything to say about the direction they’re headed or what they’ll end up doing.  The prescription is often the product of sustained social pressure such as aligning with the tradition of a particular profession like medicine or law; or in some cases it is an accommodation of the person’s overwhelming shortcomings to ensure he has something to do for the rest of his life such as being a stock broker in a closely held corporation.  In rare instances it is the ambition of an entire clan to produce a leader or statesman sometimes of a particular ethnicity or religion.  For a man to remove himself from such high-minded destiny is seldom an easy undertaking and is frequently wrought with tragedy. To maintain the course is at times equally foreboding.  On occasion its inevitability requires almost sacrificial submission.

For the rest of us life tends more to the unforeseeable (and one would therefore hope as a consequence that the perception is less about an irrevocable fate). Certainly there are some who by contrast to those with a predestined future are eternally confined by less complimentary circumstances within an orbit without chance of breaking free. But the partnership of even limited ingenuity and enthusiasm generally ensures a less predictable and possibly more dynamic course.  For those who have a measure of intelligence and moderate financial means the possibilities are at least technically wide ranging.  But even in such a spirited environment there are inevitably significant turning points, occasions upon which the decision to go left or right is seminal.

Choice, as emancipating as it is, is nonetheless daunting as it commands enquiring assiduity failing which the ramifications can be unintended and are in any event by definition limiting.  Naturally none of us is especially well equipped to handle such elemental purpose when the provocation arises.  More often than not we respond intuitively which, while having the creditable flavour of instinct, is a response which may nonetheless be tainted by less than desirable visceral features to the discredit of rational considerations. How to contrive the resolve, whether as rational or irrational, whether short-sighted or long-term, whether cautious or adventurous, is impossible and depends upon innumerable prejudices, combinations and variations.  What however is certain is that tangible results will flow from whatever selection is made, results which will normally be markedly different depending upon the path selected.  Whether by design or default we are charting our future in more than just sand.

One is tempted to trivialize the broad strokes of life on the theory that they are but a springboard for the inherent talents of a person, a medium through which the latent strengths of that person will ultimately shine no matter what the manner of expression.  True to an extent but what is equally true is that opportunity does not appear at every intersection.  What counts is not only the quality of expression but the expression itself.  It is therefore undeniable that how one elects to travel in life is strategic to the outcome and to the assessment of personal fulfillment.  Que sera, sera! 

It is oddly less certain whether we’re able to change the course of events when things do not go well. Some commitments are  sticky.  Some are purportedly for life “until death do us part”.  Others are simply inconveniently prolonged or cumbersome, perhaps involving inordinate devotion of time or capital. Extracting one’s self from complicated affairs can be terribly wearing.  Some obligations are ruinous and may leave a man nothing but a shell of his former self.  The desire to achieve a turning point in life may nonetheless persist. Getting there is another story.  How often do we witness a fellow human being caught in a perpetual struggle in spite of his obvious desire for change?  The objective of change is however not unlike any other crossroad in that the choice of one entails the relinquishment of another; and many are not prepared to suffer the consequences.  How inconceivable it is to endure the public demonstration of our prior imprudence!

In the end the outcome for any of us is virtually set in stone, whether by surrounding circumstances or our own ostensible choice.  There is a point beyond which the trajectory, orbit or ambition is unalterable.  There is nothing to be achieved by remorse if indeed one senses any regret.  It may help philosophically to elevate one’s station in life to something approaching predetermination though it amounts to nothing more than absolution of free will.  Who on the other hand is capable of defining the mysterious means by which we have become what we are?  Do we indeed astound ourselves  as we stand staring into the future at the crossroads of  our life?