All day I have dawdled and drifted. The gossamer sheers swell in the withdrawing room. The air is uncommonly fresh and clean, the temperature acceptably warm, the cumulus is breaking up to give a lovely summer evening. I squared my Protestantism with an early morning bicycle ride followed by a blissful lounge on the garden patio in the midday sunshine spilling from the azure sky above as I ritually pointed my face into eternity.
“Like too many other men, who are not to be turned from the path of right by pleasure, by lucre or by danger, he mistook the impulses of his pride and resentment for the monitions of conscience, and deceived himself into a belief that, in treating friends and foes with indiscriminate insolence and asperity, he was merely showing his Christian faithfulness and courage.”
Excerpt From
The History of England, from the Accession of James II — Volume 3
Thomas Babington Macaulay
On a late July warm and breezy summer morning in Ramsay Township there is nothing that surpasses the idle pleasure of a substantial breakfast from Wendy MacDonald Catering at the Mississippi Golf Club in the Village of Appleton adjacent the meandering Mississippi River. Once again today we were propelled from our domestic habitation to the welcome flagstone patio of the club overlooking the first tee and the tranquil waters of the nearby river. The effulgent sunshine partly impeded the clarity of my forward view but it was a qualification I happily endured as I nestled into my lounge chair, sipping strong black coffee awaiting the arrival of homemade blueberry pancakes with maple syrup and butter.
It is I find a singular feature of most bloodyminded people (and by the way I include myself in that blunt assessment) that they go on and on about the charisma of the place where they happen to live, as though there were no other, as though the rest of the world were God’s insouciant production just to see if He/She/They got it right the first time. It’s called the “no place like home” eulogy, that seemingly warm and congenial endorsement meant to legitimize one’s return from a foreign land or as a commendation of the universe to which one is currently moored.
“when the old boughs wither,
we thrust new ones into a chimney”
Excerpt From
The Dunciad: An heroic poem. In three books.
Alexander Pope
Knowing when to quit is a banausic philosophic adage of broad application which advances the seemingly unpopular admonition of retirement or withdrawal. Often it runs together with the metaphorical encouragement to abandon ship while there is still time. It is accordingly both a substantive and temporal admonition. The warning has been associated with almost every critical aspect of human endeavour and relationships. Most often, because of the prerequisite of involvement, the harangue applies to what for the moment at least is important to us. Accordingly the decision to “jump ship” at what is likely an inopportune instance is regularly equated with an element of possible indiscretion at the very least or the more probable abbreviation of what is already a bad or ineffective alliance.
It was with a spirited presence of adventure that we launched this morning’s junket to the Township of Adamston/Bromley to visit my sister and her husband at their summer resort. But first there were stops at HFT (Healthy Food Technologies) in Almonte for donuts then Antrim Truck Stop in Arnprior for a strengthening plate of protein and a mixed berry scone slathered in icing sugar.
Yet the new regiment had a very peculiar character. The soldiers were all rigid Puritans. One of their first acts was to petition the Parliament that all drunkenness, licentiousness, and profaneness might be severely punished. Their own conduct must have been exemplary: for the worst crime which the most extravagant bigotry could impute to them was that of huzzaing on the King’s birthday.
Excerpt From
The History of England, from the Accession of James II — Volume 3
Thomas Babington Macaulay
I venture to say that most of us have our personal priorities, things about which we’re not only particular but also habitual, things that matter to us so deeply (though not necessarily so importantly) that we’d be at a loss to know precisely why they are so, things of prime concern and precedence. On occasion the pressing matter is illustrative more of obsession than imperative. Maybe there are routines which must be performed each morning to initiate the start of the day, the beginning of another realm of unfolding discovery.
There are two things about which I can safely say I know very little; viz., the Pacific Ocean and women. Ignorance has never stopped me before so I will not apologize for continuing with this commentary. If you must know, I place some confidence in story-telling generally. My legal career of punctilious documentation is over. I have instead abandoned myself to the exoteric pleasure of unbridled presentation! Granted it is a wishful ambition but it captures the dominance of the narrative.