There is not, I don’t imagine, a more succinct and penetrating idiom for food than “bread and cheese”. With perhaps, according to some, the addition of wine. Maybe Champagne. But aside from the stimulants we employ at and about table, even the supplement of as basic an ingredient as meat to the jargon might be conceived a superfluity though there are admittedly compelling distortions such as grilled cheese sandwiches with bacon! But that is more a culinary infatuation than a metaphorical adaptation. In any event it came as a surprise to discover that the classic rendition of the concoction – bread and cheese – is the fabric of a long-standing Native/Canadian/British tradition. It is refreshing to awaken palatable features of our past which connect to national heredity.

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The heat today was a furnace. We languished for lunch at the golf club in the shade on the fieldstone patio overlooking the first tee.  We were spared a measure of the sultriness by a gentle breeze. The weather in spite of its ineluctable sway did not diminish the gusto of the familial congregation; specifically the youth of 18, 19 and 20 years of age. An encounter of this scope is for a septuagenarian such as I an infrequent affair. I view this historic brush as an invitation for discovery and expansion – oddly reminiscent of a mythical query I heard years ago:

Q: You are crossing a field and encounter a hedgerow which extends high above you and as far to the left and right as you can see.  You must get through it to the other side.  How do you proceed?

A. Go either left or right in the hopes of going around the obstruction; or,
B. Plough directly through.

Q: When you get through the hedgerow, what is on the other side?

A. Nothing; or,
B. A farm house.

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When my father was approaching 92 years of age and still living with my mother in their own home – on the heels of a lifetime of diplomatic excesses such as first class tours on transatlantic ocean liners, private planes, private clubs, cooks and chauffeurs – it was not uncommon to hear him say, “All I want is peace and quiet“.  Not an appetite which at the moment resounds especially well for me. Nor I suspect would my late mother have had much truck with it.  Indeed her routine remark upon returning from a diplomatic tour was, “Instant poverty!” She rather disliked the Cinderella theme of a night at the palace.

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As the cable news networks and Donald J. Trump continue onward together in their daily broadcasts for popular attention (and whatever corporate or political gain they hope to embrace), the issue remains, Why do they believe “The Big Lie”? The ammunition is directed at the Republicans for the most part and certainly at the mysterious pool of Trump supporters which allegedly prevails (though growingly with less and less authenticity). The reputed Trump insurrectionists are steadily cast as a blow-up rental version of Confederate militarists and white supremacists. The other reprise on the networks is the disgraceful conduct of Republican Congressmen and Senators who have with ignominy contradicted the truth for personal gain.  The unfortunate Marjorie Taylor-Greene has in the process acquired the familiarity of Alfred E. Newman. I put her survival in the same arena.

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The phrase derives from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount: “You are the salt of the earth.” (Matthew 5:13) Jesus meant that the common people he was addressing – fishermen, shepherds, laborers – were worthy and virtuous. … Back then salt was highly prized as a preservative of food – so precious that it was used as money. Roman soldiers were sometimes paid in salt, giving us the word “salary,” derived from the Latin word for salt – “sal.”

Anyone who has tasted Maldon sea salt flakes knows the value and reward of salt; and, hence its treasured metaphoric use.  Oddly the historic narrative of salt – unlike its now popular usage – is a resource deriving from not added to the mix. Indeed it was that peculiarity – a bastardization such as, “It’s what you get out of life not what you put into it that counts” – which prompted me to appraise what exactly I had been given by similar percolation from the ground upon which I have walked throughout my lifetime.

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The problem I find knowing people who contribute to society is that they are as a result partially impenetrable.  I mean to say, getting together with a chap and his wife who have so clearly devoted a good deal of time, capital and energy to improvement all ’round, it soon becomes apparent that progress marches on and that nothing happens by accident.  I can only speculate that they must have consumed countless hours in the creation, institution and management of their latest projects (both commercial and domestic). This at least was the overall sensation which insinuated our Sunday afternoon foregathering on their exquisite deck overlooking the tranquil, meandering Rideau River and the distant traces of historic architecture across the water in the Village of Merrickville.

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No doubt there are as many narratives of motoring – that is, of driving one’s favourite motor vehicle – as there are drivers. Considering what I believe is the undeniable mingling that transpires upon the roadways – that is, the jockeying for position, the attempts to impress with speed or appearance, the exhibitions of rage, the clamour for priority, the insistence upon speed limits and the preservation of dutiful lines – I can only assume that the experience is for each of us as singular as any other communal activity.

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As lugubrious as it may plumb, wholesale recognition of one’s decline and impending doom is but the first step towards defeating intolerance of the perilous decomposition. To my undying credit – catch, if you will, the skilful innuendo – I have succeeded to camouflage my incremental inadequacies through the plausible mettle of science. Consumed as we all currently are by evolving pandemics which threaten to scour the face of the entire globe, it appears that for most of the worldwide population – other perhaps than Republicans and Trump allies in the United States of America and what I consider the vulgar generally  – science is our saviour.  Naturally it offends those swallowed up by erstwhile religious fabrications and the falsities of ignominious politicians to accept there is anything as palpable as science in face of competition from the mystical and misplaced alliances with constitutional freedom of rights.

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With his customary flourish the country gentleman had telephoned yesterday to invite us for dinner and a swim this evening. The primary intention of the congregation was however quite patently removed from either food or water. Rather it focussed entirely and quite unreservedly so upon the initial gander at His Lordship’s new granddaughter Sofia. She and her parents are visiting from the South Pacific.

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Regimentation, I have perhaps belatedly learned from personal experience, has its appeal. My boarding school upbringing was part of a strict system or pattern – basically a combination of academic and social routine, detailed daily physical exercise, military battalions and the Church of England. These Stoic expressions were naturally designed to manipulate the membership physically, emotionally, psychologically and spiritually. Though there were occasional academic pursuits which afforded conspicuous mental stimulation and development, most were primarily ceremonial, formula and memorization. Apart from that operative condemnation however the general spirit of the endeavours was worthy, the most wholesome of which was nothing more grand than the seven o’clock alarm which awoke the Upper and Lower School every morning.

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