Ebbing And Flowing

Regarding the great ebb and flow of it all, I've reached an age when I'm a lot more keen on the ebb than the flow. Unfortunately today was a day when it was all flow, to the point of being swept away. Hoping the current turns tomorrow.

Questions Of Taste

Came across a brief clip the other day of music critic Alex Ross talking about acquiring a taste for The Beatles and Dylan. As always Mr Ross is the man to go to for good sense and massive insights about musics of all varieties. It seems to me he is saying something of huge importance here, that could mightily enhance the quality of life for many. I'm not so sure I have the best ears in the world, but I do strive to keep them open, and have been repaid many times over for doing so.

The Plan

Looking back to June, and what I managed to read after the ferocity of my working life had calmed somewhat, I suppose I feel a bit disappointed by my general lack of endeavour. Other than the stuff mentioned in earlier posts around that period I read precious little else: the three earliest Rebus novels by Ian Rankin, Ricks's TS Eliot and Prejudice (this after completing Milton's Grand Style), and, on the poetry front, Alice Oswald's Falling Awake. In addition I sort of started Andrew Motion's biography of Keats (aptly entitled Keats, for all you connoisseurs of pithy titles out there), Iain McGilchrist's book about the divided brain The Master and his Emissary, (the full title of which is, not so pithily, The Master and his Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World) and Ian Bostridge's Schubert's Winter Journey: Anatomy of an Obsession, (which whilst lacking something in terms of pith makes up for it in terms of descriptive vigour.)

Now you may think that I found something lacking in these three to make me temporarily give up on them. The truth is, though, that I was gripped enough by each to decide I wasn't doing them any justice reading them alongside other matter, and that's why they were put aside. Today I resumed Motion's fine biography from where I left off, with the great Romantic about to pen Endymion, and it felt like I'd never put it down. In contrast, I decided to restart McGilchrist's densely argued tome, of which I'd read the Introduction and the first couple of chapters, and was glad I did as I achieved a greater degree of clarity regarding his thesis on a second reading.

And it's these two books that as of now officially constitute my current reading. (Of course I'm dying to get going again on the Schubert book and there's a fair bit of other reading matter clamouring for my attention but I'm holding firm to just these for the time being.)

Something Finished?

I suppose I feel a sense of relief at completing Nikolaus Wachsmann's KL: A History of the Nazi Concentration Camps today. I haven't enjoyed reading it, but it has made for utterly compelling reading. I thought I knew a reasonable amount about the horrors of the camps, and the Holocaust generally. I didn't. Almost every page of Wachsmann's work has been revelatory in some degree.

Initially I'd hesitated over buying the book, and embarking on my reading, wondering whether my interest in its grim subject matter involved some kind of prurience. But finally I'd felt morally obliged to read it, and I think that's an appropriate perspective to adopt. Collectively we need to remember what took place: the work of Wachsmann and that of the researchers he draws upon, and the first hand accounts are precious indeed in enabling us to do so; but all this needs to be read and understood and communicated somehow.

There's a particularly resonant sentence towards the end of the book: In the same way our search for deeper meaning in the KL will go on, even though efforts to extract a single essence are destined to come up short. The our here refers to the work of the historians involved in grappling with the phenomenon of the camps, but I think the suffering of all the victims - so many! - means the word must have a wider application. The business of the camps should not be seen as finished.

The Rewards

Went on a bit of an iTunes rampage this evening, downloading stuff by Messiaen, Vaughan Williams, Peter Hammill (2 of the solo albums) and Yes (the extended version of Fragile, an album which, astonishingly, I don't think I've ever actually possessed, despite knowing every note.)

Not entirely sure why I went a bit crazy, but I think the newfound pleasure of listening over the earphones to music from my phone played some little part in all this. (Today I completely lost myself in Toru Takemitsu's brilliant score for Ran over a cup of tea and felt very jolly indeed doing so.) I suppose also that in some deeply infantile way I was rewarding myself for surviving recent travails, but I'm not sure I want to admit this to myself, even though I just did so.

Something I Forgot

Have enjoyed some outstanding discussions of items in the news in Pastoral Care lessons this year - and learnt a lot myself. Today's was no exception, a remarkably thoughtful, thought-provoking forty minutes or so on the way we respond to news of human tragedies and the aptness, or otherwise, of those responses.

In closing the lesson I felt it incumbent on me to remind us all, myself included, of the sad reality that the world is so often a terrible place and the human condition is one of pain and suffering and sadness. But I forgot to express the corresponding truth that the world is also a place of astonishing, magical beauty and that happiness is as inevitable as pain.

Blake: Without contraries is no progression.

Highs And Lows

I've never bought into the idea that work is ennobling, especially my own. But, to strike a balance, neither have I ever considered any kind of work demeaning. I've cleaned my fair share of toilets (including the Ladies at Ciba-Geigy, Trafford Park) and I didn't think the less of myself, or anyone else, for doing so.

So I was a bit taken aback talking to Noi today when she referred to someone of our acquaintance who, as far as I understand it, regards the notion of working as a security guard as indicating a lack of something - class, status, whatever. Baffling. A perfectly good and very useful way of making a living, it seems to me, assuming you can get paid a reasonable wage. I wouldn't want to be a security guard here simply because, as far as I understand it, most are grossly underpaid. But it seems to me that the people to look down on in this situation are those doing the underpaying, not those on the receiving (or 'not-receiving') end.

And here's an odd thing that just occurred to me: in my experience talking to folks who for some reason are seen as being at the bottom of various imaginary ladders is usually a lot easier than conversing with those on the presumed higher rungs.

Well, Well, Well

Noi has just back from Melaka. It seems Mak is making what sounds like a good recovery, but she'll go back again after a week to further lend a hand. So for the moment all is well, and we have the promise that all manner of things shall be well.

(Actually, I've felt oddly under the weather all day, but in the great scheme of things that really doesn't count.)

No Time To Lose

Somewhat to my chagrin I realised that I've still not finished the February/March issue of Philosophy Now, the one with a special focus on human rights. This is isn't because the articles aren't interesting, it's a tasty enough confection, with a couple of quietly illuminating pieces on the late, great David Bowie. No, the fault is entirely that of this reader; or, rather, of this reader's work and its intrusiveness upon the finer things in his life.

Now having reached that time of year when things might lighten up a little (and I mean only a little) I'm intending to really get going on the five items on my current list of books and sundry items that simply must be read soon, meaning right away. So pressing is this list that I haven't time to say what's on it but must simply start immediately. Bye!

Showtime

Part of the fascination and fear of live performance is the way things change once an audience is involved. The first time I directed a show, a long, long, long time ago, I could hardly bear the tension. Now I can, but only just.

I used to ask myself, about twenty minutes before Showtime, why on earth I was doing this. And after every performance I would have the answer.

Postscript: Got the answer yesterday evening as usual - and all the richer because I don't take the 'as usual' for granted.

Kinds Of Truth

After a good dress rehearsal I invariably find myself in a curiously over-excited state of mind. A brain that's racing after rehearsals is a director's friend since there are always more than enough things to think about to make it worthwhile finding it difficult to relax - and waking way too early the next day creates a useful space. But we're at the point at which, with most things in place, the to-do list suddenly looks reasonable.

So this evening I needed to figure a way to slow myself down and change the subject, just a little. My remedy was a few pages from Wachsmann's KL, and very grim reading they were - as expected, pretty much every page being grim one way and another. There wasn't much in the way of joy in the concentration camps.

But here's the point. Somehow in these darkest of places some decency survived, and it occasionally illuminates a dark page: In summer 1942, when the Ravensbruck SS punished Jews with a month-long cut in rations, another group of prisoners, led by Czech women, regularly smuggled some of their own bread into the Jewish women's barrack. (By the way, to contextualise this, the cut in rations would have spelled certain death for many of the Jewish women, whilst to give up your own bread was to put your well-being in considerable jeopardy.)

What we're putting on stage implies a very bleak account of our fundamental nature, and I think it's important sometimes to represent that kind of ugliness in the theatre because of its truth. (Reading Wachsmann's book will convince you of the truth of our essential ugliness, if you think otherwise.) But it's equally important to recognise other more positive truths. I think they are there in Lady Macbeth. Just difficult to find. As they were in Europe in 1942.

In The Dark

One thing's for sure, Lady Macbeth takes you to some very dark places in the human soul. The paradox is that there's so much light to accompany one there, emanating from all the creative souls who are bringing it to life on stage.

Stepping Out

Had vague thoughts of getting to the gym this evening but, finding myself with an imperatively urgent to-do list, generally production-related, wisely abandoned my plans. Just ticked the last item off the list, I'm glad to say.

Then I checked the health app thingy that mysteriously counts your steps. Did 14,978 today, it seems, and climbed 35 floors. I reckon that's a pretty fair replacement for the gym, for now at least.

Not Letting Go

Like most old curmudgeons I enjoy looking back nostalgically at how wonderful things were in the past and sort of pitying the youngsters of today for missing out on all that. Of course, most of the time I'm aware I'm just happily deluded. But occasionally a memory will pop up suggesting that the nostalgic haze might not be quite so deceptive.

The other day I chanced upon an early single, I Can't Let Go, by The Hollies, a fine sixties (and beyond, I suppose) 'combo', originating from Manchester of all places. It's a song I know backwards, having happily embedded itself in the consciousness of the little lad I was back then. But hearing it again made me keenly aware of just how brilliant it was, and is. Can't think of anything I've heard in the world of popular music in recent years that comes close to evoking the sheer joy of the song - and, by the way, I reckon The Hollies playing it live is even better than the studio version. Two and a half minutes of bliss that's sort of lasted more than fifty years.

Moral Demands

I seem to have been reading Nikolaus Wachsmann's KL: A History of the Nazi Concentration Camps for an awfully long time, yet I've still got well over a hundred pages left, despite the fact that it's been my exclusive reading now for a few weeks. I don't feel any desire to speed up though, or the slightest bit of boredom with the book. Far from it. It remains utterly compelling. Almost every page tells you something unexpected, or sheds awkward light on aspects of human behaviour that demands shedding. I suppose it might be fairly said to illuminate a frightening darkness also.

Yesterday I found myself reading about the strange fact, supported as always by shedloads of evidence, that there was a clear contrast between the behaviour of German civilians towards those camp inmates they came into contact with in the later stages of the war and the behaviour of civilians in other Nazi-occupied European nations, like France. Put simply, German civilians behaved for the most part with cold indifference towards the suffering they encountered whereas the ordinary peoples of other nations showed a much greater degree of empathy and genuine concern.

Wachsmann suggests various factors that contributed to the contrast, taking it for granted, of course, that this had nothing to do with some form of innate 'German-ness' involving a fundamental lack of humanity. He suggests that the years of virulent Nazi propaganda having had a dreadful effect on the way ordinary Germans perceived those imprisoned as a key factor, and it's easy to see how this is likely to have been the case.

This reinforces for me something that has come to figure large in my thinking in recent years. I'm convinced that what might be termed a nation's ethical climate is a very real thing and that we neglect the notion at our peril, since we inevitably all contribute to that climate. It seems to me fundamentally mistaken if not downright dangerous to see ourselves as powerless. I'm becoming more and more convinced that we have a moral duty to contribute to that climate positively, because if we don't we run the risk of becoming as complicit in wrong-doing as any citizen of Germany in those awful times who passively accepted the evils of the Nazi regime.

Just Visited

With Noi off tomorrow to look after Mak for a while we've had no time to ask folks round for the usual Raya visits. I reckon that we'd have held our annual Open House Raya Bash this weekend otherwise. Fortunately we managed a pale imitation of the event by playing hosts to Rohana & Osman this afternoon, thus reciprocating their hospitality of the other evening, and Marsha & Omar also came along - which considering the amount of grub Noi confected for our small gathering was further good fortune.

Noi and I are off to bond over a cup of coffee later, ahead of her departure, which will sort of mark the end of a rather odd Syawal for us, but in the final analysis a satisfactory one given what looks to be a positive outcome for Mak's health. Oh, and since Man was looking good, and the health bulletin from John and Maureen on the phone last night contained many more positives than negatives, there are further factors to add to the general cheer.

(Quick update: Noi has just decided against going out for a coffee since she's tired after all her preparing. Instead she's just offered me one of her patented shoulder rubs, so it looks like the perfect end to the perfect afternoon. (Spent the earlier part of the day engaged with the Toad, work, so that bit doesn't count.))

Blood Will Have Blood

08.20
Just walked over to work carrying a flask of tea and a basin of blood.

(Now that's a sentence I never thought I would ever need to commit to paper.)

Just Visiting

We're off later this evening for our first Raya visit to someone in this Far Place, the someones in question being Osman and Rohana and family. This will be only the second time I've met Man this year since we've avoided going round whilst his chemotherapy has been on-going due to the risk of infection involved. Last time I saw him he was struggling also with a broken collar bone, but I'm told he's much better and the chemo has gone well. So hoping for a splendid evening in the light of that good news.

Nice to be doing something appropriate in Syawal. Our window of opportunity for any sort of visitations is extremely narrow since I'm ridiculously busy and Noi's intending to go back to Melaka on Monday to help look after Mak, who's now homeward bound (yay!!) having been discharged from hospital. (And how good it feels to type that sentence, by the way.)

A Thing Of Beauty

Brilliant post over at Prof Ed Feser's blog applying Aquinas's criteria of beauty to the movie of David Mamet's Glengarry Glenn Ross brought to my mind the realisation that Joyce's application of the same terms in A Portrait remains the single most coherent explanation of what constitutes 'art' I've ever read. I suppose I could say of myself with regard to the whole realm of aesthetic theory that this is all I know and all I'll ever need to know.

More Comfort

In ridiculously busy times I now find myself very deliberately setting specific periods of time aside to listen to specific pieces of music. The temptation is to continue getting on with unfortunately necessary stuff and just have music as background, but that doesn't work for me these days. So I abandon the very idea of listening, except, as I said, for selected pieces and to these I listen hard and fast, refusing to think about what I really should be doing - but only for those few minutes of time deliberately set aside. I'm talking about real planning here, involving actually writing down my intentions, almost to-do list fashion, odd as that may sound. Sounds a bit weird, I know, but all I can say is, it works for me.

And it worked in a particularly big way last Sunday when I carved out a few minutes more than an hour early in the day, when I really should have been doing something else, to listen to the second CD of my 2 CD set of RVW's Pilgrim's Progress. This segment of the opera begins with the Vanity Fair episode and takes us, via Pilgrim in prison, up the Delectable Mountains and to within sight of the Celestial City. I'm not quite sure why, but I really did get taken to another place on this listening, a sort of version of English Pastoral, entirely of the imagination, but entirely real and entirely wonderful.

I don't think I've ever felt quite so refreshed by a musical experience as I did that morning, as if I had sojourned in the foothills of paradise along with Pilgrim. Somehow the weight of the day's work that came after felt not exactly lighter but easier to bear.

Comfort And Joy

Noi got back in the early hours of the morning, when I was too muddle-headed with sleep to register the deep sense of things putting themselves to rights attendant upon her return. So I've been enjoying that feeling this evening.

It's easy to underestimate how lucky we are simply to have comfortable lives. I try not to make that mistake. (Odd disconcerting slip: just now I initially typed upon her routine, rather than return.)

She may need to go back to Melaka soon as Mak is still in hospital and there are still issues over her treatment and condition. So it's right that Noi should do so. But I'm enjoying her being here while it lasts.

Still Keeping It All In Mind

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We packed a lot into a couple of days over Raya. More to remember above.

Recapturing The Spirit

 

 

Normally we'd have been visiting here and there at this point in Syawal, but that's not been possible this year. So I'll have to just remember the pleasure of the first day of Raya (evidence above), and hope we can get back in touch with that spirit once Noi comes home.

Unconditional Love

Got to thinking about Gran this evening. How incredibly patient she must have been with the little prattler she looked after for most of his early years. And how completely secure I felt with her warmth to sustain me. I suppose I grew up a fundamentally secure and confident individual. Wonder how much of that was down to Gran.
                        

All Smiles

Mak's condition continues to improve. She's out of ICU and the tests so far indicate no grievous problem. Noi is even talking about her going back home, suggesting we're through the critical period.

In fact, Noi is talking about taking a break from her duties there and coming back on Sunday, at least for a little while. All this calls for a little celebration in the form of the first ever use of an emoticon in this Far Place: 😤. There are times that mere words cannot do justice to a smiling face.

Rather Smart

Having been forced entirely against my will and better judgement to acquire a smart phone (if that's what they still call them) I find myself, sadly, beginning to come to terms with the thing. I'm still not completely adjusted to the horrors of WhatsApp, which insists on keeping me more in touch with the world than I really want to be, but there are bits of the phone I actually find useful.

In no particular order of merit these are: the thing that counts your steps; the QuranExplorer App; the QiblaCompass; and the headphones which are surprisingly comfortable and let you listen to iTunes stuff close up, as it were. In fact, it was through the last of these items that I made quite a remarkable discovery today when listening to Gentle Giant's excellent album from the early 70's Acquiring the Taste.

This was the one GG album I owned on vinyl. I bought it on spec and, for some mysterious reason, probably my extreme musical naivety as a teenager, I was sort of disappointed with it, though I played it often enough to become very familiar with its contents - those being the days when I was so poor and albums so expensive that it was imperative for me to always get my money's worth. More recently I downloaded it on iTunes and was delighted at just how fresh and adventurous and imaginative it sounded. The very off-centre, unconventional nature of the music speaks to me today more than it ever did in earlier years.

The thing is though, that until today I'd only listened to it played through our stereo system from an iPod. This afternoon I listened to it for the first time on the headphones played from the phone and picked up on some glorious layers of detail in the sound and arrangements I've just never heard before (more than 40 years late - think of it!) To mention just one: there's a counter harmony on the vocals towards the end of the brilliant opening track Pantagruel's Nativity that just blew me away, sending shivers not just down my spine but down both legs and into my ankles. A reminder of the joys of close listening to music that requires it; and with that I'm off to don the headphones and enjoy another 40 minutes of bliss before bedtime.

In Praise Of The Fridge Magnet - 5

 

With a single glance, a reminder of where my heart is. At least at this point in time.

Coping

It felt strangely normal to be reunited with Noi over the weekend. Now I'm back to the routine of the working week and all seems awkward without her. Will need to learn to live with this for the immediate future since we've decided she's needed in Melaka until things settle back down to some kind of normality over there. Must say I noticed a distinct sense of glee on her part when we were discussing the need for me to start ironing shirts again. 

Now I'm trying to figure out an alternative to cheese sandwiches in the evening. You can have too much of a good thing, you know.

The Public Good

It's obviously counter-intuitive to say so, but the ICU at Meleka Hospital feels like a fairly cheerful place to be - or at least it did this afternoon when Noi and I visited Mak again. I suppose the fact that she was looking even better than yesterday helped in my very subjective sense of atmosphere, but the colourfulness of the surroundings (not at all the usual sterile, clinical white we associate with such places) and the relaxed yet clearly caring nurses (in healthy numbers, at least one to each patient, I'm pleased to say) helped generate what seemed to me a very positive feeling of the goodness of just being alive.
 
The hospital itself is more than a bit shabby, and would hugely benefit from a coat of paint and general clean-up, but, like its ICU unit, it generally feels like a comfortable place to be. Must say, I'm puzzled as to why it's thought that there aren't enough funds to make the place look reasonably spruce. It can't be that expensive, given the cheap foreign labour available here, and you'd think that the money that went into caring for basic infrastructure would actually generate economic benefits in a general sense. I've never bought into the argument that somehow the public good is beyond a nation's pockets - and especially in a country like this where it isn't as if healthcare is freely available.

Just Visiting

After travelling through the night, arrived at the Alor Gajah services in time to do the dawn prayer, and visited Mak in the ICU in Melaka Hospital late in the afternoon. Spent the rest of the day variously marking, sleeping and drinking tea.

All worth while to see Mak looking pretty well to my untrained eye and to catch up with the Missus.