inspirational

All posts in the inspirational category

Meet Betty

Published 19/10/2016 by davidgward

Elizabeth, usually known as Betty or Bet, leaned towards me in conspiratorial fashion and tapped me on the arm to gain my full attention. Scanning from side to side to ensure her words were not being ignored by those around us, she began in a bold ‘stage whisper’
“I made rabbit pie yesterday” she announced with a beam that spread across her face as a symbol of ‘I’ve still got it!’
“I picked up a whole rabbit from the sweetie shop and slow cooked for three hours.”
The first part of this sentence requires some explanation for the uninitiated. When Bet talks of a whole rabbit she is not talking of the fluffy bunny we all know and love. No, this is a rabbit that has been skinned, gutted and hung pending the arrival of the more carnivorous members of the population to add to their high-protein diet. The ‘sweetie shop’ is the nickname given to the butchers we introduced Bet to in recent times. As she walked into this old-style emporium, with sawdust on the floor and blood on the aprons, Betty gazed about her with the awestruck expression of a child finding, for the first time, the Pick-N-Mix counter in Woolworths.
This meeting was a win-win for both parties: for Bet it was an opportunity to test the resources (and knowledge) of these redoubtable slaughtermen:-
“Do you have any oxtails? Calves liver? Haggis? Do you know what skirt is? Biltong? I haven’t had brains for years!” We can fill in our own next line at this point.
“Do you have any honeycomb tripe? No, don’t try to palm me off with the brown tripe and you can add some cow’s tongue and lambs hearts too.”
For this business it was like finding a new restaurant on their doorstep. The regular shipping orders are so bulky that the assembled artisans could not believe that this would be for two people only to consume.
But for Bet food and, more importantly, food preparation are a crucial element of who she is.
Bet continued to explain in meticulous detail how the rabbit pie had been manufactured as if I were the James Boswell to her Dr Samuel Johnson, transcribing her ‘bon mots’ for future generations to enjoy and wonder at.
This episode gives an excellent insight into Bet and her personality. Her culinary prowess is legendary and her reach is tremendous, from the traditional roast through authentic Indian curries to her own original fusion menus. But if her mains are a thing of legend then her desserts are epic: wedding, Christmas and birthday cakes made with flair, ingenuity and a healthy slug of brandy to create memories that last a lifetime and become a thing of family folklore – and for many a family along the way. The originality of design set these cakes in the realms of gastronomic masterpieces.
Bet has forgotten more about cooking than most people learn in a lifetime and she has no hesitation in imparting her knowledge to anyone within earshot. However, you would be very mistaken if you imagine that this lady is a ‘one-trick pony’, indeed she is very much the ‘Renaissance Woman’ who can turn her hand to dressmaking or shoemaking or designing and fitting out an authentic Edwardian dolls house. She is a collector of an array of objets d’art of indeterminate value. From Victorian christening gowns, through a collection of limited edition paintings to a complete set of catering equipment sufficient to start her own culinary school.
Then there is her unrivalled knowledge of British birdcall – and believe me I have tried on more than one occasion to challenge her and every time she has been proved to be correct.
Architecture, art and history are all subjects about which that she can more than hold her own, revealing information that she has assimilated in the most extraordinary of ways. For example, the time in the Tate Gallery, amongst the great and the good of the high art circuit, when she persuaded many of them to furl up their catalogues into a cylinder to look through it, like a telescope, at the specific piece of artwork in order to focus, without distraction, at the detail, the true detail, of the picture. It is like stargazing with all of the streetlights and household lights turned off. They call this ‘light pollution’; in the Tate Gallery Bet introduced the aficionados to ‘distraction pollution’.
Bet is also a many-times winner of the Shoeburyness World Scrabble Championship. Not heard of this competition? Well, it takes place most mornings after breakfast and, like the annual Boat Race, it seems to have the same finalists for each tournament. In the case of the rowing it is always Oxford and Cambridge; for the SWSC it is always fought out by Ted and Bet. There are those who say that Bet is a bit of a hustler, claiming that she has invented even more than the 1700 words made up by William Shakespeare, and most of them are merely two letters long and contain ‘X’ and ‘Z’ quite often. She has even been known to win at Handicap Scrabble, outpointing a pairing of A* grade students at one sitting.

In spite of all of these attributes, Bet would probably take most pride in her six spectacular and singular children, each one a credit to her and her husband of sixty years, Ted.
Bringing up six children with an age span of eight short years must have been like herding earthworms and her methodology might be open to scrutiny amongst the liberal parenting thinkers of the twenty-first century. The difference is that they cannot prove their theories whereas Bet and Ted have the evidence of the end product in six individual cases. Bet’s pride in her children often led her to exaggerate the status of each and every one of them but in her defence Bet would point out that she was merely predicting the final success that each achieved in their chosen field.
A couple of years back Bet was seriously ill. The prognosis was bleak. Bet ‘died’ but survived. She questions why we brought her back. The fact is that it was her own strength of character that forced her back to enjoy the weddings of two of her granddaughters, the thirtieth wedding anniversary of one daughter and a string of stunning exam performances from many of her grandchildren. Her great-grandchildren are following in the family tradition.
Reason enough to be ‘brought back’. Reason enough to be proud. Reason enough to celebrate the successful dynasty.
Respect!

Make your today as great a yesterday as it can be!

Published 14/03/2016 by davidgward

It is the Dalai Lama who tells us “There are only two days that nothing can be done. One is called Yesterday and the other is called Tomorrow. Today is the right day to Love, Believe, Do and mostly Live.”

The Tibetan Buddhist monk beseeches us not to dwell on what happened in the past and to stop worrying about the future. Instead we should learn the lessons from yesterday and utilise this experience today to work towards our life plan for tomorrow.

There is a temptation to believe that he wants us to make today perfect, and to strain every sinew to make it so. This can create two diametrically opposite responses.

The first response is to feel pressure to achieve perfection in everything that we do. The result is that we spend our day with our heads down, checking and rechecking everything we do. Not only do we fail to ‘smell the coffee’ we don’t even know what ‘an Austrian goat milk double, half caf – half decaf, soy milk cappuccino extra hot with a dash of Madagascar cinnamon and half tablespoon of caramel latte frappe mocha’ costs in Starbucks. We are so big on building for our spectacular tomorrow that we do not allow ourselves to enjoy today. And yet it is the memories of our today that become our warm recollections of all our yesterdays.

The second response is to feel that perfection is not achievable and therefore there is no point in making any effort. Sometimes we become so overwhelmed by the need to be ‘the best you can be’ that we resolve that if we do nothing no-one can question the quality of what we have produced. A contagion of procrastination creates an attitude that ‘no grade’ is preferable to ‘low grade’.

It is my belief that what the Dalai Lama was aiming at with his comment is that, as today is the only day that you can influence you should make the most of it; do the best you can in all aspects of your life. Your best is enough; perfection is a bonus.

During the London Olympics in 2012 I had the privilege of being a Gamesmaker at Lords Cricket Ground, the site of the Olympic Archery Tournament. Now, I have no claim to be a toxophilite, an expert in archery, but let me explain how the competition was organised on the hallowed outfield of Lords. Temporary stands were built on either side of the 70 metre track with the targets set facing the Pavilion with its historic Long Room being the best seat in the house. This setup created something of a wind tunnel for the competitors and so two flagpoles behind the targets were vital for the competitors to understand wind speed and direction when taking their six arrows, which they have to shoot off in four minutes. Two large clocks, a couple of yards in front of the shooters, count down this vital four minute limit.

The ‘David Beckham’ (or, in this case, the ‘Stevie Wonder’) of world archery is Im Dong-Hyun of South Korea who is registered as blind. Standard vision is 20/20 but for Im Dong-Hyun it is 20/100 and 20/200 – meaning he needs to be 10 to 20 times closer to the target than normally-sighted individuals. Im is an idol in Asia and archery royalty throughout the world.

The 2012 London Olympic Games was expected to be further evidence of his supremacy and on 27 July, in the team event, Im was at his imperious best and smashed the world record, notching up a score of 699 out of a possible 720. His efforts won his country the Bronze Medal.

Im confirms that all he can do is to try to distinguish between the different colours on the target. Indeed he has told us “For, me seeing the target and not seeing the target does not make a difference.”

Three days later, the world of archery was watching the expected progression of Im Dong-Hyun into the final of the Individual event. He eased his way effortlessly through the first two elimination rounds without ever quite reaching the levels of perfection he had achieved in the team event.

The personal pressure mounted as his opponent, Rick Van Der Ven of the Netherlands, raced into an early lead. Im took his place 70 metres away from the target, seeking out the yellow inner ring, through opaque vision. The clock started to tick down the four minutes as Im watched the fluttering of flags and as they fell limp he loosed first one arrow, then another and then a third. The shots were in the inner ring. He was on a roll. The fourth arrow was all-important and, again, he watched the flags to assess the winds direction and strength. He waited for all of the elements to be in his favour. The tension in the crowd mounted as they appreciated the import of this fourth arrow. They were willing Im to achieve his brilliant best, to prove the power of the human spirit to overcome any disadvantage and be perfect.

The flags continued to flutter forcefully east to west, dipped slightly before, again, standing erect from the flagpoles that held them.

Im continued to wait, continued to hold his fire, calmly determined to find that yellow bullseye yet again. The massive, knowledgeable audience took a deep breath and waited with him. A bird screeched in the distance, sending a minor tremor through the tense scene.

They waited still.

The strident claxon screech of the timer shook the attendant masses to their core. This claxon sound was, in the world of archery, the shattering peal of the seismometer predicting an earthquake registering a magnitude 7 on the Richter scale.

Im had defaulted and was out of the competition. The damage was irreparable. Im, imperious days before, would not be the Gold Medal winner and his today would not be creating a memorable yesterday for Im Dong-Hyun.

The Dalai Lama is right when he tells us that today is the only day that we can influence but we must remember that to do our best today is preferable to seeking perfection and achieving nothing.

The trEUth about Brexit

Published 23/02/2016 by davidgward

In four months the people of the United Kingdom will be asked to make the highly significant decision about whether we should stay as a central player in the EU or leave and take a step into the unknown.

To put it another way, in four months we will be asked to decide whether to have the bureaucrats from Brussels tell us what to do or to stand on our own feet.

See the subtle difference in tonality, based upon the way in which these terms are phrased?

As a simple-minded person, what I need to know is exactly how these alternative courses of action will affect my country and me, both now and in the future. My issue is where do I get the facts in an unbiased and comprehensive manner, and by ‘comprehensive’ I mean both ‘complete’ – nothing left out to skew the argument – and ‘understandable’ to me and my fellow voters. There is little point in me being fully conversant with the facts and basing my decision on this research if I am to be in a minority where the majority are making such an enormous decision based on sound bites and personality politics, so this information should be easily available.

It was Xenophanes, the Greek philosopher, who is first credited with distinguishing between truth and opinion, between belief and knowledge around 500BC and yet current politicians will not allow us (or, indeed, themselves) to distinguish between what they actually know and what is simply an opinion! But in this current debate the lack of understanding of the difference between fact and opinion is not the exclusive territory of the politician. Academics, business moguls and celebrities from all walks of life are espousing opinions for and against Exit as if they were undeniable truths.

I am listening to the arguments (‘Look at what happened to Norway’ ‘It took Canada seven long years to get a treaty’) but I am forced to challenge every piece of information; to play ‘Devil’s Advocate’ to find out what is the commentator’s fact and what is merely opinion. In this role I find myself arguing for both sides, depending upon who I am talking with, testing their knowledge against my perceived view.

This fence-sitting, this looking both ways at once has led me to a greater truth – or is this just another opinion?

I now believe that the outcome of the referendum on 23 June 2016 is totally irrelevant! At the end of the day it will not make the slightest difference. Vested interest across the globe will ensure that the U.K. will contribute, in exactly the same way that it is doing right now, to the world picture politically, economically and militarily.

When David C suggested that he knew many people who had served divorce papers but none with the ultimate aim of renewing their marriage vows, I know what he meant. However, I know of quite a few who would have served the divorce papers if they had the courage to but, lacking that spark, had stayed in the relationship and over time things had improved and a contented and satisfied life had ensued. By the same token, there are a number of people I know who have taken the route to divorce and, after a few turbulent years, had emerged stronger and happier.

At the end of the day, as an individual and as a country we can only work with the hand we are dealt and we will make the best out of this hand for us and our companions.

And that is the TRUTH!