Do You Have a Minute?

I had the one minute part in the School on Thursday night, with the following brief: to adapt to what is on the person's mind and to offer the free home Bible study. So I found it an interesting challenge to fit that into 60 seconds.

6. Starting a Conversation

(1 min.) HOUSE TO HOUSE. The person asks you to be brief. Offer a Bible study. (lmd lesson 2 point 5)

5. Be adaptable. A conversation may go in an unexpected direction. So be willing to share something that is relevant to the person, even if that means discussing a different Bible truth than the one you had in mind.

Sue:  Good morning. I am Sue, one of Jehovah's Witnesses...

HH:  (interrupts).  I’m sorry, I have no time this morning, I am right in the middle of cooking lunch for the kids.

Sue:  Of course, its half-term. I won’t keep you. But may I just offer you this magazine to read when you do have a moment to sit down. It is full of loving and practical advice from the Creator of the family arrangement.

(The magazine I offered was an Awake! "12 Secrets of Successful Families". You can read it here: https://www.jw.org/en/library/magazines/awake-no2-2018-jul-aug/)

HH: Look I admire your faith, but I do not share it, because if there is a God he would be doing something about all the awful things that are happening. Do you now watch the News?!

Sue:  That is an excellent point. Why, if there is a Creator who is all-powerful and all-loving are these terrible things happening. So may I offer you something else - a free home Bible study, for an hour a week, or even 15 minutes, at a time convenient to you, as I would love you to know what our Creator Jehovah has done about this, what he is doing now and the wonderful things he will do in the near future.

One minute. Blink, and you would have missed it.

Wednesday evening on the balcony was spent under a watercolour sunset watching a yacht race on the Channel - a lovely quiet sort of race - and a small rainbow briefly appeared among the clouds. So it must have been raining out at sea.

Col has had a lot of early starts recently, and I am not sleeping well - being in what hospitals call "discomfort" (as in The Gestapo caused "discomfort" to those they were interrogating). At least I haven't had any more stress dreams. But I guess this is all part of old age.

And, once again, I must remind myself that every day is a bonus now, and that the hope of living forever in the restored earthly paradise is a "pearl beyond price" - even if I have to get there the long way round, via the resurrection.

A Poem to Note the First Glimpses of Autumn

The geraniums on the balcony/the sound of the sea on the pebbles/seagulls gliding at eye level/or balcony level/grey sea/grey sky/a feeling of Autumn/the scent of nemesia.

It ought to be possible to turn that into a poem. I think it was the seagulls swooping at eye level in front of our balcony that were the strongest note in the symphony.

We have had some rain recently, some grey and cloudy days, and the sea has been noisy on the pebbles. I have been loving it all and wishing I could manage a poem about this moment when summer starts to tip towards Autumn.

I want to say that no matter how long I live - and how many seascapes I see - I will never see the one I saw then. I will never see the same one twice, such is the glory and variety of Jehovah's creation. 

So here goes - and I am trying not to look like "the actor Wolf Hall" in Upstart Crow, just before he auditions his very important and sensitive rendering of Thomas More.

Balconyscape   by me

It was there for a moment

cloud moving, sea so nearly still

balcony geraniums 

waving gently to the grey Channel

nemesia scenting the warm air

it was a symphony punctuated by seagulls

gliding at balcony height 

But where are our murmuring starlings? 

will they come tomorrow

and be part of the many scapes I hope to see 

as the years, the millennia go by, 

loving them - loving all of it - more and more

as they come and they go.

Well, for the moment, that is the best I can do.  

I sat out on the balcony in the sun on Monday morning, starting my study for the week, continuing in the Book of Acts, noting this week how the original Christian congregation was ordered, and how the congregation is organised in the same way today.  In fact I sat out there so long I was a bit late for our Monday Zoom, only to find that neither of my sisters had arrived, it was just John waiting - and he had only just arrived himself. Anyway, in the end we all appeared, along with the Derby family, and had a nice Zoom session.

Nute has had a swing, a proper swing, put up in the garden!   How wonderful. Exactly what I would want if we had a garden.  I would love a sunken bath too - but it is possible that the flat downstairs might not be too keen about it.

Norfolk Pines

We have been talking about our travels recently during our evenings on the balcony and we were thinking that we were glad we did our travelling when we did.  Though I guess people who did their travelling a generation before us would have said the same.

It certainly must have been something to travel in the days before passport controls, though of course only the rich could do it.

We became "rich" (travelwise) in our expat years because of the generosity of The Company.  They gave us a cheque every repat and, provided we were out of Kingdom for a minimum of 21 days, we were free to use it to go home, or elsewhere.  So we were able to visit my bro and his family in Sydney quite a few times (along with many other countries), which was wonderful. And the picture I have chosen for this blog is of the Norfolk pines you see on the seafront there.

We have a pine tree (not Norfolk) outside our balcony and sometimes when the sea is turquoise behind it, it reminds me of our days on the Northern beaches of Sydney.  

Maybe this talk of past travel was why I had a very stressful dream the other night, which seemed to go on for ages. I dreamt that I had taken a job back in the Middle East with The Company and had flown out there on my own with no money, no credit cards, nothing, except for food that I had, strangely, packed in my suitcase. I was in a company house, one we used to live in apparently though I did not recognise it, but there was no salary waiting for me. The dream had all sorts of twists and turns, and it was just beginning to dawn on me that it was a very strange thing for the company to be recruiting elderly ladies, when I woke up. It was such a relief to find myself at home, in my own bed, Captain B at my side.

Interestingly, when I took my blood pressure the morning after the dream it was very high!  (Captain B and I both have to do a bp chart this week.)  Why does my subconscious do this to me?  It's bad enough my own immune system attacking me...  what next in the frightening progression of old age?  Will I start punching myself in the face?

If I do, I hope I will manage not to damage my expensive new front teeth... I do not want to go through all that dental torment again.

The gift of life still continues to feel more and more wonderful though.  What is that line from a Sinatra song - "the days dwindle down to a precious few"?  

Every day is so precious now.

And the meeting at the Kingdom Hall last night was so comforting.  The teaching from the Christian congregation is an invaluable guide. You could not put a price on it, yet it is free to all who want it.

And the spirit and the bride keep on saying, “Come!” and let anyone hearing say, “Come!” and let anyone thirsting come; let anyone who wishes take life’s water free. - Revelation 22:17

Let anyone who wishes take life's water free. Jehovah is offering everyone back the life and perfection our first parents so tragically threw away.  Why not accept?

Mrs Ravoon (and a flare-up, left foot)

 

MRS RAVOON

The ship has returned 

From the alien star

Captain and crew

Who knows where they are?

Nothing inside 

But a large silk cocoon

In which form the features of

MRS RAVOON

Sue Knight

This website explains who Mrs. Ravoon is, as she is not my creation: https://www.mrsravoon.uk/

The poem above was inspired by a competition, many years ago, I think in The Oldie (not sure, was a long time ago).  We were required to write about a poem about Mrs. R, and it inspired me to think about the origins of the fearsome lady.

I didn't win. Nor was my poem printed. But here it is, now.

I have since wondered if the receptionist, Mrs.Raven, in the comedy "My Hero" was in any way inspired by Mrs. Ravoon. She was a great character anyway.

The above photo is the only one of a raven I could find in Captain Butterfly's gallery. It is doing acrobatics, which does give me a chance to speak about how wonderful Jehovah's creation is.  We know what goes into making a plane, let alone one that does acrobatics mid-air - well scientists and engineers do.  Had it been left up to me, I fear we would still be using Shanks Pony, and only Shanks Pony.

So please think of the miracles of creation, all around us, telling us of their Grand Creator, as clearly as if they spoke. If we follow that thought and search for Him, he will let us find him, and we will also find the way to enjoy life forever on this beautiful planet.

A friend called in with Victoria plums from her garden yesterday, and she took a mango from the box Col bought. They are beginning to ripen now. And both the Captain and I had our usual Monday Zoom sessions with the family - from Oz, to Bavaria, to York, to a rambling old farmhouse in Sheffield, and my parents retirement bungalow in our Nothern hometown.

All seems well.  For which I thank God.

And I must also thank Him very much for the promise that, under the loving rule of the Kingdom of God, no-one on earth will say "I am sick".  I am in the middle of a very painful flare up - left foot - and am reduced to hobbling slowly and painfully round the flat on my Zimmer. And even Captain B is feeling his age.  It is frightening and depressing.  How do people cope without hope?

The Sandwich Fairy Panics!

The Sandwich Fairy nearly had a fail this morning.  Captain B, given his full day yesterday - marshalling at an Arun swim, and then on to the Detectorists BBQ - said he would not be going out today.  But to my surprise he was up quite early this morning.  And he suddenly mentioned that he was just about to leave - for The Field.

"You said you weren't going out!"  I panicked.  "There are no sandwiches in the fridge - and no bread unthawed!!"

"Yes, I am going. Of course. I decided last night".

Alas, he forgot to mention it to the mysterious sandwich fairy who makes sure that, no matter how early he leaves, a box of sandwiches and cake is ready in the fridge.

Anyway, she did manage. And he left with his full lunch: ham sandwiches and marmalade muffin. It was touch and go, though.

As August progresses I watch for the moments when Summer begins to tip into Autumn.  The last two Thursday nights I have had to turn my car lights on when driving back from the Kingdom Hall.  That is one sure sign. And on Saturday when I went out onto the balcony the sunlight felt so different. It was hot and calm, really hot, yet somehow the summer had gone out of it. 

How quickly the seasons fly past now. When I was a child they seemed to last forever.

Bede’s famous parable of the sparrow is a common text in many introductory courses of Old English. It is found in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People (731), when he discusses how King Edwin of Northumbria was converted to Christianity in the year 627. In Bede’s story, one of Edwin’s counsellors compares the life of a pagan to the flight of a sparrow through the king’s warm hall.
https://thijsporck.com/2020/07/27/from-bede-731-to-bone-1991-2004-a-sparrows-flight-through-the-ages/

However, both the life of a pagan and the life of a believer is so short - just the flight of the sparrow through the lighted mead hall - from darkness into darkness.

The Bible tells us this: "For there is an outcome for humans and an outcome for animals; they all have the same outcome. As the one dies, so the other dies; and they all have but one spirit. So man has no superiority over animals, for everything is futile. All are going to the same place. They all come from the dust, and they all are returning to the dust." - Ecclesiastes 3:19,20

The life of both man and animal - and we are all souls - is short.  But the Bible teaches us that there can be an awakening from the dreamless sleep of death. Jesus spoke of the coming resurrection of the dead, and Daniel tells us that "many of those asleep in the dust of the ground will wake up".

Our first parents were made to live forever, so we feel the tragedy of the shortness of our lives now. Poets have lamented it down the ages.

The photo is of a Rufus Sparrow, not the sort of sparrows that we used to see in flocks everywhere in my childhood.  And that reminds me that I once saw a bright yellow canary living happily with a vast flock of sparrows in a London square  they were feeding together and flying together in harmony. That would have been in the 1960s. Both sparrows and their yellow companion will be long gone, but they were all known by Jehovah, and loved by Him.

Scanning

This is a heads-up for the Ultrasound staff at Southlands on Monday. I had an unpleasant and intrusive procedure but it was done with sensitivity and made as painless as it could possibly be.   I am very grateful to them.

Only two problems:

Firstly, it showed I do have another problem.  I hope hope hope this will not mean any more operations and will not mean that I have to return to the horror of the wards.

But I won't find out for about 3 weeks which is when I am scheduled to see the doctor.  I guess he needs to be sure he has the results of both scans in - and time to scan them himself - before he talks to me.  And hopefully talks to me, not "breaks it" to me.

It is all putting me in mind of that brilliant comic line by Victoria Wood "As the doctor said to me when I had my tubes tilted..." so I will leave it there.  

Tuesday started off very hot here on the South Coast - and apparently there were heavy thunderstorms in the North - or was that Monday?  I felt a bit washed out and am still in some pain from the procedure, but I managed to catch up with my studying, re-fill the freezer with cake for Col's packed lunches, and make a veggie chile using up the cauliflower.

Wednesday was my afternoon double Zoom session with a friend, and continuing my studies for the week, plus some witnessing letters.  The congregations are in the middle of a study of the Book of Acts at the moment, plus the Psalms.  Hence the photo - Palm trees (not Psalm trees though) from a visit to NZ, in our expat years.

We were out on the balcony last night - with a cloud-barred half moon peeping out from a slot in the sky - and were reminiscing about our travelling days.  When we were young students could we have imagined ourselves, well into our seventies, in a balcony on a sleepy little town on the South Coast loving being retired?

The answer clearly is No, we could not have.  But would I have been so happy if I had not talked to those two Jehovah's Witnesses who called at my door all those years ago - and listened to them?  No. No way.  Which is something I hope never to forget.

Travellers

The recent visits we have had from our travellers and their caravans has reminded me of a Keats poem, a favourite from childhood.

Meg Merrilies
BY JOHN KEATS

Old Meg she was a Gipsy,
And liv'd upon the Moors:
Her bed it was the brown heath turf,
And her house was out of doors.

Her apples were swart blackberries,
Her currants pods o' broom;
Her wine was dew of the wild white rose,
Her book a churchyard tomb.

Her Brothers were the craggy hills,
Her Sisters larchen trees—
Alone with her great family
She liv'd as she did please.

No breakfast had she many a morn,
No dinner many a noon,
And 'stead of supper she would stare
Full hard against the Moon.

But every morn of woodbine fresh
She made her garlanding,
And every night the dark glen Yew
She wove, and she would sing.

And with her fingers old and brown
She plaited Mats o' Rushes,
And gave them to the Cottagers
She met among the Bushes.

Old Meg was brave as Margaret Queen
And tall as Amazon:
An old red blanket cloak she wore;
A chip hat had she on.

God rest her aged bones somewhere—
She died full long agone!

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47348/meg-merrilies

The cones in the photo above are Larch cones (European larch) in honour of Meg's "sisters".

I used to worry about Meg, and how hungry she often was - always was? - as the post-war (WW2) was a hungry time, a time of food rationing. I don't mean we were deprived, we had enough, and in many ways it was probably a more healthy diet than many children in the West have now. But we were always really hungry for our meals, which were not lavish.  So I could imagine her hunger.

I now wonder about how she survived, homeless, living outside, no caravan, no nothing. 

Our current travellers, who are Irish Catholics, seem prosperous enough, thank goodness. Their cars, caravans and vans are all smart and new.  But I am guessing that Meg was a Roma gypsy, like the little lady who used to call at my parents many years ago. They are a different people, with a different culture and customs.

She would always have a cup of tea with us in the garden, but would never come in to the house. She said that gypsies were always accused of stealing, which is why she wouldn't. And, sadly, she is right. I once worked on a building site with a lad from a gypsy background and he was accused of stealing. Yet the stealing on the site was going on before he arrived, and continued after he left, and I don't think it had anything to do with him. So it was just prejudice.

Saturday, as I start this blog, is promising to be really sunny. Apparently we are in for an incredibly hot weekend. I am hoping for a good sea breeze, but time will tell. And hopefully this blogpost will too. I am not a fan of hot summers, though I know most people love them. Spring and Autumn are my favourite seasons.

We woke up on Sunday to a sea-fret  - the Channel and most of the Green had disappeared.  But once the mist had gone it was a very hot day - thankfully with a lovely sea breeze here.  Col said it was stifling further inland. where he was detecting with the lads.

I had a long chat with Bea on Sunday - phone chat - mainly about our mutual health issues, neither of us being young any more.

John Keats re-creates Meg so vividly in the poem, that I do believe she was a real person, she did live. And if so, and if she sleeps safe in Jehovah's memory, safe in "the everlasting arms", then she will live again one day. She will be able to live on this lovely planet, but without hunger or suffering. And she will have a home.  No-one will be homeless then.  The Kingdom of God will do what no human government can do, provide lovingly for every one of its subjects, worldwide.

The Oak Eggar

 

"There is an exquisite creature on our balcony!"

"I know", I said with a modest smile, "I like to sit out here and do my studying."

"Not YOU. THIS lovely creature."  (See photo above of the Oak Eggar moth that graced our balcony for a while.)

How perfect Jehovah's creation is.  And I hope that, one day, I will be just as exquisite. 

We are still having a lot of sunshine, but the other day it actually rained for a bit - a light rain, but much needed. As our balcony is a sheltered one, I was sitting out in it, studying, watching the rain, and enjoying the calm beauty.  The moody cloudy sky and grey sea seemed to make the Green ever greener in contrast, and the balcony geraniums even brighter.

It was wonderful to sit there with the beauty all around me.  It made me so happy in the midst of all my medical troubles.  And it made it very easy to thank Jehovah for the precious gift of life.

We got out early on Thursday and did our fruit and veg shopping. Weather nice, sunny, with a light breeze, and not humid. The windsurfers were out on a calm Channel. Col did not go metal detecting on Thursday.  That should be a HOLD THE PRESSES moment of course - but it is actually something of a sad one in that even Captain B is having to pace himself these days.

The two caravans - travellers - that re-appeared outside our window a couple of days ago had gone by this morning.  I did see a Police car turn up there yesterday.  Once again I noticed what quiet neighbours they are, evening and night wise.

And I got back to the Hall for the Thursday night meeting. The congregations worldwide are studying the Book of Acts at the moment.

This morning I zoomed with a friend and made some veggie soup - and we watched the Olympics.  It was bouldering today, won by a young lad from Northern Ireland.  Amazing to watch.

From The Field

Captain B phoned me from The Field on Saturday morning, to tell me it was freshly ploughed, which is excellent for detecting, and he sent me this photo.

I was thinking how hard farmers work. The fields change all the time. I managed to do a bit of work myself, changed the bed, got sheets, duvet cover etc washed - its great drying weather at the moment, being so hot and sunny. And I made an apple crumble for himself. I also caught up with my studying and did some witnessing letters. Though I did not get to the Hall in person on Sunday, but attended in pixel form. Not too well, adjusting to the new medicine.

We had our usual Monday Zoom sessions - all seem OK, though one of my siblings is facing an operation. We are all getting so old - well not so much our bro who is the youngest... 

If we had ever taken our series Wuthering Frights to its intended conclusion, our bro, who features as Branston, would have emerged as the best selling author, completely surpassing his feckless sisters, who continually failed to write their best seller. But we only got a few episodes written. And it was a long time ago - when we all lived in the same Northern town.

The caravans, or two of them, returned to the Green this afternoon.  As before, they are beside the playground.  Each caravan seems to hold a lot of small children, so I understand why they want to be near the playground.

There are riots in the UK at the moment. People are getting more and more angry and frightened. These rioters will be clamped down on very hard and many will end up in our horrendous prison system, which is already so overcrowded it is bursting at the seams. So I suspect it will lead to more anger, more bitterness, and more violence on our streets.

Psalm 37 provides the perfect antidote. It shows us that our Creator, Jehovah, knows how the cruelties and injustices of the current system of things on the earth are going to make us feel; it teaches us how to deal with them without being shaped by them. And it assures us our Creator has not abandoned us to this.

Let go of anger and abandon rage;
Do not become upset and turn to doing evil.
For evil men will be done away with,
But those hoping in Jehovah will possess the earth.
Just a little while longer, and the wicked will be no more;
You will look at where they were,
And they will not be there.
But the meek will possess the earth,
And they will find exquisite delight in the abundance of peace.

- Psalm 37:8-11

So how important is the field service, the Kingdom preaching work?  Everyone needs to know this, urgently. We all need to know about the Kingdom of God and need to start learning to live by its kind and perfect standards. Those standards protect us from letting "the world" shape us in its violent image.

And there will be exquisite delight in the abundance of peace for all who will do so.

Dressage

Can I find any poems regarding medical scans? Can I write one, given that I have just had one and am facing a second?  One would think I could but... 

Is there a moth somewhere with "scan" in its name?  The Scandalwood moth maybe?  If not, I will pick out a recent mothy visitor to the balcony to head the blog. The one above is a Common Marble.  Tenuous connection? Scans are a common thing these days.

It's the best  I can do.

Anyway, scan No.1 went much better than expected - I got there early and was seen straight away.  It has shown up one problem though.  What will the second - and more drastic - scan show?  

Our family visitors have been for the traditional summer visits - and gone.  They are all now safely back home.  They picked the sunniest week of the year so far for the visit, which included lots of trips to: beach, playground, funfair - all within walking distance - and two longer excursions to Brighton and to Butlins (Bognor).  And of course we had our evening out at the Arun View.

According to granddaugher Mark 1 the sea was actually warm!  Not bad for the UK.

During the visited we hosted a sandwich, salad and cake lunch for the York branch of the family, a friend of theirs, and cousin Elizabeth. So it was a bit of a family reunion. We don't have many of those these days.

And of course the Olympics are on, and we have been watching some of it.  Apparently it had a strange Bacchanalian opening ceremony, which I didn't see, though I saw a bit of the boats and the horseman on the Seine. 

But what a cruel world system it is.  And maybe the pagan nature of the opening ceremony was appropriate.  because now we have seen the cruelty involved in "training" the horses for the Dressage event. And that made me notice, for the first time (I am ashamed to say), that all the riders at the equestrienne events carry whips.  So what do all those horses go through in training?  They are not volunteers.

I will not watch the equestrienne events anymore. Is an Olympic Gold Medal worth even one moment of cruelty?

How much we, and the animal creation, and the whole earth, need the loving, perfect rule of the Kingdom of God, the heavenly government for whose coming Jesus taught us, and teaches us, to pray.

When we are living under the rule of that Kingdom, we will no longer need to pray for its coming, but I am sure we will thank Jehovah from our heart every single day.