A Moment in Time

 WHAT COLIN DID    13th December 1985

Colin and Mark crouch on the floor

Looking through photographic magazines

By the score

More gadgetry to spend their money on

Is what they’re looking for

Or a ten thousand dollar photographic tour

All the goodies that will lure

Monies out of bank accounts

In large amounts

Bank Managers and wives are feeling sore.

Colin, developing photos at the kitchen sink

Framed in the hatch above a shell filled shelf

Seen through a fringe of potted plants

Makes quite a good picture himself.

These are two moments from our expat years, moments I tried to capture as they flew past. They are from the days of Abqaiq Court when we had our own improvised dark room. I knew, back then, how to develop Col's photographs and make prints. How the world of photography has changed! I am trying to remember who Mark was - yet he probably spent a lot of time in our small house... it was a long time ago.

They were the days of the Dhahran Camera Club, and Bruce Bailey. I learnt a lot about photography from him. He was apparently related to David Bailey, the famous photographer of the Sixties. We have some fabulous photos Bruce took of the empty quarter in Saudi Arabia in our bedroom. They don't seem to be in Col's photo gallery though, so I have chosen a Saudi sunset to head this blog.

Our years there went through so many different ages/stages - and these poems were written in our early years.

What moments am I having now? Friday night was a bad one, very painful, but the pain in my shoulders abated as the day went on. I made a fruit cake - an old fashioned boil and bake recipe from my Cranks cookbook. I have made it many times over the years, but it turned out particularly well this time, once I got the hang of my new oven.

I needed to work out how to set its timer. So I got out the Book of Instructions... unfortunately, as I don't have a Masters Degree in Higher Physics, I was none the wiser after reading it. So I had to stay awake. While I had to cook it a lot longer than usual, it has turned out very well. Captain B says it is my best ever.

Let's just hope it's not my last ever.

Monday was reasonably busy - Doctors appointment in the morning - they were running 45 minutes late - discussing a new medicine, one I am not at all sure about - then family Zoom - then lunch - just soup, fruit and yoghurt - did some studying as the meeting is tomorrow night - Circuit Overseer visit - lay on bed and sofa quite a lot - easing pain in joints and back.

Tuesday - a day of Zoom, and the first day of the Circuit Overseer visit, so I hope to saddle up my pixels and get to the morning Field Service, and again this evening to the mid-week meeting. And in between I have a double Zoom with a friend.

The "increasing of lawlessness" continues worldwide. One of the items in our meeting tonight is about what is happening to our brothers and sisters in Haiti and The Ukraine. And above all, how Jehovah is supporting them in the awful events they are caught up in.

Isn't the corruption of the whole system become more and more obvious. Private Eye has always been very good at exposing it. And I do wonder if the relationship between men and women, worldwide, has ever been as bad as it is now.

The consequences of our first parents disobedience in Eden should be so evident. Trying to go it alone without that vital connection to our loving Creator has been a disaster.

Under a Mauve Sky

The Sky Above

Under a mauve sky
The world is stirring

Under a lilac sky
The world is wrapped in a morning hug

Under an azure sky
The world is focusing

Under a tangerine sky
The world is relaxing

Under a crimson sky
The world receives a goodnight kiss

Under an inky sky
The world sleeps

Daniel Age 12, Year 8, Hadlow School

https://nzpoetrybox.wordpress.com/2021/08/30/poetry-box-august-challenge-some-favourite-sky-poems/

I was looking for a poem to go with a photo of our August skies that Col took and I came across this one from a young lad at Hadlow School. I thought it was just right.  He expresses beautifully how the sky changes all the time.

Thanks Daniel.

We saw the Lady of the Flowers on Wednesday morning and talked some more about the Kingdom of God and all the wonderful things it will do for us here on the earth.

Those wonderful things include perfect health. Think of how Jesus healed people when he was on the earth.  I am thinking a lot about it now. The pain in my foot has lessened, but my right shoulder has taken over painwise. It is my "good" shoulder. I have limited movement in the other, so life is difficult. 

Friday morning it was both my shoulders...  I wish I was allowed some effective painkilling.  Oh and because I had not realised that my recent medical appointment was for another blood test I forgot to warn the nurse that my skin will no longer take sticking plaster. So I am now slowly, painfully, trying to remove the plaster without taking the skin off with it.  The movement involved is making my shoulder worse too...

Old age is difficult, painful and undignified.  But I truly am grateful still to be here to watch the moonrise over the sea, to watch Autumn slowly begin - maybe my last one, this side of Armageddon.

I am hoping for unnumbered Autumns after that, but that depends on my Creator, not on me.  Having that hope though makes all the difference, and I wish that everyone could have it.  We are making a special effort to offer everyone a free Home Bible Course this month, and maybe many will accept.

Col left very early, laden with metal detectors and his sandwich lunch (ham and chutney, and marmalade muffin) for The Field and I have a field service Zoom at 9:30.

The Circuit Overseer visit is next week, and that is something we always look forward to.

A Sad September Song

 3. W. B. Yeats, ‘September 1913’.

Yet could we turn the years again,
And call those exiles as they were
In all their loneliness and pain,
You’d cry, ‘Some woman’s yellow hair
Has maddened every mother’s son’:
They weighed so lightly what they gave.
But let them be, they’re dead and gone,
They’re with O’Leary in the grave …

https://interestingliterature.com/2019/08/the-best-poems-for-september/

This is a sad take on September - a specific September - a lament for the romantic Ireland "dead and gone" (if I am understanding this right).  This was written the year before The Great War, WW1, fell on an unsuspecting world - and so much and so many were dead and gone after that. 

We have just been talking to our student, the Flower Lady, about the Biblical significance of the date 1914.

The photo one is one of Col's from our beach - I wanted something for "her yellow hair".

It was a stormy night last Thursday, lots of white horses on the Channel Friday morning. And not a single moth in our hotel. I managed to get letters done to both Richard and Beryl which I had intended to do in August, but somehow August ran away from me before I managed it. My meeting attendance was in Zoom Thursday and Sunday.

A pair of pigeons are trying to set up home on our balcony and so far all our shouting, waving of arms (the Captain) and quiet reasoning (me) has failed to deter them. It is sad though if we are now so short of suitable homes and roosts for pigeons that they are reduced to balconies.

And on Monday I was in such pain, sole of right foot, that I was back on my Zimmer, painfully tottering around. We had the family Zoom sessions this week - and we also got a letter of appreciation from Butterfly Conservation thanking us for our donation in memory of Richard.

As long as Richard remains in Jehovah's memory, held safe in "the everlasting arms", he will live again, but not until the whole earth is being restored to paradise under the loving and perfect rule of the heavenly government, the Kingdom of God. As I probably wondered before, maybe Jehovah will wake him up in a cloud of butterflies.

It was raining again Tuesday morning and The Green is beginning to look like its old self. Tuesday was my latest blood test. Can I have much blood left in me by now? Apparently I have a problem with both white and red blood cell counts, which might explain why I am so tired that getting up and getting dressed feels like climbing Everest - with no oxygen and no Sherpa support.

The Teapot Factory on Overtime

As we are creatures of habit these days, we have an early supper on a tray in front of the telly while watching Countdown.  We record it.  And last week a lot of contestants came and went. I think one was toppled every day, so they were using up their Teapots at a frightening rate.  Though the young victor on Friday looked like he might be staying around, maybe to become an OctoChamp?

I put teapot into the search engine of Col's photo gallery - nothing.  Then tea - nothing.  Then pot, and came up with a crabpot on our local beach. So that is as close as I can get.

We watch Bargain Hunt at lunchtime, when we are both at home. I am usually at home these days, Col not necessarily so, his Detecting work keeps him busy.

Our food has got into a routine too.  We always have oats, with seeds, nuts and bananas for breakfast - Col has his oats as porridge, mine are soaked overnight.  We nearly always have soup - lentil/veggie homemade - for lunch, followed by fruit and yoghurt.  Col has sandwiches and cake when he is out in The Field.   And in the evenings Col usually has: pizza (Waitrose). baked potato with salad and beans, a pie from Turner's pies with new potatoes and veggies, a cheese and tomato omelette, and chicken/veggie soup on the days that he has a sandwich lunch.  And he does often have crumble and custard for his dessert - plum crumble at the moment.

We still have our weekly supermarket delivery and pretty much order the same things week after week. I used to cook (and entertain) a lot in our expat years - and even in the first years of our retirement - curries, Thai food, Chinese food, Italian, TexMex, lots of interesting things. And actually writing this has reminded me of the tasty chili that Nadine cooked for us - and that I had decided to get out my old chili recipe from our expat years that I made so many times.  

It is a very versatile recipe, incorporating lots of veggies and can be used with rice, pasta, or even topped with potatoes as a cottage pie.

In the face of all that is going on in the world, this blog seems occupied with the trivial details.  Yet this morning I was talking to an American friend on Fb, a Jewish lady who lives in NYC. She was talking about the increasing violence and lawlessness on the streets there and was asking what things are like where we are.

I did mention "the increasing of lawlessness" the Bible prophesied for this time, and am wondering if there is any chance she will want to discuss it. We are living in, as the Inspired Scriptures say, "difficult times, hard to deal with".

Twayblade

We chose this oddly named orchid for our September calendar.  Can it be a year since we chose it? This year is fairly hurtling along, and it is time to start thinking of a theme for next year's calendar...  (I always wonder now, will we be here next year though?)

I can't tell you how much I hope so.

There was a young orchid of Cheam/in colours of white and of green/it had two blades, not one/but wanted a gun/that tough little orchid of Cheam.

And while this specific orchid was not photographed in Cheam, I expect it can grow there as as well as anywhere else.

I have almost certainly said this before but it seems that Adam and Eve first opened their eyes in an Autumn garden, given that the earliest calendars start in The Fall.  How lovely must that garden - the Garden of Eden - have been?  I don't think we have ever stopped longing for the paradise that was lost.

But while we cannot go back and find it, it does lie ahead, if we will seek for our Creator while he is to be found. 

The News online today reflects the "increasing of lawlessness" worldwide.  And the "natural" disasters increase the damage they do.  Nepal is still still searching for those workers trapped in tunnels after the horrendous glacier collapse send a wall of mud water and rocks through the valleys, wiping out whole villages en route. The total of the dead keeps on rising.

We talked about this at our study with the Flower Lady on Wednesday morning, as we were talking about what God's Kingdom will do for us here on the earth - it will give us real peace and security for a start.

She does seem to see now that no human government can put things right.  So I hope we can continue to build on that.  

Autumn Daybreak

         

Autumn Daybreak

Cold wind of autumn, blowing loud
At dawn, a fortnight overdue,
Jostling the doors, and tearing through
My bedroom to rejoin the cloud,
I know—for I can hear the hiss
And scrape of leaves along the floor—
How may boughs, lashed bare by this,
Will rake the cluttered sky once more.
Tardy, and somewhat south of east,
The sun will rise at length, made known
More by the meagre light increased
Than by a disk in splendour shown;
When, having but to turn my head,
Through the stripped maple I shall see,
Bleak and remembered, patched with red,
The hill all summer hid from me.

Edna St. Vincent Millay

https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/autumn-daybreak/

I chose one of Col's photos of autumn in Houghton Forest for this blog to mark the approach of the season.  What this coming autumn will be like I don't know - but it will be beautiful I hope.

And now I have to ask: Will it be my last Autumn?  Hopefully not Captain B's as he is a bit younger then me, but at our age, who knows?

Now, as August nears its end, we are having more rain. There was a downpour on Saturday and a small shower on Sunday afternoon as Col was driving me back from the Kingdom Hall.  The Green is definitely becoming green again - tough stuff, grass.

It is nice to have Col home on Sunday, though I am afraid I did not manage a Sunday roast dinner or anything. I managed to rustle up the usual lentil/veggie soup followed by fruit and yoghurt.  And there was a bit of pork pie left for supper that he had with new potatoes and salad - and ice-cream to follow.

After a stormy night, the sea is sparkling, the sky is blue with clouds scudding slowly across - if its possible to scud slowly.  The balcony geraniums are a little battered from the storm but are smiling in the sun.

There is already such a feeling of Autumn in the air. And of course my hope is to have unnumbered Autumns in the restored earthly paradise, alongside Captain B.  

I hope we all will.

Roland Milk

 

Col took this beautiful shot of the moon rising above the rusty hulk some weeks ago.  So I thought I would remember Beachcomber's floppy-collared poet Roland Milk, and his ode to the moon in this blog:

The moon and I 

met face to face

in a sequestered country place

I thought the moon was heavenly

I wonder what it thought of me.

I doubt we will ever know.  But it probably found Roland rather fey.

We had an interesting study with the Lady of the Flowers on Wednesday morning. She was very welcoming as usual.  We were doing Lesson 32, God's Kingdom Now Rules, in the Enjoy Life Forever Book.  You can look up book and chapter on JW.org, under Library and under books, if you want to.

If you do you will see it contains an examination of Bible prophecy in Daniel and Revelation which tells us that the Kingdom of God began its rule from heaven in 1914.

Now, given that, why have things on the earth gone so spectacularly badly since then?  The Book of Revelation explains what happened in heaven at that time.

And I found this interesting quote from an American newspaper, in 1914:

  “The terrific war outbreak in Europe has fulfilled an extraordinary prophecy. For a quarter of a century past, through preachers and through press, the ‘International Bible Students,’ best known as ‘Millennial Dawners,’ have been proclaiming to the world that the Day of Wrath prophesied in the Bible would dawn in 1914. ‘Look out for 1914!’ has been the cry of the hundreds of traveling evangelists.”​—The World, a New York newspaper, August 30, 1914.

We, Jehovah's Witnesses, were known as International Bible Students back then, or sometimes Millennial Dawners. But how busy my brothers and sisters had been before 1914 even though there were not so many of us back then!

The warning was sounded and now millions are listening. And while, yes, it is a warning, we are trying to tell you that this is the darkest hour before the dawn and things are soon to get wonderfully better. The present wicked system of things on the earth is soon coming to its end. That really is good news.

And given these fearsome floods that have swept away whole villages in Nepal in an instant - caused apparently by the partial collapse of a large glacier - how much we need a government that can perfectly control the natural forces, the heavenly one.

We woke to clouds and rain on Thursday morning - precious clouds and precious rain. And we are having friends to lunch today - just a sandwich lunch in the lounge - with ice-cream to follow. My cooking and entertaining days seem to be effectively over - this side of Armageddon. But we did a lot of entertaining in our time, including the early years of our retirement.

And with my back aching simply from making the egg mayo filling for the sandwiches I need to remind myself to thank Jehovah that I have actually had a long enough retirement to speak of its "early years".

We had a lovely lunch with Steve and Angela - and it was a shock to realise how long it was since they came round for a meal - back in the days when we had a dining table, not a computer desk. The years race by, faster and faster.