It has been a busy week in the Holme Valley. Despite the fact that, somehow, unaccountably, it has reached half-way through February without me really noticing, the weather is still stuck firmly in January mode. Cold, damp, wet, dark, rainy, apart from Monday’s brief radiance of pale sunlight, which may have been golden, but was almost certainly counterfeit.
With it being so cold and rainy, the animals are still reluctant to move far from the fire. Tig has shown a passing interest in “walkies” but doesn’t particularly relish being turfed out into the garden at night to do her “necessaries” before it’s time for bed. Kitty darts out of the door, scuttling across the decking, her ears flat and her tail down, and you can almost see her thinking, “Brrrrrrrrr!” Then she comes back in through the bifold doors and sits in her cat bed in the hearth, steaming quietly and giving herself an elaborate cat-wash to get rid of the rain from her fur, the pads on her extended back foot looking for all the world like the segments of a fresh, pink raspberry. Only a cat would think of licking itself to get dry. Actually, in the past, some of our cats haven’t even had to bother: my mother used to dry Ginger off with kitchen roll if he happened to come in wet from the garden.
My week has been singularly unproductive. Just getting anything done in this country any more is well-nigh impossible, despite the well-meaning efforts of the army of people who seem to be working on my behalf. This week I have learned that I may be getting some more intensive physio, and possibly a standing hoist at home, plus I have had visits from the Job Centre people and the Benefits Welfare Officer.
I have also managed, a considerable achievement in my opinion, to procure one of the two necessary quotations for the concreting of the ramp up to the side door of our side of the house. Set against those questionable achievements, however, was the fiasco that was Monday, and the renewal of the car tax.
While I was in hospital the MOT expired on my car, and the clutch went, so Deb arranged for the garage to come and collect it and store it off road at their premises all over Christmas and the New Year holidays period, while we saved up enough to have it fixed. Because I came home from hospital in a wheelchair and am now chairbound in my current state, this means that now I am receiving DLA, and I am entitled to a free tax disc in the “disabled” class.
Last week, we told the garage to get on and do the MOT, but for one reason or another, backlog of work, or whatever, they didn’t actually get round to doing it until Monday, by when it had got to the stage whereby I was ringing them up and haranguing them telling them that I needed a valid MOT to tax the vehicle.
We finally got the vehicle back from the garage on Monday afternoon, complete with new test certificate, and I sent Deb off with the MOT, the insurance certificate, the tax exemption certificate from DLA, and the reminder, to the nearest post office that does motor tax, only for her to be told that – whereas able bodied people can sit at home and do their car tax on the phone or on line - for disabled tax discs you have to not only take the stuff in in person, but also to take the original log book as well! So she had a wasted journey, and I was left considering whether this is actually discriminatory against people with disabilities.
Anyway, at that point, mindful of the fact that if we didn’t do something that day, as 14 days had gone by since the tax disc expired, and not wishing to get fined, I had no option but to go online and declare a SORN. That evening we found the log book and I duly signed and annotated it, and the next day, Deb went back and taxed it in the disabled class, handing over the signed log book, which should now be nestling somewhere at DVLA. I say it must be, but on Friday I received a letter from DVLA to say that, because I had not either taxed my car or declared a SORN, I may now be fined £80! I have written back to say that if they care to check, they will find that in fact, rather than not taxing it or declaring a SORN, within the space of 24 hours, we did both! I am hoping that it has just crossed in the post, or it will be yet more spaghetti for me to unravel.
All this was happening on Monday afternoon to the background of the plumber crashing around, having finally come to fit the missing “O” rings on Colin’s boiler, and in the midst of all that, Debbie’s Mum and Dad arrived back with their car on the back of an AA Low Loader, having failed to make it to Mike’s heart appointment at Papworth Hospital because the suspension collapsed on the A1. Deb had no choice but to give them a lift back home, leaving me to deal with the plumber while simultaneously on the phone to the car insurance company, trying to access an online version of my insurance certificate to print out. Anyway, the “O” rings were duly fitted, which should at least prevent Colin’s boiler from emulating the Space Shuttle Challenger any time soon.
Monday, then, was a draining day. Deb had some good news on Tuesday, though. She may well be able to pick up not one, but two or three more sessional courses, one of which may be teaching literacy to would-be teachers of literacy, and one teaching IT. So, with Debbie teaching the teachers and doing IT tech support, truly the Barbarians are at the gates. Still, it’s all money. The third one was to teach GSCE but she is unsure about it because it involves teaching literature and maybe answering awkward questions about the purpose of poetry.
I, of course, would love nothing better, and I have considered getting a long black wig, borrowing her staff ID lanyard, and pretending to be her, for just those lessons. The wheelchair just might be a giveaway, though.
By Friday, the pressure had eased slightly. But I had forgotten that Debbie was supposed to be meeting up with some of the Bolton University people in Manchester that night, and Granny came round because she was going to pick up Debbie off the late train and give her a lift home. All of which duly happened. Because Debbie hadn’t indicated whether or not she would want to eat when she got in, I erred on the safe side, and made her a Pea and Lentil Frittata with accompanying mustard and fennel mash, which she duly wolfed down anyway (despite having already had something in the pub, washed down with three pints) and then fell asleep on the sofa, half way through “Special Victims Unit”, with her head resting on the cat, using it like a pillow, resembling nothing more than one of those medieval tombs where the Crusader’s crossed legs rest on a little dog.
The snow returned on Saturday, God rot it. Actually, by the time I had finished glaring at it out of the window, it was already turning first to sleet and then to rain. I sincerely hope it won’t stick around for long. While we were watching the snowflakes fall, and arguing about whether you could teach anyone anything about poetry against their will, a thrush, in its vivid plumage, suddenly alighted on the bird table outside, cocking its head from side to side and searching for crumbs with its bright shiny black bead of an eye. Debbie mentioned that she had often seen it sitting on next door’s roof, but I was sceptical that it was the same bird. I asked her if she could remember what its song sounded like:
“Of course not. I don’t do bird impressions, I’m not Percy bloody Thrower!”
Realising that I was in a hole, I stopped digging. I spent the rest of Saturday pecking away like a demented thrush myself, at creative writing projects, which is at least a break from the endless filling in of online-job applications. For some reason, as well, there seemed to be a never-ending procession of sirens along the road outside for most of Saturday. In fact, since I have come home from hospital, there seem to be more emergency vehicle sirens than ever, or perhaps it’s just that I notice them more, and the “Big Society” really isn’t coming apart at the seams and descending into anarchy.
Of course, the rule of law is the only alternative to anarchy, and, coincidentally, the rule of law seems to be at least in part the subject of the various texts which the powers that be in the Church of England have decided are appropriate for the Seventh Sunday of Epiphany. This spooky coincidence does, I suppose, argue against the impression I had previously formed and put forward, that they are texts selected at random by a blindfolded Rowan Williams, sticking a pin into a Bible.
The Old Testament text, Leviticus 19: 1-2 and 15-18, kicks off with God telling Moses that he should point out to the Children of Israel that, because he is holy, they are holy. Nope, me neither. This is why the O.T. generally (and Leviticus in particular, to be honest) leaves me cold. Apart from the mildly amusing bit about not eating ferrets, like you would even want to, anyway. Even then, though, I did learn something from this passage. I was amazed to find that verse 18 says
Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
I really thought that the O.T. was all about thunderbolts and smiting, yet here we have the later words of Jesus pre-figured. Very odd. By contrast, the Psalm this week failed to make even a dint in my lack of recognition. Psalm 119: 33-40 says:
Teach me, O LORD, the way of thy statutes; and I shall keep it unto the end. Give me understanding, and I shall keep thy law; yea, I shall observe it with my whole heart. Make me to go in the path of thy commandments; for therein do I delight. Incline my heart unto thy testimonies, and not to covetousness. Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity; and quicken thou me in thy way. Stablish thy word unto thy servant, who is devoted to thy fear. Turn away my reproach which I fear: for thy judgments are good. Behold, I have longed after thy precepts: quicken me in thy righteousness
Much as I applaud the adventurous use by King James of the word “stablish”, I don’t necessarily go for keeping to the law. This doesn’t mean that I am an outlaw. My forest survival skills are minimal, and when it comes to tights, I don’t have the legs for it, and green just isn’t my colour. My problem comes with obeying the law when the law is obviously wrong. I am not alone in this of course, everyone has their own interpretation of what is “obviously wrong” – the Christian bed and breakfast owners who refused to serve a gay couple probably thought the law was obviously wrong, as well, though Leviticus is strangely silent on the subject of the full English breakfast.
It does point up a crucial dilemma for anyone who believes in any sort of moral structure though. What do you do when your beliefs clash with the law? Ultimately, unless we want anarchy, the law must prevail, otherwise you would have everybody making it up as they go along. We must respect the idea of the law, I suppose, pretty much in the same way as I respect the idea of the Monarchy, respecting the institution, whatever you might think of the current and future incarnations of it. All you can do is try and minimise the conflict. Don’t take a job in an abattoir, if you are a vegetarian.
It usually occurs in cases where there is a conflict between the letter and the spirit of the law. If you believe this situation is wrong, the best thing to do is to campaign for the law to be changed. UK Uncut are currently pointing up the gap between the legal and the moral position over taxation for multi national companies. What these people are doing may well be legal, but is it moral, when libraries, community centres and swimming pools are closing left right and centre?
Jesus, of course, decides, in the specified New Testament passage, to re-write the rule book in Matthew 5:38-48
Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away. Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so? Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.
Love your enemies? What’s that all about then? This famous passage contains all of the things I find most difficult about Christianity. Every day I struggle against an overwhelming tide of crap, but the nearest I ever get to loving my enemies is that reluctantly, I allow people who really do deserve to have every last ounce of the living crap choked out of them on account of their innate stupidity, to carry on living. But usually, even that is only because I don’t fancy prison food much, and the alternative would create lots of paperwork. And I could bear a grudge for England, if grudge-bearing ever becomes an Olympic event. It’s easy for Jesus to say “be perfect” but, as I said last week, sometimes I am not even convinced that Big G himself is as perfect as we like to think he is, or at least, his idea of “perfect” is very different from ours.
Funnily enough, I found an echo of this in considering the final text specified, 1 Corinthians 3:10-11 and 16-23.
Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness. And again, The Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain. Therefore let no man glory in men. For all things are your's; Whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are your's; And ye are Christ's; and Christ is God's.
If God’s purpose is so at odds with wisdom, that the wisdom of the world is foolishness in the eyes of God and vice versa, and God knows the thoughts of the wise, and they are in vain, why are we bothering? Why am I even bothering to type this sentence? (Why indeed, I hear you cry!)
I am still waiting to be battered by Big G from last week. I don’t know which is worse, actually, being battered or being ignored. In the week, Maisie sent me a couple of prayer cards bearing novenas to St Jude, the patron saint of lost causes and things which are despaired of. In the spirit of a football manager who is trailing 2-0 in a crucial fixture with 30 minutes to go, I have been using them, bringing on the nuclear option, the sub Jude to play up front alongside Padre Pio. I had previously thought that praying for the intercession of a scary Italian monk with the gift of bilocation would be enough to gain Big G’s attention and get me up out of this bloody wheelchair, but clearly I need the extra beef of the big lad carrying a club, with his hair on fire. Yep. Definitely my kind of saint.
One thing Jesus did get right in his bit of today’s scriptures was that line about the rain falling on the just and the unjust: so, once more the weather has prevented me from getting out and about this weekend, but I have at least been assuaging my longing for the North of England with its mountains and fells, and the lake shore at Derwentwater where I suspect that even now the first green buds are showing on the bare branches of the trees overhanging the lake, I’ve been playing music from Northumberland while writing this. For some reason, “Keep Your Feet Still, Geordie Hinny” has attached itself to me as an “earworm”. I like it because it has personal associations – I remember Uncle Bert and Auntie Nancy getting up on stage at the Blackburn Welfare Club and singing it at their golden wedding anniversary party – but also I like its unremitting working class humour in the face of adversity.
Perhaps it’s a skill I need to acquire. I get a feeling I’ll need it next week.
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