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Regina Brett, aged....er......90

In this blogposting…
* Life’s Lessons
* Paper Sculptures
* AGM XXXI
Excelsior!

LIFE’S LESSONS
My inclusion of ‘Life’s Lessons’ in the last posting seems to have stirred up something of a proverbial hornet’s nest amongst the more critical - not to say restive - members of our sacred congregation.  (If you want to see the list - and if your computer operates like mine - all you need to do is scroll down the page you’re on now.)

You may already have seen from the Comments box that alarm-bells sounded as soon as the source of the list was revealed as a viral email.  Val’s researches quickly showed that Regina Brett is not 90 years old but, instead, a sprightly 55-year-old.  As you can see, she looks even younger.

Nor is she a wise old ‘daughter of the soil’; she’s a highly-paid US newspaper journalist who therefore makes considerable amounts of money from dreaming up ‘heartfelt’ lists like these.

But Val’s comments were not the only criticisms I received.  Others included:

‘Ian, you must be joking.  I thought you were immune from these sentimental internet musings…’
‘This list is preposterous drivel; Ian - you’ve let your guard down’
‘What’s next, Ian?  Pictures of puppies and kittens to make us all go ‘aaaaaahhhh’?’
‘Lots of the items on the list are not just mawkish and saccharine - they are unrealistic, unhelpful and untrue.’

That last comment came via email from Mike in Melbourne (he who contributes so much to our Truckshunter Geography), who was particularly agitated by the list, as you can tell.  He went on to say that, for many people whose lives are hard, unhappy and poverty-stricken, the list will read like a sick joke ‘dreamed up by a comfortable, middle-class white American lady with nothing to do but concoct lists like this’.

His email certainly made me look at the list in a new light - especially the comments he made about individual items included on it.  And I’m afraid he’s right.  Commands to ‘forgive everybody everything’ are not just unwise but immoral.  And the advice to ‘Yield’ is simply incomprehensible.  Being told that ‘you already have all you need’ will sound hollow to the millions of people who don’t.

On reflection, I still think that there’s a lot of ‘good sense’ in the list.  But basically, that’s all there is - self-evident truths about which it does no harm to be reminded occasionally - but surrounded, in this case, by sugared, and often meaningless, sentimental homilies.

I plead guilty to a general - and hopefully temporary - lack of sceptical good judgement and stand corrected.

Here is a picture of a puppy and a kitten.

Aaaaaaaah.

PAPER SCULPTURES
And now for something much more up the Truckshunter Street, as it were.

A friend recently told me about some mysterious paper sculptures that started to appear anonymously in several of Edinburgh’s city libraries.  This was the first one…

It’s made entirely of paper and stands on a book of poetry.  The note left beside it read:
‘We know that a library is so much more than a building full of books… a book is so much more than pages full of words.… This is for you in support of libraries, books, words, ideas….. a gesture….’

Soon afterwards, others began to appear with similarly uplifting and (in my view at least) articulate messages.

I love looking at them and hope you do, too.

Thanks, John.

AGM XXXI
It’s time to start planning for the first AGM of 2012.  Hildie has suggested a new venue, namely the cafe in Newcastle Art Centre.  It’s attached to a shop and gallery of the same name at the bottom of Westgate Road, more or less opposite the Assembly Rooms.  It’s lovely there, there are tables outside as well as in ( - you never know - ) and a surprisingly fine sculpture dominates proceedings.

If you’ve never been, you’re in for a treat.

The AGM will take place at 1100 on Thursday 16 February and a splendid time is guaranteed for all.

CONTACT ME
Post comments on this blog or email me:  truckshunters@googlemail.com