Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all
If you’ve taken even a cursory interest in my drivel over the past however long, you will know that I wander around a lot both actually and metaphorically. A friend from my teeny tiny tot-rearing stage recently commented on FaceBook that she never knows where I am. Tempted though I am to serenely claim that I am being mysterious and elusive, the truth is that I generally have no idea quite where I am, what I am doing nor where I am going.
Appearances are often deceptive and I know that I am a confusing condundrum. I present as ultra-outgoing and sociable but the truth is, that although I find it quite easy to be the happy-go-lucky life and soul of the gathering, I am in fact rather the hermit and I certainly need time to recharge and that time is generally taken alone.
Enter my wanderings. I walk muchly and often as a solitary bee (with the noble and frankly ego-centric exception of The Bean and of course, when available, a goodly dollop of husband) and I find my re-set button pressed gently and effectively when I do.
Friends, true friends, I have few and, in keeping with, I believe, many, Social Media has interfered with this natural equilibrium. I partake less and less in the babbling noise, the king for a day, something to say because I am a self-invented expert-ness of it. I will flatter myself that I was rather good at it but it is akin, I think to rather good at tooting cocaine … it falsely bolsters you up and erodes your olafactory receptors to the detriment of having a decent pair of nostrils with which to twitch and inhale sensitively your surroundings. It has a place, of course it does (Social Media, not cocaine) but I think we really do need to be a little careful of this creeping addiction. And the way in which it induces behaviours that we would not normally indulge in. Think selfies and I will rest my case. For the avoidance of doubt there are those of you here in this blogging place, where we actually give some thought to what we are spewing out, that I do consider friends even though we have never met.
I do have a few lifers. I use the word wisely, for it surely must be some sort of sentence to be embraced wholeheartedly to my bosom and kept there. One such is JimPig. He came to me through a husband who was to prove diabolically damaging but The Pig stayed and I am glad he did. When we met, I already had a daughter and he had a son. I taught his son to skateboard. This made them both happy. My girlie was shy of 18 months old when we met and I made him her honorary Godfather. He bought her a chocolate stegasaurus from Harrods which stood on her special things shelf for years until she took it to a ‘show and tell’ aged 6 and the teacher confiscated it because it was chocolate, stashed it in her cupboard from where it fell on the floor when the door was opened and smashed into irrepairable pieces. The head teacher gave the 6 year old a ruler from Australia as a consolation. It didn’t work. My daughter is still stinging from the loss of her precious dinosaur – the scars will stay for her lifetime, doubtless.
JimPig is probably the greatest waste of academic talent I will ever meet. I hope he is because any greater would be dreadfully sad. Not that he is sad. His grandfather died when he was a Trinity Dublin under graduate and left him a legacy which was just enough to live a simple life on. A selfish life some would say. He is a linguist. He speaks eight languages fluently. Not that he will ever admit he is fluent. Linguists are like that. He looks like ‘Where’s Wally’ (that’s Waldo if you are from the US side of the Atlantic and as I am reminded by the quite marvellous Mel (of France Says) in the comments and one whom I certainly consider a friend ‘Ou est Charlie’ in France). Uncannily like him to the extent that when Wally was at the height of his sneaky powers sometime in the 1990s I walked into a large bookshop in Oxford and asked for the lifesize cardboard marketing Wally which they duly allowed me to bear delightedly away and stash in the boot of my Volvo three weeks later. The Pig feigned delighted when I presented it to him as a gift. I am sure it was feigned because I don’t think he either knew who Wally was or cared to find out.
It was the aforementioned daughter who christened him JimPig and no-one, least of all she, knows why. She was two years old at the time which is forgiveable. The rest of us were clearly not concentrating which may be less forgiveable. On her eighteenth birthday she had an interview for a London college and I suggested that we have grown-up lunch at the place of her choosing and invite The beloved Pig. She chose a very fashionable Italian restaurant for the flimsy and entirely defenceable-at-eighteen reason that it was known as a fertile celebrity hunting ground. We were late. There was a blizzard and we were tottering on foolish heels on frozen Mayfair pavements which I find iron hard and unforgiving at the best of times. When we arrived there was a rather tatty bike chained to the railings outside. We made eye-contact, nodded and mouthed ‘Pig’ in unison. Inside we were relieved of our chic designer tweed coats in which instants before we had been proud to be seen but which all of a sudden made us feel like hulking hicks from sticksville on account of the frankly frightening volume of furs that adorned the unfeasibly high-cheekboned, skinny thighed, sky-scraping legged Slavic ladies being lunched by slavering red-faced pinstripes quietly drooling across tables far too tightly squooshed into the odd interior of this modish canteen which included an incongrous porthole with views of raging seas behind it. It had the effect of inducing a sort of hypnotic nausea which seemed rather inappropriate in an eatery. In the midst of this, entirely oblivious to his contradictory appearance was The Pig. Wearing worn to softly transparent chinos and battered converse high-tops and with his shiny anorak on the back of his stylish but clearly, from his air of sitting on a wasp, wholly uncomfortable chair and his wreck of a rucksack stashed on another he was reading Herman Hesse in Italian. Because he could and because it was an Italian restaurant. The staff were clearly bewildered by this apparition. Was he so rich that he simply didn’t need to care what others thought, or was he truly a tramp? We sashayed over and joined him, landing proper smackers on his waiting cheeks – no air kisses shall pass on my shift absorbing but ignoring the collective startled intake of breath from the other, clearly far more sophisticated than we, diners. As it turned out lunch was mediocre but the company was divine. The Pig is hyper smart and raises you to levels of mental agility that are simultaneously stimulating and exhausting. When the bill came I was rendered white at the gills appalled … I was paying and it was twice plus some what I had expected. Of course I seamlessly effected nonchalence but kept the receipt and on checking at home discovered that each and every one of the small bottles of water we had drunk had cost £10. I counselled the daughter earnestly and urgently that in future it would be far better if she always insisted on the finest vintage champagne … I know for a fact from her friends and her husband that she took this sage advice earnestly to heart.
PS: The quote is from Herman Hesse’s 1920 work Wandering:’Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all.’ My picture is of Grenoble which is my home for the moment. I have read Wandering only in English, The Pig has, quite naturally, read it in several languages. It is only when I consider the cover now that I realise The Pig looks rather like Hesse.
The Pig, by the way, like my two brained husband has no Social Media accounts. Interesting. Perhaps. Do we think?
PPS: I couldn’t possibly write a piece in response to a challenge called ‘Wanderlust’ (the full library of noble entries here) without adding this moment from ‘A Fish Called Wanda’ … I quite simply couldn’t – enjoy.
Interesting piece. A propos, I also don’t do social media.
It has it’s place and I think we have to accept that, but like a virus it is running out of control. Glad you enjoyed it 😊
I accept everything that exist because one would be foolish not to, but I choose to exist without it for the same reason I choose not to waste my time on socializing with people who are not interesting to me.
Bravo!🎊🎉🍾🎈
I told someone else already that I give up on spelling today. Apparently, I have given up on grammar a few days before, to my utter embarrassment! Obviously, “everything that exists” rather than “exist.” However, I am still alert enough to notice that as a female cat, I deserve a “Brava”!
Thank you, dear Osyth, I am just flying on too much coffee and exhaustion – nothing that a bit of sleep can’t fix.
In France, in a rare moment of non chauvinism which I hope will be replicated on Sunday when le Pen is NOT elected, we would say Bravo irrespective of gender. In Italian, I guess you might say Brava to a woman though I’m ashamed to say that I had never given it any thought … Spanish? I have none so I can’t comment but if Bravo or Brava – both are intended from the heart ❤️ Go sleep dear lady. Sleep fixes so much, I find 😴
Thank you, and thank you for the correction. That’s one nuance of French language, among many, that my granddaughter has not shared with me yet (Spanish follows Italian in gender markings).
Nor do I, Dolly, for the most part – not enough time in my life to deal with twittering and posting pics of each of my meals, surroundings and clothing as I ate them (etc.).
LOVED the post, Osyth, and always enjoy your writing style. I’m sure I’m one of the few who would deign to suggest that ANYTHING could be improved, ::deep breath:: but so many neurodiverse readers struggle to stay tracked on long strings of text uninterrupted by white space – especially online. In the future, could you look for places to break up long paragraphs, pretty please?
And NOW, a message for teachers everywhere: we KNOW you are overwhelmed attempting to keep order in the classroom, but as a Senior who *still* recalls a couple of things taken away by unthinking teachers, if you are going to confiscate *anything* that is not a weapon — chocolate dinosaurs or a black baby doll from a white little girl, in my case — you MUST take extreme care to make sure you can and DO return in its original condition. Apologies are empty.
I had to pitch a fit when my mother arrived to get my precious, teacher-desheveled SaraLee returned to me, and will forever mourn the dress I spent many hours carefully constructing that a teacher decided needed ironing before the fashion show – given to an older student who melted the zipper, knocking it and me out of a much anticipated activity.
These are 50-year old memories, btw – so kids DO note and recall with mourning.
xx,
mgh
(Madelyn Griffith-Haynie – ADDandSoMuchMORE dot com)
ADD/EFD Coach Training Field founder; ADD Coaching co-founder
“It takes a village to transform a world!”
Hi Madelyn and thank you for your suggestion but sadly, like all artists, I have a style. You see. The thing is this. I am a writer. NOt a pleasing everyone along the way blogger. So I am what I am and to try and tailor my style to please all would be suicidal. Give the enormous quantity of ‘likes’ you have spattered my work with today I am, I must say, a little perplexed to receive this comment. You ‘like’ what?
I LIKE *everything* about your writing, Osyth – love it, actually. My sincere apologies if my comment made it seem otherwise (and I was certainly NOT suggesting you change a single word, btw – only to insert a return to add some white space when paragraphs get long).
I am lucky in that I am someone with Executive Functioning struggles who reads easily (more quickly with a book in my actual hand, but I can intake info on a screen as well, now since I have so much practice). I long-ago figured out how to stay tracked on long paragraphs — even deadly dull ones like the science tomes I read to stay up with the research (NONE of yours are in that category, to be clear).
I’m mostly thinking of my ND/EFD readers – I know they’d love your content too, but so many wouldn’t be able to manage it. JUST a suggestion, not a criticism – and one you have every right to totally ignore. I’ll keep reading either way.
Please forgive the unintended slight.
xx,
mgh
I take your point and it is kind of you to suggest that your readers would enjoy my work. I’m just me and I do things my way. I can try to remember to insert more white space but I fear that I may fall short because I tend to get engrossed in the voice spilling rather than anything else. I need you to know that I found it rather alarming to find 88 ‘likes’ and comments all of a sudden last night, the vast majority of which were attributed to you. It overwhelmed me and I found it rather uncomfortable. It’s just my crooked way 😊
Thank you so much for this response. I admire your writing and your heart so much I was totally dismayed that I might have created an unintended rift.
As I said, it was a suggestion – not intended as a criticism – and I will continue reading your super posts whether you insert white space or not.
I like to read all the comments when I read a post and “like” my way down the screen to keep track, as well as to let people know that I agree or find it interesting. I always appreciate it when my comments on other blogs are “liked,” so in my mind, turnabout was fair play.
I have been kept from regular blogging for almost a month now and have been playing catch up, so I have been reading several posts on each of the blogs I follow with each visit – I had no IDEA I had left so many. I’ll pay closer attention (and ‘like’ fewer) in the future. I wasn’t thinking that you were being notified as well.
Again, so sorry to be an annoyance. NOT my intention at all – I was actually intending to be supportive.
xx,
mgh
Very true; childhood emotional traumas stay forever and affect the rest of a person’s life. Unfortunately, not all teachers understand that an event or even a comment insignificant to an adult may constitute a severe emotional trauma to a child.
Your students can’t possibly know how lucky they were to be taught by YOU, Dolly — on every level.
xx,
mgh
Thank you so much for your kind words – I would blush if I could!
Totally deserved, my dear.
xx,
mgh
I appreciate the confidence, dear Madelyn!
Always! 🙂
xx,
mgh
It’s mutual, always!
awwww – thanks.
xx, mgh
🙂
I really enjoyed the film clip
It’s a favourite!
Oh, I miss your posts. They are always so full of truth. I am with you and your daughter – drink champagne as often as you can afford.
Bernadette, I’ve been a little blue of late ((it happens as I know you know)) but I am surfacing and though I will be a little elusive the next few days due to being away from internet, normal service should be resumed next week. You, by the way, I count as a friend not only in this context. I send you my warmest ❤️
I, too, am glad you are back 😊 I have also been paddling in mud recently and finding it hard to write. I was all set to write an amusing piece about our littles’ first Easter with us when something unimagineable happened and I was sent spiralling down into the mire. I find myself with no posts to post but strangely not getting anxious about it.
A wise friend (not The Pig in this instance) once said to me ‘go with it’ – I won’t bore you with the context but I have fallen on his words often in my life when the unexpected trips one up or when it seems like surfacing from ‘the mire’ is beyond me. And it works. Otherwise that old devil called anxiety gnaws its way in and then, in my experience, nothing makes sense at all. I hope you will be back and bubbling soon but in the meantime I hope you can just ‘go with it’ 🙂
Yep, thanks, not fighting it, just letting it do its stuff, also busy with family preoccupations – and watching Tour de Romandie! 😊🚴
Sounds very very good to me 😊
Thank you Osyth. It is rather a strange way to build a friendship but I value yours.
It is indeed and in truth I struggle with the notion but there are a few shining lights that make it all seem entirely normal. You are one such.
Are you a little blue?
Rather. I’ll write to you … Am at the house this weekend with little internet so a bit difficult til I get back to Grenoble
We all need those people like The Pig in our lives, who raise and challenge our thinking.
We do. My mother in law used to say ‘show me your friends and I’ll show you who you are’ …. I keep that advice carefully stored in my heart ❤️
He sounds like a keeper….and agreed only a two year old could get away with naming someone that…LOL love reading your post…..hope you are centered and ready to reenter the blogging world…..its nice to take a break from social media and just be….and you live in a beautiful part of the world where just being (with the bean and/or hubby or not) makes it easy…xxkeep twirling….xxkat
I’m back but will be a little elusive the next few days as I have to go to our renovation project and that necessitates a) wall to wall hard work and b) no internet. However I remain convinced that normal service is on its way. You, by the way are one of those I count as an actual friend. Keep twirling you too! I’m plotting the real thing this weekend 😉 x
Funny, when I first started reading this post I immediately thought of Wally, Waldo, aka ‘Ou est Charlie?’ Having read to the end I more convinced than ever that our minds are socially-virtually – even spirtually – linked. The off-line, unconnected life is definitely one in which I find myself happier. The trick for me is in the dosing. Long may you wander, dear Osyth! P.S. Thanks for reminding me how much I love John Cleese.
I shall edit to include Charlie which my dear Husband claims to have known perfectly well when I read it to him but omitted to share! We are clearly soul beasts and IOU a note to arrange that elusive terrestrial meeting. Long may you ride my dear!! Xx
Edited and linked to your sight in a bit of clever Social Media Marketing 😉
I am truly honoured. (She says, blushing but not knowing how to do the right emoji). I could use some of your social skills! xx
Skills? I wish!!!! xx
Great post as usual. I agree with the previous person. Drink some bubbly as often as possible. I always have several bottles in the fridge. From good champagne for special occasions to inexpensive prosecco or crémant.
I might write a post at some point on the advice I gave each daughter on turning 18 and 21 …. bubbles feature, as you might expect! Very pleased you enjoyed the post 😊
Thank you for sharing this story of The Pig. I have a couple of oddball friends who are similar, including one with Ronald McDonald hair, who wears mis-matched Converse (since long before they were fashionable, one might be yellow, the other blue, you never know) and rumpled button-down shirts with monograms that aren’t his own. He rides a bike everywhere, in all weather. And is dryly hilarious, gentle as a lamb and an amazing wordsmith. Such people are like little fireworks displays (though they aren’t doing it for attention at all), brightening the days of those around them.
As for social media, I am not on Facebook–a black hole for productivity. Do blogs count as social media? I consider them to be digital versions of small-circulation specialty publications.
I love the sound of your friend …. right up my alley. A keeper indeed, though you clearly don’t need to be told that! I’m afraid blogging does count as social media but I think it niches entirely in the way you describe and I avoid those that just reblog others work but rather take the time to write their own. Social Media can have a place but the dangers outweigh the values in my view.
Yes, reblogging seems like cheating. I also get tired of the shopping posts. I like info I can use, or something meaningful, like your story.
I treat it like walking into a bookshop and going to the sections that appeal to me. Meaningful is a lovely compliment by the way and if I can play it back to you …. yours is a treasure of a blog that I get all sorts of value from be it in advice and information I can use in my own life or in observations with substance. Keep doing what you do, lady 🙂
Herman Hesse in Italian – when most of us struggle with a menu! What a legend…….
Oh sister, home is everywhere and nowhere – I know that only too well, I’ve given up trying to work it out, maybe the Rapunzel House holds the key – speaking of which.
still no key! French administration be damned – if it was the in the Uk I would be stomping my impatient little feet and cutting my noise off to spite my face and pulling out of the sale……but we have signed the compromis so no such privilege – just as well as I am smitten.
We had a trip out there the weekend before last to introduce my youngest daughter (she of Bible in a year words of wisdom) to her, and she had all been completely cleared out by the vendors (or rather the ‘pappy’ with the holey cardie who was probably paid with the log stack that we had our eyes on!)
The upstairs landing is a much more usable space now that we can see the floor and the walls (I thought of you and the ‘decheterie’ that you were left to clear out and gave thanks) We now plan a second bathroom up there, and the ‘Pigionier’ has huge and Monsieur le Frog has it earmarked for a library………I can just see JimPig installed there (and you and I outside with a glass of wine)
Gorgeous photo also – you know how obsessed I am with the sky – in fact M le F is now photographing the sunset in my absence on his phone and whatsapping me each evening……
Maybe home is where the sky is…….
Much love
Lindy
It took us a year to get to signing the Acte and getting the keys …. it will happen all of a flurry and it will be the most wonderful home for you both. I am so fortunate to have you in my life. One that lives a life different and yet so similar to my half baked paradise full of longing to put down roots! I’ve been off the map for a while and will be this next few days but when I am back (from the renovation which is making my hair stand on end presently) I will email you. By then I should have a proper plan to be in Liverpool somewhere around 25th when the youngest piglet has her Graduation Exhibition. Much love to you, xx
25th 26th is good – 27th I go to Dublin (as you do…..)
Things is, as it is a long weekend, we sacrificed being together on our wedding anniversary this coming weekend in order for M le F to be able to go down and get cracking – now I am going to a bistro Cote in Liverpool with my daughter, friend and cousin to celebrate my wedding anniversary and my spouse is at home with the constant election publicity….hey ho xx
I will either fly in 24th and out early on 26th or in 25th and out 26th as I have commitments in Grenoble thereafter -30th. I know the feeling of not being together for the important dates too well. But you are making the most of things, both of you and you will cherish the time together all the more. Bon courage ma belle soeur! xx
I enjoyed the meander through this post, you write in such a lovely descriptive style. It flows from you like a smooth, yet burbling, creek in the height of Spring. Yes, a bit of contradiction there in my description, but that is how your writing feels to me. Quiet, gentle, slow and crystal clear moments, and then little flashes of speed and sparkle as it burbles on, both entwined to make a complete, joyous river of thought.
For me, home is always where my children are, (even with one flown the nest to their own home) and I have the strongest urge to be here always. I cannot imagine living anywhere else in the world than where I do, but I do so enjoy your stories of another part of the world.
Be safe, be happy, be home where your heart is.
Claudette you humble me. If that is really how my writing makes you feel then I am amazed and delighted. As you know I value you highly and I would count you among my little troop of friends I have never met. The hardest by far thing about finding love late in life and then finding I would have to live in a different land is being away from my children. I am proud of them for their indépendant lives but I miss them in a way that I don’t think my meagre words could ever express. As always, I wish for you happiness and content and that home envelops you in safety and warmth as it should 🏡 ☀️ ❤️
Ah, Osyth, I truly mean that is how your writing makes me feel. And Joy, I get a lot of joy of life feeling from what you write (even from those times that the subject is not joyful, I see it peek through). I am most humbled to be in your blog friends, perchance you ever travel to my side of the world I should count it a wonderful thing to meet you. I understand the mssing of children – I have to tame my fierce urge to be with them as I let them grow to be their own person. Parenthood has so many joys, and so many little “good” hurts too, and I count this to be one of them. Warmest wishes, always.
Thank you. I would love to meet you someday and with family in various parts of your continent, I harbour a hope that I will get ‘down under’ some day.
Oh how lovely. The company of truly great friends allows whatever happens around you – whether in a restaurant or even sometimes in a frightening world – to recede so that we can cope and enjoy our lives. The numbers of true friends we have simply prove that we recognise how very special they are x
What a lovely comment and absolutely on the money for whatever my money is worth! X
Osyth, as always your posts bring a smile to my face. Or it may be that it is just you that brings the smile. I don’t do much Social Media; I quit FB over a year ago, never to return. Just WP for me, because I have true friends here – and you are one of my favorites. One day my dear, in person we shall meet. Happy Day, Happy Week, Happy Life my dear Osyth. 🙂
I only hold onto FB because of my daughters but I would gladly put it in the bin. Apart from that it is WP for me too and for the reasons you give. And you, my dear, dear Terry – you are king not for a day but forever in my book of real friends made in this place. One sweet day we WILL meet … I can’t wait!! 🤗
My blog autoposts to FB and LinkedIn – otherwise I’d dump them both!
xx,
mgh
I love the film, “A Fish Called Wanda!!”
I am sure I read a chapter or two of “Steppenwolf” and one of “Siddhartha.” I think Hesse is brilliant but above my intellect! Wish I could say I feel guilty, Fiona. . .
I hold my home in my “core” (childhood memories) or my heart.
Home is where my heart is was embroidered on a simple cloth in my high school days by me, supervised by a Great Aunt Dot in Rockport, Mass.
People have always felt I was the one Miss Congeniality fit, once labeled in high school. I was a rather cocky toddler in ballet class, following the teacher’s lead, either for the giggles which ensued or due to my awkwardness. . . Mommy said I exaggerated in dramatic fluorishes.
I have had a habit of sitting like an onlooker of life, on benches, often take walks by myself. I usually re-charge but I like the newer concept of “resetting!” Somewhat kindred spirits. . .
I had a great and sweet guy friend, Bob, who was heavy and sweet. He showed up for my daughter’s ballet performance and often his mother would call me after a trip to ask for me to mail her a recipe of something I had thrown together. I was a single mom of a 5,3 and 1 year old one Christmas and he sent me a very nice sum of money so Santa would have something other than pajamas under the tree and one you apiece. Sadly, he married for a short time later he got sick and passed away. I went to the wedding but am less proud that I called him and wrote home letter
Try to find a copy of Wandering … it’s beautiful and certainly not above your intellect. Steppenwolf and Siddhartha are great works but not everyone’s teacup. Your descriptions of what home means to me strike many chords and your honesty, as ever humbles me. Be happy Robin … you are one I count among my true friends never met. But one day, one fine day, we will put that to rights ❤️
Ohh, so sorry. . . It was a beautiful summary of All the wonderful things he had done for me and how much I loved him as my best friend. Anyway, he was my first husband’s college roommate but he was almost all the rest of his short life was “my best friend.” The kids simply called him Uncle Bob. Sounds like your Jim was slightly like my Bob. Gotta get dressed and head off to the warehouse! Love you from a distance and consider you a dear friend, Fi. <3 xoxoxo
Jim and Bob are similar certainly. Decent good kind people who just fit in! Xx
I shall look for a copy of Wandering, Fiona. The library should have it! Thanks for seeing some similarities as well as having hope to cross paths. I have my grown children and grandchildren so no worries. I also have been dating for nearly 12 months an Italian man who has a Greek name, Calisto. 🙂
I hope you find it. I am overjoyed with this lovely news of your beau. May your lives be filled with love and joy 😙
First of all: great to see you back, Osyth!! 🙂 I hope the black dog has left (and for good! But since I´m familiar with him, I know how hopeless a wish this can be…)! Second: “A Fish called Wanda” is and will always be one of my most favourite films ever! I can watch it again and again, it´s like candy for the soul 😀 So thank you, for sharing this particular scene 🙂
I´m also quite wary of social media and although I am on fb, I don´t really use it except for throwing out a possible line for friends and family who I have lost sight of over the years… I actually would love to turn my back to it though, and maybe I will, who knows. Lately I have become a bit weary of the whole virtual thing… it´s quite time-consuming and steals a lot of my time that I could spent being creative… But then there are so wonderful friends like you that I would really miss so much if I would give up on it, and that I could not tolerate. So I keep on going and hope to find the right balance.
ThePig sounds like a jewel of a man! I love how you described your joined restaurant experience and how much he stood out of the crowd and made everybody wonder if he might be a multi-billionaire 😉 And you are soooo right about the champagne! 😀
And your photograph of Grenoble is stunning! Those clouds and the light… it absolutely reminds me of the works Byrne of my favorite painters, William Turner!
I wish you a peaceful, warm and sunny weekend, dear Osyth, with lost of lovely cake to lift up your soul! 🙂 xxxxxxx
Oh hurrah! Another Fish Called Wanda appreciator! I absolutely love it!! You entirely nail Social Media in that comment. I find it very very draining as well as being a consummate time bandit. However, I keep FaceBook and as another follower commented, it is all in the dosing. JimPig is a gem and a half and will never be allowed out of my circle of trust 😉 And your comment about my picture …. wow! Byrne, Turner – I’d better sign off now and eat a bit more cake. I have been dosing myself liberally and do you know what? That Black Dog has left the building (for now … jus the way that one is). Much love to you and I hope you too have had a lovely warm and sunny weekend xxxxxx
It really is one of the best films ever made, right? 😉 I have it on DVD and can not even begin to count how many times I watched it 😉 Kevin Kline as Otto is absolutely amazing and I just love how John Cleese speaks Russian 😉 The only other film that rivals it and is hard upon its heels is “Fierce creatures” 😉 – when I watch this one, nobody can really tell if I´m laughing or crying, especially at the scene where he´s hiding all these animals and talks on the phone with Wanda, eh Willa 😉
Ahh, I really could do with another go…maybe tonight! 😀
I´m sooo glad that old brute of a dog has left the building!!! Liberal dosages of cake usually does the trick which is why I tend to bake that often 😉 This way he doesn’t stand a chance 😉
Wish you a wonderful week! Much love 🙂 xxxxxxxxx <3
I’m with you on Fierce Creatures too. I wish you a joyous week too! Xxxxxxxx
Thanks, Osyth! 😄 xxxxxxxxx
Sorry! I got so carried away yesterday with John Cleese I forgot to leave a comment. Your Charlie sounds like a gem to be polished and treasured. My husband doesn’t do social media either. He was strong-armed by a mover and shaker he hoped might shake some work his way into opening a Linkedin account. (Linkedin in pronounced Link-ed-in in this household, and neither of us understand what it does or why.) Sometimes he tells me someone has tried to add him to their list of connaissances or whatever it’s called, and he’s ‘refused’ them. Thinks anyone wanting to add him to anything is up to no good. ‘But I don’t know who he/she is!’ he protests when I explain that that’s sort of like the point of these things.
Your husband needs to meet mine. He has Link-ED in (stet) and has three contacts all of which he tut tuts about because he is convinced there is something fishy going on. I have over 2,000 as a result of being a small business owner some years ago but I’m afraid I can’t enlighten anyone as to what it actually does. It seems to be a place where people crow about things or share things that are loosely business related. My network grows incrementally every year with zero input from me which must say something! My Pig is indeed a gem and he is treasured … I have many other stories which I will probably write in due time. As for John Cleese. There can never be another!
I think husband has seven contacts, all of whom he knows personally. Link-ed-in is a mystery to me but I’m not actually suspicious of it. Husband sees it as an infringement of his civil liberties if someone asks permission to add him to their network.
Land Rover people call them Landys. Our children call them Land Rovys. Or Pigs. They are rather reductionist. Like dogs with long noses are Finbars. It was a great rollocking ‘caisse’ anyway and if there’s only going to be one ‘car’ in your life it may as well be a Series III.
I can live with calling LVs Pigs. I can live with calling most things Pigs …. good things that is, being as how I’m a slavish devotee of all things porcine! Love Finbars for the long snouted dogs too … we call them snooters 🙂
Youngest is always saying things like ‘I booped his snoot’. I think it’s internet dog language. Pigs is never derogatory on my vocabulary. Pigs are good things.
One of the finest compliments I was ever paid was by a very old swineherd who told me I have ‘a definite affinity with pigs’. I stand proud. I shall ask my youngest about booping the snoot. She was filling me with various acronyms for dogs from the internet when staying last week. I can’t remember any of them but they made sense at the time!!!
There’s cat language and there’s dog language. Dog sounds noticeably less coherent than Cat, to my ear anyway.
Which probably translates to reality quite effectively!
Cats’ needs are pretty basic so they don’t need an extended vocabulary.
Hiya, Jane – I don’t really see the point of LinkedIn neither. People just leaving a copy of their CV on the internet – what’s that all about!
Kindness – Robert.
It probably depends on what kind of work you do. Doesn’t hold much interest for me. I don’t want to work 🙂
Funnily enough – neither do I. 🙂 Still – needs must. 😉
UGH! – LinkedIn has a bizarre spam-regulation loophole that facilitates the increase of marketing spam dramatically once you allow a person into your network (by hundreds, literally!) Your husband is a wise man – at least if he hopes to be able to navigate his email account efficiently.
I, long-ago now, stopped approving anyone I don’t know personally once I noted that most of the e-glut that ate my life came from those contacts, and have all but abandoned that platform.
I actually had to open a “secret” email address to get any work done, since getting off their “important info for you” mailing lists proved practically impossible (sent additionally by LI itself!), deleting them took almost an hour some days, and “unfriending” folks turned out to be unnecessarily complex.
xx,
mgh
Linkedin occasionally asks me ‘do you know these people?’ or words to that effect. They are always the same, people who used to work for the disastrous publisher who had my first book. I always ignore the message, but even if I wanted to ‘add’ them to my whatever, I’ve forgotten my password and can’t log in to my account anyway. Linkedin mostly leaves me alone considering me beneath its dignity, I suspect. Husband obviously intrigues them but he’s not the type to give in to cyber-bullying. Unfriending seven people wouldn’t be too onerous, but I imagine you have whole swathes of them. My sympathies. Jane
Thanks, Jane. My fault for approving them in the first place, I suppose – I was young and naive in the ways of social media marketing?
It’s managed to ruin email for me, however. I absolutely hate it anymore, thanks to their narcissistic arrogance.
xx,
mgh
I’m certainly glad I can’t get into it. There are enough timewasting social media outlets enough without that one.
lol – I can think of so many more interesting ways to waste my time!
xx,
mgh
I took up poetry 🙂
WONDERFUL!
xx,
mgh
🙂
The funny thing about th’interweb, as Son calls it, is that it sometimes, by some strange energy, brings things, people, to you at just the time you needed them. I’ve been suffering (suffering is too strong a word really, labouring under perhaps) an over-powering case of stage fright. There have been times when words have poured right out of me but lately the words are stuck somewhere between my collar bone and my belly button. Not just writing words but even speaking words. I’m not sure I can do this thing anymore and I’m not sure I can stop but I’m damn sure I don’t want to keep going in this fearful, tentative, half-arsed fashion.
Anyway, something in your words has soothed me. I think I’ll just float for a bit and see what happens. Sorry, I’ve said quite a bit for someone supposedly silenced. ThePig sounds like a true treasure.I have one like him. Never let him go.x
My dear Bun … don’t force it. This painful and frustrating blockage will suddenly evaporate and you will be filled with inspiration and your fingers will positively fly across the keyboard as you hammer out your brilliance. The inter web (please ask Son if I can steal that expression … I love it) is a help and a hindrance and I find it crippling on occasion. I have to go outside and breath real air because something about it suffocates me. I find it terribly draining and I find my anxiety suddenly goes off the clock. Once equilibrium is restored I then have a phase of being very fresh and frisky with it before the malaise sets in again. Float, my friend, float well and I will always be here when you surface. By the way, in case I haven’t said it recently you are an extraordinarily gifted and smart lady and I am proud to know you 🎁
Thank you. Just that, thank you,
😊
Oh so true.. I heard a piece on the news tonight about a teenager who committed suicide as a result of the bullying he’d experienced for the last few years on Social Media.. His mum was speaking and described his desperation to read what people were writing even when she tried to confiscate his phone.. So Sad and the ‘dark side’… Thank goodness there’s also a light side too though and we are able to meet brilliant people who we would never have come into contact with otherwise… You’re one of my great connections Osyth.. Thanks! x
The dark side is all too prevalent and it is terribly important that we try to protect our young. The bright side is people like you. Thank you for being you. X
Thanks Osyth and thank you for being you and bringing a smile to my face with your wonderful words xx
ps – the clip – hilarious! xx
ONe of my all time favourites – I couldn’t resist using it, however tenuously! Xx
I’m not surprised and I’m so glad you did! xx
I love this post, Osyth. You have a gift for illustrating your story. I can just imagine the snooty Italian restaurant (or perhaps the guests were snooty?). This is my social media – WordPress. FB sends me into a panic and friends give me a row for never looking at my cell phone. They all know my house phone number…
I, too, would mourn a chocolate stegosaurus. That’s the coolest gift, like, ever!
Sorry for the delay – I’ve been away with no internet. Bliss! Thank you for your lovely comment, my dear Kerry. I just do what I do but if it paints a picture that someone recognises I get a nice warm fuzzy glow 😊 By the way I think the guests were far worse than the staff though The poor Pig did get hit on the head several times by waiters with large trays which he declared deliberate (did I mention he is one of the most neurotic creatures on earth?). I have FB but I have to be very stern with self because it makes me very anxious if I get drawn in. WordPress is much better …. more thoughtful somehow. As for the Chocolate Stegosaurus … number one daughter will always mourn its loss because, as you rightly say, it was the coolest gift (like) EVER and you should know because I rather think you are a pretty cool gift too!
Thank you so much, Osyth and now I want a chocolate stegosaurus!😸
Love the pig story and laughed out loud at your seamlessly effected nonchalance when you saw the bill, I would have done just the same and then got home and wished I had drunk champagne instead! But the broken chocolate was just too too sad! I think Social media, like most things, is fine if used properly and sensibly. I am not a huge FB fan but on the other hand I have found old school friends that I thought I had lost touch with twenty years ago, so many of us are now friends from all over the world, swapping stories about what we have been doing in the intervening years. Blogs are indeed social media, this interaction between you and I right now is very much social media, but is it good or bad? I like to think that this is one of the upsides to the Internet!
Kindred! We are indeed engaging on a Social Media platform here on WordPress and I, too, have FaceBook. As I said to another reader who loftily told me they dont indulge … it has its place and it is here to stay but like everything in life it needs managing. I dont think you need much educating – I’d say you are pretty media savvy 😉. Daughter number one will never get over the broken chocolate (she”s 30 now) …. and if Windy Airport ((the nickname of the offending teacher) is ever mentioned, she does into a howling frenzy of retribution. We try not to goad her too often!!!
Your thoughts and babble lead me down a road leading to your door whereupon I enter and gladly wash the dishes of tonights dinner just to be with my friend.
That is such a previous thought. Soonly my friend (though you need not wash the dishes … just bring the cognac 😉)
You know I will.
For me, home is where my husband is: what happens when I no longer have him is to be determined. Mark you, I may go first…
I am on FB…but just to keep up with friends who are there: I don’t find it useful or attractive apart from that.
The blog world annoys me sometimes…the people tracking down your reading lists not because they find the blogs interesting, just to add them to the list of future useful contacts…but on the whole it offers a community of thought, of thoughtful people and that I do appreciate.
My home is with my husband also. We have 5 children between us but they are all grown and mostly flown and though I know others might view is as selfish we believe it is our time. They should be free to live their lives unhindered by dribbling old fogies and we ours unimpaired by them. We are there when needed and it is lovely to see them but roots and wings is what I chose to give them and they, being mine took it literally. My husband is 8 years older than me and it is easy to assume I’ll be the grieving widow but who knows. For you, I know your husband’s health is a driving factor. I wish you many more years together and no worrying for the future. Blogging often tires me and can irritate and even anger. I am particularly irked by plagiarizing either of ideas or harvesting followers. I prefer therefore to just do it my own way and hope I bring little irritation to the feast.
Blogging as such gives a great deal of pleasure…contact with others, widening the horizons….but I do admit to being annoyed when used as potential fodder!
I share your irritation – I suppose it is like that old adage about imitation being the sincerest form of flattery. No matter how many times my mother told me that it never made me any less annoyed when someone stole an idea and the same goes for pillaging one’s hard earned readership/!
And you wonder what they want to do with all these contacts….
That takes me to a place darker than I care to consider in honesty.
Loved your writing and your post ❤
Thank you so much Madame Zenista …. it is lovely of you to take the time to read and to comment. I hope we will see more of one another along the way 🙂
For sure! I have to return to explore your blog😊
You are very welcome any time and I will return the compliment of course!
Very interesting piece and true friends are always limited in numbers. I haven’t joined the world of Facebook, Twitter or other social media and have never regretted of not being part of that world. I guess the blog does count as a social media in a certain way but it has such limited readership that I don’t get too inundated by comments. Keep writing and wandering (Suzanne)
Thank you Suzanne. Blogging is certainly social media but I find it controllable and I enjoy the interactions with thoughtful people such as you. FaceBook I have simply because I have children in the UK and Malaysia and they enjoy seeng pictures and the odd ripe comment from me. Twitter I can’t handle at all. I’m glad you enjoyed the piece and I totally agree that real friends can only ever be counted in tiny numbers.
Well worth the wait Osyth and the excerpt from A Fish Called Wanda once again had me laughing out loud. Warmest wishes 🙂
I’m glad it was worth the wait, Andrew … it would be dreadful if it had been a total damp squib! I love that clip … it never fails to make me snort in a most unfeminine way!
“damp squib”…impossible 🙂
You are far too kind and exactly what I need just now 😊
This will also raise your spirits if you haven’t seen it already, especially the Gilbert and Sullivan at the end 🙂 http://wp.me/p3gSod-4Kb
Hope you’re getting your balance back. Loved the story. A French friend always insists on a carafe of water in restaurants from the tap so she doesn’t get stung. I’m not good at all at social media but as one who has just embarked on indie publishing it seems inevitable. Still holding out against the mobile phone tho’. Lovely writing as ever. I miss you when you don’t post but can guess how it is for you.
I feel a little more équilibre it must be said. I have these malaises from time to time and experience has taught me not to force it but rather to get out and wander until it the fog clears. Your friend has it dead right and these days I do the same … the fateful event was twelve years ago and the daughter is probably more cosmopolitan now than I ever was. You will have to indulge in some SM (not S&M) for your book – its the way of things but I am sure you will balance it perfectly! I will try not to let the fog descend again and to be a little more regular with my posting again since you are so kind about my pathetic output!
Oops, losing my grammar. I mean the water comes from the tap not the restaurants.!
Great post, Osyth! I completely understand your view. Farmguy accused me of being a hermit just the other day. Like you, I crave alone time to recharge. I also agree with you regarding social media. I love interacting with readers on my blog; however, I sometimes feel overwhelmed trying to balance it with everyday life.
Thank you! We petits hermits must stick together and support the need to recharge with me-time. With so many calls on your time I think it is remarkable that you are so generous with your blog. One of the things I have always noticed is that you take the time to interact with your readership and I know it is appreciated but Social Media (including blogging) can be taxing and draining so make sure you take care of you amongst all the other calls on you 😊
Thank you for your kindness and support. I really enjoy visiting with everyone who comments on my posts, and I feel anxious and guilty when I can’t respond promptly. However, I think most people understand. 🙂
I am certain they do … I struggle with the same guilt and anxiety and yet the rational me (which occasionally sternly speaks to my heart) knows that actually people are kind and generous and understanding. The stern rational voice seldom wins though 😉
😊
I suppose I have become a hermit since making friends in Cincinnati has proven difficult and my close friends are scattered. HOWEVER, since I have always been quite an extrovert by nature, I believe I’m qualified to say that even we must have our alone time to recharge – despite what the Myers Briggs folks may claim.
xx,
mgh
PS. I thought I was already a follower, but just noted that I was not. Not sure how that happened, but it is rectified now.
Any chance there’s an executive summary available? 😉
Kindness – Robert.
Ha! I was rather thinking of turning it into a dissertation 😉
I was rather thinking that it would make a beautiful PhD thesis too! 😀
Your piece opens like a story, and a real interesting one !! One is compelled to read, your style is so influential 🙂
YOu are far too kind … I felt a little rusty and rambly on this one but I n’opère it might have made a modicum of sense!
I find it comforting to know that I am not the only one on this planet earth who doesn’t have any social media account other than this poetry blog where I get to express my creative mind..
and yes, reading your previous posts gave me an impression that you are very sociable. ..but reading this again made me think otherwise. ..
right now…I just felt sooooo damn good..lol…I am not the only one who’m you can’t easily find on the Internet. ..
You are wise. Social Media is akin to Plato’s Allegory of The Cave in my view. The distortions it evokes, really quite scary and the paranoia it is capable of invoking so easily. I could wax lyrical endlessly on the subject. Stay out of the cave, Mich – I’m happy that you are unblemished!
one time I met a new friend in the gym where I used to do my usual work out…she told me.. “I think I have trouble with my internet cos I can’t find you in facebook”…and I said “your internet is perfectly okay, I am not on Facebook”..she replied “what kind of human being are you?” I just shrugged my shoulders and walk away ..
What kind of human being? A smart one 😉
Haha. ..I will have to say that. ..the next time someone make.fun of me not being on social media..
You’re absolutely right about social media, but it does have its uses! I still believe that connecting with people on Twitter was important in helping me through my spell of depression five years ago, and can be good for keeping in touch with friends who don’t use Facebook. I joined FB at a friend’s suggestion just before I retired, having always believed that it was somewhere that young people organised orgies and wasn’t for me. I now wouldn’t be without it, although the orgies seem to have passed me by 😊
I have remarked to a few people who rather piously tell me they have no social media, that it has a place and it is here to stay. I think it is all about being mindful and being your FaceBook as well as your WordPress Buddy, I know you are mindful as, I hope am I. Mostly xx
It’s like anything in life, really: don’t do it to excess. I think we’re both fine xx
Moi aussi mon ami!
😀xx
What a gorgeous picture and yes home is surely within you! Oh by the way, miss you dear Fiona xxx
Thank you darling Lynn! I’m hoping for news of when I might be able to return to your side of the Atlantic so that, importantly, we might be able to chat as we used to, very soon xxx
That would be amazing xxxx
I don’t think any well thought out comment would add very much to your words already quite replete with meaning and much colour. So I’ll keep relatively stum. Though I do enjoy your words very much. 🙂
Thank you Maria. Replete with meaning and much colour is a lovely comment. I’ll keep it! 😊
I love your blog and the ideas about what makes our home. There is no fixed place. The style of writing is uniquely appealing and relatable.
Thank you so much. That is such a thoughtful and kind comment. I am delighted to welcome you as a follower – I hope you will continue to enjoy my little ramblings. 😊
I love your posts, which are always deeply thoughtful and philosophical. I am a little too deeply-rooted in the practical to think about what goes on underneath. I must admit to being very attached to physical places, but some of those remain inside us for life, even if never visited again in reality.
such a great job osyt
Thank you so much, Danish …. I really appreciate you taking the trouble to stop by and comment 😊
its nice to see someone actually wrote so deep and with a magnificant language! u definitely have a good command to writing..best wishes! spread more knowledge!
Thank you. You have actually and truly made my day!
I have missed visiting your enchanting and enthralling ramblings of the mind!
I shall be back!
(I need half a day, in quiet sunshine with good music and a bit of red stuff to savour your tellings and tales… maybe tomorrow afternoon will be that day!) 😉
It’s always good to see you when you have the time …. if you have a glass of the red nectar as well you are doubly welcome 😉