Three telephone wires pass through the upper branches of a yew tree at the front, so I’m drafting this quick, before the tree’s violent agitations snap them and my internet connection.
Like a child in a bygone age, I sit wide-eyed on a wooden stool, gazing out at the storm of gusting wind and rain. The passers-by deal with it bravely, I mean the pedestrians, whose shallow bank-balances consign them to a closer contact with blessed Mother Nature than their richer brethren who ride past splashing them on the ankles.
For me, kissing the sky, on any excuse or none, is my ecstasy, but today a double dissuasion keeps me indoors. The weather is one but I’m not scared of wind and rain. The main shackle is leg pain, gradually subsiding as my resting muscles mend themselves.
I could stare from this upstairs window all afternoon, like a confined child with nothing to do. But the sight of these telephone wires, plucked like harp strings by the savage and tortured yew tree, makes me nervous. In childhood I would love to flirt with the danger of high seas as they crashed against the esplanade, threw pebbles across the road and mashed up anything in their way, including me if I stumbled and couldn’t escape fast enough. Adults lose this sense of reckless adventure when they have property to protect.
The pub staff put up billboards: “Great Pub Food Now Being Served” (which the wind soon blows down) and one by one the customers brave the elements to go in, including a man, dog and shopping bags. A road sweeper passes by on duty, but he too pops into the pub for a break. It’s called “The Bird in Hand”—certainly worth two in the bush for its regulars.
John Milton ends his sonnet “On his Blindness” thus:
God doth not need
Either man’s work or his own gifts. Who best
Bear his milde yoak, they serve him best. His state
Is Kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed
And post o’re Land and Ocean without rest:
They also serve who only stand and waite.
(I’ve had the audacity to amend the punctuation.)
Do they also serve who only sit and look? I’m sure they do. In the last few months I have observed various recent immigrants to this town, for example young Poles. They wander the streets with shaven heads, but they are not punks looking for trouble. They are Church-going Catholic boys, here legally since Poland joined the EU. They’re hungry for work and you know from their eyes they’ll find it. They see our town differently and that is their main value: fresh eyes.
Another group of young men, within the security-fenced compound of a factory, where they looked like prisoners, were shifting rain-sodden oil drums and planks and rotting cardboard and nameless trash with extraordinary enthusiasm, as if they had just arrived in the Promised Land. I guessed they are illegal immigrants. Where everyone else saw a depressing eyesore, they saw Opportunity.
It must be the way we see things that changes the world.
a wayfarer’s notes 
surreal
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BTW, seems your life is getting miserable by the storms! good luck.
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I love to watch storms, but from what I've heard (and the pics) the storm lashing you right now is truely frightening.
Eyes of opportunity vs. eyes of entitlement.
One of the most embarrassing phrases I hear periodically from a friend: when I recount some tale of woe and struggling with my house she says with a desperate, solemn intensity “you shouldn't have to put up with that!”
Again and again it startles me until I remember the wide difference in our backgrounds as we grew up. I remember I am lucky, and she simply expects more than I do. I have much more than I had as a child, so I count myself fortunate.
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The storm blew over quickly leaving clear skies. Others have had it so much worse. This house is at the bottom of a valley. The phone wires have remained intact.
What do you mean by “eyes of entitlement”? Is that a comment on illegal immigration? This country has been so wrecked by the Blair government that I think “entitlement” no longer carries any moral weight.
“You shouldn't have to put up with that!” sounds like an exclamation from the privileged, to go along with “Only little people pay taxes.” Throughout history, we have all had to put up with that. Strangely, I find myself with no motivation to leave the ranks of those who have no choice but to put up with that (whatever it may be at the time) in order to join the cushioned and protected, whose sense of outrage carries weight for powerful forces are always at their behest: e.g. “a good lawyer”.
I am happy to be one of those who rely upon luck, and whatever the weather brings. (I use whatever power I have of course, but reject the compromise of traiding integrity for more of it.)
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this was not about illegal immigration.
when I said “eyes of entitlement” I was thinking of the inevitable contrast between those who have some, and those who have less. To those who have, putting up with less seems intolerable. To those who grew up with less, they see opportunity where more priveledged souls might see nothing.
I tried to illustrate what I meant by comparing myself with my friend: I grew up with less, while she grew up comfortably middle class. Anything less than that tidy package seems unbearable to her.
To me, she is looking at the world through eyes of entitlement. She thinks I shouldn't have to put up with my less-than-perfect house; I know that it is putting up with it that is enabling me to come out better in the end. To me it's an opportunity to build to something I couldn't afford to buy outright.
And I'm quite willing to work hard to build up to a more comfortable, safer life. I've seen friends and relatives die from lack of medical treatment: that's what poverty means to me and why I will work to avoid it. I do wish to cushion and protect myself to the best of my ability.
I guess I didn't do a good job of explaining myself.
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Actually as I read this post I have flashes of an Alfred Hitchcock movie running through my head, Rear Window.
I hope the pain in your leg has subsided.
peace, joy and Love be with you.
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Thanks for your further explanation, Hayden. You were just a little succinct the first time, so I jumped to wrong conclusion.
I am very interested in the differences between you and me, when you say, “I do wish to cushion and protect myself to the best of my ability.”
I realise that I also hope to be cushioned and protected, but by angels as they see fit & not as I specify. In return for that, I feel free to use the best of my abilities to support my angel-inspired vision.
Things just seem to turn up when needed. It's just as well otherwise the Marthas would take over the world and the Marys would die of starvation.
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Thanks for your good wishes, Serenity. The pain in leg was impervious to medication, rest, exercise and anything else I could think of. There was no visible sign at all.
I say “was” because an event in my life this morning seems to have brought to an end an inner conflict which may have been the root cause of the physical pain and interruption of habitual healthy attitudes.
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