After the love has gone

Usually, I abstain from writing about politics, the main reason for this is that I don’t really feel qualified to offer a rigorous analysis. Mostly, I deal with feelings (an allegation often levelled at women - as if emotions are a shameful, ludicrous and irrelevant notion). And right now, what I’m feeling is concern. No, concern doesn’t cut it - it would be more accurate to say immense unease.

From the jeering triumphalism of the right, to the gloomy comparisons to 1930s Germany on the left, then on to the cynicism and nihilism of (some of) the abstainers, there is scant comfort on social media this week.  I’m scrabbling around for something positive to say and I’m struggling.

It’s not so much that we’ve democratically decided to leave the E.U; an organisation which, even the Remain campaigners acknowledged, wasn’t perfect. It is the horribly distasteful symbolism of the thing. The ugly, racist rhetoric that categorised much of the Brexit campaign, was disturbing in the extreme. Comparisons were made to Nazi propaganda - particularly in relation to the misleading “Breaking Point” poster that *Farage posed in front of on the very day that Labour MP, Jo Cox, was murdered for her humanitarian views; allegedly by a man shouting ‘Britain First’ as he attacked.

*Nigel - hideous, smirking, leather driving-glove of a man!

Whoops, I’ve descended into irrational mud slinging and catcalling, I’ve descended to their level.

[Just as I was trying to write this post, I cam across something far more pithy and succinct :

https://www.the-pool.com/news-views/opinion/2016/25/on-being-a-brown-skinned-brit-in-a-post-eu-referendum-world/on-being-a-brown-skinned-brit-in-a-post-eu-referendum-world ]

So far, so emotional and visceral, on my part. Because, when the arguments used to ‘leave’ are all emotional and visceral, and Michael Gove says that people are sick of ‘experts’, where else is there to go? I’m hoping, in a horribly petty way, that those very right-wingers who are hopping up and down from one leg to the other, waving their flags and mocking and sneering at those who grieve for democracy and for a kinder, more inclusive world, feel the negative effects of Brexit. I hope their haulage businesses go down the pooper and they feel it where it hurts - in their wallets. But the great irony of course in that is that, when it does come back to bite them, they’ll still blame all the bloody foreigners!

Already one of the great lies of the Brexit campaign has been exposed -

• That the £350 million that we send to the E.U would be spent on the N.H.S:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/24/nigel-farage-350-million-pledge-to-fund-the-nhs-was-a-mistake

And here are some more:

http://indy100.independent.co.uk/article/8-of-the-most-misleading-promises-of-the-vote-leave-campaign-ranked-in-order-of-preposterousness

So, what can we do now?

Now, I know that not everyone who voted OUT was racist and/or right wing. In fact, a significant number of Labour voters, that I know, voted that way. Nice, decent people. The Labour party needs to address the problem of a disenchanted (we can’t say disenfranchised) working class. Jeremy Corbyn has acknowledged this (and yet he, of all people, is being blamed and scapegoated for the result, much as immigrants are often scapegoated for the problems that the wealthy elite create...).  His was one of the more honest voices in the campaign: ‘remain but reform’ was his official line. A proper, left wing Labour party, which is seen as a genuine opposition to the old Etonians who are ruling the country (even as one goes, another Bullingdon club bore, is waiting to take his place) needs to woo back the voters, who have gone over to UKIP.  And we, the 48% who did vote to stay in the E.U, need to try and come together and form a formidable opposition. (Maybe some of the Tory 'remainers' might want to think about a shift over to Labour?? Come on, you know we have all the more interesting people on our side - actors, writers, musicians and the like ;) )

#MoreinCommon

(I just need to have another cup of tea first.)

The Joy of Walking

The. Joy. of. Walking.

Yes - you did read that right. I can’t think of any time, recently, when I haven’t felt better after a long walk. When I attended a Mental Health awareness workshop the other day, a recurrent theme was the importance of exercise. We were shown a video, produced by the World Health Organisation, on depression, which stated that exercise had shown that it could be as effective as medication in combating mild to moderate depression.

Now, I’m not really a fan of exercise, that is to say, I’m not really a fan of sport - playing it or watching it. At school, I was such a hopeless duffer (or rather, I had such scant confidence in my own physical prowess) that I ducked when someone threw the netball to me at school. That’s right - rather than risk dropping the ball, or missing the ball, I ducked so that someone else could catch it. One of my school friends was all too fond of reminding me of this. (She might be reading this now, actually, she does read this blog sometimes.) I come from a line of duffers; my mum never begrudged providing me with a note, excusing me from P.E, because her own mother had always done the same for her. I was always the last to be picked for any team - rounders, netball, hockey etc and quite resigned to the fact.

The only thing I was any good at was swimming; it must have been something to do with the effect of weightlessness that the water produced, but there I felt at home. My technique wasn’t brilliant but I had masses of stamina (and I really wish that there was a way I could have written that without it sounding like a double entendre). I could swim or float for hours.

In my twenties I discovered running; tried it for a while, loved the endorphin rush but started to knacker my knees so downsized to walking instead. And that first walking holiday - to the Lake District, hiking for hours, in between visiting Beatrix Potter and Wordsworth’s houses and eating wholesome food at a vegetarian hotel,

http://lancrigg.co.uk/

was bliss. Honestly! It was wonderful; it made me want to eat homemade soup all of the time and walk for hours. I’d always been afraid of heights (as you’d fully expect of the sports duffer) but on this holiday I overcame the fear, somewhat. I put this partly down to my super efficient walking boots and partly to a newly purchased walking pole. We were the youngest people at our hotel but I didn’t care - I was happy to be a young fogey. I was also resigned to being overtaken by sprightly old-timers on our hikes; racing past me as I picked my way, gingerly across the stepping stones.

Sour milk ghyll 

I felt healthy, I felt close to, dare I say, ‘at one with’, nature.

But then, the walking fell off a bit until recently when I got myself a fitness tracker, which I’ve already bored everyone senseless with….

Nowadays I walk for health and pleasure and I feel cheated if I don’t have time to walk to work. I always feel better after a long walk, even if it’s raining and I get drenched, there is the pleasure of a hot shower at the end of it (unless I get soaked on the way to work).

This has been a truly horrific week in the news; a week of senseless acts of  violence and hatred. When atrocities happen, they can make us feel utterly powerless, depressed and sometimes guilty. Nothing can make that right, I wouldn’t make that bold a claim for the power of exercise, and in a way, we owe it to the victims of these crimes to pause for thought and give them our compassion - we shouldn’t want to instantly forget about it. But walking through the park today, gave me a sense of groundedness after the surreal horror of the news. At least when you are moving, it gives you a sense of control; even if it’s just for that little portion of your life.

If you are feeling down; it might do the same for you...

Easedale Tarn (if memory serves correct)

Festival Survival Kit

So I did it - I went to a festival, with the kids, and survived. It was fun in parts (a curate’s egg of a concert) and I’ve compiled a list of festival (and camping) essentials, for the uninitiated. Things to bring to keep you clean, sane and healthy.

1. A torch

So you can find your way back to your tent in the dark. Also, so you can go to the toilet safely (and see the disturbing evidence of other people’s lack of torch). Men - if there are no lights in the toilets and you haven’t a torch, could you not at least just sit down to pee?!). 
As a bonus, the kids can entertain themselves with an impromptu lightshow and blind everyone else in the process.

2. Baby wipes

I heard a rumour once; perhaps it is just one of those things that has entered folklore, so wild and fanciful is the idea, that some festivals have showers. Granted, my experience of such things is limited but I have never come across such things, hence the need for the wipes. Akin giving yourself a bed bath…

3) Dry shampoo

You can get little, mini ‘holiday sized’ cans now! Please see above, with regards to lack of shower facilities.

4) Wellies

An absolute must. Then you don’t have to worry about ruining your trainers. I alternated between wellies and sandals at my most recent festival (such is the nature of British weather).

5) Anti-bacterial wipes and hand gel.

Self-explanatory really...

6) A water carrier.

Fill it up at a tap then you don’t have to rely on your essential and rapidly dwindling, bottled water supplies.

7) Brioche buns.

As our friends said - these things would survive a nuclear holocaust, or at least being bashed around in your bag and baked in the sun. They last for ages and make a decent breakfast food. Not the healthiest but then - you is at a festival!

8) A pocket mirror

To make fire

Nah, just kidding, to check for dirt smudges, sunburn etc. Or you could just go totally don’t-give-a-toss and not look at yourself for a whole weekend. It’s liberating (I’m told).

9) A rain poncho

Look, I’m going to level with you here - you are not going to look stylish. You can’t even wash your hair so just go with the flow (man), put on a circlet of flowers and just don that poncho if it rains. The poncho is light and goes over your clothes. It will keep you semi-dry and that’s all that matters. In your sleep deprived, dehydrated and slightly inebriated state, you will think that you look like something from Woodstock ‘69. (Just don’t look at the pictures ‘til you get home, OK, just focus on that image in your head).

10) A good book

If you need to escape to a quiet corner (as I did, when my 3 year old daughter wanted to go back to the tent for a nap) the book is your friend. (Although this puts me, rather disturbingly, in mind of The League of Gentlemen - Pauline’s pens, pens are friends...) When you are away from home a good book can be your solace and your escape. I’ve read of travellers who take their well worn favourite books away with them, to turn to in times of homesickness and that sense of spaciness and alienation that sometimes attacks the most seasoned of travellers. I’m not suggesting that you would get homesick at a festival, just that, it’s really handy to have some portable, peaceful entertainment with you; when the noise and the drinking all gets a bit too much.

11) Earplugs

There will always be a group of wankers staying up far later than you, playing loud music and talking and laughing long into the night and early hours of the morning. Ideally, you should try and be one of those wankers, yourself and then it won’t bother you. However, this isn’t really an option when you have kids, so draw straws (if there are two of you) on who gets to wear the earplugs*

* Sadly, I wore them at the weekend and they didn’t really work, but they might work for you!

12) A bonus one

A guide to the nearest hotels/B&Bs - for if it all gets too much or you are planning for the next year.

The disparity between the real and the ideal

Many years ago I realised that there was a great, yawning gap between the vision of the person I wanted to be and the stark, sobering reality of the person I actually was.

As a teenager, I revered the 1960s, had an idealised view of it and wished I’d been around then. I loved the music, the fashions, the people and I wanted to be a hippy. I duly donned some love beads, had my nose pierced, bathed in patchouli oil and bought shares in henna as I fruitlessly attempted to turn my jet black hair, pillarbox red. I chucked around phrases like ‘I’m a free spirit’ and ‘go with the flow’and fantasised about having a string of Bohemian love affairs and living on narrow boats. I thought that I wanted to travel extensively and rough it along the way; sleeping under the stars, preferably accompanied by a man with long hair and a beard. 
Who was I kidding? I hate ‘roughing it’. It’s not that I want to surround myself with expensive things or anything like that; it’s just that I’m a neurotic, germ-hating fusspot. I want to sleep in a structure which has four solid walls and a proper roof and I want to sit on something comfortable. I don’t even like putting my bag down on the floor of a public toilet so (if you have any experience of toilets at music festivals) you can imagine how I feel about using them.

My first experience of camping brought me to earth with a bump. My boyfriend and I had got the train and ferry to Amsterdam, massive backpacks strapped to our spines like Teenage Mutant turtles. It was a blazing hot day in May so we pitched our tent under a tree for the shade. That night there was a massive thunderstorm and I spent most of the night worrying that we were going to get struck by lightning, this was in between was trying to avoid rolling over onto my mud-caked Doctor Martens. Which brings me to one of the crappiest things about camping - having to have all your chattels piled up around your ears - backpack, baby wipes, toothbrush, sopping wet towel - the whole crappy lot!

My wannabe Bohemian spirit deserted me - I wanted to sit on a proper sofa and sleep in a comfortable bed, at a reasonable distance away from my muddy boots.

My first (and last) music festival was a similarly sobering experience: although the music was amazing - I very much enjoyed the  magical experience of watching Bjork sing with fireworks going off in time to the music - ditto, sitting at the back of a field, listening to Neil Young, surrounded by mini bonfires, the toilets were like something out of a horror movie! Plastic boxes with a bucket full of crap and some bloody tampons perched upon the poo (sorry to be crude but this is what they were like!). People left those cubicles looking as traumatised as I felt.

“The trick is,” My boyfriend said. “to go into them just after they've been emptied.”

But I don't think that I ever quite mastered that trick.

I have to say that the experience put me off festivals for life (although I’ve been camping since and to day festivals, where I could go home to my comfy bed and my own, somewhat cleaner toilet, at the end of the day.) and I’ve never really felt that I was missing out. The thing is, I’ve made my peace with the fact that I am not a chilled out, festival-loving, laid back hippy. I don’t like dirt and germs and I’m not particularly keen on crowds.

So why, you ask, dear, sweet reader, am I writing about this now? I’ll tell you why - my other half has booked us all to go to a two night, yes, a two night festival! And when I say us, I don’t mean just me and him, I mean me, him and our two children - aged 5 and 3 respectively, one of whom is still in nappies! So I won’t even be able to get so wasted that I don’t care about the state of the toilets. I think the whole thing will be a make or break experience, in that if I make it out in one piece, I won’t break his nose!