Sentimentality in Life and Films

Sentimentality in Life and in Films

October 28, 2017

Sentimentality in Life and in Films ©

By Michael Casey

I’ve just watched Hope Floats on the telly, an old Sandra Bullock film it was nice and sentimental and had some nice comic moments in it. Meanwhile this morning my daughter had to go back and collect the keys she had lost while out with an artist friend the day before. Thankfully the security crew had found them, and yes we gave her merry hell last night, as we would have had to change the locks on our doors. So we let her waste 2 hours this morning on 2 buses there and 2 buses back till she retrieved her keys. You don’t get a chauffeur from mum if you make such a stupid mistake.  I told my daughter yesterday that we’d laugh about it in the future, and it would become a treasured memory. Once the screaming finished there would be laughter.

Today dawned and a new day and a new life was born. My wife’s  boss’s wife gave birth to their first child today. So the lost keys gave way to the joy of life. The key to life is babies and family after all. No doubt in future the baby may be baptised.  I mention this because Paul the Vicar was talking to me yesterday and he said the narrowboat trip was cancelled, and that once he cycled into the canal in Birmingham. I smiled as I said it must have been a form of baptism for him. He replied it was the filthiest water he had ever been in. I thought  he’d not met some of the Souls I’d worked with  over my life.

We can be sentimental after the event, at the time in real time things can be  murder. I know from bitter experience how  the Wall, not the one  when you run a Marathon but the one in Life can be very hard or high, but afterwards the Relief is so great. Then you can sit around and laugh as you have a  beer or just a coffee and biscuits and think just how did you survive. Our police, nurses,  teachers, bus drivers, mothers and fathers all have memories that take them to the brink of disaster, mainly other people’s that they have to sort out, our live with. Then afterwards in bed as they talk through the day with their lover or partner, they realise how lucky they were to survive that day. Then they can laugh, even laugh till tears fall.

At a funeral we can say, I hated that bitch, but I loved her, she was terrible to me, but I’ll miss her so much, she lent me that money to start my business but refused to accept payback. She said pay for my funeral instead, that’s why we have 6 black horses, and a hall for 1000 people and a gospel band here at her funeral. Mom I really miss you, all the things you made me do, like always polish my shoes, like always but always shave. And I was just a mechanic, until she pushed me, I ended up with a Limo hire business, and I diversified into the funeral business as I liked the cars so much. That’s  why she said pay for her  funeral.

So life is hard but we are very sentimental about the smallest of things. Nobody dare throw out that old chair, cos uncle always used to sit on it, and he used to tell such outrageous stories, did he really have 27 children? Or was he a liar? The old ladies used to blush when they saw him, and lots of  boys and girls used to come and stuff  ten pound notes in  his top pocket, he was their dad and granddad and great-grandad. He must have has 1000 pounds in that pocket alone. Then when  the priest and the  rabbi and  imam can by he always slipped money into their hands asking for prayers for his soul.

WE are sentimental when we remember old stories and they can hit us like a bullet just when we least expect it, I told a story about how my uncle was visiting from Boston USA and he hadn’t told mum that he was coming so he came in the back door with her sister Hanna and Joe her husband. Then mum turned around to see her brother who she had not seen in years, so she dropped a bowl full of crockery smashing them. Remember then we did not have a phone, mobiles had not been invented and a twice yearly letter was what all you got. A simple ordinary story but when I told my daughter the other day I started to cry. Why? Because I remember the Family Love, my mum, my uncles and aunt and my dad. I have a snapshot of it in my mind, like I’ve said before, even if I don’t have Total Recall I am a vacuum. So emotion gets sucked up too.

All of you reading this all over the world, and especially in Poland have these great great family memories, so you can think of you own family and friends and remember the laughter and anger then laughter again as family life unfolds, and sometime vomits like a baby on the Page of Life. So swop stories as you have a meal today and say Michael Casey encouraged you to think of the Sentimental Times, the Laughter Times. See who has the funniest  story, the stupidest story. 

And when you are in bed with your wife you can share other stories, just use your imagination. Then the children will ask mum and  day why were you laughing so much in bed last night. You can tell them as Clare Moore once did, when her dad asked her why she was laughing so much in her bed room. Its Michael Casey he’s making me laugh, she was reading  my stories.

Donald Trump's Opioid Crusade

Donald Trump’s Opioid Crusade©

By Michael Casey

To begin with, I should say I have NEVER taken illegal drugs.

I do take painkillers for my Arthritis

And pain killers for post op chest pain after my Quadruple Heart Bypass

Every 2 months I get a repeat prescription which I take to the Pharmacy and they dispense it.

Paracetamol which I take for pain can be bought over the counter everywhere too.

YOU should never take more than 8 tablets in 24 hours

So I keep a note on our microwave of what I take.

I also use Movelat for pain relief on my joints and no more than 4 times a day is the limit.

I follow these rules religiously.

It costs 8quid or so per item for 2 months supply.If you take lots of meds you can apply for a certificate which costs 110pounds a YEAR

THAT'S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN USA AND UK.

The most you will pay is the 110pounds is that 145dollars a Year?

If currency rates are taken into account

I was just talking to my local corner shop guy and he mentioned I was looking mobile tonight, so I reminded him that 30 mins previously I was  screaming in pain from my left shoulder until I slapped on the Movelat gel pain killer. I alos get pain when I lie down and try to sleep. My chest is so sensitive that if the bedsheets rub my left nipple I will scream. Then I may get the random pain in my left side,  skeletal muscular pain, which may make me scream at the top of my voice. Then my scars on my legs may throb and make my scream too. Yet to the average observer I'm just the fat siver haired guy in shades strolling around the high street. Though sometimes I walk with a pronounced limp. Then there is the stabbing pain above heart but not the actual heart, that too can come and go.

But I do now have great Blood Pressure readings thanks to my unplanned quadruple heart bypass nearly 3 years ago. The there is my CkD kidney disorder which means I wake every 2 hours in the night, and I visit the bathroom up to 20 times a day, thankfully I wake up in the night.

NOW THIS IS ME AND THIS IS MY LIFE.

That's why I enjoy the writing, because the writing shows the best of me. And that's why I wouldn't destroy my mind by indulging in substance abuse of any kind.

You have to carry on as best as you can, and there are millions of people with much more pain than me, in far far worse circumstances.

I am just the fat silver haired writer in shades from Birmingham England. I have written more than a million words. But I am also still the undiscovered writer.  The penniless writer, anybody can put a book on Amazon, and I would encourage you all to discover KDP, because the next Mark Twain might be out there. And you may be discovered, me I've been writing for 30 years now, on and off, with 20 years listening to Quality Speech Radio before that. So 50 years in the making, though I still am much more good looking that George Clooney, my spirit is willing but my flesh is weak.

So save your mind and just say NO to illegal drugs. A 1% tax on the big drugs companies in USA or even a 0.1% tax could fund drug rehab over there.  Or why don't they make the offer themselves to prove that they are for THE GOOD OF THE PEOPLE, doesn't it say We The People somewhere in the USA Constitution?

Fight your pain, don't just reach for your pills, I only ever take mine when pain strikes. Sometimes when I'm screaming in pain. Other times I get up in the middle of the night and put the computer on for an hour or two. Then when I'm so tired that I'm falling over, I go back to bed at 4am or 5am or 3am or whatever time it is. In a way its a sad life, but really it is not because, thanks to God I'm still alive and kicking and writing. If I can keep on writing I will always have Hope in my Heart, and as we all know Hope and Love moves Mountains.

If I could sing then I'd sing We Shall Overcome or anything else YOU can think of that makes YOU happy, or just play Barry White's Just The Way You Are, because God loves us Just the Way we Are.

the common room

The Common Room (c)

By

Michael Casey

What are you sniggering at? You are worse than a child, I have to mark this drivel, you would think if they got to Cambridge they would have least learnt how to write, they’d know how to string a sentence together. Or at least make it interesting. This one will get an F, and F is the appropriate letter I should begin with for this drivel. If his Daddy paid for all the best schools perhaps he should have bought his a Dictionary too. Or at least paid for a French mistress who could have taught him English in his gap year. At least they leave a few cases of the 69 at the Porters lodge. He’s a decent sort, he told me to be really rigorous when marking his son’s papers. If only the French mistress was as rigorous and taught him a bit of English in the gap year.

You are smirking now, I’ll have to gather myself up from my chair and see what exactly you are reading. Oh, that 300 and Not OUT, a cricket magazine  or something. I would ask Jeffrey Archer to pop in and explain how to write  page turning prose, only he’s gone off with Andrew Graham Dixon and some Italian bloke to have dinner. I despair of the youth of today, they can’t string a sentence together, what they write reads like an obituary. Shakespeare should inspire them, or Charles Dickens, or that Little Woman, or rather the book Little Women, they should have Pride and no Prejudice in what they read and then write about. Instead its cut and *&***((ing paste, do they think we are stupid, WE ARE CAMBRIDGE DONS after all.

Yes I will have a Cuban cigar, and I know you really did steal them from Fidel, help yourself to some of the 69 while I light this monster. We are the last bastion of good taste here at Singing Anvil College, we really were founded by a blacksmith 100s of years ago. We are known as the SAC college because of all the ale stored underneath the chapel. That bastard you are reading stole the idea and used it in his butchered version of the baker and the undertaker story, The Butcher The Baker and The Undertaker, my big fat hairy Cambridge arse.

You are still sniggering, is he really any good? Or does he just make lots of money from his books, even though his writing is horse manure, if I’m being polite. So he’s written over a million words, but is undiscovered, like a pearl of great price but you’ve lost the shovel and the map marking the spot. So he’s just a bit of a cult, yes I said cult. So who exactly reads him? Only Dons in Cracow Poland. But the Poles have a funny sense of humour.

But what do you see in him. He’s fat and silver haired and wears shades, mainly to hide his ugly mug. His structure is like an outside toilet, big and strong with the odour of something quite right, if I ever met the daft brush I’ll give him a bottle of something. No not a bottle of the 69, it would be wasted on him, maybe some cheap perfume for men, or failing that some Jeyes Fluid disinfectant to dab behind his ears.

He just teases and half tells a story and then expects us to finish it for ourselves. I say he’s just a lazy writer, or has run out of steam. You don’t think so? If a girl and a boy are alone then he should tell us what happens, it’s more like a Bollywood film and he just leads us a merry dance. I want more detail. He uses a metaphor. She weighed up his evidence, she assessed the power repeatedly, she smiles and gently glowed, and she in turn gave him a stiff sentence, or was it a stiff drink. Or knowing your writer it’s always  a pint of Stella Artois. The only thing sophisticated about his writing is the Stella Artois.

I know, but he’s big in Poland. Only Amazon don’t publish in Polish, the irony of it all, now that is amusing to me. I better mark some more of these useless bastards’ essays. And yes of course I do want to read 300 and Not Out when you have finished with it. He may be a totally useless writer but at least he entertains me, otherwise I’d have to read Harry Potter to my grandchildren.

Some say he’s really a Don at that crappy University, up the road, you know Oxford. He just pretends to be a moron, when really he’s an Oxford Don, though how do you tell the difference? The moron is better educated. Wasn’t there something in a Tom Sharpe book years ago about a writer who had somebody else pretend to be him to do all the publicity. While he stayed in some house of ill repute, like the House of Lords or something? Well whoever really is this Michael Casey I just hope that someday he gets discovered  then he can bequest all his money to our college. The SAC college wine cellar needs replenishment, those bastards from Porterhouse College tunnelling into the cellar and stole a load of the 69. Is there no honour any more?

With that it’s just after midnight, so go to bed with your wives and lovers and mistresses And if its 3 to the power of one its far cheaper, though for the mathematicians out there, you are in for a very exciting night, 3 to the power of one, is your favourite equation after all.  And if you don’t know what this fat silver haired writer in shades means by that, I’m sure your girl will enjoy explaining it to you. 

See no wonder Cambridge Dons hate me, though one brother really went to Cambridge and another to Oxford. Me I was just more common, as common as a Common room. 

Nourishment

Nourishment ©

By Michael Casey

We just watched the Great British Bakeoff on tv, a cookery programme if you don’t have it in Poland or Ukraine or Russia or wherever you are reading this, Timore L’Est  popped up the other night so I have very far flung readers. My own tastes are very wide, as is my pain. I had to stop to put on Movelat pain killer just then, buy shares in it, it really is fast acting, paracetamol is also part of my daily diet. I just hope that they are not contributing to the decline in my kidneys.

Ok, back to the story, Nourishment, the GBBO finished and I flicked channels and stumbled on a documentary about Benedictine Monks. Considering yesterday’s story, A Korean Christmas Carol, it might have been inevitable. So I’ve gone from food nourishment to spiritual nourishment, just by changing tv station.

So immediately I knew I had a story, so here it is. We all need nourishment, food and water and love and sex and something to nourish our spirits. We have comfort food and comfort sex. We are starving when we come home from work so we’ll grab a bag of chips or a kebab, or in my case for 20 plus years I’d throw in a processed food item into the oven. It’s healthy because I never fried anything, I only baked or grilled in the oven. Sadly the MSG in processed food was probably coating my arteries and may have killed me, but for my unplanned quadruple heart bypass. But I am not a dietician, I’m just a fat silver haired writer in shades from Birmingham England. I remind you of this as there is a clever Dublin guy and a Monk, who share my name. I am the good looking one, they are not me.

Family and food go together, just as English and Writers go together, otherwise its Writers who write in English which is not the same thing. The Great British Bakeoff is about cakes it is not about meat dishes, if you want meat dishes you need to watch another show. Andrew Graham Dixon one of my tv heroes does ART programmes, but when he is with his Italian mate together they do food and art programmes. You have to decide what you really want to learn about, otherwise you can dilute the subject matter, and ruin both. In my opinion AGD is fantastic at both, and his mate is a great cook.

I side-tracked myself there, perhaps you need to be a Don to understand my point. My point is that we need to feed our body and soul. We need food that is nice, otherwise we are in a jail, even a self -imposed jail. This Summer we abandoned our old supermarket as my daughter wanted quality food while she studied for her Exams. Well the quality food seems to have worked, she got 4Bs, 4As and 3A*. Which compared to other future Medics is average to good.

So now when my wife brought home some none nice food my daughters and me could not eat it. You are what you eat and you get used to what you eat, or can afford to eat. Luckily we don’t drink, nor smoke which is disgusting anyway, and we don’t gamble. Yes I know you will all start singing The Adam Ant Song, What do you do? And yes I do drink 12pints not a week but a year, on my Meds I should avoid alcohol. And yes I do buy the occasional lottery ticket, that’s for the Pedantic out there. Ok, so you can decide what is important and your food basket reflects this.

Polish people love their food and judging by the bit I’ve eaten the quality is so high compared to your average English supermarket. Egg yolks are bright yellow for example, just as Maltese food is so nice, not forgetting the food I’ve eaten in County Kerry Ireland. The closer the food is to the table the nicer it is. Family and food make such a difference.

Love and sex make a difference too. If you live all alone without even a cat to stroke then your mental wellbeing is not as great as a family environment. Mind you if you had a horrible childhood then being alone is absolute Heaven. But generally we all need somebody to talk to, to laugh with or to cry with. To make love to, badly or fantastically, quickly or slowly, all night long or a stolen 5 minutes before her cookery programme is on tv, or your football match is on. Or even if all you can manage is holding hands because you are 95, though for 70 years you did regularly break beds, but luckily you owned a furniture shop.

We all need nourishment, just as that plant on the shelf to my right needs watering too. It’s a Shamrock the Irish symbol. We may not be able to afford the best of food, and our sexual technique may have gone off the boil. But we all have our memory and imagination, so if we close our eyes we  can be anywhere in the world as we eat our food, nice or plain. But a bit of nice margarine or butter and this will lift any meal and turn it into a joy. The French invented sauces because they were eating rats at one stage of their History. So a bit of flavour lifts any meal, as a bit of variety. Just as it used to be Fish on Fridays.

Sex makes us happy, and we are not alone, literally, two become one, and three or more if you want to practice your maths skills, mainly multiplication. I don’t need to elaborate, you can all look at your lover and stop reading this and do something much more fun instead. But finish your bread and butter first, as you may need your strength or just the…    

A Korean Christmas carol

A Korean Christmas Carol

October 23, 2017

A Korean Christmas Carol ©

By Michael Casey

Vincent was a little child in Seoul, he had been learning English at school, so the teacher decided to read a Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens to the class as Christmas was approaching. The teacher Mr Michael confessed that he had listened to it on the radio after Midnight Mass at Saint Patricks after he’d thrown snowballs at Danny Moylan. And there was another Vincent there who defended himself with his umbrella. Vincent  laughed at the mention of his name.

So Vincent  fell asleep with the Tale fresh in his head. But Vincent was worried because they had a noisy neighbour called Kim who was always letting off fireworks, one had even smashed their bedroom window. As Vincent drifted off to sleep the world news with Douglas Stewart reporting was on the BBC world service, A Christmas Carol was going to be next but Vincent fell asleep as it began.

The Ghost of Christmas past came first, this was a beautiful Korean girl smiling and singing Kpop songs. Vincent smiled in his sleep. Korea was one big happy family then. Just singing and nice dancing, no marching, just laughter, real laughter and nobody carrying notebooks in their hand.

Vincent was so happy he even chuckled in his sleep. Mr Michael his teacher was right Charles Dickens was the BEST. Well in the English language anyway. Then clouds appeared and walls and noise and stamping and unfriendly fireworks appeared. Half the land sung Kpop the other half, just marched like robots with a smile that was fixed with fear hidden in their eyes. Half had technology  and lights, the other half had no roads, no street lights just dim dim dark life.

One half had food galore and had the Korean Dream and Samsung really was king, the other just seemed sad but pretended to be happy by shouting a lot. They marched a lot too,  to stay warm as their homes were so cold. Only the army mattered, not the people not the poor, not the sick, not the uneducated, not the least of Korea’s brethren. Only the army mattered.

One half got poorer and poorer and sick and turning into skeletons and ghosts. But all the time they cheered for the Emperor in his new clothes. While the people in that half became more and more naked, building a giant Golden Ox which was the name of the nuclear missile, though some thought it was a great hotel. But really inside it was a hanger for the greatest nuclear weapon ever. And still the people in that side clapped and carried notebooks to record the Emperor’s every word. As their clothes fell off their backs and they were more and more naked.  Some even dying as they marched for their Emperor.

Vincent started to cry in his sleep, why couldn’t the Emperor just vanish like in fairy tales. The Ghost of Christmas present was a newsreader shouting and shouting, threatening and threatening. There was no hope and love in her voice, just anger. Wasn’t Christmas supposed to be about Love and Hope and a Future. Vincent screamed and sat bolt upright in his bed he was so scared, his parents came running and comforted him. Then with his head resting on his mother’s breast he fell asleep. His mother switched off the radio, why was he listening to BBC World service, he should listen to more Kpop it was Christmas after all.

Vincent slept on the Ghost of Christmas Future appeared, it was a scruffy monk with mittens, the monk showed Korea, all Korea in ruins, mushroom clouds drifting in the sky. Seoul was in ruins, millions were dead, the North was a wasteland. The Emperor was trapped in his bunker far beneath the Subway, 100s of metres underground. But even the Emperor knew his half  was destroyed  just as much as the  other half. The food would run out and the air would run out, maybe he’d last  3 months, but then he would be entombed, just like an Egyptian King. Nobody would bother to dig him out, but at least HE had felt no pain as the entire country was vaporised.

There was a knocking at his office door, a scruffy monk in mittens  appeared, the Emperor raised his gun to shoot the monk. The monk laughed, I’m dead already, 1968 was the year I went to Heaven. As for you only Hell awaits, I’ve come to show you a vision of Hell. Vincent screamed in his sleep but his mother did not come to comfort him. Vincent watched frozen as the scruffy monk in mittens placed his hand on the Emperor’s head. The Emperor screamed and convulsed in pain, he peed his pants and poohed simultaneously, then he vomited.

The scruffy monk, then said, that is  but a vision, this is what it really feels like, much much worse than being vaporised in a nuclear war. So the monk continued to hold his hand on the emperor’s head, in one second the Emperor felt an eternity of pain. Hell is the absence of God’s Love. The Emperor fell to his knees and begged for forgiveness, if only he could turn back the clock, if only, if only.   

Vincent woke up  sweating, he could not speak.  He grabbed his Rosary, Mr Michael had explained that the Rosary was Mary’s Nuclear weapons. And with the Rosary you could defeat the Devil himself. So Vincent said his Rosary and went to sleep happy and safe. The funny thing was that his radio was still on. The end of A Christmas Carol was being told.  Scrooge repents and leads a good life and knows how to Celebrate the Joy of Christmas.

As Vincent fell asleep a News Flash North Korean was ended all its Nuclear ambitions and Putin himself would visit on  Christmas Day to sign a deal to ship all nuclear material over the border to Russia. And how did this come about ?  The Christmas Disco in Heaven was KPop that year and the 100,000 Korean Martyrs had asked the scruffy monk to Save Korea not just for Christmas but for always.

So he really had slipped out to pay the Emperor a visit. He also visited Putin too telling him to grab his place in History before his heart attack. When Putin heard this he decided to do as the scruffy monk suggested. Though the monk did put his hand on Putin’s chest, telling him he could live till he was 100 if he retired, being President is really stressful.  The scruffy monk also paid a visit to the White House, all he said to Trump was Be Humble when Putin rings you, and then you retire immediately as after saving the world everything else is a waste of your time.

Vincent woke up and it was snowing in Seoul, church bells were ringing, Korea would be One again, as for the scruffy monk in mittens, he got back in time to hear George Michael singing the Ave Maria, Merry Christmas Korea, all and one Korea.

From Blank Page to Full Stop

From Blank Page to Full Stop ©

By Michael Casey

I was having breakfast with my meds, just as my pharmacist orders when I was thinking about what to write about today. The idea of a blank page and a full stop beckoned. So I was going to start with a fair wind to my back but then I stumbled over PMQs or Prime Minister’s Questions so I watched that. Then the love of my life, as she tells me she is, or the witch as we call her rung to command me to bring in the washing.  Then there was the very latest Windows 10 update so I had to wait for that. Afterwards my small daughter arrived, so with her watching the computer I went shopping for her chocolate biscuits. 

The Windows 10 update finally finished and I had one, just one chocolate buiscuit. Then the pain monster decided to pay a visit, so I have just slapped it on and rubbed myself down, while stood in the front room window. Our Polish neighbours think I’m an exhibitionist, the little old ladies wish they were 30 years younger, me, I just wish Arthritis never came my way. I inherited it from my mother, and my heart from my father. It’s nice being a close family but you could do without the diseases.

So to today’s theme From Blank Page to Full Stop. 

We start as a blank page, as virgins, we are pure and white, we are babies, I hope I don’t need to mention other colours and don’t need to say I’m not actually talking about sex or colour. I’ll take it as read that there are no pedantic readers with nothing better to do.

So we start all shiny and new without a clue, then we watch and observe and are influenced by events all around us. I grew up in a busy house and we shared the house with our lodgers, then we had the house next door too, just by accident. My dad’s brother was going to buy it but tragedy stuck their sister in law died in childbirth. So dad’s brother Willie went back to Kerry to help Danny raise the ten children. So the lawyer changed the name and our dad bought the house instead of his brother.

So the page was changed, events had changed History and the Future, the family future changed here in Birmingham and over in County Kerry.  This meant we had more lodgers for me to watch and observe, making it real life theatre for me. Growing up watching mainly alcoholic lodgers was different to the average family in the 1960s onwards.

Good things and bad things can little tour life page, some things tear strips off the page. Or screw and scrunch the page up entirely, I’d had a scrunched up page several time, you just have to iron out the rough spots as the songs goes. Or even throw away one page and start again. Don’t be so obsessed with keeping the original plan. A new page can be a lifeboat to a new future, such as me stumbling in my computer operator job. As I talk to you my Bourne Jones angle looks down at me, a leaving present from that 21year job in computers. Another totally different page was my 3 years as a concierge plus everything else, or you could just call my porter.

My daughter had just started a new page by going to her new 6^th form college a good  bus ride away. Meeting new people and studying hard for A levels with high hopes of doing Medicine at Cambridge, or anywhere that’ll have her. This is her page. We all need to have dreams and hopes. Even if we never attain them, without direction we are just like those zombies on stunk you stumble over in some cities.

Influences and winds of change alter our direction on the page that is our life. If this were a Winnie the Pooh Cartoon the artist would draw as I talk to you. Sadly I cannot draw and the stormy weather has not brought an artist to me, maybe I’ll stumble over one in a bar. Maybe even a Polish artist as I seem to have many Polish readers, even if they never buy a book on Amazon.  

So our lives continue and the page gets fuller, just like the space on the fridge where every family leaves its diary, outside of the fridge, inside is the dairy. You can use a rubber to make space on the page, you can retreat and  regroup or cordon off some ME Space in your life. You may even wish you had used London Rubber then you’d have more space in your home. 

Nothing is set in stone, you can have that North Korean Lover, even if in your imagination, or you could have that Parisian Romeo, life is up to you. We’ve all seen those romcoms on tv after all.  However a word of caution, there is only so much space on the page. At some point the space runs out, the page is full.

So you have to ask yourselves did I waste my page, my space, my time, would I have used crayons or fine liner, would I have used capitals or a different font to my life. Or am I happy the way I filled the page that is my Life.  The way my own life turned out with lots of pain punctuating it has coloured my page, but all in all I’m glad how my life has filled the page. I have had lots of time with my dad when he was alive. I have well I won’t be gushy, I am not American. I am glad I was born into the family I was born into. 500 years of Kerry Ireland farmers so I’m told. Now my own family which comes from rice farmers from Shanghai to match the Kerry side.

So Chinese Rice had met Kerry Potatoes, and my kids will write their own pages, as a doctor and maybe as an actress. This is their Future the blank pages lie before them. Me I continue to write in the vain hope of making a bit of money so we can move house. I’ll continue filling my pages until I come to my final  full stop.