The importance of being human

So some days don’t go to plan. Or just don’t go. Which is fine, you can’t be happy every day unless the medication or the inner child are very good indeed. And let’s be honest, the vast majority of us have what is (probably uncharitably) called baggage, and are not so good at dealing with it.  

Various literary themes sprung to mind today. Well three to be exact. The first is Susan Ertz, who I confess not to have read. But I have had one of her quotes in my head for years after finding it somewhere when browsing: “Millions long for immortality who don't know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon”. That quote has always reminded me of an episode of Hancock’s Half Hour when him and Sid James sat there bemoaning their boredom. Not that I was bored, but it was definitely a Sunday today …

The second, on the subject of baggage, was The Importance Of Being Earnest which I have seen, read and heard. It all involves a strange plot about how people are expected to behave and the origins of the main character, being found in a bag at a railway station. By implication taking things too seriously is, as it were, its own emotional baggage. Or as Marty McFly put it in “Back to the Future III”: Lighten up Jerk.

Inevitably the third literary allusion is to A Christmas Carol which I have read many times and seen in many guises (I think the Muppets probably do the best version, acting Michael Caine off the set, particularly Kermit). Always at this time of year there is an undertow of the morose despite the happy rush towards Christmas. It is after all midwinter with another year of our oh so brief lives gone …

I am depressing myself. Anyway A Christmas Carol gets you thinking on how you have lived your life and whether there is still room for atonement and better years ahead. Can you be a better person in  the time you have left, however old you are? 

Point is, the art of being human is feeling, but sometimes feeling is painful so your rational self works on your emotional side to moderate it. I know what I'm talking about here, I've had CBT. But being rational and insightful can turn you into a bit of a robot. Cyberman. Superbly controlled but unfeeling. So thats the tension. When to feel, when to stay in control. 

So sometimes when I blip the image leads the words and sometimes, as today, the words make me think about and (eventually) compose the image. With a bit of help from photo editing software. Point is, rational feels safe, emotional feels human. And today I am feeling distinctly confused and definitely feeling unsafe.

I much prefer the the last two days. They were really lovely. 


Sorry rubbish and very long blip. Both the rational and emotional part of me also have a cold. Tomorrow will hopefully be better. 


Four years ago - the second day of Christmas