Airplanes and red shoes

Let's start with a riddle: What do aeroplanes, sugarlumps and red dancing shoes have in common?

No, sorry, you can't have the answer yet.

This blog is all about aeroplanes, and some worries I have...

Now don't get me wrong, I love flying. Rollercoasters and football matches do nothing for me: when I'm looking for excitement, the buzz is best when that juddering aircraft leaves the tarmac, and I'm flying off to somewhere new and exciting. And as for the feeling I get when I'm up in the sky looking down on the clouds. Well, if you ask me, it's quite obviously magic, and it's marvellous!

But a friend sent me this video, and it has made me think that maybe we're doing just a little bit too much flying. Have a quick look at it before you read on (if you haven't already) so you'll know what I'm talking about...

Now, at one level, I think the video is rather beautiful. It reminds me of other things, like ripples and magnetic field patterns and the dances that bees do to find their way home. But these are aeroplanes, not bees.

Do you know how many flights there are, globally, each day or each year? Go on, have a guess...

The most reliable source I could find on t'interweb said there were 77 million flights in 2008, and numbers are rising. 77 million each year?! That's about 211,000 flights each day! And there were 4.874 billion passengers... Which, frankly, is such a BIG number that my poor brain can't even process it.

Now, I could go off on all sorts of interesting diversions about global economics ('cos this many passengers equals one hell of big pile of dollars, dunnit?!) and international development inequalities ('cos look at how the flight-paths predominantly zoom in and out of the US and Europe) ... But the big question this video has raised for me is about saturation.

Saturation, I hear you say. What, if you please, is saturation? Or rather (given that my readers are educated people) what on earth has saturation got to do with air traffic?!

Let me explain myself...

Saturation is what you get when you try to add too much of something to something else. So, you can add sugarlumps to tea, and go on adding them for a long time, making your tea sweeter and sweeter... But there comes a point where your tea can't absorb anything else; and if you go on trying to add sugar, it won't dissolve, and you'll get a lumpy mess. You see, the tea has reached its 'sugar saturation point', and it just can't take any more.

There are lots of other examples where a little bit of something is fine, but too much is not. The odd whisky (or wine or beer or whatever your tipple) is great, but too much alcohol becomes a problem. And a little bit of food down the plughole is OK when you are washing up, but half a plateful will block your pipes!

I suppose I'm worried that we might just have reached our 'aeroplane saturation point'. At least, I'd like to know what or where this point is. Perhaps 55 million planes a year was OK, but 77 million isn't. Or perhaps 78 million is OK, but 79 million will be too many. Do you get my drift? It would be useful to know, wouldn't it, just how many aeroplanes the planet can cope with.

Now, at the risk of getting all earnest here, maybe we should be asking the same question about everything we do, at a personal and global level. Basically, the question is, how much is enough?

Do you know The Red Shoes fairytale? I may tell you more about it another time, but for now, all you need to know is that the central character loved her red shoes so much that she wore them too often, and went dancing in them when she shouldn't have, and then couldn't stop dancing until someone cut off her feet with an axe.

And that, in a nutshell, is what aeroplanes, sugarlumps and red dancing shoes have in common. When it comes to things we like, we're not good at knowing when enough is enough.

And no, I'm not being puritanical.

You know I have an interest in go-going with the flow, dontcha? Well, so, I'm not saying don't dance; I'm saying we need to know when to stop, if we want to go-go with joy. Dance all night if you like, but make sure you can stop when you want, without needing someone to chop your feet off!

So if any of you know how to work out the global aeroplane saturation point, please let the rest of us know!

Flow x

I had a dream!

No, I'm afraid it wasn't as profound as Martin Luther King's dream; it was a real, mundane dream, about an hour ago. And it woke me up.

Other people's dreams are pretty boring, so I'll paraphrase... I was writing an outline for a new TV series. But I there were other people around and I was due to go out somewhere, so I there were too many distractions to write. Plus I needed to get my younger son to hurry up, and I couldn't, so I was going to miss whatever it was I was supposed to be going out to do. It all led to pretty familiar feelings of frustration. Life getting in the way of art, again!

When I woke, feeling rather disgruntled, I spent quite a few minutes trying to remember the details of the TV outline so I could write it down - now that all the distractions had stopped. It didn't really dawn on me that it had all been a dream until I was awake enough to realise that there was nothing, really, to remember.

I was in a bad mood because mundane things had stopped me from doing something I wanted to do, but which I hadn't really been doing anyway!

Hang on to that thought for a moment...

Anyway, Ladles and Jellyspoons, you will have noticed that I have been away for Quite Some Time. I could give you an-elephant-ate-my-homework type of explanation, but other people's excuses are just as boring as other people's dreams, so I won't. I'll just say that I have been in a Bad Mood.

This Bad Mood has lasted a long time (and it hasn't quite gone away yet, but never mind that for now). At the root of it, I realise, is frustration that mundane things have stopped me doing things I want to do. Ha - deja vu!

The things I want to do (the important ones that I'm not managing anyhow) are writing, swimming outdoors and enjoying some sunshine. But somehow other things have got in the way - things like earning money, housework, newly-diagnosed arthritis and rain.

The trouble is that after a while of not doing things for very good reasons, you get out of the habit of doing them. Then you feel frustrated about not doing things you want to do, although you are making no effort at all to do them anyway!

So... I haven't been go-going with the flow, I've been sort of limping along with the flow. Time to kick myself up the arse!

Anyway, I've done a bit of writing, and now the sun is up, so I'm off.

'Til later...

Flow x

P.S. You'll notice I've had some fun with this silly-but-clever fake newspaper creating tool!

Reasons to be cheerful (part 1)

Hello, hello, and Seasons' Greetings to you all!


If you have been celebrating Christmas, I hope you had a good one. If you haven't been celebrating, I hope you've still found plenty of things to enjoy during this past week. Here are some of my own current Reasons to be Cheerful:

* The days are getting longer and the sun is getting higher in the sky - hooray!

* There are two brave little pink roses trying to bloom in my garden.

* We had a nice Christmas: my children liked their prezzies and we had a lovely meal with friends.

* My youngest son's favourite present was a cuddly polar bear given to him by his big brother, so they have declared an amnesty and are friends at the moment.

* My eldest son gave me Bill Bailey's Tinselwood DVD, and (almost better) since I haven't yet watched it, I am still in a state of excited anticip-p-p-pation about it!

* I have rediscovered sloe gin and ginger wine: perfect winter drinks!

* I haven't listened to the news for several days now, so I haven't been made depressed by what I've heard!

* I have an open fire, and logs and dried rosemary twigs to put on it.

* I am catching up on sleep.

And last but not least, someone called Trevor invented a marvellous phrase to describe the Random Act of Fun I posted about last time, which I would like to nominate as Original Linguistic Invention of the week... it's 'cracker frippery'! Perfectomundo!

Flow x

When 'going with the flow' just isn't joyful enough

A few people have asked me about the title of this blog. Why 'go-go' with the flow, they ask, and not just 'go'?

'Going with the flow' is a notion most of us are familiar with, even if we're not very good at actually doing it. Going with the flow means taking life as it is, accepting what comes your way, not fighting battles that can't be won and not yearning for things that can't be had.

It's a wise idea that goes back thousands of years. There's no surer way to make yourself unhappy than to want things (that's possessions and events) that you don't have. Lao Tzu may have been the first to put it into words, in the Taoist classic the Tao Te Ching:

"There is no disaster greater than not being content; there is no
misfortune greater than being covetous... In being content, one will
always have enough" (45:105).

Now, I'm not the best person to come to if you want to learn more about going with the flow. Try websites like this instead. I often find it hard to accept things that come my way - and I'm especially likely to stomp and fight if I think something is unfair. That's one reason I didn't call this blog just 'Go with the flow'.

You see, I believe in 'the flow'. I'm quite passionate about it, really. I won't try to define 'the flow', here, because that would lead me into deep philosophical discussion, and it's too early in the morning for that! Please just let me get away with using shorthand for now and saying that I mean some kind of interconnected everythingness.

My important point is that I believe we are the flow and we make the flow.

I'm sure I don't need to work hard at convincing anyone that there is a lot of shit around. That was the subject of my very first post, and it's the reason I started this blog. But the thing is, I think that all this unpleasantness - all the war, famine, violence, cruelty, nastiness and unhappiness - is doing the psychic equivalent of polluting the flow.

We're all swimming here together, I'd like to say, so don't piss in the water!

And because I believe that we all create the flow we're floating in, I want to do my bit to make it as joyful and good as possible. I want to add laughter to the Universe, and beauty, and usefulness, and hope.

For me it's not good enough to just 'go with the flow' - I want to help that water sparkle!

So now I'm off to enjoy the sunshine, and do some go-going in today's flow! And I hope you can do the same!



Flow x

Penguins

I must just share this with you...

Penguins.

Yes, I said penguins!

As my friend Scribblemoose says, "It's hard to take life too seriously when you're watching penguins. So silly, so beautiful and so very full of joy".

Penguins, it seems to me, are absolutely the best role models for go-going with the flow! Thank you, Scribblemoose!



Video and photo - copyright to Scribblemoose 2008.

And here's a link to another fabulous piece of artistic silliness ... a melting icecream van, which I found quite by chance on Boingboing.net, which describes itself as 'a directory of wonderful things' and is apparently the most popular blog in the world!

Flow x

The trouble with teens ...

My close friends already know I'm having a bit of a tough time with my teenager at the moment. He's 13, and testosterone has just begun to kick in big-time. If you remember Kevin the Teenager from the Harry Enfield sketch show in the 90s, you'll have a fair idea of what he's like on a bad day ... except there's more swearing in our house. Sometimes I wish I had a BBC sound editor living here to bleep it all out. They could join my 'fantasy parenting' team of essential support staff, along with the cleaner, the cook, the counsellor, and whoever can get here first with a large bottle of whisky.

But I don't want to give you the impression it's always Hell at home. A lot of the time he's lovely. He still talks to me (there's no grunting yet!) and he can make interesting conversation, too. He does his share of the housework, sometimes without even being asked. On my birthday, he cooked tea for the whole family - grilled salmon, new potatoes and veg - and it was delicious. And I've just eaten the fried egg sandwich that he made me for lunch, while I got on with this.

Out and about, he's usually pretty good too. Other mums tell me how helpful and sweet he is with their smaller children. Local shop-keepers regularly compliment me on my son's good manners (really and truly - I'm not making that up!). Sometimes, indeed, he is almost heroic: he carried shopping for a struggling neighbour recently, even though some other boys were watching and scoffing at him; and he jumped in the canal a couple of weeks ago to rescue someone's struggling dog.

So what am I complaining about, eh?!

Well, the flip side of this loveliness is sometimes pretty grim. School doesn't suit him, and while serious trouble is rare, there are a whole string of minor problems, and he's more likely to bring home stress than homework. Then, as well as the day-to-day stomping and Kevin-ness, there are occasional bursts of very stupid or dangerous behaviour. At the moment, for example, he and some friends are excluded from school (that's 'suspended' in old money) for bringing in a lighter and playing with fire in the sports hall. Exclusion brings a whole pile of hassle and - since he's a boy who doesn't like school anyway - it is certainly more of a punishment for me than for him.

Then there's trouble that descends and lands on him, unexpectedly. A couple of weeks ago he was robbed in the street by two thugs who threatened to kill him if he didn't hand over his 'phone. He was physically fine but we were all a bit shaken, and for me that also meant stressful conversations with the local police, the CID in the city where it happened, and the youth worker who was supposed to be looking after him at the time.

The trouble with teens, from a parent's point of view, is that it's an emotional roller-coaster. When I wake up each morning, I don't know whether to expect shouting or smiles, trauma or delight. Almost certainly, by the time I get to bed, I will have been though all of these, and a fair few other feelings too. Teenage emotions are dramatic... and my teenager seems to change like the weather, blowing through my day, leaving me storm-tossed or sunburnt!

Angel or devil - superhero or villain - or even ordinary mortal boy - it's all absolutely exhausting.

Which brings me to the real trouble with teens. There are lots and lots of rules and systems in place to control them and punish them when they do wrong, but there's very little support to help them do right. It's more-or-less all down to me, and I'm pretty much on my own. As a single parent, I find it particularly hard sometimes ... But don't get me started on absent fathers now... And I'll save my rant on how society is failing boys for another blog.

Being a parent of a teenager is certainly a lesson in learning to 'go with the flow', and I know I'm not very good at that yet! A wise friend once said, after listening to me let off steam, "Yes, it's shit, Flow ... but it doesn't have to be our shit!" And as I sit on my life-raft and watch the flotsam and jetsam and smashed-up cargo of teenage life float past me, I need to remember that a lot of it isn't his shit either.




Flow x