Walking The Dog

The dust of exploded beliefs may make a fine sunset. It is funny how we sometimes stumble upon something that inspires us to turn detective; to ask questions and then stay up too late researching the answers.  For example, consider the quote above - I had a photograph in need of a quote and I found this one about 'sunsets' (the word I looked up) and exploded beliefs (not what I was expecting). The words are  by Geoffrey Madan, 1895 - 1947, whose father had the marvellous name Falconer (disappointingly he wasn't one) and was master of Brasenose College, Oxford and librarian of the Bodleian. I'm guessing that with such an academic pedigree the young Geoffrey would have been introduced to books at a young age. And that this lead at some point to the compiling of lists of quotes and  aphorisms for which he is or was famous.  *Short interlude here while I remind myself (and you, perhaps... ) exactly what an aphorism is. Think of a phrase or ...

I can't believe I've let #WinniethePoohDay pass without posting something about the bear of little brain who is and always has been my favourite literary character. Were I ever cast away on a desert island, the collected tales of Pooh would be the book or books I would choose to have with me. Alan Alexander Milne created a character who has universal appeal. Whether we are young or old, in China or Dubai or Greenland or a windy village in a wintry England, we all have Pooh days. Days when we 'stop to think and forget to start again.' And days when we fail to 'pay attention to where we are going and without meaning to get nowhere.' I have those days all the time. There is Winnie-the-Pooh thinking or philosophy or whatever-you-want-to-call-it in all of us. For a birthday treat this week, my big children invited me to London. It was one of those 'I'll come down* to London and spend the day with you for your birthday doing whatever yo want to do'...

Whisper to the wind, ' This is how to write.' No, not these inexpertly assembled procrasti-rambles but words discovered in a book that I have been promising myself I would read for many, many months and have now started. My ascent so far has taken me to chapter 4. What a journey those first chapters have been! I am daily transported to India. All its scents, noises, lights, people, traffic, food, grime, poverty, politics, fabrics, fruits, spirits, humanity, hysteria, tragedy, faith, prostitution, drugs, hospitality, bribery, corruption, travel, cosmopolitan enlightenment, tolerances and intolerances in just four chapters; sixty or so pages. A portrait of a place so immersive and with characters so bright that they light up each page with the intense shine of their being. Reality is not merely being created for the reader - this setting and its characters live and breathe (even if some of them are fictional). What a lesson in how to write! I don't remember now ...