This Thing Can Be Done

Featured Image: Bronze sculpture of F R Spofforth (‘The Demon’) at Sydney Cricket Ground

I’m inspired by the Demon. Many of you might claim I’m consumed by them? Fred Spofforth refused to accept inevitable defeat at the Oval. On 28 August 1882 England only needed a mere 85 runs to clinch the test match. The Demon famously proclaimed: ‘Boys, this thing can be done. This thing can be done’. Spofforth took match figures of 14 wickets for 90 runs and bowled Australia to an incredible[1] seven run victory in the fourth innings. The celebrated letter subsequently appeared in ‘The Times’ announcing the death of English cricket so giving rise to the iconic ‘Ashes’. A commissioned statue of the Demon now graces the Members Pavilion at the SCG. What a fabulous idea and what a fine tribute!

It’s a fact of community life that most great advances come from inspiration rather than regulation. I was forcibly reminded of this fact when attending the ‘King of the Ranges’ in May. In 2009 I was fortunate to visit the Jasper Rodeo in the picturesque Rockies of BC in Western Canada. The competition was held indoors in a multi-purpose sports hall the prime purpose of which was Ice Hockey[2]. I was impressed. In hushed reverential tones a local told us the ‘Edmonton Oilers train here’? By comparison[3] I thought the unique ambience, class of competition, enthusiastic attendance and exquisite natural beauty of the complex at Murrurundi exceeded that of Jasper. Well done Shane, Paul and cohort crew. I’m not sure who had the original idea but indeed ‘this thing could be done’.

Once upon a time I bred fast cattle and fat horses. Bill Presland reading this in the Belmore Hotel might reflect. I had delusions of grandeur in the spheres of thoroughbred racing and breeding. I enjoyed my moments in the harsh sun but eventually the time came to sell the farm and opt for more sanguine pastures. My green fingered spouse Sarah wanted to turn on the water tap without recourse to the pumps. It worked – at a price. With more time on my hands and on reflection I devoted extra time to volunteer community events. None of these were[4] either prescribed or indeed proscribed. Historian A. J. P. Taylor wrote: ‘Any event once it has happened can be made to appear inevitable’. In other words once it has happened it has happened. Is Coal Seam[5] gas inevitable?

Making things transpire by insistence and persistence rather than instruction is the key. On reflection, I can recall many community achievements which depended more on inspiration, imagination, innovation and perspiration than by decree. White Park Horse Boxes, Bill Rose Sports Complex, Junior Soccer, Scone Race Track and Research Centre, Upper Hunter Horse Festival and the Upper Hunter Village Association now known as Strathearn Village all qualify. Men’s Sheds are fast becoming a reality in the Upper Hunter. Think ‘King of the Ranges’, ‘Highland Games’ and ‘Festival of the Fleece’? The list goes on. ‘Old Bill’ of Stratford wrote: “There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the full leads on to fortune. Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. On such a full sea are we now afloat. And we must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures”. In other words – get stuck in, do it now and make it count. The National Farmers’ Federation defines rural success as: ‘Vibrant local volunteer community concerned with health care, aged care, education, employment, adequate policing, public transport and committed to arranging events such as shows, gymkhanas and tennis tournaments’. Gerard Henderson recently wrote in the SMH: ‘European Culture of entitlement is mercifully absent Down Under’. Let’s keep it that way. Doesn’t sound like regulation to me? The concept of self help prevails? Perhaps I should try breeding fat cattle and fast horses next time? What do you think, Bill?

[1] I suggest extraordinary or remarkable rather than incredible. We hear too much of incredible in its loose colloquial sense.

[2] Lower case nouns here.

[3] By contrast. You are establishing the differences.

[4] Grammar: was.

[5] Lower case nouns

Balance or Manifest Destiny – that is the question?

Featured Image: ‘Manifest Destiny’ in the Wild West USA

How do you achieve acceptable balance? The NSW Department of Local Government Council’s Charter requires that we as elected Councillors act according to the following premises: provide directly, or on behalf of other levels of government, adequate, equitable and appropriate services and facilities for the community; ensure that provided services are managed efficiently and effectively; exercise community leadership; have regard for the long term and cumulative effects of decisions; have regard to acting as custodian and trustee of public assets; effectively account for and manage assets for which we are responsible; raise funds for local purposes by way of rates, charges and fees, investments, loans and grants; keep the local community informed about activities; ensure that in the exercising of regulatory functions act consistently and without bias.

The Guide to good governance and ecologically sustainable development for local Councillors states that the Council serves to represent its local community and that local Councillors are intrinsically more accountable and accessible than their counterparts in other spheres of government (‘grassroots government’). On quality of life and ecologically sustainable development Councils make decisions that can significantly touch upon the day-to-day lives and ‘quality of life’ of the local community; Councils and Councillors must provide vision and leadership to their community; Councils and Councillors must protect and improve the community’s quality of life taking into account competing priorities that are inevitably involved – ‘social, economic and environmental’ dimensions’.

The Mission of the Upper Hunter Shire Council (UHSC) is ‘to enhance the quality of life of all Shire residents by the provision of appropriate services and facilities through effective and efficient management of resources’; ‘to serve the community through equality of opportunity and involvement’, and ‘to build a prosperous environmentally sustainable future’. Similarly, we are committed to ‘protection and enhancement of the natural environment, including the promotion of development, which is compatible with the area’s natural environment and which will enhance the area as a place to live and work’.

I think you’ll agree it’s a pretty tall order? The keyword in all of this is ‘balance’. My review thesaurus lists alternatives to balance as equilibrium, poise, stability and steadiness. Frequently during the past four years we have been placed very firmly under the microscope to arrive at decisions which will satisfy the criteria listed above and not upset more than 51% of the local population. Recent DPOP roll out consultations have reaffirmed this in spades. Think Scone Traffic Lights, Bickham Coal Mine, Air Quality Monitoring, Wind Farms, Timor Quarry, NEH overpass, SRV and CSG to name but a few without mentioning ‘fugitive emissions’ in our midst.!

Herbivorous dinosaurs were very good at the latter both front and back with no concessions to etiquette. Rural and remote say roads, roads and roads. The jury is still out on some of these. Manifest Destiny was the 19th century American dictum that the United States was destined to expand across the continent. It was used by Democrat-Republicans in the 1840s to justify the war with Mexico. Advocates of Manifest Destiny believed that expansion was not only wise but that it was readily apparent (manifest) and inexorable (destiny). Do other democratically elected governments share the same philosophy? Do you think it’s our manifest destiny to be devoured by the ever northward expanding industrial corridor with its insatiable voracious appetite – or will we retain our identity?

Remember the North Muswellbrook jibe early last year. Its well over 200 years since Lieutenant Shortland discovered coal on the beach at Newcastle while pursuing recidivists. That really started something! Could it be that our largely silent mainly urban majority warmly welcomes the exceptional lucrative job opportunities made available in the mineral extractive industries? Some of the arguments are compelling while others are equally dispelling. Did I mention balance? Aren’t wind energy, solar thermal and geothermal tomorrow’s technology? Do you ever delude yourself we’re masters of our own destiny? Are we united only in the face of adversity? Clarity of vision and unity of purpose are high ideals but I rather fear Homo sapiens are more inclined to solipsism, sophistry and vested self-interest?

Do we have the power of self-determination or are we subservient to ‘the odious hypocrisy of economic convenience’? How do you redress the balance? You might like to contemplate all of this before the LGA elections. You might even ‘throw your hat in the ring’ come September 2012. That’s the challenge. ‘Never forget only dead fish swim with the stream’ said Malcolm Muggeridge! He also stated that ‘one of the many pleasures of old age is giving things up’. I might subscribe to that.

An Ode to English Plural

Featured Image:

We’ll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes,

But the plural of ox becomes oxen, not oxes.

One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,

Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.

You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,

Yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.

 

If the plural of man is always called men,

Why shouldn’t the plural of pan be called pen?

If I speak of my foot and show you my feet,

And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?

If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,

Why shouldn’t the plural of booth be called beeth?

 

Then one may be that, and three would be those,

Yet hat in the plural would never be hose,

And the plural of cat is cats, not cose.

We speak of a brother and also of brethren,

But though we say mother, we never say methren.

Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,

But imagine the feminine: she, shis and shim!

 

Let’s face it – English is a crazy language!

 

There is no egg in egg plant or ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple.

English muffins weren’t invented in England.

We take English for granted, but if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square, and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

And why is it that writers write but fingers don’t fing, grocers don’t groce and hammers don’t ham?

Doesn’t it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend.

If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?

If teachers taught, why didn’t preachers praught?   If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?

Sometimes I think all the folks who grew up speaking English should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane!

In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?

We ship by truck but send cargo by ship…    We have noses that run and feet that smell…  We park in a driveway and drive in a parkway.

And how can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out, and in which an alarm goes off by going on.

And in closing, if Father is Pop, how come Mother’s not Mop?

 

All I Have To Do Is Dream

Featured Image: ‘All I Have To Do Is Dream’ by the ‘The Everly Brothers’

I will write this from the vestiges of my memory. It’s about journeys real and vicarious; theirs and mine. Life is a journey. The first is about one of the all-time great voyages in the history of human endeavour. A good friend has just lent me Number 117 of the London Gazette of Friday, August 19, 1768. It originally cost twopence-farthing. He claims it is authentic and has been in his family for generations. There are some watermarks which look suspiciously like those from a photocopier to me. The writing is newer rather than older English. I would be a cynic, wouldn’t I? On Page 2 there is reference to the Demon Drink. It transpires that shocking as the account may appear no less than seven soldiers have destroyed themselves on the Isle of Wight within these ten days by drinking spirits. One, lamentable to say, was an officer. The main cover story on Pages 1 and 2 addresses the secret voyage of Lieutenant James Cook on HIS MAJESTY’s Bark, Endeavour from Plymouth Sound. The article discloses certain information speculating on the real reasons for the voyage. Methinks there were leaks other than on the ship. There are detailed descriptions with diagrams dealing with the Endeavour and its’ fit-out at Deptford. Lieutenant Cook would take with him his special anti-scorbutic concoction containing a mixture of scurvy grass, marmalade of carrots, syrup of lemons, and other vegetables. Milk would be supplied to Officers from a goat which is the very same animal which was carried for that purpose on HIS MAJESTY’S Ship Dolphin. Did I claim I was doing this from memory?

Almost sixty years ago I was selected to represent my Quaker coeducational boarding school in West Yorkshire against our sister school at Great Ayton in North Yorkshire. I only had eyes for Margaret who had left our school and moved to Great Ayton. This was about the same time I was addicted to the Everly Brothers and their signature international hit song ‘All I Have To Do Is Dream’. It was of little interest that a large statue on top of a hill dominated the village commemorating some old bloke called Captain Cook. Many years later I became enraptured with the same old bloke. Like millions of others I immersed myself in his exploits. I made it my business to explore as many of his haunts and jaunts as I could. This was my real time dreamtime journey.

I took my young family on a return visit to North Yorkshire as well as my old school. By the way 2005 Australian of the Year burns specialist Dr Fiona Wood is an alumnus of my school. I thought you might like to know. So is convicted rogue trader Kweku Adoboli who like me was head boy. Don’t tell anyone. We reviewed the Captain Cook Museum in Great Ayton and also went to Marston, Staithes and Whitby. Later in Melbourne I minutely examined Cook’s Cottage in Fitzroy Gardens. Cooks Landing at Kurnell is a given as is La Perouse. On another occasion I hired a car from Cairns and drove to Cooktown in far north Queensland almost coming to grief on the way. Adventure Bay on South Bruny Island in remote faraway eastern Tasmania was my destination when in the Apple Isle. As an aside William Bligh visited the bay four times in his life: once with Captain Cook while on the Resolution and another on the Bounty. It’s all in the Bounty Museum. Next year I plan to go to the Queensland coastal town of 1770. I have yet to make plans for the Pacific Islands. A cruise on the Aranui II around the Marquesas Archipelago beckons seductively. It seems like a very good idea. Let your imagination run wild: perchance to dream?

In another life I also avidly followed Robert Louis Stevenson. As an undergraduate student at Edinburgh University there was ample opportunity. We used to furtively peak and stealthily sneak into the myriad clandestine nooks and crannies (called Close and Wynd) frequented by the likes of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. This was usually done while on the obligatory right-of-passage pub crawl down High Street from the Castle to Holyrood Palace. Darkness added cachet to the experience. I am ashamed to admit some of these impromptu opportune visits were to seek personal relief from excessive imbibition of pale amber fluid. Imagination was fuelled by the alcohol. Even worse was the dare to urinate on the Heart of Midlothian embedded in the cobblestone pavement outside St Giles Cathedral. The trick was not to be caught. Much later I made one of my very favourite vicarious forays to Tusitala at Apia in Western Samoa. Aggie Greys was special but that’s another story. There the pilgrimage was to RLS’s home Vailima and his resting place on top of Mount Vaea. It was a hot steamy climb. We made it and had the space to ourselves. The sense of place is intense. It’s exquisitely beautiful. His self-composed requiem on the obelisk is poignantly and eminently memorable:

Under the wide and starry sky,

Dig the grave and let me lie.

Glad did I live and gladly die,

And I laid me down with a will.

This be the verse you grave for me:

Here he lies where he longed to be;

Home is the sailor, home from sea,

And the hunter home from the hill.

I know it’s there: I’ve seen it. Show me the evidence. If I had been one of the Twelve Apostles I’d have been Thomas. Is there any doubt? I couldn’t have been an Apostle at Cambridge because they wouldn’t have invited me. I strongly suspect any rhyme like that is beyond me: even in my dreamtime journey. I’ll settle for what remains of my memory.

A Figurative Journey

Featured Image: ‘Milestones’.

I’ve recently embarked on a figurative journey. For five or six weeks I’ve taken part in a memoir writing course. Self-improvement Wednesdays embrace my six ‘E’s of learning: encouragement, enrichment, enhancement, enlargement, embellishment, enlightenment. Could this be cerebral? I have to ask myself what I learned. The best way to check is to write it down. Test your memory by reflection and revision. How much is imprinted? Reinforcement can be powerful. Planning has been emphasised at every turn. I’m reminded of bite size digestible chunks of learning known as modules in another life. Learning outcomes is a time worn cliché borrowed from the competency based training purview. My erudite academic colleagues call these attributes. It may be playing pedantic semantics. In the cognitive domain of learning we have knowledge, understanding, comprehension, analysis, synthesis and evaluation. Let’s see how far we have climbed. In the end we go back to the beginning: yet one more recidivist chestnut.

In the beginning I learned that writing begins with imitation. I like that. Imitate until it becomes your own voice. Write what you know. Write what you read. Use a dramatic sense of language. Add variety. Is this a licence to plunder, plagiarize and purloin? Why indeed reinvent a written wheel. Others have claimed that you must read at least one hundred pages in order to write one. I’ll subscribe to that. Write an opening which snares. Write short sentences and short words. Writing is about who, what, where and when. A journal is a subset of memoir. The connection is at the beginning: emphasis at the end. Another mantra states writing is about clarity, precision and elegance. I may have trouble with the third edict. Use quotations sparingly. I’ll try to remember.

Eulogies are speeches of praise. Eulogy is a world of character. Focus on words, deeds and reputation with a congruence of words. ‘Smart as a hatful of rats’ is very good. It’s vital to focus on character: we are what we say, we are what we do and we are what others say about us. The structure will have a beginning, middle and an end. There will be skilful choice placing of key words with balance and closure. I had my first introduction to sober colons. The appositional colon links examples to the collective: it anticipates a list. The causal colon replaces because in the middle of a sentence. The semi-colon takes out both ‘and’ and ‘but’ in a sentence. Both sharpen the dialogue.

Journeys are actual and figurative. A literal journey may carry a figurative force. Characterize who and the place. Use quotations sparingly. I despair. How can I write what I read? Cheating and padding are more difficult. Unless journeys are serendipitous they will have a PLAN. The journey has a goal: consequence of a conscious plan. The plan will include where, when, who, what and why. There will be a ‘motif’: a pattern of language with words in sequence. Journey narratives embrace: modes of transport, reason or reasons, duration, time element (short or long), unexpected incidents, destination, ‘sense of place’, ambience and purpose. Phew! I think I understand.

You don’t write a paragraph; you make a paragraph. No wonder the engineers are doing so well. The PLAN will start with a topic sentence including subject and focus. Supportive detail in the middle links to a conclusion with cohesive key words: check for topic, focus and ending. I wonder of this works?

Write down a skeleton plan. Lexical chains are sets of words linked by meaning: linked words. They create cohesiveness and make the prose hang together. Lexical chains in boxes are very good for writing.

Journals can be daily or weekly accounts within narrow timeframes. There is immediacy and accuracy: clarity, precision and elegance. Eulogies are appraisals of life: praise, celebration and thanks. Journeys can be literal or figurative. A literal journey is a factual account. A figurative journey will include who, what, why, where and when. It is a repository for ideas with portals such as food, meals, seasonal time, doors and windows. It can be spiritual or transitional, may lie within a literal journey and stimulate recall. Rising action moves to a greater significance as exemplified by Shakespeare. Always start a new major topic with a new paragraph.

As instructed I have just ‘Googled’ Leda and the Swan by W. B. Yeats. How sensuous is that. What’s Agamemnon doing there? I’ve read an analysis of The Second Coming by the same author. It’s about the emotional element and the symbols that drive the emotional element. This will take me some time.

We consider the ending at the end: pure logic. Although advised not to I will finish with a quotation:

‘When we have passed a certain age, the soul of the child that we were, and the soul of the dead from whom we spring, come and bestow upon us in handfuls their treasures and their calamities’.

La Prisionnere by Marcel Proust, translated by C. K. Scott-Moncrieff.

Actually I have never read Proust; this is the first sentence in The Cardboard Crown by Martin Boyd. I thought I’d better own up: I’d be found out anyway. Perhaps Lord Victor Rothschild III was right: it’s all about burnishing our residual grey matter.

 

Stephen Fry and Cricket Tragedies

It’s that time of year and the flannelled fools are out of hibernation. The talk is of cricket tragedies.  Sir Winston Churchill might have reflected about me: ‘there’s a lot to be tragic about in your cricketing career’. Stephen Fry has an illustrious cricketing pedigree. An ancestor C B Fry was an early English superstar before they were even ‘invented’.

I especially like Stephen Fry’s address at the Lord’s Cricket Dinner in 2009. See below. I can also recall umpires Crapp & Fagg!

Featured Image: ‘The Laws of Cricket’ narrated by Stephen Fry

See: stephen fry and cricket – Bing images

Stephen Fry’s Speech at the Lords Test Dinner

Thursday, July 16th, 2009

Thank you ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much indeed.  It is an honour to stand before so many cricketing heroes from England and from Australia and at this, my favourite time of year. The time when that magical summer sound comes to our ears and gladdens our old hearts, the welcome sound of leather on Graham Swann.

I have been asked to say a few words – well more than a few. “You’ve twenty minutes to fill,” I was firmly told by the organisers. 20 minutes. Not sure how I’ll use all that time up. Perhaps in about ten minutes or so Andrew Strauss would be kind enough to send on a physio, that should kill a bit of time.

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