CLIMBING SNOWDON: PART 6

1pm. Imagine an airport terminal where all the planes have been scheduled to leave simultaneously, and for some reason everyone’s dressed up for ski-ing.

Can you see it? How about if, as well as all of that, for some reason there are no dehumidifiers, it’s freezing, and there’s only one announcer who’s loud and for some reason, very Welsh.

We’re close now. Close to describing the impossibly-packed, condensation-filled, noisy, unbearably wet, railway terminus that calls itself a café, at the top of Snowdon. Once you’re in, it’s almost impossible to move. Elbows, rucksacks, poles, beanie hats, gloved fists of coffee, red-faces, shoe laces, cardboard cups, waterproofs, phones and jackets fill that hall like an ocean tumbling out of Millets the camping store.

It’s really three things, which I think might be part of the problem. It is the railway terminus for tickets down the mountain. Every now and then the Welsh announcer bursts over the hubbub with the names of the latest lucky standby-ticket owners who’d successfully bought their way down for £27. I was right - there never really was any way I’d take the train, but not for the reason of unfit laziness. It was simply not possible.

The massive shed is also a gift shop (because of course it is) as well as a nominal cafeteria. Nominal as in, there was a counter serving snacks about as far away as Glastonbury. And the multi-coloured ocean of high-end outdoorswear was not navigable. I caught a glimpse of the gift shop hoodies above the heads of about a million people. It was a long way to go for a cheap hoodie that says I climbed Snowdon.

I found my colleagues. Through some miraculous act of quick-thinking, Robert had actually found a seat and had gradually started bagsying spaces around him. In that place, there’s no seat left unsat upon for more than three seconds. I suspected Robert had used similar tactics to his approach to the trigpoint. Ah well.

“I’d imagined a tea room with doilies and a teapot,” said Vicky. Yes. I’d have settled for a little space to dry wet clothing a bit, and maybe a Jaffa cake. A decent cup of tea would have been a lovely bonus. I ended up leaning against a cold window, drinking water and eating sandwiches out of a zip-lock bag. I was grateful I’d saved them.

When I think of climbing a mountain, I don’t think of hundreds of people. I think of that Friedrich painting with the Victorian man looking out at the fog from a craggy peak. I think of Monarch of the Glen, or Lawren Harris, the great romantics with their themes of solitude, tranquility, beauty and vivid stillness... not several hundred soggy hikers trying to move in every direction all at once in a gigantic wet chicken shed.

2:30pm. It was time to start descending. Through the cloud, out of the misty rain and the hubbub of the summit. Dave, our expedition leader, had chosen the easiest route down, and, although we’d all get separated again, there were no complaints about taking the long and gentle Llanberis Path back down to the real world.

By the time we were all sitting in the pub, we’d had the chance to reflect about the achievement, comparing step-counters, heart-rates, and calorie counters. It was an achievement: several hours of walking and climbing and scrambling. There were sore knees and sore shoulders, there were tight calves and stretched hamstrings, as well as windswept faces and unkempt hair that normally would have mattered. But none of it did really.

And there, out there in the drizzly sky of North West Wales behind us, was the mountain itself, unchanged, unmoved, unbothered in the mist and the cloud. Snowdon: a piece of land that geology had once selected for elevation to a thousand metres. A pile of rock with a trigpoint on top.

They say the best reason to climb one of those things is because it’s there. I looked around the room at my fellow Snowdoneers, holding beers and ciders and wine, and yes, for at least one soul, a gin and tonic. I think the experience is there to move us, perhaps to bring us closer together, as colleagues, as mountain-climbers, as friends. The mountain might not move anywhere, but perhaps we do. Perhaps putting it under our feet by walking over it gave us all a thing we didn’t have before.

And that’s great. Because from now on all of us can say we’ve done it. And we did it really well too. Together.

<< Travel Diaries

CLIMBING SNOWDON: PART 5

12:15pm. The shape of the summit was just about visible in the cloud. My legs pounded as each foot arched onto the next step towards the top. This was the bit where all the paths collide, and it was surprisingly busy.

People came down, wet hair and saturated gear. People, like me, stumbled up the last unmissable stretch. It was almost solid in either direction.

“Oh I do hope the cafe’s open,” said a lady in a northern accent. I wondered exactly what she might be picturing.

The summit itself is a bit of a plateau, with a cairn of stones piled into a central high point of the peak. On the top is a trigpoint, showing you the direction to look to see landmarks of Snowdonia, the sea, the Isle of Man, even Scotland.

Or, if you like, a massive selfie platform.

I saw the cairn emerge from the fog as I approached, and the crowd of walkers slowed to a sort of reverential halt.

There it was, the top of Snowdon: we had made it, all of us: young, old, fit, unfit, trekking poles, plastic rainmac, sopping hats and fleeces and rucksacks and boots. And what nobody had expected on this most British of adventures, was a queue. But there we were.

Yep. There were so many people up there that they’d quite naturally formed a queue to go up to the trigpoint.

I wondered what to do for a moment. My colleagues were all behind me, and I knew they’d arrive at different times. The chances of us all going up together were slim. And anyway, slowing down to a stop to think it over had resulted in (you guessed it) me being part of the queue anyway.

“Would you look at those people,” muttered the Northern lady. “Pushing in.”

A smaller group were clambering up the down steps to bypass the queue. It wasn’t popular where I was standing. Plus it looked a little dangerous.

By this point, it was cold, wet, and windy. I’d taken my specs off because I could see better without them, and all around us the wind roared from the thick white fog. The cairn of stones with its up queue and its down queue was being buffeted by that freezing wind, and all the selfie-takers were struggling to stand up, their shiny waterproofs billowing in the breeze. Navigating down the down steps would be a challenge enough, without passing a bunch of queue-jumpers on the way up.

“Bit rude in’t it?” she said. I nodded in agreement.

It was just as she’d finished saying it, that I happened to look up and see Tim and Robert happily taking selfies on the trigpoint.

-

12:50pm. I made it. I’ve got to be honest, the golden disc of directions wasn’t entirely helpful on the day. The Isle of Man? Cloud. Scotland? White cloud. The sea? Cloud. Snowdonia? Cloud. The rest of the queue? Cloud. There was no danger of vertigo up there; we were surrounded by white cloud.

My phone was wet but I did manage a selfie of me looking grumpy about the take-photo button not working properly. Then I put both hands on the trigpoint and prayed for Wales. The party of people around me did the same it seemed; there were suddenly several pairs of gloves around the disc. I found myself wondering whether angels need gloves and whether it could just be that... but I wasn’t brave enough to ask any of them.

“Right,” I said to myself. “Time to find the warm.”

And so I did. I tottered down the down steps, and headed for the café, Though I’ll be honest, the word café doesn’t quite do the job in describing the next scene...

Climbing Snowdon Part 6 >>

CLIMBING SNOWDON: PART 4

11:30am. Wet rocks, slippery footholds, streams cascading down the mountain. With my backpack on, I felt as though I had a lower centre of gravity, but I was certainly compromising by staying as close to the ground as possible. The ‘ground’ of course, was vertical.

While I’d dawdled a bit on the flat bit, the scramble-up-the-steep-bit was much more energising. Every move is part of a problem-solving exercise, where a hand or a foot in the right place makes all the difference for the next. I was extremely grateful that the new boots had so much grip - not a single slip happened on those shiny boulders.

The one thing I was deliberately not doing was looking behind me. I caught a glimpse of the height at one point while scrabbling on all fours. The view was upside down between my feet and my shiny waterproof trousers, but unmistakably the silver lake and the misty morning, far below. I focused on the climb, rather than the fall.

A consequence of that was that I wasn’t really conscious of how far behind my colleagues were. The steps up were getting painful now, and I knew I had to keep going to keep warm. That also meant that it would have been tough to wait for them all.

I did stop though, near the top of that scramble. There was a natural ledge that a few climbers ahead were sitting on, and I decided to join them, now quite unbothered at the thought of the cold and the damp seeping through my waterproofs. Though I should have been, I suppose.

Tim and Robert and Kelly were first up, after a few minutes.

I imagined that we were all thinking how weary each other looked. I peeled off my gloves and chomped through a banana.

“Only half a k to go,” said an older gentleman next to me. You might not believe this but over a thousand people a day visit Snowdon, and although I’d lost my troop, I was never on my own. In fact, in lots of ways, it’s quite encouraging to see people of all shapes, ages and sizes trekking up over the difficult stones.

I wanted to ask him whether he meant half a kilometre to the top, or just to the top of the Miners’ Track. We could certainly see files of hikers along a high craggy route, joining up to the misty path ahead.

“Cold, Matt?” asked Robert.

“Yeah, how long you been here?” added Kelly.

I suddenly felt the cold. I slipped my hands back into my wet gloves and balled my fists a few times.

“Yes,” I said, “Ten minutes or so. Starting to feel it.”

“You could always do press-ups,” suggested Robert, half-seriously. I declined, then asked them if it was okay to keep moving.

12:40. I was certain that to the left of me was a serious drop. I could see the stones sliding off into the fog. On a better day, I bet the view would be magnificent. If I really was just half a kilometre from the top then I must have been around a thousand metres above sea-level. I wondered whether seeing that view would have made the ascent easier or much more difficult.

Climbing Snowdon Part 5 >>

CLIMBING SNOWDON: PART 3

I got laughed at the other day for predicting there’d be a flat bit, then a steep bit.

In the end though, that’s exactly how the Miners’ Track worked out.

There are six proper ways up and down Snowdon, some tricky, some easy. We had chosen one called the Miners’ Track (flat bit then steep bit) up the mountain. I mean surely the miners would have found a nice climbable route for themselves and their stuff, right?

It occurred to me too though, that all routes up a mountain have to converge anyway at some point. They’re probably all going to be difficult.

11am. The rain fell steadily as we rounded the lakes at the bottom of Snowdon. We were surrounded by rock face, looming up into the clouds. Tiny streams and waterfalls lined the slate hills, each one a silver ribbon tumbling into the wind-rippled water.

We’d been walking for about an hour. The miners’ track had taken us around a few of those lakes. With the weak light and the misty clouds, the lakes took on an otherworldly silvery shimmer. Bleak but beautiful. In my layers and my hooded rainmac, I felt a bit like an astronaut, carefully striding on the surface of the moon.

“So we have to go up that?” asked Rachel, pointing a gloved hand towards the mountain. Way up, zig-zagging high on the rocks was a small group of trekkers with poles. They reminded me of those goats who file up the side of cliffs, impossibly precarious, dangerously high. They slowly disappeared into the cloud.

“I guess it’s one step at a time,” said someone else.

I took a deep breath, a swig of electrolyte-powered water, and headed for the rocks at the base of Wales’s highest mountain.

Climbing Snowdon: Part 4 >>

CLIMBING SNOWDON: PART 2

3am. I couldn’t help it. A rustle of sheets, followed by soft footsteps across a creaky floor. The sliver of yellow light around the door filled the room as I stepped quietly out and onto the landing.

I needed the loo. In the quiet dark cottage, I could hear the sweep of rain outside. It fell on the cars and the bins and the tarmac. I stood a while and listened to it, convinced that it only makes that particular quiet pattering sound in Wales.

8:32am. Togged up, we waited at Pen-y-Pas. The early morning sky was grim. It hugged the mountains like evil clings to Mordor - dense, dark fog and swirling mists hiding the craggy tops and silhouettes. We were waiting for the other half of our crew, who’d parked the cars at Llanberis so that when we came down the other side at the end of the day, we’d be ready to just drive off. They were catching the bus back.

Rain pattered into my raincoat.

After a while, a bus did draw up. We watched as it swung into view..

Then, almost as if drawn by some divine comedy, a man in a bright yellow banana suit got out.

I don’t know if it would have been so obvious otherwise, but the morning was so dark and so grey, the luminous, felt banana costume slipped into the scene as though a powerful lamp had just been lit.

He was followed by Luigi (green overalls, fake moustache, felt hat), Buzz Lightyear, Jack Sparrow, Robin Hood, and most comically of all, a rather soggy looking Batman, who looked like he would rather be anywhere else than Snowdonia dressed up as the Caped Crusader.

“Stag do?” said Ant, looking round at us.

“Wouldn’t be my choice of stag do,” retorted Tim.

The fancy dress crew shuffled past us on their way to the toilets. A few moments later, I saw the banana ordering coffee in the little cafe, without a hint of oddity. Batman was still sulking.

9:04am. Synchronised tracking watches, found the path (more about that later) and set out into the cloudy hills, heading for Snowdon.

You know, in all that happened after that, we never saw the fancy dress crew up the mountain.

Climbing Snowdon Part 3 >>

CLIMBING SNOWDON: PART 1

10:00am. I left the house feeling, if anything, summery. It wasn’t too cold, and the Autumn breeze flapped at my shirt and lightweight zipper jacket. The sun was bright behind the thick clouds, more like a mid-August sky than a September one. I supposed the weather on top of the mountain might be different.

I slipped the front door keys into my sports bag, slung my rucksack over both shoulders, camelbak pipe looping into the pocket like a Ghostbusters backpack, and strode out to the road, ready for adventure.

-

9:30pm. “Has anyone checked the forecast for tomorrow?” asked somebody around the table. Steve checked it. 99% chance of rain. We’ve all adopted a sort of ‘what will be will be’ attitude it seems. I think we’ll get wetter than we’ll end up caring about somehow.

The journey was okay. Showers were interspersed with sunshine, and towards the end, while we were winding along Welsh roads of grey slate and rain-washed villages, the setting sun was properly shining.

I like the way the sun catches the hills on evenings such as these. Long shadows fell across rounded green slopes, rock faces glinted, and sheep wandered aimlessly through the glistening evening. It was all very pleasant. In the distance, dark mountain peaks were shrouded in mist and cloud, like a sign.

“It’d be lovely if it were like this tomorrow,” said Rachel. Indeed it would.

-

We arrived just after the rain.

Our base camp is a cottage, big enough for twelve, but not with twelve bedrooms. Also not quite big enough for any one of us to escape the sound of all the others. It’s so strange this situation - colleagues and their partners, the awkward politeness of relative strangers, colleagues who would never be friends. I understand why alcohol works its magic, I think. Though it’s not for me.

-

10:13pm. I’m ready for sleep now. Earlier, as the hills and mountains of North Wales flashed by the sunlit, rain-specked window, I started to wonder what it would be like to be out walking up them. And then I remembered that tomorrow we’d be climbing one that’s much taller than all of these. Over a thousand metres of mountain, probably snow-capped, probably wind-ravaged, probably craggy, probably difficult.

I really hope I’ll be alright.

Meanwhile, below, in the kitchen, my colleagues laugh to the music of chinking glasses. I worry about being selfish, then close my eyes to the white noise of their chatter. 

Climbing Snowdon: Part 2 >>

SANDWICHES AND MOUNTAINS

So even my colleagues (the ones who are not going) now think I'll probably end up taking the train either up or down Snowdon on Saturday! I'm really hoping I can prove them wrong.

Meanwhile, the crew of mountaineers themselves have been discussing the important matters of the day: how much wine to drink the night before, how to get enough cars at the right end of the mountain so that we can all go home, and, perhaps most controversially of all, what is a sandwich.

I mean surely, it has to be two whole slices of bread with a filling? I can't imagine the eponymous Earl rushing off to fetch a knife while his noble chums snuck a peek at his playing cards. In what world could it possibly be the half-diagonally sliced variety?

Anyway. I don't get involved. Not me - keep my opinions really tight, I do, on such political matters.

(I said that with an air; hope you caught it.)

I also did a bit of research today. The Met Office are predicting 'breezy, with a few showers. Cloud thickening, strong winds and heavy rain possible.'

It might not be preferable to ache up a mountain in freezing rain and not be able to see anything except our own drenched colleagues in the fog. All those people who are looking forward to the photos might just be disappointed by a group of bedraggled office workers.

I also googled 'Snowdon' ...

"Man dies on Snowdon after rescue attempt by helicopters and mountain rescuers."

Ooooh good.

You know, maybe the train isn't such a bad idea. Never google.

THE EIGHTH EYE TEST

The doctor had an air about him. It’s a sort of ‘professional kindness’, I suppose. He understood that sometimes my vision goes wobbly but his face was giving away very little about it. My guess is that they’re all trained how to do that.

Apart from not being clever enough, incredibly squeamish, unable to make critical decisions, and very flappable under pressure, that’s probably the fifth most likely reason why I can’t be a doctor: my facial expressions are a dead giveaway.

“So we still can’t find anything wrong,” he said, smiling dispassionately. A giant picture of the inside of my eye hovered behind him on a computer screen. I’ve been here before, I thought. And indeed I have - the very same room in the eye clinic! He moved the pen around to track my eye motion. He shone a bright light in me like a transporter beam and got me to look at the floor, the ceiling, his ear, the left wall and the same old posters. I don’t particularly want to have to do this again.

“So I think we’ll just do a more refined test of your movement next time,” he said, “Then one more check up and we’ll discharge you.”

“Do you think it is migraines then?” I asked.

“Not for me to say, really,” said he, the eye doctor, to me, the eye patient who clearly has nothing wrong with his eyes. Optics eliminated, it’s something else.

I stepped out into the bright sunlight. The drops were still working, keeping my pupils fully dilated against the will of the iris. It hurt as the sun scorched into my eyes. I blinked and sat down in a high-backed chair.

I don’t quite know why they can’t discharge me now, given that they know my eyes are healthy. I suppose it’s nice to be sure (and thank heaven for the NHS!) but it still leaves me wondering how to be less stressed, less boiling, less prone to migraines making the world jump about like Mexican beans. If anyone - the neurologist, the health and well-being counsellor, or even the dispassionate eye doctor - could help me with that, then maybe I wouldn’t need to be quite so familiar with the blurry old eye clinic.

EXPLOSIONS OF JOY

I was listening to a podcast at the bus stop today. It’s the one where celebrities have to guess how old other celebrities are. Seemed like a good test of the ol’ wireless headphones.

Then, out of nowhere, while discussing how old the tennis player Tim Henman is, comedian David O’Docherty just said,

“Names are funny. At some point... a man... had a hen.”

And I laughed out loud. It was a real burst of cacophony, a single explosion of joy. 

And everyone at the bus stop was suddenly looking at me as though I was in pain.

It isn’t even that funny! It’s kind of random at best. Nonetheless I had to turn around and face the hedge out of embarrassment, while I softly chortled into my sleeve... which of course made it all the funnier.

-

I’m at the hospital today, for the eighth eye test. So far I’ve had the nurse do her usual debate of whether or not to do the ‘ishihara’ test, I’ve been poked in the eyes with the pressure tester, and I’ve had the drops that dilate the pupils.

In a few minutes, I’ll be through for a scan. The drops are kicking in. I won’t be able to see properly in a mo; I can already see the letters going blurry in the waiting room of strange newspaper readers and walking stick owners. No explosions of joy here, it seems.

Where’s David O’Docherty when you need him?

THE NON-RETURN OF THE TROPICAL MUFFIN

I'm pretty sure I didn't dream that I had the Tropical Muffin, but ever since, all they've ever had at the cafe is double-chocolate-chip.

Compared to tropical, double-choc-chip is like old cardboard. I know, right - and I love a double-choc-chip muffin (especially when the distribution of chips is evenly spread)! That just goes to show how out-of-this-world the Tropical Muffin actually was. How succulent, how delicious, how gloriously sweet and fruity, how heaven bound had it been?

Shuko and I made the regular trip this afternoon to the cafe.

"What muffins do you have?" I asked the lady.

"Chocolate," said she. I made a face and then she wrapped one up for me anyway.

I'm a little nervous about asking, "When are the Tropical Muffins coming back?" What if really was all a dream? What if they look at me blankly as though I'd asked for moonsparkle toast, or unicorn butter? Tropical fruit? In a muffin? Really? Really Matt?

As if to rub it in, it was at that point that the clouds swelled grey overhead and the windows of the cafe were suddenly specked with drizzle.

"We'd better run," I said. Shuko agreed and clutching a diet coke, the double-choc-chip muffin, and an iced-latte, we hurried between the trees on our way back to the lake towards the office.

It chucked it down. Before long we were stopped under a tree, watching the rain sweep across the grass and the fountains, in great streams that pelted the wooden footbridge and splashed off the shiny concrete paths.

"Last day of summer, eh," I said, reflecting. It really felt like it. Shuddering under a tree while the cold rain fell through the autumn leaves, I wondered whether the days of the Tropical Muffin might just be over. If ever they were real in the first place, that is.

CITY OF STRANGERS

I’ve had to come into town on a warm, late summer’s afternoon. It’s September alright; hot enough for cricket but also the golden glow of sunlight through leaves, and long shadows.

And the town is packed! There’s a claustrophobic Londonish feel about being so close, and yet so far apart from, the slaloming mass of people who shop here. It’s a city of strangers.

They’re not all shopping though. Some seem to be dressed for the twenties - flapper girls with feathers, gents in waistcoats and flat caps, even boys in braces and cheeky sailors uniform. Some party I’d wager.

Meanwhile I’ve been looking for new walking boots for my upcoming trip to Snowdon. Some colleagues, their partners, and I, are going on an adventure for charity in a couple of weeks. Last time I went up a mountain, I realised my old boots had no grip and were letting snow melt into my socks. At least this time there’ll be a few of us.

And hopefully with warm, dry feet.

I often wonder who I’d like to see in this ‘city of strangers’. I mean people I know rather than the guy who just walked past me with a beatbox loudly playing Will Smith’s Summertime. I mean what year is it?

Who would I pick to have a chat with, who’s my friendly face? Who would I want God to teleport in my direction? Who’s out there, beyond the cast of Peaky Blinders and the Blazing Squad?

Well anyway. I got walking boots. The guy also sold me half-price spray, which the sensible odds say I will forget to use.

The bells of St Laurence’s ring out over the flame-coloured trees, the buses rumble by, and the chattering mass of souls swells happily and hotly through the streets. And somewhere in the distance, Will Smith and Jazzy Jeff serenade the summer with a fading beat.

MOONLIGHT

Middle of the night again. In a daze I peered through the lazily drawn curtains and saw the gardens and the park covered in snow.

Wait, what?

Well not snow. Moonlight - but that full, silvery moonlight that so beautifully paints everything white in the small hours of a cold morning. I feel as though even I might look noble out there, lined in jewels and clothed in silver.

I’m not going out there. I’m staying in here where it’s warm and I can look at the moon and think of Nocturnes, and Sonatas, and Debussy, and Schubert, Chopin, and Beethoven: the masters of the night music. They knew how to capture the mood.

Monet used to paint snow scenes with blue - somehow it works, and with low light there’s an even more pronounced optical illusion that shifts all the colours to the blue end of the spectrum. Moonlight isn’t really silvery, and yet it is.

But then, if you think about it, light isn’t really any colour at all - that bit’s kind of interpreted by our brains, which tell us how the wavelength of the light ought to be processed. Before they met my eyes, the photons that started in the sun some nine minutes ago before bouncing off the moon... were completely invisible, by definition.

Well. I don’t want to think about that too much. Science gets in the way of art sometimes, and, as a friend of mine is keen to point out, you ‘can’t always rely on the data’. Sometimes you just have to enjoy the output, much like the old masters did.

So I perch on the windowsill, where at other times I’d watch lightning storms or snowfall. The park is bathed in the cool moonlight, grass gently blowing, trees fluttering and stars glittering. It is a beautiful night.

VEGETABLE BIRYANI

A quite extraordinary thing happened today. I selected vegan chilli from the menu in Stockholmhaven, and the Elves who work there assumed I was a vegan.

They didn’t have any vegan chilli, so they entered an elvish conflab about what else they had, and before I could protest and say ‘it’s okay, I’ll just have chips,’ I was thrust an iPad with a long list of ingredients telling me exactly what goes into a vegetable biryani.

Now. I’m not a vegan. But tell me, why should only vegans be expected to eat vegan food? I get the feeling that most of us have just assumed that vegan food is so tasteless and bland that you must have to be rigidly attached to your principles to eat it - because nobody would be mad enough to actually choose it, would they?

To be fair to my Swedish friends, I think it might be statistically true that most people who choose vegan food from a set of options... are actually vegans; I do appreciate that. And also to be fair, I’m in a small minority as a sort of flexitarian who resents the idea that a lifestyle choice earns you a label.

But here’s the thing, meat-eaters. You can eat it all; you’re not limited. Pick a veggie meal in a restaurant if you like the look of it. Why not? There’s every chance it’s the tastiest thing on the menu!

And veggies, you don’t have to be defined by that label either, whatever your reason for the herbivorous doodah! Eat, drink and be merry. And definitely don’t judge people who pick the veggie option when they don’t have to. It isn’t religion.

As for you people who make it and serve it, maybe we can dream together of a world where meat-eating isn’t the default and where anyone else isn’t a wild-eyed, hippie maverick? I mean maybe, just maybe... it’s quite the norm to have given up chomping through the body parts of dead animals, delicious though that may be! And actually, vegetarian cuisine is just getting better and better anyway.

‘How was that vegetable biryani then?’ I hear you cry.

Well. It could have done with a little more flavour in my opinion. But of course it could.

THE SEVEN THINGS I HAVE TO DO

I've been doing some calculations. I've figured that it's sensible to build margins into your life, moments of down-time, perhaps time between the times, or just contingencies.

I've been wondering though, how that ideal squares up against the Seven Things I Have To Do, and whether in fact, there really is enough time - or whether (as I suspect) I have to choose which of the Seven just won't fit:

* Eat Healthy
* Sleep Well
* Exercise Often
* Work Hard
* Keep a Tidy Home
* Serve in Ministry
* Have Fun With Friends/Family

The results aren't encouraging. The graph shows how they fit if I somehow manage to do them all on the days I'd like to do them. It is possible, but with so little contingency. So what's happening to me then, is that out of the Seven Things, all the ones that don't impact anybody else get dropped, and I'm slowly getting buried in tiredness and mess.

It shouldn't be this way, should it? I feel like I need a month off from everything I do, just to get my flat sorted, my car sorted, and my diet sorted out. But you can't pause time, can you? And I need friendship like I need to work. And I need to serve too, and do everything else. There aren't easy answers, but something's just got to give. And I'm a little worried that ultimately, that something will be all of me.

BUS ETIQUETTE

Do you say thank you to the driver when you get off the bus?

Well. You’re not alone; a lot of people do too, and that’s great, but I don’t think it’s universal. I try to - sometimes it feels like the least I can do for a person who’s pulled a bunch of strangers up a hill with a rickety jalopy and its overworked engine. Seems kind of obvious really.

This morning though, I had to say something else. I had to apologise, as the 15 rolled to a stop by Sainsbury’s.

None of us - not me, nor the ladies chatting behind me - had bothered to press the bell.

“Anyone for Sainsbury’s then?” called the driver, slowing down and nearing the stop.

“Yes please!” called one of the ladies. (I had chickened out.)

“Bell not working then?” he called. We wobbled nearer the doors. “Maybe you should push it next time, instead of makin’ me stop in the middle of the road,” he added, tersely.

We alighted, me adding a sheepish “Sorry!” where a cheery thanks normally goes.

So. I learned something. If you want to get off the bus, you should always push the bell. Even if the next stop is the actual end of the road, the bus station, or the terminus, always press, never just assume.

It occurs to me now that the same thing might be true with conversations where you’re uncertain about what’s happening. There’s a lot of potential for future hurt unless you find a way to get onto the same page. The only problem is, that process can be embarrassing. Nonetheless if you’re not sure, you should always press, never assume.

This is all part of my ongoing quest to work out how to be assertive, directional, kind, and good at listening, all at the same time. It’s harder than it sounds, but I think it’s possible.

You know, it’s several hours later and I still don’t know why I didn’t look for the ‘Bus stopping’ sign and realise it hadn’t been lit yet. Courtesy is so simple sometimes, I don’t know why it feels so hard.  Tomorrow I’ll look the driver in the eye and say thank you with a smile, I think.