My latest article on The Huffington Post

This week I have the pleasure of speaking with Paul Pellew (The Viscount Exmouth) about his recently released autobiography, A Prisoner of Fortune.

Please click here to read the article: The Passage of Time and Things That Matter (Part Five)

Paul Pellew (Viscount Exmouth)

Things I saw in the woods today, part 52

The Autumn brings a subdued, misty light that is haunting and evocative. This abandoned iron gate speaks of an era that has long since gone. No one pushes the gate open anymore but it once was the grand entrance to the estate now covered with Autumn leaves that no one sweeps away....

A very scary looking spider deep in the woods today. He was guarding an enormous hole in a tree which was the entrance to his lair. I am convinced he only had one eye...

A strange mushroom:

 

And finally, the sky as seen though Autumn leaves...

Not in the woods but the view from my house the morning after the Storm of 28th October.

All photos copyright SvD.

The passage of time

There are cliches about growing old. Life is determined in cycles and there are three- what crawls in the morning, stands upright at noon and has three legs at sunset? Man.

I have always wanted to be old- ever since I was a child. I hated being told what to do. I liked my independence and as soon as I could, I made a home for myself on my own terms. True freedom when you're a nascent adult must be playing the Rolling Stones at full blast in the middle of the night while drinking too much alcohol!

I yearned for lines on my face and gnarled fingers. Somehow lines, and wrinkles signify a type of wisdom.  I LOVE my grey hair so much so that when people stop me in the street- to gasp in admonishment that I don't dye my hair, I laugh all the more. I am free of the slavery of maintaining a myth. I stopped smoking the year my father died and I was livid to find that despite having smoked for  24 years I had no withdrawal whatsoever. It was as if I had never smoked ever in my life! But the bondage of dependency really sucks at the life force and once I had given up the nicotine rush, I felt unleashed. It was an awakening.

Giving up fear was the second best thing I ever did. Becoming detached. Thinking that whatever happens however terrible, well so what? Accepting that when one surrenders, one becomes stronger.

Being a slave to anything, TV, popular culture, are all things that make me want to live on top of a hill and spend the rest of my life in contemplation. Politics? Well, don't get me started.... I recently ran into my dog-walking friend, the undertaker: "People who go into politics have to want to help others," he exhorted, "they have to want to change the world for the better...." Yawn. How do you know when a politician is lying? His lips are moving.

What is so terrible about getting old? I rather love the way it makes me feel- crumpled in parts, wobbly in other bits but content and calm. Surely that state of saying, "apres moi le deluge!", is what really matters? To know that one has earned one's stripes, earned the ability to laugh in the face of adversity and maybe even thrive when faced with challenge and hardship.

But getting old can be an obstacle course- what's the point of being old and miserable? There is a man who walks his dog that I see often and I estimate the last time he smiled was in the Stone Age. How is it possible to be so darn miserable? To lose the ability altogether to say hello, smile at your dog's happy face and not look like you had a bucket of sour lemons for breakfast?

When I look back at my life there have been older people who crossed my path and now I can see them: branded by the past as if a hot iron had scarred their minds forever. Bitter, embroiled in never letting go, never moving on, never getting away from what sends you into a permanent state of kissing the bottom of an abyss.

There are older people who I have met who turn a thing around and around and around in their heads forever as if the words beginning and end  had never entered the English language. The past becomes the present and the future is now. Bitterness engenders bitterness. Miserable people don't have happy friends. And if they do, they want to squash the smile right out of them because it makes them feel good.

Getting old can be sexy- hard to imagine in our sex-obsessed society but in the true etymological meaning of the word: lustful for, yearning for ....life.

We are never too old that we are dead. And when we are dead then it is quite simply the end. But until then, do yourself a favour. Chuck out the botox, the hair dye, the viagra, the wrong wife and most importantly, burn the illusions of being anything but who you really are.

Photo copyright SvD.

Your happy memories 10/27 | Blog talk radio

I continue reading from my book, Maestro, and get to the part that was worth waiting for...

Your happy memories 10/27 

My latest article on the Huffington Post

Please click here to view: The Colour Yellow, Autumn and How Not To Feel Blue

Things I saw in the woods today, part 51

A sunset on the way home with the hound after our walk.

Steps in the woods - I walk up these steps most days and very occasionally will see anyone. Our Autumn landscape is still green and will remain so until the very cold weather sets in late December when winter truly begins.

And these acorns are all jostling for prime position in the mud so that the strongest will become an oak. Someone/something has to come along and push the acorn deep into the earth. One in every 20,000 acorns becomes an oak. Which one do you think it will be?

All photos copyright SvD.

Things I saw in the woods today, part 50

We've had nothing but heavy rain for the last few days so my attempts at taking photos have been limited. I did pass by the ghoul today- he's still there and still looking terrifying. Whoever/whatever he is, he remains the guardian of the woods.

Photo copyright SvD.