Olympic glory
Olympic glory DM 27th July 2024 It’s Olympic season again, and soon the torch will be lit, the village occupied, and competition begun. But O for the chance to see again characters like Eric the Eel and Eddie the Eagle. Alas, they are no longer allowed to compete. Once upon a time, the person who […]
Original thinking
Original thinking DM 20th July 2024 Whenever I read a book, and there are no footnotes at the bottom of the page with citations or references or attributions, I assume that what is written, and the arrangement of expression, are coming from the author’s own mind. (Notwithstanding the technicality that every author’s mind and heart […]
Dullness and Green
Dullness and Green DM 13th July 2024 I still have to look up the dictionary. The latest consult was prompted by a word in one of T. S. Eliot’s poems (‘East Coker’) – ‘hebetude’. It was sited in a stanza about things to look forward to in old age. As I thumbed to the ‘H’s’, […]
Referees and Resurrections
Referees and Resurrections DM 6th July 2024 Sometimes I wish that our Bible translators watched more soccer. There’s a verse in the opening paragraph of Paul’s famous letter to the Romans, where he makes the point that Jesus’ resurrection is demonstrative proof of his divinity. My NIV puts it this way: ‘… and through the […]
Real food
Real food DM 22nd June 2024 I felt like Pierre in Tolstoy’s War and Peace, sitting at home, after the war, with a plate of potatoes before him, and feeling like it was the first time he had ever tasted their simplicity and warmth. I had bought some potatoes, fresh from the earth, washed the […]
Love your enemies
Love your enemies DM 15th June 2024 I once took revenge on a near neighbour, whose cat attacked my daughter, by mowing her lawn for three years. I’m not sure that she actually knew what her cat had done, but nor did she ever come out of the house to acknowledge that her grass was […]
First anniversaries
First anniversaries DM 1st June 2024 Traditionally, paper or cotton is given on the occasion of a first wedding anniversary. I think I gave my wife flowers – in fact, a bunch of hydrangeas, in the same colour as those that formed our wedding bouquet. Contemporary couples apparently give clocks and watches, though the logic […]
The flavour of grace
The flavour of grace DM 25th May 2024 Well there’s another thing ticked off my bucket list. A meal of Muttonbird – fresh from the southern sea and sprinkled with salt and seasoned with garlic. And the taste? Sort of sea-watery. Oily. Crispy. Not bad. Probably the same thing, though in reverse, experienced by a […]
Flim-flams & Paschal Lambs
Flim-flams & Paschal Lambs DM 18th May 2024 In the church to which I belonged as a young Christian, there was a fellow who worked as a flim-flam-man. I’m not sure if it’s a thing now, but his job was to deliver birthday greetings and other messages of congratulations, in sing-song voice, at full volume, […]
Mists and meaning
Mists and meaning DM 25th April 2024 I’ll never forget a movie scene where a Minister preached a text from the Book of James to some army boys on the eve of their departure to war. “For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth […]