That feeling – memento mori

M.C. Escher, Eye (seventh and definitive state), mezzotint, October 1946

M.C. Escher, Eye (seventh and definitive state), mezzotint, October 1946

I know for some of my readers, I’m just a boy and the logic inside me tells me to keep going your doing OK.

And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years. – Abraham Lincoln

Yesterday however I got a real sense of feeling that I’m getting old as I spent the day in the office. It didn’t help that someone in passing said to me you won’t have long to go now. He was talking about early retirement, part of the conversation of him turning 40 the day before, and then weeks earlier having his first child. The person next to him, his manager also within a few weeks of turning 40 and part of my managers leadership team. I looked around in those milliseconds where a response in jest is required. I was the oldest by a good 10 years, motivation shot to pieces and had just been reading about the latest organisation restructures. It included someone I went to lunch with a rough 25 years ago. They were moving on to take a break or so the rhetoric implied.

I responded with some glib remark about having a while yet and that I still need to get the boys off the books and how I’ve still got the mortgage. He was envious that I might escape and he didn’t know I’d be writing about the encounter today. For me I wasn’t sure how I’d be feeling about seeing myself in the organisation, the pang of regret that I was stagnating again. It was more the 40 year old beside him, I didn’t know how old he was until then, it didn’t matter until he put a number on it and I’d just seen him as a peer someone who I go into battle with to get things done.

There are more and more moments like this, watching Indiana Jones and the lost ark with my son at the weekend. Harrison Ford was 38 when he made it! Flipping heck, I was barely 10 years old when I saw it and Mr Ford I thought was an old swashbuckler, a professor no less.

With each passing obituary on the news, Sinead O’Connor (56) and the popular British journalist George Alagiah (67) just this week I’m reminded of the seconds counting down. My dad passing at 64 and then my grandad at 98. It’s mind boggling the difference, the lottery and I hope I’m somewhere in the middle.

We have my father-in-law (87) coming over tomorrow, looking for a flat nearby, there has been mention of the big C, possibly manageable. All I can do is provide that shoulder of support to my wife.

It’s not a great post in terms of mood, my thoughts need reframing. 7am, I look out the window, the rain is on…..it’s time to decide, to run or not to run.

An image of a running route

So I did run, and the sun came out, I took in the smells, and breathed deeply as the tunes bouncing around from my watch to the headphones (isn’t Bluetooth amazing). I noticed the blackberries are on the way. The elderberries camouflaged in green, fully formed and not quite turned. I wonder could I come back nearer the time with my Tupperware box. I take a different turn than normal for this route. It’s painful there is a dip an up hill, another up hill, it’s my walking route in reverse. A metaphor for rewinding my thinking. To face into the challenge and defy the resistance, to change the route means to change the direction I’m going in and be better. I can run up this hill and I can take on the next challenge, there is time.

The weekend has arrived and we are taking the opportunity to try out a fish restaurant, Fin and Grape (that is new to us) this evening, and a way to close the week. 77 reviews and 5 stars, that is something to get excited about. Will let you know how we get on.

For the cookbook lovers out there I thought I’d share a picture of their cookbook shelves from instagram. Loving the sound of the ‘A very serious cookbook’! I spend the next five minutes looking it up and find it’s the story of some of some of the recipes from Contra and Wildair, Lower East Side tasting restaurant in New York. Something for the bucket list!

I’ve worked through some new recipes to keep the boys happy, taken from a fitness magazine and a library book, needed a little reworking for me, my kitchen. I’ll get them up on Cook One Thing soon:

If you cook one thing then it has to be the Tuscan Style Chicken dish, really worked a treat and kept my seventeen year old you busy for a half hour or so!

Lockdown Escape

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Coffee today is from a small village at the gateway to the Cairngorms, known as Blair Atholl.

The 5 mile Scotland radius lockdown was lifted on Friday and we couldn’t wait to escape.  We’d managed to hire a small lodge in the woods for the week as a replacement to a usual summer road trip into Europe.  In one way we were sad as the usual adventure had been cancelled and in another….just relieved to break away mentally from the confines and routines of home.

The view from the bedroom window is one of trees, an abundance of green….and rain, lots of torrential rain.  The rain drops almost the size of golf balls, then with moments of blue sky and sun.  To me though the rain didn’t matter we were going to get out to soak up the fresh air and absorb the life forces that just seem to emanate from the cycle paths, the trees and the hills.

Foodwise it was a strange one…..we really had to think ahead, put a weeks’ worth of a meal plan together.  We knew there was a local village store, which we counting on for bread.  The watermill (dating back to 1590) was only for pre phoned through orders for the Saturday….and it looked like the local chippy was coming out of hibernation.

The meal plan roughly:-

  • Friday – Chicken Stew, Rhubarb Crumble
  • Saturday – Chippy (Fish and Chips)
  • Sunday – Chicken Stew, Rest of the Crumble
  • Monday – Scrambled Eggs, Beans on toast followed by Chocolate Puddle Pudding
  • Tuesday – Bacon, Pasta and Crème Fraiche rest of the Puddle Pudding
  • Wednesday – Backed Potatoes, Smoked Mackerel – Pancakes
  • Thursday – Grains, Chicken Legs – Roast Apricots with a crumble topping
  • Roughly gave me the idea for the following post around a few tips for self-catering for the home cook.

 

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We managed some of the mighty big hills (Munroe’s) in the area and my lungs and mind are feeling all the better for it.  A break from the screen, the escape and that feeling of euphoria that you get by challenging the mind through excursion.

So home now and the weekend has flown by, with jobs in the garden to catch up on.  Amazing how the weeds shoot up whilst your away.  It’s like they were sat in waiting, for that moment when nobody would be looking!

Hope your choice of beverage is both relaxing and refreshing and that you have a great week ahead.


The #WeekendCoffeeShare is an informal weekly link-up hosted by Eclectic Alli that serves as weekly heart beat and sort of of a mind-dump. Helps me reflect on my week, with a list of achievements, thoughts and rambles normally whilst drinking a beverage probably listening to music.

 

Dr Rangan Chatterjee: Feel Better in 5

Podcast https://drchatterjee.com/blog/category/podcast/
Website https://drchatterjee.com/
Book Feel Better in 5

I’d had this in my wish list, an ask for my birthday…the promise of salvation. With 97 podcasts under his belt at time of writing this is a man who knows his stuff. I’m very late to this party!

Since Christmas I’ve been binge listening on my walks into work at 1.5 speed I can probably sing his theme tune.

I’m filled with a sense of optimism that I can make a difference for myself not in the bolt of lightning sense…but for the long term. It fits my habit tracking effort and all you have to do is give the man 15 minutes a day in 5 minute intervals.

I can do that!