GENERATION GAP

My friend June wanted me to go with her to go to an editing course. I thought my short story collection could do with editing and just might, if improved, become fit for publication, so I went along. Dawn Garish, who is a dear friend, is running the course.  Now, she is very much into using writing, especially, memoir writing, as therapy. This is not really what June and I are after. So far we have attended two sessions and I  think we both found them disappointing. However, I did take note of some comments made about my pieces and changed them, very possibly for the better. So it hasn't been a fruitless exercise by any means. At the second session, one of the participants read us the piece of writing that she had  revised as had been suggested and it was very much improved. So she certainly benefited. But I can't help contrasting this course with other courses I have attended. I think particularly of Sindiwe's writing courses and also of Finuala's workshops. I did find one of her comments on my poem about ICU useful, but really when it comes to poetry, Dawn just doesn't have it.

I was in two minds about continuing with the course. Thinking it over and  analysing my feelings, I have come to the conclusion that I am out of place in the group. My work may be light, even frivolous, but I am serious about writing. I love what I consider "good writing" and am very critical of anything else. In other words I am a literary snob. If I were to give my honest opinion of  most of what has been read at this group, it would would just be hurtful and offensive and not help at all. The style of writing most of the participants admire and probably aspire to is popular and may well turn out to be publishable. This goes for the subject matter too. A lot of it is about unhappy childhood, which so many writers seem to have experienced. I do not easily relate to this.(I also think it has been rather done to death, but maybe that is just me.)

After careful consideration, I realise that the main problem is that I am too old for this group. Two of the members are approaching my age and they write  stories that I can enjoy. I can't say the same for the other three. One piece, involving child abuse, that was read at the last session, I thought was quite revolting.  I found bile rising in my throat. It actually turned my stomach.The other members of the group obviously did not feel the same way. Dawn did say that there was perhaps too much graphic detail, but in general the writer was told she was honest and wrote well. I did not agree! If it had been a description of her own experience of abuse, it would have been bad enough but would have aroused sympathy. It wasn't! She admitted that it was entirely fictitious and in fact, listening to it, one of the things that struck me was that it did not ring true. The voice, supposedly that of a nine or ten year old, sounded much too adult. I am probably too squeamish, but the writer seemed to enjoy  wallowing in  disgusting detail. I could not keep quiet. I had to say that I found the piece too disturbing and did not want to listen to it.

I understand now that for this group I am on the wrong side of a generation gap. Perhaps, growing up in the puritanical fifties I am  too prudish. I do not share what seems to me to be an a strange fascination with guts, genitals and bodily fluids. I admire the clear, spare writing of the authors I grew up with and don't like the fluffy pretentious style of much of what is published today. I think I shall go to only one more session and before it, or after it, explain my problem to Dawn.




  

Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity

These are two long words for "Gay or Straight?" and "do you think of yourself as male or female?" ?" At church today we were told that these questions are of great interest to the Powers that be in the diocese and are to be the focus of debate. I am not sure quite what this means, but assume we shall be called to meet  and discuss our attitudes to LGTB people.

After hearing Father Stafford's sermon, someone in the congregation suggested to me that I might be interested to meet some gay friends of hers. I didn't want to be discouraging, but I couldn't see much point in such a meeting. I have friends who go in for in dog training, bird- watching,creative writing or poetry. They are my friends because of our shared interests and because they are people I like. Some of these friends are gay. It is just something I accept about them like the colour of their eyes. When I was young my parents numbered several same-sex couples among their friends. So I was aware of differences in sexual orientation from a very early age.

However, I am aware that gay people are often subject to prejudice and discrimination and I am willing to join in any discussions that may be instigated by Father Stafford. To this end I decided to look up the subject on Google. I battled my way through some rather heavy scientific articles and came up with some most interesting nuggets of information.

Firstly it seems that our gender identity and sexual orientation are an integral part of who we are. They are both permanently programmed in the brain while we are in the womb. In other words we are born that way.  There is no evidence that the way we are brought up or our social environment  can influence our gender identity or sexual orientation.

At conception we receive either two X chromosomes or one X and one Y chromosome. The embryo with a Y chromosome will develop male organs and male physical characteristics and the  one with two X chromosomes will develop female sex organs and female physical characteristics.But the story doesn't end there. Hormones are produced in the mother's body which have an effect on the baby's growth. The amount of testosterone during the development of the foetus determines the sexual differentiation of the brain; a testosterone surge causes the brain to become more masculine, a lack of testosterone causes it to become more feminine. So a baby may be born with the body of a boy and the mind of a girl or vice versa.

It has been found that female animals that have been affected by high testosterone behave like males and choose other females as mates and male animals lacking testoterone before birth behave like females.

So nobody chooses to be gay.  Being born that way is  challenging, It is harder for them to  accept themselves, find their place in the world and to find love.  Those of us who were born "straight" are challenged too. Our challenge is to find ways of being more accepting and inclusive of those who are different from ourselves.

A problem with prayer

The Bible reading in church on Sunday was from the Epistle of James. In it he encourages anyone who is ill to inform the church elders so prayers can be said. I was not feeling well enough for Church on Sunday and had to tell a friend who rang in the morning, that I couldn’t give her a lift. She obviously took James seriously and when she got to church  asked the congregation for prayers for my recovery. Unfortunately, this caused a certain amount of consternation because when you are prayed for like this, everyone imagines you are, if not actually on the point of death, at least seriously indisposed. 

My neighbour,  Liz, from two doors away, was at church that morning and heard the prayers. Shocked and concerned , she popped in to see how I was. At that time I was still  groggy and could only sip at the  bush tea she brought me. However, it seems the prayers of All Saints Church are very powerful and by evening I was almost fully recovered. In fact, having not eaten all day, I was rather hungry and so when Val, my next-door neighbour,  rang and invited me to join her in a light meal I  left everything at once  and walked over to her cottage. As I didn’t intend to stay away long, and was going to be so close by, I left the computer on and the door unlocked ( Actually, I never lock my dogs in the house so in case there is a an emergency like a fire  they would be able to escape.)

While I was enjoying a glass of red and a delicious bean bredie,  my almost- next-door-neighbour, Liz , came round again  to see if I was still in the land of the living. She was horrified to find the state of my home. It was  reminiscent of the Marie Celeste: door open, lights on, computer running ,  dogs hiding in the bedroom and the occupant mysteriously missing.. What could have happened? It was already dark. Perhaps I had suddenly had another attack of illness and gone to find help. Perhaps I had gone outside and collapsed and was lying unconscious somewhere. . She consulted her husband, who was on the Residents committee. He agreed something should be done. Security was informed, nurses were called, the supervisor was phoned, all the  staff alerted. Everyone went into action: the house was searched and the grounds scoured, but although I was only a few metres away I was not to be found. Just before Management was about to go to the lengths of informing my next-of-kin, Liz came to check my cottage again, encountered me  getting ready for bed and the search was called off.

I was most touched by the concern shown by friends and by staff, but now, to prevent a similar happening, I have given my cell-phone  number to Security to keep in the office at the gate and I have also given it to as many people I can think of, so I can be located when next I go missing

Anthony Beale

FAMILY STORY

If I should need to write a novel in a hurry

It would have to be about my ancestor,

Captain Anthony Beale, adventurer and rogue,

slaver, seaman, pioneer. He was

an officer,  but not a gentleman.

The BEIC sent him to St Helena island

soon after it was colonised, his task,

to subdue the rabble that had collected there.

Other governors had failed, but Beale

no stranger to the lash, soon

whipped the ruffians into shape.

There weren’t too many of them anyway.

But then the Dutch attacked,

He tried to chase them off

by rolling rocks down on them from the heights.

The Dutch retreated but returned in force.

He thought it best to flee. He took a ship,

went to Brazil, hired a sloop and set out

to warn all British ships that St Helena

had been captured by the Dutch.

By chance he met some naval ships,

and with their help reclaimed the island for the Crown.

The Company were not amused. They cut his salary;

 demoted him from Governor to storeman.

He took this opportunity to cook the books,

got caught and got the sack,

Now Beale was forced to till the soil and

sell his house, ( I’m sure

it wasn’t  at a loss.)

It wasn’t long before this little isle,

in mid-Atlantic was again the scene

of strife and battle.  Some malcontents,

Beale among them, started an insurrection.

The rebellion was soon put down,

the instigators executed, most of them.

but Beale, although condemned to death,

 contrived to talk his way into a milder sentence,

Instead of being hanged, he would be exiled.

He was never to go back to England.

And that is how our family came to be

settlers and have remained settlers to this day.

(As for Anthony, he came to a sticky end,

poisoned by one of his slaves,

an early victim of  decolonisation.)

This is a not very successful attempt to write a poem about my ancestor Anthony Beale. I found his story in  an account of the  history of St Helena. All the happenings in the early years were meticulously recorded in the records kept by the BEIC. Re-reading the account of the events and writing the poem made me wonder how much it might have affected the history of South Africa, if Anthony Beale had not chanced to meet that British Naval vessel when he was trying to warn ships not to stop at St Helena while he was on his way back to England.

At that time the Dutch East India Company were not very happy with the station they had established at Table Bay. They had found that the harbour was not at all safe. The weather was inclined to be very stormy. There was always the danger of shipwreck when rounding the Cape. The indigenous population were unfriendly; livestock was always being stolen and then fighting would break out.  That is why an expedition was sent to St Helena. The intention was to drive the British out and establish an alternative station there.  Perhaps they even intended to move Van Riebeeck and co.to St Helena. After successfully capturing the island the Dutch force returned to the Cape leaving just a weakened garrison to defend it. They didn't expect to lose it again so soon.  If  the Dutch had established themselves there, it would have had a profound effect on the BEIC. They might have been squeezed out of the Spice trade and lost much of their wealth. It would have had an even more profound effect on development of the Cape Colony. Fewer Dutch ships would have stopped there.  The settlement might have been abandoned. It would certainly not have grown the way it did. The Portuguese might even have taken over in the Cape.

In school, we learnt all about Simon van der Stel, Ryk Tulbagh,Wolrade Woltemade and so on, but nobody is ever taught about Anthony Beale and the naval captain who chased off the Dutch and recaptured St Helena.

Seeing the past differently

Last night I was suffering from a bout of insomnia.  Lying awake, I started to muse on the past. I had been reading a book about a woman teaching young college students and how she became involved in their development towards maturity and independence, This made me think of  the time when I was the same age as those students. I remembered, particularly, the year when I lived in a  flat with three friends I knew from University.  How I looked up to the other girls!  They seemed  so  sophisticated and confident, especially two of them, Shirley and Erica, who were close friends and had known each other from schooldays. They always seemed to know exactly how they wanted everything to be. They always knew what was the latest trend in books, films or pop music. Their clothes were always stylish. The two of them together set the tone and took the lead. They made the rules about meals, shopping, shared expenses,who was invited to our flat etc. etc. The other girl and I simply did what they wanted. Looking back I see that I was treated rather like a younger sibling, someone not quite competent. I wasn't bullied exactly, but my wishes and opinions were not much taken into account.

Now, so many years later, I suddenly perceive the four of us in a different way. I think of the behaviour of the other girls and see them as bossy and self-centred rather than clever and confident, somewhat immature, not particularly so for their age, but certainly more so than I. After leaving University I had found a job, so  I was the only one earning my own living. Though I could always depend on my parents to help me if necessary,  I was, already, almost financially independent. The others were still completing their studies and had well-off parents who paid  all their expenses, I had always had holiday jobs and while studying, did part-time tutoring for pocket money.  I was the one in a stable relationship, was contemplating marriage and was more sexually experienced. I  also came from a very literary family and was better informed and better read than most of my contemporaries. Now looking back I can't understand why I felt at all inferior. I see myself now as the  more grown-up one and the other girls as less mature. How interesting to find that the past is not fixed and that although our memories may not change in themselves they can take on  quite different aspects when we revisit them in old age.

Wilderness Weekend

What a lovely interlude. to stay
in a "Bushcamp" that was really a mansion,
surrounded by wild forest, looking down on
a stretched-out golden-sanded beach,

with sons and daughters and grandchildren,
who have come from all over the country,
and even from across the world.

DECOLONISATION

I have just been reading a newspaper article about a newly appointed academic who is very eager to transform and decolonise her university department. As an ex-colonial, I know I am prejudiced, but I found the article painful to read. Not only was it full of  worn-out socialist cliches, but the writing was very poor too. I thought that the standard of English in the local papers had improved slightly lately, but it seems I was mistaken. However, that is beside the point. What was interesting to me was the rise of anti-colonist sentiment (which in this country means being against colonisation by Whites)  at the same time as immigrants from Africa are flooding into Europe.  Just as, two centuries ago, Europeans escaping poverty and wars in their own countries, settled in Africa, now North Africans and Middle Eastern people try to escape poverty and wars, by settling in Europe. In many countries there has been resistance to this new form of colonisation. Not all Western Governments have been as welcoming to refugees as Angela Morkel's has.  Ironically for a country that was once a great colonial power and whose citizens spread all over the world, there has been a lot of anti-immigrant sentiment in Britain.  Yesterday I read a moving poem explaining how wrong this is and how the influx of migrants enriches the country in which they have chosen to settle. not only financially and culturally, but also by bringing in new ideas. I am sure this is true. but it is also true that they cause changes that are not welcome.

All through the ages, populations have spread from one part of the world to another and a mixing of races and cultures has taken place. Sometimes this has been through conquest sometimes simply by entering and taking over. In some parts of the UK and some parts of France, I believe, natives are  now in the minority. Soon this may be the case all over Europe. Perhaps, instead of trying to eradicate European culture from our universities, we should be preserving it. It may not be around for much longer. It could soon be colonised out of existence.