New Glasses

When I started working for myself I chose to take a fairly big drop in my salary, so from the outset Alicia and I were thinking about how we were going to make ends meet. I’ve never had any trouble spending what I earn. To be brutally honest, I’ve always spent more than I earn. Sometimes you hear people talk about what they would do if they won the lottery. There is usually a fairly crafted shopping list. People rarely say ‘Oh I don’t know’ in the way that they might if you asked them what their favourite movie is. The shopping list seems to be written, prepared, regularly redrafted, and ready for that lottery win. It is a conversation that seems, in itself, to bring people genuine pleasure. I see friends faces light up as they reel through the purchases and carve up the fictional winnings amongst friends, family and charities.

Earlier this year Chris Weir, a psychiatric nurse, and her husband Colin, a camera man, netted £161m (around $262m) in a European wide lottery. The prize was Europe’s biggest ever. The couple made public appearances, giddy, excited, energized, unable to sleep, endearing themselves by telling the British public that they were ‘tickled pink’. When the UK lottery was launched the basic idea was for the sale of lottery tickets to support ‘good causes’ as well as give players the chance to win a life changing sum of money. Just over a quarter of the money raised from the lottery ticket sales goes towards ‘good causes’. What constitutes a ‘good cause’ is decided by one of the thirteen distribution bodies. Six of these concern sport, five relate to the arts, one deals with heritage grants and one, a distributor called the Big Lottery Fund, provides funding to community groups and to projects that improve health, education and the environment.

What constitutes a ‘life changing sum of money’ is anyone’s guess. In the UK, chances are your everyday household with personal loans and credit cards is going to owe somewhere in the region of £15,000 (around $24,000), and that isn’t counting the money we owe on our mortgage. Certainly, before the credit crunch, banks and credit card companies were willing to offer me a total of £35,000 (around $57,000) of credit in the form of plastic, personal loans and overdrafts. It was for me, and I’m guessing many others, our very own lottery win. When did it become ok to dangle that sort of money in front of people? When did a ‘life changing sum of money’ become the £15K we need to clear our debts? And what on earth did we all spend it on? The total UK personal debt at the end of June 2011 stood at £1,451billion! That is £1,451billion we have spent before we’ve earned it! £1,451billion we have spent on ‘stuff’ that we told ourselves we wanted and needed. So when we compare our developed world to the developing world, is what we are so proud of, our ability to access and spend money that isn’t ours to spend? And we can’t afford it. Every 14 minutes a home in this country is being repossessed.

So the banks said we could have the money, and the seductive adverts, fashions and fads told us we needed the money, but what about us? The middle men in this exchange of borrowings for ‘stuff’ and services (stuff would sometimes be referred to here as ‘goods’ - now there is a loaded word if ever I heard it). Why didn’t we put the brakes on? Why are we still out there shopping like our lives depend on it? It is as if all those old instincts and drives to seek out food and shelter, to survive, to belong, to achieve and have worth in our belonging, have been played, taken advantage of, substituted. As though ‘stuff’ has become administered like methadone to substitute the heroin we usually call ‘striving’.

I’m not name calling here. I’m at the meeting too, just recognising I’m an addict and trying to come off the dependency. We are what we are, human beings with brains that make us both of the animal kingdom and other than it. Both virtuous and flawed. Saying we are to blame is just nuts to me. We just are… this is what it is to be a human being… it’s tricky… our old instincts and drives are not of this seductive modern world, but they have to get along just the same. Sometimes we seem to elevate ourselves too far above the rest of animal kingdom, and forget we are just another primate with a few extras and some unique ways of using what we have.

Teaching in schools I saw increasingly how school just felt so old fashioned. Despite the ever flowing technology and the new building programmes, it was what schools did with it all that just felt old fashioned. The comment we’d hear with increasing frequency was ‘why do we have to be here’, and ‘why do I have to learn this’. Educationalists and parents alike try and steer a path through these very pointed questions, caught in the headlights of a youth that are ready to start buying, and feeling held on the bit by their inability to earn. And we were right to resist, and stutter out our arguments about the power of knowledge, the value of an education… but I’m not sure even we didn’t feel like our arguments were somehow being hollowed out from within. Nowhere else was belonging and worth and identity so tied up with what you had; nowhere else was the curse of the self more evident. And not surprisingly either, after all adolescence is a time in our lives when our identity is thrown open as part of everyday brain maturation.

I digress, and how difficult it is not to, and how much I want to. So whilst I’m spending like it is the last day of my life every day, along with all the other shoppers… I start wondering where all this ‘stuff’ comes from, where it all ends up. I watch The Story Of Stuff and it’s a good starting point. The prices we pay for ‘stuff’ are determined by the raw materials, the costs of manufacture, distribution and sales, and then the mysterious profit margin… which we are to understand is determined in effect by us…. by how much we are willing to pay… by the worth we place on ‘stuff’. And then there are those things which the price doesn’t reflect: the air and water pollution, the depletion of natural resources, the people whose health, education and futures are jeopardised by the need to keep production flowing and cheap. Isn’t it a strange world where in one country we protect environments and workers from exploitation, and then across the water it happens without restriction.

So I’m spending money I don’t own, to buy things I don’t need, made by people who can’t escape, on a planet that can’t give anymore. I’m not trying to make a political point here, this is personal. This is just one family’s realisation that in so many ways, and for so many reasons, we can’t keep living like this. We can’t live with our consciences if we are perpetuating and contributing to keeping communities enslaved. And we can’t afford to keep spending beyond our means. So we have taken a long hard look at what we buy and who we buy from. We are just starting out, starting out for the first time again. It isn’t about making ourselves endure some kind of suffering… it has more to do with finding happiness in pursuits other than ownership and competitiveness. It is another piece of the jigsaw that we found on the slip road as we left the rat race.

I admit, I never really cared about the planet, but I’ve always cared about people and now I realise that the two are interconnected. When I buy something that impacted on an environment, it also impacted on a community’s way of life and their ability to sustain themselves. I can’t spend money now without knowing a bit more. And the internet has changed that, because I don’t have to take the advertisers’ word for it any more. I don’t buy clothes often but when I do, I can seek out clothing that pays the cotton growers a fair price and that doesn’t use sweat shops. It will cost what it costs and I’ll either be able to afford it or I’ll go without. But I can’t live with myself buying something that brought harm to my fellow human beings, however much they are hidden out of sight, and I won’t be duped into buying something because it appeals to my need to fit in, be accepted and add to my self worth. It is a simple life we are travelling towards and we are learning as we go.

Something that might interest you: http://www.teamsweat.org/

Epiphany, But Slower

Life for us has changed and is continuing to change in so many ways. As I grew up, being taught to believe that there was a God, now and then life would bump up against those beliefs and things wouldn’t make sense. I borrowed my belief in God, rather than owning it for myself. When I was trying to put the pieces together after another major depression, I looked into following a religion. The internet and discussion threads are full with people who recommend God to others at times of illness. My father certainly seemed to think it would do me good.

For many, many years I have been a non-practising Muslim, and therefore in my eyes… not a Muslim at all; only one by birth, if such a thing exists. One by one, each of the rituals and laws fell away from my life… except the one about eating pork. I still don’t do that, although I offer no rational explanation for why I still avoid this meat and I place no importance on this fact. I’ve always been uneasy about not believing in God though. I suppose I’ve always hedged my bets, so that if one day it turned out there was a God I might still be able to argue my way into heaven. I wouldn’t even allow myself to quietly think that there was no God for fear that God would be listening. I’ve declared myself an agnostic in the past… which is a posh word for sitting on the fence. A word no doubt invented for boys to impress girls with.

Recently, and for the first time, I’ve have accepted and I am easy with the view that there is no God. I say this without any wish to influence others and without any delusion that I might be capable of doing so. I’m ok with the idea that there is no God. I am an atheist. I can say that now without looking over my shoulder. I am not any the poorer for living life as an atheist… I like still to make sense of the world and I do so the best I can. Along the way I get stuck sometimes because our knowledge and understanding is limited. But I’m open to ‘not knowing’ and not having all the answers, and feel no pressure to substitute ‘not knowing’ with anything else.

When Alicia was pregnant with Xavier, Alicia and I had discussion over a meal about how we would approach the subject of religion as parents. My parents are Muslims, Alicia believes in God but does not follow any one religion, and I was, at the time, not sure how to characterise myself. I’ve seen others take to religion when they had children, almost out of a necessity to gem up before turning teachers to their children. Having children does bring into sharp focus questions about what is right and wrong and many people find themselves dusting off their moral compass in readiness for parenthood. We decided then and there that for Xavier, religion was part of his cultural identify and we would welcome any religious instruction from all grandparents. That said, Alicia and I would just be ourselves with Xavier, and he would come to know our uncertainties and our own personal beliefs over time. It is easy to think that this is something that can be put off and won’t apply until he is much older, but life is rich with beliefs and ritual and celebration and remembrance. As much as I want him to one day find his own path, he will be impressionable and under the influence of religious belief for a long time before he chooses for himself.

Alicia and I do our best to make sure Xavier feels loved unconditionally, and feels safe and secure through the care, affection and protection we offer him. He is a confident and happy boy and a great companion. It is possible to be a good person without religion, and it is possible to establish a bedrock of feeling loved, safe an secure without religion. We do this through our relationship with him.

Without religious belief, or what people call spiritual belief, I take time to understand better what it is to be human. We are at once falling angels and rising primates. It is why I write and read so much about our unique human brains. Why I learn about biochemistry and neuroscience and psychology. Why I see human behaviour, and struggles and delights through this understanding. I want to learn about our sameness, our unique qualities, our beauty and our flaws. I’m interested in the way we have gone about constructing societies, where these societies originate, how they shape us and how we shape them. I feel like I’m lifting my head, like I’ve been trying to lift my head many times before and not quite made it. I feel prejudice and ignorance substituted with understanding and compassion. I’m sometimes very uneasy about what I see and the temptation is to once again keep one’s head down. But like a bite of the apple, there is no going back. We look… try and better our understanding, and try to steer a path that we can live with. Life for us has changed and is continuing to change in so many ways.

London's Burning

For three nights London has experienced rioting. The news reports and images portray a widening war zone, characterised by violence, looting and arson. There are the usual angles emerging from the media, lawless hooded youths, the lack of a police response, the destruction of local businesses.

Looking to explain why our capital city, and other cities around the country have become battle grounds, some have searched for the chain of events that led to this civil unrest. Four days ago, Mark Duggan was shot in Tottenham in north London. I could say any number of things now that would characterise Mark Duggan in our minds. If I tell you he was only 29 you might think what a young age to end a life. If I tell you he was a father you might picture his young family and think of their loss. If I tell you that he was known to the police you might believe he lived on the wrong side of the law.

But actually, I don’t know who Mark Duggan was, most of us don’t. I can’t discern his character from our plethora of British media houses. I can’t make sense of the conflicting reports about the circumstances surrounding his shooting by police. There seems to be a keenness to arrive at pantomime characterisations of people and events. I guess it might take some time for the facts to emerge somewhere down the line.

It would appear there was a police operation involving armed officers, that Mark Duggan’s minicab was surrounded, that shots were heard. Exactly who fired, how many shots were fired and why police opened fire remain questions without definitive answers. Claims that Mark Duggan was carrying a firearm seem to be confirmed. We are very much in the hands of the investigators to learn more about the incident, and in the hands of political leaders who will no doubt decide what, how and when information is released against the context of a city in melt down.

Somewhere along the line, the peaceful protest that then ensued outside Tottenham Police Station deteriorated and ballooned unexpectedly into the images we have now witnessed over the last three nights across London and other major cities. Does what is happening on our streets have anything to do with Mark Duggan now. Probably not. So what is it all about?

Well, the pundits are not short on analysis and theories. Is it the bad behaviour of unruly teenagers, the product of poor parenting, the uprising of the have-nots, the frustrations of an unemployed youth, the consequence of conservative government austerity measures, the consequence of the labour government’s nationalisation of childhood, the dysfunction of a godless society, lacking cohesion and community, the abdication of parental responsibility? May be it is all and none of these things. Maybe this is not a community united by a single cause, but instead a collection of individuals and small groups united by opportunity to do whatever it is they have each fixed their sights on.

It is terrifying, and the fires have lit up more than just the street of London, they have ignited a conversation in this country.

Kindness

The nurses at St. Thomas’ took good care of me and cleaned me up. Moments after my feet hit the pavement a stranger kindly gave me a polo shirt to put on, and later that day I picked up a pair of standard issue black pumps whilst at Southwark police station. These, together with the jeans I escaped with, would be my worldly possessions. After the fire, the pub cook let me camp on her floor for a month or so, a lovely lady full of east end life and a heart the size of a bowling ball. She was a mother to me whilst I was in London.

There were a few weeks to go before the end of the summer term, and the end of my degree. Everything rested on a final project that had gone up in the fire. I’d have to start again. The university gave me the summer break to put it together. A good friend, MD, gave me an old drawing board of his so that I could get back to work. AK loaned me her boyfriend’s apartment to work in over the summer whilst he was out of the country. JH provided some company and even pitched in with my drawings. This amazing show of kindness came together like a wind behind me. I did my bit too, and I graduated alongside everybody else that year.

The days after the fire, walking about with nothing but the clothes I wore… without so much as a piece of paper with my name on it, those were strange days. It was a long time before I went back to ‘owning things’ again… but I still don’t care about ‘stuff’ like I used to. I’ve lost sentimentality.

The landlords cried; they blamed themselves for cutting corners: no fire alarms or means of escape; the bars on the windows; the drunk and unconscious bar manager that had slept in the bar whilst the events of that morning unfolded; the loss of somebody’s precious daughter. The bar, ironically, had escaped the fire. The arsonist had posted his petrol bomb through the side door and the fire wound its way up the three flights of staircase in search of fresh oxygen, tearing through the accommodation. The arsonist was later identified from camera footage purchasing the fuel from a near by petrol station. He and his accomplice stood trial and served a few years. The pub was refurbished but never really recovered, and I believe it now stands empty.

I graduated into the recession of the early 1990’s and after several hundred rejection letters from sympathetic architectural offices I took up a couple of jobs at local retail stores. So many people did little and big things to help me get a foothold after the fire. “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel” Maya Angelou. Well, I remember it all and I’ll never forget your kindness.

White Noise

On Wednesday night we had dinner and drinks with friends over at their place. I’ve not been taking Fluoxetine for that long so I’m still trying to figure out how it gets on with alcohol. Experiences with other antidepressants have been enough to put me off alcohol for many years now. Every now and again I take a chance and have a few drinks but it leaves me regretting the decision for several days afterwards as my mood plummets.

On our recent trip to London we had generous quantities of rosé with our meals without any unpleasant consequences. I was amazed. I used to say a house without wine is not a home, and the fridge usually had a bottle of champagne in it. Don’t misunderstand, I’m not suggesting I had a trust fund to dispense with at the local wine merchants. But it is fair to say that a significant portion of my student loan whilst studying architecture went towards supporting my friend, Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin. I think much of the rest fed the pool tables of south east London.

In conversation over dinner that night Alicia mentioned the fire. It’s been in and out of my mind since then. I used to live on the Old Kent Road… a road well known to players of Monopoly, the cheapest property on the board, and the training ground of boxer, Sir Henry Cooper. A man who was robbed of his chance to take down an unsuspecting Cassius Clay with his trademark left hook. How different history might have been if that day, Cassis hadn’t had his fall broken by the ropes, or his corner man hadn’t illegally treated him with smelling salts, or ripped his gloves to buy him recovery time.

It was a busy place to live, an artery into Central London, home to dubious night clubs hosting the occasional shooting, public houses with security, and side streets rife with petty theft. I had a room above a well known public house. A small room on the top floor, made smaller by the folding of the pitched roof and the intrusion of a set of wooden steps that led up to the tiny window, providing a primitive means of escape onto a small parapet wall four floors above the pavement. It was a place to sleep and a place to draw, all I really needed whilst I studied in London. That and clubs. Looking for student digs in London was a minor nightmare, made worse by the need to accommodate an A0 drawing board on a stand, something of an awkward room mate and travel companion.

One night I fell asleep like any other night, only unusually the black and white portable TV was switched on playing the soothing sounds of white noise to mark the end of the evening’s transmission. That exceptional circumstance would save my life. As the first broadcasts of breakfast television broke the early morning silence, I’d look up and see the black threads of smoke rising from behind the screen. What followed was my confused and sleepy attempts to make sense of what was happening. Not the TV, the bottom of the door, that is where the smoke was coming from. I opened the bedroom door and filled with fear from the confusion. Where was the window off the landing? It wasn’t there, nothing was there. It took a moment to understand what I was looking at. A new, live wall of impenetrable black smoke.

I flung the door closed… and shouted ‘fire’ as they do in the movies. My thoughts turned to the others in the building, friends. I opened the door again… I’d never seen anything like it. There was nothing but dense smoke, visibility zero. I could taste it. I couldn’t make it out there.

I had just enough time to put my jeans on, but that’s all. The smoked had filled the bedroom… and those funny little steps… that I used as a bookshelf… those funny little wooden steps that invaded my floor space and no other… provided a route onto that small parapet wall. I was terrified of heights, ordinarily. It didn’t seem to matter that day. I ran along the ledge to see what had happened to P, I called out for him and leaned round the corner of the building… and there he was… clinging to his third floor window frame with his big hands and just enough room for his toes on the ledge. And his first words “are you alright Med?” In the other direction M, I moved to his window and banged on the glass… my fist broke through. I remember at that moment worrying that the landlord would be angry at the broken window, I guess I hadn’t quite realised how serious the situation was. He woke and joined me on the parapet wall. Below people could hear us shouting for help. I shouted. I shouted as loud as I could… I realised afterwards that others mistook this for panic… I looked like I might have jumped… but I wanted to be heard. C was on the other side of the building, and her window had bars… how do you get other people to understand that in a hurry… I shouted.

When the fire crews arrived the frustration just grew. They refused to go in and look for her, insisting on getting us down first. I understand that… I don’t blame them at all… but I can’t help wondering if it could have turned out differently.

At St. Thomas’s Hospital, and at Southwark police station… I asked over and over if she made it. I should have guessed that what they weren’t telling me - told me everything I needed to know.

I look at that wall of smoke and wonder why I didn’t have the courage to go and get her. I wonder how different things could have been. I know people will say all sorts of things to reassure me, and they have… but I was the only one there. Nobody can know what I know. We all have things we have to live with.

Black is White

I was wondering if any of you fellow bloggers have any had any experience of 5-HTP (5-Hydroxytryptophan also known as oxitriptan). I read a newspaper article the other day where the author mentioned that this amino acid is sold over the counter as a dietary supplement, used to treat depression. She claimed it was nature’s antidepressant; that it raised levels of serotonin without the need for antidepressants. So I was surprised I had never heard of it before and decided to take a closer look.

“5-HTP is derived from an African plant called griffonia, and has been called 'nature's Prozac', because it works on the brain to boost serotonin, though without the side effects."

Stephanie Merritt, The Observer.

I find that you can use Google searches to find evidence to pretty much prove or disprove anything. I can type in 5-HTP miracle cure I’m led to personal testimonials on health and holistic remedy web sites, all very interesting. Alternatively, if I search 5-HTP myth, I learn about warnings, concern and bad science. Still interesting.

I’ve used this to great effect when my son was born. Alicia and I liked the name Xavier, and so we went for it… knowing that my parents were quite keen (understatement) on Islamic names. I think my mother’s main concern was that if we were to call our son John or something like that, she wouldn’t know what to say to the rest of the family. Oh just think of it! So to put her at ease I Googled Xavier, Islam and hey presto… up popped a website linking the two. Press print. Present the hard copy to my mother and disaster averted. Pathetic on my part, I know… but sometimes a quite life is all I ask. Funny thing was, when we sat opposite my parents and told them for the first time he’d be called Xavier, my mother almost burst into tears and my father unleashed an enormous grin on us. At first I though we had won 50% of the vote, but then my dad elbowed my mother boisterously and said “come on, don’t wind your mother up, what are you really going to call him?” It was a moment scripted for sitcom. Only it really did happen. And it felt a whole heap longer than a moment.

Anyway, on this occasion I am none the wiser. So I’m not going to waste anyone’s time by going into the scientific arguments for and against 5-HTP working on depression here. It would seem that there is a real lack of quality study on this so basically, the jury is out, or maybe the jury hasn’t even heard the case yet.

What I’m left with, in the absence of science… it a bit of good old gossip. So, have you had any experiences with this supplement? For the record, I do not use 5-HTP and I’m led to believe I should avoid it if taking an SSRI antidepressant. So there you go.

Have You Got a Minute?

I hate to put you on the spot by asking… and I don’t want to scare you away… but I just wanted to ask why? I have to admit that I like the conversation… and just talking is only half the pleasure. I like to know what you think… even if you think it is all a load of bollocks. Not what you think… that is too vague. Your opinion. No, that is too vague too. You could easily mistake that word for meaning critique. I don’t mean that. I mean… when I write it’s only about life from my perspective and I don’t really know what it’s like to be you. And I end up wondering if it is the same, or different, and different how? That’s the bit of the conversation I want to get at.

I’m rubbish at small talk. Yesterday I was painting a porch and I don’t know why… but so many people kept stopping and chatting with me… beaming smiles and complimenting me on the work. It was nice. It felt good. But as I say, I’m rubbish at small talk and I always try and wrap things up really quickly. I just have no idea about it. I envy all you out there that can just chat away to the person at the bus stop or the lady at the checkout. I often think of something amusing to say to people at checkouts… but then I play it out in my head. They will laugh, and then I won’t have any small talk to follow up, so then we will stop talking, abruptly. And it will be awkward. So most times I back out of striking up conversation.

So here I am, chatting away here like I never ever do. And you are there. And I am here. And you are quiet. So I just wanted to ask you why?