FordeFables - Thought for Today

Thought & Song for Today: 16th November 2018

16/11/2018

Occasionally, one finds within a song a simplicity and poignancy that tells the listener this song holds special meaning to the singer. The extra relevance it holds to the singer's experience is present in the rawness of the emotions expressed and can be felt in the singer's voice and the words of the song.

Today's song is 'Tears in Heaven'. It was recorded by Eric Clapton in 1991 and the lyrics were inspired by the tragic death of his 4-year-old son, Conner who fatally fell from a New York flat apartment building.

When a loved one dies, especially in tragic circumstances that could never be anticipated, their sudden departure and instant loss in our lives can seem no less an experience than a major amputation having occurred. A major love limb has been severed from our body trunk, leaving our tree of life badly bruised and emotionally battered. The shadow of our happiness that was forever close to us when our loved one lived suddenly disappears. We pine for the deceased person to come back to us, yet see them only in ghostly shadow or darken dreams. We miss them as we stand beside their grave, but they were always dead to us there. We miss them, even more, when we revisit the places where they were alive!

It becomes so easy for the bereaved person to give up on life when a significant loved one dies, leaving a gaping void of loss that seems unfillable. It becomes easier to cut off oneself from all others at oane's highest point of hurting and make the rest of the world strangers. Often, when the one we loved dies, we don't only throw dirt into the grave to conceal the coffin from all life thereafter, we also run the risk of casting off all things soft and gentle, beautiful and bright, positive and hopeful in our future life and burying these qualities of ourselves with our deceased loved one as well.

In the immediate aftermath of bereavement, the death of a loved one can often leave us weighed down with the heavy burden of anger, loss and guilt; enough it seems to sink one into the deepest of depressions. And yet, the heaviest of crosses that life sometimes gives us to bear and the sheer weight of the loss we a are asked to face can save us as well as sink us, if we use our bereaved experience as an anchor to keep us in calm and reflective waters until the surrounding climate settles and we are strong enough to commence our next voyage.

Love and peace. Bill xxx

Thought & Song for Today: 15th November 2018

15/11/2018

Today's song was recorded by my close friend, Chris de Burgh (Davison) in 1988. When two people meet and instantly fall in love, there is an intensity of emotions that make minutes apart from each other hurt as much as days to you or me. At the height of the 'love you' pinnacle, nothing or nobody else matters as much as your sweetheart you are missing deeply, because all meaning for you stopped on an axis of love as soon as you last parted and your world will remain suspended and not start again until they return and you can see them again, look into their eyes once more, hold them in your loving arms, kiss them and tell them again 'how much you love them'

In today's world of advanced technology. the absence of one's loved one can be softened immensely by all manner of gadgetry like laptops, computers, mobiles, house phones. However far apart a couple in mad passionate love is today, all manner of communication is available within seconds. Whether the distance between two lovers is a country mile or across the world in another continent, they can message each other, speak to each other, and even see each other in live time.

Now, try to imagine a time in the past when there was no access to current communication technology; not even a house phone for the ordinary person. These were days when any contact that couldn't be carried out face-to-face between sweethearts was carried out by a letter or a public red phone box on the street corner. Such telephone calls were very much a hit and miss affair, as often one's sweetheart would be trying to get through to you while you were impatiently queuing behind six other people waiting to get their tuppence worth in the public phone box.

Imagine what it must have been like for lovers during the 'Second World War' years, with the soldier man on the battlefield and his sweetheart not having had a letter from him for months, fearing him dead in some muddy Flanders' trench or alone, abandoned and left for dead in a wounded condition in a foreign field? Imagine immediately postwar in the 50s and 60s, one sweetheart may be miles away and contact through the red public phone box at a prearranged time of day or night was the only means of instant communication; and only then after the caller had committed to memory the specific number of the phone box in question along with the hope that at the precise moment another chatterbox-person wasn't using that phone box while your sweetheart rapped the glass to ask her to hurry it up!

The point is simply this; whether we are talking today or a hundred years ago. While means of communication were vastly different between the centuries, the intensity of feelings between two people in love, deeply missing each other, was no different or less intense than they are today!

I recall once reading an account of a woman in love during the 'Second World War'. Her sweetheart was a soldier who was fighting on some foreign ground. The woman hadn't had a letter from her soldier sweetheart for four months, despite him writing to her daily from the trenches. One day, twenty of his letters arrived all at once. Overjoyed, she rearranged them in date order to read repeatedly at leisure. In one letter, her soldier sweetheart wrote, "Even though we are separated by the English Channel, I feel your presence alongside me, When I am cold, I feel you snuggle up closer to me. When I fear that I might not make it through the war and survive to marry you, I hear you whisper in the night-time breeze, ' We are married in every thought we have, in everything we do and in all we wish we desire'. Even when we are ordered to advance on the enemy, leave the cold and damp trench and go over the top, though good friends fall and die as I advance with gun in one hand, my other hand holds yours as we run on together. I love you so much. Every time I close my eyes I see you when I open them I miss you."

The French language doesn't precisely have words for saying, 'I miss you', but the French do say, 'Tu me Manques' which literally means 'You are missing from me'."

Love and peace. Bill xxx

Thought & Song For Today: 14th November 2018

14/11/2018

Today's song was recorded by Elton John in 1976 and addresses an issue that has over the years broken long-established friendships, divided families, strained and soured so many good relationships. I refer to one's inability to apologise in appropriate circumstances. The song is 'Sorry seems to be the hardest word'.

I remember my late mother advising me as a child never to be afraid or too proud to say sorry when I had caused hurt or done some wrong. During my lifetime, I have known so many situations where family relationships that had broken down and stayed broken for many years, Sometimes serious offence had been taken by one family member against another in respect of something done, whether intentional or unintentional, grave or minor, when all that was required to bring back peace and re-establish cordial relationship was three little words, 'I am sorry'.

Indeed, I'd go as far as to say that the failure to say 'I am sorry' has been as responsible for the creation of as much grief in this world as the failure for one person to say to a certain other, 'I love you'.

As a Probation Officer serving in Huddersfield between 1972 and 1995, I recall a woman who hadn't spoken to her father once in over 16 years. A breach in trust had been committed by the father to his daughter, and being of stubborn disposition and filled with false pride, he was not the type of person who could bring himself to apologise, even though he knew that he was clearly in the wrong. He just didn't do 'sorry'. The incident occurred when the woman was 17 years old and lived in the parental abode. She left home and took up lodgings, established an independent lifestyle and frequently met up secretly with her mother in town. Naturally, having divided loyalties, her mother never told her father about these clandestine meetings with their daughter.

Over sixteen years, the young woman got pregnant, married the child's father, had another two children and divorced in her early thirties. Her mother told her husband that she had heard such news on the grapevine, yet the foolish man's misguided pride simply led him to close his ears. Mum attended the Registry Office wedding as a Saturday morning shopper 'who just happened to be passing the Registry Office at the precise moment her daughter and husband left it as a newly married couple'. Mum also visited her estranged daughter in the maternity ward when she was having her third child.

Over the next ten years, mum kept in contact with her daughter, along with two of her sisters after they had left home. All such contact was kept from her father and her own husband, to avoid the outbreak of continuous arguments and rows in both family homes. The woman's marriage eventually broke up, and so did her parent's marriage after her mother decided that she would no longer live life in constant fear of her husband's wrath and disapproval.

Such was a case where a minor slight that caused offence led to an argument between daughter and father, and because her father was a strict man who wouldn't be bettered in dispute or back down, he made matters infinitely worse by getting too angry and calling his daughter names that no man should ever call a female; let alone his own daughter! Although his daughter's feelings were hurt, she would have allowed peace to be restored between them had he apologised for his crude and vulgar remarks. However, her dad was one of those men with old-fashioned values who saw the making of apologies as a weakness of character and from every word in the English language he would have found 'sorry to be the hardest word'.

What a waste of so many occasions of potential family happiness by allowing relationship wounds to fester and rot until the family sore becomes putrefied with the puss of downright stubbornness, obstinacy, and false pride.

I will end with a piece of advice I once heard a Catholic priest gave his Sunday morning congregation during his weekly sermon. He said, 'If there is anyone here in church this morning who has a fractured or broken relationship between themselves and another family member or thinks badly of a brother, stand up now and go home and make your peace before coming back next week, because you may deceive your neighbour by your church attendance but you do not deceive God.'

One final thing, be sincere, direct and brief when you say 'sorry' and don't ruin your apology with excuses.

Love and wishes. Bill xxx

Thought For Today: 13th November 2018

13/11/2018

This morning's song was released in 1997 by Elton John. I have always found the old saying so true that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. What is beautiful to each of us varies enormously, especially when what we see as beautiful inhabits the face of a sweetheart and soul mate. It requires the love of one person towards another to see beneath the skin and to be able to feel and experience the essence of all that lies there unseen.

Another peculiarity of mankind is how a special occasion can make a loved one look more beautiful to their partner than they may appear on other occasions; perhaps seeing the untold happiness on a mother's face who has just given birth to a much wanted child ideally represents this assertion. There are insufficient stars in the heavens to match that glow of beautiful light radiating from the mother's inner happiness.

I know there have been occasions in my life when the loved one I have been with appears to have radiated more beauty than I have seen them emit previously. It may have been as the result of a new dress they were wearing or the different way they have arranged their hair etc.

Indeed, I would go so far as to say, behind every look is a beauty to be found; an untold story worthy of understanding and appreciation that lights up the intrinsic softness of the skin, the increased warmth of the heart and which is capable of glimpsing unfathomable depths of the soul. This is what I call a 'Cinderella moment' that reserves itself for special occasions and special nights and days of the year that enables one's eyes to see anew without a shadow of imperfection.

I recall seeing such beauty on the first night I knew for certain how much I loved my wife, Sheila, and again on the morning of our wedding when even the briskness of a November climate could not steal the beauty of unmistakable love and happiness that filled Sheila's face. I knew then that whenever I wanted to see, feel, taste and know beauty, that Sheila was my favourite place to go.

Love and peace. Bill xxx

Thought For Today: 12th November 2018

12/11/2018

Today's song has been a firm favourite of mine and millions of other romantics across the world for the past thirty-two years since first released in 1986. I think that 'Lady in Red' has been played at more weddings more often than 'Here comes the Bride' (Bridal Chorus).

I have been a close friend of Chris de Burgh and his wife Diane (Davison) for the past thirty years and whenever I go back home to Ireland for a holiday, and Chris isn't touring, I always visit the family. My friendship was initially with Diane after she had incurred a bad fall from her horse and was in danger of never walking again. Having been unable to walk for three years after a childhood accident, we shared an experience that provided a natural affinity between us. Her millionaire pop-star husband just happened to be married to her, so it was natural that over time we became friends also.

Whenever Chris tours in the North of England, Diane always sends me free tickets as a special guest to attend his concert and we always meet up for food and drink afterwards. Four years ago, my wife Sheila and I were special guests at one of Chris's concerts up in Newcastle. That night was a special occasion in my life as we were the guests of honour at the concert; I sat between Diane and Sheila all night, I danced with Diane, the 'Lady in Red' in the aisle as Chris sang on the stage, and at one point of his performance, Chris came down into the audience and after seeking me and Diane out, he laid across his wife's knees and placed his head in my lap, while adoringly looking up into my eyes as he sang 'Lady in Red' to me. I'm sure that it has been a long time up in Geordie land since they witnessed one man sing a love song to another man in public in such an inviting way and escape back down South without having been given a good old 'Geordie Kiss' by the watching masses (an act of disapproval known to Newcastle locals as a firm headbutt).

I hope that I do your beautiful song justice, Chris. Love and peace. Bill xxx

Thought For Today: 12th November 2018

12/11/2018

'Maggie May'was co-written by Rod Stewart and the late Martin Quittenton. It was released in 1971 and was an immediate number 1 hit with listeners.

'Maggie May' expresses the ambivalence and contradictory emotions of a schoolboy involved in a relationship with an older woman. Rod described the story told in the song as being a true episode in his own earlier life. Although he changed the name of the woman to 'Maggie May' ( a name he stole from an old Liverpuddiler song about a prostitute ), the woman in the song represented the first woman he had sex with when at the Beaulieu Jazz Festival in 1961.

It is not so unnatural for adolescents and young men to become sexually attracted to the older and more experienced woman. It was a natural part of my own late-teen development whereby the fantasy happening first occurs in the mind of an infatuated schoolboy with a sensually attractive teacher. For the vast majority of romantic dreamers, 'in the mind' is where the image stays, but for some young men, the infatuation materialises into a real event; if not with the teacher, then with another much older woman. I have known a couple of such relationships with a wide disparity of age crash and burn immediately after emotional take off, and yet there is one relationship I knew of where the relationship was fruitful and lasted through marriage for over twenty years before having run its course and ending in divorce/separation. The woman of the relationship once told me when speaking about her toyboy, 'He's half my ex-husband's age, but twice as energetic when we have sex.....and twice as grateful afterwards!” (He seemingly always bought her a new dress after a satisfactory sexual session).

I liked older women in my late teens because they seemed to have more knowledge of the world; their minds seemed better stored with wiser observations, and their conversation proved generally more improving. I am also of the view that because too much store is placed on a woman's looks, when they cease to be physically attractive, they study to be good for men in other ways. In order to maintain their influence over the man in their life, they exchange their diminution of outward physical beauty by the augmentation of utility. They learn to do a 1000 Services small and great, and are the most tender and useful of all friends when you are sick. Thus they continue amiable; a reason why there is hardly such a thing to be found as an old woman who is not a good woman. Women are a hundred times more capable of getting one over on their physically besotted partners through their wily ways than any man's brain would ever be capable of working out, and that is why I have always held a healthy respect for women of all ages. When it comes to the young male competing with the cougar knowledge of the much older woman, he will always lose out.

Relationships between a younger man with older women are often seen by the male as being safer, there being less hazard of children being unintentionally being produced. Older women conducting such relationships also tend to be more discreet in conducting an intrigue to avoid suspicion and unwanted talk. If I was 100 % honest, I'd have to admit that this was probably always a most welcome feature of any such 'intriguing relationships' I ever held.

The predominant attractions for each party become clearer to me the older I get. The younger man and the older woman relationship and the older man and the younger woman relationship is mostly driven by a sexual desire that requires satisfying. It is also more usual for the younger person of the relationship to appreciate being in the presence of a wiser and more intelligent person who stimulates their sensibilities and enables them to feel more adult and important. And not overlooking the point that the older person is usually more financially independent.

So, aware of the fact that age is but a number I would advise the avoidance of relationships between all younger males and older women until the man is sufficiently emotionally developed to cope with the aftermath and consequences of a future dissolution of that relationship. To press, I have personally known of two occasions where the younger man of a relationship with an older woman that was developed during their school years, committed suicide. Such a sad loss for someone who feels unable to easily mix within their own age and peer group. Love and peace. Bill xxx

Thought For Today - 11th November 2018

11/11/2018

Today commemorates 100 years since the 'First World War' ended. The 'First World War' was a global war originating in Europe that lasted from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918. Contemporaneously described as the 'war to end all wars ' it led to the mobilisation of more than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, making it one of the largest wars in history. An estimated nine million combatants and seven million civilians died as a direct result of the war,
Despite it having been described at the time as 'being a war to end all wars', before the end of 1939, Great Britain was at war again in Europe against the forces of Adolf Hitler in Germany. Since then, there has been numerous and continuous conflict around the world. Indeed; I often wonder if the world and its leaders really took on board the lessons of the 'First World War'.
As a nation, after the 'First World War', we vowed never to forget the bravery of all soldiers and wartime personnel who died in the conflict each 11th November on the 11th hour by a one minute silence across the nation, along with laying wreaths at cenotaphs and the wearing of the Royal British Legion remembrance poppy.
The remembrance poppy is an artificial flower that has been used since 1921 to commemorate military personnel who have died in all wars. It represents a common or field poppy, Papaver rhoeas. Inspired by the World War I poem 'In Flanders Fields', and promoted by Moina Michael, they were first adopted by the American Legion to commemorate American soldiers killed in that war. They were then adopted by military veterans' groups in parts of the British Empire. Today, they are mostly used in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, to commemorate their servicemen and women killed in all conflicts.
I was 'a war baby of the 'Second World War' and was reared with a tremendous pride and undying respect for all of those soldiers and civilians killed in the World wars of 1914-18 and 1939-45. Like millions of others, my mother's favourite singer was the 'Forces Sweetheart', Vera Lynn. Mum would have been immensely proud to have known that years after her death that her oldest child (me), would become good friends with Vera.
When I was growing up after the 'Second World War years', my mother would often listen to Vera Lynn on the radio. Whenever 'The White Cliffs of Dover' came on, I would always ask her about a couple of lines in the song that mentioned a boy called, Jimmy'. "Mum, who's this 'Jimmy' she's singing about?" Mum would reply, "He's you, Billy Forde. He's every boy who lived through the war years!" I've never forgotten that question and answer, and I've never forgotten how mum often changed the name from 'Jimmy' to 'Billy' whenever she sang along with the 'Force's Sweetheart' and I was nearby.
Throughout the world, every country has a particular landmark for its famous city or boundary that informs the traveller they are entering a particular place and tells the native they are 'coming home'. It may be emblematic of either entering a city or a country. For example, in New York, it is the 'Statue of Liberty', in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, it is 'Christ the Redeemer', an Art Deco statue of Jesus Christ, in Paris, it is the Eifel Tower. In Egypt, it is the Pyramids, and in England, it is the 'White Cliffs of Dover'.
Whenever our soldiers fought across the English Channel during the first two World Wars and thought of coming back home, it was the chalky 'White Cliffs of Dover' they first saw in their mind's eye. 'We shall not forget either them or what they fought for.' Love and peace. Bill xxx

Thought For Today: 10th November 2018

10/11/2018

'Today is a double anniversary in the Forde household. I am celebrating my 76th birthday and Sheila Forde and I are celebrating our sixth wedding anniversary; having married on my 70th birthday. Despite a number of medical setbacks since our marriage, after a six-month honeymoon period, I was diagnosed with a terminal blood cancer. Since that diagnosis, I developed another two cancers and I am presently on the hospital emergency waiting list for another skin cancer operation on a malignant growth in both sides of my forehead. And yet, I can honestly say that since I met Sheila in 2010, and particularly since we married, the past eight years have been the happiest I have ever experienced.

I wish you a very happy sixth wedding anniversary, sweetheart, and just for today, I will sing you six songs; one for each of the years we have been happily married. Each song is special to me because it reflects the growing strength of our loving relationship. If others choose to listen to them also they are most welcome, but if not, it matters not, as I sing them just for you, Sheila.

I love you, Sheila and I know that we are blessed as a couple that we came into each other's lives when we were both in danger of giving up on finding lasting love with another partner. We had unconsciously placed ourselves at an emotional distance to others; essentially protecting the vulnerable parts of ourselves, and thereby making ourselves 'emotionally unavailable'. All this changed, however, after we first met. I knew as soon as I left you that first day I met you in Haworth that things would never be the same in my life again. We met and fell in love, and after a two-year courtship period, we married. Ever since that first day, my love for you has grown daily and I experience a depth of love that few men have been lucky enough to ever know in the autumn of their life. From the opening to the closing of my eyes daily, Sheila, you lovingly and unselfishly anticipate and fulfil my every need.

I am often asked, 'Bill, how can you remain so positive about life when you have a terminal blood cancer that will shorten it?' I reply, 'You don't know what it's like to be loved by someone the way that I am and to love somebody the way I do. I feel loved by Sheila, more than any man has ever felt loved. That's what makes it all possible; that's what it's like':

The way that you have looked after me, Sheila, during difficult times has reflected the loving, caring and sensitive woman you are. While it may sound a tad selfish of me to say so, because we have become dependent on each other's presence and unqualified love of the other, we perhaps occasionally run the risk of living in a world of our own. When we married, Sheila, you welcomed me into your house and made it our home, and you welcomed me with open arms into your life. Today, sweetheart, 'Welcome to my world'; the world that you have made possible by converting my innermost dream into daily reality:

During our years together, Sheila, you have been a wife, lover, friend and soulmate to me; never once failing to displease or disappoint in any of these roles. These are the main reasons I love you, Sheila, though they barely scratch the surface of why I truly love you. I love you because you understand me better than any other human on this planet. You are ever present in my life, meaning more to me than the sun, moon and stars in the heavens as you gently turn me on your axis of love in this life of mine on earth. You soothe me with every touch, comfort me with every warm embrace, reassure me with the hold of your hand, kiss of your lips, smile on your face and the sound of your spoken word. My day could never start or end with purpose without you in it. You know how to lovingly get me to alter some of my inappropriate ways without offending my sensibilities; you are the seasons of all my change for the better. Whatever others might think or say about me, you never doubt me. In short; your laughter makes my heart lighter, your intrinsic goodness makes my days brighter and you hold the only key to unlock my door to happiness by simply being you. These are the reasons I love you, Sheila, because.......:

I remember with much fondness how you went 'Rock and Rolling' with me at a club in Batley for the first three/four years of our relationship. Even though you didn't know how to bop when we first met (having come from a family of classical singers, accomplished violinists and concert pianist), you nevertheless instantly recognised how important this kind of dancing was to me and made it a part of your weekly routine also. Sadly, after I contracted my terminal blood cancer I needed chemotherapy sessions for the better part of two separate years. That chemotherapy and my absence of any effective immune system led me to avoid all future crowds. However well we did or didn't dance together, sweetheart, I always felt the proudest person on that dance floor. I knew that I was partnered with the most attractive woman as my dancing companion for life; spun dizzy by our mutual love. Though my dancing days are now over, I am so glad, Sheila that you 'saved the last dance for me':

You always know the very best way to reassure and support me, sweetheart. A recent example was when the skin-cancer consultant who had operated on me a few months earlier to remove cancerous tissue from my forehead told me that the two biopsies he had sent off for analysis after my operation, unfortunately, revealed the cancer to be more malignant and invasive than initially feared. He had been unable to remove all the skin cancer in the last operation and would place me on the emergency hospital waiting list for another operation and attempt to excavate any remaining cancerous tissue from each side of my forehead, if possible before Christmas 2018. He also planned to raise my case for clinical discussion at a forum of skin-cancer consultants that he would be attending before the end of the week. After we arrived home and had got our heads around the shock news we had an hour earlier received, Sheila, you told me about a song you had heard on the car radio that day. You thought that it would suit my style of singing as well as me as an individual as it epitomised the kind of person I was and my lifestyle. I looked up your gift of this song called, 'The Rose' and immediately fell in love with its beautiful melody and poignant lyrics. My dear mother and all my sisters have always loved a red rose, along with Sheila and I. Indeed, we recently planted three dozen roses in our allotment in a variety of form and colour. Sheila, I will always treasure the song gift you gave me when I most needed it and shall, henceforth regard 'The Rose' as 'our song':

During my life, Sheila, I have deeply loved three women more than all others. You were the last of these loves, yet the best of these loves. While the other two loves of my life provided me with most of my needs, only you gave me all I ever wanted. I met, fell in love with and married a woman who fulfilled my sensual, sensitive and spiritual dimensional needs as a soul mate. Sheila Forde, you are 'Once, twice, three times a lady and I love you: I love you'. I wish you a very happy 6th wedding anniversary, sweetheart. Love Bill: November 10th, 2018":

Thought For Today: 9th November 2018

9/11/2018

The Commitments' is a 1994 musical comedy-drama based on the 1987 novel of the same name by Roddy Doyle. The hit song to come out of the movie was 'Try a little Tenderness'.

In today's hard life, 'tenderness' has become a much under-rated quality, but it nevertheless remains the manifestation of personal strength, endeavour and resolution. 'Tenderness' is a fast road for one human winning over the heart of another. When one expresses 'tenderness', one conquers by loving, understanding, caring and forgiveness.

The very first tenderness I can recall receiving was in the loving arms and reassuring embrace of my mother. There is no soother balm than the tender touch of another, be they your mother, brother, lover or friend.

Expressing 'tenderness involves an automatic acceptance of the person and their situation and sometimes demand forgiveness. Once we are able to both accept the person as well as forgive any failings, a remarkable transformation occurs. Tenderness and love arise naturally and spontaneously.

To 'try a little tenderness' is to acknowledge that nothing is too small to care about in the feelings department of the human wardrobe and no obstacle is too large to surmount. People who mean the most to us are not those who give advice, provide solutions or administer cures for our ailments, but are instead those who choose to share our pain, marry our worried minds with mutual understanding and touch our wounds with a gentle and tender hand.

When we are lucky to find our soul mate and the person we are fated to spend the rest of our life with, we will also find that all our 'saved up wishes' will have found their natural home.

Your future happiness is out there somewhere waiting for you, but you shall only find it if you look in the right places. Look not for tenderness on 'Tinder' or seek that catch you have long sought to hook on dating sites such as 'Plenty of Fish'. Your soul mate is out there waiting for you, and you are more likely to recognise them if you know where to look for them. Look in all places where human pockets of truth, honesty, faithfulness, sensitivity, goodness and forgiveness naturally reside; for it is there that you are most likely to find these inextricable stands of good character wrapped up in a huge ball of human tenderness. Love and peace. Bill xxx

Thought For Today: 8th November 2018

8/11/2018

If anyone was to ask me who I thought the best singing group was in the world, I would have no hesitation in answering. It wouldn't be a world-famous British group like 'The Beatles' or the 'Rolling Stones', but 'The Eagles' from America. Not only have their records sold over 150 million worldwide but they have received so many accolades and awards that it would take the better part of the morning to reel them off. Apart from their singing, what I love about the group is the universality and ubiquitous nature of their song's construction or message which are capable of being appropriately applied to more than one situation while still retaining truth and meaning.

This morning's song, 'Hotel California' is a good example. Its central message, which is revealed at the end of the last sentence sung, and the construction of the song in its very long musical introduction and its even lengthier musical ending has too many like characteristics which could be said to mirror the political dilemma that Great Britain has found itself in since the early 1960s.

I refer to the greatest political decisions Great Britain has taken during the past sixty years; its decade of failed attempts to get into 'The European Common Market' before 'The Treaty of Accession' was signed in January 1972 by the then prime minister Edward Heath, its constant unease as a member state ever since, and its interminable efforts to extricate itself from its mass of joint treaties and to leave the E.E.U. following the referendum of 2016.

The UK's applications to join in 1963 and 1967 were vetoed by the President of France, Charles de Gaulle, who said that "a number of aspects of Britain's economy, from working practices to agriculture had made Britain incompatible with Europe and that Britain harboured a 'deep-seated hostility' to any pan-European project." How accurate in his assessment Charles de Gaulle proved to be!

When listening to the words of 'Hotel California' simply substitute (Hotel California for the European Union) and (the long musical introduction for the decade it took Great Britain to get accepted into the club) and (the even lengthier musical ending for Great Britain to get out after it held its referendum of 2016 and obtained a majority vote to Brexit). Also (substitute the Night Man character in the song for the Chief Negotiator for the 27 EU countries, Michael Barnier) and finally, substitute (the central message of the song spoken by the Night Man as being spoken by Michael Barnier to Great Britain at the eleventh hour of its Brexit talks to secure an exit deal).

That central message to both California Hotel residents and Great Britains wanting to leave the E.E.U. as spoken by the Night Man in the song and Michael Barnier at the Brexit negotiating table in Brussels is one and the same: " Relax, we are programmed to receive. You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave!".

Canny, isn't it? Love and peace. Bill xxx