Home thoughts on abroad

I listen to the Today programme on Radio 4 for an hour or so whilst I am getting up in the morning. I catch about ten minutes of Woman's Hour on my drive to work. Most days I can absorb the opinions and information, but this week I am moved to write something, more for myself than anyone out there who reads this. I know I may reveal a political naivety or an idealistic rather than pragmatic approach here too. I'll start with Woman's Hour. I can't be the only listener who finds it patronising. Maybe it's my age. I don't consider myself old, I think of myself as mature and experienced. I know that my generation were movers and shakers back in the 60s and 70s. I still have plans and dreams, and some of them get transformed into reality. I would prefer to plan to live in a commune than sheltered housing for the over 50s. I'm happy to share meals with people of all ages, but I don't want to be described as a grandmother ( and I am not! ) simply on the basis of my age and my ability to cook. Because of changes in pension entitlement, I have to continue working and applying for jobs for the next 5 years, in competition with younger people. I don't envy them. At least I am doing it from a position of experience and employment. It is a potentially soul destroying process. Especially when you hear about the random ways HR departments whittle down the volume of applications. I know I can switch off the radio if I don't like what I hear, but I am intrigued to follow how women's issues are being dealt with on what considers itself a serious radio programme. The Today programme has been particularly interesting this week. The sad news about Robin Williams gave Adrian Strain the chance to share his thoughts on his son's suicide and his work as a Samaritan. His comments on his conversation with the policeman attending his son's death will stay with me for ever. As a Samaritan, 90% of his suicidal callers are women.The policeman revealed that 90% of the suicides they attend are young men. Women talk, men take violent action against themselves. Heart breaking.I have lost friends to suicide over the decades, like many other people. Could you have done more? Would a chance intervention have changed the course of their lives? Adrian Strain suggested a very practical intervention for young men presenting with stress at their doctor's surgery. Of course a sick note presupposes you have work to be absent from. And that's another factor. Finally Gaza, Iraq and Russia. Listening to Paddy Ashdown on Radio 4 this morning made me realise that WW1 and even th Great Game are still creating ripples through present day politics. The Sykes Picot agreement and the containment of Russia's power before the Revolution. He described it as a convulsion. An interesting image. If an airlift of refugees from a mountain in Iraq can be planned by international powers, then why can't women, children and the vulnerable be taken out of danger in Gaza? I remember breaking up arguments between Iraqui, Kurdish and Iranian students on a regular basis at a language school in Manchester in 1981. They tried to explain, and I could only relate it to Northern Ireland at the time. And my other naive question, as Paddy Ashdown talked about the type of interventions he thought would help, is where is Tony Blair in all this? Is he on holiday? I thought this was his role as envoy in the Middle East. And each time I hear a broadcaster say Sunny and Shia, it sounds like a tragic joke waiting to happen.

Rites of Passage

My daughter and her lovely boyfriend got engaged a few weeks ago, much to everyone's great joy. The proposal took place on the oldest working wooden roller coaster, in Tivoli Gardens, Copenhagen. I like the symbolism. The roller coaster of life. There has been a flurry of decisions and arrangements as a date and venue are set for this time next year.On Thursday morning we went to look at wedding dresses at a proper specialist wedding dress shop, a new experience for both of us. She looked gorgeous in all the ones she had chosen to try on. When I got married the first time, we had a traditional wedding. My parents seemed to organise it and they certainly paid for it. I remember meeting the vicar,and going for lunch at the hotel we later booked for the reception. My bridesmaid and I went to choose a boutique bought long dress for her to wear. My husband to be had a white suit made, at a bespoke tailors. A clothing designer friend made my dress for me. I can recall going to buy the fabric, blues and creams, floral and floaty with ribbons and flowers and butterflies in lace. I wish I had kept it. I hand wrote the invitations, using cards with an image of Breughel's wedding feast. None of it was stressful. I was doing my first year exams at University a few weeks before the date. The style of the wedding was traditional, but the friends who came were a troupe of beautiful hippies. Velvet jackets,long curly cavalier hair styles for the men, ethnic dresses,flowing locks,loon pants and embroidered mirrored t-shirts. I need to look for the photos. A bright sunshiny day. My second wedding was simple and a secret, with two good friends as witnesses. It took place in a registry office, and we only announced it after the event. I wore a white cotton dress from Warehouse, where I was working at the time. There are only two photos. So once a bridesmaid, twice a bride and here I am as the mother of the bride. It's forty years since my first marriage. Things have changed in the wedding world, and it's going to be an exciting and interesting time. No doubt I will write about some of it here.