Lila's Blog from Europe

It doesn’t happen very often but today I relived the weekend in every quiet moment that I got. I had a super duper great week end!
It all began on Saturday morning. I had a free day and even though I had a huge basket of clothes to wash and iron I was quick to say yes when my daughter called me on the phone and invited me to go out to dinner with herself, her husband and my grandson.
My friend would also be joining us. They had reservations at one of the best restaurants in our town and when we arrived we were escorted to the garden where our table stood. We were surrounded by the sweet smells of herbs. This place had been a convent and the architect had managed to preserve the sphere of the secluded living. A fountain formed a soft back-ground music to our conversation.
The dinner was delicious and the deep purple skies and great company encouraged us to linger over the coffee. We left with a mild regret but otherwise feeling in a way that is reserved only for the end of a perfect day.
On Sunday my sister and I went down to Belgium. There was a yearly festival taking place and knowing that the people of Belgium are famous for their delicious eating and drinking we were prepared to have a great time. We were not disappointed good food, wine and traditional music. The festival found place in the town square and if you did not feast your ears on the music or your stomach with the food then there was enough to see. Nearly every house or building was worth viewing. I felt some what like a Roman of olden times at an orgy! A plethora of pleasure. We found it difficult to leave all that living behind us and return to our quiet homes
I have decided however that I am going to reserve more time to get out of my day to day life and my computer go out and experience life!

So, yesterday evening I had the whole family over for a barbeque. It was my turn to do so even though I am not, like the rest of them having my vacation at the moment. It is the last weekend of their vacation and they all wanted something to remember.
I stocked up on the food and the beer and all my favourite CDs lay by the computer ready to be enjoyed. Then I decided to do a little glamour bit and dressed in a skirt and little black pumps. Did I love their faces when I opened the door! My sister Exclaimed, “Lila I have never seen you wear a skirt before!” My son-in-law joked, “Hi mom, are we invited to a wedding, what have you done to the groom?” I enjoyed the jokes but before the evening was over I had to rush upstairs to change my shoes. I did manage to resist the temptation to slip on a pair of comfortable blue jeans.
I’ll have to say again, beer and politics don’t mix well. In spite of all my efforts the party broke up rather suddenly when my brother-in-law made a remark about Moroccan and Turkish people making more use of the social services than the original Netherlanders. My son who has lots of Turkish and Moroccan friends was not at all pleased about this and made that known in no uncertain terms. There was nothing more to do and my brother-in-law and my sister left the party.
My son later told me that he would visit them today and offer his apologies for having been so rude. It was just that he is so tired of hearing this everywhere he goes. He had had an all day football training session and one of his team players had remarked on the fact that one of his friends drove around in an expensive automobile though he was only nineteen and his family was not very rich. Martin is as a friend of that Moroccan aware that he does a lot of extra work in the garage in order to pay for that automobile. When now he was here at home enjoying the party and his own family began to make such remarks it just made him lose control. If my brother-in-law had not had a beer too many he would not have said any thing like that.
Beer and politics don’t mix well!
Have a grand Sunday everyone, I’ll think of you all when I’m at work today especially if it turns out to be, as the weather man promised a scorcher of a day!

I just had my son on the Telephone. The poor thing, he should be having a great time in Spain with his friends but instead of daily visits to the Spanish discos and lazy sun-filled days on the beach he is lying in an apartment vomiting blood!
He sounded so sick and oh so sorry for himself that I am feeling a bit guilty about not jumping on a plane and bringing him home at once.
He still has two days left of his vacation and as every mother will understand I am going to be as nervous as a cat on a hot tin roof ‘til I can take him in my arms and reassure myself that he is not at death’s door. Is he not suffering from deathly, incurable disease?
Being a young and relatively healthy teenager he does not have an insurance policy for such an emergency so he has to spend the last two days of vacancy alone and feeling terrible!

For all of us who are trying to get our work published this will either cause us to throw every bit of written hope into the rubbish or give us the determination to go on writing in the face of all the disappointments and returned manuscripts.
Today I read one of the many newsletters to which I am a subscriber and really I did not know whether to laugh or cry.
Mr. Lassman, a writer struggling to have his work published decided to try an experiment. He sent the first three chapters of three manuscripts to different publishers, amongst whom were the Agency Christopher Little, the publisher of J.K. Rowlings. Penguin, publisher of the Jane Austin’s”Pride and Prejudice”, Bloomsbury, Random House, Harper Collins, and Hodder & Sloughton
The only one to recognise and comment on his manuscripts was Alex Bowler, assistant editor at Jonathan Cape who kindly suggested that he looked at his copy of “Pride and Prejudice” very carefully because the laws regarding plagiarism were very strict.
None of the publishers requested to see the rest of the books or showed any interest in acquiring the publication rights of any of the works; in fact the Agency Christopher Little “Was not confident of placing this material with a publisher”
Naturally Mr, Lassman had changed the names of the main characters and had even given one of the books its original title. He used the pseudonym Alison Laydee.
The manuscripts that Mr. Lassman had sent to the publishers were the first chapters of three of the best known novels of that great English writer , Jane Austin Northanger Abbey, first published in 1798, Pride and Prejudice (1813) and Persuasion (1818).!

Source WRITERSWORLD Newsletter 166

I spent most of the weekend talking to the dead, no I did not attend an on going séance I was assigned to work in the museum on both days.
Now I have nothing against museums except for the fact that I have a lot of pain in my feet after a day walking around looking at the exhibits and they are good places to experience the peace and quiet not readily found in the world today
My work places, yes I had the pleasure of being assigned to two museums one dedicated to the role of the Franciscan brothers in the Roman Catholic Church and their place in the history of Weert. I live in Weert a town in The Netherlands. The other museum tells more about the history of Weert in general
I had never visited this first museum before. On opening the door I was confronted by a feeling of nostalgia.
The robes and a number of gold-plated monstrance’ displayed in the glass cases sent me back to my childhood. I remember the awe I felt going into the sacristy at our church as a child of nine to help Sister Margret Mary clean the brass candle sticks and vases needed for the Mass on Sunday. We were not allowed to touch the monstrance, oh no not that, we were unworthy!
I really enjoyed the paintings of Jacob de Witt such clear, sparkling colours even now after all these years still, I don’t think those people in the paintings at all real, they all look as if life would have whipped them senseless; such fragile beings. The portraits of the founders show on the other hand men who knew the good living and had the best of everything, not one with an ascetic emaciation but solid men of the world There were crucifixes and statues of the Christ and his mother Mary and also of the woman whom I admire most in the whole bible, Maria Magdalena
After a while I felt the eyes of God follow me everywhere I went. I finally told him, “God I am only here to protect the things that your people treasure, so let me be!”
In the other museum there is an exhibition of modern art and a display of flint tools and axes. Weert was in the early days a town surrounded by a wall and a moat. There is nothing left of these things except a memory the names of some of the places in the area and a few canons at strategic places in the town.
In one of the display cases you can see a map of the old town. Swords, cannonballs and other paraphernalia, found as a result of archaeological exploration in the area are also on display and there is also a four dimensional model of what the town looked like in the time of the Graf van Hoorn.
I had visited this museum years ago but I still found it interesting to wander amongst the artefacts and ponder over how life must have been in the old days.

I am always at loss about how I should celebrate Father’s Day. My father and I did not really have a relationship as such because I did not have much to do with him since my third. When my mother died he remarried and we, my siblings and I became something of an embarrassment to him.
He sometimes visited with us at the children’s home but was always uncomfortable with us and left as soon as possible. We, on the other had always found the few presents he sometimes brought us unsuitable and they made us the objects of spot in the eyes of the other children. His presents were mostly items from the little shop owned by hem and our stepmother. One day they brought us all a pack of margarine, can anyone explain to me why a child of nine would desire a pack of margarine?
When my sisters and I finally managed to make a home for ourselves then they always invited him over on father’s day for a copious meal of all the things he loved to eat. I served him the meal not with love, but just to please my sisters who would have been hurt had I refused to be involved with their efforts to please him.
When I began dating he suddenly remembered that he was a father and tried to have a say in my choice of a date. I had to be very firm and threaten to disown him if he ever tried to meddle in my affairs.
My father later became dement and it seems that the only one of his children he remembered was me. Each time any of my sisters visited him he asked when I would be coming. I suppose that if I had been able to I would have done because I now see things through the eyes of a grown-up and I know that good intentions do often fall by the wayside and it is very difficult to balance between two families.
Anyway, today it is Fathers day and it is good to honour all fathers and hope that they all have a great day!

I read an article in the New York Times today about the effort and the expense that an illegal immigrant and his family will take on just to be able to have his body buried in his land of birth.
I myself, though not illegal, am an immigrant and understand perfectly this longing for the motherland. I was inspired by the article to write this poem, while writing I experienced such a wave of homesickness for a land that I left more than thirty years ago that I had to sit a while here at my computer just staring at the keys.

To the Mother

When the shades of death have fallen
and the sun and I no longer speak
then must this yearning long bespoken
be fulfilled, as I lay down to sleep

“Goodbye.” I said then with hope and sorrow
knowing that I never more would see
your sweetly rounded purple hill tops
as they gently sloped down to the sea

When now the cold mists of the morning
clothe the arms of pine wood sweet
I am walking through the mangrove
In the damp richness of rotting heat

And as I struggle though the daytime
hearing the noise of cars and trains
I sometimes wander while I’m walking
to the golden quiet of my dreams

There to where the sound of the parrots
wake me early fro’ the arms of sleep
calls me into the fresh air waiting
wanting me to breathe in deep

When now the shades of life are drawn
and my body falls into its longest sleep
bury me in the womb that once held me
the land that has my heart to keep

©Lila Joseph

It is nearly time for a summer break and in preparation for the long lazy days with nothing to do but enjoy life we celebrate the “Month of the Suspense Thriller” It is June.

What kind of book deserves the title of “Suspense Thriller”? well according to the Jury at this years’ committee ”A suspense Thriller does not have to be chock full of sex, violence or horror to catch you by the throat. Too much of these things can make a book not worth the reading!” ( freely translated from an article written by Jef van Gool and published on the website Literatuurplein)

Which authors are going to be accompanying us to the beach, who are we going to find exciting enough to stuff in our hand luggage?

If you don’t have a favourite author then you can search in the bookstores for someone on this list, I am sure you won’t be disappointed.

Ian Rankin
Frederick Forsyth
Stephen King
Elizabeth George
James Elroy
Rinus Ferdinandusse
And Henning Mankell

What do these writers all have in common? They have all been chosen at least once as suspense writer of the year!

So with this list clutched in the hand hurry down to the bookstore and enjoy.

I needed a filing cabinet for my documents but those things are expensive! I began spreading the word amongst my friends, not might I add with much hope of finding a cheap second-hand cabinet but just in desperation. All my drawers and cupboards were filled to bursting and there was nothing I could throw out.
After a week or so I got shifted to a new workplace and what do you know, the factory was being closed down and they had filing cabinets for sale; in my budget range, what a coincidence!
Yesterday I had to work an unexpected extra shift at another factory. I got into a conversation with a young lady who worked there developing games for older people. She thought that these games would help them keep their brains active and so delay the begin of dementia. This is a pet theory of mine and so we had a lovely long chat about whether or not this works. We were in agreement. What a coincidence, of all the hundreds of people working at that factory I struck up a conversation with someone who was interested in something that I was also passionate about.
Do you believe in coincidence, I once read that some people believe in the theory that life is made up of coincidences. I wonder if there is anything in that theory.

On Wednesday, the blond saviour of the culture of The Netherlands had some good news for the police. He wanted to have the law amended giving the police permission to use live ammunition to control a crowd by a big demonstration or football riot.
Riots surrounding the football competition have often been the cause of upheavals when the destruction of property and mishandling of people find place. Why Mr. G. Wilders is suddenly so concerned for the safety of the police that he wants to give them carte blanches to use live ammo as a method of crowd control?
Ah well the last riot found place after a friendly game between the teams of “Youths under seventeen” from the Netherlands and Morocco.
In another of my blogs I have written a little of the situation that exists between the Netherlanders of Moroccan descent and indigenous Netherlanders so I won’t go into it again. Suffice to say that Mr. Wilders will love to be relieved of the sight of anyone who has a hint of an African or Asian ancestor.
He finds that it is a justified to shoot into a crowd of people. Mind you, he was good enough to qualify his recommendation saying that the police should aim at the legs. I don’t know about Mr. Wilders but in my opinion the irresponsible idea of leaving such a decision to an individual policeman gives me the bibbers. There have already been so many mistakes made even with the built-in safety precautions of the method used at the present time. It is also a very difficult thing to aim and hit the leg of a particular person in a moving crowd but I suppose it will not matter to Mr. Wilders if we have one death more or less.
The other groups of people whom Mr. Wilders will expose to this special treatment are squatters, drug addicts, habitual criminals, anti-globalists, in fact anyone who does not toe the line set out by Mr. Wilders. It will in no way trouble him if they were all shot down as rabid dogs.
Mr. Wilders considers himself to be a champion of democracy; he should have no trouble getting along with Mr. Pinochet, Mr. Hitler and others of that ilk.