None of us wrote this one.....

A fellow square peg ,who for reasons known only to himself, decided to become a teacher.
 On the last gathering of the pegs, he informed us that a fellow educator who teaches History, was under the impression that The Battle of Britain and D Day were both from the same time period of The Second World War. He also let us in on the fact that the song Tax Man, penned by Mr George Harrison, was in fact going to  be credited to Mr John Lennon, in a lesson dedicated to the 1960s and the influence of said musician on the decade.

Small matters you may feel but ask yourself this. What if the above were in fact the case and what we know as history and accept as the truth wasn't? What if everything we've been told was in fact based on the whim of those who told us, and not how things actually happened?

How  many of us know what we believe to be  the truth  actually is that? How much of it is based on what others have told us and ,honestly now, how many of  us really care?

When we think of the past, we tend to think about it in terms of things we can't touch or feel anything about, unless we have some personal link to it , sometimes through a well known or documented event. It doesn't matter because it's  gone and not our here and now. We are distanced by time. It has no effect on us, it is black and white and hung on museum walls. I sometimes think of the present in terms of a rocket that's just blasted off. One minute we're at the very tip of the nose cone, right at the centre of the heat and friction at the sharpest point of  what's happening then suddenly, we slip and we're after burn.


Our times will be left for others to record . The minutiae of who we were will  never be known. We will form part of someone elses' depiction of the past  and become a vision of the truth for those who come after to accept just as we do now with what came before us.

 We don't have to.

Now, as never before in any time in history, we have the capability to make our own voices heard. To leave behind our stories, our own accounts of our lives, who we are,what we felt and thought. It isn't about any kind of fame or status, it's about saying this was me, this is my truth.


In his colleagues' defence, my friend did point out that some people who teach, know a lot about one thing and very little about anything else, it's called being a specialist I suppose.
 This did nothing to lessen the indigence of the other pegs, who were all of the opinion that at least a general knowledge of other things was preferable to a general ignorance towards them.


Anyway, I'm off , got a good book on the go about how The Victorians invented the last 600 years...and I know they didn't..........

Sirens
Before he set sail,

his course all set out
on a home made chart,
they told him about the rocks


"Don't go near"!  they said
"They're sharp and the women who live there will sing,
thoughts of deep salt kisses will  fill your head,
they'll sigh and longing for limbs entwined will cloud your mind,


Remember the rocks,
you'll bleed
you'll drown,
you'll go down


So, he promised not to go near the rocks
and, as he sailed away he waved
and he shouted he'd write,
when he hit land
when he got there,
he'd let them know
all things would be fine,
he'd be alright 


A few days later down on the beach
something was found,
pulled from the surf,
tattered and dripping,the words on it blurred  by the salt water
taken back, it was laid out on the ground,
the home made chart with a course set out


They cried and shouted,
between the sobs
how they wished he'd listened to those who knew


They should have saved their breath
and their tears too
because,
from the moment they'd said don't go near the rocks
that was all he'd wanted to do..

I PREDICT A RIOT...I THINK

So, The  abandoned  and neglected young generation so much in the press over the last couple of weeks , have gone back to being just that. They are once again relegated to the sidelines in favour of more exciting and up to date issues. We are all let off from being responsible for their situation and can go back to worrying about the housing market or  some despot who stands in the way of Westernisation of the rest of the World


There will be , of course, those who championed the young before the events of last month and who still will no mater what. Stick with it, don't give up on them..seriously. 
I say this because I spent part of the day with people from the other end of the spectrum of  social neglect, the 50 plus. Not to be too much of a harbinger of doom people but the majority of us are closer to them than the ones who ran about the other month updating their televisions and stocking up the local Cash Converters.


My job involves making positives out of negatives. I help people to look at the situation they are in and hopefully, give them some way of seeing things in a better light. Help them feel they can do something to help themselves. It works with most but the unemployed 50 plusers are a different breed, especially the men. For the most part, closed off, impervious to changing and victims of the unspoken truth that is age discrimination, they present the biggest challenge of any delivery session I could give. They have life experience and skills. For the most part, they turn up but when they do... that's when the problems start.


They sit and look at me with that look and body posture, usually arms folded or leaning forward on the table, which radiates "I HAVE BEEN SENT HERE, WHAT IS THE POINT" like nothing else.


Then begins a battle of wills that quite frankly, beats any I've ever had against teenagers or self assured younger people that I've worked with. They interject, they talk about the past...they debate, they make me work...and I champion them for it.


The fact is this, we have more than one generation that's being ignored. We have two. The 50 plus are as much victims of our system as all the young people we were made to feel responsible for who ran about causing damage because,apparently ,they were angry. They know their age is against them and so do I. I'm aware of it every time I tell them to follow up their feedback and keep trying because, what else can I do? If I could change how it is, I would.
Being over 50 and finding yourself in the strange and unholy land of unemployment is a terrible thing, make no mistake. It's something I guarantee some of us 40 somethings will get to see.

Come the day we get there...lets get angry about it..............