“Simply standing together in peaceful solidarity as we did on Saturday is a start. And perhaps the best thing now, for those who oppose Trump just now, might be to hang around under the trees and keep our powder dry.” As protests mount globally against Trump’s Muslim ban, here’s a view from Boston, Mass.
Archives for January 2017
A steep learning curve
“With so many reasons to avoid sex, whether it be long days working and longer nights with the baby, and so many alternatives at my finger-tips, it can be tempting to neglect this area of life under false pretences and disappear down a digital rabbit-hole.” Loki learns to cope (and with himself) in the third part of his diary.
Time to reject May’s absurd adventurism
“The notion that it ought to be the people who are sovereign, rather than parliament, has a long and proud history in Scotland.” “Scotland can either stick with the result of the 2014 referendum or it can respect the result of the 2016 referendum. It cannot do both.”
Poetry and the power of simple pleasures
“With Trump in the White House and Britain heading blindly for Brexit, we must not be silent about horrors we witness, but let’s not stop enjoying and sharing simple pleasures’.” Fay Young reclaims the right to joy as a weapon against totalitarianism.
Will Trump declare war on the EU?
“Even if he only believes half of it, that could be enough to destroy the EU, and at its most extreme, the stability and peace of all Europe. Maybe he won’t turn out as bad as I fear. But I would rather not count on that.”
You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone
“Behind this current, impoverishing turmoil lurks a similar, equally certain idea of English identity that’s clearly contradicted and compromised by the ideals of the EU. It may be that this sense of identity sees shame in accepting the need to collaborate internationally…”
Unanswered questions of Scotland’s economy
Derek Mackay’s first budget as finance secretary is assailed from all sides – even his own. Scottish Conservatives label Scotland the highest-taxed part of the UK; Labour’s Kezia Dugdale endorses higher Scottish taxes as part of a federal-style devolution of revenue-raising powers. Leading economist David Eiser pondered deeper economic issues.
Fatherhood fears
In the second extract from his diary, Loki reflects on his fears of being a Dad but getting closer to his own parents. “Intimate relationships are very challenging and the feelings of vulnerability are overwhelming at times….In my parents I see the two extremes of what I am capable of.”
My Irish Baby Box, a vintage treasure with topical notes
‘It’s a post-war period piece, a personal memento from a different world and yet it echoes with the aims of the Finnish baby box.’ Fay Young re-opens her forty-year-old Irish ‘baby box’ to find topical insight.
David Bowie, devout sceptic
Like millions of other Bowie fans I find myself listening to his music more than ever since he died a year ago today….it continues to offer consolation, not only for the hard fact that we shall hear no more from him, but for the particular challenges of my own life. Why should this music, so often abstract, glacial, detached, obscure and mockingly ironic, hold such a powerful emotional appeal?