Lisa Marie Gabriel's Blog: Persimews Musings

I have been trying to walk more since the toe injury has settled. This is a case of use it or lose it as a few months back I was struggling to walk at all thanks to a sprained knee and angina – possibly the result of long covid. Now as I am determined to live long enough to collect my pension (a reward for a lifetime of hard work that I paid for incidentally, not a benefit) this exercise is a must and slowly things are improving. So, we set out for an enjoyable stroll on the Viking Way in the Spring sunshine, followed by breakfast at the Pantry and a quick trip to the Coop to pick up the groceries we forgot last time.

It was on the last leg home that it happened. As we emerged from the alley, we saw an elderly lady fall. She had been out shopping with her carer and suffered an epileptic seizure. The girl helped her up and then she just flopped again, was lowered gently to the ground and was totally unresponsive. I asked if there was anything we could do, and the lass said it was OK and she was going to call for an ambulance. Meanwhile neighbours gathered also offering help and we listened obviously as she phoned 999. The old lady meanwhile was out cold, in the recovery position (clever carer) half on the footpath and half on the road. She was totally unresponsive. A gentleman we know came out of his house and I asked if he could bring her a blanket. She looked so frail. He came back with a warm crochet blanket. Meanwhile a young woman took a fleece blanket out of her car and the carer, who had been on nights, took her pyjamas out to make a pillow for her injured head.

It appears that she had a shoulder injury from a previous fall, had terminal cancer and epilepsy and had only just been discharged from hospital. She had hit her head on the kerbstone on the first fall and it was bleeding. The carer was on the phone for a long time to dispatch who appeared to be attempting to triage her over the phone. Eventually she said an ambulance would be on its way in SIX HOURS. We were all shocked. The gentleman and the young lady both offered to take her to hospital by car. The carer rang her boss and arranged to be picked up in about fifteen minutes. The old lady stirred periodically now but was only semi lucid. We left. All we could do at this point was pray, I was tempted to offer the carer a cup of tea but as we live a couple of streets away, I thought her boss would probably arrive before I had returned with it.

Seeing this happen was a shock to all. Noticing how caring people were to this frail old lady was good, but what on Earth is wrong with our NHS that they would leave an elderly, frail and terminal patient with a potentially serious head injury lying on the road for six hours? She might even have died on the street. Never mind the injury to her dignity, or the fact that she might have been hit by a car if left, the practical issue was that she had hit her head on the concrete and if that is not a medical emergency, I simply have no clue what is. I hope to God that I never collapse in the street but if I do, I would be glad of the kindness of strangers, especially in the absence of emergency medical care.

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You would think that the news might report on the lives of people around the world but my beef with the BBC is the endless loop of what is essentially celebrity gossip. I am not going to chime in with my views on Boris and his parties, let alone Prince Andrew and his, and as for Djokovic’s vaccination status I am glad that, for now at least, his fifteen minutes of infamy has stopped looping on the so-called News Channel. It would be handy, although frightening, to learn a bit more about what Putin thinks he is playing at but as there is little I can do about it, other than pray he doesn’t nuke the neighbouring village I prefer to dwell on another curmudgeonly musing and it has to do with feet.

Feet? Yes, FEET! Not in a fetishistic sense, but in that pinch toed, blistery, heel aching sense we all know. (Or at least, those of us blessed with the larger sort). Now I find myself wondering why some of us have pretty little dancer’s toes while others have veritable PADDLES. I have big feet, not in the Ian Thorpe category. Thorpe was the only swimmer to win six gold medals in one World Championships and held a total of 11 world titles. If I remember rightly, he had size 17 feet. How on EARTH did he get socks to fit? Did his mum handknit them I wonder? My feet come in at a modest size 8. They are quite paddle like though and I have a high arch. This makes it impossible to find ladies’ socks to fit. A shame because ladies’ socks have lovely patterns and colours, but as I am diabetic I have to allow my toes to breathe and 4-7 does not achieve the necessary roominess.

To be honest, I have always had a problem with nylon hosiery. Big broad feet have to steal room from somewhere – and usually this is from the knicker area. When the waistband is five inches down your thigh and you have to tug and tug for ten minutes something has to give. Usually the gusset splits or the toe ruptures, given rise to a full length ladder. This is why, when forced to wear a dress for formal occasions, I choose long length so I can leave off the pantyhose and wear ankle boots and socks. So why the curmudgeonly musing?

The horrible truth is that now men’s socks are downsizing too. I bought some military style socks, size 9-12, which were both warm and comfortable for my poor old tootsies. They were so nice that I in fact bought more, only to find them significantly tighter. It appears the sizing is now 6-12. A size range that large is just unrealistic. Two washes and they were tight, so into the Salvation Army bin they went. The best of it was finding some thermal work socks, size 11-14, I now have toffee apple toes and eagerly await shrinkage to fit. Knowing my luck, they will be the first pair in years not to.

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I don’t know, we have so many unread books in the house, but sometimes a title just jumps out at you from a book bin or shop shelf and says: “Buy me.” This is what happened yesterday, and I read The Midnight Library cover to cover in some four hours. I liked this book. Very often I am turned off by the anodyne nature of so much mainstream fiction, but this book has more going for it than most. As you might expect from an obscure author of weird fiction, I am not easy to please and this book deals with several themes that are, shall we say, not completely original. Richard Bach was writing about parallel lives in the multiverse over twenty years ago, but somehow Haig’s expression of this idea is easily accessible.

I have read the book contains suicide triggers, but I don’t see this. What I do see from the protagonist is that it’s possible to appear to have everything – many talents, obvious privilege and overt parental support – and yet to be in total lack of an identity because those around you have imposed their dominant will over your own reality. I agree. I was saying today that the one thing I was discouraged from doing in life was the thing I loved doing most. My parents and teachers were in accord that playing the guitar was a waste of time because I was never going to earn a living; even to the extent that my Maths teacher stole my guitar and hid it in the staffroom because he thought I was practising when I should have been doing extra maths homework. It wouldn’t happen these days of course, but it takes a very strong will to defy parental, educational and peer pressure.

So, yes, I felt for Nora, I felt her despair and I was on a learning curve with her in the Midnight Library. I thought it was a wonderfully easy read, maybe a bit thin on the quantum side of things but that’s inevitable; I suppose it’s what you get when you have a professional editor and a mainstream publisher. That, and the fact that Voltaire, the cat, couldn’t come back to life, whereas Nora’s father, the adulterer, could come back and continue to exercise control, cost the author one star. The explanation Mrs Elm gave about the cat was inconsistent in context. That said, I don’t often abandon everything else to read a book cover to cover and that, for a mainstream bestseller, is impressive.

I don’t know, we have so many unread books in the house, but sometimes a title just jumps out at you from a book bin or shop shelf and says: “Buy me.” This is what happened yesterday, and I read The Midnight Library cover to cover in some four hours. I liked this book. Very often I am turned off by the anodyne nature of so much mainstream fiction, but this book has more going for it than most. As you might expect from an obscure author of weird fiction, I am not easy to please and this book deals with several themes that are, shall we say, not completely original. Richard Bach was writing about parallel lives in the multiverse over twenty years ago, but somehow Haig’s expression of this idea is easily accessible.

I have read the book contains suicide triggers, but I don’t see this. What I do see from the protagonist is that it’s possible to appear to have everything – many talents, obvious privilege and overt parental support – and yet to be in total lack of an identity because those around you have imposed their dominant will over your own reality. I agree. I was saying today that the one thing I was discouraged from doing in life was the thing I loved doing most. My parents and teachers were in accord that playing the guitar was a waste of time because I was never going to earn a living; even to the extent that my Maths teacher stole my guitar and hid it in the staffroom because he thought I was practising when I should have been doing extra maths homework. It wouldn’t happen these days of course, but it takes a very strong will to defy parental, educational and peer pressure.

So, yes, I felt for Nora, I felt her despair and I was on a learning curve with her in the Midnight Library. I thought it was a wonderfully easy read, maybe a bit thin on the quantum side of things but that’s inevitable; I suppose it’s what you get when you have a professional editor and a mainstream publisher. That, and the fact that Voltaire, the cat, couldn’t come back to life, whereas Nora’s father, the adulterer, could come back and continue to exercise control, cost the author one star. The explanation Mrs Elm gave about the cat was inconsistent in context. That said, I don’t often abandon everything else to read a book cover to cover and that, for a mainstream bestseller, is impressive.

Sometimes I despair when I watch the news. I had some media training back in the day and I know all too well that even in unrehearsed speaking it is vital not to confuse words. How much more so when it comes to a potentially lethal respiratory infection? For the second time this week (without mentioning names as that would be unkind) I heard a scientific expert say “virus” when they meant “vaccine”. No big mistake unless you consider that they are trying to convince vulnerable people to have VACCINES against a killer VIRUS. These are people who may not be entirely on the ball with science. This reminds me of the cartoon below by James Gillray. People actually believed the injection would make them grow little cows that erupted from their skin like the monster in Alien. Some attitudes to the coronavirus vaccine are equally silly.

In the same news program, I heard the latest silly rumour about the vaccine. It is FALSELY said to affect fertility. This really is fake news. Now some studies of male COVID survivors between ages 30 and 64 indicate that catching the COVID virus itself might cause fertility problems as the virus attaches itself to the ACE 2 inhibitor cells in the testicles and 25% of a sample of men who had been seriously ill with the VIRUS had azoospermia. In other words, they would be infertile as a result of catching the disease. All the more reason to have the vaccine rather than the virus. Yes? How much more reason do you need not to go out partying with mates than the possible price of your future fertility? Do the COVID deniers and immortal young people really want to go down as Darwin Award nominees? But more seriously, how much more important to be able to rely on public speakers not to confuse the two words? There are enough confused people in the world as it is. Now I do have some dear friends who remain convinced of various conspiracy theories spread by anti-vaxxers in general. It causes me grief, as I worry for their safety, but I don’t wish to cause conflict.

On Monday, having been invited for vaccination due to health problems, I had my first dose of the Oxford vaccine. In March 2020, I had unconfirmed COVID (testing was not available to me at the time) and the lasting effects were pretty unpleasant. It attached itself to ACE-2 inhibitor cells in my kidneys and caused very low blood pressure two weeks after I thought I had recovered from what I thought was a mild flu. This lasted weeks and weeks. I certainly did not wish to catch the VIRUS again, but being well-informed on medical matters I did expect some side-effects from the jab because my body’s response would be much more intense. Fortunately nobody had told me in advance not to abstain from whisky two days before or fourteen days after because that would decrease the response. Equally fortunately for me, having happily walked two miles through the snow to get the jab I naturally had a couple of whiskies on my return. I had a slight reaction, temperature, chills and a snuffly nose, my legs did ache and that was very unpleasant but to be honest that might well have been from walking two miles in my wellies. Who can say? The temperature and snuffles could have been from a chill. Very likely indeed as I love the cold but am probably getting too old to play in the snow.

Today, I can say I have never felt better. More importantly, I have not been dragged off to the underworld by the evil grey lizard people and the government will STILL not be able to track my every movement as I do not use a cellphone…

The Satirical Etchings of James Gillray

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It is nearly seven years since I published my first novel, The Cougar, and it has since been edited and rewritten. I had not intended to write a novel at that point; I was mostly absorbed in music and poetry. The Cougar arose out of a strange dream in which a mysterious woman appeared and instructed me to write her story. I did so. It took the shortest time to write than any subsequent novel because the story was already there. I was just a conduit. Whether that was a conduit to the subconscious or to something else entirely is something I have never really worried about. It was not there one day and it was there another.

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I have since thought that issues of good and evil, darkness and light are ideas of degree in the human condition rather than stark black and white. Ideals of love and compassion can lead us from darkness into light. We are all sinners and imperfect beings and I find myself exploring these themes over and over again in subsequent stories. Is anyone truly beyond redemption? Only God knows, and God offered a solution in his son or so the Bible tells us. The shapeshifter vampires in The Cougar therefore are not evil, bloodsucking predators. They choose not to kill. In fact, if they were to prey on humans their lives would become even more dangerous as the sun would become their main enemy.

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Naively, I sought reviews early on and garnered some negative ones. One I got from a genre writer in a Goodreads group was particularly scathing and the whole book was panned on the basis of only one page read. I learned from that. I had been delighted when The Cougar started to sell really well, then she picked up a couple of these very negative reviews and it stalled for ever. That’s life, I’m afraid. Rewriting took on board some of the early author criticisms and these days I am happy with the story, somewhat amused by third party sellers attempting to sell copies for over $1000 (they obviously have more faith in my writing than is borne out by reality), and still very glad I told Berenice’s story to the world. Some readers, including my one page wonder reviewer, have told me angrily that this is not an LGBT book because there are no M/M scenes. Some have one-starred it precisely because it IS an LGBT book. Others, triggered by one episode of rough marital sex, have thrown it down in disgust but to be fair to Berenice she would ask you to read the whole thing before you decide if this is either a bad book or an evil one. Personally, I don’t think The Cougar is either. It is a searching book, it is the type of book I would love if someone else had written it. It may have a few challenging moments but I think the rewrite has ironed out the early criticisms. Be warned, The Cougar is a deep book, both in its premise that Love Just Is and in its sharing of time and place. Some readers have been delighted by it, enjoying it on a soul level. That is a very real pleasure. I started out as a poet and to me language is important. Words have a music of their own and an ability to paint pictures of scenes we may have never encountered or have experienced and wish to share vividly. That is where I come from as a writer, an explorer sharing a new world. This is a world in which philosophy, science and nature are as important as plot; where Creation itself is a character and love is the driving force. I have never written to a formula, to be honest. I could, and I might be more successful if I did, but I write purely from my heart to yours and here you have it, my heart and soul in British Columbia. Why not give it a try?

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Yesterday, for the first time, I had the rare privilege on being coughed on by a passing runner. I could not believe it actually happened. We always habitually allow runners plenty of room, virus or no virus. This is to prevent crashing or sudden stumbling and injury to the athlete or ourselves. The right to run is a given; even in lockdown it was encouraged by the government in the interests of fitness and mental health. I felt the French had a much better handle on it, restricting runners to off peak times, but nevertheless exercise was never time restricted here. Heaven forfend that a jogger should be told to wear a mask!

This particular young runner had chosen to exercise on a narrow footpath beside a main road at precisely the same time local schoolchildren were emerging and being met by busy mums and grandmas, some with prams, Quite a few pensioners were out shopping before the evening rush hour. You might question the wisdom of that decision, but he obviously thought it was a good time to practise his favourite hobby. Naturally the path was full of people, an elderly person on a mobility scooter pulled aside to give him more clearance. I stepped aside into an open gateway to allow a group of children to go past with their mum, who was pushing a large pram. They were in quite a hurry so it seemed sensible and polite.

The runner literally turned towards us all in passing and coughed loudly and deliberately just once. It was a loose, clearing the throat type of cough. Mercifully he did not spit but, sadly, I could not resist shouting after him:

“Wrong sort of cough, mate.”

Now I have almost certainly had the virus and am still experiencing some post-viral effects months later. Logic dictates that I am probably immune to COVID-19 but obviously I am not immune to being triggered by rudeness or ignorance. I will work on it. I can only work on my own mistakes, but I do find myself questioning why people, particularly young men it seems, are becoming so inconsiderate of others.

Suicide Seeds by Ken Fry

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It was the title that caught me. I am not a fan of GM crops and I think non-seeding varieties exploit the poorest people in the world. Terminator seeds are something else and this fast paced and violent thriller is centred around a plot to sow them in Africa, hence suicide seeds. Ken Fry does a superb job in this story and I only dropped one star on account of the trigger violence against women and animals. To go the whole hog to five would be to disregard some scenes I found very worrying. Yes, the assassin is obviously a dangerous and sick sadist but the murder and sexual abuse of one female character upset me a little. If it disturbs someone who is not, generally speaking, a sensitive reader it will trigger someone who is. Nevertheless there will be people who expect and enjoy graphic scenes that push you to the edge so I hope Mr Fry does not mind this one criticism because it is well intentioned and I have read and enjoyed other books by this author.

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Living Free by Joy Adamson

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

What a wonderful book! It was a gift from a friend who saw it in Lincoln Cat Care shop and bought it for me on a whim. It took me right back to my childhood, those wonderful days when I couldn’t stop reading and most of the books that I read were animal books; innocent days, watching Born Free in the camp cinema at RAF North Cotes and crying my eyes out because of the bad things that happened to Elsa. I can’t remember at what point I became disillusioned with animal books, but I think it had a lot to do with this modern philosophy of non-interference, or that sadistic way of portraying nature red in tooth and claw. Both appal me. I know I can’t bear to watch nature films anymore, whether by David Attenborough or any other modernists. The minute you intrude upon the wilderness you are interfering with animals. Fact. The minute you build or expand another city you are interfering with the animals. Fact. Need I go on? Animals are increasingly pressed into the margins and even there they are not safe. So much for non-interference.

Living Free was written in 1961, an era much less politically correct, in which the human population was about one third of what it has expanded to now. This is a world we can no longer recognise and so this will not be everyone’s cup of tea. It annoyed me that the Adamsons fed the lions on goats for instance. Surely they could see they were making goats into a prey species for Elsa and her cubs and causing problems further down the line? That was my only real problem with their story though. I found the style was easy to read and it was lovely hearing about the adventures of Elsa and her babies. I could see my own cats in the mischievous behaviour of the lion cubs and Elsa herself in the camp and there was evidence of thought, planning and emotion in their behaviour. It was horrible when Elsa was injured and remarkable that Joy was so trusted that she was able to treat her wounds. The ending was heart-rending, but at least the poachers didn’t kill her.

Joy Adamson was a remarkably courageous woman in my opinion and she obviously loved the animals and the Africa she knew despite the many problems. As for anthropomorphism, I am sorry but if you acknowledge evolution as a fact you cannot in all honesty deny that all beings share certain qualities, emotion and thought being common to all conscious beings and language merely a form of communication that we take in a different direction. It is remarkable that wild animals understand and communicate not only with us but with other species. Read it, it is certainly worthwhile. I only wish some of these trendy film makers would care more about the animals they exploit for gain as well as knowledge. All lives matter, all beings are connected by the miracles of DNA and evolution and all share the field phenomenon of consciousness. I have absolutely no doubt of that. In time, I hope all anthropocentric thinkers will learn to accept this.

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Agnes Grey by Anne Brontë

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I felt I needed to read more by the Bronte sisters. I have read Wuthering Heights, which I love, and seen various productions of Jane Eyre but studiously avoided reading it. (We could have read it at school and friends suggested it, but our teacher felt it would probably be too difficult for eleven-year olds and somehow that stuck). So, I was unfamiliar with Anne Bronte and given a choice between Agnes Grey and the Tenant of Wildfell Hall I decided to put my toe in the water with Agnes Grey. A first novel, right? Shouldn’t be too difficult, OK? My thoughts, having read all through, are conflicted.

Firstly, allowing for the language and grammar of the day, this is not a difficult book at all. I read through it in three sittings and I was certainly drawn into the story. That is excellent.

Secondly, the story itself is common enough for the period when middle class women could only choose between marriage, teaching, convent and prostitution for the main part. It was a governess story and this tale is truly horrific in its early chapters. Agnes is certainly caught between a rock and a hard place. She has no power and no authority over her charges, no backing from their parents and constant vilification for being unable to control these evil little sprites in her charge. I didn’t like Miss Grey, I liked the children even less and the parents least of all. As a retired teacher, with some supply teaching experience, it made being a substitute teacher in a rough secondary school seem like a doddle. At least I never had to resort to mercy killing to prevent a wicked boy from torturing a nest of baby birds, still less be accosted by an angry mother because I did not allow her son to pull living creatures to pieces.

Thirdly, when she moved on to a more sympathetic post, she not only proved ineffectual dealing with the girls but turned into a timid mouse putting up with all their machinations and teasing. Agnes as a main character lacks any drive, she is nice enough and good to the poor, but she is put upon daily, muzzled by social norms, strait-jacketed by her position as a servant and yet, despite giving no encouragement to Edward Weston, or any denial of the two teenage sisters’ lies, she still achieves a Happy Ever After. No! No! No! It is just not believable.

I am not sorry I read this, even if the MC is so lacklustre, meek and sorry for herself throughout. For its time, it was probably much more appropriate and believable. I am looking at it through 20/21st century goggles. I realise this and take that into account in my rating. On the plus side, we really should read and treasure our classic novels, language was much richer, style more adult and storytelling was not the rude word it has become in modern times. There is a lot of social history to be gained from these Victorian novels. It enables an understanding, via first person accounts, of the gulf in society between the haves and have nots. We still have a gulf between rich and poor of course but these days people do speak up for themselves in a way that would probably have shocked poor, grey Agnes.

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