Perpend.

Looks odd that word all alone up there in the title box.  I once bought a book designed for teachers of music and children that contained a section on rhythmic clapping, it was entitled 'Pass the clap' which didn't sound very nice.  Nevertheless my juvenile brain somehow appreciated it so I made it into a birthday card and sent it to a person who liked to come in and out of my life at leisure.

I hadn't realised how many cells we have in our bodies, anything from 50-100 trillion depending on what you read, biology was never my strong point, being squeamish, the thought of cutting open anything other than a celery heart makes me shiver.  As a youngster my dream was to become a nurse and I enrolled with the St. John's Ambulance and managed to pass 'First Aid' and 'Home Nursing' easily dealing with the dummies and making beds.  My mind changed a bit later, when my brother too enthusiastically engaged with a glass door (our house was built in the 1930's by Nash and all the doors were glass - gradually my Mum replaced the glass with hardboard because she understood children and glass don't really mix that well) he sliced his arm wide open.   After a mad dash to casualty I passed out as a reaction to all that blood.  Later the blood thing got so bad that I'd pass out trying to give it.

I don't understand the desire now in so many people to become forensic photographers - it surely must be a grotesque thing to do and not the least bit fun.

Thinking about all those cells boggles the mind but reminds me again of Thich Nhat Hanh and Mindfulness.  I was watching my hands and my fingers, the skin covering them, thinking about the ability to touch and feel and how everything all works.  How lucky we are while we are alive.  He's got a point you know.
   
Recently it was reported that there has been a link made between a rise in syphilis in young people and Facebook users.  A horrible thought.  Though why Facebook and not My Space?   Another nasty 'virus' lurking within our netbooks?   Obviously it isn't, it's not the technology's fault but what we do with the information we get from it.   In any case the idea brings me back to the question of my lonely and futile debate, what's best - the book or the screen?

Books don't seem to contain the same kind of threat although it does remind me of a dusty old book I bought for 50p called "The Lure of Love A Manual for future brides and benedicts" written by Dr Robertson Wallace, MB, CM who was also the author of "Indigestion : How to Avoid It" rather appropriate that he wrote both since one begets the other.   The "Lure of Love" had obviously been consulted as I found a pubic hair stuck within its pages,  which raises the alarming question: what deed was being performed to cause it to be there?  It's not like opening a treasured book and finding a much loved lock of hair, this one strand was stuck to the page by its root.

There is no date for the publication of the book but it uses phrases like 'the ribbons and decorations of the men', 'the cloying sweetness of Love's banquet' and all by itself 'Perpend' so it's fair to say the book and the pubic hair are early examples and that the problems of sex have not receeded. 

Afterimage..................................................

Too long spent looking at a screen, reading reading. Why don't younger people (makes me sound old - well today I FEEL old) like to read BOOKS - massive generalization I know but even those close to me who love to read have gravitated towards the digital book and screen, discarding their paper books as too cumbersome, taking up too much space, irrelevant - 'not as handy'. Why do they seem to prefer to read from a screen - the surface of which makes your eyes whirl and burns into the brain? And trawling through the net the content that can be accessed is so often surface compared with books. I presume this will change in time - more depth will be included as books become artefacts. The feel of a book lost to the glare of the screen. Flat, backlit, mostly untouchable, for your eyes only. It wouldn't be so bad if knowing this we knew that trees weren't still being the subject of slash and burn.

As I get up to pour myself a port and lemonade (something my Mum might drink when she was young - though not often being almost teetotal/tea-total - before the days of mass coffee drinking) my eyes blurring with the afterimage of the text on the screen it occurred to me that I don't get that from books. The afterimage I get from books is cerebral not retinal. Am off to bed with my book and head-lamp.

Random eyes

Memory, the intangible thing that is memory, has fascinated me for years.  The universal and yet entirely personal nature of it.  Mostly, we all have it in some form, but for each of us it's very, very different.  So much so that often our shared memories are unrecognizable.  Were I a psychologist that is the area I would research. 

Penelope Lively wrote that our memories (in this instance those of childhood) float untethered (by time), are 'recalcitrant'.   Chris Marker indicated that his filmic or photographic images acted as substitutes for his memory, becoming it.  William Boyd noted that 'our memories will play us false about our past' asserting that only our journals can be the real 'witness' through the passage of time.   The Witness.  Our recording devices.  Boyd also remarks how on reading his journals he didn't recognize the individuals he was.   Lively documents to an extent the struggle to reconcile the photograph with her memory.

Where is it located?  I could research it and find out, although vaguely remember doing that before. Somewhere long ago in my past... a memory exists of studying body language.   Long term memory recall - eyes top right?  Or is it eyes top left?  Why would our eyes move?  Are they attached by cords to the memories in the filing cabinets of our mind - do we re-see those things we are trying to access?  Through pictures or words?  But why in the top right (or left)?   Why not straight back?  We'd look odd it's true (our eyes really in the back of our heads - only the whites showing to anyone watching while we search for the memory - at least the watcher would know what we are doing) but that surely isn't the only reason.

Are our eyes acting like telephonists of the past - they always amazed me - how did they know which plug to link to which socket within that jungle of wires in order for the correct people to converse?  Do our eyes 'plug in'?

Recently I went to a jumble sale with my Mum (it threw us way back in time - are jumble sales back in vogue?) everything was 10 or 20 pence.  We found a crimplene housecoat - I wish now that I'd got it but having worn the fabric as a child I eschewed it at the sale, which is odd given the stuff that has made its way into my home.  Sue told me that it never frayed and was perfect for making into tiny doll's clothes.  Do I remember doing that or has her telling me created a false memory...

Some words are just so redolent of other times.  Crimplene is one.