Standing on the edge

I used to play a game on holiday in Maine New England where I had one foot in the sea and one on the sand, I called it 'standing on the edge of America'. Like the great wall of China I was standing on a point that could be seen from space. I think I got the expression from a sci fi book about standing on the edge of the universe. Well the caption stuck and I have used it many times. Now I use it in the metaphoric sense. 'Standing on the edge of the rest of my life' Many people like my brother in laws anonymous knew what they wanted to do when they are 18. For me it is at 54. I wish it had come earlier but there you go some of us take longer to work out where we are going than others. I should be thankful to have reached this age in sound enough mind to make such decisions. Many do not, Debby, my dear. Life can be a rocky road and you don't always choose the directions but I am thankful that I have been blessed with the chance to see my road and stand on the edge of my future. (I hope someone converts my blog into a book one day, it will hopefully make perfect (non) sense)

Vagueness and ambiguity.

There was a programme on TV the other night that indicated that the English language including archaic, technical and proper nouns contains well over 2 million words. My view is that that is why Roget was able to create a thesaurus. If there was only one word to describe each state then the thesaurus would have been small and useless. Hence the title of this missive, it is my possibly mistaken belief that there are probably many words that describe a state of ''un-clearness''. A means to hide or make fuzzy what one's true meaning is. I expect a whole half hour of ''University Challenge'' could be devoted to the subject, crosswords could be made up of any and all derivations. A book could be written. Why ? because often in there very nature these items themselves could be ambivalent, uncaring, lofty. Isn't the red herring in the whodunnit mystery only there to mislead. We glorify our lives in the ability or need to deceive or at least lead astray. To hide the truth, often from ourselves, what a momentous occasion is it then when the shades are dropped and the truth is spoken clearly. Tolkeins stories are full of shades, the barrow wights, the bridge of Khazad Dum but it is the light afterwards that shines in our day and gives us hope. Shakespeares Henry V shone more brightly as king after a youth spent in the shadow of Falstaff. He shone like the sun after a rainstorm. And what is my point, dear reader, that we all need a ray of hope and a way out of the gloom to put us back on the road to purpose and conviction. Such is the ambiguity of life .....and the gamble.

Jan 18th 2013
Dear reader, I read this today and realise a) how low I was when I wrote this and b) how far I have come. In another life I would delete this but I want to leave it stand for what it is. The musings of a mind that was not entirely at peace with itself.