Thanks are due to everyone who posted on local social media with sympathy for the loss of my aluminium bench that got nicked. It was only one miscreant who did the nicking but many nice people who wrote kindly.
The whole incident gives rise to several thoughts.
The first is that there are people who need to nick an old aluminium bench. As someone pointed out, it has scrap metal value. Very true, but where are you going to get the money for it in the lockdown? As a couple of others pointed out, perhaps the thief thought it had been put at the end of the drive to take. Whoever took it was strong, it had been fastened to stakes driven into the drive, one of which I found further down the pavement, the thief who managed to wrench it off had legged it at speed, shedding bits.
The current crisis will make the divide between the haves and the have-nots into a greater chasm. I was so surprised to learn on the news of African drug dealers turning into food deliverers. In theory it does not matter where you are in the heap of humanity when disaster strikes. You still get to choose between good and evil. Regular readers know that I have experienced quite a bit of deprivation of the, ‘what will we eat tomorrow?’, variety. I have a son who has sofa surfed. The reason I have a walk-in wardrobe now is because of all the years I had when my clothes would have fitted in a small box. I’ve shopped in charity shops and thank goodness for them, from all perspectives.
At one point the S&H, trying to start a business from his bedroom and with nothing, was owed a thousand pounds by someone who topped himself. The S&H refused to let his debtor’s daughter inherit the debt. He wrote it off. Yes he knew where his next meal was coming from, but if that debt had been honoured he would have been on his way to a proper business, which never happened. At the same time an acquaintance of ours for whom he had designed a website, over many hours of work, refused to pay him. Troubles never come singly. Then he got beaten up in a car park and his skull broken. He remained optimistic and continued to do all the right things.
I think the current crisis illuminates a very old concept. One which is currently out of fashion.
Taking care of your conscience.
I don’t believe you are doing that if you are living behind a wall of toilet rolls. I think stockpiling dried pasta possibly shrivels your conscience up too. I think if you steal anything, it’s really your peace of mind you are depleting. I’m sure elbowing the weak out of the way to get at the supermarket shelves, is actually giving the elbow to your right to a good night’s sleep.
What goes around, comes around. It usually does not do so immediately. I had two pairs of shoes, a pair of sandals and a pair of wellies, for about two decades. I did looking after a demented person, and all that entailed, for five years, twice.
It’s that old saying about the pictogram for catastrophe being composed of two other pictograms, one for danger and one for opportunity.
What are you going to do in the opportunity?
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