Why, oh why, oh why…?
The front page of the Fever newspaper dated 25 August 2006 ran a full page article headed: “Another cold-blooded killing”. It told the horrible story of the senseless shooting and subsequent killing of our very popular Beeld newspaper Distribution Agent, Schalk Visser. He was statistic number X on the now fast becoming notorious, N2 toll road, earlier this week.
I do not need to and definitely do not want to repeat any details here, but I can vouch that Schalk, as an agent, as a patient of ours, and as a human being, will be seriously missed. Not only did he deliver my newspaper personally every morning; come sickness or inclement weather, he also had a little special greeting or short piece of wisdom to share ever so often. Schalk, God bless, and to Kotie, may His peace and love guide and embrace you and your family in these troubled times.
Which brings me to exactly the point in question; these troubled times. What is being done to ease the pain of our nation and country going to the dogs and rushing back towards the Middle Ages? I thought the new generation all firmly believed in the exponential expansion of the universe which dictates that after the initial “Big Bang” explosion everything is supposed to be moving away from the initial point of density, (including – and especially; Time), but no, in our beloved country (pun intended) we seem to be heading forward towards the past.
Not only are we reminded relentlessly of our immediate past and the supposed atrocities of said era, we are also accelerating at more than a dizzy rate back to the barbaric middle ages and even before that.
The Five W’s:
Who is going to stop this landslide into the abyss?
What is needed to bring back the future?
When is the pendulum going to reach the apex?
Why are we expected to absorb all this mayhem?
Where is the point of no return?
Dear reader, normally my newsletters are marked by, (and from what I’ve been told,) quite popular, because of some degree of humour expressed, but this month I cannot comprehend the funny side of anything. I am sorry, in these times of sorrow, of violence, of fear, of hate, a little one-page newsletter by some weird guy trying to be funny might not seem significant to most, but I normally treasure the opportunity to make just a few people smile while reading my strange mind, printed in a letter. This time, however, I doubt. I am too upset to entice even a smirk!
Last point on this issue: Think long and hard about the five W’s. Someone will have to stand up and answer these sooner than later.
Now on a different note:
During all those lonely hours in the bicycle saddle one eventually starts to notice a lot of things normally missed by people rushing past in their motorised vehicles. Not that there is anything wrong with the last mentioned method of perambulation! In fact, we all love our car or truck or bakkie or buggy or whatever blows your hair back. If you have enough hair to be blown back, that is.
Anyway, getting back to whatever point I’m trying to make, mechanical powered means of transport and human powered means of transport are not really compatible on the road and more often than not, the human powered one turns out to be the bottom feeder in the traffic food-chain.
This was vividly emphasised recently when another cyclist was killed by a speeding motorist in Durban. This sparked a massive outcry and eventual mass protest ride (or memorial ride as it was labelled) where, according to reports, more than two thousand cyclists took part. The reason was to get the message to the top of the food-chain that us pedal-powered travellers need more safety, consideration and respect from fellow road users as well as from the authorities.
Fat chance!
They do not care! They do not believe that we need to even exist. All they are concerned about is the next ridiculous salary cheque, the best way to scrape the last morsels from the travel allowance, the most mileage from the expense accounts, the most opportune moment to fall asleep during Parliamentary sessions without being caught on camera on channel 58.
They do not care about cyclist being killed by mad motorists at five in the morning, they do not care about a family-man getting gunned down on a busy main road during bright daylight, they do not care about the old farmer having the soles of his feet removed with a pocket knife after being held in boiling water in order to exhume information from him, they do not care if a little five year old girl is raped because some barbaric tribesman unearthed the wisdom that the despicable act will cleanse the perpetrator from the African Flu (which our dear minister of health fortunately believes can be cured by just eating Beetroot!). They do not care. Yes, I know I’m on thin ice. Yes, I know I’m being negative. Yes I know I’m ranting and raving.
Somebody has to do it.
Oh, yes, coming back to what we witness while out riding our bikes; a lot, I can give you my word. We see things and activities that would have gone unnoticed if in a car. I also believe that we sometimes see things we are not supposed to see or maybe people do not realise that we are out there and that we can actually see! Ranging from minor traffic offences to serious drunken driving by some serious members of society to people sneaking home from late night activities not normally smiled upon by society, people leaving houses (before first light ) where they are not personally responsible for the bond, and the list gets longer almost every time.
Maybe one day soon we can do a newsletter where I will be the roving (or be it cycling) observer, reporting ‘from the bike’ and revealing some lekker local corny news for all to share?!
Names and places will be changed to protect the writer.
That is all from the podium for this month. I do not apologise for my black mood. I do apologise for forcing it onto you. We should however not ignore the real state of affairs. The truth might dawn too late for tears.
Take care out there, be alert, be wise, and above all; be healthy.
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
Newsletter July 2006
Twelve little newsletters since the rebirth in August last year: That is where we are now. Time is no-one’s fool indeed. For the newcomers, we started with edition 1 on the 24th of November 1997, one month after the day we took over the pharmacy.
For 5 years, without missing a single one, we produced sixty editions of the letter, doing the last one on October 27th, 2002; exactly 5 years to the day from the time we took over. It also was my wife Renette’s birthday (it pays to advertise as it is almost time for it again). On that day, a Sunday, I typed the last newsletter. Until August last year, that is. Thirty four lazy months! But we’re back.
So last month saw the story of little Flenters the dog. My heartfelt thanks go to everybody who phoned, or came in to enquire, or just passed a nice comment on his wellbeing. Quite a popular doggie!
Also, the tongue-in-cheek “genuine” sympathetic observations about the broken toe have been noted. Thanks. Really, thanks.
It has healed now, so let us please leave the history behind.
This coming weekend sees us off to the Imfolozi game reserve up North to do a mountain bike ride through Big 5 country in aid of conservation.
You do not have to be quicker than the lion; you just have to be quicker than a fellow cyclist. Easy. No broken tows or anything to fuel some patient’s sense of humour. We sincerely hope so.
Almost one third into this letter and I haven’t said much; just filling up the space, just killing time.
Time. That’s it. We will talk about time. Now, after the end of another spectacular Tour de France, I suddenly have so much time to myself. But what is time, and why does it not give more of itself, or wait for us, or stop occasionally?
Nobody knows why and nobody knows what time really is.
The American Heritage Dictionary defines time as "a nonspatial linear continuum in which events occur in an apparently irreversible succession."
The Oxford English Dictionary defines time as "the indefinite continued progress of existence and events in the past, present, and future, regarded as a whole."
What?
And I thought it was only the stuff that I never have enough of? The stuff that drags me back home after a long cycle session, the stuff that makes an evening with friends fly into history, the stuff that makes fun disappear and pain lasts for a seeming eternity.
How much time do we have? Time; for anything, not just for life itself? Do we know and do we appreciate the time lent to us for a given aspect of your life or a moment in your life?
We all know how relative time can be; ten minutes left in the game when your team needs to score 1 more point to win goes a lot quicker than ten minutes left of the sermon when your eyelids feel like two trapdoors.
We are brought up to wish time away. From childhood, in fact, especially during our earlier (for some, much earlier) days, we are forever looking forward to something, always wishing for the holidays to begin, hoping that the time will come to go to high school, later on it is a matter of cannot wait for little Johnny to start walking and talking. Of course, after some time we realize that we have a child with wings and the voice of an angel and that he never stops asking questions and never slows down to even a mild blur, then we tell him to sit still and shut up. (Or we wish the time away for him to go to school to give us a little bit of peace and quiet?)
Point is; how much time are we allowed in our lives? And why do we never stop and make time work for us, instead of being a slave of something like time; who eventually leaves you, literally, dead in its tracks?
“How”, you ask me? “Now”, is my answer.
Do it now. Stop your clock! You can’t stop the Greenwich Time, but you sure can stop your ‘own time’. You cannot make time or take away time, remember it is a linear continuum and it stops for no-one. The trick (and I’m absolutely NO expert), is to go with the time-scale and not try to jump ahead of the clock by rushing headlong into everything.
We rush and fuss, we torment and cry, we toil and boil, all in vain trying to beat the linear nature of time.
King Solomon (970-928 BC) wrote: "There is an appointed time for everything. And there is a time for every event under heaven” … and we all know the rest of the famous verse. So much wisdom, just think about it; in today’s life where there is never enough time for everything, could this verse still be true?
I say “yes”. All we have to do is to make a list like Solomon did in the Bible. If you find that there are way too many things for the time allowed, you have a choice. Make time or cut the list in half. Yeah, by now it is evidently clear that only one of the two is possible. So?
I’m cutting my list. My new list will fit into the time allowed;
I will stop trying to stretch time to fit the list.
Wow, what time is it? OK. Just kidding.
Time for Staff news.
And now, it is time to go. Remember, cut the list. Also remember to get a Polio vaccination if travelling to Namibië or Botswana.
Greetings from the chronometer,
Pieter & Renette Naudé. (Count how many times the word Time appears in any article. Time is no-one’s fool, indeed.
For 5 years, without missing a single one, we produced sixty editions of the letter, doing the last one on October 27th, 2002; exactly 5 years to the day from the time we took over. It also was my wife Renette’s birthday (it pays to advertise as it is almost time for it again). On that day, a Sunday, I typed the last newsletter. Until August last year, that is. Thirty four lazy months! But we’re back.
So last month saw the story of little Flenters the dog. My heartfelt thanks go to everybody who phoned, or came in to enquire, or just passed a nice comment on his wellbeing. Quite a popular doggie!
Also, the tongue-in-cheek “genuine” sympathetic observations about the broken toe have been noted. Thanks. Really, thanks.
It has healed now, so let us please leave the history behind.
This coming weekend sees us off to the Imfolozi game reserve up North to do a mountain bike ride through Big 5 country in aid of conservation.
You do not have to be quicker than the lion; you just have to be quicker than a fellow cyclist. Easy. No broken tows or anything to fuel some patient’s sense of humour. We sincerely hope so.
Almost one third into this letter and I haven’t said much; just filling up the space, just killing time.
Time. That’s it. We will talk about time. Now, after the end of another spectacular Tour de France, I suddenly have so much time to myself. But what is time, and why does it not give more of itself, or wait for us, or stop occasionally?
Nobody knows why and nobody knows what time really is.
The American Heritage Dictionary defines time as "a nonspatial linear continuum in which events occur in an apparently irreversible succession."
The Oxford English Dictionary defines time as "the indefinite continued progress of existence and events in the past, present, and future, regarded as a whole."
What?
And I thought it was only the stuff that I never have enough of? The stuff that drags me back home after a long cycle session, the stuff that makes an evening with friends fly into history, the stuff that makes fun disappear and pain lasts for a seeming eternity.
How much time do we have? Time; for anything, not just for life itself? Do we know and do we appreciate the time lent to us for a given aspect of your life or a moment in your life?
We all know how relative time can be; ten minutes left in the game when your team needs to score 1 more point to win goes a lot quicker than ten minutes left of the sermon when your eyelids feel like two trapdoors.
We are brought up to wish time away. From childhood, in fact, especially during our earlier (for some, much earlier) days, we are forever looking forward to something, always wishing for the holidays to begin, hoping that the time will come to go to high school, later on it is a matter of cannot wait for little Johnny to start walking and talking. Of course, after some time we realize that we have a child with wings and the voice of an angel and that he never stops asking questions and never slows down to even a mild blur, then we tell him to sit still and shut up. (Or we wish the time away for him to go to school to give us a little bit of peace and quiet?)
Point is; how much time are we allowed in our lives? And why do we never stop and make time work for us, instead of being a slave of something like time; who eventually leaves you, literally, dead in its tracks?
“How”, you ask me? “Now”, is my answer.
Do it now. Stop your clock! You can’t stop the Greenwich Time, but you sure can stop your ‘own time’. You cannot make time or take away time, remember it is a linear continuum and it stops for no-one. The trick (and I’m absolutely NO expert), is to go with the time-scale and not try to jump ahead of the clock by rushing headlong into everything.
We rush and fuss, we torment and cry, we toil and boil, all in vain trying to beat the linear nature of time.
King Solomon (970-928 BC) wrote: "There is an appointed time for everything. And there is a time for every event under heaven” … and we all know the rest of the famous verse. So much wisdom, just think about it; in today’s life where there is never enough time for everything, could this verse still be true?
I say “yes”. All we have to do is to make a list like Solomon did in the Bible. If you find that there are way too many things for the time allowed, you have a choice. Make time or cut the list in half. Yeah, by now it is evidently clear that only one of the two is possible. So?
I’m cutting my list. My new list will fit into the time allowed;
I will stop trying to stretch time to fit the list.
Wow, what time is it? OK. Just kidding.
Time for Staff news.
And now, it is time to go. Remember, cut the list. Also remember to get a Polio vaccination if travelling to Namibië or Botswana.
Greetings from the chronometer,
Pieter & Renette Naudé. (Count how many times the word Time appears in any article. Time is no-one’s fool, indeed.
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