Armchair Living

A second post in one night, Cloake? What is going on? 

[I had caffiene too late!]

I am not wishing to presume that all of you that read this are fully conversant with the form and nature of the Tweet or indeed of the thing we call Twitter. If you are that person, Twitter is a fairly new social-network device which allows the user to communicate electronically to the world (or varying strata within that number) in 140 characters or less. Life by statement, in other words. There is an emergent language too, which would would be seen as (for example):

@FrDavidCloake RT @revdlesley I am having a gr8 time at #gb10

Loosely translated, that Tweet (for that is what that array of symbols is called) states that Lesley Fellows [Twitter name @revdlesley] was having a good time at Greenbelt 2010 [hash-tag '#gb10' so all those who 'follow' that tag can see what she had written]. I  myself had read that and 're-Tweeted' it, hence 'FrDavidCloake [me] and RT [re-Tweeted]. Clear, dear? Keep up! 'Re-Tweeting' is bouncing a Tweet that I have read at all the people who follow my Twitter-feed [all the 140 character or less statements that I make, and that others read]. I've made it worse, haven't I?!

Anyway - Twitter is (and I have said it before) like being everywhere yet no-where. I was at Greenbelt today, in the Tiny Tea Tent, the Jesus Arms, listening to Maggi Dawn (though not ignoring my wife this time), getting a feel for the Edgy Mass - all from my settee in Aylesbury as the kids played dutifully at my feet. I am very frequently in the mind of some very dodgy folks, in their sober times and otherwise. I have seen governments fall and sports reporters rise, all without moving an inch from my sedentary position. 

So, if you are ludicriously nosy, Twitter is for you. It is like Eastenders without Dot; like Coronation Street but less amusing; like Top Gear but not as good and lacking Clarkson which is not an advantage; like Antiques Roadshow but digital (people air their dusty nick-nacks a lot on Twitter, but not for valuation) - it is a life you just can't afford not to lead (double-negative, I'm off to bed).

Leading By Example

Over the course of this weekend, I have trodden a transgression triply. That is to say - I have patronised a retail establishment not twice but thrice over Sunday and today.

Shame, shame and double shame.

As a former retailer (yes, reader, I know I have said it before, just leave it - ok!) and now as a 'professional' Christian (...zippit) I have soiled the kitty-litter of Sabbath, the Seventh Day that the Adventists love so much. 

On Sunday I went to the shop. And I made a purchase. Of something. Did I need to? No, of course I didn't. I had white but fancied red and was 'out'. Did my very life depend on that purchase? No, of course it didn't. Could I have waited until the start of Tuesday to make my needful purchase? Of course I could've, (though not had I intended to consume said Rioja - makes a mockery of the staff meeting if I turn up kale-eyed). The thing is this - I went to a shop on a Sunday and bought something unimportant that could have waited and upon which the very fabric of my being did not depend. 

It's all well and good when twonks like me roll up at shops to buy things. Great for us. The Covention for Human Rights rejoices for me - but what about the people who are called to man their emporia on the off-chance that I might feel called to make a non-essential purchase? They have to abandon family, weekend, Bank Holiday, maybe even a little dignity - to open up the stall for my non-essential purchase of the non-essential. 

Seriously, as a retailer (and a member of Da Management very often during that time) I was placed under no illusion that my 'right' to opt out of Sundays was not compatible with my status as manager (sod going to church, Cloakey). Contracts are written in retail these days in such a way as speaks of a 'sixth day worked', and not a Sunday, a sabbath day, not a family day. Employees, especially in retail, don't really have a choice all the while pratts like me feels inclined to visit the shop on a day when I too should be enjoying life in the bosom of my family. Me wanting to shop means that ten others are required to work for businesses that regard Sunday as the 'new Saturday' and are too fearful to close.

I am going to try, and I mean this, to stop visiting shops on a Sunday. Sunday working is a curse to family life, to church life, to quality of life. B&Q shareholders love it, but the thousands of people who (wo)man our stores on days when they should be with their families, but are too salary-dependent to stand up and say 'no'; many of them, even after so many years of Sunday Opening, loathe working when the rest of their family get on without them.

If you have read this post and give a toss for family life and those who are denied it by Sunday working - do something about it and don't follow my poor example.

A Breadth of Fresh Air

In our label-motivated society, I struggle at times with the nature of my own. I have wrestled with it here, and so many utterances that revolve around 'bloke' have already been made - and won't here be revisited!

I speak (naturally, and why wouldn't I, don't you?) of my 'ecclesial' label. What kinda Christian am I?

There are some non-negotiables, and for sake of a start, will list them here [for ease, future employers]

1. I am happy that God knows what he is doing as regards those he calls to ministry (forgive the gender slant in my own words) - and I therefore do not regard sexuality, gender or academic prowess to be impediments to ordained ministry.

2. I am a proud Anglo-Catholic, love the living liturgy, celebrate the ceremonial, revel in the ritual. These 'do it' for me, as they bring me closer to my own relationship to the Holy Sacraments - the absolute centres of my spiritual existence. I love the music of the liturgy, and the older the better (broadly)

3. The Eucharist is the source of my energy and the root of the expression of my faith.

4. Those who call themselves Christian should go to church as often and regularly as they can, even on those occasions when it seems a chore and a burden (more so in those cases, perhaps) - I apply this model to myself and have always tried to live according to this model of discipleship. 

This is not an exhaustive list, but more the 'broad brush-strokes' of what I personally stand for. My parishioners call me 'Father', I wear black and a collar when I am in 'work' mode - and so on. Then there is the other side of me which has yet to find itself a list. They are facets of me that are growing. I am rather 'charismatic' in my liturgy - I am not bound to the spot, and wander around rather a lot; I have reverted to preaching without full texts, move away from the printed words at times. I am annoyed by the over-fussiness of some ceremonial style, regarding them as rites suitable only for the 'interest group'. This blog and my own persona are odd in my own ecclesial circles - and for that I can't and won't apologise. I find myself wondering whether Greenbelt might even a little be for me, and I have a reserved place at Spring Harvest already. I find I hold in tension a love for Walsingham with a frustration with lacey liturgy; a passion for Palestrina and a love for Metallica. I adore the transcendant beauty of liturgy-done-well, but I also thrive on the spontaneous opportunities that emerge in that liturgy. 

Perhaps I am a maverick, perhaps I am (to borrow the Heavy Metal styling) Nu-catholic! My DDO (look it up dear, I haven't the energy) once told me that I couldn't go to St Stephen's House to train, that I was catholic enough. I had to go somewhere else to train where I might acquire a little breadth. 

It is an interesting journey for me - often bewildering if I am honest, but one that is probably only of interest to this greying over-weight cleric, hence its appearance at nearly midnight on a Saturday night. 

I thank my God for my chance to be the hybrid breed that appears to be required of me. Who knows where it will take me next ...

Disclosure II

My last 'late-night-so-nobody-reads-it' disclosure was that I am chief among the cloud-adoring nerds of our world.

Tonight it is the turn of real-time strategy games. For years I have loved empire-building games that require some sense of the strategic. I am marginally addicted I think. 

My fix-of-choice at the moment is Tribal Wars, where I am enjoying a considerable success - it is a game where, in essence, the player manipulates time (acquire resources that increase at a constant rate) in the context of a group of like-minded folk (players form tribes, and I 'run' one of the largest). For me it helps me think about real life, but others take it very seriously. My wife and mother worry about me and my mother and sister-in-law worry about my brother, a similar addict. It is free on the Interweb (and slightly enhanced for a small subscription). 

Former games that I have fought and conquered include Settlers (all three), Populous, Age of Empires (and all the other Microsoft Age ofs...), Civilisation and another whose name escapes me. They have featured large over the last ten years or so for me - forget Sonic the Hedgehog, mate!

Why, I hear you ask. Well, each game is dependant on the management of really very complex economic processes, all held in balance with one another. In other words, I get to play God! There, I said it. Last week, on Tribal Wars, I won an award that was awarded for 'killing' the highest number of enemy troops - I think the number was 3.6million of them.

Yes, I am 38 - my wife has said the same thing over and over .... blah blah blah! It's a bloke thing.

Maggi Dawn or My Wife?

Every once in a while, circumstances collide in order to illustrate a very useful point, and yesterday was one such occasion. 

I was sitting in a soft-play centre while the kids burned off some of their superfluous energy, all the while nursing my Blackcurrant, my new gadget of choice. I can now text my wife, speak to her and others, read and send emails, order pizza, Tweet, update Facebook, and a whole manner of other things - all from one delightful little handheld gadget. While the kids played, I busied myself with said forest fruit of the gadget generation!

Then an two interesting things happened - simultaneously, I recieved a text from the Mrs Acular and a Tweet (direct to me) from none other that one Maggi Dawn, of blogging and other fames. Wow, she tweeted me! The thing is, Maggi Dawn or Mrs Acular - which message do I read first (what would Tommy Zoom do?). The wife lost - sorry wife! This quandary hadn't escaped me, but rather reminded me of something that I saw once that is now something of the frequent flyer - gadget world versus real world. 

Once, a couple I know were sitting next to one another on a settee in a room where I too was sitting. Both were texting ... each other. It turned out that while the bonhomie of the moment flowed like good Rioja, they were entwined in a grotesque marital bicker which they continued electronically underneath the good conversation we were all having. 

At said Soft-Play area, I looked around. Easily a third of the adults in the warehouse in which we sat were engaged in an electronic encounter. I could see Facebooks, Twitters, texts, games, pictures of the kids, and so on. It is seeming to me that the most prolific relationships are those that involve none of that filthy personal contact stuff - Heaven forefend. On my Facebook I have two-hundred-million friends (well, a few fewer than that), on Twitter I can engage in dialogue with both Maggi Dawn and Banksy (of graffiti fame) at the same time - and I could easily burn away hours doing it. 

These were once hours I used to grant my wife, do chores and the little jobs that 'keeping home' demand. I am guilty as charged m'lud! I am now starting to spend more quality time with my gadget friends than I do with the centre of my universe, the fragrant and wonderful Mrs Acular. I am in good company, because it seems that we are all 'at it' - even the aforementioned Uberhomefuhrer is Facebooking like a woman possessed - to friends who themselves are married. 

This extrapolates easily into the world of our faith. No wonder some eejit is proposing to celebrate the Holy Mysteries on Twitter - the eejit might have a point. I am willing to bet that many Christians spend more time 'logged on' that at church ... so I am secretly hoping that God has a Twitter account too.

Save a Kitten

On September 11th 2010, I am going to sit on one end of a tandem with the Mayor of Aylesbury sitting on the other. We are cycling to raise a few shekels for the Buckinghamshire Historic Churches Trust and for my own church St. Mary's - a huge ancient and costly place that does so much for so many in Aylesbury

Please sponsor us by making a donation here

X

Good luck to all those who are taking part in the Stride & Ride Event this year! 

This post has nothing to do with kittens, or their saving - but 'Gimme Cash' would not have engaged you to read! 

School Shoes and Easter Eggs

Firstly, noble reader, I must apologise for not spewing forth this last few days. Sometimes, the Day Job gets in the way - you know how it is!

Today I want to grumble about something ["Makes a change, Farv", I hear you hollerin']. 

I was watching the Gogglebox over the weekend, ensconced as I was amid the gubbins of the Matriarch, and an advert appeared which took me wayyyyyy back to my halogen days of yoof. It is was a 'Back To School' advert for some shop or other. It reminded me of those bitter-sweet days of yore, the last day of school when half of me couldn't wait to get the hell out, and the other part of me that is clingly and needy and would miss the routine of daily school life. Normally, the Scarper Tendency won, and I can still remember a considerable number of those moments when I left the school for the last time for the summer. We weren't a family for copious foreign holidays so I had the prospect of a whole six weeks at home mucking about with the others in the park or at home - blissssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss.

 I used to spend the odd summer back in the Homeland with my Nan and Grandad - memorable and wonderful days of Sesame Street, Painting with Nancy, Laurel and Hardy, Crossroads (with Benny and Miss Doi-anne) and Granada News at Six. We would go to Oldham Market and Nan would buy me gladly recieved plastic crap that only an 8yr old could love. We'd have Scotch Pies for lunch, perhaps a trip to Presto for something for Grandad's tea, a drop by the big Co-Op where Nan used to work - then past C&As where it all went horribly wrong - 'Back To School', on the 18th of frigging July!

It must happen now for the little poppets as they gaze forth to a near-eternity of holiday wonderfulness - only to be assaulted in so many media by the stark reminder that they will have to go back to school sometime. Leave the kids alone, man! Oh, the humanity!

But it happens in all walks of life. I have no doubt that supermarket warehouses will already be holding full pallets of Christmas fodder. By the 3rd of January, Easter fodder starts to find its way to the shelves. Fourteen seconds after the Lord rises from the tomb, summer-holiday fodder is called to the front. We are in such a hurry ..... The problem with this is not so much the cynical profiting from religious feast days the meaning of which has been lost by most, but more because in all this hubbub of retail foreshortening, the year seems shorter and increases our sense of hurry. It is the McDonald's effect - food presented for delictation in less than minute that causes the punter to neck it at Warp Factor Nine. Speed begets speed. Hurry begets hurry. 

I know that in about eleven seconds it will be Easter 2011. I daren't sleep anymore, life is happening too fast now. I might miss a Christmas and a Valentine's Day if I use the loo. Welcome to the 24/7 World that never stops, even if you are caused to by the needs of living.