Author Archives: malcolmsmusingscom

…Yesterday, returning home after a lovely few days in France, all went smoothly apart from one little problem: the machine that reads passport photographs would not recognise mine. Fortunately a kind Frenchman came and I was able to move through passport control… …Sometimes I worry that I will be unrecognised, anonymous, unable to move forward…Continue reading “Remembering Worries and Insecurities”

Yesterday was our last day in France. Spending the day with sister-in-law-Geneviève we visited the shops, walked in the woods, ate together, talked together, laughed together, remembered together… Today we return to England. So what lessons have I be reminded of… perhaps learnt a little better… through this French visit? Receive graciously: Our French familyContinue reading “Graciously, Gratefully, Generously”

We spent yesterday with our French family – sister-in-law-Geneviève, her children and their children, spending much of the day reflecting on what  is the same and what is different… Some differences are immediately evident – language, driving on the ‘wrong’ side of the road, architectural styles. Others become apparent through conversation and experience… Nephew-Joel andContinue reading “Different But The Same”

I was amused yesterday when I bought a sandwich. The wrapper told me ‘This is not just a honey roast ham and cheddar cheese sandwich. This is an M&S honey roast ham and cheddar cheese sandwich, in our soft vitamin D-enriched oatmeal bread.’ I was getting something better that I realised! Not just the ordinaryContinue reading “Not Just the Ordinary…”

Yesterday… …our friend Andy of ‘Read’s Car Maintenance’, who’s serviced our cars for many years,  posted: ‘Tyre sales have become such an integral part of our business, that we have upgraded our tyre machines to the latest lever-less machine and laser balancer. So why not give us a look the next time you require tyres?’Continue reading “All New, All Change”

My old metal watering can has gone rusty. The water I pour into it drains out through holes in the bottom. I need a new one. In the old ‘There’s a hole in my bucket’ song helpful Liza has constant advice for Henry to mend his holed bucket. Practical Henry sees the problems with herContinue reading “Get a New One”

I have two childhood memories of the old hymn ‘Master the Tempest is Raging’. Firstly, I remember Mum singing it. We didn’t sing it at church; mum found it in an old hymn book. Secondly, it was the first hymn I attempted to play on the piano. it was in the key of C andContinue reading “Master the Tempest is Raging”

Yesterday, at ‘The Seagull’ our Music for Wellbeing group sung the old Beatles song ‘Octopuses Garden’. It’s a good fun song about this lovely place of happiness and peace: We would be warm below the stormIn our little hideaway beneath the wavesResting our head on the seabedIn an octopus’s garden near a cave This octopus’sContinue reading “The Octopus’s Garden”

This morning I read that people are ‘…like the new grass of the morning – though in the morning it springs up new, by evening it is dry and withered.’ If midlife is midday… folks speak of a midlife crisis… perhaps around the age of fifty? So at seventy-five I guess I’m at six inContinue reading “Standing at Six O’clock”

I’m reading Bob Roxburgh’s ‘Kingdom First’. He says: ‘Contemporary cultural influences present us with individualism, narcissism, anti-authority, anti-truth, as well as inadequate definitions of the good life, where everything must yield to satisfaction and happiness.’  His analysis of a dark world is sadly true. I could present examples from the news, from my life… fromContinue reading “My Friend Darkness”