25 | May | 2014 | Chronicles of an Anglo Swiss

Firebugs

I was on an inspection tour of the garden and heard quite a commotion.

“Hey human, be careful where you tread. We only arrived today and are getting used to things. “

Then I saw them, a whole bunch of little Firebugs.

“Well you are a bunch of sweet little things. Do you mind if I take a photo.”

“You mean a photo that everyone can see, a real Kindergarten photo. Oh yes, that would be nice. When we are older and get our nice black patterns you can reflect on how we were when we were fresh and ready to go.”

“Don’t you feel a little abandoned, all on your own, with no mummy and daddy to look after you.?”

“No, we are born with instinct and do not need anyone to tell us what to do. We stick together and follow our neighbour. Our parents are not so far away and are keeping a watch over us. Who would want to hurt a baby firebug? We are just doing our thing.”

“What is your thing.?”

“We eat seeds and sleep at the moment and sometimes we meditate.”

“You meditate?”

“Yes, about life and the preservation of the species. We are many brothers a sisters, and when we grow up we will be mummies and daddies and have children. We might only be here for a year or two but that’s the way the cookie seed crumbles as we say in firebug talk.

“Is this human bothering you children” and a parent Firebug arrived.

“No, not at all dads, she is taking our photo and was wondering why we were alone.”

“A firebug is never alone” said the parent “ we live in groups and now leave our children to grow up. After walking around with my wife for three days to ensure the future generation, we parents need some peace and quiet. “

“I must admit I had seen them doing their firebug dance over the past few weeks in the garden and now the babies had arrived. When I looked further I saw the parents having a rest between the stones. I decided to leave them to do their firebug thing.

Firebugs

When was the last time you really wanted (or needed) to say something, but kept quiet? Write a post about what you should’ve said.

Im Reich der Sinne 08.05.1008

This is what they did to me when I could not keep quiet. They could not find a bandage large enough for my big mouth, so they decided when I could not see it, I did not know what it was and made no remarks. Honestly are WordPress putting testing me? My famous last words on the forums make a mark on the blogging landscape, I cannot keep it for myself. The last remark spread over two pages and eventually I gave up as one of the experts together with an assistant expert took over the conversation and I was left out in the cold. Actually it was a photo taken at one of our first aid helper training evenings. We were studying the senses and had to eat something but could not see it, so we were blindfolded. Not that you think the Swiss are employing methods to get the truth out of you. You cannot hide anything in Switzerland, even if you want to build a hut in the garden you have to get planning permission.

What is “kept quite”? I do not even think those words exist in the polyglot tongues that I speak, or I just missed them out, although I do have a sort of inborn defect. I grew up in the big city (London) with lorries thundering past at all times, street criers selling their goods on the market “two for a penny missus, and all the best” etc. etc. and you had to make yourself heard, otherwise you would have been ignored. The only time I was ever silent was during the day when my dad was on night work and he was sleeping. I think mum would have shut my mouth up forever if I had even breathed too loudly, dad’s sleep was holy. Luckily I was at school or at work most of the day so I did not have to keep my mouth shut.

I grew up in a loud family so I blame it on the genes. Mum had a loud voice – she had two sisters and they were often engaged in shouting competitions. I think the winner was Aunt Annie, or was it Aunt Lil. My mum was the youngest so I suppose it was the hierarchy that counted. There was one brother, but he seemed to let the women get on with it. This was coupled with a dad that served on the heavy canons in the Second World War and returned home, but with a slight hearing defect. No-one really noticed that he did not hear so well, until we had this new-fangled telephone thing. It would ring for at least five minutes and we thought he ignored it until we discovered that he did not really hear it so well. When we had the additional bell fixed up in the hall, the whole street heard the telephone ring and sometimes even dad did.

Dad worked in a loud factory all his life, so things did not improve. It was just a case of speaking a little louder. Now he is 98 years old. His hearing has not improved, but it is just a matter of getting used to things and talking to him in a loud clear voice. When he says “yes” after every word you say, you know he does not hear, so just say it again.

These are the facts, and so I was at a disadvantage from the beginning. It was a question of survival, say what you want to say in a loud clear voice. What is the point of keeping quiet about it, you might be ignored and left on one side. It can be that this might become an annoyance in my surroundings, people not really wanting or needing a loud voice, or not really wanting my opinion, although there are times when I can be quite silent: one of the reasons why my blogging episodes are so popular. When I am writing my prize winning masterpieces for the WordPress world (copy to Blogger world) my brain is talking, an internal thing. I have to train my lines of thought into a pattern. I am sure Charles Dickens and even Charles Bukowski (what is he doing here?) would agree. There are times to be silent and times not to be silent (now I know what Bukowski is doing here).

And now to something completely different: I was very concerned over the past two days about my 98 year old dad. I wrote in my blog that he had had a fall, was in hospital and has now been fitted with a pacemaker. Yesterday he was very confused. I have a wonderful dear friend, from my school days, who looks in on him for me now and again because I am so far away. She is visiting him in the hospital once a day and now takes her mobile phone with her. I can now call her at an arranged time and speak to my dad on the phone, as English hospitals do not have phones for the patients in the rooms. My dad now feels a lot better, and realises what has happened. The first two days were just too much for him, his daily routine being mixed up. He realises that he has a pacemaker and now feels a lot better. I had a shouting match with him on the mobile phone and it worked very well, so tomorrow at the same time my friend said. She is a gift for me at the moment and I know when I go to London I can always stay at her house. There are some people you meet on the path of life that are blessings in disguise and she is definitely one of them.

Daily Prompt: Break the Silence – What Silence?