If you have the misfortune to be a pessimist,
or more accurately, a party-pooper, for sure there has been plenty in 2021 to
be dismal about. Let us draw a discreet veil over this difficult year and contemplate
pleasant things, wherever they can be found. Let us look about us and rejoice
at what has survived The Flood, The Tsunami and The Great Plague and all the
pains that flesh is heir to. Actually, although there have been some nasty
moments, The Apocalypse never arrived and we can look forward to 2022 with
ever-burgeoning confidence.
Perhaps, my good readers, you can join me in a
little game. List a very pleasant sound, an agreeable smell and a memorable
sensation: Take your pick - My choices:
Sound – the satisfying pop as a cork under
pressure takes its leave of its bottle of Champagne, Prosecco or other such
bubbly delights.
Smell – the highly inviting aroma of frying
bacon, to stimulate the taste buds and fortify your day.
Sensation – (not one I have experienced for 50
years!) the shudder on your fly-fishing rod as at last you hook a plump
sea-trout, which will give you a gallant battle but end up deliciously that
night grillé en beurre on your dinner
plate.
All these simple blessings survive, thank goodness!
Some simple Joys of Life
Moving on from these fragrant memories, I
thought of the lives of people we admire or who have given us moments of
pleasure. Many of these reveries will be private or otherwise sensitive but I
believe many will share my respect for HM the Queen indomitably embarking from
February 2022 on her Platinum Jubilee Year, now widowed and carrying the burden
of a somewhat dysfunctional family. We might also salute retiring Angela
Merkel, who has steered her great country for 16 years through many crises and
retained a hand on the tiller of an often-chaotic European Union. As the baton
of formidable interrogator moves on from splendid Jeremy Paxman, we welcome
soft-spoken Clive Myrie and the more abrasive Laura Kuenssberg. We celebrate
the life of dynamic Desmond Tutu, who fought so doughtily to make South Africa
a more just Rainbow nation, showing there was some life in Anglicanism at least
overseas. Surely all were delighted that
pretty Emma Raducanu won the American Open tennis in her debut year.
Some Life-enhancers of
2021
These people allow us to forget the many Dismal
Jimmies infesting our world including First Minister of Scotland Nicola
Sturgeon, Imperial College, London’s Professor Neil Ferguson, Public Health
England’s Jenny Harries, France’s Emmanuel Macron, Remainer Andrew Adonis and a
host of sour others whose apparent main aim in life is to depress us.
Begone dull care, and let’s have fun and
laughter in 2022! Nostalgically I summon up one of my earliest cinema memories
to set the mood, Fred Astaire and Judy Garland performing A Couple of Swells
from Irving Berlin’s Easter Parade of 1948. Enjoy!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3aUAiLU0TI&ab_channel=WarnerBros.Entertainment
SMD
29.12.21
Text copyright Sidney Donald 2021
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