About having children

Last year a survey was published in Great Britain in which people who were the right age to start a family were asked if they planned to have children. Most replied no, they would rather get rich and have fun. This finding merely confirms what we know from the statistics: in most European countries the birth rate now is significantly lower than it was in the 1960’s. In many countries it is even below the replacement rate, so populations are set to decline. The German newspaper “Bild” even ran a scare-mongering front page story suggesting that the Germans were now an endangered species. In practice of course, such extrapolations are rarely fulfilled and I’m sure the pendulum will come to swing the other way. I’m confident the trend will be reversed, but for the time being there is this problem in our societies that people are not having enough children.
In the survey, even those who said they were thinking of having children saw problems preventing them. Some were not sure they could reconcile starting a family with their career prospects. Others were uncertain of finding the right partner. Indeed, as these days so many mariages end in divorce and many potential parents themselves come from broken families, they may feel a reluctance to visit such an experience on their own offspring.
I find all of this rather sad. I myself am the father of two children, a girl and a boy, and they have been a great source of joy and satisfaction to me over the years. I didn’t have them until I was in my thirties. By then I had come to feel that just having fun wasn’t really self-fulfilling. I had always enjoyed the company of children and wanted my own. I had come to feel that I had found the right partner to start a family. So we did and in a way the only thing we have regretted is not having started earlier.
Of course, I’m not suggesting that having children is easy. First there are all those sleepless nights. Then there are the never-ending nappies to change. As they become toddlers they require constant surveillance. Basically you have to reorganize your entire life around them. And so on. Then finally, when they become teenagers (which is the stage ours are at) you have to manage the difficult transition towards their becoming independent adults. Children are extra responsibility, extra worry, extra stress and extra expense. My brother, who doesn’t have children, once tried to demonstrate to me how much he was saving a year by not having them. But that of course is not the point.
Along with the diffculties each age brings, each brings many pleasures. Broadly speaking, when children are small and innocent, they offer the parent an opportunity to rediscover the wonders of being alive in our extraordinary and varied world. I remember with mine playing in snow, lying outside on August nights spotting shooting stars, watching wild animals on walks, visiting caves for the first time. Their initial enthusiasm about things can dispel our hardened blasé attitude of taking everything for granted and through them we can see the world again through a child’s eyes for the quite remarkable place it is. Rilke wrote that growing up was a process of unlearning, becoming less open to experience, forgetting - being with small children can be a way of reversing that. Then there is the whole dynamic of play that parents can rediscover to their advantage. As their children get older parents can introduce them to more adult activities, giving rise to a particularly enriching sharing of experience and complicity. I enjoy going to English speaking theatre with my daughter, climbing via ferrata routes in the Dolomites with my son, playing electric guitar music with them. Later, children want to go their own way and that can be the source of some friction. But a close human relationship is never totally easy and this is only to be expected.
If you decide to have children, you’re in it for the long haul; it’s a great shared adventure with its ups and its downs.
Now of course all of this may not equate with some people’s idea of “fun” as experienced in the modern consumer society, where the norm is one of purchasing instant gratification. However, to think in those terms is to miss the point of life. In many ways real satisfaction and happiness can only be achieved through a degree of effort and commitment. The real problem experienced by potential parents is doubtless one of choice, the fact that people think about it too much and see only the inconveniences and constraints on their comfort as individuals. In the past, children happened and parents just got on with it - as they still do in poor countries.
Of course in those situations there is and was a good reason for having children: they represented your insurance policy for old age, they would look after you in return for your having looked after them. In our modern societies that task is often seen as falling to the state, so children appear less necessary. Paradoxically though it is the very fact that people are having fewer children while living longer themselves that has brought state pension schemes to the verge of bankruptcy - quite simply there aren’t enough young people working to pay the pensions of the ever growing number of old retirees.
However, it is not for macro-economic reasons that I want to encourage people to have children. I genuinely believe that having children can improve the quality of your life, as it has mine.
Firstly it brings home to you forcibly that you are not the centre of the universe but part of an intricate web of human relations.
Secondly, if we consider, by observing nature, what the ultimate purpose of life is, then it must merely be to reproduce, to perpetuate the species. If you don’t have children you’ve failed in that fundamental mission.
Thirdly, if you really believe in the value of life, then surely the greatest gift you can give is life to your children.
Finally, the only thing that will remain of most of us when we die (genetically but in a broader human sense too) is our children.

About skiing

We usually go skiing at this time of year and have just returned from a week in Verbier during which we never saw a single cloud - wonderful conditions. I learned to ski in my early twenties. I started with cross-country (ski de fond) before moving onto downhill (ski de descente) and finally ski-touring (ski de randonnée). Since I started in France the vocabulary of skiing comes to me most easily in French. Last week I did five days of downhill and two of touring. I last did some cross-country in December, for the first time in a while. Last season I skied a total of 16 days.
Cross-country skiing is best regarded as an efficient way of getting around flattish snow country on foot. I took it up before the invention of skating so do an old fashioned alternative step, sliding one ski in front of another using a gait not unlike that of Groucho Marx. Cross-country skis seem incredibly light and flimsy after downhill skis. Indeed on my last outing, my first in many years, I snapped a ski while doing nothing outrageous and had to get a new pair. I think it had gone brittle from years of disuse.
Cross-country skis work by being flexible (downhill skis are flexible too, but less obviously). They arch slightly off the ground in the middle, so when the skier places his weight evenly they don’t come into full contact with the snow allowing the skier to slide smoothly downhill, but when he places his weight on one foot when walking the centre of the ski base comes firmly into contact with the snow. On this centre there is placed a sticky substance (fart - believe it or not in French) or less messily the sole is ridged like fishscales that in both cases grip the snow and allow traction so the skier can propel himself forwards without slipping backwards as he moves along the flat or uphill. This only works up to a certain gradient, steeper than which extra effort and other techniques are required. Likewise, coming down, as cross-country skis don’t fix your heel (otherwise you couldn’t walk with them) and tend to have no metal edges to bite into the snow to help you brake (as do downhill skis) once the slope gets steeper than a certain gradient the skis get very difficult to control and an ungraceful sitting down on your bum to one side maybe the only effective way of stopping before further damage is incurred. Most cross-country skiing takes place on prepared runs called “loipe” which have two parallel grooves you ski along in with enough flat at the side if you prefer to skate (which I don’t) and as such have usually been laid out in terrain which is not too steep. Of course striking out on your own, making your own tracks can be much more adventurous. Years ago, when I first lived in Belgium and we had hard winters where the snow stayed on the ground in the Ardennes for several weeks, I used to like catching the train and skiing from one station to another following routes I knew from summer walking. I’ve not been skiing in Belgium for a long time though as the winters are much milder and the conditions too erratic. The great thing about following a good cross-country skiing route is the feeling of being away from it all in a chilly white winter landscape, knowing that you’ve got there by your own efforts. It’s a very healthy sport using both arms and legs at a steady pace, good for the old cardio-vascular system. I feel I’ve had a good work out after it.
Downhill skiing is technically a much more difficult proposition than cross-country, though it requires less physical effort. You need to be taught properly and unfortunately I wasn’t, as I started as an impoverished student being shown one or two basics by friends and then left to get on with it. Although later I took lessons from instructors, the combination of being a late starter and a badly taught beginner has left me with some bad habits that are difficult to eradicate and will always limit my ability. Having said that, although my technique is limited and style inelegant, I am a competent downhill skier capable of getting down any piste in one piece and enjoying myself while doing it. I prefer to stay in control, so will slow down where prudent and avoid unnecessary risks. I also don’t jump.
The main principle behind any ski is that of spreading the body-weight over a larger area so that you don’t sink too far into the snow. That extra area is best shaped long and thin so it’s easy to direct from the foot and can be made to slide forward easily. The problems that then have to be solved are how to make them go uphill without sliding backwards, how to go round corners and how to stop when you want to when going downhill.
For downhill skiing the first problem is solved by building a vast amount of infrastructure to take you uphill mechanically so you only ever have to ski down, or at worst briefly on the flat. This is obviously not very natural or indeed environmentally friendly. To the uniniated there is something profoundly inane about being repeatedly transported to the top of a mountain to slide back down it. However, once the skill is mastered, the pleasure of sliding down, often seemingly fast, and the satisfaction of remaining in control are immense and thrilling. The skis turn because they are wider at the two ends than in the middle, in other words their edge is part of the circumference of a turning circle (this is more obvious on modern skis that are shorter and more shaped than older ones). It’s just a question of putting your weight in the right place so the skis guide you round the bend. To stop you must bring your skis perpendicular to the line of the slope and if need be let their metal edges dig in. All that is easier said than done to begin with of course. Downhill skiing takes place mainly on prepared pistes where the snow has been packed down eliminating a lot of difficulty that comes from different qualities of snow. Pistes can easily get busy with the danger of being hit by people who are not in control of their skis or snowboards and lift queues can get long and too reminiscent of city-life. In short although the mountain scenery is present and often spectacular, the real natural charm of being on the mountain can soon be lost.
True mountain lovers inevitably aspire to ski-touring and that was always my objective in learning to ski downhill. I first had an opportunity to try ski de randonnée in 1987 and became hooked. The binding on a touring ski has two positions: heel free so it functions like a cross-country ski for walking and heel blocked so it is like a downhill ski. The ski itself is like a downhill or alpine ski. Some skiers prefer a slightly lighter model to make uphill travel less tiring, others prefer the full weight to make coming down easier. Randonnée boots also tend to be lighter than usual downhill boots and can be loosened in their upper part for ease when climbing. For climbing “skins” are stuck to the bottom of the ski. They were originally made of seal-skin but are now synthetic (good news for seals). When you stroke an animal’s fur it is smooth in one direction but if stroked the wrong way it sticks into you. This is how a skin works - it slides forwards smoothly but not backwards as its tiny hairs stick into the snow. They are incredibly efficient and can go up quite steep slopes unlike cross-country skis, not least because nearly all the surface of both skis remains in contact with the snow. As the slope gets steeper the skier must ascend in zig-zags doing a conversion to reverse direction at each corner instead of making a curve. This often happens in the last ascent to a pass; in fact, right at the end it may become necessary to remove the skis and walk up the final very steep part by kicking steps into the snow. Touring skis also come with the option of “couteaux”, essentially a kind of crampon for icy conditions that bites in deep with each step. When the highest point is reached the skins are removed and the binding put in the heel blocked position for descent. Unlike in cross-country where the terrain is undulating and you tend to go up and down all the time, ski-touring usually involves a long steep climb and then a long descent. You spend more time going up than coming down.
Ski touring is a form of mountaineering: it’s about being out on the mountain close to nature (you may see chamois, ibex and other wildlife as I did on my last outing). You discover just how varied the quality of snow is depending on which way the slope is facing, the altitude, the time of day. Some snow is a delight to ski in (spring transformed snow - neige de printemps transformée) some more challenging but fun ( powder - poudre), some an absolute nightmare (breakable crust - carton). You treat the mountain with respect. Avalanche is a real risk and everyone carries a transmitter/receiver (ARVA) that helps locate avalanche victims buried under snow. Fortunately I have never been caught in an avalanche, not least becaue I have always been out accompanied by a guide who can recognize and avoid risks I might not see. For safety reasons ski-touring is a group activity which brings with it a very special dynamic of shared experience that will be familiar to mountaineers. You have the satisfaction of climbing the mountain by your own means and then the technical challenge of skiing back down it in all kinds of snow over all kinds of terrain. The experience is in a totally different league to skiing on the pistes in a resort. It’s hard work though and you need to start early to get the best of the snow and minimize avalanche risk as things warm up out there. In the spring it can get surprisingly warm as you climb and the layers may have to come off and into your rucksack. If you’re ready to carry and ski with a heavier rucksack, containing what you need for overnight and extra food, you can really tour, travelling from hut to hut, which can be great fun but even harder.
Ski-touring is the most physical and technical sport I engage in. Before the first outing of the season I always have the butterflies - am I fit enough to complete the climb to the top? will the snow be kind enough to allow me to ski back down relatively easily? I’ve also had my share of bad weather moments (where fortunately the guide is there to get us off the mountain) thinking “what the hell am I doing here?” But usually it goes well and the satisfaction and sense of achievement keep me wanting to come back for more. I don’t know how long I’ll keep it up as I get older. I guess the secret will be not to pick anything too difficult. Last year my son and I skied the Dôme des Ecrins which is over 4000 metres. I suspect that may have been the high point of my randonnée career but there is still plenty to enjoy at a less challenging level. In fact some of the most enjoyable outings are not on the highest peaks but in attractive untouched terrain with good weather and in good company, which was precisely the case last week.

About classical music

In my childhood my family didn’t listen to classical music. I became curious about it when I was a teenager and started to borrow records of it from Bradford Central Library. Shortly after I started to buy my own LPs of pieces I particularly liked. The first of these was the Deutsche Gramophon recording of Beethoven’s 5th symphony by Karajan with the Berlin Philharmonic. The energy and the fullness of the sound were quite breathtaking to me reared on a diet of pop, not too demanding jazz and, later, 70s rock. The intricacy of the composition, the tensions, the beauty of the melodies, the variety of instrumentation and dynamics were a gateway to a much richer and more rewarding musical experience. I still listened to plenty of rock, but at some time when I was a student the classical LPs came to outnumber the rock and other ones. When in search of something to accompany stronger emotions it was to the classical ones I turned - especially Beethoven’s 9th.
If I’m not mistaken, I went to my first classical concert before my first rock concert - again Beethoven symphonies. The experience was even better in the concert hall.
Beethoven is a good entry point to the classical repertoire as he is right in the middle of it, between the classical and romantic, always very definite in his statements and excelling in each of the genres. From Beethoven symphonies I went to his concertos, piano sonatas and later still chamber music. From Beethoven himself at first forwards to Brahms and backwards to Mozart.
There wasn’t a record library at University but in the covered market there was a man who sold DGG LPs at knock-down prices (they had a nail hole driven through the middle so they were officially damaged). My taste started to broaden at the whim of what he had in stock. As Christ Church had a very good choir, I also began to taken an interest in choral and sacred music. There were some good concerts in Oxford; I remember being particularly moved at a piano recital by the great Emil Gilels.
I came to opera much later. Although I did enjoy seeing “la Traviata” at the Fenice in Venice when 17 (foregoing dinner to stand in the gods while inter-railing) I didn’t actually buy a recording of an opera until having seen the film of Amadeus, when I invested in “le Nozze di Figaro”.
In 1985 I bought my first CD player and with it some Bach cantatas and a new version of Karajan’s Beethoven 5. I now own over 1700 CDs of classical music, though recently I have brought my manic CD buying habit under control, largely because I now own most of the core repertoire ( - and a lot besides, that I never get round to listening to). Most of these CDs have been bought at reduced price or second hand. Also record companies have always repackaged great recorded versions from the past at attractive prices. I worked my way fairly methodically through everything in the Médiathèque’s CD lending library over about twenty years, guided by various books on music and individual composers. When I found something I liked, I added it to a list of what to buy when I saw it available cheaply., though I was in no hurry. So over time the collection grew and grew.
In the meanwhile I became a regular concert goer at the Palais des Beaux Arts (now restyled Bozar) where most of the famous names come to play in Brussels and took out a subscription at the Monnaie, following seeing a performance of Mozart’s “la Finta Giardiniera” from close to the stage which revealed to me the full theatrical potential of opera. I also try to get down to the monthly Bach cantatas at the Minimes when in town. Counting concerts and opera together I easily go to thirty classical music events a year. So I listen to a lot of classical music, both recorded and live, and it is very important to me.
I’d like to write a little about some of my favourite composers (the number is of CDs in my collection; at the end of each I give some examples of pieces I am fond of). These will be general impressions, easily contradicted by other examples from their output, for the essence of any great composer is variety.

Bach - spirituality (130)
Bach is at his best in his religious choral music. There is something quite sublime about the poliphony of so many human voices underpinned by such perfect orchestration. You get the feeling everything is in exactly the right place. Bach is the soundtrack of heaven. His music transcends this world, taking us on a spiritual journey to another place more conducive to meditation. His solo arias so often express a kind of questioning longing of the soul; his choruses a feeling of awe before the vastness of creation.
And then there are his flawless instrumental works too.
Magnificat, cantatas “ein’ feste Burg”, “Gottes Zeit”, St Matthew Passion, Bm Mass, Brandenburg concertos, cello suites, Well tempered clavier book I

Handel - grandness (115)
A Handel oratorio is always a real treat and none better than Messiah. There’s something grand and stirring about the choral singing and general tone that makes you glad to be alive. His operas contain some fine music too.
Messiah, Israel in Egypt, Ode to St Cecilia, Coronation anthems, Water music, trio sonatas for wind

Vivaldi - cheerfulness (45)
I'm far from being the only one to feel cheered by a brisk rendition of the Four Seasons, but there are many other great concertos by Vivaldi and more importantly the glories of his sacred choral works.
Gloria, Beatus vir, Stabat mater, il Cimento dell’armonia, l’Estro armonico

Haydn - urbanity (122)
To the modern listener, Haydn, as a composer of the classical period, always suffers from being in Mozart’s shadow, but he was and is a great composer in his own right. His music is eminently civilized and often highly original and witty. He was incredibly prolific (104 symphonies, 67 string quartets, 62 piano sonatas, 42 piano trios, 14 masses etc) and it is easy to be overwhelmed by the sheer volume of his works, as it is difficult to short list what might be his absolute masterpieces. He is not so much a composer of soaring peaks as of constant quality and as such often undeservedly neglected. I find I listen to more Haydn as I get older.
London symphonies, late piano sonatas, late string quartets, St Nicholas mass

Mozart - joy of being alive (156)
There is an incredible lightness, clarity, grace and ease to Mozart’s music, which I first took to be facile but soon came to appreciate for what it is: a great musical creativity and intelligence capable of anything and apparently without effort. Great art is, after all, that which conceals itself. He communicates an infectious enjoyment of life. Though he is capable of sadness too, never despair. He is great in all genres, but excels in the ensemble singing of his operas and its instrumental equivalent which is his own instrument, the piano, dialoguing with the orchestra in his piano concertos. Sometimes I feel: why bother listening to anyone else, when Mozart makes you feel so good ?
piano concertos 18 - 27; Le Nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, Così fan tutte, die Zauberflöte; string quintets KV 515, 516, clarinet concerto and quintet, symphonies 39, 40, 41, piano sonatas in Am and Cm, grand partita for winds, eine kleine Nachtmusik

Beethoven - struggle sometimes achieving serenity (64)
Beethoven’s music is not easy, it expresses the struggle that is life, the fight to create in the face of destruction, to get the emotions under control, the constant struggle that is man’s destiny. Sometimes a plateau of serenity, of inner peace can be reached, but never held, it will always be disturbed by a new struggle. His music is often wrought out of apparently little; small motifs painstakingly repeated and varied into complicated structures creating and resolving tensions. His music is resolutely of this world, its triumphs and failures; it is profoundly human. His best work is instrumental: the symphonies, string quartets and piano sonatas.
symphonies 3 - 9, late string quartets and op.59, piano sonatas with names and n° 30 -32, piano concertos 4 + 5, Archduke trio, violin sonata 10

Schubert - wistfulness (62)
You never quite know whether Schubert is in a major or minor key. His take on life is one of pleasant sadness, wistfulness. He is not a tight composer, you must let yourself be carried along by him, not worrying about time and structure, he will bring you to moments of incredible poignancy that have a cathartic effect.
last 3 piano sonatas, Great symphony (9), trout quintet, impromptus, Winterreise, string quintet, piano trios

Chopin - sparkle (18)
Though his ouput was small compared to the rest of the composers here, Chopin quite simply wrote some of the best music for piano, covering a range of moods and rhythmically full of life.
nocturnes, polonaises

Brahms - comfort (37)
Brahms is perhaps a less obvious choice here, but he has been with me a long time. His works combine a classical structure with a romantic taste for melody and harmony. In my opinion a most satisfying combination. His chamber music is particularly fine.
symphonies 3 + 4, clarinet quintet, horn trio, violin sonatas, late piano pieces

Verdi - nobility (44)
Verdi doesn’t do light. His stirring arias, richly varied instrumentation, glorious rum-ti-tum oompah choruses are serious and noble. This is grand opera and to be relished as such, more in the theatre than in your living room.
Traviata, Rigoletto

Shostakovich - anguish and mockery (60 )
Shostakovich is without doubt the greatest composer of the twentieth century. He wrote the best cycle of string quartets after Beethoven, and although he is better known for his impressive series of symphonies, this more intimate genre is where he made his most profound statements. He can write a fine tune and his sense of instrumentation is phenomenal. Shostakovich is capable by turns of sardonic humour, great lyricism and bombast, but his inescapable mood is one of anguish. Shostakovich is the soundtrack of what Hobsbawm called “the Age of Extremes” - he did after all write a lot of film music.
string quartets, violin concerto 1, piano concerto 1, symphonies 5 - 8, 14, 15, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk

So this first eleven accounts for about half of my collection. Other composers I enjoy include Schumann, Dvorak, R. Strauss, Debussy, Prokofiev and Britten. The one composer I really dislike is Wagner.
I find recently I tend to listen to what I know well and like, rather than exploring less familiar works. It’s another case of taking the time to appreciate more what I have, rather than rushing off somewhere else.

About the forest

The forest, my forest, is the Forêt de Soignes on the outskirts of Brussels. Forest may seem a grand word for a largish area of managed woodland, but though it is smaller than nearby grander forests in the Ardennes, it is certainly much bigger than most woods in England and as such worthy of the title “forest”.
When at home in Brussels, I go into the forest at least twice a week. We live close to the Bois de la Cambre, which is actually the part of the forest that advances into the city and was tamed into parkland in the 19th century. The forest proper starts straight after it, so it takes me less than 15 minutes to get into it on my bike. If it’s for a walk, the nearest convenient entry point at the Enfants Noyés is only ten minutes by car.
The forest is criss-crossed by a network of drives, ways and paths - "drèves, chemins, sentiers". My favourite word is "drève" borrowed from the Flemish, literally a drive, a straight track driven through the forest and therefore tree-lined (the most spectacular is the very long and grand avenue of beeches in the arboretum). The "chemins" are more winding. I have a copy of an 18th century map and most of them are on it already. These days signs tell visitors which tracks can be used by walkers, cyclists and horse-riders and while most are shared, some are dedicated, giving each community an opportunity to do its own thing unimpeded by the others. Recently the infrastructure has become very well maintained and regularly repaired. The advantage of woodland as a recreational area is that the trees hide the people, so unlike wide open spaces such as beaches which can soon appear to be busy, you frequently have the impression you have the place to yourself. Some days, like today, midweek on a cold grey January day, you actually do pretty well have it to yourself, which is remarkable at half an hour’s cycling from home in the city.
The forest is predominantly beech, interspersed with oak and birch, and with pockets of pine, fir and larch. The beeches are tall and slender, so they let through plenty of light. The forest is not a dark and dank place. The subsoil is very hard which suits the beech as it has a shallow root system - and for that reason is prone to blowing over in a gale (there are always wind-blown trees waiting for foresters to remove them - is that what a back-log is?). There is not much undergrowth, though some areas have been heavily colonized by brambles. It’s quite easy when you’re walking to strike off the path and really be in the heart of the forest, feeling and hearing the dead leaves underfoot. This is when you’re most likely to spot a deer. There are not many, they tend to be in groups of two to six but they soon get wind of you and scamper off, their white rears bobbing up and down until out of sight. You may find them in more or less the same place for several weeks in a row and then not see them for months. Otherwise, if you’re looking for wildlife you’ll have to settle for squirrels, chipmunks, rabbits, mice and lots of birds, including some fine smaller birds of prey and owls.
There are a few small lakes in the forest and little clearings which make splendid spots for a picnic in the summer.
At the start of the autumn, we used to pick mushrooms in the forest, but that is not allowed anymore, so we have to go to the bigger and wilder forests of the Ardennes. Blackberries are still fair game though.
The forest is of course temperate and loses its leaves in winter. We hear a lot these days about the tropical rainforest, but there is actually more temperate forest in the world, which is not surprising if you look at the distribution of land mass on a globe. The temperate forest is perhaps even more important to us then as the lungs of the planet. The Forêt de Soignes is the lungs of Brussels. It’s the best place to go here for fresh air. Fortunately the temperate forest tends to be less under threat than the tropical, and actually growing in surface area. The Forêt de Soignes has certainly been managed sustainably for centuries. Sometimes you see the foresters marking out the trees to be felled and occasionally witness the earth shaking crash of one of the big old beeches coming down. They are incredibly tall, you don’t really appreciate it till you find one lying down and walk balancing along the trunk.
In the winter especially you see the skeleton of the forest and the dominant dimension is the vertical: the trunks form countless vertical lines drawing you eyes upwards again and again, literally uplifting. If there is a creator, you feel his presence. The columns of Greek temples started as stylised trees, crenelated for the bark, and with geometric foliage at the top. In the middle ages the cathedral architects, inventors of the gothic arch and vaults, added branches to the stone trunks. In the modern age, the cathedral representation of the forest is completed with even stone leaves in the vaulting of the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, still under construction. Or you can just settle for the natural version in the forest. “La Nature est un temple où de vivants piliers...” (Baudelaire).
There is after all something quite wonderful about trees: their elegant proportions; their exuberant putting forth of new growth in the spring, their lush greenery in the summer, their bright colours in the autumn, their fine tracery in the winter.; their size; their age. In the National Parks of the Western US, I was more moved by the majestic vastness of the sequoias than that of the canyons.
One of the best things about going regularly into the forest is that you notice the passing of the seasons, far more than in the city. The forest is beautiful in all seasons (and all weathers) and always has someting to offer.
The forest is where I recharge my batteries. The physical exercise of pedaling my bike or walking can overcome initial weariness and introduce new energy. Yet it is more than that - the fresh air, the calm, the presence of nature, the wonder of the seasons, all nourish the soul
“Und frische Nahrung, neues Blut
Saug ich aus freier Welt...” (Goethe)

About places

“There are places I’ll remember,
All my life, though some have changed,
Some forever, not for better,
Some have gone and some remain”

In a way this “About being here” is about being there. However, our present is infomed by our past. We are what we were; the sum total of our experience. Our experience is conditioned by place, time and circumstances. Place is a shorthand for this, but in a very temporal sense. Places are not eternal as we so often discover: the great places of our childhood which turn out to be much smaller when revisited; the special places of our adulthood which turn out to be quite ordinary. We can revisit the locations of our past, but we cannot actually revisit our past. Nor do we need to, the most important parts of our past we carry with us anyway, for better or for worse, in our present.
I’d like to write about a few places where I have lived.

Halifax:
I was born in Halifax. Halifax is an archetypal Northern England 19th century industrial town of stone-built terraces climbing up hillsides away from mill chimneys. Yorkshiremen used to pray to be saved from Hull, Hell and Halifax. I guess that’s why my parents got out of there as soon as possible. But my grandmother and aunt and uncle stayed. So Halifax was a place where we went to visit “family”. It was a good hour by car and clearly had the feeling of going to another world, an older and materially poorer one, from which we had miraculously escaped. It’s a long time since I’ve been back to Halifax.

Ilkley:
I grew up in Ilkley, in every way a well-to-do genteel Yorkshire town, nestling under the moors by the lovely river Wharfe.. However, since I went to secondary school in another town, I really don’t know anyone there apart from my parents. I still go to visit them twice a year, but they no longer live in the house in which I grew up, which further distances me from the place. Ilkley really is a “place” to me in a very impersonal way, familiar but strangely remote. The best thing about Ilkley is going for walks on the Moor or in nearby Wharfedale. There I can experience the English landscape that we English so fondly associate with our country, though it never was the actual backdrop of our experience of growing up English.

Bradford:
I went to secondary school in Bradford. So this was the place where I went out with classmates on Saturday evenings for underage drinking in pubs. I tried to find the Vaults Bar a few years ago; it has been demolished and there’s a car park there. I did find Tony Kingham at Bradford Grammar School though. He was one of my first French teachers. He started at BGS at the same time as I did as a schoolboy. He showed me over the place. A lot had changed, we reminisced together about characters who had occupied spaces now used for something else. Bradford is an even more down-at-heel city than in the ‘70s, grimy, formerly industrial, fallen on hard times. The shared aspiration of most of us at school was to get away from it. Thank God we did.

l’Isle-Jourdain:
L’Isle-Jourdain is a small village in the South West of France about 30 km from Toulouse. This is where I first lived by myself away from my parents. That was in itself a liberating experience, but it was compounded by the fact that the French countryside was a very different place to Yorkshire. There was a lot of good eating and copious drinking with endless conversation, all unshackled from the constraints of a middle-class boys-only English upbringing. I returned with a strong twangy SW French accent and numerous other affectations which seemed to go well with Bohemian student life. South West France was my first love affair with a place, and it continued through my student years with frequent stays culminating in a year in Toulouse. I don’t go back that way very often now, but when I do the way of life and accent come easily.

Oxford:
I went to university in Oxford, at Christ Church. I found it at first a somewhat intimidating place but with time it came to feel like home. I made some of my best friends at university; it was a stimulating and happy time, there was so much close to hand for the taking. Each generation of students makes up its own Oxford. So mine is gone, but the decor is unchanged. The architecture is wonderful, the stone warm, the centre bustling with people from both university and town. It’s a manageable size with always something going on and greenery never far away. If I had to live in England, I’d probably make it there - it was actually the last place I lived in England. Since my daughter studies there now, I go back regularly.

Kamen:
Kamen is a small town in North West Germany where the first two Autobahnen crossed each other; the Kamener-Kreuz still features on German traffic news. I ended up there in my year out during my modern languages degree. At the time it had the most easterly coal-mine of the Ruhr (since closed down), workers’ houses painted grey, its own Turkish ghetto and a non-descript modern shopping precinct. In short, post-war Germany in miniature. Once a man who had given me a lift in a big BMW said, “This is not real Germany, you should go to Bavaria”; but the point is, it was real Germany. The school I worked in was an “experimental” comprehensive. Teachers volunteered to work there, so its staff, my colleagues were very left-wing and “alternativ” - like many people in the Ruhr they were friendly and down to earth. Living there was an experience that educated me politically. Needless to say, I never go back there.

Brussels:
I came to Brussels in 1982, which means I have now lived here half of my life. It’s certainly the place I have lived longest. This is where I have made my home, raised my family and found a circle of friends and acquaintances. Brussels is a truly cosmopolitan city (even for Belgians it is officially bi-lingual) where you don’t feel out of place as a foreigner. Brussels is not the capital of a single language community: that falls to Paris for the French and Amsterdam for the Dutch speakers. But we can accept its claim to being the capital of Europe, at least administratively. Brussels has the advantages of a capital city with plenty to see and do, access to many different cultures, lots of entertainment, restaurants and shops, and easy links to other capitals. But it doesn’t have many of the disadvantages in that it’s not too large, you can get about it easily, you can get into places without booking weeks in advance, you can get out of it fast when you want to, to the forest and countryside, and on a reasonable salary you can still afford to live in the centre in a house with a garden. In short, if you don’t mind the weather (which I don’t, being English) Brussels has a lot going for it and over the years it has really grown on me. It’s important to recognize, wherever you are, when being here is good, and to realize that it’s pointless to aspire to being somewhere else. Brussels is home to me.

Monfalcone:
Monfalcone is a ship-building town in North East Italy where my wife was born and grew up. When she first took me there, over twenty years ago, I wasn’t impressed. Nearly every town in Italy has a wonderful beautiful historic centre. Monfalcone doesn’t, it’s not old enough. Admittedly they have improved it recently by getting rid of cars from certain streets and the main square and repainting some buildings. But it’s never going to be on the list of 100 must-see towns in Italy. In fact, it’s just typical small town Italy - which is what makes it good. Italy is such a pleasant place to live that most of its population don’t bother moving away from where they were born: just being here is fine with them. So Monfalcone is full of my wife’s family, friends and acquaintances. In fact, it’s just the opposite of Ilkley, which is picturesque but where I know nobody. Monfalcone is actually at the northernmost point of the Mediterranean, which for us from further north can’t be bad. The sea offers some excellent swimming. It also turns out that Monfalcone is only a short drive from the much under-rated Julian Alps. So, although not initially impressed, I now see its good points. We own a flat there, so I spend more time there in a year than in England.

These are most of the places I have lived, as opposed to merely visited. I shall write about some of those another time.
I think it emerges from my descriptions that the most important aspect of a place is the people who are there. At BGS Founders’ Day, they always quoted the Greek: “The men make the city not the walls”. Without the people places seem curiously hollow. We return to them sometimes only to find ghosts. It’s better to be here now.

About reading

I have written before in dialogue with blogger Asbo (on “diary-by-asbo”, a blog to which this one is inevitably indebted) that BEING is preferable to READING.
It may seem strange, therefore, to begin postings to “About being here” with “About reading”. However, in writing a blog, this present exercise is clearly about reading, so this will be our starting point.
Here is an extract from my dialogue with Asbo:`

“ABH: Ultimately reading is a poor substitute for living (as opposed to merely existing), but as there are times when real living is impossible, it is good to have the substitute.
ASBO: My entire readership has commented that reading is a kind of OK second-best to real life when real life is not possible.
ABH: Admittedly I was being a bit provocative last time. I seem to have spent a large part of my life reading and continue to do so. So why do we read? To approach it from the other side: why do we write? We write to set down our thoughts, ideas, experiences, emotions (or just to tell a good story) so we do not forget them, to give them form and maybe to share them with others. So when we come to read we share that and gain an insight into others. Our own experience and direct knowledge is inevitably limited by the time, place and circumstances in which we live. Reading extends and expands our experience, albeit vicariously. Inevitably not as vividly as the real thing, but in its infinite possibilities in a very enriching way. Sometimes, indeed, in a more enriching way than some of our repetitive daily routine.
ASBO: Isn't there a Sufi saying to the effect that a man whose intellect is stuffed with information, but whose being remains untouched by the reality of the truth is as a donkey carrying a large load of books?
ABH: The image of the donkey prompts me to elaborate on my earlier comments about reading being a second best.
The risk of spending too much time reading books (of becoming bookish) is that of not devoting enough time and attention to experiencing reality firsthand, that is gaining knowledge directly from living (preferably in full awareness). Indeed certain kinds of knowledge can only be gained firsthand, never from books. So the disadvantage of spending too much time reading is that of losing a direct vision of reality, thereby becoming like the donkey.
Similarly, the glut of information in the much vaunted "information society" can stand in the way of greater wisdom. We run the risk of becoming donkeys overburdened with facts and indiscriminate opinions but without any organizing perspective: holding countless pieces of a puzzle but not having a picture of the whole with which to assemble them.”

So we reach the paradox of Larkin the librarian writing “Books are a load of crap”.
Yet reading is a wonderful and valuable pastime. Montaigne lists books as one of his three favourite ways of passing time along with friends and women (perhaps a more erudite version of wine, women and song if we take it that the pleasure of wine is in its being drunk in company).
So having accepted the value of reading, what shall we read?
We read incessantly. In fact in the internet age with eyes glued to the screen, reading is what we’re doing most of the time (what you’re doing now) and often for very practical purposes. No it’s not that, of course: what I want to write about is reading books, especially gratuitously, that is books not immediately necessary for our everyday living.
But which books ? There is a finite number of books we can read in a lifetime. Therefore, each book read represents the missed opportunity of several other books unread.
In Montaigne’s day , the late 16th century, there weren’t quite so many books as now and most of those of note were still in Latin or Greek. He probably had most of them in the library in his tower where he used to write his essays. It was just still possible as renaissance man to have an encyclopaedic reading knowledge, but even then the possibility was already receding.
We, however, will have to select. Maybe we should just follow our fancy and dip in to as many different authors as possible. We shouldn’t be afraid to give up on something that is not having any impact on us (just think of what we could be reading instead) though a certain amount of patience and persistence can yield unexpected rewards.
I myself confess to the boyish habit of list making - “I must read these books this year”. But I never get to the end, I go off on a new tangent - and maybe come back. I am also an incorrigible re-reader. As my memory becomes cluttered with too many things, sometimes I can scarcely remember the plot and main characters’ names - but I do remember if I thought it was good and may want to come back to it. Why else, indeed, keep books if not to re-read them ?
Ruskin said “a book worth reading is a book worth buying”. I buy too many books. I’ll get round to them some day, they represent previous lists of good intentions. If I never bought another book, I probably would have enough to keep me going for the rest of my life. But which book shall I read next ?
Perhaps while I reflect I can share with you what I read last, over the course of my fiftieth year.
As I studied literature at university, I have a marked preference for fiction with literary pretensions, though I also read books on among other things history, biography and philosophy. I try to read at least one book a year in my other languages - French, German, Italian, Spanish.
The main projects -
Virginia Woolf: all nine novels, including “the Waves” which is one of my favourite books, often re-read; and a “Room of one’s own”
Montaigne: most of the essays (95/107)
Classics -
Homer: “the Odyssey”, “the Iliad”, More: “Utopia”, Voltaire “Candide”, Machiavelli “il Principe”, Goethe “Faust I and II”, “die Leiden des jungen Werthers”, Borges “Ficciones”, Basho “The narrow road to the deep north”,
New novels -
Hosseini: “the Kite-runner”, Pamuk “Snow”, Haddon “A spot of bother”, Camilleri “La pista di sabbia”, Rowling “Harry Potter 7”
Other novels -
Greene: “the Confidential agent”, Lessing: “the Golden notebook”
History -
Gibbon “Decline and fall” books 2 + 3, Wilson “After the Victorians”, Hobsbawm “Age of extremes”
Biography -
“Autobiography of the Pythons”, Seth “Two lives”
Other -
Levitt/Dubner “Freakonomics”, Paxman “the English”

I clearly have been reading quite a lot. So I must enjoy it.
I shall return to some of these authors in greater detail in future postings.

About... About being here

Dear Reader,
This blog is called “About being here”.
To begin with that was because my initials are A.B.H. (Bach and Shostakovich after all took the letters of their names as the starting notes for some of their compositions).
But having created it I didn’t know what to write in it. It was always going to be about me and my experience of life, in short, about being here. However, I didn’t yet have the way in. I didn’t want to write a pedestrian diary (“Woke up, got out of bed, Dragged a comb across my head”). Or a series of more occasional pieces in the style of “what I did during my holidays”. Or rants soon to be regretted. So I didn’t start.
Over the last three months I have been reading Montaigne. It seems to me that if Montaigne had been writing his Essays now, they would have appeared as entries in his blog. I realized this is what I wanted to write.
His “essais” are exactly that: “attempts”; attempts at setting down certain aspects of life, of groping towards (for want of a better word) wisdom.
About being here, then, will be a series of attempts to capture what it is to be alive in the present, as experienced by myself..
Montaigne also writes to his reader, that his aim initially was to leave something of himself for those who knew him to read and remember him by.
So be it.
I hope you enjoy “about being here”.
ABH