An Endeavour

Today was strange and busy.
In the morning, after dropping off Tom at the childminders, I ran for my usual 15km. Then Claire and I went to the cinema to see the wonderful "12 Years a Slave". In the evening I attended the first class of my "Introduction to philosophy" course (we are both trying something new- Claire has started to dance the Lindy Hop). Later on we watched the last few hours of an American TV series we have invested over forty hours of our time watching in the last five weeks. So my day was physically and mentally tiring but, ultimately rewarding. The best kind of day, in its own way.


Been vegetarian for three weeks. Craving cheese like heroin! Making meals like spicy Mexican bean burgers, falafels, sushi, roasted veg quiche, veg kievs, veg chilli, mushroom soup, etc.


I can't not choose. If I do not choose then that is a choice. So if I cannot not choose my potential choices need to be rational and considered. So I need not be contrarian or destructively argumentative but I need to weigh and consider. No dispensation for dispensations' sake.


I am hoping my recent understanding of humanism may give me skeleton or framework upon which to flesh out ideas, thoughts and understandings, maybe about some things that were under my nose all along that can now be seen in a  new light.
The default, normal position for the average human is, compared to mine, woeful. A shorter, unhealthy life with greater disease and destitution, most people are born into a losing struggle. Most people will live a life without the things I take for granted- food, shelter, sanitation. But I have met over three thousand people through work and most of them are OK. Content enough, surviving, remaining mostly positive about the world and its people. Even some tortured refugees who have lost everyone who has ever known them, for whom there doesn't exist any shared experiences and memories, there appears to be hope and a willingness to believe in the positivity of others. Surely dogma can only fail because the human spirit is too strong and unyielding.
I remind myself of a conversation I had with a gentleman who had received refugee status. He told me that after seeing his wife and children murdered in font of him and after he was shot and left for dead and after going on the run through the desert for weeks and after being captured and tortured for months he would lie on the cold, dark floor in his cold, dark cell in a cold, dark corner of some God-forsaken desert hundreds of miles from anyone who may know him. He told me I might think he only felt despair, which I did think. But he said he also felt hope. He said "if it feels like there is only despair then there is always hope too. There is always hope". I try to think of him when I find myself wallowing in self-pity or have a sudden attack of "poor me".