Looks Serious

Placebo's "Slave to the Wage" (Lyrics Below) popped up on my iPod shuffle the other day, whilst I was on the train home and it took me back to some dark times, two years ago that I have never really talked about to anybody except my very best friend. This retrospective thought has also been brought about by the fact that I am now working in the same building (although for a different company) and doing the same daily commute that I was when the following situation unfolded.

About this time of year, two years ago I met somebody, let's call her "Charlotte", in a lift on my way to the gym at lunchtime. We briefly talked about gym's and running and somewhat impetuously I ran after her down an escalator and gave her my business card and told her that if she ever wanted to go to the gym, I could sign her in as a guest.

I say impetuously, because this is not the sort of behaviour expected of a "happily" married man with two children, particularly as to this day my wife does still not know about Charlotte.

I say "happily" because at the time I wasn't very happily married. To use the cliche I think I was having a bit of a mid-life crisis which I think started when my first child was born, and continued for a couple of years. This really manifested itself when I started commuting daily to London on the train, which opened up a whole host of flirtatious opportunities. I guess I married quite young and up until that point I had nevr had a long-term relationship, mainly down to my own lack of self-confidence, but suddenly I was like a kid in a sweetshop?!?!

At about the same time, I also started chatting regularly to a girl I had met on the train, and more importantly / significantly started deliberately getting the train she caught, rather than the earlier one that I was more used to taking. Lets call her "Lynsey".

Anyway, back to Charlotte. We exchanged more and more flirtatious emails, me still not telling her that I was married, until she suggested that we meet for a drink. I agreed, but then wracked with guilt couldn't decide on whether to continue to avoid the issue of my marriage or come clean to her - I thought at the very least, she deserved lunch out of my deceit?!?!

So I arrange to meet Charlotte for lunch, and spend the whole morning beforehand nervously wondering whether I should come clean or not. In the end I do come clean. She takes it remarkably well, although with the caveat "I don't do married men" and as a consequence she agrees to stay in touch.

What follows is a summer of platonic lunches, coffees, trips to the theatre and text messaging, all without the knowledge of my wife. Charlotte takes an interest in my marital issues and is a good listener, but the relationship is no more than that, and never will be as she is firmly and resolutely in control and wouldn't let me do anything stupid, at least with her. At the same time I am seeing Lynsey on the train on a virtually twice-daily basis and swapping text messages. Again this is platonic, and although I enjoy the "illicitness" of the relationship, again it is purely platonic as she just needs a friend to talk to.

Anyway, the crux comes when after a lot of soul searching and discussion I decide that given what's going on at home, that's it's probably best if I leave my wife and children? I felt that I wasn't making anybody happy, and if I was running around chasing after other women, however "platonically" then surely things couldn't be right?

Typing it two years later makes it all seem a bit surreal, as though I'm writing about somebody else. Basically though, when push-comes-to-shove I can't / don't do it, but do sit down with my wife an tell her how I feel. She is obviously devastated as for her it has come out of the blue, and we go through a difficult few weeks - To be honest the repercussions are still being felt some two years later as you'd expect. But, we settle down back into soem form of 'normality', given that I am still seeing Lynsey and Charlotte and confiding in them.

Then after about a month since I nearly left home, my wife finds a text from Lynsey on my phone and I am forced to come clean about her at least. I think, rightly or wrongly, that it's probably not best to mention Charlotte as well? What I do decide is to not contact her again, and given that it was always me that initiated the contact, this does not represent too many issues and she just disappears from my life. I never saw or heard from her again.

Again we have a difficult few weeks whilst we come to terms with what I've done, and again there are still repercussions, but by and large we get on with our lives.

Importantly, it kicked me out of my self-centred, selfish, almost childish "mid-life crisis" and made me realise what I had put at stake. Things will never quite be the same again, but perhaps what doesn't kill us makes us stronger? I have a loving and forgiving wife, and although the grass may appear greener somewhere else, that's very rarely the case.

SO what does Placebo have to do with all of this? Well a line from "Slave to the Wage" struck a bit of a chord with me whilst I was going through all of this. "All it takes is one decision, A lot of guts - A little vision, To wave your worries and cares Goodbye".

At the time I thought the tough decision was to leave my wife and family. On hearing it the other day, surrounded by all these memories I now realise that to run away and leave was an easy decision - To stay and put things right, which I think I have, as best I can.....Now that was the tough, and ultimately the correct decision.

 

Placebo - Slave to the Wage

Run away from all your boredom
Run away from all your whoredom and wave
Your worries and cares
Goodbye

All it takes is one decision
A lot of guts, a little vision to wave
Your worries and cares
Goodbye

Its a maze for rats to try
Its a maze for rats to try
Its a race, a race for rats
A race for rats to die

Its a race, a race for rats
A race for rats to die

Sick and tired of Maggy's farm
Shes a bitch with broken arms to wave
Your worries and cares
Goodbye

Its a maze for rats to try
Its a maze for rats to try
Its a race, a race for rats
A race for rats to die

I have hesitated about putting this post up, and making it viewable to all as it raises some serious issues about my realtionships with people outside of my marriage. In light of the whole Lynsey thing, my wife has made it clear that she would prefer it that I didn't have a Blog. To this end, as far as she is aware, I don't have a blog and therefore all of the "relationships" I have with people of Vox are a secret. Those people with which I have particularly close relationships may feel that this is not morally defensible. Perhaps not, but I am not sure if my marriage would survive their disclosure?

On reflection, I seriously hurt the feelings of Lynsey, when I discontinued our relationship - although interestingly she had not told her boyfriend about me - and I still feel guilty about the collateral damage that resulted from my actions - If you take her motives at face value, she just needed a friend to talk to, perhaps as I do / did. Perhaps Vox offers the opportunity to completely bare my soul, in the knowledge that those to which I do are unlikely to ever have any contact with my wife, and therefore betray that "confidence", even by subtle nuances. Again, the people I involve in this may have a different view on the morality of that, particularly if they have been deceived in the past.

They know that I am not "whiter than white", but the degree of my "greyness" may come as a bit of a shock to them and may alter their view of me. I'm not looking for absolution - This is my mess and mine alone. I guess I'm just at the point where I need to be honest to myself and to them.

 

 

 

 

I have just finished reading An Unexpected Light: Travels in Afghanistan by Jason Elliot which I heartily recommend.

In it is a story told to the author which just struck a fatalistic chord with me, I don't know why? It just did.

A young follower of a Sufi master is sitting in a cafe in Baghdad when he overhears Death talking about the number of calls he has to make over the next couple of days in the city.

In order to ensure he is not on the list, the young disciple runs off to Samarkand.

A few days later Death visits the Sufi master to enquire about the young disciple's whereabouts. "Oh he's probably in the bazaar" says the Sufi master somewhat distractedly.

"How strange?" replies Death consulting his list. "It says here I'm due to meet with him in Samarkand."

So after nearly two months without gainful employment I have been offered a new job. I am intending to start on Tuesday. All I have to do is sort out the final payment from the company that made me redundant - Surprise, surprise it arrived in my bank account "a bit light" and I think they have done me out of a load of holiday that I didn't take?!?!?

To be honest I've really enjoyed my time off - I've done loads of stuff with the family - although it's been a bit stressful at times, but I think it's going to be a bit of a shock to the system going back to being a "slave to the wage".

I'll let you know how I get on.

Police in southern China have discovered a factory manufacturing Free Tibet flags, media reports say.

The factory in Guangdong had been completing overseas orders for the flag of the Tibetan government-in-exile.

Workers said they thought they were just making colourful flags and did not realise their meaning.

But then some of them saw TV images of protesters holding the emblem and they alerted the authorities, according to Hong Kong's Ming Pao newspaper.

Tibet independence

The factory owner reportedly told police the emblems had been ordered from outside China, and he did not know that they stood for an independent Tibet.

Workers who had grown suspicious checked the meaning of the flag by going online.

Thousands of flags had already been packed for shipping.

Police believe that some may already have been sent overseas, and could appear in Hong Kong during the Olympic torch relay there this week.

The authorities have now stepped up the inspection of cars heading to the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone and onwards to Hong Kong.

The Olympic torch is due to tour Hong Kong on Friday. It will then travel to a series of cities in mainland China before reaching Beijing for the start of the Olympic Games in August.

Its progress around the world has been marked by pro-Tibet demonstrations in several cities - including Paris, London and San Francisco.

Rallies began in the main Tibetan city of Lhasa on 10 March, led by Buddhist monks.

Over the following week protests spread and became violent - particularly in Lhasa, where ethnic Chinese were targeted and shops were burnt down.

Beijing cracked down on the protesters with force, sending in hundreds of troops to regain control of the restive areas.

But it has since agreed to resume talks with representatives of the Dalai Lama.

The Army's chief recruiter has defended the decision to launch a £2 million public relations campaign on the fifth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq.

Brigadier Andrew Jackson, Commander of the Army Recruiting Group, said the timing was "coincidental" and rejected suggestions the money could have been better spent on improving pay or equipment.

But he also revealed the army was on course to miss its annual recruitment target by around 10% as he launched the To The Best campaign which encourages the public to show their support for British troops.

Polling carried out for the launch showed the public drawing a sharp distinction between their opinions of the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan and the soldiers themselves.

While only 41% of those surveyed said they backed operations in Iraq and Afghanistan (with 38% opposed outright), 87% nevertheless said they supported British soldiers.

The campaign, which includes a series of emotive television advertisements, urges people to log their support for the armed forces on a new website: http://www.tothebest.army.mod.uk

The subtitled advertisements feature civilians in Bosnia, Afghanistan, Sierra Leone and Ghana thanking UK soldiers for services ranging from dramatic rescues to drilling new boreholes.

Brig Jackson highlighted the positive media coverage of Prince Harry's deployment to Afghanistan as reflecting the mood in the country in support of troops. But he acknowledged a series of high-profile controversies over support for soldiers in society at large including the row over forces personnel wearing uniforms in public.

And while he accepted that a website might be seen as an "abstract" way for the public to express support for soldiers sent to dangerous places, he said he hoped it would lead to people doing so in other ways such as attending parades.

The campaign, backed by a string of celebrities from rugby player Jonny Wilkinson to the singer Jamelia, has been criticised by relatives of some soldiers killed on operations.

.......You're fired!

It's true -  I had the novel experience of being put on a month's notice yesterday and effectively made redundant.

I won't bore you with the details, but the start-up I was working for has in effect become a "Stop!" as the parent company is unwilling to put any more than the $700,000 it's already invested into the business to keep it going.

It didn't really come as much of a shock, and the process wasn't quite as brutal as "The Apprentice", but it still wasn't pleasant.

Anyway, I've been busy this morning on PlanetRecruit and LinkedIn and have made contact with some agencies / friends / acquaintances / former-employers / former-colleagues and I've got a few things lined up, so it's not looking too bad.....It might even be a good thing in the long run.....?!?!?!

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) will launch the first International Online Free Expression Day under UNESCO’s patronage on 12 March, when it will also organise its second “24-hour online demo against Internet censorship,” urging Internet users to come and demonstrate on its website, www.rsf.org.

A total of 63 cyber-dissidents are currently in jail worldwide for using their right to free expression on the Internet. China continues to be the world’s biggest prison for online journalists and bloggers.

To denounce government censorship of the Internet and to demand more online freedom, Reporters Without Borders is calling on Internet users to come and protest in online versions of the nine countries that are “Internet enemies” during the 24 hours from 11 a.m. on 12 March to 11 a.m. on 13 March (Paris time). Anyone with Internet access will be able to create an avatar, choose a message for their banner and take part in one of the nine cyber-demos (Burma, China, North Korea, Cuba, Egypt, Erithrea, Tunisia, Turkmenistan and Vietnam).

Reporters Without Borders will release its latest list of “Internet enemies” together with a new version of its Handbook for Cyber-Dissidents.

When the first “24 hours against Internet censorship” was held last year, some 40,000 Internet users came and clicked on an inter-active map of the world to help make the “Internet black holes” disappear. This time we can do even more to make this new protest a success and to put pressure on the governments that try to muzzle what should be space where people can express their views freely.

This operation was devised and produced by the Saatchi & Saatchi advertising agency. A campaign ad is being circulated online calling on Internet users the world over to come and take part in the 24-hour protest. All news media, websites and blogs that would like to support this major operation are invited to get in touch with Lilia Bouhdjar at +33 (0)1 4483-8456

Deep inside the tall towers of Eritrea's Ministry of Information, the battle-scarred war veteran leaned towards me across his desk.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/7283293.stm

Published: 2008/03/10 08:31:26 GMT

© BBC MMVIII

Great Britain's men booked their place at this summer's Beijing Olympics with a tense 2-0 victory over India in the final of the qualifying tournament in Chile.

Britain, gold medallists in 1988, scored two early goals to seal India's fate and win the six-team competition in Chile which also featured the hosts, Austria, Russia and Mexico.

Ashley Jackson set up the first for Barry Middleton in the fourth minute and Richard Mantell flicked in the second in the 10th.

Forward Prabhjot Singh had two efforts blocked in quick succession as India, who won their last gold in 1980, tried to claw their way back and V.R.Raghunath then fired over from a rebound.

India, also beaten 3-2 by the same opponents in the round- robin stage, were unable to find a way through in the second half despite winning a flurry of penalty corners.

"We have been waiting for this for eight months," said Britain captain Ben Hawes.

"It's a massive accomplishment for the team. After Thursday, when they played very well, we were aware we had to start quickly.

"The game opened up after the early goal and we weren't as nervous after that. We stayed very physical in the tackle, our technical game has improved a lot and we created chances."

China, Netherlands, South Korea, Canada, South Africa, Spain, Belarus, Pakistan and Australia qualified directly for the Beijing Games.

India missed out on an automatic berth after they failed to reach the 2006 Asian Games final.

New Zealand beat Argentina in the final of the first qualifying tournament last month. The third is in Japan in April.

>> Looks Serious says: Just to maintain some "BBCesque" balance and impartilaity, something from Gordon Brown (PM) on a similar subject. I also agree with Mark Topper, from London:

"If you are anti-war and feel the need to sling insults then direct them at Westminster".

He said armed forces members should be "encouraged to wear their uniform in public and have the respect and gratitude of the British people".

The decision not to wear uniform was taken by the station commander at RAF Wittering near Peterborough.

Defence minister Derek Twigg blamed "a tiny minority" for the abuse.

Shadow Defence Secretary Liam Fox said: "I think that the majority of our public would be appalled to hear that there are no-go areas for our Armed Forces, even in their own country."

A government review of the public's perception of the military is currently being carried out.

It has been suggested as part of the review that soldiers may be encouraged to wear their uniforms off-duty to boost their popularity.

Speaking on Thursday, Defence Secretary Des Browne said it was "a great shame that some individuals in this community don't respect our forces".

He added: "I hope that by working closely with Peterborough City Council and the local police, service personnel at RAF Wittering will soon be able to wear their uniforms freely about the town with the support of the local people."

RAF Wittering was established in 1916 and more than 2,000 servicemen and women are based at the station.

Comments (from the BBC News Site):

This is appalling. RAF employees should not be asked to refrain from wearing their uniform if they wish to do so. It should be a matter of pride to wear such a prestigious uniform. Every single person in the UK owes the RAF a huge amount of gratitude for the job they do. I would not hesitate to thank anyone wearing a forces uniform; we owe our freedom to them.
Julie Butchard, York

When I was at university, and a member of the British Army's UOTC at that university, we were all advised to not wear uniforms in public unless completely unavoidable. This kind of discretion has been a long standing part of the Army's way of ensuring the safety of both its members and the public. The same advice was widely accepted as common sense when I later attended other Army establishments. The policy of discretion allows the military to carry out its duties more efficiently and with minimum disruption to civilian life. After all, the military's purpose is to serve civil society, it is not civil society's purpose to idolise the military.
David, Scotland

People do often give you second looks when in uniform but the majority of the time, it is for the best - very few make negative comments about the work of the armed forces. It is a shame those in some cities do not respect the work we do.
Alex, Liverpool

I'm a Brit living in the United States and I'm very much aware of American opposition to the war in Iraq. However, American service men and women are not being abused but are given respect by the American population. British servicemen and women should be given the same respect for the job they are doing. Those who want to protest the war can do so - but not at the expense of those who put their lives on the line to defend the right to protest.
Mick Cook, La Crosse Wisconsin USA

I used to be in the University air squadron at Birmingham. I used to have to travel in uniform sometimes but generally tried to avoid it because it makes people uncomfortable. It's not like a police uniform where someone wears it to make it clear they are there to help. It's just a reminder of an authority and power we chose to overlook in this country and seeing a uniform in public reminds many of political instability around the world or in Europe's own history. For this reason there is a healthy mistrust of authority in this country and wearing a uniform can seem inflammatory and needless unless on duty as opposed to Japan for example, where uniform is very important and respected by many. In this country Policemen don't go to the pub in uniform, why should off duty officers and airmen etc wear the uniform. It seems a confused affair. In my experience life was simpler keeping it in my bag until on base.
Jack Nunn, Loughborough