Both my parents were bright, well read, learned as they went along and remained open to that all their lives. However, one of the family sayings was “What I don’t know about that would fill a book.”
Book nothing, darlings – a veritable library.
This is about a million miles away from “Well, I don’t know, I’m sure” as if ignorance were somehow distinguished and a right. Look, we can’t all know everything but we can be interested and aware.
My second husband was a headhunter
corporate variety
– he found jobs for men and men for jobs internationally, with considerable success. He had been in the Met, yes, there is a story about that, another time. It is not momentarily relevant. In the 80s and 90s he did a lot of work in the Middle East – he was a great salesman. They loved our engineers, who helped to build desalination plants.
We have just had the hottest summer on record, killingly hot, and we are talking in that desultory British way, about what we can do to meet the changed weather pattern. And I learned from a small article in my much appreciated daily newspaper, (it took a week to get to tv) that Thames Water built a desalination plant involving all the usual cavils – wrong place, too expensive, ineffective – dear heaven, how come we can export skills but not use them to advantage at home ?
We are an island nation, with others like us. Surely we must think about harnessing the surrounding sea to make water without salt ? You know it’s a story when it turns up in the US news report which I read regularly. Though most of us know that Thames Water is like BT – big with big flaws.
In the furnace of the summer days,
you could go shopping early in the morning before the heat rose. But you could not go on the same outing to a department store, or a bank – even one day a week – early. Oh no. That would have required phonecalls, liaison – oldfashioned organization.
Forget AI, this is management which was heretofore in the hands and brains of humans.
Wouldn’t that have been a good story alongside all the heat prostration and dying plants ? Just think – the banks and the stores could even have got together and chosen the same day(s) of early opening.
We mourn the passing of Dolly Parton for all sorts of reasons and we notice how rare it is for one person to end in garlands from all sides – because Dolly could manage
– the look (wigs alone, a full time job): the music, the tours, the arrangements – not by whizbang thank you ma’am – but by the slog that made her career shine, shine, and shine again. I have long thought that musicians are like farmers, they know how hard you have to work to make something grow
Yesterday I met a young woman in Peter Jones which is part of John Lewis. I was looking for two items in a new cosmetic range with which I am impressed. Buying on line is give up and give over time.
PJ’s didn’t have what I wanted. The saleswoman spotted this, and went off to check , in the stockroom and on line. She returned to apologise, and ask if there was another brand acceptable. There was, for one item, but they didn’t have it. At which point (nothing to do with me, I was speechless with admiration) she took the tester to her line manager , who mumbled (I watched and listened) and went past him to the next up the line who agreed with her.
She brought the container back to me and apologized that the store had disappointed me. Free product because it was a tester. I shook her hand and thanked her.
I told her that her behaviour became both her and the store.
Two things to learn from this. There is often a way, I am not going to say always, but often. And we need to learn to use language formally, properly, to reach others. There is no short cut to this if we wish to survive. I am the living exponent of this, talking to reach people was my consolation prize when I was ill as a child. Not talking to fill space – talking to accomplish connection, information, improvement. You don’t need a machine to do this – you need a human.
Annalog 