In my weekly update, I want to reflect on how I use and balance my time. Just because I’m retired it doesn’t mean I can completely drop my guard on this.
When I retired first of all I had all these grand ideas about getting the balance of my time right. Generally the balance between leisure, serving, exercise, socialising etc has been quite good.
But it’s not perfect as things around the house need some attention from me. By this I mean DIY and decorating a few rooms and he really keeping on top of things. Thing is, I’ve lost some confidence with these things and this has disappointed me.
On Wednesday evening Rachel and I went to an event organised by CARE, a well respected Christian organisation which is a kind of lobbyist and influencer of MPs. They campaign over a wide range of issues such as gambling, human trafficking, abortion. They also have the After Work website and blog which I quite like. We all really enjoyed Graham Kendrick (along with his amazing drummer) who is arguably the best modern Christian song writer around.
At the break time I had a brief chat with Nola Leech, the CEO. I had met her a few years ago in Portcullis House after I’d been to a meeting elsewhere in London. Again I can feel myself yearning to get involved in another cause but I’m just not sure what it is. I do, however, keep thinking of the many victims of war, persecution, extreme poverty who take their chances and head to the west. Some hand over all their money to risk crossing the channel in a flimsy boat and may, or may not, make it. Others who get caught up in the trade of human beings, modern slavery, sexual exploitation and so on. How do we, in our churches or our middle class and cosy lives, welcome those victims into our community for respite?
Another evening and another kind of outing was to a political meet up over a pint in a pub. Mine was a Coke, by the way and I went with my friend Dave. I was quite looking forward to experiencing the grass roots political fever akin to what New Labour might have been in those Notting Hill and Islington days. Nothing like it I’m afraid to say. The candidate for my constituency didn’t come as she apparently lived out of the area and “has a young family”.
Therefore I’m disappointed. I fear there won’t be any serious opposition to our long standing MP who has a very substantial majority. Sadly I’m thinking the opposition are thinking fielding a candidate with a big campaign just isn’t going to pay off.
On a brighter note, I did my regular Parkrun on Saturday morning. I ran quite well but a little short of a PB. Perhaps this was on account of the slippery mud in a woodland stretch and that really slowed me down. My friend Barry beat me, as he often does, and he was trying out his new running shoes with a seriously rugged sole. Kind of go-faster spikes? I did, however, manage to beat my friend Paul and this really surprised me as he normally beats me. We had a coffee afterwards, lasted about 3 hours!
Never enough hours in the day, especially when it comes to those DIY jobs that we keep starting and then never fully finish as the time available for them peters out when other priorities take over. I think I have just had to learn not to bash myself over the head about them, but it is hard after a lifetime of work where every task had to be completed and usually to a deadline too.