19th December 2010

My mother would have been 100 today. Certainly in her lifetime she would have enjoyed futuristic comics and those early TV black and whites showing flying cars and aliens in our midst. Somehow nothing was as frightening as those early Quatermass stories and aliens who could only be identified by a bent little finger.
But, no-one could have predicted the deadly advance of the PC, something that has altered all our lives. Now, with one click of that same little finger, we have the whole world at our fingertips. I remember my mother's confusion in '71 with the advent of the UK's decimal currency. How would she have coped with or even comprehended today's confusing techno world?
However, the older I get and the more different people I encounter, some things never change. It matters not a jot what you wear on your head, nor what faith you espouse, nor how technology has changed your life. It's what's in your heart that matters. The essential things remain the same, wherever you live: treat others as you would yourself and always do the 'right thing'. What was it Mill, the philosopher said? Do whatever it takes to make yourself happy, as long as it doesn't hurt others.
That's what my mother would have said back in 1910. Plus ca change, plus la meme chose. Bon anniversaire, Mom.

13th October 2008

'It's a scandalous attack on 500 years of French history', say the masses. Yet more economic woes? No. Someone has actually had the temerity to tinker with their beloved language. What chutzpah. Yes, France is in deep shock because dictionary 'Le Petit Robert' has relaxed its language rules. In the most sweeping linguistic reform in France for centuries, the nation's premier dictionary has cast aside tradition to allow alternative spellings for thousands of words. Accents have become optional, consonants can be doubled on a whim and hyphens will float in and out of literary texts under the changes imposed by Alain Rey, the linguist responsible for the opus. “We have to make spelling simpler,” he said. “It's too complicated and it's not surprising that schoolchildren have trouble learning it.” Well yes. It causes a few problems for we immigrants of a certain age too! A few weeks ago, for a bit of fun, I went along to a local village hall to participate in one of France's annual, national, dictee competitions. It was all very formal, with sealed envelopes which were opened at a precise time all over the country. I don't think I did very well, the problems, as usual, being all those feminine endings, accents and tenses. But the hall had its usual number of local French all sitting down to concentrate hard. Can you imagine that happening in England? But I've long noticed different French spellings anyway, e.g. clé or clef (for key), or imbecillite or imbecilite....enough said. However, the initiative has sparked a furious row in a country that has clung to la langue française as a pillar of its identity ever since King François I made it the official language in 1539. The controversy has now spread to internet forums, where users have denounced the arrival of text-message terms at the heart of Gallic culture.
So, how are we old codgers dealing with all this? Him indoors will still use the pictures in his Brico depot catalogue to point to things he needs. That is, of course, until he's suffering from something unmentionable and then it's poor old-suffering me, of course, who needs to translate in the Pharmacie. Nothing much changes here.