All ABOUT FOOTBALL

That old "BOLDSCOT" has been at me agin. Demands more chat about football. He talks of a hero, Jim Baxter, who was in the bar boozing when he should have been playing. He talks of his opportunity on the pitch as Baxter gets pissed. How true to life and how wonderful. Jim Baxter was one of the best "half-back" players ever to be on display and he rates in any world top twenty. Like a good football player he liked his booze. Rugby players only tried to keep up. But our very own "BOLDSCOT" went onto the field and replaced his hero with himself and all this through popular demand. The rumour is that he did very well. BoldScot remembers it still today after all those years. To stand in for a hero is wonderful and a working class hero is something to be.

Had a similar experience myself once. To stand in the shoes of a hero is ........... let us just say memorable.

THE LIFE AND DEATH OF IT ALL
As December 6th comes around again there are some things that do not change. Over on the good Yellow Duck site the old Nick ( the Santa of Holland) is remembered as a kind of life and death thing. The kids there in the Netherlands needed to be good if life was to continue well for them. On another celebrated site, at Szwagier and the Pirates lair, it becomes today all existential. Not only is Szwgier feeling "unwell today" but the old pirate ponders upon sickness and health. Still moving around the ring of awkwardness we find Anticant swimming firmly in the deep waters of real illness or sickness or the existential shocks that relate to a human body that knows it is not well. I guess somethings never change in life or at least I guess a few basics remain.
No matter the ways that sickness, or illness or whatever the correct term is, is sometimes made into a nasty stigma or a label of untouchableness - no matter these matters - there remains something deep and difficult here. Easy to fool around with or make black ( dark side) jokes about but this life and death existence itself is the only wise smile about.

Finland today, December 6th, is a rather special day for so many. Indepedence for Finland was and is no easy thing but Finns are a very independent lot. Tonight about 18.00 hours, damn it a six, Finns will by the thousands and thousands gather around at different cemeteries throughout the land. It will be dark and usually with a full white snow cover. Then the candles will be flickering. Hundreds of candles everywhere. A foreign visitor is usually amazed at this sight. It is an atmosphere that has power and emotion. But the point is this. This atmosphere is one of respect for those now long since deaprted. It is a new life being given through the memory with death.

This may be called a religious or spiritual experience or not. What I have felt from this dec 6th night of candles is really a respect for life and death itself and a warm feeling for others. Connection is the word that springs to mind. I cannot give another interetation as I am not a member of the church.

But tonight around 6 on the 6th of December I will join the candle burning folk.
There maybe be some that might sense a black-act at work - but no I will not light six candles.
I will however be impressed again to remember and connect with folk and life and death.