Of The LDS Church’s Continuing Assault On Sexual Minorities And In Praise of Love

Health and sanity warning:  This post is another rant - and a long one at that.  Although reasonably well-informed through extensive reading and personal experience it is not in any sense an academic study.  However, if anything in the following paragraphs prompts anyone to research further I would consider my work here is done.

In my previous essay I tried to explain why I still find myself fascinated by some of the behaviours of the LDS/Mormon church, its leaders and the direction in which their policy pronouncements are taking the organisation.  If this sort of thing irritates or bores you I suggest you move on.  There’ll be nothing for you here and I promise I shall get back to music and boats soon. I would sincerely like to think that I could finally leave Mormonism behind me in a past I could forget.  Unfortunately, people I love and care about (including children and  grandchildren) are still very much caught up in what I have previously referred to as a “cult”.  More recently I have attempted to avoid using this emotive term and tried to describe the Mormon church as a  “high-demand” group.  I came across this term in in Luna Lindsey’s interesting study, “Recovering Agency: Lifting the Veil of Mormon Mind Control”.  She reasoned that the word “cult” tends to close off discussion no matter how many of the criteria the LDS church fit when examining the characteristics of cults.  With some reluctance I find myself having to agree.

That the Mormons (along with a number of other religious, quasi-religious, political and campaigning groups) have been in an ongoing campaign against the rights and freedoms of sexual minorities cannot be contested.  While they have mainly targeted gay men and lesbians, many - if not all - people who shelter metaphorically under a rainbow umbrella have been in their sights.  Mormons have always had a rather idiosyncratic view of appropriate sexual behaviour and sanctions for any who deviate from their rules have been fierce.  From castrations and enforced marriages in the nineteenth century midwest, through to the superstitious lies of much of the twentieth century, the torture of outed students at Brigham Young University in the 1970s who were coerced to undergo experimental psychological conversion involving vomiting and electric shock treatments, to the snake-oil of so-called reparative therapy of more recent times, Mormons have been on the front line of a manufactured battle against the caricature of a threat from homosexuals.  From their beginnings and up to the present, formal and informal expulsions have been a more or less effective means of encouraging discipline in the ranks.

The church, and the campaigning groups they have organised and funded to mask their direct involvement, has lost battle after battle as human rights have become more equally distributed in many western democracies during the past few decades.  Grassroots LDS members have lost life savings with no chance of compensation when they have contributed in faith and as "requested" to misguided homophobic campaigns that have failed as the law has quashed proposed amendments to constitutions and equality legislation.  Even so, the hard-won rights of sexual minorities remain under continued attack.  The Mormon church has generally cloaked its loathing of homosexuality beneath its demands for chastity.  The church has tried repeatedly to control the most intimate aspects of people’s lives in its attempts to consolidate its power and influence.  It is currently facing lawsuits over the one-to-one interviews bishops (the equivalent of a parish priest - Mormons always trade-up the levels in their rigid hierarchy) are “required” to hold with everyone.  Even children and teenagers can be quizzed about personal and sexual matters and parents may not be invited to be present.  I have recently paid the fee and undergone investigation to update my certification with the Disclosure And Barring Service for any work I undertake with children.  I don't know whether Mormon adults working with young people are now required to submit to being checked. They never used to be. Tragically, some bishops have allegedly attempted to cover some suspiciously creepy ground when interviewing young people.  Anyone, child or adult, might be asked to describe intimate thoughts and behaviour as part of a process of determining "worthiness" or perhaps “repentance”. should they be found wanting.  I remember being interviewed by our bishop in the 1970s when my wife and I were asked if our bedroom activities included oral sex or “funny positions like animals”, both apparently on the unapproved list. At the time I thought it odd, embarrassing and intrusive, but I hadn't yet reached the stage where I considered such inappropriate inquisition as being part of the ammunition of control and such was my lifetime of compliance that I accepted it was within the bishop's remit. 

Having eventually lost California’s Proposition 8 after a lot of to-ing and fro-ing and having seen equal marriage become reality in many places, Mormon leaders have continued to try and make the harassment of sexual minorities seem like a worthy cause.  Last November, the church’s Handbook of Instructions for their ecclesiastical leaders was quietly revised to confirm that, should there be any children in a family with same-sex parents, they should be denied access to parts of the church’s programme that peers would normally be expected to enjoy (including, for example, baptism and ordination to the priesthood - all males over the age of twelve are expected to hold the priesthood - defined as an authority to act in the name of God).  The attempt to slip the new clarification in quietly did not go according to plan and the church has probably found the ensuing publicity inconvenient. It has had to send in the apologists to limit the damage.  I suspected that this policy change wouldn’t affect many people, but it seems that, at 26%, Salt Lake City has the largest number of same-sex partnership households with children of any metropolitan area in the USA (see here) However, since this policy appears to contravene their second “Article of Faith” - "We believe that men will be punished for their own sins … "etc - it is yet one more inconsistency that the apologists have to explain.  What is more, the policy change also states that once the children reach the age of eighteen, and are legally able to make their own decisions they may be baptised and receive the priesthood (if they fulfil other worthiness criteria) providing  (unless the policy has been recently modified ... it happens) they disavow the relationship of their parents, agree with church policy to condemn same-sex relationships and move out of the family home.  Nice.

The latest information to cause a bit of a stir is a videoed q & a with “apostle” (I said they always trade up!), David A. Bednar.  He may be following orders, but he seems to have drawn a short straw in becoming an LDS spokesperson on lgbt issues.  Following the recent death of the arch-homophobe, Boyd K Packer, and the recent relative silences of others like Dallin H. Oakes, “Elder” Bednar seems to be proving an intellectual lightweight trying to justify the unjustifiable.   If, however, you want to try and get into the mindset of one of the most powerful lobbying organisations on the planet here’s a little taster.  You can find it on this Facebook post if you are interested.

I shall also add my transcription of his answer to the end of this essay in case you feel moved to study his comments in more detail.  His answer covers a lot of the same ground as this blog essay from 2011.

The question that set his discourse into motion was, 

“How can homosexual members of the church live and remain steadfast in the gospel?”

The first thing that struck me about the question is that it seems manufactured.  Embedded in the question is an assumption that staying in the church is worthwhile.  I have seen figures guessing that between fifty and ninety-plus percent of gay Mormons leave.  Why stay aligned to an organisation that despises you, fails to affirm you as a person of equal worth and opportunity and undermines all your attempts to construct a fulfilling life?

However, following the best political practice he starts by changing the question into a form that places him on familiar territory.  Instead of being truthful and saying from the outset that there is no way that gay and lesbian Mormons can live openly, normally and remain steadfast members of the LDS community, he falls back on the old LDS Newspeak stunt of denying that there is any such person as a homosexual; there are (as LDS leaders have often said) only "homosexual behaviours".  He claims we are not defined by sexual behaviour, but he’s wrong.  As a species we are hardwired to sort and classify as strategies for making sense of our world.  We assume that someone is part of a society's majority unless told otherwise.  Defining by sexual orientation is just one of a number of ways we relate to others.  By claiming otherwise he is flying in the face of the common use of language, scientific research and legally accepted definition.  Of course, we may not be defined solely by orientation, but it is a huge part of who we are and spills over into much of the rest of our lives.  David Bednar goes on to talk about gender being an essential characteristic, the difference between male and female spirits and how differently men and women think and observe as though the Venus and Mars options are fixed.  If people's characters really conformed to these binary definitions I wonder why a church president would need two counsellors, or why there are "quorums" and "high councils" set up to oversee and advise?  The world is never simple and there are often many answers.  We may not be defined solely by sex, sexual orientation, physical ability, intellectual capacity, physical appearance, race, colour, culture, beliefs, circumstances, class, caste, age or any other single description, but we do classify according to situation and circumstance.  For some people it is important to know whether another has been unfailingly law-abiding and while that characteristic may not define them it is one that helps to build a picture.   To claim that we are not defined by sexual behaviour or inclination is misleading.  The church would have no problem defining someone as unworthy if they did not meet the so-called standards and set up home with a lover of the same sex.  Weirdly he starts to talk about beautiful or handsome people. Does this have any relevance or any bearing on the issue, or even reality?  Whatever point he was trying to explain using this odd analogy seems to have missed the target.  Whether "good-looking" or not, anyone might experience the same challenges and despair as anyone else.  If he thinks having acceptable bone structure leads to shallowness of character one of us is missing something important.  Just as perception of physical beauty and other defining characteristics can be placed on a sliding scale so can sexual orientation.  There is a growing body of scientific evidence pointing to orientation being influenced by a variety of factors, including some that occur in the womb.  He talks of what he calls same-sex attraction as a “limitation”.  I have trouble seeing this as any more of a limitation than the limits experienced by those who can only love and desire people of the opposite sex - although, I suppose I should admit that straights have more choice given their relatively greater numbers.  Apart from the biological drive to procreate which is clearly felt more strongly by some than others, what completes us as people is not the fact that we feel more strongly attracted to our own sex, the other or both, but surely the fact that we find we have a capacity to love and be loved.  To point out that we are not victims of homosexual attraction, because we have “agency” is another red herring.  Being gay is not in itself a problem. The attitudes of other people though are sometimes a different matter. We act with agency when we have developed the appropriate intellectual and motor skills.  It is nothing to do with any mystical construct such as “atonement”.  Besides, the only evidence that there was a divine being who was sacrificed as an atonement for the sins of mankind are ancient writings of men and women who needed to find ways of explaining the world in terms that made sense to them.  These days an “atonement” has little meaning to most people beyond that of consolidating power in the hands of a minority, of inducing guilt and encouraging compliance through investing unwarranted power and authority in ancient texts of desert nomads and the insistence of self-appointed leaders who have a clear interest in keeping the money flowing in. 

The main theme of his talk is that church approved relationships are all about “chastity”.  Here is where trotting out the same old lines begins to unravel.  The LDS church spins around the whole concept of “family” - defined as a father/mother/children unit where the husband/father (effectively the family’s patriarch) is obedient to the laws and commandments of God while the wife/mother/children are obedient to the righteous leadership of the family patriarch.  Chastity, according to Mormons, can only allow for sexual relationships between a legally married man and woman.  Anything outside that definition is “sinful”. Outside of the worship services there are numerous social activities in the LDS church designed to bring men and women together so that they will eventually team up as married couples and bear numerous tithe-paying LDS offspring.  There are single young adult groups (for 18-26 year olds) and separate single adult (for the over 26s) activities in every LDS community designed specifically for this purpose.  Whilst, of course, sexual contact between unmarried couples is frowned upon and may, if discovered, lead to disciplinary action (though not always) modest displays of affection are accepted and indulged.  If not (or not yet) partnered, single, heterosexual Mormons live in hope that they can meet their eternal partner and marry in the temple.  Courting couples can sit through church services holding hands and it is appropriate to exchange kisses at other times.  Holding hands is not considered a contravention of the law of chastity.  In contrast, lesbian and gay Mormons have no such hope for any kind of fulfilling future.  They can only anticipate unrelenting celibacy.  They are not even permitted to enjoy the simple comfort of holding the hand of one they love.  The twelfth article of faith states that Mormons are subject to the laws of the land.  Even if a same sex couple can be legally married respect for the law doesn’t apply on Planet Mormon.  A gay couple getting married would lose their church membership.  As has happened in the case of the law of consecration, plural marriage and the institutional racism that has pervaded Mormon history, God changes his mind when the the going gets tough.  Were the church to come under sufficient legal and financial pressure as encouragement to treat gays on a par with straights it is quite possible God would find way to let gay couples marry, live in peace and remain (should they so wish) fully fledged members.  When same sex marriage became legal the law gave the LDS church a way through the challenge.  David Bednar’s rhetoric makes it quite clear that the issue is therefore not about chastity at all. 

How lucky we are that in recent years LDS leaders have begun to teach that  “simply being attracted to someone of the same sex” is not a sin.  That has not always been church doctrine as victims of the “Strengthen Members Committee” or the “Standards Office” at Brigham Young University would testify. This article gives a history of the behaviour of the moral police at BYU.  Spencer W. Kimball’s fire and brimstone book, “The Miracle of Forgiveness” had a harder edge.  Biblical quotes also suggest differently.  Proverbs 23:7 “For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he…”

Matthew5:28 “…whosever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart”.  That the attraction is now not in itself the sin is a modern construct and one that attempts to compromise in order to curry some favour and somehow prove that church leaders are listening.  Again, to suggest that tagging someone with the label, “homosexual” is “inaccurate” makes no sense for reasons I’ve already suggested.  Many church leaders have labelled men and women “homosexuals”.  If you doubt this look again at chapter six of “The Miracle of Forgiveness”.  Anything else is playing a semantic game.  Kimball (whose hand I once had to shake and who gave me the creeps) displays his poor grasp of what homosexuality is when he argues in the same chapter that being gay is wrong because the world’s population would die out if everyone were gay!  Gay relationships have historically been recorded in pretty much all civilisations and have, as far as evidence can be found, remained a fairly consistent and small minority of any of those civilisations.  There would appear to be little danger of the world becoming depopulated as a result of everyone going gay.  It didn’t happen in Ancient Greece and it certainly isn’t going to happen now.

David Bednar claims that Mormons don’t discriminate, he isn’t a bigot and that the LDS church extends “Christlike love to all sons and daughters of God.”  This is simply more evidence that Mormons continue to mangle the English language to try and make it mean whatever they decide it means.  Somebody please buy the man a dictionary.  Of course they discriminate as the November policy clarification continues to show.

He talks of “the Father’s plan for the eternal destiny and happiness of his children”.  Again this is manipulative fantasy.  Because he read something in a book, whether it be two hundred or two thousand years old, or because he has good feelings about something (the recently past president/prophet, Gordon B. Hinckley's definition of how God talks to his prophets) doesn’t provide sufficient evidence that he is right and everyone else is wrong.  I may say the same about this blog post, but the difference is that I am pretty sure that others may have different opinions from me and that does not make either of us good or bad; simply different.

So, he is not a bigot (yes he is); the LDS church does not discriminate (yes it does); neither Joseph Smith nor Thomas Monson created the plan (I’ll give him that one, since it has evolved over the years by committee decisions made by many, many men); “the Saviour, through his atonement makes the plan operational, effective in our lives and the father has not changed his mind about how the plan should operate” (meaningless, self-referential, manipulative and delusional).

His comments about the necessity for male and female spirits in a relationship is cute but again shows a wilful ignorance and shameful lack of understanding.  I am, as anyone with the patience to have read this rant will realise, writing from a personal and anecdotal perspective.  I have been in two long-term relationships - a straight marriage (or rather one that I came to realise was a mixed-orientation marriage) and a gay partnership of well over a decade.  I suspect that I shall never quite be able to shake off the sorrow, the shame and the guilt for the failure and pain caused to people I love through the failure of my marriage.  I shall, however, always be grateful to have been in a relationship with P, with whom I have discovered how to love and how to be loved, how to support and how to allow myself to be supported.  P and I are two individuals who love and trust each other.  We don’t agree on everything, but we talk and we discuss and we can accept and respect points of view that are different.  We don’t shout, we don’t accuse, we don't coerce or manipulate and we really are able to talk about anything.  I have to conclude, contrary to Elder Bednar’s assertions, that these priceless bits of self-knowledge are unlikely to have come to me during my marriage.  I am almost certain I am a better person, absolutely certain I am happier, better balanced and more fulfilled for knowing and loving P.  My family relationships have been through difficult and sad times, but we have all emerged on the other side stronger than before, each loving the others and all in regular contact again.

I would love to see a time when all members of my family are free of the control of the high-demand group that is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I missed my window opportunity to have much say when I recognised the futility of trying to change anyone's beliefs. I decided it was more respectful, courteous and grown up to let my loved ones make their own choices. That's not to say it isn't important to be prepared to account for ourselves and our actions. I see, though, no need to have respect for particular ideas and belief systems. All beliefs should be subject to serious scrutiny and, having passed muster, not be let off the hook of continued examination. Ideas come from people and beliefs are there to be challenged.  I can, though, accept and respect my loved ones for having made good choices.  They will, of course, have to live with whatever consequences ensue - as shall I. As for good, that remains undefined in this exercise.  I am relieved that, through whatever twists and turns of mental gymnastics they need to perform, the committed Mormons in my family show their love and interest in me and my life along with whatever respect I may have earned as father, grandfather and father-in-law. In the unlikely event that any of them read this, my antipathy to the organisation that plays such a significant part in their lives does not diminish in the slightest my love and respect for each of them.  In the end it is not about obedience, or chastity, or the money, or atonement or any other myth or system of control.  Isn't it about love?

I hope THAT is responsive to the response.

Here is the text of David A. Bednar's answer to "a question from Chile", 

“How can homosexual members of the church live and remain steadfast in the gospel?”

“First I want to change the question.  There are no homosexual members of the church. We are not  defined by sexual attraction.  We are not defined by sexual behaviour.  We are sons and daughters of god and all of us have different challenges in the flesh.  There are many different types of challenges.  Would it be a challenge to be very beautiful or very handsome and in the world in which we live never develop deep character because we are able to open doors and have success just because of our physical appearance and we become shallow and superficial in many aspect of our lives?  That can be a challenge in the flesh.

Some people have physical limitations.  They may be born with a body that is not fully functional or we may have an inclination to be attracted to those of the same sex.  Through the atonement of Jesus Christ we are blessed with moral agency.  Agency is the capacity to act and not simply be acted upon.  (Holds up bottle)  This is a bottle of water.  It is an object.  It has no capacity to act. It is an object that can only be acted upon.  So this object moves if I cause it to move or if some other force causes it to move … You and I are not objects.  We are agents blessed wth agency because of the atonement of Christ.  And with that agency we are to act and not be acted upon.  That agency gives us the capacity to determine how we will respond to the variety of challenges we experience in the flesh.  So you choose - you act in accordance with the teachings of Christ.  Simply being attracted to someone of the same gender is not a sin.  There are many members of the church who may have some manifestation of that attraction.  They honour their covenants.  They keep the commandments.  They are worthy.  They can receive the blessings of the temple and they can serve in the church.  It is when we act on the inclination or the attraction, that’s when it becomes a sin. So, the reason I began my answer as I did is that in this question the word “homosexual” was used to describe or label a member of the church. It’s an inaccurate label. We are sons and daughters of god and we determine how we respond to the variety of challenges that we face in mortality through the proper exercise of our moral agency.

Now I want to speak very directly to you. The world teaches that we must be tolerant and accepting. There are some things we do not accept or tolerate. We love all people with whatever challenge any person faces. The purpose of the gospel of Jesus Christ and of the Saviour’s church is to assist people in receiving the strength to deal with the challenge. So we do not discriminate and we are not bigots. We extend Christlike love to all sons and daughters of god. But what is the purpose of the father’s plan?  We come to the earth, we are blessed to receive a physical body.  Marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and the family is central to the father’s plan for the eternal destiny and happiness of his children. That plan is halted in anything but a marriage between a man and a woman. Now Joseph Smith didn’t create the plan.  Thomas Monson didn’t create the plan. God, the eternal father created the plan. The Saviour, through his atonement makes the plan operational, effective in our lives and the father has not changed his mind about how the plan should operate. So please do not let the voices of the world confuse you or lead you in a different direction as you come to better understand the Father’s plan then you will understand the purpose for marriage between a man and a woman. I hope that’s responsive to the question …

See a related point is that there is a divinely designed difference between a female spirit and a male spirit. You need to read and study over and over again the Family Proclamation.  It teaches that gender is an essential characteristic of individual pre-mortal, mortal and eternal identity and purpose. So whenever you take those divinely designed differences the capacities and talents of a female spirit and of a male spirit and they are sealed together by the power of the priesthood it creates a unity and a oneness, it creates a whole that cannot be achieved any other way. Sister Bednar and I have been married for forty-one years.  She is (other than the Holy Ghost) … the greatest teacher I have ever had. She does not think like I think. She does not see what I see and I learn a lot from the things she sees and thinks that are different from me. Sometimes men and women get frustrated with each other because they don’t see things the same way. They are not supposed to see things the same way and the education that comes with a man and a woman in a marriage ordained of God is one of the richest blessings of this life. Now we’ve taken a long time responding to this question, but hopefully you can sense that the length of this answer emphasises the importance of this topic in the world in which we live.  That’s why we have taken quite so long.”

Someone Is Telling Me Lies

First of all I need to remind myself that this is a blog post I am writing, not a book, although I suppose it is possible that one day a book could be forthcoming.  Secondly, although I stopped believing in  Mormon teachings more than half a lifetime ago, and finally resigned my membership more than a decade ago (when I discovered such an action was even possible) the LDS church still manages to reach into my life and I continue to let it.  Thirdly, I wanted to respond to a recent video recording of one of the Elders in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, David A. Bednar.  That will probably be my next post, but before doing that I felt a bit of context would help.

Mormons love their witty phrases and as each new one gathers momentum through repetition in Sunday talks, meetings and conferences, one that probably applies to me now is “they leave the church, but they can’t leave it alone”. I don’t think this is because I carry the memory of either a happy or unhappy upbringing or feel any great sense of attachment or loss, but more because of the danger I think the LDS church poses to others.  I admit a certain anger when I discover how many lies I have been told and have in the past accepted without subjecting them to appropriate scrutiny, but like they say, “When the prophet speaks, the debate is over”.  Yes the lies have caused me anguish, but I have been much more angry at myself for my gullibility. 

On the face of it Mormons are almost benign in the same way that The Hitchiker’s Guide To The Galaxy describes Earth as “mostly harmless”.  I had one or two really lovely friends when I was involved with the LDS church.  I felt that most of the people on the ground were pleasant enough and honourable, but rarely was I able to cultivate the strength and quality of friendships that I have always enjoyed outside the organisation.  I rarely encountered anyone who seemed to share my interests in music and other arts or ideas, philosophy and politics.  Local leaders appeared to work hard to get me to abandon my musical allegiances, preferred activities and even my outside friends, unless they were targets as potential recruits.  Pronouncements would often be made in church meetings that caricatured in a most derogatory manner activities I found lifted me into happy places with no apparent evidence except that the prophet had decided that Satan was active in these projects.  Despite the fact I rarely agreed with the LDS position on many aspects of social policy and culture I didn’t see through claims that the church was led by prophets and seers until much later. 

It is known that the church does not tolerate dissent and people who break their moral codes and covenants have always been brought before their kangaroo courts and disciplined with excommunication or the lesser punishment of disfellowshipping - unless the perpetrator was deemed important enough for their misdemeanors to be forgiven (that may be something to explore another day). It is not until the past decade or so that I discovered the even more extreme punishments meted out without challenge in the church’s early history.  My essay about “The Ballad of Thomas Lewis” mentions something of this in the 2015 post “Relections on Life In A Cult 1”.

In my childhood, through my adolescence and into adulthood, until I stopped going to church, there seemed to be an extraordinary interest in matters related to sexuality.  This is particularly odd (although Mormons relish their reputation of being a “peculiar people”) since Mormon sexual appetites have been the source of much controversy and strife since the beginning.  The founder, Joseph Smith, married many women (at least thirty-four on record, two of whom were just fourteen years old), mostly without the knowledge or approval of his legal wife, Emma, and often without the knowledge of their own husbands whom Smith had sent away on missions that may have lasted for years.  The church was forced to cave on this “eternal law” in order to avoid the crippling sanctions, as well as the threatened imposition of others, which were causing damage to the organisation.  The manifesto of 1890 told their men to obey the law of the land and stick to marrying one wife.  This was not altogether successful and a further manifesto had to be issued in 1904 when plural marriages had continued to be found being conducted in the USA, Canada and Mexico, even among church leaders.  

In a similar vein, the history of the LDS church with regards to people of African descent has been less than honourable.  Brigham Young (another “prophet”, with fifty-five wives, and the second president of the church after Smith) was responsible for racist comments that nowadays are rightly considered outrageous.  Among these were that men having as little as one drop of African blood in their bodies would never be allowed to hold the priesthood, when such a “privilege” was afforded all other “worthy” males from the age of twelve upwards.  He didn’t think much of racially mixed marriages either, 

"Shall I tell you the law of God in regard to the African race? If the white man who belongs to the chosen seed mixes his blood with the seed of Cain, the penalty, under the law of God, is death on the spot. This will always be so," (Journal of Discourses, vol. 10, p. 110).  

Being a prophet he should have had at least some insight that, in 1978, another “prophet”, Spencer W. Kimball, would declare that God had said that all worthy males may at last hold the priesthood.  Perhaps it was coincidence that by the 19070s the church was having some trouble getting permission to build a temple in Brazil and that the Brigham Young University sports teams had a bit of a problem arranging fixtures with other teams whilst the racial bans were still in place.  That’s not to mention the threat of the loss of tax-exempt status if the policy did not change.

So, coming back to sex, and growing up with all these dire warnings, I eventually felt resigned to damnation for failing to conquer the temptation to masturbate.  This wasn’t the worst of it though.  LDS teachings about homosexuality blighted much more of my life.  For several years speakers to the general congregations on Sundays would find some way to thump the pulpit about the evils of homosexual behaviour.  To my shame I bought into the lies that homosexuality was a deficiency that could be overcome as one might attempt to overcome an illness or an addiction.  As I was coming to the end of my teens there was still an overwhelming sense that homosexuality could be cured through making a good marriage.  Many years later, whilst in counselling after finally being diagnosed as having tried to cope with depression for much of my life, I worked out that I had never before been able to identify as gay because the very idea was simply something that could not exist.  My counsellor explained that it was in every sense “beyond the pale”.  I admit I have wondered about what could have been had I flowered into a healthy and whole adult - assuming such a creature has ever existed.  I am pretty sure now that I would have recognised some people’s loving approaches and I may well have explored relationships with one or two men for whom I can now admit I felt great affection. At the time, though, my feelings and attractions to other males were something I seriously thought was a phase I would grow out of.  By the time I reached my late thirties I had to begin to face the fact that I would probably not now grow out of these feelings … feelings for which I still didn’t have a name.

During the campaign for the November 2008 presidential election in the USA there was an even greater campaign being fought in California.  It was a campaign for God and for the moral salvation of the people of the state.  On 16th June 2008 the state began to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.  For Mormons, Roman Catholics and others holding strong religious convictions this was anathema.  An organisation known as Protect Marriage was formed from a number of feeder campaigns to fight this equality measure.  The presidential election was also an opportunity to introduce changes to California’s state constitution and “Proposition 8”, defining marriage as the legal joining of one man and one woman, was devised.  Voting on this was to be taken in California on the same date as the main election.  As with any political process in the USA a vast amount of money was required.  The film “8:The Mormon Proposition” explores how the LDS church was instrumental in finding the resources necessary to run the campaign.  Many people sacrificed life savings and their children’s college funds, because their bishops told them God required the money.  Any adult Mormon who had been “through the temple” would also have promised in a solemn oath to give all their time, talents and everything with which the Lord had blessed them to furthering the cause.  These oaths were naturally used as further leverage.  LDS leaders also suggested names of suitable people to front the organisation who would not immediately be associated with the LDS church.  Naturally they also denied any official involvement and had worked to cover their tracks.  They were found to have submitted falsified accounts of their support for Prop 8 and following an enquiry after the events had to revise their figures substantially upwards with suspicions that there was still much unaccounted for expenditure.  

I was very surprised to discover a personal dimension to this campaign. One of my own brothers, who had lived in the USA for many years, had donated money and gone out canvassing on the streets in California near to where he was living at the time.  He also told me it would be inappropriate for P to attend Dad’s funeral.  He had to go back to the USA before the funeral.  We ignored him and P was at the funeral to be my rock and my support.

As events unfolded over the coming months I felt an urge to try and work out my thoughts about the situation.  Coming out had cost me so much in terms of security, health and family relationships that I sure as hell wasn’t going back in again!  I sat down with a piece of paper and a pencil and the words to “Someone Is Telling Me Lies” eventually appeared.  As I continued to work on what I thought was going to be a poem it became clear it was really meant to be a song.  I hadn’t attempted to express any thoughts as either poems or songs for more than thirty years.  I had no plan to write more songs or to perform this one.  I had not even given any thought to how I would describe myself.  It was simply an expression of how I felt about those events.  I recycled a tune I had composed for my ceilidh band (and had rarely used) that I thought would work in this context.  I ended up recording the song using my Mac-based home studio and Logic and created a page on MySpace.  To this point, it is one of only two songs (the other being "Who's The Fool" for a local environmental campaign) I have purposely recorded as Marshlander and it sounds very different from what I now do in live performance.  Writing this unlocked a door through which trickled more songs.  When two friends started an acoustic music night in Downham Market I rather liked the idea of being completely acoustic, so Marshlander became a singer of his own songs with simple guitar and percussion accompaniment.  Maybe, when I get round to recording more of my songs properly, I’ll be tempted to throw the kitchen sink and the contents of the boat into the production.  I think though that I should probably not ignore the fact that anyone who has seen me perform solo will know me as an acoustic musician.  We’ll see.

Anyway, this song is now six or seven years old and I have since rewritten the words almost completely and worked a little on my singing voice too.  I have only ever performed it once and that was acoustically.  There may never be another Marshlander song like this.  For whatever it is worth, this is Marshlander history.

Go to this link for this old pre-formed Marshlander recording

A different and later version of some of the lyrics for this song.  It's all different these days.

Dear Mr. Carter

After my father died in 2011 I received a letter from an officer at the local council.  The author could not be certain which pronouns he was supposed to use so he pretty much tried them all. Although the letter was addressed to me, he offered his condolences on the occasion of my death and enclosed a glossy leaflet all about the Council's options for dealing with a loved one's remains.  I felt his information to be surplus to requirements for the twin reasons that (a) had I really passed away I couldn't have used the information and (b) we had buried my father in one of his cemeteries four days earlier.  I have to assume that the whole exercise was designed to cheer me up at a very dark and difficult time.   No one could have been crass enough to have sent such a badly-worded and misdirected letter at such a sensitive time ... surely?  As a strategy, I felt it was risky.  

I was in no state to respond at the time.  The loss of my father also meant the imminent loss of what had been my home for the preceding eight years including the time I cared for him as he became increasingly ill and in need of support.  I had other priorities.

It was about a year before I felt able to return to this letter and compose a response.  I don't suppose "Mr Carter" will ever hear about this, or even be aware that I have been singing about him all this time.  Probably just as well.  I changed his name for the song.  It didn't seem fair to single him out among his colleagues, since I suppose he was only doing his job to the best of his ability.  I trust that, these days, he has acquired some skills in communicating with the bereaved - or has been moved to other duties.

Dear Mr Carter,
May I thank you for your letter of condolence that you sent me on the sixth of May.
You could not have been politer, but you're clearly not a writer when you muddle up your pronouns in this careless way.
Are you singular or plural?  “Royal Wes” sometimes obscure all sense of meaning undermining what you mean to say.
But despite some reservations you mean well, although I fear your near dismissal.
Your epistle isn't clear.

Dear Mr Carter,
May I thank you for your letter of condolence that you sent me on the sixth of May.
It was nice to get your letter, but I hoped for something better than your startling vignette that I had passed away.
It wasn't even recently, but rather more indecently you wrote that I'd been buried months ago and so I say
That, as an agent of the council, it seems odd that you renounce all normal courtesies when writing day-to-day.

Dear Mr Carter,
May I thank you for your letter of condolence least expected of deliveries this year.
Almost churlish now to mention, but there is a wee convention that a letter to the buried might seem insincere.
Plot XYZ2-80 my abode, but still quite weighty my concern that you have spurned it to address me here,
Mill Road, Walpole St Peter, undeniably a feat of intuition.  Recognition somewhat queer.

Whether Walpole now or Gayton I'll confess it is a weight on my shoulders since I don't know which is my abode,
My domicile or dwelling and the strain is surely telling.
There must be some administrative way to ease my load?

Dear Mr Carter,
May I thank you for your letter of condolence that arrived here Thursday, May the twelfth.
Now I'm dead what are my options beyond council tax reduction?
I don't mean to cause a ruction, Let's just blame my health.
As you note I've been ill lately and it's true I would be greatly obligé if you’d delegate me a rebate by stealth.
No confession would be needed if you heeded my request to do your best to add a little to my wealth.

Dear Mr Carter,
May I thank you for your letter of condolence from the bottom of my beating heart.
And the leaflet you enclose will come in handy, I suppose, in my repose and heaven knows will give a flying start
To my life in the hereafter.  If you'll please excuse my laughter while I sing about a grafter who will soon depart
From his office at the council if he doesn't soon renounce all stupid letters.
THAT WOULD MAKE A DECENT START!

Exasperation's what I'm feeling while I'm reeling from your spieling
In the matter of bereavement and my family's needs.
Consider this embarrassment occasioned by this harassment.
Stick to writing mission statements - crap that no one reads!

So,
Dear Mr Carter,
May I thank you for your letter of condolence that you sent me on the sixth of May.
I so want to be offended, but least said is soonest mended.
You intended no offence, but please I ought to say that, when writing people letters, better show them to your betters before posting as a roasting is unsightly, rightly.
Pray remember recently bereaved become aggrieved when we receive some pointless note, sent out by rote (and lest my fingers find your throat) don’t you dare try to wish me a nice day.

"Dear Mr. Carter" © Marshlander 2012
Thanks to Jason Burgess for the video shot at Norwich Arts Centre 27th February 2016

Of Bread And Solar Aspirations

I'm going solar.  At least that is the plan.  Anyone who has read any of the essays in this blog will have realised my level of technical knowledge and skill is modest.  Therefore I have arranged for reinforcements and Onboard Solar Tim will be with me in about nine days’ time.  My life may be simple up to a point (even if extraordinarily complicated in many other ways), but I do have one or two luxuries.  On these I have spent hard cash.  You may know about my washing machine, but have I mentioned my electric bread-maker?  Both of these are entirely unnecessary from a practical and economic point of view, but from a time-saving point of view I consider both essential.  In fact, excuse me for fifteen minutes while I prepare the ingredients for my next loaf.

Thank you.  I have been making bread from the raw ingredients since April, 2003.  That was when my circumstances changed sufficiently to force me to feed myself for the first time in my life.  How feeble is that for a for a fifty-two year-old man?  I had just started travelling to and from France to see P, although we had been pen (or rather, keyboard) pals for some months up till then, and I was beginning to get a taste for the products of the local boulangerie near his place in the Alps.  I knew I could never compete with a maître boulanger, but I thought I would like something that tasted better than most of what I was buying in the UK and perhaps become a little more aware about the ingredients that were being used.  Of course, I don’t know that I could ever really know that without knowing the farms where said ingredients were produced, but it makes me feel better to know I am intervening in what has until this period been a bit a mystery.  I make my bread with mostly strong wholemeal flour milled about thirty miles away.  I have no idea how much further away the wheat is actually grown.  I add some strong white from the same factory.  I think this makes the bread rise a little better.  Maybe that too is just a fancy, but my observations seem to bear this out.

So, I want to come off-grid, or at least be able to have the option, and I want to keep being able to use my kitchen luxuries, both of which require 230v power.  Talking this through with Solar Tim, I discovered I would need to upscale my leisure batteries and inverter.  I rarely use the 1kw inverter I have at the moment, so it may seem bonkers to be planning on replacing it with a 2.5kw monster.  That, though, along with having the engine running and being on the move, is what I am going to need to be able to wash my clothes when off-grid - assuming I ever get the boat moving for long enough without breaking down.  To service an inverter of that size though I shall need more amps.  In other words I need to more than double the leisure battery power I have been using for the past four years.

“You link leisure batteries together in parallel”, is the received wisdom.  That means joining all the positives together and all the negatives together.  This is what my present arrangement looked like with two batteries each rated at 110 amp hours.  I never understood how my mains charger managed to find and keep both batteries charged, but I accepted that this is what was what was happening because everything kept on working.  My C-Tek M300 charger has been linked with clusters of other wires to both terminals of the first battery - a monster that I can barely lift and that in turn is connected to a far more manageable second battery.  Having remained unconvinced that the received wisdom tells the whole story I started doing a little research i.e. type into DuckDuckGo (my search engine of choice that doesn’t track the user like Google).  After a lot of searching I discovered some YouTube videos that seemed to suggest my leisure batteries had been wrongly wired all along.  That could explain why I have had to replace the second battery twice!

Watching these videos I began to see that a faulty array of connections are what killed my dead batteries.  Method 1 on this link was how my two batteries have been configured all this time.  I didn’t know any different and just accepted what came with the boat.  My configuration, though, meant that power was mainly being drawn from and supplied to the first battery.  My suspicions were correct.  This is what I should have done:


However, this became more complicated when connecting up four batteries.  At £100 a time I really didn’t want to finish them off and have to buy more replacements.  I sat and looked at the batteries for at least a couple of hours trying to work out what was likely to be the best way of connecting them.  Clearly, the instruction to connect them "in parallel” was not sufficient for such a bear of little brain as me.  I tried joining the batteries’ positive terminals as follows: 1 to 2, 2 to 3 and 3 to four.  I did the same thing with the negative terminals.  Then I connected the red cluster of wires from the installation to the positive of battery 1 and the black cluster to the negative of battery 4.  This at least followed the pattern above, or so I thought.

Behold! Spaghetti Junction.

After a while my M300 charger started telling me that it had decided there was no charge in the battery and it was going through its reconditioning cycle.  At that point I panicked and disconnected everything leaving myself without a working refrigerator, no internal lighting and no domestic water.  That was a trifle inconvenient.  I resorted to further web research as well as trying to make sense of the advice in a supposedly essential book I once bought on a visit to the Canal Museum near King’s Cross Station in London - "The 12v Bible For Boats".  The more I read the more confused I became and I could still not find an explanation of how to link four batteries in parallel though until two discussion forums I had written to pointed me towards SmartGauge Electronics.

I had to read the linked article through at least three times and study the diagrams very carefully, before the dimmest of lights began to dawn.  I began to see that the best way to connect my four batteries would probably be:


I ran out of time before leaving for France, so that will be my project on return.  Of course, the challenge now is to make sure I have the correct wires to join everything up.  Then I have to work out whether I have cables heavy enough and safe enough to connect to my new inverter … whatever it turns out that I buy.  I have to have a conversation wth Solar Tim before he appears next week.  Time is running out.

Of Gigs And Overnighting Airports

It’s the end of a very long couple of days and I am sitting in Café Balzar at Stansted Airport.  I hadn't intended being here, at least not today and my system is in shock.  Having not eaten properly for a couple of days, (damn the Mini-Egg season) I thought that, since I’m here, I should find some real food.  Café Balzar had some tempting vegetarian offerings on the menu board outside - or what passes for an outside at an airport.  However, when the entire edifice is under a dome just like the ones you see in all those cities depicted in miserable science fiction futures it is hard to know what “outside" means.  Unfortunately at 11.30pm there is not such a tempting menu inside.  I thought the goat’s cheese, chick peas and vegetables on a flat bread base sounded respectable, so that’s what I ordered.  I wasn’t wearing my glasses and I really should know to wear my spectacles when perusing menus.  My plate is now empty except for the pile of sliced red chillies that were cunningly hidden at the end of the list of ingredients and under everything else on the flatbread pizza - and my mouth is on fire. 

 I am unenthusiastic about spending another night in an airport waiting for the following day when I can travel.  It was only a few weeks ago I did the same thing at Gatwick.  I’m off to see P tomorrow.  We have been apart for nearly two months and that is too long between visits and, quite frankly, too long between hugs, kisses, shared food, films, music and deep conversation.  I need my batteries recharged.  That doesn’t mean I had to come here tonight and sit up not sleeping because I am so excited.  I shall try to sleep at some point, but if I do grab a few winks they will undoubtedly be fitful ones.  I’d have preferred another night on the boat.  The soothing movement and sound of the water, the occasional call of the pheasant roosting in the willow across the river, late night discussions among moorhens and the solid fuel stove at the bow end throwing out the therms and keeping me warm and comfortable in my bunk adjacent to the engine room.  

My journeys to Switzerland, France and recently, Iceland and the USA are reliant on a network of friends who kindly allow me to park my van in their driveways.  Such is the price of living in The-Back-Of-Beyond.  I am fortunate to have friends who live in towns with railway stations.  They may not feel quite as fortunate in having a needy friend with a dirty van.  A couple of weeks ago at a gig I floated the question of parking on the keyboard player’s drive.  I do this when he doesn't have visitors and if I travel during the period from December to April when I can fly from Stansted to Geneva (my spellchecker keeps rewriting “Stansted" as “Stagnated” which, in my present state, is both irritating and mildly amusing).  He lives in a town on the Cross Country train line between Birmingham and Stansted Airport and it is by far the cheapest option.  

Unfortunately, the best laid plans are subject to railway timetables and replacement bus services.  I had planned to go tomorrow, but that’s a Sunday, and Sunday - as everyone knows - is the day the railway business inflicts special misery on the travelling public.  Over the past few years I have discovered that Cross Country Trains specialise in cancelling their one train an hour with little notice, so it is imperative to time the journey to account for this possibility by factoring in an extra hour.  It is no good arriving at the airport after the flight has flown.  One might have hoped that an infrequent train service to an airport, specially London’s “third” airport would be offered some form of protection by the services that connect it to its feeder constituency, but that is not the case.  Neither do they run trains in the evening when flights are still coming in or on Sunday mornings when flights (like mine) are flying out.  What is the point of an airport service that doesn’t serve?  Consequently, after an action-packed day I returned to the boat to pack and finally get round to working out my travel plans to meet my flight (I said it had been a busy couple of days).  I could not really come up with a workable combination of trains and friends’ driveways.  The only option was to take up the keyboard player’s offer , but go tonight instead and sit it out eating expensive, mouth-searing Tunisian pizza.  With an hour to go I set off into the night at speed, breaking all my own rules and the law by phoning the keyboard player’s wife to check that it was okay to turn up twelve hours early.  I suppose I am glad the airport stays open all night, unlike King’s Cross Station … but that’s another story.

Let me tell you about my busy couple of days.  I still have not resolved the battery and inverter issues on the boat, but they have had to take a bit of a supporting worry to getting some songs sorted for Saturday’s half-hour slot at Norwich Arts Centre.  NAC is probably one of my favourite places to be entertained, even though I really do not like the main auditorium in the converted church.  What makes it special for me is the staff and (unusually for me) the bar.  The bar is one of those rooms where I have frequently gone to meet friends and even the room itself feels friendly.  Every time I have gone to see something happen at the centre the staff have without fail been helpful, courteous and, on occasion, downright considerate.  Today was no exception and although I have been to events many times where friends have played, today was my first time there as a solo performer.  I was booked to be one of four acts for a monthly session known as Play The Music - or possibly Play The Acoustic Stage, I get confused - in the bar I was pleased to note.  My fellow performers for today were to be Chris Pidgeon (a solo singer/songwriter with a row of pedals including a looper), Andy Kirkham (singer/songwriter and guitarist very extraordinary) and Hot Raisin (a female guitar duo singer/songwriter act).  I was on third.  The moment I walked through the door with guitar and My-Special-Stool in one hand whilst hauling my footdrums with the other I was approached by someone who wanted to show me where I could stow my kit safely and securely until I was required to set it up.  I was asked if I needed to be shown where to go and if I knew where “the facilities” were.  If only some schools could rehearse similar courtesies.  I lost count long ago of the number of times I have driven for two or three hours to arrive and set up for whatever workshop has been booked to be greeted on arrival by a harassed, but otherwise armour-plated, receptionist/secretary and not even asked if I had had a good journey, let alone offered a glass of water.  On one occasion I took five rather unanticipated hours to get through what appeared to be roadworks extending for the majority of the ninety-mile journey to a school in Derby and all they could manage was to demand that I set up as quickly as possible because the children were waiting.  Of course no one was available to help unload about forty drums so the setting up took even longer because of the number of trips I had to make and being unable to get my vehicle anywhere near where I was working.  I was embarrassed enough to be late without needing to be treated like a naughty Year One pupil.  No, in this regard Norwich Arts Centre is exemplary.  It was no trouble to get someone with the key to open up the room two or three times when I needed access.  It was always carefully locked afterwards too.  Small things maybe, but to me they seem important enough to make a difference.  I was delighted to be sitting in the bar waiting for the organisers to show up when I heard something familiar on the sound system.  “Is this Camille?” I asked the woman behind the bar.  She smiled that someone knew and appreciated her choice and we talked about this wonderful French artist for a while.  I had the great privilege of seeing Camille perform with her band when she was touring the (at the time) newish album, “Ilo veyou”, a couple of years ago.  This was in one of my other favourite arts centres, Château Rouge, a walk into town from P’s apartment.  Bar Woman did not know this later album.  She was playing “Le Fil” which, to my mind, is a testament to Camille’s incredible creativity in that she created an album full of innovation with all the songs linked by The Thread - a drone that sounds throughout the album.  If you don’t know it, you must seek it out immediately.

Sean took some photographs with my phone

The organiser of the Play The Acoustic Stage gig had promised an attentive audience, my favourite kind.  I was rather dismayed that the audience was not as attentive as I had hoped during the first two sets.  There were little outbreaks of conversation around the room and sometimes the performers were trying to outloud them.  I don’t find that works well for me.  I am far too thin-skinned.  When my turn came I had to speak over some chat as I made some fatuous opening remarks, but I chose to sing “Cruiser” as my first song.  I love to watch an audience during songs like this.  I am not aware of another song that tackles this subject in the same way.  Soon after starting there was hush.  I think people started off being curious about the drums, but as they could hear the words they really listened to the song and stuck with me for the rest of the set.  I have often wondered why I think I do this to myself.  I don’t feel I am a natural performer.  Attacks of nerves can sap my memory, my fingers and my feet and strike at any point during a set.  Today, I got to the end of my short set and realised I had actually enjoyed myself.  I might do it again somewhere, then.  After “Cruiser” I sang “Circumcision”, “Fighting For Me” and “Dear Mr Carter”.  

One of Sean's somewhat more arty shots!

Many thanks to Jason who extended the invitation to play, to Ryan who looked after the sound very efficiently, to my fellow performers and to my new friend, Sean, who treks over to Grange Farm Studios for our monthly Hangout sessions, but who came along today.  It is nice to see some friendly faces in the audience.

Of Testing Times, Freeze-Shrunken Testicles And A Bottle Of Wine

After last night's very satisfactory ceilidh gig (for a doctor who was moving to Scotland from just outside Cambridge and whose friends, families and colleagues had mocked up a Burns' Night celebration a few weeks late, but complete with haggis arriving in grand style to us playing "Scotland The Brave" [prior to a brave attempt by said organiser to address the haggis with the traditional Burns Ode] - a last second request by the organiser who realised she had no one to pipe in the offering  [and for which our fiddle player, much as I love him, didn't know the B music, so played the A tune from memory on repeat]) I was roused from my early morning reading - an attempt to get my eyes to stay open after slumping into bed at 3am - by a cheery call, "Hello" and a knock on the boat.  I rarely have visitors, so assumed it was for someone else, until the realisation kicked in that there was no one else.  Being entirely inappropriately garbed to receive visitors, specially unknown ones, I rummaged through the tangle of clothes to locate unflattering elasticated trousers and a long-sleeved t-shirt, the nearest things to a covering that could preserve a measure of modesty and be thrown on quickly.  By the time I had stumbled to the front of the boat and unzipped the cratch cover, my visitor was striding along the river bank away from the boat.  I spilled on to the jetty and he must have heard the noise, because he turned round and came back.  At the same time I registered a bottle of something alcoholic standing on the iron table that once graced my father's patio.  I'm not a drinker, although I have attempted a few times in the past couple of years to discover the attraction, so it was obviously someone who didn't know me particularly well - unless he had planned on organising a party.  I assumed he wasn't one of the Jehovah's Witnesses who seem to find their way to the farm periodically through some supernatural homing instinct.

It turned out to be Sunken Boat Man.  He has always struck me as a perfectly affable person, but I have generally kept an unfair distance in his company before.  He seems to smile a lot, which makes the best of most people's features, but I have never filed him in the "handsome" drawer.  He has, though, grown one of those currently fashionable backwoodsman beards and this has changed  his appearance dramatically.  I know he's not reading this but, my friend ... this really suits you.  He is an interesting person.  As I mentioned before, he has been dismantling and rebuilding engines since before he could walk (allegedly) and he now works for a very large multi-national engineering conglomerate that takes him all over the country.  He was on the Welsh borders when I spoke to him on the telephone on Tuesday about his poor boat.  It seems that no one else had been in touch about this mishap.  I find it strange that, when there were people on hand who knew, it took someone who had travelled many thousands of miles during the previous twenty hours to let him know his boat had probably been under water for several days.  He also has an interesting personal background.  I would love to know more about his family.  Maybe It will happen one day.  He seems to be estranged from his family of Romany travellers.  There is a tale to be told there, I think.

Sunken Boat Man had left the wine - a cheeky little South-East Australian Cabernet Sauvignon . Shiraz . Merlot 2015 (I don't know what any of that means, or is likely to taste like, but I like the adjective, "cheeky") - in recognition of being "a star " and as a thank you for helping him raise the Titanic yesterday morning.  I really did not feel I warranted any such reward and definitely did not anticipate such generosity when I wrapped up in several layers of warm clothing against yesterday morning's bitter cold and stood around offering weak words of support whilst passing straps, ropes, various tools and bits of equipment as he was neck deep in a river that was so cold it was probably freezing his nads to the painful density of twin dwarf stars and experiencing early onset hyperthermia and frostbite.  As is usual with Sunken Boat Man, it was necessary to filter out the padding of four-letter words to be able to string the rest of the exuberant flow of language into coherent sentences.  It becomes surprisingly easy, surprisingly quickly.  One of the things I love about the English language is the richness that means that without any effort whatsoever, the words, "fuck" and "fucking" can, without adding suffixes or even prefixes, be used to mean so many things and cover all eventualities in terms of at least eight of the nine parts of speech.  If I'm honest though, I think my inability to use either word as a preposition is more down to my lack of imagination than any deficiency in the Anglo-Saxon.  Using these words as prefixes and suffixes in themselves they can be employed to communicate moods and actions across an almost limitless range of situations.  My mother used to say, when I was growing up, that people who swore did so from the frustration of possessing only a limited vocabulary.  As a fully paid-up Cockney growing up on Bankside, with a career army father who rose to the lofty rank of corporal, she must have known a thing or two about swearing.  Yet I don't remember a single occasion when I heard her succumb to the temptation.  My brothers and I undoubtedly gave her sufficient cause on many occasions, but it never happened.  I carried that legacy forward and it is only recently that I have felt able to try out, somewhat tentatively, a few words of unreceived Anglo-Saxon. I don't feel convincing and I always want to look over my shoulder to see if anyone is likely to have overheard what I just said.  There is a case to be made for not worrying about a paucity of language when so much richness is found in a single word.

 Sunken Boat Man had arrived in his van sometime after nine in the morning.  I was listening out for signs of activity, because I thought it would be neighbourly to offer some sort of moral support.  I had no intention of jumping in the river.  His van was a thing of wonder.  Much like my lock-up it was filled front to back and floor to roof with equipment and tools of his trade.  He had compressors, generators, pumps, many empty barrels of different sizes, a huge uninflated inner tube from a tractor and racks of tools, straps and winches.  He had paid attention to the smaller details too such as a camping gas stove for heating a kettle of water for a brew.  He had squeezed himself into an industrial strength onesie, over which he had zipped up a dry suit.  Over his socks he wore rubber bootees and wellingtons, which filled with water when he went into the river.

The farmer was on hand to offer the use of his teleporter along with theoretical alternatives to the main plan, which Sunken Boat Man was outlining enthusiastically.  He was going to strap empty barrels to his boat and raise it out of the river sufficiently to set a submersible pump to work, which he was certain would empty the boat faster than the river could refill it.  His manager at work had allowed him to borrow some of this gear and had told him his plan would never work.  

L-R Incredibly inventive technology, Sunken Boat Man, The Farmer, The Fireman, while Marshlander takes photographs from a distance.

The Farmer wore the secret bemused smile of a man who knew that SB Man would have to give up and ask for the teleporter eventually.  Once they got a strap under the boat the Farmer knew he could just hook up one of his bigger tractors and pull the boat out.  This Plan B was being held in reserve for when Plan A failed.  Sunken boat man spent hours in and out of the river.  He had brought matrioska box girders to make a lifting arm to which to attach barrel floats and winches.  How could he fail?  In truth he didn't dare fail.  His enthusiasm was necessary in the face of some pretty staunch scepticism.   Plan A prevailed eventually.  Plan B wasn't required.  

After a few hours hard work, the boat is above the point where water still wants to pour in and the amazing submersible pump is doing its thing.

I was rather glad.  Such enthusiasm deserves to be rewarded, specially since this enthusiasm did not involve any harm to others or the invasion of a country to which we have been selling arms and/or training its dissidents for decades.  The casualties of the operation were the huge tractor tyre that floated off down the river after it had outlived its usefulness and the back corner of the boat that ripped apart under the stress of the weight being hauled out of the water.  I'd seen it before, but it always seems amazing to me that pumping the water out of a boat allows it to rise to the surface through its built in buoyancy.  

The Titanic has been raised.

I am embarrassed that Sunken Boat Man felt it necessary to acknowledge my small part in this adventure with a bottle of wine ... with anything, really.  I only did what I hoped any neighbour would do were the situation different.  I have been on the receiving end of a lot of kindness and consideration and it is only right to pay it forward.  I don't know about the "karma" that people talk about, but I do know that if the opportunity occurs to offer someone a helping hand it is a pleasure and something of a privilege to be able to do just that.  He didn't ask for help and to be honest he could have managed without it, but somehow it just feels right to keep an eye open for people around us and try to make things a little better if we can.

The latest on this tale is that after clearing out the carburettor the outboard fired up after about ten pulls on the starting rope.  We hauled all the sodden soft furnishings out of the boat and I guess it is time for that refurbishment.  No doubt Sunken Boat Man is pleased that, if this had to happen, it took place before he had repainted and fitted the new leisure batteries and solar gizmos.

Oh, and as for testing times, my own boat has passed its safety inspection, so that won't need doing for another four years.