The Second Coming

Mum and Dad are coming for lunch today. They're coming over to see Emily and Lucas before the two American passport holders go back. It's funny how you get used to people being around. I shall miss them when they are gone, but they'll be back I'm sure.

Meanwhile everything else is changing. Just one month left at The Alexandra Practice and I'm looking forward to the move. I can't stomach being in the same room as my current 'partners'. I really don't think they understand how easy I have made it for them.

Yesterday was Steve Raw's 60th birthday celebration, so we all trekked up to Crowden for a picnic. It was raining of course, but cold and windy too. Just as I remember it, and just like those days camping out in Mull. Ah, happy days. There were lots of people, considering the weather, all linked in one way or another to each other. Apparently Lucas didn't like the cold, so as soon as the birthday cake had been lit and the song sung we came home. I didn't mind either, anything to get away from TJG and his smarming presence. I think I may have said goodbye to the Men's Group for the same reason. As soon as we left the sun came out. Perhaps we missed something momentous through our lack of faith and goose pimples, but I doubt it.

On Thursday night I attended a meeting of the Didsbury Lefties. I don't know if that's really what they're called, but they have been meeting for years and are ex-academics and lecturers mainly.
The house was a good sized Didsbury semi. We gathered in the kitchen then moved into the lounge. The chairs were placed in a circle and we all sat down. It had the feel of a prayer group, like people waiting and preparing for the Second Coming.
We did a double act, Martin and I. He is the Director and sole employee of the Socialist Medical Movement, and he gave his thoughts on the NHS reforms. Well, until I suggested we perhaps moved into the twenty first century.
I told the assembled about the good stuff we have been doing in Central Manchester, and that co-operation was working despite their scepticism. They wanted to know why, if the changes were so good, was there so much opposition to them from the profession. I pointed out that the BMA has opposed every change including the very inception of the beloved socialist NHS.
In the end they seemed to have enjoyed the discussion, and I had too. They're hardly a bunch of militants. In fact I think I might start going to their meetings myself, as their youth policy.

Talking of prayer groups, I was on the Emmanuel 6.15 congregation annual weekend away, last weekend. It was good. We even had a barn dance. The new vicar is obviously wanting to make his mark and take the congregation forward. We had prayers and Eucharist etc and also his vision of where we might go. We all considered his suggestions prayerfully and agreed, like the good sheep we are, to head in that direction. That direction is to try to become more like a community of the early church. More supportive of each other and more socially cohesive, instead of just turning up on a Sunday and going away again. The early church also lived their lives as I imagine an egalitarian commune might. They also expected the return of Jesus anytime. Like the old Commies are waiting in their front room for the second coming of their Messiah.

Perhaps it is time for the Second Coming, after all. Or is it already here?

A cherry blossom tree to remember Richard

I set up a facebook group of Manchester Medics, class of '79 yesterday. The numbers doubled over night. There are now about thirty members already, and talk of meeting once a month for a beer. Admittedly this was the boys, well me and John really, who both live in and about Manchester. I thought 'the Friendhip' in Fallowfield would be nostalgic enough. Tommy Ducks, the Plaza and the Conti having closed down.
There are some names I just don't remember at all.Other people I can picture but don't recall their names, and others who's names are so common that there's no way of knowing which one was a 'class of '79er'. It'll be fun to see what happens.
We planted a cherry blossom tree yesterday, to commemorate the life of Richard. What a great way to be remembered. Much better than a gravestone in my opinion. It's what I would like for myself.

Cherry Blossom in Manchester

Back home after slick trip from Newark. Now Emily and Lucas have arrived back in Manchester to sort out their longterm visa. The blossom is starting to come out. The sun shone briefly yesterday, but it's still chilly here. Next weekend I'm going up to the Lakes again.
I went to look around my new practice yesterday and have a go on the computer system at the Range practice. It looks brilliant and much better. Altogether I am looking forward to the move. In fact, the troubles at the Alexandra Practice looks like being a blessing in disguise.
I was thinking yesterday, if I had planned how I should spend the last five years of my career before retiring, this is what I would have liked to do. In other words, a reduced clinical load, two surgeries  a week. A cardiology session a week to use my specialist skills. The rest being spent on commissioining work as Clinical Director. I am very happy with my work at the moment.
I can also spend more time with Lucas.
Spring is a time for optimism and looking forward, and I feel good

The Declaration of Independence

'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.'

I am so glad I didn't return to Connecticut yesterday. I was going to, rationalising that I had seen what I came to see, and really wanted to spend time with Lucas. I find myself saying these words to myself in a sort of Southern American accent. I don't know why. Perhaps it's because I spent yesterday morning on a sightseeing bus with American commentary, or last night at a play called 1776.
'The bus leaves from the front of the hotel at nine, and then every hef awer' said the helpful receptionist. First stop, Union Station. At the time it was built, the largest and grandest in the World. I think Grand Central beats it hands down, but that was at the time. I hopped off and had breakfast, and took in the atmosphere. Not terribly busy, but I had missed rush hour, and lots of renovations. I ate in the cafe and would give it a bare 'average'. Then the Red Bus route.
I'll try to remember the highlights, but there were so many of them. Lots of museums [or is it musea?] and if part of the Smithsonian legacy then entry is free. Lots and lots of memorials, including the Lincoln memorial and to all the different wars the Americans have been in. The reflecting pool, I found out, was being repaired to stop it leaking, and the whole of the National Mall was being re-done to improve soil drainage and the cultivation of a lawn. The Washington Memorial had recently suffered as a result of an earth tremor, and so was also being checked over too. It wouldn't look good if that fell down.
The city was designed by a French born gentleman called L'Enfant. He must have still been a child when he came to America. He is buried at Arlington Cemetery on high ground, so he can overlook the city he planned out. We went there later and it is quite moving to see the rows and rows of white tomb stones. To get there we have to cross the Potomac river after going round the Tidal Basin to which it connects. Although my children groan, I do think this sort of tour bus is a good way of getting an overview, literally, of a big city.

I got off the bus for lunch. Wandering around I came across a handful of tents, camped out in Mc Pherson Square. They looked pretty hippyish with anarchist literature in a shabby looking orning, and books which people could 'please borrow and return them for others to use'. The sun was warm. Three people were talking 'to camera'. No one else was there. The 'Occupy McPherson Square' movement, was obviously having a day off. It is Good Friday after all. They were probably all at church.

In the evening I took a walk around. I came across a queue of people outside the Ford's Theatre. They were waiting for a play, 1776, to begin. It was too early to eat so I paid my $70 and took my seat near the front of a packed theatre. I had forgotten my glasses, but it didn't make much difference in the end.
I didn't know too much about the Declaration of Independence, only tit-bits I'd picked up randomly, and I don't know how historically accurate this play was. It turned out to be a rather amusing musical version. Mercifully the songs were few. The acting was quite good and appropriately funny when it was meant to be. It was good to see the various characters come to life

I hadn't appreciated the political in fighting, compromises, and alliances that went on. For instance, I didn't know that Pennsylvania  through their leader John Dickinson, were such loyalists to the Crown. Benjamin Franklin, the older gouty statesman was there, also from Pennsylvania. So was our previous hero John Adams, the Massachusetts agitator; Thomas Jefferson, newly wed and reluctant author; John Hancock, congressional leader; and Roger Sherman from our own Connecticut, amongst others.

For more, if interested, see italics below:
'The Declaration of Independence was a statement adopted by the Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, which announced that the thirteen American colonies, then at war with Great Britain, regarded themselves as independent states, and no longer a part of the British Empire. John Adams put forard a resolution earlier in the year which made a formal declaration inevitable. A committee was assembled to draft the declaration, to be ready when congress voted on independence. Adams persuaded the committee to select Thomas Jefferson to compose the original draft of the document, which congress would edit to produce the final version. The Declaration was ultimately a formal explanation of why Congress had voted on July 2 to declare independence from Great Britain, more than a year after the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War. The Independence Day of the United States of America is celebrated on July 4, the day Congress approved the wording of the Declaration.
After ratifying the text on July 4, Congress issued the Declaration of Independence in several forms. It was initially published as a printed broadside that was widely distributed and read to the public. The most famous version of the Declaration, a signed copy that is usually regarded as the Declaration of Independence, is displayed at the National Archives in Washington, D C. Although the wording of the Declaration was approved on July 4, the date of its signing has been disputed. Most historians have concluded that it was signed nearly a month after its adoption, on August 2, 1776, and not on July 4 as is commonly believed. The original July 4 United States Declaration of Independence manuscript was lost while all other copies have been derived from this original document.
The sources and interpretation of the Declaration have been the subject of much scholarly enquiry. The Declaration justified the independence of the United States by listing colonial grievances against King George III, and by asserting certain natural and legal rights, including a right of revolution'.

The Declaration avoided the issue of slavery, in order to get the Southern Staes on board. This stored up trouble and lead, in the end, to the bloody Civil War. They abolished slavery almost a century later under the leadership of Abraham Lincoln, a Republican. Of course, he got assassinated for his troubles, but lives on in those words of the Founding Fathers.

So now it's back to Connecticut and Lucas. I'm glad I stayed the extra day. I understand the Americans much better now. They had a point. If only they had lived up to their high ideals better. I guess they're only human. We all make pledges and declarations, and fail to live up to them.

God bless America.

Bocker T Washington

During my walk around the city I came across a brass engravings placed within the pavement. One of them was about this man. I thought I'd find out more. It may not interest you as much as it did me.

Booker Taliaferro Washington (April 5, 1856 – November 14, 1915) was an African-American of mixed race. He became an educator, author, orator, adviser to Republican presidents, and black political leader. One of the last generation of black American leaders born in slavery, he spoke on behalf of a constituency of Black Americans who lived in the South, but had lost their ability to vote through disfranchisement by the southern States. 
Washington was born into slavery to Jane, an enslaved African-American woman on the Burroughs Plantation in southwest Virginia. She never identified his white father, said to be a nearby planter. His birth father played no role in Washington's life. At the end of the Civil War in 1865, when his family gained freedom, his mother took them to West Virginia. Here she formally married the now freedman Washington Ferguson. Booker T took the surname Washington at school after his stepfather.
From 1890 to 1915 Booker T Washington became a dominant figure in the African-American community in the United States, but was not uncontroversial. His opponents disparagingly called his powerful network of white politicians, businessmen and philanthropist supporters the "Tuskegee Machine." Washington maintained influence through his ability to gain support from a wide diversity of groups. As well as influential whites, he recruited educational and religious communities nationwide. However, his accommodation to the 'political realities' in the age of the racist 'Jim Crow segregation' brought disapproval from other Human Rights activists.
Washington's 1895 Atlanta Exhibition address was viewed as a "revolutionary moment" by both African-Americans and whites across the country. Then fellow activist, W. E. B. Du Bois supported him, but they grew apart as Du Bois sought more direct action to remedy disenfranchisement and lower education. After their falling out, Du Bois and his supporters referred to Washington's speech as the "Atlanta Compromise".
Washington advocated a "go slow" approach.The effect was that many Southern Blacks had to accept sacrifices of the potential political power, civil rights and higher education they sought. His belief was that African-Americans should "concentrate all their energies on industrial education, accumulation of wealth, and the conciliation of the South."

Washington was on close terms with national Republican leaders, and was often asked for political advice by presidents Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft. Washington argued that the surest way for blacks to gain equal social rights was to demonstrate "industry, thrift, intelligence and property." He also said, "I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has had to overcome while trying to succeed".

Booker T Jones, and the MGs, was someone entirely different. Their tune 'Green Onions' remains a classic instrumental.

100 years of the cherry blossom festival

I got to Washington DC in good time. One of the interesting things is that this city is twinned with many capital cities around the world. No doubt it gives each of the civic leaders a reason to visit on expenses. One of the cities it is twinned with is Sunderland. Yes Sunderland.
Well of course Washington is a district of Sunderland and is the ancestral home of George himself. I can't think there's much in it for the Washington DC elite, but the Sunderland councillors must have a lot of networking visits in their schedule.
I arrived about midday, checked in, and set about taking in the city. It is a criss-cross road pattern, like many new cities. They are numbered in one direction, and lettered at right angles. The Marriott is at 12thNW and G. A few roads cut across them diagonally, like Pennsylvania Avenue, and Constitution Avenue. It makes getting about very simple.
I got to the Washington Memorial and looked at the Lincoln Memorial. The 'reflecting pool' was dry, for maintenance. Then down Jefferson Avenue and the Mall, to Capitol Hill. The White House itself is visible but slightly hidden away so I didn't see it at first. It was funny to think of the President no more than a quarter of a mile from where I was standing.

Along the walk between the Washington Monument and capitol Hill there was a stage and a steel band playing. Above the stage was a sign indicating that they were celebrating 100 years of the cherry blossom festival. The famous cherry blossom is everywhere, and I found a picture for you.

The festival marks the planting of white and pink cherry blossom trees, a gift from the Japanese people. They themselves mark the beginning of spring. Each year, for the last 100 years this festival been an occasion to show off multicultural and international cultural events. The steel band was from a local high school. As if to demonstrate how far they have come, multicilturally, here in DC, there was not a single black face in the band players, and there was no self-consciousness or embarrassment either that they were essentially playing black music. They were just having fun, and so was the audience.

I going to go on one of those hop on hop off bus trips now. Walking is good, but tiring. I'll tell you about it later.

The District of Columbia

I'm on the train to Washington DC. It's an Amtrak direct from Stamford, but is going to take five hours. So lots of time for rumination and doodling. So here I am doodling.
The District of Collumbia is governed directly by the Federal Government of the United States, in contrast to other States. It was formed when the winners of the war of independence decided they needed a separate Federal Capital. It was initially ten miles square from land that was formed from Maryland and Virginia. Later Virginia reclaimed the land.

Anyway , more of that when I get there, meanwhile a brief historical note:

'The outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861 led to notable growth in the District's population due to the expansion of the federal government and a large influx of freed slaves. President Abraham Lincoln signed the Compensated Emancipation Act in 1862, which ended slavery in the District of Columbia and freed about 3,100 enslaved persons, nine months prior to the Emancipation Proclamation. In 1868, Congress granted male African American residents of the District the right to vote in municipal elections.
After the assassination of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., on April 4, 1968, riots broke out in the District, primarily in the U Street, 14th Street, 7th Street, and H Street corridors, centers of black residential and commercial areas. The riots raged for three days until over 13,600 federal troops managed to stop the violence. Many stores and other buildings were burned; rebuilding was not complete until the late 1990s.
In 1973, Congress enacted the District of Columbia Home Rule Act, providing for an elected mayor and city council for the District. In 1975, Walter Washington became the first elected and first black mayor of the District.'