Today’s narrative is the 1,500th I’ve written since embarking on this literary odyssey in March 2015. The spring day I setup my website writesaidfred.org, leading me on a locutionary path of cathartic reflection, self-esteem reconstruction and acquiring awareness I’d completely undersold my capabilities for almost half a century. I’m angry with myself for the decades of propitiation, particularly to people who weren’t worthy of the reverence shown. However, I’ll live […]
Yesterday, on writesaidfred.org, I published an essay It’s Good To Talk about depression. This updated piece was predominantly written a couple of years ago when I was more guarded about suffering from mental health issues. A time when, in a badly veiled attempt to maintain my anonymity, I’d refer to the sufferer as ‘a friend’. As it’s still Mental Health Awareness Week, I thought I’d re-share some musings on the same […]
It’s Mental Health Awareness Week in the UK. As someone who’s experienced the all-consuming joylessness of depression I felt it’d be remiss of me not to pen my thoughts on the subject during the days aimed at raising the profile of mental illness. Below I enclose an updated version of an essay I wrote two years ago on the subject of mental health. A time when I was more guarded […]
It would’ve been my old man’s 83rd birthday today. At 9am*** precisely he’d have rung either me, or one of my two siblings, and in his engaging Leeds accent thanked us for his presents – Ordinarily a decent bottle of red and a CD. After relaying his gratitude he’d hang up, going on to make similar calls of recognition to his other offspring. *** – He’d never ring before 9am. […]
Occasionally I’ll listen to movie scores on Apple Music. I find the act of experiencing these suites of music without pictured accompaniments concentrates the mind into a more focussed evaluation of their artistic integrity. Allowing a more informed critique supporting the merits of the audio underpinning the film; an element often inadvertently ignored by an audience distracted by the unfolding onscreen action. Recent examples of my listening choices include an […]
Today sees the Gregorian calendar baton passing seamlessly from April to May. A change taking followers of Pope Gregory XIII’s 16th century almanac into its fifth monthly epoch of 2019. What will May bring its attending guests and more importantly what’s the dress code? Hopefully not raincoats, wind cheaters and kaleidoscopically coloured leg warmers like the month just departed. April was a month of mixed emotions for yours truly. On […]
In recent years I’ve embraced a more contrarian nature than previously adopted during earlier adult life. Middle-age granting me the wisdom that staying true to my beliefs were an infinitely preferable bedfellow to compromising principles to curry favour. The latter displays of appeasement frustratingly occasionally granted to people completely unworthy of my respect. My former behaviour manifesting from a misguided belief I was following a laudable strategy to improve/maintain popularity. […]
