Defection

An interesting word from Latin: it begins in the verb 'to fail'.  It appears that those who find sanctuary in another country, creed or culture are admitting a lack of ability to create change.

I have been absent from you for some weeks due to work commitments.  Grateful that I have work, I still worry how I can spend £100 per week wisely whilst not having the spending power of Bertie Wooster's friends.  I don't feel as though I have defected from the blogging classes but I do have a nagging suspicion that I have under-achieved.  Witness: no career, one warm side of the bed, two ex-wives, three geographically distant childer, fork-handles and five gold rings.

I have spent too much time reading and listening rather than pontificating.  For instance, agog in the workshop, we heard Jeremy Vine on Radio 2 presenting a discussion about reduced funding for the Arts Council being in direct competition with funding for the NHS.  I was so so angry that I almost wrote to The Times.  Of course I didn't; neither do I normally listen to Radio 2 as I favour the Home Programme.   Defection through culture, I admit.

Moussa Koussa has not defected either, he is trying to buy his way to safety by appealing to be bound by the church doors.  Oh!  The ignominy of sanctuary for a Moor!  Still, while Gaddafy Duck still looks like your Gran, the former Foreign Affairs vizier has a burgeoning career on Sesame Street as a playful adjunct to Big Bird's pedagogue rhymes.  I'm prepared to allow the new 'Itchy and Scratchy' a defection of country on this basis.

Defection by creed is more worrying, substantially more dangerous, also less regular.

I have held a creed for four decades, mostly built upon family ethos, religion and private morality.  Not very New Testament but probably less hectic than my public pronouncements.

My latest weekend aberration left me wishing for a chance to defect: perhaps to the Soviets.  I am still chilling while the thought 'admitting failure' careers through my mind.  Too serious, and no bloody music reference either!  The closest word in the English Dictionary is 'defecate'.

SH1T, as they use to say when I was at school in Libya!  XXXX