Contemplation Time

I am sitting here listening to a song, The River Knows Your Name, by my favourite singer-songwriter, John Hiatt. It’s from the album Walk On which was the first album of John’s I bought and still the one which captivates me the most.

In the town in which I live are three rivers and the smallest one flows into a larger one and then further along that river flows into the largest. So there are 2 points along the journey of each river where a river merges with another and becomes one before individuating once more.

I am reminded of the quote attributed to Rumi – “You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop.” I like that. We don’t have to surrender our individuality in realising we are each more alike than different.

I was thinking about water and how it often represents emotion and just as the song began, rain started to pelt against the window. There’s a whole world outside that window. I used to get up really early and walk about and streetlights would be on and the occasional lighted window in the houses around me but by and large, everyone would be in the land of slumber having hopefully nice dreams and who knows, maybe some astral travel as well.

The rain hit the windows hard and I was reminded of the musical warrior, Gord Downie. A remarkable individual. I was introduced to him through the parent band, The Tragically Hip. The album was Live Between Us. It was so different to anything I had heard before yet I was captivated at once by the sound and feel of the band and the deftly poetic allusions created by Gord as he expressed himself artistically through song.

The first studio album I heard was In Violet Light and I was especially taken by a song called “It’s A Good Life If You Don’t Weaken.” Gord Downie died in 2017 of an aggressive form of brain cancer, called glioblastoma.

In the time remaining after his diagnosis, he went on a final tour with The Hip and that last show is on YouTube in its entirety. The song Grace, Too is incredibly hard to watch because in the screams contained within the song is a man railing against the dying of his own light. He begins to cry. The screams become a cri de couer. It makes me want to reach into the screen and hold him and tell him everything will be okay although he and I would know that it wouldn’t be. I would still want to reassure him in some way. At least to let him know I value/valued his presence on this Earth.

Gord also recorded a haunting album entitled Secret Path which charted the short life of Chanie Wenjack, an Anishinaabe boy who ran home one night from an Indian residential school before sadly succumbing to hunger and exposure. His body was found next to a railway line. He had walked for 36 hours in sub-zero temperatures, wearing just a windbreaker. It’s a powerful musical statement pertaining to a terribly sad time in the history of Indigenous peoples living in Canada.

When I was in Intensive Care last year, I got chatting to a nurse who worked there. She was mad keen on the band Rush, another group of incredible Canadian musicians and it was through her I reacquainted myself with them. The drummer Neil Peart had himself passed away due to brain cancer. I had in the past been crazy about the band and had seen them in London on their R30 tour. The only concert I have been to where people not only stayed for the drum solo but awaited it with baited breath and Neil didn’t disappoint. Three master musicians.

Anyhow, I started watching YouTube videos and I came across a performance of “It’s A Good Life If You Don’t Weaken” performed at the 2021 Juno Awards with the remaining members of The Tragically Hip and with special guest Feist on vocals. It broke me in two. Here I was, still close to death and yet suddenly remembering how precious life was/is. Sometimes I forget. I have healed and life goes on. Gord isn’t here. Neil isn’t here. Their music however remains, as do I.

And as do you reading this.

If I could, I would reach out from this screen and hug each and every one of you and let you know, in no uncertain terms, how grateful I am that I know you.

Thank you for your Earthly presence in my life.

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Window on the World

I went for a coffee yesterday and I sat right by the front window of the store. A few inches of glass between myself and the wider world.

People were walking past outside, most looked in and yet it felt as if I was in my own private place.

All around me inside the bakery/coffee shop were people, those queuing up for takeout beverages and snacks as well as those hoping to find a seat to enjoy their purchases in warmth and comfort in the friendly and pleasant surroundings.

Even had it been warm enough to sit outside, I would still have felt that sense of privacy. My very own window on the world.

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A New Direction

Today marks a new chapter in my life for this blog and a new direction.

I have changed the domain name to The Tuxedo Cat in honour of my beautiful little friend whom I shared some Earth time with and who changed my life forever. She is pictured below.


Her son is laying here right now as I type this. He’s his own person however I can’t deny, she lives on in him and for that, I am very grateful. This is him below, pictured next to his Mum.


And that takes me to the cat I re-homed because I was so smitten with the delightful little Tuxedo cat and her beautiful jet black son. She is pictured below and is also a Tuxedo Cat.


So, welcome to The Tuxedo Cat. Our home on the internet.

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1994

I have been absolutely miserable since 1994. Yes, all that time. I was thinking back to then and trying to work out what could have occurred to make me feel that way and I realised it was the year I got into organised religion. Organised religion may work for billions of people however it didn’t work for me at all. It caused me to wallow in depressions, caused me to hate myself and it definitely caused my mind to fragment.

So, I started thinking back to that time. What brought me enjoyment? Music. I had discovered some great musicians around that time and I had my Sony Discman and my rechargeable batteries and I would charge up a load to get me through a day’s listening and really give my attention to a couple of albums, not flitting between mp3 albums like I got into the habit of doing. I wonder if I would have loved music the way I used to had I been brought up on Spotify? I developed a kind of musical ADHD in relation to it. I would be partway through an album, see the tab for Related Artists and before I knew it I was listening to another album and then another and so after a few tracks into each album I would be off listening to something else. You really can have too much choice.

I grew up with a television which up until 1982 (I was born in 1973) had only 3 channels and the programmes didn’t go through the night, there was a cut off point around about 1 a.m. but there was always something to watch, not like now when I can trawl through 50+ channels which are on 24/7 and seldom find something I a) want to watch and b) is actually edifying to sit through. Most of it is dross. There was infinitely more quality back then.

So, I made the decision to go out and buy albums again. We have a charity shop here in the UK called Oxfam and they have stores dedicated to music and books while their other stores deal with clothing, bric-a-brac, jigsaw puzzles, board games etc It was in one of these the other day I bought 2 albums, one by Ray Wylie Hubbard and one by North Mississippi All-Stars. Both still factory sealed and at £2.99. I felt that old rush of excitement buying music. I have not heard these albums but I know something of the artists in question so I know I will like them. To actually give my time to music rather than keep zig-zagging about.

So, today I connected my mp3 player to the dvd player and have sat through individual albums again. One interestingly from 1994.

Those albums are:-

(Blues) Freddie King – Burglar (1974),
(Jazz) Esbjörn Svensson Trio – Seven Days of Falling (2003),
(New Wave) Men at Work – Business As Usual (1981),
(Psychedelic/Space Rock) Ozric Tentacles – Become The Other (1995),
(Rock) Dave Matthews Band – Under the Table and Dreaming (1994),
(Heavy Rock) Dynamite – Blackout Station (2014),
(Contemporary Rock) Albany Down – South of the City (2011).

This was how it used to be. My Mum and Dad would give me a tenner (£10) each week and at the weekends I would head to the record stores and pick up an album or 2 and they would get played through the week. If I liked the music, I would seek out other albums by the same musician/band and if I didn’t like it, I would swap the album for something someone else had and didn’t really listen to or else I would give them to charity shops.

I have thoroughly enjoyed listening to music today. So far, all of the albums I’m keeping. If I come across some I don’t like I will just delete them from the device to make way for something else.

I have also jettisoned organised religion from my life and I have renounced everything from the Abrahamic faiths. I was happiest when I was involved in Earth Spirituality. Mother Earth, Father Sky. No names for it. Just a simple appreciation that everything is living and wanting to connect with all life forms, from the smallest insect to the largest cetacean.

In my mind, it’s 1994 again and I’m on the correct path once more. I wish I was 20 again rather than nearly 50. I’ll just call it 1994 with 30 years worth of experience under my belt.

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Impromptu Poetry #1


Delightful bumbleebee
You buzz among the flowers

Moving collector of pollen
In sunshine, drought and showers

Mystic beauty so beguiling
And therein lies your powers

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I Am Rather Curiously Banned From Substack

I wanted to comment on a blog entry to discover I am banned at Substack. I have no idea why. I can appeal via a link however I’m not going to. If they don’t want me there and haven’t given me a reason why they don’t, it’s not somewhere I want to be. I have deleted my Substack account today. If you have a blog there and wonder why I haven’t commented, now you know why.

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At Cross Purposes

When I was taken into hospital earlier this year, I had a number of ‘coincidences’ occur which normally I would shrug off however they are bothering me and I wanted to outline them here.

I have always had what one could term a ‘spiritual side’ to my nature. ‘Belief’ has always held a fascination for me. I was happiest within that as a teenager when I discovered Paganism and then Shamanism. I was unhappiest when I explored the Abrahamic faiths.

I need to take you back to 2009. My birthday actually that year. I was sitting in my garden, camera in hand photographing nature around me. I was thoroughly depressed and frankly, wishing to die. I asked ‘God’ if he/she/it/they existed and in that moment, a brilliant shaft of light came through the clouds above and illuminated the fir tree in next door’s garden. A very clear outline of a golden cross shone out, which I quickly photographed and have included below.


It took my breath away. It was only in the tree for a minute or so. I went back outside every day for weeks trying to see it again but nothing occurred. So what did I do? I went back to organised religion and was once again, miserable. Christians are not pleasant people in the main. I stayed within that nonsense for a further 8 years. What a waste of time, effort and energy. I genuinely felt God had answered my prayers in an incontrovertible way.

I eventually left and put all such things to one side.

Then this year happened. I am taken into hospital with suspected gastroenteritis and it was soon discovered I had blood clots in my stomach which had caused a small section of bowel to die. I had 2 bowel resections, during which time I was in Intensive Care. When it was made clear to me the severity of my situation (my mother had been told to ‘be prepared’ as I was taken down for my first operation) I prayed. I did so sceptically. I simply asked if there was a God, and would he/she/it/they reveal themselves to me again incontrovertibly to notify me of its existence?

I was ventilated for several days then taken off it and so I began my recovery. I was assigned a nurse who dealt just with me as a patient. Each bay containing a bed had a designated nurse looking after them. All of mine were Christian. Every single one of them. Many were from overseas. When I was able to, I would chat with them and as religion/spirituality was still important to me asked if they held any religious convictions. What was interesting was that many hadn’t planned on becoming nurses, they just seemed to find themselves heading in that direction. Quite a few were brought up within other faith systems or structures yet felt the calling to be Christian.

I was eventually put into a side room. Still within Intensive Care and still with one-on-one care however I was deemed no longer clinging to life and to free up the ward bed for someone who needed it more desperately than I did. I met with other nurses I hadn’t as yet met or so I thought at the time. It was one of these who said to me:-

“Hi Jonathan, how are you feeling today?”
“Getting there” I replied.
She said “You don’t remember me do you?”
I told her that I didn’t.
She told me that she was the very first person who had spoken to me when I came into ICU.
I apologised and she smiled and said “Don’t worry about it.”
I then said “I’m sorry, I don’t know your name?”
“That’s okay” she responded. “Madonna.”
I was incredulous. “Your name is Madonna?” I enquired.
“Yes” she said.
“Are you Catholic?” I asked.
“I am” she said.

I then discovered I had been looked after when I came into ICU by a nurse called Mary. I vaguely remembered her. Madonna and Mary.

Aside from a certain pop singer and it’s not even her given name, I have never known anyone in my life who was called Madonna and what were the chances of being looked after in the same ICU by a Madonna and Mary? I then remembered my prayer. Was I being shown something? All I could think of was the evils perpetrated in the name of Catholicism. That and the fact the Vatican had become a vaccine hub during the recent couple of years, some of the said vaccines containing human fetal tissue.

I left that ward and was taken down to another ward, still for people who are critical but no longer deemed to have life-threatening conditions. I was introduced to a nurse who immediately told me she was a Christian. She gave me her testimony. When she became Christian. What made her to do so. The exact date of her conversion and how her life had been subsequent to that. She launched straight into it. My mother was beside me. She didn’t introduce herself or ask after us, just straight into the story of her life as a Christian. Why had that happened? Did she do that to everybody who is new to the ward? I discovered she didn’t. Why me then?

This has all been very puzzling to me. I compartmentalised it until very recently.

I then found out the names of the people who performed my operation. Their names translated to ‘Light’ and ‘From the Sun.’ “Here we go again” I thought. The last person I had contact with at the hospital before being discharged from their care, her name was Mistry. I took that to be Mystery and so I began looking up Light Mystery (Light Mysteries relates to the Rosary) which lead me back to Catholicism. The Madonna and Mary connection. Also, I was born in 1973 and the Catholic bible contains 73 books. I steer clear of 66 books because I think that number of books approved of by ‘the powers that be’ is there for a reason. 666 and all that.

Then I thought “Hang on, what does Mistry mean as a surname?” It translates as Carpenter. Joseph and Jesus were both Carpenters. I am a J.J. Jesus died at 33. I was born on the 12/12 which reduces to a 33. The nurse who drew my bloods that day was a Catholic and attends the same church my Stepdad had done while he was alive.

All I can think of is the evils perpetrated by the Christian church throughout the ages. I can’t get past that in my mind. Yet I am seemingly being drawn in this direction. There are far too many coincidences. I have heard of people converting to Christianity with far less examples of what they believe to be Divine Intervention happening in their own lives that have led them to that point.

I don’t know what to do.

The bible is a terrible book. I don’t like Christianity as a religion. Am I being led to Gnosticism I wonder? Or am I being led back to mainstream Christianity? If so, what possible reason could God have for me there? I will be miserable again.

Anyhow, this is where my head is at currently.

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What Now?

I had so many plans when I started up this WordPress blog. So many things I wanted to say. Almost none of which has come to fruition. It’s been over a year of aimless blogging. I used to love writing. I can remember the excitement I felt when I paid for it (this blog) and began to set it up, design the layout etc.

One of my earliest recollections was of my mother taking me to visit a friend of hers and in one of the rooms downstairs was a typewriter. I already held a fascination for words and the idea I could sit in front of this machine and set out on paper what was in my imagination just blew my mind.

Then with the advent of the internet, all I did was write. I had various other blogs during that time and websites, you name it. Starting this one up, a more professional vehicle for my writing promised so much yet it’s only led me to dead ends. I’m in a total rut with seemingly no way out.

What now? I just don’t know.

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