Shaped by a world of champions

We need champions

What I cannot deny is the need for champions in your life, people who see the potential and the best in you, long before you realise you could be anything. Even more so are the people who believe in you, who encourage you, give you the support to begin to believe in yourself, and offer the scarce opportunities of access and privilege to attain what might have at one time been totally impossible.

In my life, I have had many champions, out of all sorts of persuasions, the people who pulled you up when you were down and those who firm the foundations of the platforms on which you stand, you should also not forget those who do not want you to stand still resting on your laurels, they want to see you progress and they try to remove the obstacles that seem to pre-empt you.

Create your vision

The need for a vision for yourself that you can begin to think and to dream and to work towards realising is one of the biggest challenges an individual faces. How do you begin a journey to a destination you cannot even visualise yourself getting to? While an accident of good fortune might happen, we cannot live by accidents and make that a purpose for life.

Today, I remember one of the greatest champions of my life, Cash Soyinka, an uncle and relation on both side of my family who almost 40 years ago became my guardian and mentor. He led by example rather than by instruction. He took me into confidences while nurturing my voice of expression and sense of adventure in ways I could never have imagined, yet in such impactful ways.

Most of all, he allowed me the courage of my convictions, obviously, I had to convince him of why I was making a decision, even as he shepherded me with insight to be more rational than emotional. He passed on three years ago and he is sorely missed.

Take on the mantel

When another friend and mentor, John Coll, passed on at the end of 2013, I did wonder who would champion me in the issues of life. However, someone else suggested that the torch had been passed on to me to champion, mentor, and encourage others, in the same way that I have benefited from the counsel of those who came before.

Much as I strive to live up to this standard, I know I am hardly close to the standard of those who have stood up, stood for, and stood in for me. I will not relent, I hope to get better. My best friend of over 40 years is another who a few have indicated, I could never be impugned, like I could never do any wrong. I have many wrongs, but I am given allowances and forgiven easily for my failings, and I am grateful that none of my failings are used against me.

The partner champion

However, daily, it is Brian that champions me at every moment, the way I am loved so deeply and unconditionally, the way he believes in me, encourages me, and strengthens me even when I seem to lack the resolve. He sees possibilities with facility, even in the midst of limited resources and straitened circumstances, he is a believer.

I do not acknowledge this enough nor is as appreciated to the extent that it has been valuable. I do not exist in isolation; I am a product of the numerous investments of champions that have willed me on beyond where my sights and abilities could carry me. I am grateful for having had the tutelage of champions and the enduring support of those who uphold me daily.

Thought Picnic: My life really does include my partner

Coming out without fear

I find myself returning to the theme of living your own truth in terms of the things you choose to do in your life and your relationships. I have many times celebrated the coming out of people whilst also touching on other broader topics of discussion on sexuality and expression, as the references show.

Blog - Opinion: Now, a thought for Kenny Badmus' wife

Blog - Opinion: Regardless of our sexuality, our past and future is our whole story

Blog - Opinion: Tom Daley and the pursuit of happiness

Blog - Opinion: When William Haines decided against a sham marriage

The most recent coming out event was by Philip Schofield about whom I have written an extensive but unpublished blog, because the fire of my inspiration was first snuffed out and then, the season for its revelation passed. A few days ago, I could have completed the blog, but the whole exercise felt mechanical than inspired. It might yet be published because there are issues, I discuss at length in it, I have persuaded myself it would have a longer than usual incubation.

Gospels in sound and vision

Having retrieved my audio Bible collection from some old hard disks at the beginning of the week and uploaded them to the cloud, as I was seeking something to watch on my Amazon Fire TV Stick, I happened upon the dramatized Gospel of John which I watched on Amazon Prime, but it is available on YouTube too. [The Gospel of John – YouTube]

As it transpired, I then watched The Gospel of Matthew and a not particularly dramatic The Gospel of Mark on YouTube. Next was the complete reading without an interval of The Gospel of Mark at the St Paul’s Cathedral by Peter Suchet of Agatha Christie’s Poirot fame, his opening remarks before his reading got me. [The Gospel According to Mark read by David Suchet - YouTube]

My life includes my partner

He was dedicating his reading for which he was receiving no remuneration to a friend who had recently passed on, Alec McCowen who died at 91 a few months before. As I am wont to do, I immediately conducted a search to appreciate this new piece of information. I did not know the actor who appeared to have a large body of work, and was well respected in the acting community that he was honoured with a memorial service at St. Paul's Church in Covent Garden (known as "the actors' church"). This according to the Wikipedia entry to his name.

The part to living your own truth that appealed to me out of Alec McCowen’s biography was that he had a partner Geoffrey Burridge who he lost to complications due to AIDS in 1987. In 1989, he was surprised with an appearance on This Is Your Life with the consideration that he had refused to be featured on the show if his partner of many years was not acknowledged. The dissatisfaction was assuaged with voice-over in the closing titles making the relationship known.

Living your truth regardless

I can say coming out in the UK in the 1980s was sensational news, acknowledging a sexuality outside the heteronormative construct could very well end careers, though there were many personalities who were ready to walk that difficult road when others stayed in the closet or contracted lavender marriages. To acknowledge your partner died of AIDS at a time when effective treatments were still being trialled but not definitely known to be as efficacious probably opened you to unmitigated stigma and discrimination.

Alec McCowen was not going to let the memory of his partner die away just because he was being given a public platform on national television to showcase his life and his achievements. This is where he earns my utmost respect, even though I am only finding out about him 3 years after his death.

My life really includes my partner

In my view, the people we share life with must always have a say in things that pertain to us, in our presence, in our absence, and in our passing. My relationship with Brian Jenkins is developing, he is my boyfriend, my partner, my companion, and my lover. My planning, thinking, and decisions are done with consideration to consulting him, understanding how it affects him and obviously how it affects us.

We have been going out together for over a year and we hope to progress this to a formal partnership at the right time. When in South Africa, he is my next of kin and as he gets introduced to my wider family, friends and acquaintances, his prominence in my life and my affairs should be without dispute along with his primacy and involvement in matters that concern me.

I would expect as a consequence that my achievements along with my love life are fully acknowledged without hesitation, because that would be the heart of the matter or it has no heart at all and it isn’t my story being told.

Like Alec McCowen, I hope for a good innings and if I do end up with a Wikipedia page, the option for Partner: must be filled in, and it is Brian Jenkins. Thank you, Brian, for making me a very happy guy.

Thought Picnic: The Love I Lost

My relationships

At my last therapy session we continued on the topic of relationships, something I thought we should discuss beyond the many other sessions we had covered in the previous four meetings.

I would cover the other issues we talked about in another blog, but in this case, we had gone over a list of long term lovers, the beauty of each relationship, the uniqueness each lover brought into my life and the things I still cherish of each of them.

Three significant relationships, I have had, the beginning and end of each left different scars. Many scars I brandish with the honour and good fortune of having been allowed to be part of their lives and yet feeling loved for their willingness to share mine with the seriousness and levity that I bring to the pursuit of happiness.

Free to be with me

One can live in regret of what might or might not have been or recognise that some relationships run their course, some long before we are ready to pack it up and others just have outlived their usefulness.

Most critical to me in every relationship has been the need that my partner not feel imprisoned in our partnership, I cherish willingness and freedom. I am comfortable with the times we spent together and the space needed to spend apart. That is my disposition.

I have remained close friends with one, another I cannot only grieve for what might have been but now is a memory and the third simply vanished, such is life.

Saw and liked

Recently, I have been exploring the possibility of a new relationship and one caught my eye. That is it, attraction is the first thing, then exploration into possibility.

This person appeared to tick all my boxes but I was disadvantaged in that we could not meet as frequent enough to consolidate what started off as a spark of interest about to ignite the kindling of love.

I retained some hope that something might happen but before that opportunity came, my love interest that I had left without the essentially nurturing the interest to keep it going and growing strong has found a new love interest and what was I supposed to do?

The pursuit of happiness remains

I read of it on Facebook, I was slightly saddened that for the second time now, as happened to the one I grieve, I failed in my pursuit of happiness with all the vigour and ability I could muster, in the process I lost out to the fact that others do have to get on with their lives in the pursuit of their own happiness.

The love I lost was a sweet love, yet, I wish them the very best and the quest for love continues.

Thought Picnic: Thoughts in grief

Get the thoughts

The thoughts that crowd my mind continuously as events and activities of the days past occupy one to the absence of intimate or social contact.

It is an unhealthy existence in some ways, my big apartment protects me from the elements but does not protect me from my thoughts – I sit like a hermit rolling the thoughts around without pause or stillness – it is no meditation but that is what it seems like.

I think I am a private man; I come alive at work, in gatherings I could be quite reserved, whereas with strangers a conversation can begin and it could go on for hours if time allows it.

One needs to get out more for this kind of interaction because I am noticing that it is seriously energy sapping having to deal with things alone.

Person to person

In grief, one needs to talk, maybe one needs a hug, a sense of caring outside oneself can go a long way – many calls need to be made but how can one give comfort when you are self-comforted and how can one give succour from just being a loner of sorts?

Indeed, my dad has a point, companionship has its uses and benefits but I have grown up to eschew such communal essentials that the thoughts of those are too alien to contemplate for any length of time.

Even when I was very ill, I was the most vulnerable in need in such great help and even I employed that help quite sparingly – the comfort of being in my own home for days on end seemed to have a tonic effect for my recovery.

My neighbours and friends did a lot for which one is grateful but introversion and introspection in this very private person is most externalised in the writing and the expressions in words.

Mine for me

That surely is not enough, but change is probably going to be hardest thing to entertain; the relationships I desire are far from the norm, the companionships I crave are different, the love that fulfils is strange but the happiness it would bring is universally understood.

A hand to hold, a hug so bold, a kiss so brazen and a love that dare not speak its name – a dare for life and dear to live for – it is time to find and keep, no more unrequited love, no more fear to approach – Gosh! I write better than I would do, but the notice is out, there are things to do, this man must no more live alone.

A partner drawn through a list of musts

An observer one is

I was reviewing my Google Reader list the other day and happened on one of my infrequent posters with an interesting take on issues.

What jumped out to me was the search for a partner which we all sometimes do in a world where companionship of sorts is an essential component of life.

As an observer and sometimes spectator of life because for so long I do not seem to have successfully fostered a partnership that hasn’t brought me to grief that I have reluctantly opted out of the scheme but maintained interest where I can to help people believe more so in relationships.

For long, I have surmised that break-ups teach you amazing lessons, what you take away from a break-up is usually what you do not want and not necessarily what you desire in the probable next relationship.

Must be, must be

How, with a wry smile, I read all the conditions of a new relationship the writer put down all listed as “musts”.

Yes, must be this, must have that, must do thus, must say how, must think big, must touch not – by the time I got to the 4^th must, I was beginning to rule myself out, not for the reasons of qualification by location but by the notion that this innocuous list of expectations began to read as aggressively demanding and high maintenance.

Surely, any relationship might just have the hope of eternity but people would rather be eased into the commitments that lead to lifetime relationships.

The perfect grows on you

We are the products of our experiences and in no way would I begrudge the expectations of anyone who seeks new partnerships.

It is strange how after reading that, I was almost inspired to create my own list of “musts”, then I realised placing insurmountable hurdles in the way of smoothing out possible companionships might well have me looking for the perfect.

Then I remembered, none of my partners were ever perfect when I met them, they became more perfect to me over time till it seemed I could not do without them – then something happened progressively that lead to break-ups – I think.

I have some preferences, probably some expectations; I will pass on the “musts”.

The wonder of a man and his maid(en)

Too wonderful for me

I can only reflect on these sayings of the man of Proverbs.

From the King James Version – Proverbs 30:18-19

There be three things which are too wonderful for me, yea, four which I know not:

The way of an eagle in the air; the way of a serpent upon a rock; the way of a ship in the midst of the sea; and the way of a man with a maid.

The first two are elements of nature and still a matter of wonder, the soaring of the eagle and the time it took for man to master the science and art of flight which still fills me with a bit of wonder, as for the serpent on a rock, we do not have a vehicle that glides over terrain the way the serpent does.

The way of a ship in the midst of the sea is now a no-brainer except when you lose power for satellite navigation and you have not learnt to use the sextant – but for people of those times – getting from one place to another mostly using sails still remains a wonder of seamanship.

The warmth of companionship

The last however is a dynamic that still defies explanation, what is between the man and his woman is just not something you can get instruments out to measure.

I learnt years ago that one should never interfere in that dynamic, it is a force that can be both overpowering and endearing, I have had opportunity to observe the Prince and his Princess, the husband and the wife, the boyfriend and the girlfriend, the boy and the girl and always been overcome with wonder.

Yesterday, I was out to Puerto Rico, one of the coastal towns of Gran Canaria where the ode to the built-environment reads like a thousand stanzas of concrete verse. All the hills built into with white beautiful and ugly hotels just because Europeans of temperate and arctic climes seek warmth in the sun on a European island as far South of Europe as possible.

Big brother

As I walked back with the bus stop with ice-cream cone in hand, he said, “Would you like an ice-cream”, she said, “Oh! Yes, please”. They were probably in their sixties and full of fun – the Prince was playing big-brother, it looked and sounded so nice, though I did not expect to see them skipping hand-in-hand to the beach.

Playmates

Then, you wonder why the older generations go to dance classes, I could answer that question – they were dancing the night away – waltzing, fox-trotting, tangoing and whatever makes ballroom dancing exciting.

The decorum of this kind of dancing sweeps away from sight the grotesque antics of embarrassing middle-aged dancers. The Prince and Princess were playmates – I could not dance with myself, I need to consider dancing lessons too.

Protector

Walking through the nature reserve of Maspalomas, one can walk the dunes bare-footed but on the firmer ground of dried plants with footpaths to negotiate, there are dangers. Double-sided prickly disc-like seeds which adhere firmly to your shoes or sandals – the preferred footwear in those places – so, this couple were on an adventure to encounter pain when I warned them of the dangers.

The Prince answered back gruffly, obviously slighted by the fact that I may have pointed out that his was leading his Princess into danger. The Protector was not really being smart. Maybe afterwards, after picking out the barbs from her soles, kissing it better might salve the pain – I interfered.

Patriarch

The restaurant serves a buffet, which means people have to walk around the food tables to get what they like. In most cases, they walk around, have brief chats about the food and then make their choices before returning together to their tables.

However, there were some Princes who were too princely to walk around, their Princesses did all the running around and served their masters who almost expressed impatience for the lateness of the plate and dismissively waited for the plates to be cleared. The man does have a maid here, reminds me of a cheeky comment someone made when he asked if I had laid the maid, (talking about my cleaner) some people can never attain comportment. Oh! There were quite a few Patriarchs in the house and these are Europeans.

Partners

They were looking for the beach promenade and had walked around in circles till someone decided to ask questions – they even had a 5-month old boy in the pram shielded from the sun because you could not really apply sun-tan lotion on the skin of a toddler.

In fact, it was he, who asked the question about directions and I found out that unlike the commonly accepted view that the men never ask for directions, in this dynamic, it was the lady who would never ask for directions.

They shared the joy of helping each other; he pushed the pram through the difficult terrain of pavements without ramps for wheelchairs or trolleys as we walked to the promenade and all the way down to the Playa del Ingles beach where we parted ways. The Prince and Princess were partners.

A-Partners

The last night, he literally wailed as she began to put a distance between herself and him by running. He said, “You find their jokes funnier than mine”. Any Princess would be to rid of such a pathetic Prince. Somehow, there is still a dynamic at work, there is still an attraction that manages to tolerate the insecurity, but would this go on for much longer? The Prince and Princess were beginning to look like A-Partners.

A-partners, coined by the Sun newspaper to describe couples who get on well after separation.