I renewed acquaintance with Barry, an affable chap I met at a talk on 5G a couple of weeks ago. We seemed to be on the same wavelength. He described himself as a stoic.
there is believe it or not a website called dailyStoic.com
Stoicism goes back to Greek philosophy and claims that the path to happiness for humans is found in accepting the moment as it presents itself by not allowing oneself to be controlled by the desire for pleasure or fear of pain. His social behaviour did not quite fit with this. He said that he does not bother to talk with people about important things, 5G included never mind 911 because they immediately marginalise and dismiss him.
I countered with the possibility that he was probably being drained through their negative attitudes; he would be quite happy to speak about his chosen subjects with those who were on his wavelength. The more I go on, the more I realise it’s a question of wavelength. Barry is Irish, he grew up under the Catholic influence and became an evangelical Christian and now seems to have turned into a humanist, a pagan, an enthusiast for nature and natural ways of doing things. It is nice finding that someone who has had a parallel life to yourself. I told him I had decided to live my life in reverse because my teen years was so dreadful that I decided to live them at the other end of my life – so here I am at 74 years of age going on 18.
He spoke about one of my websites, giving useful advice, and we decided to meet again.
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I went to see two clients today, two new potential gardening jobs. The first one was to clean some decking which unfortunately had been painted with plastic -based paint which was the worst of all worlds for the wood. I have to mow the lawn and I have to remove a large antenna.
The second job was a bungalow where they were paving stones to the front, side and back end due to the activity of the wind, the paving stones on the side were stained. I gave quotes for both jobs and had them accepted.
I sometimes wonder whether I charge too little. You have to estimate how much you think people can manage. If someone is on a pension anything above £100 is too much and yet many people retire on good pensions especially round here and they have plenty of money for holidays and so on so I can charge them a realistic amount without problems.
I have a rule as I said before that I never work for unpleasant people and I do stick to it.
this may look grim but the soil is good and was cultivated with love over the years by the husband, now deceased, Two or three people could clear this within the hour.
Françoise works on Monday for age UK. She met a woman whose garden had deteriorated after the death of a husband and said she would be quite glad for someone to come and work it. We went round to see her and we said that in return for the person using the space – which was currently doing nothing except supporting weeds – she would receive vegetables from time to time. So it’s bartering. The amount of space was 42 m² plus a glasshouse so that would be enough for most people. I love the idea of people fully utilising the gardens of their property and I’ve made a note on my ever-growing list of useful social projects.
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