It was fine and sunny first thing this morning when I went out to the market in Uppermill. Now we are back to grey. On the whole ai think I prefer it to begin grey and turn fine and sunny later.
There was only the fish man in the square this morning. Can we still call it a market? Apparently the shoes, slippers, second hand books and bric-a-brac people are on holiday. They go regularly to Spain. (At some point in the past I inadvertently revealed that I have been a teacher of Spanish and sometimes find myself having random conversations about Spanish grammar with the stallholders.)The fish man told me this morning that fruit and veg man has decided he is just too old to run a market stall. So that’s another one gone for good! However, the fishman assures me that he has no plans to disappear any time soon.
Making my way home, very efficiently arriving at the bus stop not long before the bus was due, I fell into a conversation with another hopeful person, mostly about public transport: how often buses were late, the excessive number of temporary traffic lights along the route, for example! The same thing happened yesterday as I waited for a bus from Oldham to home, on that occasion it was the number of buses going to a mysterious destination called ‘Not in service’! Now, according to this article people, especially younger people, are losing the ability to talk to strangers.
Maybe it’s mobile phones. Maybe it’s having been ferried to and from school in their parents’ car. Maybe it’s the continual reminders about “Stranger Danger”, the feeling that we shouldn’t engage with people we don’t know. Maybe it’s general social anxiety. But there it is, a reluctance to talk with people we do ‘t know.
The writer of the article mentions getting into conversation with the waitress in a restaurant: “we chatted and I learned that she was from Seoul. She was shy and softly spoken. We talked gently about Korean food and what she missed about home.”
Later her 15-year-old son asked: “Is it OK to talk to people in that way?” What way? He was asking about the boundaries when it comes to talking to someone about their home country. But the question could apply to talking to any stranger.
“This was a very good question.” the writer went on, “How do you know, generally, what the terms are of a conversation with a stranger? I realised that there is a sort of unwritten code you learn as you get older, which enables you to assess whether a conversation is a good idea or not.”
It’s rather sad that modern society has become more insular. As for me, I frequently talk to strangers on buses. The world is full of interesting people!
“Vegan but Bacon” is another aspect of modern life I have read about. It seems that quite a lot of people like the idea of being vegan. After all, we keep hearing about the need to preserve the world’s resources and how much better it would be if we all ate less meat and other animal-derived food. The problem for some folk though is that they can’t bear the thought of giving up the “bacon butty”. Abandoning fried bacon between slices of white bread or on a white bread roll is a step too far. The concept - “go vegan but bacon” - of continuing to enjoy your bacon butty but otherwise being vegan comes from a social media influencer, of course, followed by millions of people. Vegan but bacon is a step on the road to perfect veganism, which for purists is even better than vegetarianism. Every little step goes some way towards protecting the planet.Perfectionists would hold their hands up in horror. Mind you, for some of them the idea of eating white bread rather than wholemeal is anathema!
As for me, I’ve been vegetarian but nowadays eat chicken and fish but not red meat. I’m a long way from perfection and confess to liking to add ham to some dishes. So it goes!
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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