Sea Prayer – Khaled Hosseini
On a moonlit beach a father cradles his sleeping son as they wait for dawn to break and a boat to arrive. He speaks to his boy of the long summers of his childhood, recalling his grandfather’s house in Syria, the stirring of olive trees in the breeze, the bleating of his grandmother’s goat, the clanking of her cooking pots. And he remembers, too, the bustling city of Homs with its crowded lanes, its mosque and grand souk, in the days before the sky spat bombs and they had to flee.
When the sun rises they and those around them will gather their possessions and embark on a perilous sea journey in search of a new home.
Sea Prayer was inspired by the story of Alan Kurdi, the three year old Syrian refugee who drowned in the Mediterranean Sea trying to reach safety in Europe in September 2015.
In the year after Alan’s death 4,176 others died or went missing attempting similar journeys.
“My dear Marwan, I look at your profile in the glow of this moon, my boy, your eyelashes like calligraphy, closed in guileless sleep. And I say to you, “Hold my hand. Nothing bad will happen.”
Pray God steers the vessel true, when the shores slip out of eyeshot and we are a flyspeck in the heaving waters, pitching and tilting, easily swallowed. Because you, are a precious cargo, Marwan, the most precious there ever was. I pray the sea knows this. Inshalla.”
Maude Fealy (Tuck5710)
This Maude Fealy postcard was sent on 5th September 1906 from Gladys in Helston to Miss M Slaple of 12 Chapel Street, Camborne
Idiots!
President Obama is putting a symbolic twist on a time-honored tradition, taking the oath of office for his second term with his hand placed not on a single Bible, but two — one owned by Martin Luther King Jr. and one by Abraham Lincoln.
The inclusion of King’s Bible is particularly significant since the inauguration comes on Jan. 21, the federal holiday in honor of the civil rights leader, who delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech 50 years ago at the Lincoln Memorial. Obama will be facing the memorial as he takes the oath. King’s Bible, which his children say he used early in his career as a preacher, has never been part of a presidential inauguration.
Though there is no constitutional requirement for the use of a Bible while taking the oath, George Washington began the tradition with a Bible hastily grabbed from St. John’s Masonic Lodge No. 1 for his swearing-in on April 30, 1789, in New York. Since then, presidents have typically chosen Bibles with historical or personal significance, many using family heirlooms. Obama is not the first president to select two Bibles — Harry Truman did so in 1949, Dwight Eisenhower in 1953 and Richard Nixon in 1969.
I can’t decide whether the originator of this post on Facebook hates Obama, Muslims or both
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My wife, bless her tells me that I am rapidly becoming, or perhaps that should read have become a “Grumpy old fart”, so what better forum to spread my doom, gloom and paranoia than WordPress. I also have a love of old pictures, postcards and Edwardian Actresses, in particular Miss Gabrielle Ray which I hope to share at regular intervals. As my collection has grown I have set up another blog which contains only pictures of Miss Ray. Gabrielle Ray Thank you for viewing and comments are welcome.
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Grumpy old fart!!! 