For reasons which are as complex as they are uninteresting, I find myself taking Padel lessons.  Padel is a sport which may or may not have originated on British cruise ships and is a sort of mixture of tennis and squash.  I have bought myself a padel racket, though that does not mean that I am committed to any sort of continuation of the game, but I am having individual tuition and very taxing it is too.
     I know no one in Castelldefels who plays the sport.  Which is to say, I know lots of them, because I see it being played every day - but these people are not in my social circle.  And even if they were, what the hell would I say to them?  How would I keep up with the inconsequential chatter that is such an important part of the gamesmanship which surrounds each sport?  In a foreign language!
     And the game is only played in doubles!  I am a truly awful doubles player, for all the reasons that people might suspect if they know me!
     So, the chances of my making a go of padel are none to the square root of minus one.
     Still, while the lessons go on, and go on they do, I am giving it my best shot.  I have a young and unrelenting teacher who leaves me wishing for death at the end of each hour's lesson.
     The following poem came out of a post-wishing-for-death cup of tea and the notes I was able to make.
     The cowlick and colour of my hair are both real, or perhaps I should say 'were'!  I wanted to use the word 'archaeological' in the penultimate line but, try as I might, I could not get it to fit.

Sport?

Tirednesses compete.

And in the no-man’s-land that borders pain                    

I cling to that kind calm that comes

when you don’t want to move – 

and you don’t need to, too.

There are no aches unless you shift.

And in the stillness, where the pen’s

the only thing to budge,

you can pretend that you’re

re-living all those facile times

when squash and badminton and swim

could flow together in an effort’s ease;

and where exhaustion was a momentary joke;

and fuel was a pint of Brains SA,

or just a change of scene, or talk.

Now knees remind me

of the past-tense points

in games with no rematch.

So why the present lessons

in a strange and hybrid sport?

And, one beyond the classes,

I’m not going to play?

There are some reasons

that I could adduce –

and real ones to wit.

But I so much prefer to think

my stumpy racket, sweat and hurt

are resignation redefined

to match the fanned-out, cow-lick swirl

of thick, dark brown, unruly hair

whose forehead site is

clear and plain

on my smooth scalp.

I was reading today about the British 'Golden Generation' of which I am part.  As a Baby Boomer (Leading Edge) I am part of a generation of British people who have (apparently) in Mac the Knife's phrase, 'never had it so good.'  We have been sucking money and resources from our fellow countrymen with reckless abandon with everything, up to and including our University education paid for by others.  I would point out that my yearly University grant was sixty-six quid, which, even all those years ago was not enough to live on.  My parents paid for me to get through University and they subsidised my teacher training year too.  Jobs, I have to admit were plentiful - getting a job during the vacations was easy, and professional posts when I had done my training were numerous.

     We were lucky and now we are retiring and we all know what problems that is going to create.  But, in retirement, we are not going to be like our parents.  We are not, we keep telling ourselves, ever going to be as old as they were!

     This, obviously poses problems.  How are we going to grow old?  What does that even mean?

     I suppose the poem above is a rumination on the process.

Brains is the name of a brewery in Cardiff - my home city.  SA (aka Skull Attack) are actually the initials of the original brewer. If you should ever be in Cardiff then I recommend a pint of Brains SA without reservation.