Comet Tails and Dust Trails

Day 28 (Monday 28th December 2015)

28 domino tiles make up a standard set. The earliest mention of dominoes
is from the Song dynasty in China. Dominoes were first played in Europe in the 18th century,
it is presumed that the game was brought to Italy by returning Christian missionaries.
The word "domino' is derived from a spotted hood traditionally worn during the Venetian carnival.

For many of us around the world, today is a Bank Holiday to compensate for Boxing day falling on a Saturday. Even if you have not a day off work, I hope that you are enjoying a peaceful period before the start of the New Year and find some calm in which to read today's wonderful blog.

It gives me great pleasure to introduce a new voice to the Advent Series, Siobhan Sheridan, the HR Director of the leading UK charity NSPCC (founded in 1884 and originally called the National Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children). Siobhan commenced her career in a customer-facing role in retail banking and soon found herself responsible for training others. She transferred into HR via Learning & Development. She has an impressive track record, moving from Financial Services into the Public sector, where she was HR Director for Defra and the Department for Work and Pensions, before becoming a recognised leader within the Not For Profit arena. She has a strong moral core and a great sense of humour. Siobhan is active on social media. You can follow her on Twitter, her handle is @SiobhanHRSheri.

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Comet tails and dust trails... 

'Will you write me a post?' 

'Comet tails and dust trails is the theme' she said... I was struck by the beautiful melody of the title, my instant slightly magical desire to grab the tail and take a ride across the night sky and perhaps more importantly, by the fact that I know nothing about either comets or their tails.

Somewhere in the far recesses of my memory I recalled that comets often appeared in ancient stories as 'harbingers of doom' or as 'portents of great events.'  Inspired by recent conversations about traditional stories with Geoff Mead and Sue Hollingsworth, I set off in search of where this view of such a beautiful phenomenon might have started in storytelling terms. 

Fairly soon after I began to forage, I was intrigued to stumble across not just any story, but what is claimed to be the world's oldest work of literature: The Epic of Gilgamesh. I won't trouble you here with the telling of the whole tale itself. It is, as you would expect, quite long.

Gilgamesh and the Star of Anu that falls on him

In summary this famous poem, which apparently dates back to 2100 BC, tells the story of Gilgamesh, King of Uruk, and Enkidu, a man created by the gods to stop Gilgamesh from oppressing the people of Uruk. My interest was piqued not only by the poem itself, which I had never heard of, but also by the story around it. 

First discovered in 1853 it caused a bit of a stir due to containing a number of similarities to The Bible, including a Garden, a Man being created from the soil and of a Great Flood. Dating of the oldest fragments originally concluded that it was older than the assumed dating of Genesis at that time. This lead to a great deal of debate about who borrowed what from who and when.

In 1998 a new discovery revealed the first four lines of the poem. At that stage almost 20 percent of the epic was still missing and a further 25 percent of it was so fragmentary that it could be only partially understood. Translations of the poem though were remarkably consistent and had remained so for about 150 years. 

Just this year however, researchers discovered a new tablet which added 20 previously unknown lines. Not a great deal of additional content when one considers the overall length of the poem but they appear to have a relatively significant effect on the story overall.

Tablet discovered in Sulaymaniah Museum in 2015 resulting in a correction in the
order of chapters and completion of some blanks in the Epic of Gilgamesh

The new section added more detailed descriptions of the 'Forest for the Gods' which completely changed the interpretation of what the Forest was like. They reveal the inner thoughts of the protagonists and describe their guilt at some of their actions, previously unknown emotions. They redefine one of the characters as less of a monster and more of a King and finally reveal that two of the key characters had in fact been childhood friends. The story is now different from that which existed before. 

Gilgamesh and his childhood friend Endiku, by modern artist Neil Dalrymple

Stories are everywhere in our lives. We use them to help us to make sense of many things; of ourselves, others, our work, the world and much, much more. We use them at their best to share wisdom, connect communities, inspire teams and to delight our children. Humans have been doing so for many thousands of years. As Ursula Le Guin said 'There have been great societies that did not use the wheel but their have been no societies that did not tell stories' 

And yet they are of course, stories... 

Becoming aware of a new story can change our perspective of an older one. Our brains have the amazing capacity to create complete stories from incomplete fragments without us even knowing that we've done so. Two people having the same experience can create entirely different stories about it. Before long we can start to feel that the stories we have created are in some way 'right.' Stories have the ability to keep us stuck in an old groove, not realising that we are in some way imprisoned by our own fertile imagination. 

And yet, the addition of a few words, the consideration of a motivation we hadn't realised existed, the discovery of a fact we don't know about or the opening of our minds to a different kind of ending, can quickly change everything. And suddenly what we thought we knew isn't quite so clear anymore.

So whilst the stories that we hold dear, about ourselves, our organisations  and the world, deserve to be held dear and honoured. Its helpful perhaps to also be able to be open to holding them lightly, seeing them change or reinterpreting them in order to allow ourselves and others around us to grow and move forward.

Stories are a truly wonderful creative force in the world, offering  a delightful opportunity to look at the world, our organisations and ourselves in new ways.  As Geoff Mead writes in his book 'Coming Home to Story' 

'The magic of storytelling is an essential and timely contribution to the re-enchantment of our disenchanted world'

Christmas Story Telling, A Winter's Tale, 1862
by Sir John Everett Millais

I hope that your Christmas creates the kinds of stories that you will want to tell for many years to come and that you all have a thoroughly magical and enchanted season of goodwill. 

I'm off to grab a hold of the tail of that comet and see where it might take me...

Down in the Dirt

Day 16 (Wednesday 16th December 2015)

16 of this year's "Forbes Celebrity 100: The World's Highest-Paid Superstars of 2015" were women. 
The boxers, Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao, topped the list - Mayweather made $300 million 
(the highest annual amount ever earned by an athlete), 
$250 million of his earnings were winnings from his fight against Pacquiao in May. 
Katy Perry was #3, due to income related to her world tour.
According to the World Economic Forum the gender pay gap may take 
another 118 years to close.

It gives me great pleasure to introduce you to Paul Clarke, the author of today's piece - given the time of year and prevalence of office parties, the publication is timely. Paul had a high flying career in management consulting (advising public sector organisations on their IT strategies), prior to seeing the light and following his passion to become, in the space of less than 5 years, one of the UK's most respected "real time image creation" and event photographers. In 2013 he was listed, by Professional Photographer magazine, as one of the Top 100 Photography Heroes; in 2014 he won the Professional category in the Event Photography Awards and judged the event this year. Paul is inspirational on many levels - perceptive, creative, fiercely bright (he studied Engineering, Economic and Management, Information Management at Oriel College, Oxford), aware of his own weaknesses and always prepared to question and challenge. I first met Paul via Twitter, and have subsequently become a client - he took some brilliant photos of family and friends at my eldest son's 21st - and he is also a friend. He introduced one of our new blogging voices via the Adnet Blogs series last year and I am delighted to have him with us in 2015. Chatting with Paul is always a pleasure, so long as you don't mind surprises and debate. He is a fine wordsmith - try out his photography blog - or else enjoy his company on Twitter (his handle is @paul_clarke).

NB Paul had no involvement in the photographs used to illustrate his post.

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It's just after midnight, on a train outside Purley. Not quite the last train – now that would be a special hell – but pretty rough all the same. It's mid-December; most of the people around me have been hitting it hard today. The signs are everywhere. 

The grey-haired guy in the camel coat slumped down over his bag, drool running from the corner of his mouth on to the crumpled Standard beneath. The pale, sweaty woman by the door, fingers playing nervously with her big handbag. The puker-to-be.

It's not overt violence that hangs in the air so much as sadness. Ten big lads have taken over First Class and are noisily stuffing down burgers and beers. Anyone mug enough even to approach the door will be washed back on a wave of Stella Bantois. A young woman is asleep in the space by the doors – everyone who passes her looks nervous, then guilty, as they're not sure whether to wake her and tell her which stop it is. But you know, these days, can't be too careful...

The office parties, the quick drink after work, the we-said-we-must-catch-up-and-it's-nearly-2016. The unwrapped Secret Santas, the soggy party-hat, the quarter-full bottle of Prosecco under the table. The champagne and the shame and the pain.

The train's been stopped for a while, and my thoughts travel back seven Christmases. That was me – guy slumped over the bag. Or sometimes the red-faced and shouty one. Or the one looking for cabs at Horley having slept right through my stop. Sad and sick. Drinking problem, you see. Call it what you will – call it alcoholism, call it wrong-life-wrong-job – the problem bit would always show up at that time of night in one particular way.

I could not – whatever had been happening earlier in the day or evening – I COULD NOT get past the Whistlestop at Victoria without dipping in for a quick bag of “travellers”. Four tins (at least) of the strongest beer they had. They didn't stock the super-strengths. (Pro-alkie-tip: neither do Waitrose, but they DO stock the Belgian Trippel stuff – it's pretty much the same, and the neighbours won't be shocked. Middle-Class-Special-Brew.)

So that was a drinking problem all right. The first would be empty by the time the train pulled out. The second not looking so healthy by Balham. And neither would I. Three was reserved for the delays around Selhurst, and four would be dispatched just before home. Wouldn't want to come in the door clutching booze, would I? Now how bad would THAT look?

I was down in the dirt. Covered in the grubby coal-dust of modern London life. Stuck down a mine of my own design. I remember one similar train journey, a few years ago, when someone had left a copy of The Sun on the table. The front page was some screaming headline about the Budget, and proposals for higher booze pricing. “CHANCELLOR TO PUT A TAX ON FUN” or something like that. Fun. All that fun. I've never seen that particular F-word in the same way since then, if I'm honest.

How could I cope without all that fun? I'd be ostracised, apart, ridiculed. “The Other” at all those parties. What if Secret Santa wasn't actually funny, sober? Imagine that. In time it turned out that none of those fears were real (apart from the Secret Santa one). But that's for another story.

Anyway, back to dust and dirt and darkness. Thing about even the most insignificant and blackest dust is that you can turn it around and see it in a new light, and it will show you glories unimagined.

Take the comet: thousands of years lost in space, dark, scared, alone – frankly a bit of a mess. If Carlsberg did alcoholic space objects… But put it in the right place, look at it in the right way, and that dust streams out into the most vivid and striking tail. All that darkness, let go, and reimagined. Even bright enough, I'm told, to be seen through the rain-streaked windows of a signal-limping commuter train in south London.

I was lucky. I found the sun, and set my face to it. The dust streams, and now I blaze.

Comet ISON, 2013

Good luck finding yours, wherever it may be hiding.

Comet Donati 1851