What do the Cormorants know that we don’t?

Feathered Bastards.

Sneaky feathered bastards hell-bent on destroying the British fishing industry, or so a quote on BBC Radio Four once said. I heard it, sitting bored out of my mind, in my relative's kitchen. It is a quote often mentioned, in a comedic way, by family members. And don't whatever, mention the squirrels! Evil personified in a furry garb, destroying cables that supply power to our homes, getting barbecued in the process. Do they really have an underlying plan known only by a few enlightened ones who know natures plan intimately. Only time will tell, and perhaps they have the upper hand, or so I told a trick cyclist in Harley Street. I didn’t need an acid trip, I saw the absurd, and Radio Four was on the same trip as me. Those bastard Cormorants and Squirrels trying to destroy the comfortable world of Radio Four. Articles spewed out from Broadcasting House about their dastardly nature.

My early mentor, a teacher called Ivor, gave me a sticker, one of those cheap stickers that you could get printed in the seventies. I was labelled slightly imperfect, and I was happy with that. Not perfection, but nearly there. Set on the road. Excellent. It was my teacher Ivor who inspired my life’s quest for finding the truth with a pin. I left the acid trips to my uncle Lawrence, and some others, it seems?

Echoes of the past hit me, chatting with friends on Zoom, and I realised once again that Lawrence planted a seed, that grew into a Lotus Flower. Perhaps that was his underlying mission? For a moment, a past echo of my time with Lawrence hit me like a metaphorical freight train. For a moment, a lump in my throat appeared, and I nearly had to fade to black, and end the call? But I carried on. Life can be like that sometimes. The ‘Zoom’ must go on!

My time with Lawrence was very much a ‘technicolour’ existence, seeing the exuberance of the ‘jet set’ the party of 1970s indulgence, warts and all. It was there laid out in our mansion of champagne, cocaine, vitamin H, and pretty much every recreational drug known to science. As I said, I didn’t need a trip, my life as a child was a trip in itself. I left the golden brown to others, I was sitting in a ship of fools. A ‘danse macabre’. Leading to Desolation Avenue. I was a kid but bastardising, Shakespeare I luckily, knew something was rotten in the state of Denmark.

Strangely, my dad’s two brothers, Lawrence and William, were often fiercely protective towards me. My mother’s sister once experienced that fierceness, very much an over the top reaction, but I was the golden child. I was Charlie Taylor’s grandson, and I cannot escape that moniker.

I was lucky, I think, I know I am slightly imperfect, and when people find out what a turbulent time I experienced as a child they are shocked. Some people assume that I must have had a pretty ‘flucked’ up childhood. No! I wouldn’t have changed it. One regret of that time, is that my grandfather Charlie never saw me treading the boards, as a young member of the RSC. Sadly, I think he was on a trip of his own at the time, downing ‘blue tips’ waiting for his time at the ‘Bailey’. I think his smile would have been as big as the one on Lawrence’s face when I received my Gohonzon from Robert. Mission accomplished Lawrence. As the SGI’s website says,

Whatever our karma, the message we are given in Nichiren Buddhism is that chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo is the new cause which enables us to lessen and change the karma we have created in the past. Our prayers for the happiness of ourselves and others, transforming the world around us into a place of harmony, dignity and respect, are the best cause for our future karma and our future happiness.

I have at last a mission, and I have grasped the tiller of the ship. I need to lighten the load, perhaps. To save me from the rocks in front of me. Changing or converting the negative into a positive. I reflect on my life, but it does not subsume me. For some in my family, they cannot escape their past and are consumed by their own inner demons. I cannot reach out to them, and I am saddened by that. Lawrence had that ability, to reach out, I unfortunately do not. They are stuck, consumed by their past. I have moved on, and I think that they still feel a sense of being secondary, the understudy to the main player. I hope that they find peace in their world.

I never told my story, I followed the code of gangsters, I kept shtum. Until now, it seems?

In many ways, it is incredible that both Lawrence and William achieved so much, given their start in life. Many are often incredulous? Our collective turbulent life. It must be a work of fiction? It was no pantomime to be sure, but I had family that guided me to anchor. My parents especially.

As I type this out, the tears are flowing. Bad because my keyboard is not waterproof. They are strange tears, tears inspired by a life lived large and bold.

However, talking frankly, (as I have said before), I am searching for a heart of gold, and I am indeed getting old. That is my Karma?