1266 No Country for Old Men

Going to bed at 10pm meant that I was going to be physically exhausted the following evening which proved to be so and I went to bed without having put printer to paper, but I must have slept a little beforehand because I did not sleep on going to bed and rose about an hour later in order to write this. It has been an interesting mixture of a day.

The priority had been to experience the Oscar nominated Coen Brothers film, Not a country for old men. This is a bleak, and bloody allegorical film about the extent and nature of violence in society, of crime and punishment and the increasing awareness of death as we grow old, with the consequent self assessment of what we have done and what we can and should do with the self aware time still available to us. Just as the recent BBC two part Messiah dealt with the biblical forecast of Armageddon, the aging Coen Brothers ask the question what is there in the USA for old men with standards and beliefs?

Most of the people in the film merit their bloody demise and their behaviour raises hope for the existence of eternal damnation as they possess no redeeming qualities. The contemporary angel of death, played by an actor Oscar nominated in a support role, is a much more credible and fiercesome agent of God than the exterminator of Messiah. His single minded and principled ruthlessness executes anyone and everyone who comes across his path without discriminating between levels of villainy and sin and works on the basis that if you encounter the spirit you must be guilty of something, and in this film no one is innocent and therefore without guilt and sin. Whereas in Bergman films there is always the hope of redemption for the sinner and continuing life for the innocent and the good, there is nothing to cheer up us old men. Tommy Lee Jones, and his grandfather play the old men, the latter waiting for death. Tommy Lee decides he does not want to go on in the world as it has become an opts for premature retirement and his loving but nagging wife. She knows this is not the solution for him. We know he will die from the fear the death.

The film is floored, or at least I think it is because the main character is an experienced and skilled hunter and veteran of Vietnam who like most people who do not have a lot, does not understand the nature of money and is blinded with the lust for the better life change he thinks finding 2 million dollars of drug capital finance will bring. He does not know that although the quality of life changes, in this instance he learns what is like to be the hunted as well as the hunter, and the chase is prolonged, that money is just as imprisoning as anything else which dominates a life before the love of others, life and one's God, and which is free and available to everyone irrespective of position in society

In the plot he encounters a scene of carnage in the desert where he has been hunting and wounds but does not kill a wild deer, together with the 2 million dollars and the drugs which were to be bought with the cash. He takes the cash for himself and his wife and then returns to the scene to take water to one of the criminals who he has found founds alive. He knows this is an idiotic thing to do, and the film suggests he needs to do it perhaps to be able to enjoy money but he knows he will not enjoy unless he takes water to the dying the man, just as he had a flicker of conscience about leaving the wounded deer. His decision to return with his own vehicle enables the owners of the drugs and the money to identify the man and his family. However his major mistake is to keep the money in its original container and not to check the money or the container for a tracking device. In many ways he merits hell more than the professional assassins and drug runners, because he is willing to sacrifice his wife and his mother in law in his attempt to find a solution to the moral poverty of existence. Being the Coen brothers they wrap their biblical wrath with a sense of humour. It is a great film for masochists.

The idea which took over the rest of my day was the decision to cover the stone tiled kitchen with laminate flooring. There is some cheap flooring available for under £10 a metre but it is not suitable for bathrooms or kitchens. I settled on one pack of Beech laminate similar to that in the day room which provided about 1.'5 square metres and with the 10% reduction for pensioners on Wednesday at B and Q and which cost just under £20. The system is interlocking and does not involve glue but does need cutting. I only purchased one pack to assess if I could and wanted to do more than create a working surface near the sink and the cooker, and to assess the quantity required if I decided on having a go at covering the whole visible surface which would be a complicated activity because of the present location of the three doorways, the sink unit, the various surfaces and floor cupboards and the cooker and refrigerator which protruded in different ways. The project will take time and will be a challenge and I had to make three visits for the three packs which I eventually worked out be needed.

The instructions require the planks to be kept in the use environment for 48 hours before laying so it will be Saturday before the work can commence, although I will ensure I have everything ready and work out a plan of action. In he meantime I also purchased a small tube of plastic wood to fill the gap in the lower panel of the front room door. This is my task for the morrow and then the downstairs clean will be completed and I can move to the stairs and bathroom. I have bought some new carpet cleaner along with instant porridge oats, bread and rolls. However I also bought some chocolate peanuts and toffees for the pictures. Bad Boy, Confessing the truth does not help.

I came across a passage in a Christmas gift novel which made me sit up. The book is The Steep approach to Garbadale by Ian Banks. It contained a number of truths which govern my work. There is way to avoid telling the truth without telling lies but which misleads others because of what is not disclosed. I work to tell the truth, without lies and which does not mislead because of what is not disclosed. Sometimes the telling of the truth has to wait until someone dies which is the situation because I did not feel able to write about aspects the relationship with my other and my aunt until after their deaths, and it is why I also need to gain recognition by those responsible for he premature death. For the past five years I have put the system of investigation on trial and so far it has demonstrated its inadequacy and incompetence which I first encountered nearly thirty years ago. However the passage in the book also makes two further points of extraordinary relevance to my predicament. The first is that sometimes the telling of truth needs to be withheld until doing so longer matters, although from my viewpoint such truths were never worth telling and the write also admits that some truth never cease mattering which is the kind of truths I have always attempted to engage in. The author does make the point that sometimes the truth is left until ones own death when it does not matter what impact the truth then has. For me this is a form of revenge just as suicide can be an aggressive act towards those you leave behind, as well as a courageous act of love. One should never say in death what one dares not or cannot say in life.