Watching our politicians debate abortion last week I was struck by how much my own opinions on the subject have changed. I was schooled by the Jesuits in Glasgow and felt I was blessed with a fully rounded education. The only area where I might be critical was its singular lack of acceptance of any view on abortion other than that of the pro-life lobby.
Obviously for Catholics there are few more potent issues than that of foetal termination, but I remember at the time feeling that it had to be a woman's right to choose what happened to her body. The fact that a foetus would struggle to survive outsi
de the womb meant that, for me, there was no power in the argument that the unborn child's life had the same value as that of a living child.
At the time, we should remember, we were not as au fait with striking images of unborn children in the womb. Scans and the like tended to be rare and blurry and were not handed round when you visited relatives for a cup of tea and a slice of cake.
I spent my school days keeping my pro-choice opinions very much to myself. University afforded me some platform of expression and I clearly saw a link between the subjugation of women and the imposition of anti-abortion laws. So long as a patriarchal society forced its opinions on women there could be no hope for sexual equality.
And I still believe that. But with abortions in this country reaching 200,000 a year, it seems that there is an element of abuse at play. Abortion can never be an easy decision and those who characterise it as just another form of contraception can have no idea of the emotional and physical trauma involved. But there has to be something wrong with a society that can annually wipe out a population equivalent to a city the size of Aberdeen. And while some will argue that foetuses are foetuses and are not human beings, advances in medical science are enabling life for premature babies who would have been regarded as hopeless cases a decade ago. This set against a backdrop of an ever-increasing desperation among childless couples to spend huge amounts of time, money and emotional energy on having children when they simply seem unable to conceive. I sometimes wonder whether there is too much choice in our world.
Forget the full English to GlasgowI had to be in Glasgow early Friday morning but found myself locked into a Thursday evening social commitment involving asparagus and a blue cheese sauce (don't ask). I was therefore faced with the prospect of the sleeper train overnight to Central Station. It's an expensive mode of transport and it seems ironic that a train called a sleeper is so difficult to actually sleep on. The biggest annoyance is the breakfast. I got an egg roll and a cup of instant coffee. Where was the full fry-up with lashings of freshly-brewed coffee, freshly-squeezed orange juice and warm pastries? After a restless night being dragged sideways for 400 miles, I deserved better.
Shine on you crazy diamondAs I approach my fifth decade I have realised that my indefatigable attempt to keep abreast of the contemporary music scene is simply untenable. There are too many hip new acts with weird and bizarre names like MGMT, right, Get Cape Wear Cape Fly or Fischerspooner. I can no longer keep up. Instead I have decided to go retro and return to the music of my childhood. I have been sleeping to the melodic and discordant sounds of the astonishingly brilliant Dark Side Of The Moon by Pink Floyd, above. What an incredibly forward-looking piece of work. It's as if it was recorded last month – so fresh and vibrant is the sound. And my mid-morning coffee and sit-down is now conducted in concert with Neil Young and Harvest Gold, the sort of album that makes me believe that everybody has a heart of gold. And my evenings are spent with the gentlest of head-banging sessions as the blues/rock of Deep Purple's Machine Head reverberates around the flat. Next week I might wear flares and beads and flowers near my hair.
My rice bowl runneth overTS Eliot said he had measured out his life in coffee spoons – I sometimes feel I can measure out mine in bowls of rice. In fact, I struggle to think of a form of rice I haven't eaten and enjoyed. From the puffed rice they called Krispies from my boyhood breakfast through the sticky rice of Thailand and the vinegared rice of sushi there is no rice dish that hasn't passed my lips. But there can be none more favoured by me than the simple delight of rice pudding.
I grew up eating rice pudding, but I knew it as kheer. This is the Punjabi variant of the dish, full of nuts and dried fruit and almost too sweet to eat. Almost. Growing up I never realised that there could be any other form of rice pudding. Then I discovered Ambrosia. This was truly ambrosial. I could imagine a clutch of Greek gods tucking into this delicious sweet rice delight, trying very hard not to drop any on their freshly laundered togas. Ambrosia was no ordinary rice; it was creamed rice. I was obsessed with the stuff for much of the Eighties and early Nineties. Maturity took hold and I realised that there was world of creamed rice beyond the tinned version; sweet rice, unctuous and buttery, spiced with nutmeg or cinnamon; sometimes served with Armagnac-infused prunes; even a savoury version with leeks and goat's cheese. I found myself remembering all the rice pudding dishes I had enjoyed in my life last week as I waited for my own concoction to form its golden brown skin in the oven. A couple of hours later it was delicious, enjoyed with a massive splodge of raspberry jam in the middle. Life seldom gets better.
The full article contains 1029 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
