How to stop comparing.

Thanks, Bruce

I may be a bit behind on the news, however I'm interested in comments by Janet Daley in the Sunday Telegraph.*

She has obviously been waiting for David Cameron and the Conservative Party to develop a clear sense of direction, and believes that they now have as she writes, "So let's give credit where it is due. What the Conservatives are saying now is nothing less than a full-frontal attack on moral relativism: the doctrine that says that no one has a right to criticise (or "stigmatise", in the fashionable parlance) any life choice, however selfish, irresponsible, feckless or socially destructive it may be."

I'm not into "moral relativism," Perhaps its time for a pendulum to swing back the other way (if we can do so in a way that is accepting of human beings who do not fit other people's absolutes).

*Article 24th January, referred to in The Week 30th January 2010.

Is it true? I'm hearing that a contributory factor to Haiti's financial poverty, which has made the impact of the recent earthquake worse, is that they only finished paying of debts to French banks around 1950. After slaves in Haiti won their freedom by rioting, apparently these debts were imposed on the people of Haiti by Napoleon as compensation for the losses incurred by the European owners of the plantations there on which the former slaves had worked.

Our celebration in 2007 of the conribution to the abolition of slavery in Britain by William Wilberforce and others brought home amongst other things the way in which slavery contributed to European coffers while impoverishing other people.

Search "Wilberforce" in the blog for related articles.

One of the challenges, in supporting people prayerfully in the church and otherwise, is knowing how much to encourage a positive attitude and how much to encourage people to be real about how they are feeling. Much of my work has been with families who are bereaved, and is informed by a knowledge of the Grief Process.* On the other hand, some people within Church circles seem to believe that there is a very close relationship between positive thinking and prayer. Indeed Jesus did say that whatever you ask for you should believe that you have received it and it will be yours.

I was interested and challenged by an extract in The Week of 16th January from Barbara Ehenreich's book Smile or Die: How Positive Thinking Fooled America and the World.

She speaks of the behaviour of those around her - and support groups in particular - to her breast cancer. She found that people were trying to make her collude with a "positive" culture that, because of its attitude that any problem is a gift, prevented honesty about feelings including anger and also prevented honest discussion about what was being done to prevent and treat the disease in the population as a whole.

I think a wise balance is needed. It is my experience in working with those suffering grief (which includes redundancy and serious illness as well as the death of a loved one) that long-term denial is not helpful and that people need to have time and space to be real about how they feel, and that finding good in the event - or adapting to it - is a good eventual outcome but takes time.

*Here's an overview of the grief process. There are alternative descriptions for the various stages.

Yesterday in Church we celebrated the tenth anniversary of the music group Con Spirito. Yes, they've been playing at the monthly informal worship services at St Philip & St James' Church, Neston, for that long!

Well done!

Steph and Josh went sledging today and made several snowpeople. About four centimetres of snow fell yesterday and during the night, and in this we are lagging behind other parts of the UK. The shock of sudden snow seems to have made many people fearful of going to work, perhaps because so many local villages are accessible only by narrow lanes which the council do not grit. The snowscape is nevertheless beautiful, and evokes a sense of peace.

Greetings to all my readers and subscribers for a happy and healthy 2010.

Enjoying the Christmas season with friends, we spent some time visiting our local historic city of Bath and were impressed to discover an amazing exhibition of photographs around the city centre and in particular at Bath Abbey.

These fabulous photographs are by Yann Arthus-Bertrand and mostly taken from the air by helicopter. See the links for the brochure of the exhibition in Bath and more information about the Earth from the Air project including pics of some of the photos. The exhbition is in Bath until the end of January - go see it!

The exhibition encourages sutainable development, and the first few lines of accompanying text are arresting. "Since 1950, economic growth has been considerable, and world production of goods and services has multiplied by a factor of 7. During the same period, while the world's population has only doubled, the volume of fish caught and meat produced has multiplied by 5. So has the energy demand. Oil consumption has multiplied by 7 and carbon dioxide emissions... by 4. Since 1900 fresh water consumption has multiplied by 6, chiefly to provide for agriculture." Most of this increasing consumption is by the fifth of the world's population who live in industrialised countries.

I wonder about some of the data and conclusions to do with climate change, and consider whether by talking about climate change we risk missing key points by inappropriately conflating partially related issues. However this kind of information  leads me to think that whatever else is going on our consumption is out of control, which points to an underlying cause of greed.

St Bartholomew, Corsham, Christmas Eve

Come Holy Spirit,
 fill the hearts of your people
  and kindle in us the fire of your love,
   for Jesus’ sake. Amen

A new born baby!

If there is one thing that seems guaranteed to produce a reaction, it is a new-born baby!

Whether it is around the hospital bedside, or around the buggy in the street, the assembled friends and relatives will go “Ooh, aah, isn’t she beautiful!”

At least, that’s what the women do, the men are more likely to stand back looking bemused. That is, until our own baby is born when we join in excitedly and proudly.

So it’s good to be celebrating Jesus’ birth tonight.

Babies are amazing. Human beings are amazing. And all the while God is looking on, saying: “We made him!” Or, “We made her!” I like watching nature programs on t.v. Among all the other creatures we can be gob-smacked by, let’s remember that human beings also are creative, created, and amazing.

Tonight we celebrate the Christmas event: that is the birth of Jesus. The fact that this happened approx. 2000 years ago and we’re still celebrating shows that it is a rather special event! Tonight we read passages from the Bible and sing carols that all remind us of what took place. It is hardly surprising that, there at the centre of it all, is a group of people going, “Ooh, aah,” around a baby.

Well, compared to your average birth today, there are similarities. There is the group of people.

However it is a little unusual that at various times the group includes shepherds, who are summoned from their fields and sheep by angels praising God, and magi who have arrived by following the stars.

God looks on, this time not just saying: “We made him”, but “I am him.” This is the awesome truth of the Christmas story: that God becomes human, or incarnate (which means the same thing). God, who amazingly created this small and wondrous planet that we live on, chooses to come and live among us.

Like those visiting shepherds, and magi, we need to have a sense of awe. I wonder when you feel that? Perhaps you feel it every Christmas. Perhaps you feel it when you see snow on the ground, or when you look up at a clear starry sky, or when you see the first spring bulbs coming into flower. Perhaps you feel it when you see a new-born child. These are moments when we have to recognise that life is not all about ‘me’; that we don’t do everything on our own; that there must be a God, and that he must love us a lot to surround us with such creativity.

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If you were part of that “Oooh, aah” crowd looking at the new born Jesus, what would you be thinking?

If you were going to sing a few lines from your favourite carol to celebrate, which would they be?

Some of us live very much in the present moment, aware of what is around us, and indeed soaking up the beauty or awesomeness of a new-born child. “Wow! He’s got his father’s eyes! He’s got his mother’ nose! (Oops!) What a pretty dress!”

Others of us like to think to the future. “Have we finished decorating the baby’s bedroom? What school will he go to? Will she get a good job? Who shall we ask to be the God parents? When shall we have the baptism, or christening?”

We are all human, and we do have different skills, strengths and interests. These become more evident as we grow older, and so we know that it is our duty as parents to do our best to nurture any growing child of ours – so that they can make the most of their life.

As far as we know, Jesus went to school in the way that other boys of his time did. He worshipped at the synagogue on the Sabbath, and spent most of his life following in Joseph’s footsteps to work as a carpenter. It was only when he got to the age of about thirty that he stepped into new work and started to teach and to gather disciples around him. We don’t know exactly how Jesus became aware of this, but it was a serious change in vocation.

This change was marked in a number of ways, including at Jesus’ baptism by his cousin John, which as a church we shall celebrate in a few weeks’ time. This is the famous moment when heart-warming words from heaven were heard by the crowd announcing Jesus’ place in things: “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”

Maybe, for some of us here tonight, life will be like that. We’ve spent all our lives working in what we thought was the right job, then along comes God and says, “Follow me!” All change – a new vocation!

As we think about the birth of Jesus, and what his presence means to us, we could talk about such differences, but instead let’s talk about some similarities.

For all of us as Christians, our baptism marks the moment when we put our lives into the hand of God and allow him to make the most of us – to help us to become the people he made us to be, to live life to the full and enjoy it.

I wonder whether you believe, as I do, that God has plans to prosper us, to give us hope and a future; that he has good work in store for us to do; and that if we will connect with him we shall discover the best for our lives?

So we can stand in the crowd around the new-born Jesus and be struck with awe and joy. We can also wonder about the potential of this child.

We may have different vocations, but as Christians we share a vocation to care for one another; to connect in a spiritually intelligent way with creation around us and its Creator; and to make good use of the gifts that we have.

It is these small acts of love that bring hope to the world.

I asked you what few lines of a hymn you might want to sing.

My favourite hymn is O Little Town of Bethlehem, and two lines in particular.

O holy Child of Bethlehem! Descend to us we pray,
Cast out our sin, and enter in; be born in us today.

It is an awesome thought that as people and as Christians we can celebrate Christ’s birth, and we can also celebrate his birth in us. We can wonder at the potential of a baby, and we can wonder at our potential. We choose to nurture a new-born child, and we can also choose to nurture Christ in us.

As St Paul writes, Christ in us is “the hope of glory”.
(Colossians 1:27).

Our world needs hope, and it is the way that we let God work in us that brings hope to the world. We need to nurture him.

Tonight we celebrate again our kinship with the new-born Saviour. With those gathered shepherds we wonder what it all means.

Watching God and us grow together, nurturing the Christ within us, is the only way we shall find out.

O holy Child of Bethlehem! Be born in us today.

 

As I write the conference in Copenhagen about climate change draws to a close. Some people claim that there is a consensus that global warming is caused by human action that has caused an increase in carbon dioxide. There are notable opponents to this view, including Viscount Christopher Monckton who has spoken out at Copenhagen. He claims that human influence counts for at most one sixth of the global warming, and that government attempts to deal with this by telling us what to do are an abuse of power.

In other words, he says that powerful people are making use of the "scare" to gain more government-level control over world populations. I should like to dismiss such theories, except that it seems obvious to me that people can seek to use any opportunity to advance their own cause or power. See my article about Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine.

As I understand it, religious people who warn us against the creeping threat of one-world government or one-world religion see this as the fulfilment of Biblical prophecy. The fact that some of those who bring such prophecies are portrayed as insane in media reports does not mean that they are wrong. Prophets have a proud heritage of being misunderstood or ignored (and at other times their advice is acted on). Logically there are three possible positions each of us may take: concerns about one-world government (etc.) are unfounded; the concern is real, and the climate change lobby are part of the movement; the concern is real, but the climate change lobby is not related in to it.

I'm not sure I find these things helpful, because I don't find scary information helpful unless I know what to do about it. Such interpretations or predictions do not suggest that we should take action, rather they suggest that it is part of God's plan - revealed in the Book of Revelation and elsewhere in the Bible - for things to get worse before the final successful battle of Christ over evil. So that suggests that all we can do is watch. The only action advocated (and which readers should thus take seriously) is to fear God and avoid the "mark of the beast."

It may be tempting to ignore anyone who says what we do not want to hear, whether it is those saying we caused climate change, those saying we cannot blame others for climate change, or those who want to put God at the centre of the conversation. Even if only a small part of climate change is caused by human generation of increased carbon dioxide, there is still the observation that our seas are becoming more acidic to the detriment of shell fish and corals.*

My own belief is that solid progress will not be made while climate change is seen just as a problem to be solved. There needs to be recognition of the connectedness between ourselves (humans), Creator, and creation (which includes our distinctive role or vocation). In such a framework the underlying issue would be seen as sin, and in particular greed. So progress requires that as individuals we do not only look at what practical steps we can take to reduce energy consumption, but that we also look at our underlying beliefs and the effect they have on our behaviour and take penitent steps to address that too.

I also wonder what would happen if, instead of wondering whether we are to blame for climate change and trying to change the climate (King Canute and others have failed), we invested the energy in looking for technological and humanitarian solutions for those populations which are expected to be affected most detrimentally. 

It is extremely difficult for a single culture to recognise the ways in which its own belief systems are self-destructive, so maybe that's where the prophets come in.

 

*Source The Week 19/12/09 quoting Charles Clover in The Sunday Times.

This week I heard some fascinating presentations about helping people to reach their full potential. The occasion was one of the regular get-togethers organised by the Institute of Business Consulting in South West Britain. The evening, yesterday, was hosted at At-Bristol by Veridian plc who wanted to tell us about their learning tool Freemind, designed by Tom Fortes Myer.

This is a collection of recordings on CD which individuals and organisations can use to get rid of the blocks to achieving their full potential. The underlying belief which Tom explained, and which I can agree with, is that performance = potential - interferences. So achieving potential is about getting rid of blocks. Before the talk I spoke to someone who had used Freemind. She spoke of how it had transformed her life since she started to understand that every situation she faced was an opportunity for her own development. That statement is, itself, transformative. by which I mean that it changed my own way of thinking.

The recordings are available on CD or by download from the Freemind web site, which includes some sample recordings free of charge.

Tom's talk was complemented well by a talk by Jan Childs of EQ4U about Emotional Intelligence (EQ) and how it is much more important in the development of leaders than IQ. I recommend her book "Understanding Emotional Intelligence in 90 minutes," which can be purchased from the web site.

Part of my own fascination is the relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Spiritual Intelligence. Spiritual Intelligence is to me about the uniqueness, connectedness, and vocation of human beings in creation - which embraces the growing desire amongst employees in particular and people in general for meaning and purpose in their work. I notice that Jan heads off in this direction in her book, particularly in the final chapter, and I see the Tom's approach to unlocking potential as drawing together the spiritual and emotional.

Is it easier to find employment or to start a business in the current economic climate?

Last Friday I attended the Grand Final of the Wiltshire New Business of the Year Competition. Almost every town in Wiltshire, including Corsham, had a good handful of entries, and the winner from each town reached the final and won several thousand pounds and other goodies. The entrant who impressed me most (but did not win) was a nineteen year old from a local town who was fed up with being unemployed. She decided to set up her own dress shop because she saw there was no other shop in the town selling the kind of clothes she wanted to wear.

I hear people complaining about the lack of help for job seekers; I see the government seeking to help new businesses through Business Link and other schemes. I find myself wondering whether it is easier to set up a (successful) business than it is to find a job at the moment.

I had a great evening yesterday, in the company of twenty or so colleagues (is that the right word - see previous article!) from the Institute of Business Consulting of which I am a member because of my coaching and consultancy business. The occasion was the annual Chairman's Networking Dinner impressively hosted at Casani's French Bistro in Bath by our illustrious regional chairman, David Rigby, who has a real gift for these things. The enjoyable meal was interspersed by ten-minute speakers and there was the opportunity for much idle or deep and meaningful conversation.

I found myself talking to two people who, like me, have a significant background in Information Technology. The conversation with the person on my left was all about the problems of using computers today. This ranged from the way in which computer media or files from a decade or so ago cannot be read by today's computers, to how we are losing historical records because inks used for printing documents (and photographs) do not last well. I still intend to print out a lot of my digital photos to add to my traditional album - that may be necessary if my p.c. is wiped out by EMP or plagued by future incompatibility; but what is the point if the prints will not last? My conversationalist is still using a 35mm camera with traditional film.

After the main course I chatted to the person opposite me. Her work as a consultant focuses on helping teams of people in remote places to communicate with one another. She encourages the embracing of modern technology, taking people beyond mere web-conferencing to the on-line virtual world of Second Life. She sees such use of technology as essential in today's environmental crisis. She is the first person to have offered to help me sort out the wardrobe for my avatar. I have not accepted yet!

I am struck by the contrast between these two conversations.

I am very aware that as a personal and business coach I value working with people face to face: yet I use e-mail to arrange the appointments, and I am typing this on a computer now. It alarms me when I visit offices and see people glued unergonomically to their computer screens even to the exclusion of a lunch break.

It seems to me that in today's society we risk being turned into machines by the machines, that is to say we become dehumanised. What it means to be fully human is a bigger topic than I allow for in this one article however, as I attempt to think through the extent to which I should use automated e-mail newsletters (etc.) to promote my business, I feel that I first need to envision the way in which a healthy society makes use of technology, and be faithful to my vision. A challenge in Finding True North!

"Technology is a great servant, but a poor master." In times of technological change, and when "the market" wants us to adopt new technology for its profit, what values do we need to hold on to use technology to grow in our humanity rather than to be dehumanised?

 

I suspect that people have been asking similar questions since before the Atom Bomb, and maybe not enough during the Industrial Revolution. Paul Vallely impresses me with his writing, and I note his article in the Church Times of 6th November 2009. He comments on the row over the sacking of government scientific adviser David Nutt and concludes that the problem is not our contempt for science, but that scientists condescendingly do not (always) see that "science must be subjected to social values not be a substitute for them."

At a recent work-related gathering a friend(?) of mine made a comment along the lines that he knows who are his friends because they are the people with whom he socialises. By implication, people he works with are unlikely to be friends.

This set me thinking (yes, maybe I do too much of that!). Perhaps partly because of my ersthile by local role as a vicar, most of the people that I know, and may think of a friends, I have got to know through "work," or perhaps through a local club related to one of my hobbies, or some course of study. If I were to define my friends as only those I (just) socialise with (and what does that mean?) it would be a small bunch indeed.

I find myself wondering how technological and other changes have affected what it means to be a friend. A century or so ago, before the easy transport that we take for granted today, most people's friendship group would have been those in their local neighbourhood, and they would have got to know one another through living near to one another and attending the local school together. At the other extreme, today, a friend is someone I am unwilling to refuse access to my Facebook profile.

Changes in technology, transport, and access to university education, all make it easier to build geographically wider communities - of friends or at least acquaintances. The technology ranges from the telephone to e-mail to Second Life.

I could define friends as people who enjoy one another's company, without seeking gain from that. I could recognise friends as those who are there for me when I am in need, and I for them (yes, I recongise the Biblical alusions). So how important to friendship is physical presence (touch, or literally a shoulder to cry on)? Is the nature of friendship changing? If so, is that for better or for worse?

Answers and insights welcome...

Following the retirement of our Team Rector, I find myself readjusting to leading church services, starting with the Remembrance Sunday service at St Bartholomew's Church today. This was a well attended service as usual, with plenty of military uniforms in sight, and Padre Andrew Cooper preached an impressive sermon. It was moving to see the number of wreaths laid at the war memorial by various local groups.

One of my daily readings this morning (from Celtic Daily Prayer) coincidentally spoke of the "worst curse" in some cultures of not being remembered, of having one's name struck out. This reinforced for me the importance of just the act of remembering, whatever else may take place.

On the other hand I'm interested in the construction of the word remember. Member. I think of this as a word for parts of the body. Re-member. Remembering must have something to do with putting things back together. What action flows from our acts of remembering? I'm reminded that in the Old Testament when God "remembers" this is not a reference to some thoughts He has, but a reference to action that He takes.

We've been working hard this weekend digging a hole for our new Green Cone, subsidised by Wiltshire Council. It does not look much, but much of it is buried underground: we had to dig a hole over 2 feet deep and about 3 feet in diameter.

We can put food scraps in the Green Cone, which will "digest" them and create just water which will drain into the soil. Impressive, huh? This saves filling our dustbin and landfill sites with food waste. We'll see how well it works.

We considered doing composting, which we did in our last house, but don't have a large garden and the composter equivalent to the green cone (the Green Johanna) requires balanced quantities of food waste and garden waste all year round, which would be a challenge.

http://www.recycleforwiltshire.com/component/content/article/208.html

Roger Clifton, Team Rector for Corsham and neighbouring parishes, held his last services in St Bartholomew's Church today.

The church was full for the main service at 10:00 this morning. The uplifiting worship for the festival of All Saints, with an excellent choice of music and hymns and a great sermon by Roger, was followed by refreshments and speeches in the Town Hall.

A moving morning. We wish him well, and shall miss him.

Here's some challenging quotes that I like

 

All man's miseries derive from not being able to sit in a quiet room alone.

Blaise Pascal,  French mathematician (1623-1662), Penseés

 

The man to whom little is not enough will not benefit from more.

Columbanus (7th century monk)

At the Corsham Chamber of Commerce yesterday we listened to a fascinating speaker - Sue Wilkin from the local Trading Standards office. She deals with relationships between businesses and their consumers.

I thought I knew a fair bit about this, but some new regulations were brought in last year. I learned that:

• It is now an offence for businesses to engage regularly in unfair commercial practices, such as refusing to replace faulty goods. Trading standards officers can now make use of the civil courts to deal with such businesses.
• Traders who give quotes in the consumer's home for work to be done, such as replacing damaged roofing, have to offer a seven day cooling off period during which the consumer can change their mind.
• Goods sold have to be sufficiently durable, so retailers do have an obligation to compensate consumers whose microwave ovens fail just after the guarantee period has ended! They cannot say, "You did not buy an extended warranty: go away!" (This is not new, this is from the Sale of Goods Act.)

E&OE. While I believe this information to be correct in English law, I take no responsibility for its accuracy or any consequencies if you rely upon it. Check it with authoritative sources such as aTrading Standards Office, Consumer Direct, or a lawyer.

An interesting article in The Week today  (3rd October 2009) comments on how the original data on global surface temperatures, which has underpinned the climate change hypothesis, has vanished. Apparently the original data collected by Wigley and Jones, and drawn on by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has been lost although "adjusted" figures remain.

The question is: if there is no scientific data to underpin beliefs about climate change, then is the movement really a religion?

Here's enticing GVI video footage of Steph & Josh's whereabouts. Although I think the videos are from a previous team, they are great to watch.

Steph GVI Pta Gruesa, Mexico; Josh with GVI Seychelles.

       

Click on photos to see them full size.

While enjoying lunch in the garden recently, before the wave of wet weather set in again in Wiltshire, I was distracted by a large wasp on a nearby plant. This turned out to be a hornet. Further investigation revealed hornets coming and going from a nest in our neighbour's roof space.

I'm not sure whether to be pleased that we have rare insects in our garden (to complement an impressive variety of butterfly species this year), or look forward to our neighbour having the nest destroyed before the wasps become overly pervasive later in the year.

Here are links to the blogs for Steph and Josh's marine conservation work with Global Vision International (GVI) over the Summer, and newspaper coverage of  art exhibitions at which Josh is exhibiting paintings and photographs at the Corsham School and the Pound Art Centre.

GVI Seychelles (Josh). He's based on the main island, but will do a short visits to Curieuse where there are giant turtles!

GVI Mexico (Steph).

Pound Art Centre (Wiltshire Times)
2007 'A' Levels (Wiltshire Times)

Original articles included photos which don't seem to be available online. There are similar articles in the Gazette & Herald.

Last weekend we enjoyed a family celebration at Stourhead for Dad's 80th birthday, finishing with fireworks.

More photos.

Last week I enjoyed sailing in the Falmouth area with friends. We chartered the yacht Alcyone from Cornish Cruising. The winds were Force 4 to Force 6, which gave us some exhilarating sailing at sea. We also enjoyed the beauty of harbours such as Fowey and the Helford River, as well as some tranquil sailing up the River Fal: we reached Truro on a high tide. Of course we found some good pubs too. "Glad to be alive 2!"

See album for full set of photos of sailing and scenery.

Three years ago, following growing and enjoyable participation with Bristol Anglican Cursillo, the Bishop of Bristol appointed me as the clergy rep to be part of the leadership team (so a trustee and Spiritual Director) of this growing Christian community.

I've decided to step down from this role, but hope to continue to be actively involved in this valuable ministry. I value the ongoing fellowship and support, and the way people are encouraged to look at their life with God through the three lenses of piety (that is prayer, or devotion), study, and action.

Apart from our regular renewal events (Three Day Weekends) the life of the community centres around regular small group meetings. I was pleased tonight that we held the first meeting of a new group, after rearranging the groups to include the record number of people who joined at our weekend earlier this year.

In my work as management consultant and coach (Finding True North) I've been asked to do some interim management work for Robin Hood Ministries - to head up their staff team part time for six months to help steer the charity through its current growth stage.

The charity is based in Trowbridge, Wiltshire, and helps alleviate poverty in various countries by supporting projects that help communities to be more self-reliant.

They also encourage businesses to support them through the initiative Business Against Poverty.

At the weekend I found myself talking to someone out walking her dog. She was recovering from Swine Flu and lives not far from us.

She'd been diagnosed as having Swine Flu because of aching greater than that she'd experienced with 'flu before, and having started a course of Tamiflu recovered well and quickly.

Travelled to London on the train yesterday afternoon for a trustees meeting of Accts MMI. The train manager happily announced that we were running ahead of schedule until we were near Reading. Then the train stopped for quarter of an hour while the manager and driver inspected the train and the police arrived. It turned out that children had placed timber and concrete across the rails - and been seen running away so probably got caught by the police.

The train ploughed through this material without most people noticing, and even the braking seemed fairly normal. I feel for the driver, though, as he must have seen this at the last moment and for a few moments had time to wonder whether the train was about to derail and he was about to die.