Like a fish taken from the river and tossed back in
I am slowly, very slowly, writing something about knitting and its healing qualities. Knitting a jumper for yourself is an act of love. The piece is also about two bad work experiences which came before I began to knit. I had written ‘jobs’ at first there, instead of ‘work experiences’. One of the jobs wasn’t bad. On paper it was near perfect. I would have been content doing that job for a few years.
I will finish the essay someday this century, but the moral is life goes on and hobbies bring joy.
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This week, an elderly relative texted me. They have very poor digital literacy. They needed help accessing an email attachment. I sent instructions, screenshots of me doing what they needed to do. Some people cannot work computers or comprehend interfaces. Some people cannot learn what comes as second nature to me.
In the end, the relative gave me all their passwords and asked me to go into their emails and to print and then post the attachment. I don’t mind doing this, but it breaks my heart. The attachment was a ticket to an event they were looking forward to. Now they feel silly and weak and they chose to surrender their privacy to me. It is not trust, it is desperation. Life goes on and hobbies should bring easy joy.
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In 2006, the former Ombudsman and Information Commissioner Emily O’Reilly gave a speech to the Institute of Public Administration to launch their Diploma in Management of Modern Public Service Delivery. She discussed the evolution of services and how they were being offered. She asked the audience to “remember not to be in thrall to technology and to remember that the customer is a living, breathing human voice who just occasionally would like to talk to another one.”
I came across that speech years ago, when I was on a Emily buzz having read her book on right wing anti abortion campaigners in Ireland Masterminds of the Right.
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I think of towns with no banks, no post offices. Last week, on a bus to a friend’s home, I passed the Department of Social Protection on Amiens Street. There is a bus stop in front of it and it is a horrible place to wait for public transport because the path is always crowded. I used to wait here a lot of evenings when I lived in North Strand. It would ruin your mood. There is plenty of space on this stretch of foot path, but there is a barrier boxing off open space. People are pushed into each other and pushed towards irritability. And the space yawns there, someone somewhere having decided to fence it off.