Ah, Sweet Misery of Life…

Ah, sweet misery of life, at last I’ve found you!

Those of you for whom the title rings a bell probably recall the version of Victor Herbert’s song (Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life…) sung by Mario Lanza but it you wish to have it at its most grating and annoying you simply have to listen to Jeanette MacDonald in the 1935 film, Naughty Marietta (She co-starred with Nelson Eddy). It is a song which has been parodied over the years, a tune to irritate and annoy, a torture to the ear and sensibilities, and I can’t be sure where my regularly used version of the title originated but “sweet misery of life” has always struck me as very appropriate and is often trotted out at suitably miserable moments in this household. Despite my lack of appreciation for Victor Herbert’s song, it was one of his greatest successes and, I suppose, mockery and parody are really a reflection of how popular this song was in its day.

Of course, misery, while not popular, is certainly ubiquitous at the moment. Covid 19 continues to cast a pall of worry over the country and even the announcement and rollout of a vaccine is tempered by the realisation that it will be late summer or early autumn before the greater portion of the population is vaccinated. Present levels of care and personal restrictions must continue and we will certainly have high numbers of cases after Christmas, following the greater levels of socialisation over the holidays. Misery!

Hopefully, there will be a pot of gold at then end of this rainbow.

Nature has conspired, with our present weather, to contribute to this general feeling of gloom and doom for we have had quite horrible weather for some time now. Gardening and even walking, our two regular outdoor pastimes, have been out of the question as we have had day after day of rain. Being confined indoors for too long is not the best for this one’s wellbeing and I long for bright and dry days to be out again but this seems so very unlikely at the moment. Misery!

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The ground in the garden is absolutely saturated, with big puddles in many areas, and it is impossible to work in the garden at the moment.

Politics is not one of my regular subjects and who could blame me for doing my best to steer away from it as much as possible. We see reports from the USA with armed protestors on the streets challenging the results of a democratic election and this, it seems, with the encouragement of the President. Such actions in a lesser country of interest to the USA would prompt their interference to set matters to right – to restore democracy! Nearer home we have daily reports of the negotiations between the United Kingdom and the European Union with such nuggets as the Prime Minister’s comment that the British navy would patrol their fishing areas – hardly a suggestion indicative of goodwill nor of future accord between the UK and the EU. At home, political decisions regarding measures to deal with the Covid 19 situation have been made with a strong bias towards supporting business and people’s desire to socialise freely rather than following the advice of medical experts. Misery!

Days of sitting indoors are not the best for one! It’s miserable out there but days indoors quickly become tedious. I do my best to keep myself occupied with reading, far too much internet browsing, television and I make the occasional foray into the garden, generally with the camera in hand, to see how the flowering of the snowdrops is going and, I must report, it is going very well. Soooooo, all is not misery in the world! (By the way, Mary says that I am a misery-guts; that I seek it out and that I wouldn’t be happy unless I was miserable – figure that last part out yourself!)

Now, why not treat yourself to Jeanette MacDonald’s rendition of Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life or that from Mario Lanza or you can pass both by and see how the snowdrops were doing today – photographed in the rain with the photographer in full raingear.

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  Galanthus ‘Barnes’

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  Galanthus ‘Castlegar’

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  Galanthus ‘Faringdon Double’

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  Galanthus ‘Mrs. Macnamara’

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  Galanthus elwesii

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  Galanthus ‘Colossus’

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  Galanthus ‘Three Ships’

All is well!