Ashes to Ashes

"That's the Vale of Trent" my elder brother solemnly announced as we looked out across the valley which spread itself below the hilltop village where my father was born and where my mother and father had been married, almost sixty years ago.

The nimbo-cumulus clouds, some threatening imminent rain, filled the massive sky which was the impressive backdrop to the fields which lay, like a cottage hand-woven quilt, beneath the glowering skies. Fields where my father had played, ridden ponies bareback, hunted rabbits and brought home food for the family table, and cowered below German Luftwaffe bombers during the course of a lifetime of visits here.

The fields stood behind the barbed wire fence and through the rustic gate at the end of the road where my dad, Walter William, was born in 1934. Coleby hilltop was the entrance to his field of dreams, or at least to the fields where he could escape the harsh reality of his family and their life of near-but-not-quite sufficiency.

Below, in the verdant valley, were the many pathways and copses where he had escaped the village schoolmistress. She, who had a drawer full of specially fashioned switches with which to beat the hands of recalcitrant students such as my father, who after breaking into the same drawer destroyed them all by burning them in her stove before taking refuge on the roof of the school. The copses where he had discovered his first swarm of bees which he had returned home with in a cardboard box and founded his first hive and thus begun his interest in apiary. Where he and Sam Butler had learned to smoke the butt ends of Woodbine cigarettes, scavenged from outside the blacksmith's where they had hung around long enough for my dad to have learned the skills of making wrought iron and for converting the bullet cases left behind during the Army's mobilisation into cigarette lighters.

These fields, whereupon my father had made his last wish to be scattered as ashes, by his family, when he died.

I had been for Sunday lunch with my mother, brother, sister, and her two children at a local pub where, in spite of a wait for the pre-booked table and a small altercation with the barman over the non-arrival of my drink - and a heated dispute over whether or not he had charged for it - we had managed to calm our nerves about the seriousness of our purpose. "You know you always wanted to take dad to the pub?" I asked my brother rhetorically. Having gained his attention I added "Well here he is!" handing the carrier bag across the table towards him. The confusion on his face was quickly replaced by amusement as he realised the bag contained the box, about the size of a shoebox and which contained what the label described as 'The earthly remains of Walter William …'.

It was surprisingly heavy (6lbs) to the extent that the undertaker had warned my sister about it and which I realised having now repeatedly handled it might easily cause physical strain if lifted carelessly. My brother laughed nervously but my teenage niece looked rather disturbed and I was forced to explain that the real reason we had taken 'Granddad' into the pub was to ensure that if anyone did steal my car, at least we wouldn't lose him. Lunch over, we left the pub and I drove my mother towards our date with destiny, further along the cliff top road where my dad grew up and to where my mother had come as a young woman, having met my father whilst both serving in the RAF, nevermore to return to the Welsh valleys of her own origin.

The conversation we shared was interrupted by the choking sensation which we had both been experiencing since my dad died six months previously from a ruptured Aorta, the direct result of a lifetime of cigarette smoking, to which my father had directed himself uninterrupted for over 60 years of his life. Born into an age which held no prejudice for the voracious consumption of the evil weed, dad had puffed his way through literally millions of Park Drives and Woodbines before a very lengthy relationship with Embassy (the red packet) which had furnished parts of our house through their coupon and catalogue reward scheme. This eventually matured into a dalliance with Benson and Hedges which was ultimately replaced, at my suggestion, with the more economical - if no less hazardous - roll-your-own option, culminating in many thousands of Rizla wrapped Golden Virginia and Samson 'coffin-nails' as he would prosaically describe them.

My mother, herself a part-time smoker for many years, had stopped in her early fifties, but only after my father had suffered his first heart-attack. This resulted in him living a somewhat limited existence from his early fifties onwards where, in spite of his great energy and enterprise in business, he had required my brother's enlistment as a business partner to make good his own practical and visionary genius, which continued to support the family, despite his failing vitality, for a further 25 years.

My brother and I were also smokers of some vigour; my brother preferring cigars, I having experimented with cigarettes, pipes and finally becoming a roll-your-own expert. I had struggled and made successive attempts and subsequent failures to quit, sometimes lasting years at-a-time, but I was at the time of my father's death smoking quite heavily. My dad's last words to myself and my brother, before he was wheeled off to the operating theatre where urgent surgery proved inadequate against the years of self-abuse still rang in my ears. "It's too late for me, but not for you and your brother ... yet!"

It took me three and-a-half months after his passing to act, but by the time we drove him to his final destination, I was clean. I hadn't smoked for over a month. There was no ash on my clothing or in my car. Honestly dad! Mum, who had spent the months since my father's death trying to erase the residue of tar and stench of the agent which had robbed her of her lifetime companion, had herself suffered from the toxic fumes, long after she had herself quit, by passively smoking my dad's. Ironically, and rather dramatically, she had herself just been in hospital where the effects of this and her denied grief had resulted in her experiencing heart failure, leaving her with angina and many similar symptoms to those which had finally overcome dad.

No longer able to climb the stairs to the upstairs bedroom, she now slept in a single bed in what had formerly been my father's office, and where he had consumed many hundreds of thousands of the 'fags' as he would call them, that had reduced both of their lives to the box of ashes we now carried in the foot well of my car. I remembered how, as he sat poring over the accounts of one, or another, of his business ventures, he would tap the butt of his cigarette on one of the ferrules of the grey ashtray, the ‘demon’ ashtray, which featured four spokes - two ‘imps’ (fallen angels) and two channels on which to rest one's cigarette - before curling all four of his right-hand fingers and thumb into a 'cage' in which the fingers and tips of the thumb caressed the yellowed end of the filter. He would then place the very end of the overheating filter between his lips and suck greedily upon it as its embers glowed angrily from within the 'cage' which, as the white paper disappeared left only the brown flecked tip. This was then hastily positioned over the ashtray before it could allow the remaining glow to deposit its coal onto the carpet or, by burning the filter itself, create an acrid stench unpleasant even to the heaviest of smokers. The 'art' of smoking had and has many subtle rituals, and I had learned nearly all of them from my father, a high-priest of smoking.

The cortege of cars arrived in the narrow street where my father and his family of six had pressed together in the cottage which featured an open fire, and coal burning kitchen stove but had no running water. I walked past the street water pump which had not only ensured he was late for school every washing day, as his young hands and arms had strained to fill and carry the buckets for the copper on the stove, in the remorseless cold of a winter’s morning, but which had also accounted for the life of my grandfather’s first wife in an outbreak of typhoid poisoning during the 1920’s.I carried the weighty box under one arm as my mother linked her forearm into the inside crook of my elbow.

My sister, and her two teenage children, arrived first at the gate from which she hurriedly retreated having discovered a grey dappled pony on the other side of the fence. She was, to my surprise, somewhat disconcerted by this inquisitive creature’s appearance. My surprise was based on my sister’s former love of horse riding, a passion she shared with both my father and I. I couldn’t quite understand how she had allowed this animal, who stood about the same height as me, to spook her so completely when, like me she had shared my dad’s love of horsemanship which had taken us so far and on so many exciting dashes across country, but nevertheless here she was refusing to share a field with this admittedly flighty animal.

I strode into the field rather more confidently than I felt, and tried to assuage the animal’s familiarity by first stroking its muzzle, and when it attempted to bite me, an act not missed by my once again retreating sister, slapping its neck and pushing it boldly backwards. We stood around a huge concrete plinth into which was set a manhole cover giving access to its unknown purpose and depth upon which the pony now reared both of its front legs and placed its hooves, thereby dominating this peculiar scene from which my sister, accompanied by her slightly less fearful daughter, scuttled back and forth.

Looking around for some alternative solution to this impasse I decided the next field along the hilltop, about 70-80 metres distance, might be preferable, provided my mother, with her respiratory difficulties and angina, was capable of walking such a distance and that, should we also find some way past the apparent obstacle of the stile between the two, could be coaxed and supported into making the return journey. The pony, now intent on eating the remains of my father, continued its rude intrusions, and succeeded in making the decision for us all.

With some fuss we made the traverse across the hilltop, as first the wind blew and then the inevitable rain began to fall upon our distressed funereal party.Luckily mum squeezed between the dry stone wall and the stiles barbed wire as the notion of lifting her was both undignified and perhaps impractical given her bulk. We assembled on the muddy path as the wind howled into our faces, threatening any attempt at scattering Walter William with the inevitability of him decorating the windows of the nearby bungalows and cottages. I opened the box and revealed within a red plastic jar, not unlike those which abounded upon the shelves of shopkeepers during my childhood which were clear plastic and contained the multitudinous varieties of boiled sweets such as sherbet lemons, acid and pear drops and Jamaican Limes, all sold by the quarter pound weight. Inside was a creamy-grey residue of granules and powder, the ‘ashes’ and earthly remains of my dear old dad. Mum was the first to take a handful, and as she released them she exclaimed “I let you go”!

We all took our turns, decided on seniority to take a handful and as we released this into the fierce wind stating our parting wish, mine being to thank him for the life I have. The wind, now whipped up into a frenzy, and in spite of our attempts to release each handful low to the ground, as advised by the undertakers, caused the ashes to fly all around us, coating our clothes, once black, now grey, and even getting into our hair, eyes and mouths.

The rain hurtled down and we were possessed to walk further down hill where now only my brother, my young nephew and I took command of the task which was to scatter almost all of my dad’s remains on the fields of his childhood and youth. I finally assumed full responsibility, throwing great handfuls and then scattering directly from the mouth of the receptacle great swathes of granules and clouds of powdered dust, taking care to preserve sufficient to satisfy mum’s request to retain a small amount to fertilise the garden at home. I recalled aloud to my brother and nephew how the Nazis had used the ashes from the crematoriums of Auschwitz to lay paths upon which they symbolically would stride.

Soon, as the wind continued to blow father in all directions, and as the accompanying rain washed him into our skin, hair and clothes, our task was completed. By now my mum, sister and niece had retired from the hillside and were leaving the field, still pestered by the grey pony, and as my brother and I regained the pathway we were confronted by a solitary jogger, wet and sweating from his exertions, and whose path we had inadvertently blocked as we rejoined the muddy walkway.

He turned out to be someone that I not only knew personally but a local chiropodist of some repute who had, in the last months of my dad’s life, taken some professional interest in his feet and toe-nails! Our brief conversation was of course interrupted by the unwelcome attentions of our skittish equine friend who butted us peremptorily out of the field.

The wind immediately fell. The rain ceased, and the dark clouds gave way to sunlight which spread across the valley as if someone had drawn away a dark cloak. Turning away from the transformed landscape to check my mother’s whereabouts and wellbeing I was astonished to see, describing a majestic arc above the Norman church spire under which she had married my father, a beautiful rainbow, garishly exhibited against the blue-grey background of the sky.No-one took a photograph, and little was said other than to ensure everyone in the family group had witnessed this unlikely yet timely transformation.

Dust to dust. Ashes to ashes I thought silently, adding secretly ‘funk to funky, we know Major Tom’s a junkie, strung out on heaven’s high, living an all-time low’ … the lyrics to a David Bowie song popular with my brother and myself as adolescents and despised by my father as ‘absolute rubbish’. But then we never knew his favourite song was Bohemian Rhapsody, until after his death.

After driving mum home and having a cup of tea together, she decided to have a little moan about him. He certainly was stubborn. I delayed having a shower until much later that day when I watched carefully but observed no visible trace, as the water from my hair ran down the drain. Particles of him will always remain. I’ll never be able to completely wash him away.

Resist, Resist

A colleague today evinced the desire to quit smoking. I suggested she join a group to which she replied something along the lines of "I don't feel comfortable about sharing with strangers". I proposed the benefits of nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) but she further opined that there is no point in quitting smoking and keeping using nicotine as that was the problem. I put it to her that statistics suggested that she was twice as likely to succeed if she used NRT and that if she
joined a group she was twice as likely to sustain her quitting. She retorted that this was government propaganda and that she "didn't believe a word of it!"

Now this is an intelligent and self-actualised person I am talking about here and in spite of - or possibly because of - the ferocity of her response I am now reflecting on her reaction to my suggestions. Undoubtedly smokers see their relationship with their drug as a 'weakness' and their defensiveness to such perceived 'weakness' is both understandable and to a large extent acceptable. Although our societal tolerance to this self-abuse has altered insofar as where it is allowed, we still defend the individuals rights to continue to self-harm in their own time and space. It is unthinkable that anyone should be criminalised in pursuit of its practice, unlike the consumption of other legally proscribed substances such as cannabis which it is widely believed is less harmful than the tobacco it is commonly mixed with.

Imagine, if you will, in a future, some may say more enlightened age, tobacco being outlawed and its use scorned in the same way as a number of class 'C' drugs. Imagine the shame felt when for example a school teacher is caught in possession of tobacco. Someone who through their contact with children could corrupt them simply by their own possession and consumption of a tobacco cigarette! Far-fetched? Ridiculous? Think about it. Which one kills 5 million people a year?

A symptom of our society's ambiguity of this murderous product is the shared psychosis that this product should not only be allowed to be available but that society should continue to collect windfall taxes on its sale and distribution! Why not sell dope and tax it? It's clearly not a case of morality or indeed ethics! It's a case of money. Capitalist gain and the size of the potential market and the way in which illusion remains the way in which we perceive the world, the madness of so-called sanity. Smoking is a mental illness which becomes a physical even fatal illness.

My colleague is clearly struggling with this paradox.

Tobacco Crazy

I recently recalled an occasion when, as a businessman, I attended a meeting with a colleague at a clients. My colleague, a manager in his 20's, sat down to engage in a discussion and immediately produced from his pocket a small tin of miniature cigars. He opened it, removed a small and pungent cigar, placed it into his mouth and lit it with a quartz lighter he had produced from his waistcoat pocket. The blue-grey smoke drifted into the air, quickly filling the small boardroom whose table we sat around. No-one said a word. Why would they?

Forward 35 years. Imagine trying to do that now. It is utterly inconceivable that it would go unmentioned. Disbelieved perhaps, but ignored? This is the change in conscious awareness which now exists in relation to smoking. Consider this text from a 50's text book entitled The Modern Woman - Beauty, Physical Culture, Hygiene by Lillian Bradstock and Jane Condon in which the authors assert:

'Millions of moderate users find comfort daily in the use of tobacco. As long as the smoking is moderate no serious harm seems to be done. In fact, when one considers that the majority of medical men, whatever their special ideas and theories, smoke themselves, they can scarcely regard the practice as very harmful'.

I wonder if it would be possible to hold such a conversation now, much less publish such an opinion, without being fitted with a straight-jacket!

You really couldn't make it up!

Three Weeks Without a Transgression

This evening would mark three weeks since I stopped smoking and first attended my group (I actually stopped three weeks and-a-day ago!). I would have liked to have been with my support group (and to see how many of them still remain) this evening but I am required to be at the school's open evening.

Today was interesting in that instead of spending my lunchtime sat in my car pretending to smoke my fake fag I went for a walk in the glorius sunshine. I felt different. It felt different, as if I really didn't smoke anymore. I couldn't even be bothered to simulate it and dispensed with the entire paraphenalia by choice.

Perhaps the medecine is working so well I no longer need or want it!

Stats and FAQs

ASH, an organisation dedicated to quitters state the following:-
Q. What's the best way to stop smoking?
When you are thinking about stopping, talk to an expert about what's involved ­ e.g. helplines, NHS
specialist centres, pharmacists or your GP. Find out whether one of the proven pharmaceutical treatments
like NRT or Zyban would be right for you ­ they can double your chance of success, and are both
available on NHS prescription. Get your friends and family involved as they can give you moral support.
Then pick a day ­ like No Smoking Day ­ and stick to it.

The following is a transcript of a conversation with Natasha, a NHS online advisor at their gosmokefree site.

Talking...
System:
You are now connected
Natasha:
Hi, you are through to Natasha, I am an NHS stop smoking advisor, how can I help you?
P-O-D:
Hi Natasha. Can you please tell me which method of stopping smoking, in statistical terms at least, has or is proving to be the most effective?
P-O-D:
The user has requested a copy of the session transcript
Natasha:
joining your local stop smoking service and using nicotine replacment therapy thats best suited to your individual needs is the best way to help stop smoking and sustain it
Natasha:
I see you are a non smoker are you trying to help someone else give up?
P-O-D:
Ok, thanks. I read a lot of articles which claim that either cold-turkey or hypnotherapy are supposed to be the most effective ways of stopping permanently. Do you have an opinion on this?
P-O-D:
Actually I recently stopped and did so through a local NHS stop-smoking clinic using NRT
Natasha:
we are not allowed to really give out personal opinions but in terms of hypnotherapy research is non conclusive and more about the individual. cold turkey is very hard and only 2% of the population manage it and find it hard to sustain long term. Thats fantastic how long have you been smoke free?
P-O-D:
Almost three weeks, this time. I am actually a teacher and would like to be able to advise young people appropriately. Also I am writing a blog and would like to be able to state some specific and accurate statistics, if possible.
Natasha:
I can give you a link to some of our literature which may be usefull also websites such as ASH can be beneficial for statistics and information and links to other areas
P-O-D:
Thank you, that would be great
Natasha:
The BBC website also has a large ammount of accurate details and statistics related to smoking
Natasha:
http://gosmokefree.nhs.uk/quit-tools
Natasha:
http://www.ash.org.uk/ash_za0a700j.htm
Natasha:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/
P-O-D:
That's very helpful. I will search there. There are lots of organisations I am slightly cautious of taking seriously who appear in google searches so this is much better for reaearch purposes
Natasha:
our own website also has a lot of information and usefull links as well
Natasha:
Not a problem if you or any of your students need any help always feel free to contact us for any help we can give
P-O-D:
Can you let me have the link please. I will certainly recommend this as a helpful resource to anyone it might help. Thanks very much
Natasha:
http://www.nhs.uk/gosmokefree
Natasha:
No problem if you need anything else You can call us on 0800 169 0 169 7am – 11pm 7 days a week or alternatively if you want to chat again we are available from 7am to 11pm 7 days a week via web chat. Helpline number and opening hours
P-O-D:
Yes thanks, just spotted it again. Thanks again and bye
Natasha:
Bye

There are as many ways as you like to avoid it but only two real ways to quit. Now or never!

The Courage to Quit

I spoke with my brother this morning who, after asking me how my no smoking was going, told me he had bought a £1000 bicycle in preparation for his own attempt to stop. In fairness to him he'd paid £300 for this lightweight (13lbs) wonder of cycling technology which he'd not used as yet due to the fact he hadn't got a helmet and feared the consequences of falling off.

Sounds like a fairly complicated web of procrastinatory co-dependencies to me.

I also received another extremely articulate and insightful email from my ex-smoker friend which I'd like to discuss with him, and with anyone else who may wish to enter the debate about the very important discourse he raises.

In response to my last post on Bachanalian remedies he says:-

'I was a bit concerned to read that your guru was advising the avoidance of stressful situations. This is the very behaviour which leads to anxiety related disorders such as agoraphobia etc, where avoidance of a given situation enhances and reinforces the belief that the situation presents some danger to one's self.

I suggest, in my reply, that there is a remarkable book I once read entitled The Courage to Be by the theologian Paul Tillich which deals with this subject in some depth. Although not a religious man myself I certainly found this remarkable work very helpful and sustaining in facing a number of existential difficulties. I don't propose to review it here - there are in fact a number of excellent reviews available at: http://www.amazon.com/review/product/0300084714/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?%5Fencoding=UTF8&showViewpoints=1 one of which states;

'Technically, this book is difficult to read and often hard to understand. The book feels like an awkward translation by Tillich of his own stream of conscienceness. But, that should not deter you in any way. Once you feel comfortable with the language the book really opens up as you get a feel for Tillich's rhetorical skill. The arguments are well made and are very fun to wrestle with. He speaks on Courage in it's different forms, their manifestations in history and politics, and it's place in our modern lives. I found this book to be a very interesting (and helpful) perspective on how we arrived at the point we are in live today, both individually and collectively. Far from being an anachronism Tillich's famous book is as enlightening now as it was in the 1950's.'

My erstwhile colleague however puts the argument, relative to quitting, or continuing smoking thus:

'... in a large percentage of those situations which the addict has deemed to be stressful, the stress has actually been created by the nicotine, or more accurately the fact that the situation will temporarily prevent one from indulging the monster.'

This presumably posits the notion that the cigarette is simply the 'comforter' the vestigial and usuallydenied nipple from which one's separation causes the individual existential angst. He continues ...

'If we are to be entirely honest with ourselves, we would admit that in the vast number of cases where our attempts to rid ourselves of the demon have been scuppered by the actions of our nearest and dearest, it is more likely the case that the nictotine raddled brain of the user has engineered the situation to provide a convenient excuse for relapse.'

Self-sabotage then is another of the properties of nicotine?

Life, post nicotine, is a series of first experiences, and the sooner all these are confronted and successfully negotiated without the crutch, the better, because each avoidance will make the attempt more difficult in the future. Some situations are genuinely stressful, but in actual fact you find that the nicotine has been kidding you all along, because no matter how many fags you consumed before facing the stress, the stress was still there to be faced.

Existential angst seems therefore to be unavoidable and inevitable. However, is it not our mind and how we, the individual employ these external shields, be they nicotine, alcohol, narcotics, gambling, eating, adrenaline, violence, sex or the many other manifestations of addiction with which we are confronted almost constantly in the form of neurosis, and not the substance or activity itself that performs the delusion and allows the behaviour to become our master?

This is the problem with many forms of counselling and advice on 'giving up' (which in itself sounds like a sacrifice ... of what ?) they attach a very false importance to the effects of nicotine, which merely serves to heigten the idea of deprivation in the reformer ...

These are all valid arguments which lead to an ineluctable truth. If we truly want to quit we have to avoid all substitutes which means I and every other member of my support group have quit smoking by replacing our dummies with a blanky! In my case I have actually replaced it with another dummy, the inhalator, but given that I am now managing my existential angst without the drug capsule which goes in the inhalator, presumably this could be considered a progressive regression? I think this is known in the trade as a 'transitional object' and can take many forms, medical, psychological and spiritual and all of which serve to support the addicts move from dependency to semi-dependency, co-dependency and ultimately, unlike religion for example, to arrive at complete independence from any form of 'crutch' whatsoever.

Reader's may recall that I began this writing by pointing to the popularity and dangers of the cold-turkey route to independence. Time will tell whether the transitional approach proves to be more successful in my individual case, although there must be some statistical data I can adduce to support my theory. I will go and look!

Group Therapy

Last night was week 5 and we were thin on the ground. When I say week 5, the first two weeks were preparation for quitting and since then we have been gathering to measure our success, resolve and to receive pre-prepared distractions and support ideas.

The first weeks measuring revealed a small number whose medications and nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) hadn't been timed to co-incide with the same quit date as everyone else. A gentleman who I had taken to be a successful quitter when he had first been introduced to the group proved to be a celebrity backslider. His progress, or lack thereof, seemed to be the exponential opposite of that desired as an outcome. As we prepared to quit, he was beginning a tumultuous backslide culminating in ramping up his own consumption as ours reduced to zero. Apart from providing the odd and almost certainly unintentional comedy moment he seemed to be the tethered goat of nicotine consumption, utterly helpless before its approach, and yet one can only admire if not respect his tenacity, at least in terms of attendance.

Having quit, one faces the weekly routine measurement of one's CO levels which, in my case began at 25 on the week before we quit, immediately decline to 5 the day after quitting and has progressively lowered itself via 3 to 2, the measurement expected of a non-smoker and therefore the proof of one's commitment and measure of success. The tobacco addict's equivalent of weight-watcher's scales, the activity involves breathing down a cardboard tube which one retains - and in my case records the weeks data on in ballpoint pen - preceeded by a group confessional in which each of us is required to cough up any off-road moments when a cigarette, cigar or any form of tobacco has proven irresistible.

Feeling pretty smug myself from a complete avoidance of the demon weed I await my chance to boast a clean record whilst various others confess they have had one, two or several slip-ups, or in some cases failed to even get to their start-stopping day. Our celebrity backslider, when similarly quizzed as to how long it is since he last had a drag considers carefully with lips pursed and chin in hand, wheezing tunefully through his cupped palm before replying "an hour-and-a-half"!

Feeling home-and-dry I suppress a chortle. Now it is time for our first healthcare visitor who's purpose, we are informed, is to talk to us about how exactly to avoid stress and therefore the possibility of giving in to temptation at moments of extremis. The beatifically smiling guest assures us all that she too was once a leper such as us but now tobacco holds no power whatsoever over her. Casually but smartly dressed in loose flowing top, trousers and those tell-tale combat sandals with neatly manicured and painted toe-nails she tells us a cautionary tale of the pitfalls to be expected and avoided, avoidance being the most favoured option, before introducing us to the emergency cure should this be unavoidable - Bach's Rescue Remedy! As she adduces its great properties and constituent components, which if she is to be believed would relieve a Lion's toothache and reduce an Elephant's broken tusk to no more than an itch I suddenly realise we have been cornered. She's off, handing round samples of which, she confidently avers only one drop is ever required. A drop in a glass of water can seed another glass. A drop in ... well, an ocean!? I recall the tale that a prize of £1,000,000 lies unclaimed by anyone who believes, as this lady seemingly does, that they can prove the veracity of a homeopathic remedy! We've been offered up for seduction by the snake-oil saleswoman! Suddenly it feels like time to go home! And so I do!