devant son pas hésitant elles s'écartent doucement

entre les doigts d'une enfant tant de fleurs restent à offrir qu'elle n'ose en cueillir aucune

elles s'inclinent doucement devant sa grâce dansante

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Photo “Zoe Lilley-Verou in a field of flowers” by @kizu@pixey.org censed under CC BY-NC-ND

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photo Allan Cummings @acsync@vivaldi.net

Mahy, Margaret. The Tin Can Band and Other Poems. Illustrated by Honey de Lacey. London: Jonathan Cape, 1989, 7.

“İşte dikkat çekmek istediğimiz ilk nokta: Tamamen insana özgü olanın dışında komedi yoktur. Bir manzara güzel, latif, muhteşem, değersiz yahut çirkin olabilir; ama asla gülünç olmayacaktır. Örneğin bir hayvana güleriz çünkü onda bir insan davranışı ya da ifadesi görmüşüzdür. Bir şapkaya güleriz gülmesine ama bizi güldüren bir keçe yahut hasır parçası değil, insanların ona verdiği şekil, şapkanın kalıbını aldığı insan hevesidir.” – Bergson, Gülme- Komiğin Anlamı Üzerine Bir Deneme

The Wayans family built a comedy empire (and made Jim Carrey a star) with In Living Color in the early 90’s. Now, at last, we can peek behind the curtain into the workings of this seminal show to witness the birth of brilliant comedy, as this transcript of an early pitch meeting shows.

Keenen Ivory Wayans: Okay, people, what have you got?

David Alan Grier: Get this—Damon and I are film critics. Like Siskel and Ebert?

KIW: I’m with you so far…

DAG:Only…gay!

KIW: Wait. That’s the joke? The film critics are gay?

DAG: Yeah, that’s the joke.

KIW: I LOVE it! Run with it! *laughs* Gay men—in the entertainment industry! Who ever heard of such a thing! Y’all are killing me! Jim, what do you got?

Jim Carrey: I play a fire marshal…with severe burns!

KIW: You want people to laugh at a burn victim.

JC: Yeah!

KIW: Well, I’m laughing already! Who’s next?

Jamie Foxx: Okay, so I’m gonna play a woman, right?

KIW: But wait a minute, Jamie! You’re a man!

JF: I know! But the woman is really ugly!

KIW: *laughs, wipes tears from eyes* oh, that’s good stuff. That’s real good stuff!

JC: Oh, boss, I’ve got another one!

KIW: Keep ‘em coming! This shit is GOLD!

JC: Okay, I play a fitness instructor, BUT..she’s a woman…AND she’s ugly!

KIW: Oh, you literally cannot go to that well too many times. It’s just a brilliant concept to hang a sketch on!

Damon Wayans: Alright, get this. I’m gonna play a superhero…who is handicapped! So like…how can he be a superhero, right? And I’ll do like a cerebral palsy voice!

KIW: That’s fucked up, D. You can’t make fun of disabled people like that.

DW: Oh, I—

KIW: I’m just playing! I love it! Go write it!

Stichting Kor Relatie

Goedemiddag daar ben ik weer dokter Kor, u heeft vast net iets gezien en gehoord en weet, het is tijd om te zoeken naar mijn stichting, Kor_relatie, u heeft behoefte aan relatievering via Kor. Nou mooi, ik regel al jaren het een en het ander zodra er iets meer aan de hand is dan een ring, muis of een vaatdoek. Ik weet dat u dan op zoek zal gaan naar de Stichting, er op vertrouwend dat u daar, hier, een luisterend oor zult vinden, ook al ben ik me bewust van dat u eigenlijk zocht naar iemand anders werkzaam voor een andere stichting, doch ik ben spontaan in het grote gat, zeg maar gerust de diepe kloof, gesprongen tussen de c en de k, Ik heb mijn naam en achternaam mee dus niemand kon me stoppen om u ook te begeleiden naar een hoopvollere toekomst met een totaal verwerkt verleden, wat zij zeggen te kunnen kan ik ook beweren, maar dan net iets anders. Mijn hulp is geboden door u overhaaste beslissing en het volle vertrouwen in Google, DuckDuckGo, Startpage en de rest maar hier is Kor Relatie, en ik heb meer hits, dus ik ben de beste. Bewezen door u eigen handleiding en de ware impulsen van de zoekmachine, sponsorkrachten.

Goed en wel, ik heb mijn eigen belteam voor u stem klaar zitten ergens in Azië, alles wat u zegt wordt live vertaald door een AI tolk programma en alles wat mijn team van experts van alles wat en soms wat meer zeggen ook weer. U zult langzaam maar zeker meningvol kunnen communiceren dankzij de impulsen van techniek en inventief werken. Het zou heel misschien kunnen dat u alleen een hele poos spreekt met een robot maar wel een hele slimme en empathisch geprogrammeerd, eentje die u aan de lijn houdt tot er een echt persoon terugkomt van de hele korte toiletbreak die de door mij betaalde managers hun toestaan, onder begeleiding van een meerdere, ingeklokt, allemaal omdat ik u zo graag wil helpen met alle ineens weer opgekomen problemen. Dit nummer kost u niet meer dan de gesprekskosten, geen extra onkosten voor ongemakkelijke stiltes en ademteugen door u of ons levendige personeel.

Wij kunnen, mocht dat nodig zijn, u ook doorschakelen naar onze tweede nog wijzere, zeer professionele belteam in de ruimte naast de andere van belteam 1 en de AI tolk robot, alwaar extreem uitmuntende experts in diep geworteld ongeluk en dergelijke pech u met woord als daad bijstaan. Zij weten op een zeker moment na ongeveer vijf minuten meteen wie u eigenlijk had moeten bellen en beter ook kunt bellen zodra wij klaar zijn met het bezorgen van ons complete pakket telefonische zorgverlening. Kor Relatie Experts voldoen aan de ISO norm voor belteam experts en we hebben al vijf jaar achtereen de Benny, meest prestigieuse prijs voor telefoon optredens, gewonnen, dus u weet dat wij onze hulp net zo serieus nemen als die andere met ons wedijverende stichting, een welke gebruik maakt van een merknaam terwijl ik, hier, met naam en toenaam hulp bied, me niet verberg achter deskundigheid of spreek over jarenlange ervaring.

Over ervaring in en over alles kunnen wij inmiddels als beste spreken, We hebben iedereen geholpen die hulp kon krijgen door met ons te spreken of door onze site te bezoeken en zo in contact te komen met onze zeer geneeskrachtige games. Dokter Cookie, Mens Erger Je Niet Online, Jack de Hacker en onze nieuwste net ontwikkelde game Ganzenmoederbord. ER geneest zo hier en daar altijd ergens wel iets bij onze Stichting Kor Relatie, de eerste Stichting met Winst Oogmerk, zekerheid voor kwaliteit. Ik dank u met alle liefde en eerbeid voor u gebrekkige vaardigheden met betrekking tot het intikken van toetsen, zelfs al liggen op het toetsenbordje de letters k en c mijlenver uiteen, dus het kan alleen maar meer dan toeval zijn dat u hier uit komt voor de oplossing van u probleem. Kijk gerust dieper in onze spiegel des oordeels en kies bewust van u zelfbeeld voor Kor Relatie, speel nu Ganzenmoederbord en win vijf extra Kor Relatie zorgpunten.

“Yaşam akıp gidiyor; gerçek, o.. Asıl oyun, o, doğru yanlış, akıp giden uygun.” —Vedat Türkali, Yeşilçam Dedikleri Türkiye

Emil Nolde, Flower Garden-Kneeling Woman with Hat, NGA

“Why do our lot never admit failure? Never. It might be better for us if we did. And it’s not only love and men. Why can’t we say something like this -we are people, because of accident of how were situated in history, who were so powerfully part- but only in our imaginations, and that’s the point-of the great dream, that now we have to admit that the great dreams has faded and the truth is something else-that we’ll never be any use. After all, Molly, it’s not much loss is it, a few people, a few people of a certain type, saying that they’ve had it, they’re finished. Why not? It’s almost arrogant not be able to.” —Doris Lessing, Golden Notebook

Lessons from three decades in networking that continue to hold true despite fast-paced tech advancements

Reflecting on over three decades in networking, there are recurring themes and lessons that have stuck with me. Technology may have advanced at lightning speed, but these foundational insights remain relevant.

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1. Ostrich Syndrome

Just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not happening.

In networking, simply ignoring a problem doesn’t make it disappear. This “Ostrich Syndrome” – burying one’s head in the sand and hoping the issue will resolve itself – is common, especially among ISPs. ISPs frequently test only from their core, not from the actual user edge where customers experience issues. Their tools may not detect what the user is facing, and while they may rely on data showing that “everything looks fine,” end-users know better. The key takeaway here? Don’t assume that because you’re not seeing an issue, it doesn’t exist. Real visibility into customer experience requires testing from all perspectives, and better tools are often the difference between discovering and ignoring hidden problems.

🪶Ostrich Syndrome in Networking | When Problems are Ignored🤦‍♂️

An example of Ostrich Syndrome is the way many techies approach the use of spanning tree:

🌳Spanning Tree is Not the Root of all Evil as Noobs Proclaim 🫚

2. Eating the Elephant One Bite at a Time

Effective maintenance is proactive, not reactive.

Networks are complex, and it’s tempting to ignore maintenance until there’s a forced outage. But most networks exhibit signs of degradation long before they fail entirely. Proactive maintenance is essential – by addressing the top interfaces with errors each day, you make incremental progress toward a healthier network, effectively “eating the elephant one bite at a time.” This approach requires a robust Network Management System (NMS) to identify and prioritize these problem areas, avoiding the “crisis-only” maintenance that results in bigger, preventable outages.

🐘Eating the Elephant One Bite at a Time | Proactive Network Maintenance for Long-Term Health☑️

3. Causation

Workarounds are temporary; addressing root causes is vital.

The focus should always be on addressing the root causes rather than merely putting out fires. A common trap in networking is the quick-fix mentality: a workaround that temporarily resolves an issue but doesn’t address the underlying problem. This approach may seem efficient, but it leads to chronic recurrence, higher costs, and increased complexity. A mature organization takes time to investigate the root causes, knowing that the cost of fire-fighting far outweighs the effort of tackling the underlying issues once and for all. The bottom line? Invest in solving root causes and save time and resources in the long run.

🚧Causation in Technology | Workarounds are Temporary, Root Cause Analysis is Essential🏗️

4. Normalization

Complexity is a risk, not an asset.

When it comes to firewall rules and network architecture, complexity is the enemy of reliability. You might have a million firewall rules, but if only four would suffice, then you’re complicating your network unnecessarily. Normalization means simplifying your network to its core essentials, eliminating redundant components, and ensuring that what remains is easy to maintain and troubleshoot. Complexity often arises from incremental, organic growth, where layer upon layer of fixes and features build up until the network becomes unmanageable. A well-normalized network is efficient, easier to troubleshoot, and more resilient. Cut the excess and streamline.

⚠️Normalization in Technology | Complexity is a Risk, Not an Asset🚨

5. Time

Time is a fixed, limited asset in network management.

Time is an ever-present factor in networking, impacting everything from detection to recovery. Whether it’s the actual time versus detected time, restoration time, or escalation time, every second counts. Networks demand quick thinking and rapid response times; often, you won’t have the luxury of unlimited time to troubleshoot. Time must be respected and managed effectively, knowing that the faster you can respond, the less impact on your users and business. From workarounds to incident reporting, mastering time management within network operations is a skill every professional must develop.

⏰Time Management in Network Management | Making Every Second Count⌛

6. Visualization

Seeing the big picture reveals the hidden details.

While command-line interfaces (CLI) are invaluable, sometimes a picture is worth more than a thousand command outputs. Visualizations – in the form of network diagrams, metrics, and trend graphs – allow you to see the bigger picture and quickly identify problem areas. Without visualization, you’re often stumbling through dense data trying to spot patterns. With it, you can grasp overall health, spot trends, and, importantly, identify issues before they escalate. Visualization is about making the invisible visible, turning data into actionable insight, and helping you cut through the noise to focus on what matters.

📈Visualization in Computer Networks | Turning Data into Insight🚀

7. The Spawn of Satan

Technology from the dark side

Over the years, certain technologies have felt like they were designed more to frustrate than facilitate. Printers, wireless extenders, and certain manufacturers (I’m looking at you, Huawei) have consistently failed to live up to expectations. These “spawn of Satan” technologies test your patience and resilience, proving that not all tech is created equal. Choose your tech carefully and know which tools work best for your environment. A lesson for the ages: sometimes, it’s best to avoid problematic tech altogether rather than deal with the headache it brings.

😈The Spawn of Satan | Technology from the Dark Side👹

8. Captain Jean-Luc Picard

“Make it So!”

In the world of Star Trek, Captain Picard could issue a command, and his crew would immediately execute it. Unfortunately, in networking, you can’t just say “Make it so” and expect results. Technology operates on its own logic, and there’s no way to command it into compliance. Understanding that systems function on their own terms, not ours, is crucial. You have to respect the constraints and rules of each technology, knowing that patience, troubleshooting, and methodical analysis are the real pathways to success, not just commanding it to “work.”

🛸Captain Jean-Luc Picard’s Leadership Lesson for Technology | “Make it So!”🖖

9. Rabbit Holes

Overthinking instead of solving

Networking issues can lead you down some deep, time-consuming rabbit holes. It’s easy to overthink a problem, losing hours on something that turns out to have a simple solution staring you in the face. Sometimes the answer comes by stepping back, clearing your mind, or consulting a colleague for a fresh perspective. That “lightbulb moment” often arrives when you stop overcomplicating things. Networking requires persistence, but it’s essential to recognize when to pull back and re-evaluate rather than getting stuck in endless troubleshooting cycles.

🐰Navigating the Connectivity SLA Rabbit Hole | MPLS vs. SD-WAN 🕳️

10. When All Else Fails, Wireshark

Packets don’t lie

When every other tool and technique fails, there’s always Wireshark. Packet analysis is the ultimate truth in networking: packets don’t lie. Learning to read and interpret packets is a vital skill that every network engineer should master, as it provides an unfiltered view of network traffic and issues. Wireshark allows you to get to the heart of the matter, tracking down problems that can elude even the best diagnostic tools. In networking, Wireshark is the final arbiter – if you haven’t learned to read packets yet, it’s time to start.

🦈Wireshark | A Powerful Tool for Network Troubleshooting & Cybersecurity🏄

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Bonus

• Documentation | Don’t Leave It for Later

Good documentation can save hours in crisis

Documentation is often neglected until something goes wrong, but it’s one of the most powerful tools for network engineers. It ensures that knowledge isn’t lost, facilitates faster troubleshooting, and can expedite onboarding for new team members. Networks are complex environments with a multitude of interconnected devices, protocols, and configurations; without accurate and up-to-date documentation, troubleshooting is like wandering in the dark.

Committing to robust documentation saves time and money by reducing dependence on memory, simplifying maintenance tasks, and allowing smoother handovers when personnel change.

👨‍💻Don’t Leave Documentation for Later | Why Good Documentation is Essential in Network Engineering🚂

• Redundancy | Avoiding Single Points of Failure

Failure will happen; redundancy keeps services running

Networks are expected to be up 24/7, but hardware, software, and connections fail. That’s why redundancy is essential. When every critical component has a backup, you have a safety net to catch unexpected failures. Redundant links, power sources, and failover configurations can mean the difference between seamless operation and extended downtime.

Redundancy isn’t just about duplicating infrastructure; it’s about creating resilience in the system design. However, it’s also critical to avoid “over-redunancy,” where too many backup systems become cost-inefficient and unnecessarily complex.

👷How to Build a Resilient Last Mile SD-WAN & Avoid Single Points of Failure⛔

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Each of these ten lessons (as well as the bonus ones) encapsulates a piece of hard-earned wisdom from years in the field. They’re reminders of what it takes to succeed in networking: clarity, simplicity, attention to causation, respect for time, and above all, the willingness to dive deep into the packet flow when all else fails. Networking has evolved, but these lessons remain as relevant today as they were in the nineties.

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Ronald Bartels | LinkedIn | Instagram

Talking Heads

In all my years of hiring—and being hired—I’ve come to a rather sobering conclusion: the only undeniable truth about a great interview is that it was, indeed, a great interview. It tells you precisely nothing reliable about how the candidate will perform once they’re on the job. A charming, articulate, perfectly aligned conversation in a conference room or over Teams can feel like destiny, but it’s often just theatre—a momentary alignment of expectations, nerves, and performance.

I learned this lesson the hard way, or perhaps the fortunate way, during one particular recruitment drive. We were filling a key position on my team, and I interviewed four internal candidates. Two of them absolutely shone in their interviews. They answered every question with confidence, asked insightful follow-ups, and left me convinced that either one would be perfect. I was paralyzed by indecision, unable to choose between them. HR, ever practical, suggested a technical test to break the tie. Since they were all internal transfers, fairness dictated that we extend the test to all four original candidates.

When the results came back, I was stunned. The candidate who had delivered far and away the best performance on the test—the one who aced it—was the very same person who had stumbled through what I considered the weakest interview of the bunch. He had seemed hesitant, inarticulate, and frankly underwhelming in person. Yet the objective measure revealed his true capability. We hired him without hesitation, and he turned out to be one of the strongest performers I’ve ever had on my team. To this day, it was fortuitous that we hadn’t extended offers to the two “interview stars.” That experience cemented for me how dangerously misleading interviews alone can be.

Over time, I’ve observed what separates the interview champions from the rest. The real trick, if we’re being candid, lies in presentation and restraint. A sparse LinkedIn profile is gold: it gives you room to maneuver, to mirror exactly what the interviewer wants to hear without the risk of contradicting your own documented history. Fill it out too completely—every project, every role, every achievement—and you box yourself in. One stray detail from your past can torpedo the narrative you’re crafting in the moment. This leads me to a broader question: if a candidate’s LinkedIn profile is current, detailed, and comprehensive, why do we still demand a separate CV? Isn’t it largely a relic, a legacy habit from the days when résumés were printed on paper and profiles didn’t exist?

My own LinkedIn is the opposite of sparse. It’s a living archive: every significant project, publication, patent discussion, and even that morning prime-time TV interview I did with Gerry Elsdon—it’s all there, publicly accessible. Yet time and again, I’ve sat across from interviewers who clearly hadn’t glanced at it. They’d ask questions answered plainly on my profile, or miss connections that would have made the conversation far richer. Until the world catches up and treats LinkedIn as the primary source of truth it has become, I suppose I must continue to rely on delivering that “great interview.” But it does make me wonder: should I thin out my profile to play the game more effectively? The thought feels like a betrayal of transparency, yet the evidence suggests the game rewards opacity.

In the end, hiring based solely on the traditional interview—what I now call the Legacy Manner—is a recipe for disappointment. It prioritizes performance in a high-stakes, artificial setting over demonstrable skill, consistency, and real-world evidence. My anecdote with the four candidates isn’t unique; it’s a pattern I’ve seen repeated across industries. If we want better outcomes, we need better filters: tests, trials, references, portfolios—anything that pierces the illusion of the perfect conversation. Interviews have their place, but treating them as oracles of future performance is a folly we’ve clung to for far too long.

Ronald Bartels | LinkedIn | Instagram

Comfort Food

No matter how old I got, or how far I’d ventured from home, whether arriving back from hostel after a long term at school or traveling back a whole day after a semester at university—the first thing that greeted me at the door was the unmistakable aroma of Mom’s chicken soup simmering on the stove. Lenore had a way of timing it perfectly, as if she could sense my arrival. That rich, golden broth, laced with the earthy scent of carrots, celery, and herbs, would wrap around me like a warm embrace before I even put up my weary legs.

It was our family’s unspoken ritual: the standard fare for any homecoming, and the ultimate remedy when life felt a little too heavy. Feeling low after a heartbreak or a bad grade? Sick with a cold that left me sniffling and achy? Mom would simply say, “I’ll put on some soup,” and that was that. No fuss, no elaborate recipes pulled from cookbooks. Her version was beautifully simple, a hearty chicken base, tender vegetables coaxed to sweetness in the pot, and those fluffy dumplings dropped in at the end, bobbing like little clouds until they puffed up just right.

We’d sit at the kitchen table, steam rising from our bowls, and the world outside would fade away. The soup wasn’t fancy; it didn’t need to be. It was home in every spoonful—the quiet assurance that someone cared enough to nourish you body and soul. In those moments, with Mom across from me, ladle in hand and a gentle smile on her face, everything felt repairable. Her chicken soup with dumplings wasn’t just food; it was love, distilled into something warm and enduring.

Ronald Bartels | LinkedIn | Instagram

Martial Eagle sightings have dropped by as much as 60% since the late 1980s and the bird may be heading towards extinction, says a study (republished from UCT)

(Via https://www.instagram.com/megdanielart/) @Megdanielart

The population of Martial Eagles, Africa’s largest eagle species, is in free fall in South Africa and may be heading towards extinction. This is according to a new UCT study based on changes in sighting rates over the past 20 years.

Martial Eagle sightings have dropped by as much as 60% since the late 1980s, in stark contrast to human population growth across their shared natural habitat, said the study, which was published this week in the scientific journal Bird Conservation International.

Although the reasons for the decline remain unclear, researchers said that their findings point to an urgent need to better understand the threats to this iconic bird.

The research was conducted by Dr Arjun Amar and PhD student Daniël Cloete of UCT’s FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology, using two Southern African Bird Atlas Project (SABAP) surveys carried out 20 years apart. Their previous research showed that comparing these surveys provided an accurate way of measuring changes in the population size of this eagle species.

Protected areas a buffer?

Worryingly, the study also highlighted a marked decline in Martial Eagle sightings within protected areas, including in the world-famous Kruger National Park and the Kalahari Gemsbok National Park. However, declines in populations of the species in protected areas were not as severe as elsewhere, suggesting that these areas could act to buffer the factors leading to declines.

Martial Eagles mainly prey on large birds and reptiles, and small- and medium-sized mammals, but are strong enough to prey on small antelopes. They typically nest in high treetops.

Martial Eagles are now recognised as globally threatened. Photo Wikimedia Commons

Their plight made international headlines last year when Mozambican hunters killed an adult bird that had featured in a British documentary starring well-known wildlife presenter Steve Backshall. At the time, the bird was being tracked via a GPS satellite tag.

Total population figures for Martial Eagles are still relatively inexact, but their conservation status was changed in 2013 from “near threatened” to “vulnerable” – which means that they are recognised as being globally threatened.

The study published this week provides the most accurate assessment for the decline of the species in any African country and was possible due only to an army of volunteer bird watchers who contribute their sightings to the SABAP database.

Fynbos sightings stable

The study found significant declines in three provinces: KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga and Limpopo. Changes differed across the biomes (distinct regions with similar geography and climate), with the species faring worst in the Grassland, Savanna, Indian Ocean Coastal Belt and Nama-Karoo biomes.

However, there was better news in the Fynbos Biome of the Western and Eastern Cape, where reporting rates remained more stable over the past 20 years.

“Despite having full legal protection in South Africa, this species is known to be targeted and killed by farmers who blame the species for predation of their livestock, or may be accidentally killed by poison left to kill other predator species,” the authors noted.

Another major threat for Martial Eagles may be electricity infrastructure, such as power lines, particularly among juveniles, which have a wider territorial range.

“We have now quantified the decline of the species in South Africa,” said lead author Amar. “But that is the only the first step. We now need urgent research to better understand the factors that are responsible for causing this iconic species to be lost from our countryside, so that these can be better controlled.”

Read the full paper in Bird Conservation International...

Ronald Bartels | LinkedIn | Instagram

I have already made this exploration, pulled at this thread, tested this thought. Still it keeps moving. But it has given me something that I wish to try and share. I am not sharing an answer only the experience of the return from the surface.

1. Voice

Open with voice, not technology. Not style. Not vocabulary. Not literary manner. Voice is the self in relation to the world. Explore voice as disposition. Curious. Sceptical. Affectionate. Patient. Combative. A voice is not what we think. It is how we stand in relation to experience. Then move gently into confidence. Where does confidence in voice come from? Not certainty. Not authority. My own experience: • speaking publicly • radio • television • print Confidence came from confidence in the message. But confidence in the message came from believing the words were honest. Don't labour this; just plant it.

2. What Threatens a Voice?

What causes a voice to become uncertain? Ridicule. Audience anticipation. Performance. Fashion. The temptation to become a character. A distinction emerges: A message can survive contradiction. A voice can be undermined by self-consciousness. Perhaps introduce the idea that modern platforms expose voice to judgement before it has fully formed. But keep this secondary. The essay is still about voice, not technology.

3. Contradiction

The heart of the essay. Voice is not certainty. In fact, certainty often produces voices that sound strangely alike. Emerson, Orwell, Nietzche. What puts words on the page? Not answers. Contradictions. The writer discovers that they think several things simultaneously. The world presents itself in contradictions. So does the self. This is where my own experience enters. For years I have found myself returning not to solutions but to contradictions. Not because I enjoy uncertainty. Not because I doubt everything. Because contradiction is where understanding begins.

4. Contradiction as Passage

This is where my imagery lives. Most people encounter contradiction as an obstacle. I encounter it as a route. The cleft in the hill. The passage to the col. Or: Scaffolding. Contradictions expose the structure of an idea, institution, belief or social construction. They reveal where things join. Where the load is carried. Where history has become solid. I trust contradiction because it is difficult to fake. It is often where reality pushes back. A key sentence somewhere around here: The contradictions are not flaws in the system. They are the means by which we move through it. And then: Every going beyond one contradiction brings us insight into another. This is probably the deepest point in the essay. It might be worth noting: Hazlitt often begins with self. Young often begins with observation. My essayism seems to begin with a relationship between the two.

5. Surface

Only now arrive at the title. The notebook. The desk. The Surface. The phone. The platform. Each offers a different surface upon which voice may appear. But no surface is neutral. Some encourage exploration. Some encourage performance. Some favour reflection. Some favour reaction. The question is no longer what voice is. The question becomes: What conditions allow a voice to remain itself?

6. Return to Voice

Circle back. A voice is not a conclusion. A voice is not certainty. A voice is not even consistency. A voice is a continuing relationship between a self and a world that resists simplification. The writer inhabits contradiction not temporarily but perpetually. The exploration never ends because each insight reveals another horizon. The wound remains exposed

7. Ending

Very quiet. No answer. Something close to: Perhaps that is why the search for a voice never really ends. What puts words on the page is not certainty but the effort to understand how the self stands in relation to a world that continually resists simplification. Then one final turn: In an age of endless platforms, audiences and surfaces, I wonder whether the question is no longer how we find a voice, but how we create the conditions in which it can remain itself. Stop. No explanation. No moral. No “therefore”. Leave the reader standing at the col looking into the next valley. That's where the essay really ends.

Morné du Plessis

There are moments in sport when a man looks at what the game has asked of him, & quietly decides it has asked enough. For Morné du Plessis, that moment came not in a stadium, not on a tour, not under the weight of a losing score, but in the silence after a teammate died on a rugby field. He was, by any measure, one of the finest rugby players South Africa ever produced. Born in Vereeniging on 21 October 1949 into a family where sport was simply the language of life, his mother Pat captained South Africa's women's national hockey side, his uncle Horace captained the national soccer team, Morné carried bloodlines that ran deep into the soil of South African sport. His father Felix had played lock for the Springboks against the All Blacks in 1949, part of a team that swept that series 3–0. Six weeks after the last test of that series, Morné was born. The oval ball, it seemed, had been waiting for him. He came to rugby almost by accident. At Grey College in Bloemfontein he excelled more at cricket than rugby, & it was cricket that drew him to Stellenbosch University. He even played five first-class cricket matches for Western Province, taking 16 wickets at 25.62. It took Barry Richards, one of the most gifted batsmen on earth, hammering him for two sixes in a single over of a Castle Cup match, to persuade Du Plessis that perhaps another game was calling. The game that was calling was rugby, on a campus where, as Du Plessis himself once said, going to Stellenbosch to play cricket was like going to India to play rugby. Danie Craven, the great patriarch of South African rugby, who lived in the same residence at Stellenbosch, converted him from lock to eighthman, deciding the 1.95-metre Du Plessis was, remarkably, too small to be a lock. It proved an inspired move. Du Plessis captained Western Province 103 times, a record that still stands today. Here is the number that stops people cold. In 22 tests he was on the winning side 18 times. As Springbok captain, his team won thirteen matches & lost only twice. He led South Africa to a series win over the All Blacks in 1976, winning 3–1 across four tests with scorelines of 16–7, a narrow loss of 15–9, then victories of 15–10 & 15–14 in the final test. He captained the Springboks to victories over France in 1975, winning 38–25 in Bloemfontein & 33–18 in Pretoria. He led his country to a 3–1 series win over the British Lions in 1980, playing his rugby through an era of growing international isolation, in a country where sport & politics had become impossible to separate. He was nominated South Africa's Rugby Player of the Year in 1976, 1977, 1979 & 1980. And then, before the 1981 tour to New Zealand, he stopped. Mental fatigue played its part. But the deeper wound had a name & a face. In 1980, Chris Burger, Du Plessis's Western Province teammate, a full-back of twenty-eight years, sustained a neck injury during a Currie Cup match against Free State in Bloemfontein & died. He had been playing under Du Plessis's captaincy. Craven tried hard to convince Du Plessis to make himself available for the New Zealand tour, & believed, with conviction, that South Africa would have won the series if he had. Du Plessis could not go. Some things weigh more than a rugby jersey. What he built after rugby tells you everything about the man. He established the Chris Burger Fund in 1980, serving as its chairman for thirty-eight years. Now called the Chris Burger Pedro Jackson Players' Fund, it supports catastrophically injured South African rugby players & has established a twenty-four-hour emergency helpline for serious rugby injuries. He co-founded the Sports Science Institute. He was elected to the Laureus World Sports Academy & chaired the Laureus Sport for Good Foundation in South Africa, helping raise R260 million to improve the lives of disadvantaged youth. In 2007 the South African government awarded him the Order of Ikhamanga in Silver for excellence in rugby & the promotion of sport for social change. In 1999 he was inducted into the International Rugby Hall of Fame. Wellington Lions loose forward Du'Plessis Kirifi carries his name into the modern era of the game. Morné du Plessis was a cricketer who became a rugby captain, a Springbok who led through one of the most turbulent decades his country had ever known, a man who walked away at the height of his powers, not out of weakness, but out of an honesty about the cost that the game can quietly exact. He turned that honesty into thirty-eight years of work protecting the men who play it.

Ronald Bartels | LinkedIn | Instagram

How does a human being write honestly in conditions of uncertainty?

A Simple Guide to Choosing Bedspreads for Australian Homes

A bedspread can change the whole feel of a bedroom in minutes. It adds colour, texture and an extra layer of warmth, and it protects your quilt underneath from dust and everyday wear.

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