! Gratitude Dawning

Alarm clock. The sun rises. The buses, railways, flights are running. There’s a bottle of milk on the doorstep. Facts of life. Except when they’re not there. Who lives a life of continual gratitude for life? Hey guys, the sun which disappeared last night has turned up again today! Wow! Relief! Let’s get down on our knees, raise hands, voices… and while we’re about it, put your hands together for all morning milkmen, where they still deliver milk… Except – no milk this morning. Shall you telephone – politely, with a subtext of unpractised gratitude? I only saw the current milkman once; said to him, this is the first time I met you… he said, well, you’re not around at 4 ay em are you? So you telephone. A foreignish voice from the land of holy cows replies from a script I guess, …your previous milkman… left the company… late…on his way… Morning gratitude. The cow who gives you the love for her calves, in liquid form; yielding too, the butter for your toast; the pig who gave her life for your bacon rasher; the hen who parted with her offspring for you to kill its life in sizzling frying pan… they’re all female, you’ve just noticed; how about the oranges whose liquid praise of the morning sun you drink? tomatoes, mushrooms, anybody? maybe you should write a note to the dairy, say, please convey to the milkman who has now left the company for pastures new, hur hur, and we hope a creamy, frothing future, our gratitude for services rendered which we would not ourselves be easily persuaded to take on… yes, maybe you should.