Other Calendars

Calendric Wisdom South Of The Border

The calendric wisdom of indigenous Mesoamericans has come to be increasingly appreciated in recent years. As prescient observers of celestial cycles and their connections, agricultural and otherwise, to terrestrial events, they came to remarkably similar conclusions about the nature of time itself, despite striking cultural disparities. Spurred by academic impetus imparted by early investigators along with the pending conclusion of the thirteenth Baktun, scholarly interest has focused primarily upon Mayan temporal mensuration. Other systems evolved throughout this region, however, also offer fascinating material, especially when evident parallels are highlighted and psychically explored. Lucky Six Farms, in particular, is convinced that the depths of Mesoamerican calendric wisdom have yet to be fully or fairly plumbed.

Calendric Wisdom - Aztec And Maya

Probably the best known alternate Central American calendric system was developed by the Aztecs. The complex nature of all such systems has long been recognized, since each significant social group employed not just one but several intercalated calendars, each with a specific purpose. Like the Maya, the Aztecs recognized an overriding ceremonial primacy for a recurring 260-day cycle wherein constituent units were assigned simultaneous numerical and symbolic aspects. Enumeration was progressively incremented through subcycles of thirteen digits but twenty symbols, thus requiring passage of 260 days until numeral and symbol again matched their initial configuration, resetting the cycle at its starting point. The Maya referred this the entire sacred 260-day count as the Tzolkin, while the Aztecs used the term Tonalpohualli. In both cases, however, it is clear that the orderly designations were utilized to accommodate a highly specific sequence of presiding deities. The better these entities and the transitions from one to another were understood, the better one could adapt to shifting conditions inherent in their qualities.

Calendric Wisdom - Interpreting The Counts

It is interesting to note how even extreme pressures of cultural heterogeneity coupled with inevitable vicissitudes and horrors engendered by foreign conquest have produced so few ostensible divergencies in attributes of individual days. For example, the day on which I am penning this blog according to the Tzolkin is 12 Muluc (Water); its Tonalpohualli designation is 12 Atl (Water). Thus, despite semantic differences, key aspects of the period remain virtually identical. Although this kind of striking consistency is by no means uniform across the two calendric systems, it is nonetheless common enough to be indicative of a powerful noumenal foundation, a conceptual base transcending arbitrary vagaries of cultural whim and accident. In this spirit, we hope our inventory of venerable herbal aromatics, including smudge sticks and White Sage essential oil, smudge cones, and whole leaves, always subserves their highest traditional and sacred roles. 

By Alan Beck

 

Seasonal Spotlight

Thanksgiving’s Origins

Thanksgiving marks the inception of the most important American holiday season, although retailers, including Lucky Six Farms, usually commence concerted year-end marketing efforts immediately after Halloween. Media pundits, pop psychologists, and a variegated collection of pulpit pounders have a field day during this period, so I feel right at home freely opining about the true meaning of these wonderfully celebratory yet duly solemn times. Although not personally present to generate pleasant reportage for the event, I believe the story told concerning our very first Thanksgiving is probably true. Native Americans (henceforth to be designated as Indians on account of a few nominal navigational errors) and newly-landed Pilgrims feasted together at the behest of the latter as testimony to their benevolent largesse. Since both parties held deeply, yet somewhat divergent, spiritual views, Thanksgiving soon became an eclectic, culinary expression of gratitude for Divine favor bestowed over the prior twelve months.

Thanksgiving Thoughts

While some never tire of descrying how creeping commercialism has gradually subverted Thanksgiving’s originally pure message, I take a more pragmatic approach. Since trade and business are as venerable as human society itself, no primordial wrong is engendered when they underscore religious themes. In fact, extensive material considerations have always functioned as handmaidens to higher endeavors: witness the elaborate preparations necessary for serious rituals conducted by every faith and tradition throughout recorded and - as places like Stonehenge and Gobekli Tepe imply - even unrecorded history. We spend the better part our lives focused on issues of physical survival and comfort, so is it any wonder that enterprises subserving those needs inevitably rise to prominence in worshipful acknowledgement of the Ineffable Transcendent.

Thanksgiving In Action

In precisely that spirit, then, it behooves me to once again point out the value of our offerings during our sacred festivals. Our ecologically cultivated, prayerfully harvested, hand-processed, and certified organic White Sage products - essential oil, hydrosol, smudge sticks, cones, and whole leaves - have long played an integral role in authentic Native American, Wiccan, and alternative purification. In addition, our new lines of herbal smudge wands - Black Sage, Cedar, and Yerba Santa - have the potential to open an exciting range of new psychic horizons for savvy customers worldwide. We hope all of our readers enjoyed a delightful Thanksgiving and can now look forward to a blessed Holiday Season!

By Alan Beck

Birth Of A Smudge Stick

Smudge Preliminaries

By far, Lucky Six Farms’ most popular products are smudge sticks. For many years, we made them exclusively from certified organic White Sage but have recently expanded our stocks to include Black Sage, Cedar, and Yerba Santa gathered from remote, ecologically sustainable stands in the Southern California high desert. Eventually, we plan to offer a series of herbal combination wands to satisfy the needs of even the most discriminating seekers. No matter what their constituents, however, smudge sticks will always appeal to a savvy demographic well-versed in both traditional Native American lore and alternative spiritual practice. Yet, the precise route these items take as they wend their circuitous way from Mother Nature to you is rarely described, let alone explained. It is for this reason that our staff often receives inquiries about the way quality smudge sticks are created, so I have dedicated today’s column to filling in those frustrating conceptual lacunae. 

Smudge Harvest

As some critics have rightly observed, it is terribly ironic that many who wish to pay homage to our benevolent Mother Earth inadvertently resort to approaches that ultimately exploit and decimate Her resources. Because our respect for the authentic Mother of All is profound, we have made a point of harvesting only herbs we have either personally cultivated or gathered after reverent study of local ecological systems. This study includes consultation with Native Americans who are both intimately familiar with local flora and directly involved with their conservation.

Each growing smudge stick herb is prayerfully taken at its seasonal peak, when the leaves are healthy, full-sized, open, fresh, moist, and available in abundance. We are careful to insure that every herbal stand is maintained for future growth and natural reproduction: none are ever destroyed or harvested past the point where easy regrowth is hampered.

Smudge Plaiting

Once the leaves are gathered, they are arranged for plaiting in bundles of varying sizes. Here the wands begin to assume their familiar tubular configuration. Plaiting is a skill that takes guidance to learn and much time to master. It is a genuine handicraft, and no artificially powered machines are ever employed in the process. Leaves are gently but firmly pressed together in a rotatory motion so as to create a uniform whorl from one end of the stick to another. The resultant wands, with the leaves already sticking well together, are then air-dried for several days in a special proprietary process unique to Lucky Six Farms. When they are finally hand-encircled with delicate spirals of all-natural thread, they readily yield to the augmented pressure so as form robust rods which combine maximum physical integrity with the range of characteristics required for smooth smoldering.

Considering the care that goes into the production of our smudge sticks, it is no wonder that they are often the first choice for Native American ceremonies, rites of magickal pilgrims, and New-Age practitioners worldwide!

By Alan Beck

 

Walk On The Wild Side

High Desert Animals - Where Are They?

Friends residing in typically urban or suburban environments of southern California often ask me whether I ever encounter high desert animals as I stroll through the stark, boulder-strewn acres of Lucky Six Farms. Their curiosity is certainly justified, since casual visitors remark that they observe no signs of mobile life even after spending hours trekking around our silent peaks and dark valleys. Of course, animal life is all around us here and in abundance too; it’s just a matter of being in the right place at the appropriate time to actually catch a glimpse of the creatures in action. I find it interesting, though, that the wildlife I spot often doesn’t quite match fauna documented for this area in books, monographs, and similar official publications. High desert animals can and do violate the rulebook because of the prevalence of micro-ecologies coexisting both within and between established, recognized regions.

High Desert Animals - Diurnal Dodgers

The great majority of animals regularly visible during our brilliant daylight hours are almost always on the run, sprinting from one hiding place - a burrow, thick brush, rock or tree hollow - to the next in order to efficiently dodge the keen vision of predatory birds, including red-tailed hawks (Buteo jamaicensis), ravens (Corvus corax) and even eagles (Aquila chrysaetos). The most-commonly observed members of this fleet-footed group are large ground squirrels (Spermophilus beecheyi) and cottontail rabbits (Sylvilagus audubonii). The former dig out extensive burrow systems where they live and raise their young and which the latter can make use of in a pinch when familiar four-legged carnivores like the coyote (Canis latrans) are detected nearby. While coyotes do hunt during the day, they are probably best slotted into the next activity category.

High Desert Animals - Crepusculars and Nocturnals

As our blazing sun dips beneath the jagged western horizon, a whole new bunch of creatures emerges from disparate shelters to forage or prey. Twilight is the preferred time for snakes to be up and about, particularly rattlesnakes (Crotalus sp.) and rubber boas (Charina bottae). Fortunately, the two are easy to differentiate - the viper’s multilobed tail and acutely-angled head are characteristic - so that rattlers may be readily moved to wilder environs while constrictors can simply be left to their own devices. And In the stygian depths of night it is possible to locate the barn owl (Tyto alba) by its mournful hoot and broad, plaintive face, while few sounds emanate from the Arroyo Toad (Anaxyrus californicus) as it waits unobtrusively and with infinite patience to take ultimate advantage of passing insects and spiders.

We are happy to note that all of our purifying aromatic products - essential oil, hydrosol, smudge bundles, cones, and whole leaves - are certified organic and thus intrinsically allied to vital natural forces which have forged this beautiful country and its resident wildlife.

By Alan Beck

 

White Sagecraft

Precious Gems Of Tradition

Just as we protect our most valuable possessions, we guard the sanctity of herbs, the precious gems of indigenous Southwestern tradition. One of our most talented Lucky Six Farms staffers derives his principal heritage from the Chiricahua Apache Nation, famous for outstanding chiefs like Cochise, Mangas Coloradas, and Geronimo. History testifies not only to their wisdom and courage in the face of overwhelming adversity but also their steadfast adherence to sacred traditions laid down long ago by ancestors who established profound bonds, both visionary and pragmatic, to Mother Earth. A superb craftsman and artist in his own right, he personally oversees the creation of our White Sage smudge bundles. His presence is made clearly manifest in every stage of production, from cultivation, through selection and ecologically sound harvest wherein plants may be utilized without undue damage, to actual hand manufacture of individual wands, large and small. As he inspects them with a critical yet loving eye, he often remarks that they are precious gems as much as diamonds and rubies.

Precious Gems Of Purity

While some might consider this type of evaluation fantastical or far-fetched, in reality it is not. White Sage is one of the very few plants frequently employed by Native Americans plus an enormous array of highly diverse alternative spiritual traditions for precisely the same purpose: quickly and effectively eliminating accumulated negative vibrations and replacing them with those characterized by energetic purity. Stringent requirements imposed by vision quests and serous psychic investigations into primordial noumena underlying the forces of Nature provided the impetus for Apaches and other original residents of what is now the Southwestern United States to identify and utilize the most potent vegetative resources available. White Sage (Salvia apiana) is perhaps first among these elite children of the soil, along with Cedar and Wild Tobacco.

Precious Gems Of Land And Psyche

Lucky Six Farms has long honored this ancient wisdom by wildcrafting, cultivating, and producing pure, certified organic White Sage products eminently suitable for authentic ceremonial purposes. Thus, customers from any and all traditions can and do use our essential oil, hydrosol, smudge bundles, cones, and leaves for rituals whenever and wherever natural purity is called for. We are thus proud to link our history and motives so closely with those who have preceded us on these Divinely blessed lands.


By Alan Beck

(Selling Your) Home Sweet Home

Psychic Dimensions Of Your Relocation Move

If you’re a typical American you will put down roots in an entirely new neighborhood, house, and home once every five years: that’s an incredible total of fifteen full relocation moves during an average lifetime. We’re proud of our easy mobility and rightly so, since it is a concrete illustration of the freedom we prize so dearly. But it would be naive to neglect the inevitable downsides to all the travel, change, and adaptation involved. Moving always entails at least a few briefly radical lifestyle alterations and often a great deal more. Add on the considerable additional expense and uncertainty of selling or renting your old digs, and you may well have a very challenging time merely coping with the situation. In fact, psychologists have shown that a relocation move actually ranks with traumatic incidents such as a relative’s demise in terms of induced stress, anxiety, and psychic upheaval!

Relocation Move - How The Pros Do It

If you’re presently looking forward to - or possibly dreading! - an impending move, Lucky Six Farms thinks you might want to take a few tips from real estate pros who traffic in houses and apartments with the same facility that we make small change at a cash register. One of the most distinctive hallmarks of their lucrative profession is the ease they feel in quickly selling even the most seemingly unappealing residence. They chuckle knowingly as they deposit their commissions even though the whole business seems incredibly chancy. How in the world can they be so confident of closing those deals? Their master key lies in always generating a highly positive first impression. Laypeople can understand that a marketable house should appear clean, bright, and uncluttered. However, only seasoned agents know of certain obscure secrets virtually assuring favorable first impressions and thus rapid sales.

Relocation Move - Clearing The Air

What kind of secret am I hinting at? The first significant impressions are literally imprinted into a potential home-buyer’s mind within their initial ten to fifteen seconds indoors. And the most basic, the most primordial, the most powerful impression does not come consciously via vision but rather enters subconsciously through the breath. The atmosphere (s)he inhales contains both an aroma and a psychic feeling: these will play the single most important role in determining how a prospective buyer interprets everything that follows!  Some of our good friends in the real estate business asked us not to reveal this simple secret, but we believe only our most savvy readers will actually put what’s implied here into practice. Need I note at this point that we have long specialized in highly potent, uniquely purifying, and psychically energizing White Sage products: essential oil, hydrosol, smudge bundles, cones, and whole leaves? May all your relocation moves prove pleasant and hassle-free!

By Alan Beck

Sounds Of Silence

Wisdom Without Words

Humanity in these post-modern times is gradually coming to appreciate the power of wordless wisdom. Perhaps this is a natural result of ubiquitous doublespeak, which has lamentably evolved into a primary mode of expression throughout academia, advertising, personal relations, and politics. When verbalized conceptualizations lose their hold on lived and living experience, the primordial energy of silence becomes overwhelmingly relevant. I am reminded of this fact virtually every day as I stroll across the rocky high desert acreage of Lucky Six Farms. Down every trail and every turn, I am confronted by silence so complete that it can only be characterized as awesome. And it is within the abyssal depths of that awe that a real wisdom gradually manifests.

Pure Wisdom Of Pure Nature

The grand workings of Mother Earth reverberate across that all-consuming quiet. Every sense strains forward in response. Her movements are slow and deliberate as the great granite boulders, some as large as a multistory building, populating the mountainsides. In this connection, it is fascinating to note how Native American Tribes believe even the stones here have souls and harbor feelings. Such sensitivity can only grow from the sheer force of ever-present silence and the patient calm it inevitably engenders in all who come to seek it out. On these sacred lands, even birdsong is rare, almost as if such notes were saved only for the most pressing communications and heartfelt outbursts. Animals seem fully as aware of the penetrating presence, the intense significance of silence as we humans.

Merging Self Into Wisdom

Like pieces of flotsam sinking beneath the mirrored surface of the sea, we find our egos, our pettiness, whatever of us that is not cosmic merging into the utterly imperturbable, the self-evident - and Biblical! - “I am.” Indeed, there is something profoundly divine in this uncanny desert silence. I believe this is because wisdom equals truth, and truth is necessarily distorted in the telling. Just as ineffably minute quanta cannot be touched or even investigated without changing their state, so the pressure of descriptive words chaotically warps the absolute, perfect state of true Being. For this reason, hermits and mystics of all faiths have sought the miraculous wisdom of silence. Hopefully, just a bit of this transcendent magick is conveyed through our purifying herbal products, which remain the most natural and direct expressions of Mother Earth’s peaceful fecundity.

By Alan Beck

Beneficial Blue

Lavender - The Cosmopolitan Herb

The three dozen or more species comprising Genus Lavandula - better known as Lavender - probably originated around the Mediterranean many thousands of years ago. However, appreciation of their numerous beneficial qualities soon brought these herbs into worldwide cultivation. While their common name was long believed to have derived from the Latin verb lavare, meaning to wash, it is now thought that their characteristic hue provided a more likely etymology via the Latin descriptive livere, that is, blueish. In any case, what The Bard famously noted of the rose’s archetypal scent certainly applies with equal or greater force to this gorgeously attractive and highly aromatic plant. And very soon, I am happy to announce, Lucky Six Farms will proudly offer Lavender as a principal component of select smudge wands.

Lavender - A Multistoried History

An entire volume could be penned documenting Lavender’s many and varied uses across the centuries. Its characteristically fragrant essential oil has long been a mainstay of classic perfumes, sachets, soaps, balms, and other popular products. In addition, it has been used to add color and a pleasantly light, sweet flavor to comestibles from cookies to cheese. During World War I, Lavender saw increasing employment in serious medicinal contexts. Tisanes and infusions were successful in providing relief from burns, wounds, and insect bites. From our point of view, however, Lavender’s most intriguing aspect lies in its well-documented ability to calm agitated minds and sooth jangled nerves. In particular, several modern clinical studies have shown it to act as a potent anxiolytic and promoter of sound, restful sleep.

Lavender - Smudge For A New Age

Wiccans, Neo-Pagans, and a range of New-Age spiritual seekers have found smudging with combination bundles of White Sage and Lavender to be powerfully conducive of deep meditative states. Such observations stand to reason, as White Sage is well-known for cleansing and purifying disruptive negative vibrations, and Lavender for supporting stable concentrative effort. Those who wish to observe the remarkable psychic effects of Lavender smudge for themselves can be assured that every component of our wands has been organically wild-crafted with the health of Mother Earth in mind.

By Alan Beck

 

The Holy Herb

Yerba Santa - Gift From The Earth

I’m pleased to announce that Yerba Santa (Eriodictyon californicum) will soon join Lucky Six Farms roster of elite aromatic products. Popular demand coupled with our perennial interest in making traditional gifts from our Mother Earth available worldwide have led us to introduce a number of new smudge bundled herbs. Foremost among these is the one most rapidly and enthusiastically embraced by clergy and soldiers of early Spanish missions. Calling this remarkable plant the Holy Herb, i.e. Yerba Santa, they quickly adopted long-standing Native American customs regarding its uses as a poultice, bronchial dilator, and stomachic. Its widespread ceremonial employment as a smudge, however, was largely ignored by European newcomers until twentieth century scholarship revived overdue respect for the profundity of indigenous wisdom. Yerba Santa is uniquely suited for generation of sacred smoke today just as it has been in ages past.

Yerba Santa - The Plant

Although Yerba Santa can be found growing naturally throughout much of the Western United States, it is most commonly encountered on high, moderately arid elevations of Southern California and Northern Mexico. Vigorous exemplars can reach up to four feet high. Stands in this sun-drenched Southwestern range are reputably the most potently aromatic; their showy, trumpet-shaped, light lavender flowers and elongated, sticky leaves make for ready identification, especially when prolific blooms appear with the approach of summer. Besides the familiar californicum, several other varieties, including the Hairy Yerba Santa (E. trichocalyx), the Thick Leaved (E. crassifolium), and the Lompoc (E. capitatum) are known.

Yerba Santa - Sacred Intermediary

We anticipate offering Yerba Santa as both stand-alone smudge bundles and in combination with other venerated herbs such as White Sage. Smoldered in this fashion, it has often been regarded as a powerful activator of the deep psyche and intermediary to beneficial spiritual powers. Thus, enhanced abilities like clairvoyance, predictive dreaming, and telepathy are supposedly promoted through the intelligent and prudent use of Yerba Santa smudge. A number of prominent Central American shamans and practitioners of folk magick have opined that Yerba Santa smoke makes the entire range of altar offerings more conspicuously attractive for noumenal intelligences. As with all our White Sage products, the Yerba Santa we will provide is always wild-crafted and organically cultivated for Earth-friendliness and optimal effect.


By Alan Beck

White Sage Medicine Wheel

Color Symbolism - The Circle Of Life

For those whose careers are intimately bound up with the gorgeous landscape of our American Southwest, medicine wheel color symbolism gradually evolves into much more than a sterile anthropological exercise. At Lucky Six Farms, we are acutely aware of how the high desert home of our White Sage products reveals wonders and mysteries inherent in these key hues at every turn. There is good reason for this, of course. In one form or another the medicine wheel is respected by virtually every indigenous Native American culture simply because it is a concrete manifestation of the circle of life itself and thus embodies inescapable aspects of human existence. The wheel assigns color symbolism to each of the four cardinal directions, embracing the entire spectrum of both individual and societal concerns.

Color Symbolism - Growth And Balance

While medicine wheel correspondences between directions and shades may vary somewhat from Tribe to Tribe, the colors themselves have remained constant for centuries along with their principal attributions. Progress along or through the quadrants parallels life’s journey and our concomitant growth in specific facets of vital wisdom. In addition, each section illuminates the kind of balance necessary for us to reach maturity in that specific regard. We usually commence the medicine wheel cycle with the color red, symbolizing birth. Interestingly, this hue also stands for the spiritual per se, without which life itself could not unfold. The staff at Lucky Six Farms often sees this color glowing on the eastern horizon just at dawn, heralding arrival of our characteristically brilliant sun.

The color yellow is usually associated with burgeoning youth, the period of quickest and most evident development for our bodies and minds. Yellow also represents emotion, which is at its most volatile and intense at this stage, stamping indelible marks on our personalities. Many new shoots, including White Sage, show brief bursts of yellow as they push their way up from the dark soil into the light of day.

Color Symbolism - Metaphysics At Work

Full maturation is symbolized through black. As science observes, all the colors of the spectrum are fully absorbed by black, just as authentic maturity implies that we have assimilated and understood all the variegated lessons taught through the classroom of personal experience. In addition, black embodies physicality since it is the most stolid and uncompromising of all. Black shows absolute fullness, a state of perfect balance unmoved throughout even the greatest challenges.

Last but certainly not least is white, color of both death and the intellect. Our discriminating faculties abstract and denature isolated aspects of life even as they enable manipulative understanding of them. Just because death is an inevitable part of living, intellect should never be employed obsessively or exclusively. At Lucky Six Farms, we observe that most plants assume a plain white hue when their vivifying juices have departed for the last time. It is fascinating to note that White Sage leaves, at the peak of its their life cycle display none of these colors. Instead, they assume a luminous blue-green, hues traditionally assigned to transcendent wisdom and perfect harmony. We fervently hope our White Sage products - essential oil, hydrosol, smudge bundles, cones, and whole leaves - convey those properties wherever they are dispatched across the face of our Mother Earth.

By Alan Beck

Samhain Sensibilities

Natural Resources - An Ancient View

Natural resources weren’t always commodities to be bought and sold. Take Halloween for example: a natural resource of time and space. Although our 2012 Halloween festivities have come and gone, the staff of Lucky Six Farms knows this unofficial holiday’s raison d’etre has only just begun. Halloween marks an important seasonal shift, and its roots extend deep into a Celtic past, when a large portion of Western Europeans gleaned their livelihood from an intimate understanding of and concomitant cooperation with Mother Earth. In fact, the familiar October 31 date of our Halloween - an abbreviation of All Hallows Eve - marks the approximate period in our planet’s solar cycle when Samhain was celebrated. As conspicuous midpoint between autumnal equinox and winter solstice, Samhain drew young and old together to ceremonially close the harvest season and prepare for the cold, dark half of the year. Group and individual purification inevitably followed to insure that psychic natural resources were appropriately attuned to accord with the prevailing temporal ones.

Noumena As Natural Resources

But why were rites of purification considered so very important during Samhain that they were practically obligatory? As with all uniquely liminal times, significant transitions of this kind heralded natural phase shifts in consciousness. Peculiarly charged emotions long closed off would spring open and vice versa. Thus, Samhain was considered, above all, as not simply a mindless tick-off of a cold, calendric division but rather a portal opening quite literally and directly to the Otherworld. Spirits of the departed, elves, fairies, elementals, and angelic beings both celestial and fallen suddenly secured access to the affairs of mundane life. Like a life-giving shower of rain or a devouring yet proteinaceous cloud of locusts, this avalanche of noumena required insightful management if the social fabric was to remain intact. To deal effectively with natural resources of this kind required an especially clear head coupled with unwavering physical resolve, an energized intellect supported by calm nerves. Given these facts, ceremonial purification became the order of the day.

Our White Sage Products - Uniquely Purifying Natural Resources

Gaelic peoples often pursued psychic purification by passing between two specially constructed bonfires. In fact, the close association of fire and aromatic fumigation with psychic cleansing extends well back into the prehistory of virtually every continent and indigenous society. Native Americans utilized smudging with White Sage for exactly the same end. Our certified organic products - essential oil, hydrosol, smudge bundles, cones, and whole leaves - continue this venerable tradition. We know they will prove remarkably efficacious, as they always have, throughout the winter ahead.


By Alan Beck