The Importance of Principles

 
For reasons that would take too long to explain, I was fortunate enough some years ago to meet and befriend George Abbey who was the Director of NASA’s Johnston Space Centre from 1996 until 2003. Based in Houston, Texas, George is a fascinating man who has had an exciting life spent in aeronautics and space flight. He sent me the undernoted text recently given his current Texan location and my Scottish roots and it amused sufficiently for me to incorporate it into this blog.

In 1952, Armon M. Sweat, Jr., a member of the Texas House of Representatives, was asked about his position on whiskey. What follows is his exact answer (taken from the Political Archives of Texas):

“If you mean whiskey, the devil’s brew, the poison scourge, the bloody monster that defiles innocence, dethrones reason, destroys the home, creates misery and poverty, yea, literally takes the bread from the mouths of little children; if you mean that evil drink that topples Christian men and women from the pinnacles of righteous and gracious living into the bottomless pit of degradation, shame, despair, helplessness, and hopelessness, then, my friend, I am opposed to it with every fiber of my being.

However, if by whiskey you mean the lubricant of conversation, the philosophic juice, the elixir of life, the liquid that is consumed when good fellows get together, that puts a song in their hearts and the warm glow of contentment in their eyes; if you mean Christmas cheer, the stimulating sip that puts a little spring in the step of an elderly gentleman on a frosty morning; if you mean that drink that enables man to magnify his joy, and to forget life’s great tragedies and heartbreaks and sorrow; if you mean that drink the sale of which pours into Texas treasuries untold millions of dollars each year, that provides tender care for our little crippled children, our blind, our deaf, our dumb, our pitifully aged and infirm, to build the finest highways, hospitals, universities, and community colleges in this nation, then my friend, I am absolutely, unequivocally in favor of it.

This is my position, and as always, I refuse to compromise on matters of principle.”

A Breath Of Fresh Air

In 2003, I was invited (as were many other people) to contribute a few words to a book called ‘Scotland Recommended’ which sought to highlight the magnificence of Scotland’s architecture. Most people threw their lot in with the Scott Monument or Edinburgh Castle in Edinburgh, Balmoral Castle in Ballater or St. Andrew’s University in Fife. However, my entry was rather more prosaic…

‘An unusual entry, perhaps, but visiting the public toilets (the gents’ anyway) on the quay at Stronachlachar is to step back in time. Kept immaculately by the ground staff of Scottish Water on whose Loch Katrine quay they stand, the toilets haven’t had the benefits of upgrading over the years and are all the better for it.

The porcelain and solid wood interiors are redolent of a bygone age. Rendered almost inaccessible due to the location of the quay being at the far end of the loch, the toilets never seem to have attracted the graffiti artists who so frequently deface both the external and internal aspects of urinals the world over.

I thoroughly encourage a visit to these toilets in their magnificent Highland setting. Entering them for the first time’s like a breath of fresh air!’