No Ordinary Joe

I gifted myself a Christmas present - the 'Forever Strummer Calendar' for next year. There's a hit of sadness in that the year will lead us past December 22, 2012, the tenth anniversary of Joe Strummer's death. But the purchase is mainly inspiring in that each month is marked by a stimulating image and a quote that could inform an entire lifetime.

A rough calculation suggests that I have now been on this planet longer that Joe's allotted time. So far, I've been able to use his music and words as a series of instructive pathways. That will doubtless continue, but how we might have taken heed of an extra Joe decade, making sense of the perilous times that we're currently at. Now we have to cut our own particular groove.

But as the months fold over on that calendar, I aim to live up to lines such as 'The Future Is Unwritten', 'By Mythic and Prolific' and 'Without People You Are Nothing'. Miss you, fella.