Browsing the book shelves in a charity shop, in the days that separate Christmas and the New Year, I came across the book 'Billy' by Pamela Stephenson. Pamela is my new 'lady crush' replacing Alex Polizzi in my affections since I saw Pamela sashaying across the dance floor on 'Strictly'. 'Billy', is Billy Cononnly the comedian, and Pamela, his gorgeous clever wife, had written this book about his life.
I vaguely remember the book coming out in 2001 and the discussion it caused around the revelations it contained about the sexual and physical abuse Billy endured as a child. Because of this I have never had a desire to read it, but fuelled by the boredom that those 'inbetween' days engulf me in, and my Pammy love, I bought the book and started reading it a couple of nights ago.
In the introduction Pamela talks about the Heisenburg Principal, which if you Google, comes back with the following:
Since Δmv ≈ h /λ and Δx ≥ λ the two can be combined:
ΔxΔmv ≥ hλ/λ. Therefore, ΔxΔp ≥ h
Pamela explains this as the notion that 'nothing in the universe can ever be accurately described because the act of observation always changes it. For every one life, there are a million observed realities including several of the subject's'. Swoon...brains and beauty.
Well. That explains a lot actually.
Pamela and Billy have been married forever. In the pages that I have read so far Pamela shows a deep love and understanding of her complex man.
Billy says that what saved him during his bleak childhood was reading. He loved to read and he got his books from the library. He describes the library as 'wonderfully warm, full of people of all ages, especially older folk' and it was there that he escaped to another world. Just as I did in my visits to the library as a child. We were extremely lucky, Billy and me, to have a place where we could go, away from the grim reality of our home, somewhere safe, where we were left alone, allowed to browse, unaccosted.
It is sad that all these years on something that was so readily available to the young and old of the past is at risk of disappearing forever. The people running things now have never had need for a proper community library. Why would they have had? They had access to books, newspapers etc, their homes may have even had a library of its own. No doubt their schools and colleges and universities had libraries that were second to none, places where no snotty, poor child or tired old pensioner ever took refuge in warmth and written words. So when cuts are made these people will make them without a second thought and when challenged will shrug their chip free shoulders and say-
'Let them use Amazon'.
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