On the radio, while I was at work:

"Terry Waite was a special envoy to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who worked as a hostage negotiator until he himself was taken captive and spent almost five years as a hostage. This Sunday on Tapestry, Mary Hynes talks with Terry Waite about how he survived it all."

He was talking about how in times of crisis your body has reserves you aren't aware of, that it continues to go on long after you think it should just stop.

He told Mary Hynes, when she asked him what his ordeal did to his faith, "My faith has been exposed for what it is -- uncertain, questioning, vulnerable."

He also said that his contact with his captors taught him that: "I was probably fairly narrow in my understanding of faith."

He said he learnt that one of the most difficult things is how to live creatively - with people of different backgrounds, and to find a common source.

The interviewer moved on to the question: How can A GOD allow all this?

He didn't seem to have issues around this. Amazingly, he asked her, "How do you view your own responsibility? Have you been a kid too long?"

Near the end of the piece, Mary asked him if he would contribute a song to her informal poll. She's been asking those she interviews, mostly on spiritual topics, to name a song that has touched them in some spiritual way. Waite said, very quickly, "Please Release Me." And sang a few bars.

Then he said no, he was just kidding, and picked, and I was very surprised: A Whiter Shade of Pale. Which has been, since I was about 16, one of my enduringly favourite songs. He explained his choice by saying that there's Bach in the background, and so I went looking for that, but it turns out it's only inspired by Bach. Or so Wikipedia says. (And you may know I have issues with Wikipedia, since they tried to ban me as a 'possible sock puppet')

Do I have any faith? I don't know. I think if I do, it's more than vulnerable. What do I believe? Certainly I know I err on the side of personal responsibility... And yeah, different backgrounds can be difficult. That the faith of another makes sense in their context, even if that context seems fake or contrived to me. Is the outward expression of grief ever not sentimental?

So many things that happen to me at the moment, I can't talk about. Not that I'm trying to be coy, or anything, but I can't discuss what happens at work. And I wish I could, because some of it is very emotional. It was court week this week, and we had folk on remand staying the week. Usually the lockup is just drunks or mentally unbalanced folk. Not much in the way of conversation. I'll never understand drunk people. I mean, if I've already said no you can't have any coffee until you're sober, and then you start insulting me (I get a lot of racial/sexual slurs) do you really think I'm going to go, "Oh, dear, I'd better give you coffee so you stop calling me names." I know the Innuinaqtuin for stupid white chick. So don't think you're fooling me with that either. I also know most of the names for sexual organs.

Anyway. This week, with regular sober folk, I actually had some conversations, and felt like I was actually doing something useful. At 4 o'clock the other morning, before a couple of them were due to appear in court, I was listening to their anxieties...

What I'm saying, I guess, is that it feels strange to be writing a blog that can't really reflect what I'm doing. When I was running the lottery booth, I used to be able to report on my strange happenings. But not now.