Maurice non nem. con.

Spoke with Maurice this morning about forming a committee to carry forward the work of CRC [see previous postings] and was oddly surprised by his lack of enthusiasm for the project!

Now Maurice - village butcher and erstwhile ladies man - is not normally so coy when it comes to committee work. Indeed some would say that were he to be faced with the choice of an evening spent wrestling with the finer points of the proper voting protocol for co-opted members or grappling with a willing female, Maurice would leave the woman to sort herself out and head straight for the committee room. (I have, myself, witnessed an almost ecstatic glee light up his normally glum face when, with heavy and utterly false reluctance, he has used his chairman's authority to overrule a motion that displeased him.)

It is not so much, I believe, the use or abuse of power that thrills him. Rather it is a deep personal delight in comprehending and understanding the reign and rule of authority as things in themselves. Like a minor deity, charged with say minding the weather in the northern hemisphere, Maurice is simply fascinated that such a power exists and that he has been given authority to use it. Quite childlike in this regard is Maurice.

Anticipating therefore that Maurice would be habitually willing to involve himself in my inspired CRC work, I was quite taken aback when he said that on the whole he wouldn't mind if this one passed him by. So unlike the man indeed that I had to ask why not. His reply was a glory of ambiguity and obfuscation, so much so that at first I assumed he was seeking to imply - without being brazen - that his other, more sensuous, interests precluded devoting the required time or energy to CRC.

On reflection though, it struck me that Maurice's reluctance was a result of his instant appraisal that CRC lacked one facet vital to good committee work (everyone would be in favour and therefore there would be no argument, dispute or rancour) and also possessed one extra ingredient not to his liking at all (CRC would be a raging national success and would therefore actually achieve something).

A slur perhaps on a great man, but I really think that Maurice - as with so many of his committee-loving bent - can only properly and happily function if the hours of turgid, complex yet compelling debate required of a good committee never ends in decisive action but remains an eternal and internal wrangle of words.

A camel may indeed be a horse designed by a committee, but a very sloppy one [committee not camel] at that. Any half-decent committee would ensure that the animal in question remained merely an acceptable notion in broad terms, but one much in need of further detailed consideration with an interim report to be produced at some uncertain future date.

Floreat CRC - but without Maurice! Oh dear, must ask H for her advice.