I haven't written to you for a while. That is because I have been too busy preparing people's smiles for the Christmas season, in between bringing smiles to people's faces by whatever contribution  I can give to ongoing adventures in Parliament.

Between the in between there was the curtain issue.  I like doing up  used houses  and I promised my children who are not children anymore that by Christmas, I will turn our new (old,  but not as old as usual) house in Saint Julian’s into a sanctuary of  youth and peace.  I have achieved the youth part cause its always full of young people of all age (being  also so close to Paceville).

In any case, I am now working on the ' peace' part which I confess is still a work in progress , not least because the word 'peace'  has many definitions, many inroads and outroads and is ultimately relative and subjective.

And that is where the curtain issue comes in. I believe that curtains give the ultimate cosy finish, set the mood with their colours and frills, can frame and unframe spaces , tame and un-tame light intensity  according to mood brightness or darkness, while protecting books and watercolours , and my mind from  certain scorching .

But curtains need time to choose, cut, and commission (since I left my sewing machine  and rudimentary sewing skills at my mum’s when I first married).

Finally  for any effect at all curtains need to be hung up nice and pretty for all to be enjoyed, otherwise all the work put into them would remain totally wasted and invisible. 

So to cut a long story short while all the tragic and hilarious melodrama was unfolding in Parliament and outside it, I was  being comforted by the fact that I was putting my house in order  on so many levels in time for a new beginning  in the New Year.

Meanwhile it never crossed my mind to abandon my readers, being sure that I would find the time to catch up with you before the year is out which Is what I'm doing now.

So in between taking note of exit polls unfolding while the Spaniards decide whether they want more of the same , or whether they have the courage to change their political landscape, I  also managed to follow the most recent Sunday sermons  by our current political leaders, only to hear more of the same.

Prime minister Muscat harping on the historic slashing of utility bills and taxes, in the full knowledge that given the different reality we are living in today as distinct from two and a half years ago, his sermon is now grossly outdated and inappropriate, given the fact that the price of oil has plummeted, BWSC is more efficient and working, grossly oil guzzling Marsa has been closed because PN interconnector is functioning and Enemalta debt is down because his government sold a third of it. Which means that JM Labour Govovernment is actually taking from the people more than the Nationalists were grabbing in their worst time during the financial crisis because, the scenario has completely changed.

But Labour is convinced that the population is as gullible as it looks and that it is enough to seem (not be) better than the old PN at its worst. Ultimately, Labour believes that everyone can be bought, no matter the price, and it also believes that liquidating the country's national assets will provide  enough to meet any demand, except the demand for fresh air and healthy space which , alas, too many won't miss until they're half dead and too weak to put up a fight.

Then there is Simon Busuttil's PN which has definitely made headway in 2015,  mostly,  but not exclusively, because Labour has reneged badly  on its electoral promise of good governance.

PN has embraced and joined the people's fight against ongoing environmental  destruction  as well as corruption which had had a strong hand in destroying its own last government. 

It is clear that PN has realised that the next election is going to be fought solely on  political credibility issues, as it becomes more obvious that similar to what happened in the last couple of years of the last legislature, the country would be doing well in spite of the government and its antics, not because of it. 

What PN has not acknowledged yet is the fact that the electorate still doubts its ability to denounce what dogged it when in government given the common knowledge that Simon Busuttil is in a constant struggle to assert his  new PN in an old political party that succeeded in transforming the face of our beloved country, but failed to transform itself enough to renounce the blood sucking parasites which bled it to death.

The result is that those parasites are not only still at large, but have simply transferred to a new administration which contents itself with  being reasonably bad, but not as bad as its predecessors .

I don't know if you ever wonder about this, but to this day we do not know how and why the Nationalist Party went bankrupt and who misappropriated what, which reflects very badly on a PN harping for transparency and good governance. With hindsight I should have questioned PL much more on its similarly sinister handling of its party's finances back in 2008 when I first contested for national Parliament on its ticket because the handling of party finances ultimately can  say a lot about the accountability and transparency of a potential government in the making... 

Finally, I just want to wish you all a  serene Christmas and a very good year.

Meanwhile,  I suppose it would be comforting to join me in remembering  that life can be what we make it, for as Roosevelt put it: “Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country.”