Otium in Brighton

I went to Brighton to sing for my supper, and ended up serenading the sea! 

Not that one necessarily excludes the other, which brings to mind the complementary relationship between otium (cultured and constructive leisure), and negotium: business, active affairs, what we do for a living (from which we get 'negotiation'). Here is Wiki on the subject:

"Otium can be a temporary time of leisure, that is sporadic. It can have intellectual, virtuous or immoral implications. It originally had the idea of withdrawing from one's daily business (negotium) or affairs to engage in activities that were considered to be artistically valuable or enlightening (i.e. speaking, writing, philosophy). It had particular meaning to businessmen, diplomats, philosophers and poets."

Living to the full involves both, with an emphasis in retirement on otium negotiosum (busy leisure: pursuing a hobby and attending to one's own affairs). My objective on this occasion was to try and capture the shore buildings through the boisterous tunnel of a wave - and the waves were definitely up for it - but my shutter release proved too slow, and my camera turned spoil-sport and packed in, irreparably this time, it would seem.

Wave-play turned out to be a mere preliminary to the further pursuit of otium in the form of (sorry, no rhymes) discussion over dinner: business, diplomacy, philosophy, poetry and Orkney (odd that Wiki should have omitted the latter from its list). Ate Tapas, learned about Meet Ups, chatted to the delightful Monica from Madrid who has just graduated in Tourism and is out to make good in the world as photographer. Time to hand over to the next generation and splash back into the lap of leisure ;)