Thursday, 27 September 2012
I Spy With My Lorgnette...
Have you noticed that posh people like to start the day with foods that begin with the letter K?
They had to choose a consonant because they'd already swallowed their vowels for the day as soon as they uttered the word "brkfst". Can't gulp down too many of those pesky vowels in one go, of course, in case they get tangled up in the silver spoon.
Kippers. Kidneys. Kedgeree. What on earth are you thinking?! These aren't foods for the morning. No, no, no. Much too rich and savoury. Only suitable if you've been out fox-hunting for a few hours first. They are also foods that involve special equipment which normal people don''t have. Chafing dishes. Sideboards. Those special kipper jugs.
Get off our letter K. It belongs to us plebs and our pleb foods. K for breakfast stands only for Kelloggs, and if you want a double dose, Special K. It's for Kit-Kats, kebabs and ketchup. Or if you're out and about, it's for Krispy Kremes and KFC (which is not a football team, before you try and prove your common touch).
Proper breakfast is tea and toast, as any fule kno. Knickers to you, fancy-pants posh boys.
Wednesday, 19 September 2012
Whatever
I know that the universe is indifferent to its ants.
But I still want to think I matter - to some people, at least. When I feel that my absence would be like taking a beaker of water from the Atlantic, I wonder whether the superhuman effort of clinging on is really worth the trouble.
What am I for? Would it make any difference at all if I wasn't here? The sun would still rise and set, all the wheels would still turn, the trees would grow and drop and grow and drop their leaves. The world would not notice if I were gone, the sound of my voice would not be missed in the clamour and babel hubbub.
The people who would notice my absence could be counted on my fingers. And their wheels would still turn and churn and move them on. Nothing we do makes any difference. Nothing we say makes any difference. Acts of kindness leave no impression. Love leaves no marks.
An ant leaves no footprints.
Tuesday, 18 September 2012
Sleeper
Sometimes it takes all my effort not to lie down on the railway line.
I mean all my effort, every fibre of my being intensely concentrated on clinging on to clinging on. I did not want to get up and face the day, go to work. Then when I was at work I did not want to go home. I did not want to be anywhere. I did not want to be.
After those boys got killed in the miners strike, coal picking on the spoil tip, I used to dream about their death, rattling black rushing down and pinning them under its dark weight until the dust stopped their breath. This part of my life feels like that dream. One wave after another of black dirt piling down, heavier and heavier until I can hardly urge my chest to rise and fall under its burden.
I always wondered whether, when it was time, I might be able to simply let go of the will to carry on - and find that I just gently slid over the edge of the sunset. I thought this might be when I was ninety or so. Now I can vouch for the fact that wishing you weren't here doesn't make it so.
Death by my own hand holds a terrible allure like the urge to approach the edge of a waterfall. Two problems though. Firstly, the children. Secondly, the life insurance doesn't pay out. I'm resigned to crashing my car and making it look like an accident, although this also has two problems. Firstly, I might injure someone else. Secondly, I might not die but be horribly injured, trapped in mangled wreckage being cut free for hours then permanently maimed but still alive. So, yes, I guess life could be even worse than this. And interesting that I am much more afraid of being injured than being killed, more scared of living than of dying.
Lack of real imminent possibility (this evening at least) does not prevent me from having a list in my head of favorite spots.
1. Drop off the back of the ferry in the dead of night.
2. The viaduct at the port.
3. In the sea with stones in my pocket.
4. Beachy Head.
All of these places are far enough from home, far enough from anywhere I normally am, to give me time to reconsider. Perhaps that's no coincidence. Not tonight, Josephine.
Saturday, 15 September 2012
Pin Up
If I looked like this, I don't reckon I'd be all that stressed about photos of my buff, bronzed body turning up topless on the interweb. Let's face it, she's going to look amazing.
Privacy aside, I'm struggling to understand why Harry's nuts are in the national interest, whilst photos of Kate's tits are a national outrage.
If I gave a damn, I might be really confused about this.
Monday, 10 September 2012
Compulsion
There are a couple of things I simply have to do.
One of them is get fit, the other one is get writing. These things are particularly important given that the thing I've been working towards for the last 20 years has led me, via a very roundabout route and a large amount of graft, back to the place I started.
So I'd better strive at something else, otherwise the overall outcome of my endeavours will have been pointless.
I can't be trusted to get on with things without some sort of external encouragement, targets, goals. Maybe at least I have learned how to understand myself, if nothing else. Therefore I have set myself two challenges.
The first is a six week poetry course. I've just finished a two week poetry course as a sort of limbering up, and come up with 3 pieces I quite like. This longer stretch should get me back in the writing saddle, so to speak.
The great thing about poetry is that it doesn't require the same amount of sitting down that, say, a novel would dictate. Most of it happens inside the head while doing other things, and as long as there is the possibility to jot or record a voice memo, it doesn't always interfere fundamentally with the daily timetable. Writing a poem is a bit like waiting for a plant to grow. You can get it started, sow the seed of an idea but then it has to do its own mysterious thing in the dark before it's ready to begin emerging.
Even so, I thought that I should offset the temptation to stay on the sofa drinking comforting red wine while my poems mature in the aged oak barrels of my brain, by also signing up for a fitness challenge. 5 x 50 will commit me to covering 5k a day for 50 days, running, walking, cycling, swimming or a combination of these.
Truth be told, it's not that much of a challenge on the days I'm exercising anyway - 5k is my standard running route. It's a kick start for the sedentary days though, as I will have to go for a walk for an hour or get on the exercise bike in the evening. It can only do me good.
My brave little hero nephew has just had an operation which will leave him in plaster from hip to ankle on both legs for 7-8 weeks. And even after that, he can't walk anyway. So I thought the least I could do is be grateful for the ability to get about independently, and do a bit of extra walking in his honour.
In between, I need to fit in my work. Less said about that the better.
Wednesday, 5 September 2012
Here's To You
Met my sister for lunch this week. She lives in Australia now so this is actually quite a rare occasion. We have had a rather tense relationship in recent years (or perhaps always?) and we barely saw each other last summer, just at a busy wedding and a large family lunch. We chat on Facebook but we don't really talk or Skype.
We met at the Malmaison. She was wearing black designer clothes and very high heels. She was heavily made up, Kate Middleton style with lots of dark eyeliner. She ordered Veuve, although she didn't offer to chip in for the bill at the end. She has a 26 year old boyfriend.
I wondered what we had in common now. It's true that blood is thicker than water, but only perhaps in a strictly scientific way. Theoretically we have a shared experience of childhood, but the way she talks about her makes me think that she must have been switched with another girl and didn't live in our house at all.
Apparently, doing things with younger people keeps you feeling young yourself. I am sitting in the office drinking orange squash, eating Hula Hoops, and feeling a bit tearful because I didn't sleep very well. Does this count? I feel five. Fine. Wine. Whatever.
Saturday, 1 September 2012
Coitus Interruptus
Miss me?
Think of it as a breathing space. Sometimes it takes so much effort to keep breathing that there is no space to do anything else. Sometimes there simply isn't anything to say, even for a jabberjaws like me.
So what's new? On the plus side, I can now run 10k. On the minus side, I now need to wear reading glasses to look at emails on my iPhone. Alternatively I can just let them blur into into a yammer of horrible workstuff, these days nothing can't wait until the next day.
On the minus side, I have to buy my clothes at Sainsburys now. You can get a decent pair of work trousers for £9 - who knew? On the plus side, I have learned a lot about how the High Court works.
In my next life, I have decided not to come back as the proprietor of a school uniform shop after all. Lucrative and ludicrously easy though this may be, it will involve too much interaction with both children (bleargh) and Proper Mummies (bleargh). I have decided instead to come back as a barrister. I am quick at understanding things, good at writing, good at talking and showing off. And I like the idea of being able to earn £40,000 for two days of work.
Meanwhile, the brainchild languishes like a Victorian infant consumptive, pale and barely breathing. Which brings me back neatly to my breathing space.
Think of this as an oxygen tent.
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