Musings from the Autumn.

Every time I think of something to write to the blog I get a voice inside my head telling me: ‘It’s too trivial. Forget it. Go back to being bored and unfulfilled because those two conditions are less demeaning than demonstrating the smallness of your mind by writing trivial nonsense.’ And so I revert to being bored and unfulfilled and the blog remains sparsely populated. Is this the end of my blogging days, I ask myself? I don’t know yet.

Or is it the end of me? I was ruminating recently on the nature of my various fixations in life. I’ve had several because I seem to be the sort who is given to monomania and rock hopping. But let’s have my personal definition to begin with.

To me, a fixation is something which drives you far beyond the point which a mere hobby or interest can manage. It’s something you love more than chocolate, something which fills your waking thoughts and sleeping dreams almost to the exclusion of everything else, something you can’t wait to engage with, something which can muddle your capacity for reason and even propel you to the edge of temporary insanity now and then. And so this is my list of fixations for the sake of adding another digit to the May total:

Romance, sex (usually working in tandem because they both have their root in the need to explore), the drive to understand the nature of reality, fishing, photography, writing, and hot bacon and tomato sandwiches (I think I can allow that one because there was a time when the prospect of a hot bacon and tomato sandwich would have tugged me away from some of the others.)

Most of them have now either gone or shrunk to a mere minor titillation for one reason or another (especially bacon and tomato sandwiches since I became vegetarian.) Until a couple of weeks ago I would have said that writing was my one remaining fixation, but now I’m beginning to wonder whether that’s going the way of the others and being replaced by the contemplation of mortality.

And while I’m on the subject of mortality it occurs to me to say that if I’m to be remembered for anything – and I’m not terribly bothered whether I am or not – I should like it to be for my favourite philosophy which can be expressed two ways:

Perception is the whole of the life experience.

Everything of value ultimately distils to the abstract.

And another thing: I was listening to some people on a TV programme recently talking about their charity which sends volunteers to the homes of lonely people to talk to them. ‘Count me out,’ I said (even though I appreciated their effort and concern.) The last thing I want is to have strangers coming into my house – however well intentioned they might be – and trying to engage me in trivial conversation. That’s because I don’t get lonely. There are times when I feel depressingly alone, but that’s not the same thing at all. Besides, my head develops the odd feeling that it's about to explode if I'm trapped into attempting forced, trivial conversation just for the sake of it.

And finally: There’s a woman I occasionally encounter in the coffee shop and she seems to like me for some reason. (Oddly enough, I seem to quite like her, too.) She was there today and we spent most of our time talking about operations, their complications and side effects, and the self-injection of Clexane. And her very small daughter, Cicely, smiled at appropriate moments. It was the most fun I’ve had for ages.

I think that’s more than enough for one day.