On Being Under the Weather.

I’ve been feeling ill again today – extreme weariness, nausea, thick head, sore chest, pains in various places, and now my sinuses are beginning to get sore. It’s almost certainly due to the change in the weather. It’s turned suddenly warmer today, and sudden changes in temperature have that effect on me. So do sudden changes in barometric pressure, humidity, and even wind direction sometimes. And then there’s the matter of the usual depression, of course

I’m sure that if I went to a doctor and described my daily round of depression and anxiety, he would diagnose mental illness and bury me under half the contents of the pharmacy (which is one of several reasons why I don’t go to a doctor.)

But he would probably be right, you know. I probably do have some mental illness by the modern definition. It’s just that, where I was brought up, the term ‘mental illness’ was reserved for those given to truly mentally ill forms of behaviour, and I’m not. I don’t escape from the attic at dead of night and set fire to people’s bed linen. I don’t run naked along Ashbourne High Street shouting ‘I’ve just slept with a woman from Turkmenistan and this is me lunch break.’ (Lifted and paraphrased from a line in Spike Milligan’s Puckoon which can no longer be quoted verbatim.) I exhibit no psychotic symptoms whatsoever; I’m just scared to get up in the morning because I know it’s going to be another day of feeling anxious and depressed and I’m thoroughly fed up with it.

But at least I had an email from the priestess to excite my interest when I booted the computer up this morning. It seems the fine trade winds carrying her ship of contentment steadily through the sea of life have suddenly backed and driven her off course. Or maybe she threw the rudder hard over and re-set the sails herself. (I don’t know yet. She was economical with the details.) Maybe she’s even mentally ill, though I very much doubt it. Not the type. I expect I’ll find out sooner or later, assuming I make it through the intervening days.

*  *  *

Today I ordered the DVD of the 2018 movie Mary Magdalene without having been given any firm recommendation. It’s just that I’ve long had some interest in dear old MM, so I thought I’d see what the film made of her. It was a lot more expensive than the used DVDs I usually buy from charity shops, but I still regard charity shops as forbidden territory. All those possibly unwashed strangers milling about, browsing the shelves, picking things up and putting them down again. It doesn’t strike me as a particularly healthy pursuit, and I do so care about the state of my health.

The Remarkable Stephanie Jones.

I made a remarkable musical discovery over the past two nights on YouTube. Her name is Stephanie Jones. I know nothing about her except who she is, and I know that because of how she plays classical guitar. My comment runs thus, and bears repeating on the blog:

I've listened to a lot of classical guitar in my time, going back to the days of John Williams and Julian Bream, but I've never come across anything like this. And so tonight I gave much thought to what makes this woman unique:  

It's as though the guitar is part of her body, and so she plays it as naturally as the rest of us would make a cup of tea or scratch our noses. But it goes further than that. Since the guitar is effectively an extension of herself, the nature of who she is - her personality and emotions - comes through it. You listen to the music and you feel the essence of Stephanie Jones invading your head. The result is explosive and almost disturbing in its teasing intimacy. And I'm not being pretentious in saying this, really I'm not. That's just how it feels to me.

Trump and Cohen Go Slagging.

So who should we side with in the Trump vs Cohen spat? Cohen paints Trump as the lowest form of sub-humanity; Trump says Cohen is a liar and a loser. So which is right?

Well, Cohen’s depiction of Trump is pretty much exactly how I’ve always seen Trump anyway, so Cohen’s depiction is vindication of my own judgement through watching the whole sorry saga of the Trump presidency from 3,000 miles away (and growing very tired of it.). But I’m not stupid. Could it be that Cohen is simply tuning into the general opinion of his adversary held by the savvier end of American society, and is making the whole thing up to preach to the converted so as to make a lot of money from sales of his book? I don’t suppose we’ll ever know, but I did find a couple of the assertions at least amusing.

Trump on Hispanics: ‘I will never get the Hispanic vote. Like the blacks, they’re too stupid to vote for Trump.’ So only smart people vote Trump? What a fascinating and hilarious concept.

Trump on Stormy Daniels: ‘But I bet (my supporters) would think it’s cool that I slept with a porn star.’ That’s because they’re stupid, Donald. You need no credentials to sleep with a porn star. You don’t even need a libido. All you need is lots of money, because that’s the game they’re in.

A Simple Question.

Tonight's recommendations on YouTube include a video entitled 'Spacetime.' It asks the question:

 Do we travel through time at the speed of light?

So, would there be any point in me watching this after three double scotches, or should I just go to bed? I've already had an internet dropout and a whole load of stress consequent upon presuming to refresh Firefox (you'd think I'd know better by now, wouldn't you?)

Life's very complicated at the clever end, isn't it? I think I'll go to bed.

No Shoe Fetish Here.

When I was a kid I was taught that shoes are the most defining feature of a person’s dress. They’re the first thing everybody looks at, I was told. Shabby shoes betray a shabby person. Shoes that are clean, in good condition and well heeled are the mark of an upright and respectable person. If your shoes are good, you can hold your head up in any company. Cue the spit-and-polish mentality, but only for a while.

It occurred to me when I was cleaning a pair of my own shoes this evening that I never notice other people’s shoes. I routinely study all manner of things about people: their eyes in particular, but also their general dress style, their facial features and how they use them, their body shape, the style and condition of their hair, how they walk, how they talk, the kind of voice they have, their deportment, and in the case of women, their legs. (Sorry.) A person’s shoes are about the only aspect of their external features I don’t notice. (Apart from the colour of their eyes, that is, but I’ve already said that in another post.)

So now I’m wondering whether this is a rejection-of-roots thing or just another sign of my oddness. I also wonder whether I shall now succumb to paranoia with regard to my shoes. It’s unlikely. I freely confess that I’m often neurotic, but never paranoid.

On Losers.

I gather Donald is in trouble again for referring to the occupants of an American military cemetery as ‘losers.’ Well now, this is slightly complicated because, if you’re going to be rational about it, those who lose their life are, by definition, losers. But the point isn’t based on the rational. It’s based on the fact that in a systemically aggressive and violent culture like America, the word ‘loser’ is synonymous with ‘failure.’ In fact, it’s probably even more pejorative. And that’s what’s upsetting people, especially when it’s revealed that Donald was using the term as an excuse for not turning up because it was raining and he didn’t want to get his hair wet. (Though with a hairstyle like his, who can blame him?)

But let’s just sidetrack a little here. Much of the rhetoric being fired at Trump refers to ‘men who laid down their life in defence of their country.’ Did they really? The fact is that in most major wars, a large proportion of the military personnel are enlisted by a government (or King or President or whatever) which gave them no choice but to be there or be in gaol. And while they were out there they went where they were told to go and did what they were told to do without exception. And if they got their heads blown off in the process, it was because they were expendable pawns in the game of government policy (or that of the King or President or whatever.) The conscripts didn’t lay down their lives at all, they had it taken from them.

And of course, the real sufferers in the final analysis were – and continue to be – the friends and family and other loved ones left behind to mourn. And so the point is fairly made: Presidents should not be stepping on the toes of those who mourn.

As for the rest of us who are not mourning, maybe we should put the dead behind us. We all have to die anyway and life is, and always will be, about the living. But disrespecting those who are both living and suffering is a mark of the true psychopath.

A Kind of Coming Out.

I’ve lived in my present house for more than fourteen years. That’s the longest by far that I have ever lived at one address. And they’ve been troubled years in which depression, anxiety, desperation and various other forms of malaise have never been far beneath the surface, and have often been the predominant feature of the daily round.

The move to this house switched my emotional baseline from positive to negative. Positive people try to see the best in others; they ride the difficulties and push through adversity with a strong heart. Negative people are ever ready to see the worst in people; they’re brought to their knees by difficulties and do their best to hide from adversity. I decline to accept that one is right and the other wrong; they’re just different forms of experience and response. What I would be foolish to deny is that positive people are generally happy, while negative people generally aren’t.

And yet, on an uncharacteristically positive note, I think it’s true to say that I’ve probably learned more about life and the human condition over the last fourteen years than in any previous fourteen. And I’ve changed a lot in the process. I’m tempted to suggest that I might even have become a better person.

So the question which presents itself is this: Does the process of learning and becoming a better person have any value, since all we do in the end is die? Do we take our learning and improved proclivities with us into the undiscovered country? Do we build on them through successive lifetimes? Is this what being an ‘old soul’ is all about? Is this the stuff of which wisdom is made, and does that wisdom prove useful in the future? Does it even improve our lot in the final analysis, whatever the final analysis might be?

I don’t see how you can begin to address that question unless you truly know whether life has a purpose and, if so, what that purpose is. I don’t see how anybody can know, whether they seek the answer through religion, philosophy or science. I’ve tried all three and always ended up unconvinced.

All this might be complete balderdash, of course. It could be that something is amiss in my brain, or it could be that I have a malfunctioning gene, or it could be that my fractured childhood produced a constant drip of slimy black stuff which won’t stop dripping, or it could be that this house is simply an unhappy house. There are those who believe in such a phenomenon, just as there are those who believe in the dark night of the soul.

Meanwhile, I’m still conscious and still breathing. And as long as that situation prevails I shall continue to perceive life as my nature determines. And maybe I’ll be a happier person when I arrive at the terminus, or maybe I won’t. For now, life is a matter of getting through the days. And this post is really opening up, isn’t it?

I’m going to finish watching The Count of Monte Cristo now. I don’t really see the point, but it’s better than sitting alone and in silence while feeling disinclined to meditate.

Anxiety Fallout.

I'm becoming utterly hooked on watching Chinese people shuffle dancing. Glued to the screen I am, hopelessly fascinated. I suspect this is an INFJ's response to interminable stress.

Skills Post Mortem.

I often think about what skills I’ll need to learn when I become a ghost. So far I’ve got:

1. How to float outside people’s windows at night while my mouth opens and closes like that of a cod fish, silently.

2. How to get children to talk to me so their mothers can say ‘Who are you talking to?’ and the kid can answer ‘Mr Jeffrey.’ ‘Who’s Mr Jeffrey?’ ‘The nice man who comes and reads me stories after you and daddy have gone to bed.’

3. How to manifest to people in the form of a wizened old man with long, straggly hair and a gaping hole on the left side of his breast, to which I can point and say ‘Look what you did to me’ (in a croaky voice.)

4. How to blow cold air into people’s ears just before they go to sleep, while whispering ‘Whatever you do, don’t open your eyes.’

5. How to be invisible to humans but visible to dogs, so I can have fun persuading countless canines to make whimpering noises while wagging their tails, pushing their ears back, and staring into empty space.

6. How to get every spider in the house to congregate on somebody’s pillow.

7. How to get the radio to come on just as a person starts reaching out to press the switch.

8. How to crawl out of the TV set in the middle of Loose Women.

9. How to make the top of the ketchup bottle shoot off and the red sauce ooze out and run onto the table.

10. How to change the alarm clock to 4am instead of 7.30 on three successive nights.

11. How to flush the upstairs toilet while everybody is downstairs.

12. How to get under the sofa and make gurgling noises.

13. How to make the milk smell like cow dung.

14. How to call from the top of the stairs: ‘Do come up, my dear. I’m waiting.’ (Followed by a deep chuckle.)

I expect what they’ll actually try to teach me is how to write on walls in red paint and move fridge magnets around. I hope not; I’m so beyond that sort of thing.

But first I’d like a couple of days off to create my new environment in which my two lovely, late dogs will come bounding joyfully towards me while a bunch of young Chinese women shuffle dance in the sand. And the ice cream will be home-made and free. Hauntings can wait.

Days and Nights.

The disturbed nights are back – waking up chilled and feeling icy air on my face, even though the bedroom is heated and I’m well covered. I’m tempted to wonder whether it’s a symptom of a known condition, and then I wonder whether I’m being honoured with a visitation from some form of otherworldly presence. I even looked around the bedroom the last time it happened, but I couldn’t see anything.

(I always find it odd, you know, that some people hide beneath the bedclothes when they’re frightened. I was a nervous kid, but I never hid beneath the bedclothes. I always had to keep my eyes wide open, looking for inexplicable shadows or apparent movements in the darkness.)

And then there’s the return of the uncomfortable dreams. The one I remember from this week was of being in my home town and wanting to go somewhere. I knew where I wanted to go, but I didn’t know how to get there. And I couldn’t work out whether I’d simply forgotten the way, or whether the road layout had been changed. It brought on the beginnings of a sense of panic.

So then I woke up with the sun already climbing and didn’t want to get out of bed because I dread having to negotiate another day of daylight in present circumstances. I find darkness easier to deal with.

Where has the humour gone? Where the silly ditties? Where is my friend the llama these days, and where the musings on moths and mazy pathways? Where, indeed, are those more comfortable dreams in which I’m sitting in the Lady B’s kitchen while she consciously ignores me (which she would never do, of course; she’s far too polite for that.) But at least the childhood dreams of being menaced by a mad woman haven’t returned. Not yet, anyway.

Actually, the humour hasn’t gone altogether either. These days I save it for YouTube after midnight. Nobody ever gets the joke, of course, probably because the humour is as singular as everything else about me since I took up the reclusive habit. Gone are the days when I could make a comment to a bunch of people and they would laugh hysterically. That really did happen, you know. It did. One man scared the living daylights out of me once by nearly choking. He was in a wheelchair I remember, and it struck me as odd and salutary that humour can be so humorous that it becomes anything but funny. I suppose it’s all about living and learning.