Exciting Encounters.

I said to the new checkout girl in Sainsbury’s:

‘The thing which most attracts or repels me about individuals is what I feel of their presence. Some people have a strong presence, some people don’t. Some people feel presence strongly, while others don’t.’

‘Never really thought about it,’ said the new checkout girl.

The silence was pregnant for a few minutes while she scanned and I packed, and then she said (I believe it was while she was weighing the onion): ‘I think I agree with you.’ Her subsequent habit of smiling expectantly suggested she wanted my approbation. Can’t imagine why.

*  *  *

Meanwhile, Dr House drove his car into Cuddy’s living room tonight because she was being nice to her sister’s creepy bank manager. House is my kind of bloke, you know, and my only regret was that the creepy bank manager wasn’t sitting at the table which the big blue sedan demolished. And Cuddy did once tell my favourite doctor that he was the most remarkable man she’d ever known. Nobody ever said that to me. The best I ever get is new checkout girls apparently wanting my approbation. I expect it all comes down to whether you’ve got presence or not.

On Make-Up, Manliness, and Mary Davies

The latest ad to infest my inbox is from Boots. They want me to buy some firming booster serum, apparently from their make-up section. Or is it? Does anybody out there know what firming booster serum is? I need to know or else it would be foolhardy to press the SHOP NOW button. Back in my day women only had to tap their cheeks with a powder puff to face the world undaunted, but we didn’t have a retail-based economy in those days.

You know, when I was a kid my mother’s powder puff fascinated me. I used to sneak into her bedroom when she wasn’t around and take it out of its little pot, and then examine it from all angles, and sniff it, and feel the texture of the powder, and all out of a sense of curiosity. Thankfully, I was never tempted to tap my cheek with it. Imagine where I might be now if I had.

*  *  *

Tonight I’m snacking on:

Scrocchi Italian Crackers

With Sesame and Poppy Seeds

They’re rather nice, but I’m not convinced they’re entirely manly. When I was a kid you got Smiths Crisps with a little bag of salt, or nothing.

That was back in the day when proper men didn’t work in shops, of course. A woman made no bones about that when I worked in a shop. She told me that proper men worked either in manual jobs or offices. Only wimps worked in shops. I would never have got over it if my current love interest, Mary Davies, hadn’t grabbed my hand and held it out for the harridan to see. ‘Look,’ she said with a determined air, ‘he’s got calluses on his hands. Where do you think they came from?’ I would have preferred it if she’d mentioned my rugby playing, but I shall be forever grateful for her support anyway. Imagine where I might be now if it hadn’t been for Mary Davies.

Considering Which Road to Follow.

A young woman acquaintance of mine will turn 25 on Saturday and she’s not terribly happy at the moment. Her story, very briefly, is this:

In the matter of education she tripped merrily along in the groove to which I’ve made mention recently. She did her degree in Commerce and Law because that’s a fairly safe bet if you want a reasonably prosperous existence and the lifestyle trappings which come with it. The problem is that she’s not really the groove type. She’s a free-spirited, adventurous type who now spends so much time withering in the heat of the corporate kitchen that she doesn’t have the time to smell roses, dance on poles, woo handsome young dudes in Argentina, climb mountains, and muse on the big existential questions as is her wont.

So now I’m about to send her birthday greetings and I’m unsure whether to point out (from experience, you understand) that youth is very short and very precious, and that maybe it’s an awful shame to waste it on building a career which will bring merely lifestyle benefits and security in old age. After all, how do any of us know whether we’ll even get an old age? And given the apparent threat of global catastrophe through climate change, how can any of us know whether money will be worth very much in thirty or forty year’s time?

I think I probably will. If she finds my view unpalatable, presumptuous, or just plain wrong, no doubt she’ll ignore me as she always does.

A Return to Something Like.

I took a shower in daylight today. That’s most unusual for me because I’m strictly a late night showerer. I find showering in daylight uncomfortable for some reason. It’s one of my oddnesses (or peculiarities, as Charlotte Brontë called them when discussing Emily.) In fact, the last time I showered in daylight was shortly after I came out of hospital following my operation nearly fourteen months ago, and that’s the point of the post.

It was when I took that shower last April that I first noticed the full extent of muscle loss on my arms, shoulders and chest. The light coming from the window was in just the right position to show up the wrinkled skin all across my chest because there was hardly anything underneath to stretch it. All I could see under the skin was an impression of my rib cage.

Today I got the same view with the same lighting, and it was very different. The muscles are back in earnest, there’s no sign of my rib cage which I’m fairly sure is still there, and the skin is as smooth as a baby’s bottom. (OK, so that’s a slight exaggeration. Slight exaggerations are allowed on blogs.)

erm... not quite, but going in the right direction

So there you have it. I’m still depressed, but being depressed with chest muscles is marginally better than being depressed without them.

Da Capo.

Went to the GP yesterday about the leg problem. More hospital investigations in the offing. Here we go again. Not happy.

Something I saw in Uttoxeter yesterday led me to wonder whether feelings of guilt count towards the repayment of Karmic debt. Must ask a Buddhist.

I need some fun.

On Needing to Cover Up.

Now that my good friend, the mirror, has persuaded me to feel embarrassed about being seen in public, I’ve decided I need a disguise. I thought about getting a Cousin Itt outfit, but felt that it might prove dangerous in a farming area for obvious reasons. I thought about getting a long cape and prosthetic fangs, but feared they might attract autograph hunters. I thought of getting a black Balaclava with eye and mouth holes and affecting a mincing walk, but decided that the attention of desperate women asking if they could be my wife now would be too much to handle.

I gave them all up and settled for sunglasses. I have a pair, you know. They’re blue. (They're also polarising so the glare shall not trouble me nor the water reflect a cruel world. That's what makes them posh.) The trouble is, I need a hat to go with them and none of the ones in my possession is suitable.

One is a woolly sort which makes me look like the guy who hangs around street corners because he was fired from his labouring job for being unable to handle a wheelbarrow.

One is a flat cap which makes me look like somebody pretending to be a county type even though I don’t have the matching tweed jacket.

One is a very old bush hat which makes me look like an Australian farmhand who hasn’t been paid for several years.

None of them goes with shades, so what does? I don’t know; that sort of thing lies well beyond my experience, not to mention my comfort zone. And since I have nobody who’s advice I might seek (and since I never take advice on principle anyway) suggestions would be welcome in writing.

In the meantime I will search diligently wherever inspiration might be found. But what do I do about the withering looks hurled in my direction by passing strangers and their dogs? Squirm, I suppose.

A Matter of Values.

I decided to lighten up a bit, so I thought I’d tell the story of my new poppy plant.

Back in the spring of 2016 I noticed that an oriental poppy had seeded itself close to an ancient one at the bottom of my garden. I knew it would get well smothered by other growth if I left it there, so I decided to move it even though I’d read that poppies don’t like being moved.

I kept plenty of earth around its roots and planted it in a clearer space at the top of the garden, and was disappointed to see it apparently die back to nothing very quickly. Fortunately I’d noticed that poppy leaves do die back very soon after flowering, so I left the little newbie in place. In the spring of 2017 a few shoots appeared, but nothing else. In the spring of 2018 it grew to a height of about a foot. This year it’s grown to twice that height and has its first flower bud. Do I take great delight in that? Yes I do, because the god of small things is usually the one to bring me cheer when I need it.

‘But a poppy plant is a minor matter,’ I hear you say.

No it isn’t. It’s a small matter, but not a minor one. There’s a difference. My idea of success is not about childishly threatening to destroy Iran if it doesn’t cease being anti-American, but rather about seeing new and colourful life take hold and prosper. And I heard recently that appreciating the value of small things is a sign of emotional maturity, so I’d say the current score is Trump 0 : JJ 1.

Me and the Mood and the Muse

I’m in one of those moods today where I feel suffocated by a sense of disappointment at the quality of my fellow human beings. The European Election results didn’t help because they demonstrated yet again that a war is building between the minority given to the principles of light, reason, compassion and inclusivity, and the majority convinced of the need to be selfish, bigoted, prejudiced, self-righteous and exclusive. The sight of an exultant Nigel Farage sent me plummeting, as did the phrase ‘success of the nationalist parties.’ I remember feeling the same way when I first read Trump’s small minded dictum America First. But I was buoyed on that occasion by a sense of relief that at least I don’t have to live in America. Last night’s results were much closer to home. (Do I have a home? I’m not sure that I do.)

And in such a mood I’m led to wonder why I write blog posts like the one I did last night – posts which are both intensely personal and necessarily enigmatic. The answer is simple as always: I’m just thinking aloud, and thinking aloud is an inevitable corollary of having nobody to talk to 99% of the time (I worked it out recently that it’s actually 99.25%.) And the reason I spend so much time alone is that I can’t climb back into the groove which western culture insists is the only proper way to live and the only one it is prepared to support. Walking in the groove is as much a psychological phenomenon as it is a practical and physical one. Once your mind has seen something, it can’t unsee it.

As for the blog, I’m sure my tendency to talk aloud is the reason it gets so few visitors. But it doesn’t take long to conclude that it really doesn’t matter because the infinite space outside the groove at least gives you the occasional glimpse of magic, even though we all know that magic is a delusion. The wage slave drivers cracking their whips in the groove say so, and they know they’re right.

A Choice of Black Days.

Since the clock in our venerable old church tower has now chimed the witching hour, I suppose I can make the post I mentioned a few days ago.

It’s 27^th May here in dear old Blighty, and 27^th May shall henceforth be know as Black Monday in this household. Well, it would be if only the days and their respective dates didn’t keep changing every year. Next year it will be Black Tuesday. ('Oh no it won’t,' I hear you shriek in glee, 'because next year will be a leap year. It will have to be Black Wednesday.' OK, you got me. Seems to me that whoever set up the western calendar must have been high on some concoction derived from a plant root found only in a 10ft square patch of unhallowed ground somewhere in the vicinity of the headwaters of the Orinoco, but I expect he’s dead now so there’s nothing we can do about it.)

But I digress. It’s 27^th May and I don’t like it. I suspect it even had something to do with the infernal racket rolling up the hill from the lower levels of the Shire last night, suffocating the kind of magic which only a mild and moth-laden spring evening can convey. But I suppose everyone is entitled to their choice of noise (or so I’m told.) And I suppose those of us with more refined sensibilities just have to put up with being forced against our will to listen to it. And since I also suspect that it was contrived to accompany a double celebration, I further suppose that the weight of evidence was on their side for once.

(This could so easily go into the post about living in the groove. It’s been rolling around my mind for some time now, but I won’t force that one on you. For now.)

And you haven’t a clue what I’m talking about, have you? Just as well. What value do I have left if I can’t be enigmatic while the world fades? And who knows, maybe the Dark Rider will take pity on me and offer me a pillion position before Black Wednesday stuffs my head with sawdust.

*  *  *

We lost Masters in tonight’s episode of House. That’s a shame; I liked Masters. I think I was supposed to.

Talking to Myself and Other Signs of Madness.

I hate the ageing process.

Why?

Why do you think? That guy in the mirror isn’t me. He’s not who I’m used to being. I want to be fit and strong again. I want to be able to run ten miles and lift heavy things and climb mountains and feed my addiction like I used to.

And what addiction would that be?

Never mind. I just want my young body back again, the one that had two kidneys and a spring in its step and didn’t make me feel embarrassed to be seen in public.

So you want be who you were thirty years ago?

Of course.

No, you don’t. Ageing is a trade-off. The body fades; that’s the loss. But you gain wisdom in compensation.

Ah, the old wisdom argument. So what, may I ask, is the value of wisdom?

You get to understand things better.

I know, that’s the problem. The more I understand things, the more I get depressed.

That’s just being negative. Perception is the whole of the life experience.

Plagiarism will get you nowhere. Go to sleep.

*  *  *

It is an ironic fact that the wiser you get, the less you’re sure you know. So is all this living stuff going somewhere or not? And I had a situation this morning which made me seriously suspect that my mind is fading along with my body. I was already depressed. (I always am in the morning, you know. It goes back to my childhood and I have no idea where it came from.) And it’s been an unusually busy week for me so now I’m tired and don’t want to write any more.

Except to say that House got married in tonight’s episode, just to piss Cuddy off because she’d dumped him two episodes earlier. When they returned to his apartment after the nuptials, his bride said:

‘I know this marriage is fake but I really do like you.’

‘I like you, too,’ said the good doctor with a heartening show of earnestness.

So then she began to manoeuvre into full consummation mode, and he said:

‘I can’t. I never sleep with married women. I’m going to bed; you take the couch.’

Oh for the opportunity.