It's
2.23pm on a bright and sunny Monday - and we all know what that means!
Thasright: it's the smiley happy Monday afternoon news...
1.
So
people are always, like, “why are you so death-obsessed, man?” - to which I
say, “it’s my age; it’s because I enjoy thinking about these things; it’s my
nature.” But if you think I’m bad, you should talk to my dad: he brings it up
at least every other time I see him. This week, he was going on about his
funeral.
“I
don’t give a shit what it’s like – no bloody religion – it’s just got to be as
cheap as possible. You can bury me in a cardboard box if you want. Or get
Martin from Keighley to build a flight case. Dig a hole in the woods and stick
it in there.”
“You
know what I think,” he says, getting all conspirational, like he’s about to
unleash one of his pearls of wisdom, “I think when the coffin goes behind the
curtain when they’re going to cremate you they take the body out and use it
again. They’re not going to burn a couple of grand’s worth of wood, are they?
Think about it. Bollocks to that.”
This
is a man, by the way, who firmly believes the effects of all drugs are
pretended – that people fake being high because it’s what’s expected of them,
and makes them look cool.
A
customer enters the shop and interrupts the conversation. He holds out his hand
to reveal a little piece of metal and asks if he can buy a replacement.
“I
don’t know,” says my dad, “what is it? I can’t bloody see it.”
“It’s
off a Floyd Rose trem,” he says.
My
dad bristles and blusters. “There’s only three people in this world should have
been executed: Hitler, Stalin, and Floyd bloody Rose. Why on Earth would you
want a Floyd Rose trem on your guitar? You should take it off and put something
bloody decent on instead.”
They’ll
say many things at me old man’s funeral. One thing they won’t say is: “he
wasn’t a character.”
2.
I
dreamed of California this morning: three scenes with three different groups of
friends. The first we were in an apartment just up the coast from LA; the
apartment was so close to the water, set up on rocks, that you had to keep the
windows closed, otherwise the waves would come in (I found that out the wrong
way). Second scene I was with two women and so excited I jumped on top of a bus
shelter; almost immediately a cop roared up in his blacked out future-wagon and
put some cuffs on me. I was distraught; all that effort to get there and then
blown it in a moment of careless outlandishness. And apparently it was worse
‘cos some Hispanic woman was claiming to have been injured by my jumping. But
they looked her over and she was all right and they let me go. Phew. Final
scene was just ambling along amongst a nice crowd, some musicians playing, a
couple of people I knew and some hugs.
Main
thing I remember thinking (in the dream) is, damn, I hadn’t got rid of all my
English possessions before leaving; and wasn’t that the whole point of going
back there?
3.
You
may wonder why I’m so hard on American cops. Then again, you may not; you may
know full well how extraordinarily rubbish they are, and how much better
policing is in other countries. It’s such a shame, you know, what with being
“number one” at pretty much everything else, that the boys in blue have to let
y’all down [some tic].
I
so wish I could find that clip of UK police pulling over a coach-load of
airport-bound cage-fighters, having received a tip off of drugs onboard. They
talked to the guys nicely. They said, listen boys, we don’t want to ruin your
weekend, play along and we’ll make sure you get your plane. The guys with the
white powder came forward. They received their orders to appear in court, and
were allowed back on the coach. One who dilly-dallied looked like he was going
to mess it up for everyone, so the cops said, the rest of you go on without
him, get yourselves checked-in, and we’ll give him a ride there when we’ve
finished with the paperwork. It was beautiful, man.
An
ex-pat UK friend of mine was once surprisingly defending the US cops and all
the killing they do. “They never know,” he says, “whether the guy they’re
dealing with is carrying a gun. Imagine what that does to your mindset.”
It’s
a decent point, and I guess goes some way to explaining things, but it’s not
just the killings, is it? It’s the whole mentality. I mean, it’s not fear of
death that gets them issuing good people $200 jay-walking tickets on deserted
streets at 2 in the morning. It’s not concern the safety of others that has
them pulling over suburban moms and dishing out $400 tickets for doing 36 in a
35mph zone (just, coincidentally, as budget time approaches).
Anyway,
I’ve gone on about that enough, I reckon…
4.
A friend says to me,
“One thing that’s struck me: it’s as though you thought America owed you
something, and you don’t seem to have that in the UK. You’re a different person
when you’re there to the one you are here, and I really think it’s to your
detriment.”
“What do you mean?” I
says.
“Well, I get the sense
that you expected everything to fall in your lap when you were over there –
and, in a lot of ways, it did. But you wanted it ALL. You didn’t put the effort
in. Yet you land here and suddenly you’re all hustle and bustle looking for
work and things to do and places to live, and that makes you happy; just
imagine how bonkers you’d be if you didn’t do that in Leeds. If you sat there
waiting for things to happen. If you stared at he city and expected it to
provide you with your needs. Think about it for a minute.”
I do. I think. And I
realise he’s right.
“There’s nothing here,
is there? How weird! The county of my birth – a place I’ve spent so many years
in – and yet there’s nothing here. No real friends – you know, friends that I
see on a regular basis – and nothing in the way of opportunity. And yet why do
I feel so much more content? Because I’m doing things? Because I’ve got my
routine and my busy-ness and never have to go more than 24 hours without having
something to do, and therefore not having to think too much?”
“You had too much time
on your hands in the States. You needed a job. The routine is a good thing, my
friend. A man goes too long without a reason to get out of bed, he’s bound to
go doolally.”
“And I guess,” I said,
“that, because I’d made all that effort to be there, I was wanting something
extraordinary, as though that’s what was required to make it all worthwhile.
But here – well, no effort – s’just living – and therefore nothing much
required either. If I spend the days frittered away in nothingness in Leeds I
don’t mind too much – but frittered days in the US felt like a dreadful waste
of time and life, and made me manic for something more.”
“’Perpetually
insatiable.’”
“And yet so easily
sated here. But not forever. The volcano’ll bubble at some point, I’m sure.”
“England’s always been
like that for you – I remember even going back fifteen years and how you’d say
being in Wakefield was like being one of those space probes that builds up
momentum by going round and round a planet until it slingshots out into space
at incredible speed.”
“Yes,” I say, “I get
that. And it was fun back then, in my carefree and adventurous youth. But now
it’s sort of terrifying. Where will it all lead? When will it end? It’s not
just the routine and having stuff to do that makes Leeds more tolerable, it’s
the comfort of knowing that everything’s taken care of. You know, healthcare
and all that. Being able to legally work – or support in the unlikely event
that I can’t.”
“Do you ever get
sick?”
“No.”
“Have you ever wanted
for money, or something that money can buy?”
“No.”
“So it’s just fear,
then? Of the unknown, of the future? Of something that may or may not happen,
but most certainly hasn’t happened, and there are no reasons to think that it
definitely will.”
“It could be fear –
but it could also be caution, or wisdom. There’s a pretty fine line between
them.”
He doesn’t say
anything to that. I have a think for a minute.
“But, yes,” I say, “I
am afraid. Afraid that I’ll end up like one of those sad, wandering hippies,
lost in space, all gaunt-eyed and should’ve settled down a long time ago, but
now it’s too late. It’s all very well being like that in your twenties and
thirties – but you meet those people in later years and…well, it’s nothing I
want to aspire to, let’s put it that way. What would be nice would be to have
an example of something to aim for; to see a vision of a man sixty years old
and think, that looks like a good place to be. Is that maybe what you’re
supposed to do when you’re forty? Start thinking about where you’d want to end
up for the last leg of your life? But I never meet those people. It’s been a
long time since I saw someone I felt like emulating.”
He breathes a big
breath at this. “I hear ya, man; I totally do. I feel exactly the same way. I
guess that’s when you’re beating your own path and creating your own future.
But it is scary, especially when you factor in all the pressures – and
temptations – of finance and material comfort and relationships and the simple
fact of needing to exist somewhere and do something for the next however many
decades.”
“Jesus went out into
the wilderness and thought, ‘man, what the hell am I doing? I could be
knuckling down; I could be comfortable; I could be using my magic powers for a
life of luxury and ease, living like a bona fide king. And instead I’m chucking
it away for an uncertain existence of poverty and adherence to this weird
unseen spiritual presence that pretty much no-one else experiences. I must be
mad; what should I do? What should I do?’”
“You’re not comparing
yourself to Jesus, are you?”
“Don’t be ridiculous;
it’s just a fitting analogy, that’s all. A common frame of reference.”
“A great example of
being in a position of choice.”
“Exactly. But I think
we’re getting a little off topic here; we were talking about an ordinary bloke
in Leeds, and you were making points about America.”
“That’s it, really,”
he says. “I’m just pointing out that it seems weird how you can be so content
to live such an empty life in your homeland, and yet go so crazy to live a
better life elsewhere. And wondering what the reasons are for that. Comfort,
yes. Familiarity, okay. A healthcare system that you never use but I guess must
provide a certain level of reassurance. And having routine, being occupied, not
thinking too much. All that’s part of it – but, more than that, the idea that
you wanted something from the US that you simply don’t expect of England, and
so you’re bound to feel more dissatisfied.”
“You know what I’ve
been thinking about?” I ask. “I’ve been thinking about how striking it is that
I’ve lived in Leeds all this time, and basically have no friends, and yet I can
land in somewhere like Oakland, knowing no-one, with no plan, no idea what I’m
doing, and within seven hours I’ve met three guys I feel completely on the same
page as, and guys I’d call ‘buddies’. How I can stand by the side of the road
in some small-town in California with my thumb out and get picked up by someone
I’ll then have an amazing few hours with, and whose life I’ll hopefully have
impacted for the better. How I can roll into a town like Grand Junction, again
knowing no-one, and be so embraced and welcomed, and be off hiking and soaking
in hot springs and having wonderful conversations and meeting all sorts of
people.”
“What do you think
that’s down to?”
“I dunno: probably
just the accent” (I joke).
“I think it’s
something more than that.”
“I guess,” I say, “and
that’s what concerns me. I dunno: all that nuttiness out there, and how I was
crying out ‘to be among sane people’. But now I’m among sane people…”
“Maybe you just have
to accept – ”
“That I’m a nutty one
too. That saneness isn’t for me. And it’s not sanity, anyway, this English
secularism and materialism: it’s adherence to a narrow band of life, and it
feels sane because it’s not interesting, not exciting, not pushing any limits.
Just ants scurrying around moving little bits of dirt.”
“Can I pull you up on
one thing?”
“Sure, man, you know
I’m always open to a challenge.”
“When you say
‘England’, what do you really mean?”
“Good point. I guess I
just mean my life in Leeds; I’ve good friends in London. People I have fun
with. Interesting conversations. There’s a bit of life down there.”
“But then you’ve lived
there a couple of times…”
“And, yeah, the noise
got to me. The ugliness of the city. And that I wanted more – to do the
Master’s; to go to Israel; to go back to the US and Mexico. And one more thing
too – that it was winter when I left. That it’s winter now. That I always get
antsy for change around January/February time, and have done lots of my moving
and leaving then.”
“Winter blues?”
“Possibly. Plus that
whole thing of how Christmas and New Year and my birthday gets me thinking about
what’s been, and what’s to come.”
“You left Grand
Junction last January, right?”
“Right. And the year
before that I was in Saskatoon, but wanted to leave. And the year before that I
was in Leeds, but making plans for Greece.”
“Why did you leave
Grand Junction?”
“You know, I’ve been
thinking about that. I mean, there was the whole ‘nun with a gun’ thing, and
the completion of my quest, but also there was this sense that, okay, I’m happy
here, I like it here, I could work and play a bit of soccer and maybe do some
refereeing and…”
“And it’d be just like
your life in Leeds.”
“Exactly. And so I
thought – rightly or wrongly – well, what’s the point in that? It didn’t feel
like progress. And it didn’t feel like the smartest choice given the things I
didn’t have there: legal opportunities to work; chances to develop a career;
sensible possibilities for romantic relationships and family (given my illegal
status) – which were all things I thought I wanted at the time. Plus, there was
also this mistaken assumption about my life in Leeds: that it would be what it
had been between 2011 and 2013, when I was very happy there, and had a lot
going on. But all my friends had moved to other places. And I was no longer at
the university, around which most of my activities revolved. Plus I guess I’d
changed too.”
“So you left Grand
Junction because you were happy there?”
I laugh. “Kind of,
yeah. But mostly, I suppose, because I was mistaken about certain things. And
because, having solved the mystery, I thought I was done. And because I wanted
to go to Boulder. And then, having been to Boulder, I wanted to go to LA. And
that’s when everything really fell apart…”
5.
I
said a few weeks back how striking it was that, after all my adventures in
North America, I’d come back to England and nothing had changed. The same
people sat at the same desks doing the same jobs. The same cups and saucers in
the same cupboards. But that wasn’t strictly true: some things had changed.
Number one, they now advertise sex toys on mainstream TV. And, number two, all
the women – well, 90% of them – were wearing tight-fitting black jeans with
slits across the knees. It was wildly surreal. It got me thinking, who started
all this? On what date? How had it spread? I mean, there must have been a point
where no-one was doing it; and then, suddenly, there appeared that first
‘Monkey X’.
6.
I’d
also said that, not only had nothing changed externally, nothing seemed to have
changed internally too. That was an even bigger shock – you want something to
show for 18-months of extreme living, right? But there I was, back in the same
job myself, and the only difference for all that time away an increase in age
and wrinkles. Thing is, whatever changes there were, it was more a case of deduction
rather than addition – not something gained, but something let go of.
The
whole thing reminded me of how a friend used to say: “Buddha said, ‘I have
gained nothing from my enlightenment – but there are many things I have lost.’”
7.
That
reminds me of something another friend once said: “Buddha said, ‘Buddhahood is
found in the Yoni.’” (‘Enlightenment is found in the vagina’ – that is, ‘have
sex’.)
I
thought, that doesn’t sound very Buddha. In fact, in the Vinaya Pitaka he is
reported as saying, “It would be better for a monk to put his penis in the
mouth of a viper than in a woman’s vagina.’” So how to explain the apparent
contradiction?
I
did a bit of research. I traced it back to various New Age blogs, where it
seems to have begun appearing a couple of years ago. A bit like Monkey X, I
guess one of them must have started it and the others blindly followed. For it
is, in fact, a saying from a dubious medieval Japanese cult whose practices
involved human skull rituals and sex with children.
Not
my cup of tea, thank you very much.
8.
If
you want to see what a viper-bitten penis looks like, by the way, I believe
there are some pictures online of what happened when an unfortunate Indian
farmer chose the wrong time to take a leak.
I
haven’t seen them myself. I think I’ve just about learned the lesson of
refraining from viewing that which can’t be unseen.
9.
What’s
your favourite urban myth debunked this year? Last year, mine were all about
the moon, and this year I think it was learning that people in the distant past
didn’t believe the Earth was flat. Weird, huh? I’m pretty sure most of us were
taught the whole, “sailors thought they’d fall off the edge of the world” thing
in school – but apparently it’s not true, and was an idea started in Victorian
times by a handful of authors and repeated until it became the prevailing view
of ‘them daft superstitious folk what lived in the past’.
More
Monkey X stuff. Interesting that that keeps cropping up. Almost makes me think
there might be something in the whole ‘Hundredth Monkey’ idea. But that story,
alas, is also another piece of creative myth-making and misinformation. Shame.
10.
I
got my eyes tested this week: quite a shock to be told to “read the top line”
and be confronted with a horrible blur of what I assume were letters. Damn
bloody laser eye surgery! I’ve half a mind to write and ask them for my money
back – in which case, I’d probably be quite happy with the whole thing.
Money,
money…
Anyways,
now that I’ve done that I suppose I can find out if I’m going blind or not:
probably go again in a few weeks and see what the score is then. Certainly, I
know there are street signs I could read a couple of months back that I can’t read
now. And the poor chaps I refereed last Wednesday… wink emoticon
11.
Funnily
enough, there were some things I missed about having bad eyesight after I’d had
them lasered, so at least there’s something to look forward to. I missed, for
example, the feeling I used to have of walking around in my own little bubble:
I couldn’t see much of anything that was more than ten feet away, and so I was
much less distracted. People would say they’d seen me and waved but I’d just
ignored them. Walking down the high street I was in ignorant bliss of all the
loud, bright signs telling me to buy stuff I definitely didn’t need.
I
also remember very clearly how distant clouds on the horizon looked exactly
like mountains, and how happy that made me, living in this mountainless land.
Plus, the time I saw this cute black kitten and how it gladdened my heart. What
a lovely feeling! To come across an unexpected kitten!
No
matter that, on closer inspection, it was actually a discarded plastic bag. The
feeling was real, right? And that’s what matters.
Every
cloud and all that…
12.
Facebook’s
a funny thing, isn’t it? That you can write, for example, “I think I’m going
blind” – and 99% percent of the ‘friends’ that read it respond by either
ignoring it or clicking ‘Like’.
(I’m
being wilfully misconstruesive, of course; I didn’t write only that, and I know
‘liking’ something doesn’t necessarily mean that the content is ‘liked’. But
still…)
Another
friend posts a sorry tale of some musical instruments stolen, and there are
plenty of ‘likes’ for that one too.
I
really must dig out the screenshot I took of a conversation where I wrote,
“What’s the story with so-and-so and this horrible, heartbreaking accident
they’ve had?” – and the mutual friend replied with a giant thumbs up.
13.
My
eye test didn’t cost anything; I can probably get some contact lenses for free
too. I love England, and all the great offers businesses have here. I love
Google, and being able to type in “free eye test” and a few hours later I’m sat
in the opticians chair with strange bits of metal strapped to my face. And I
love the NHS as well, and being able to walk in and get whatever check up I
fancy for nowt too; now I notice my bus ticket has an advertisement for colon
cancer screening on the back. Might as well get that done while I’m here; I’ve
long thought it might be the cause of my demise. I wonder how crappy a way to
go that is?
(No
pun intended – though neither was it deleted/edited once recognised.)
14.
And
there I go again, circling right back around to death. You just can’t get away
from the bloody thing! Let’s finish with a joke:
“You
know,” says the sage, “there’s no difference between living and dying.”
“Well
why don’t you die then?” says the cleverclogs.
“Because it wouldn’t make any difference.”
