The sky clears. The clouds sit, layered upon one another, hardly moving. They look thick with snow. I always enjoyed being snowed in. Trapped in the village, unable to get much further than the front door.
A log fire. The windows so thick with snow that it lit up the lounge. Why do you never realize how happy you are until the moment’s passed?
I don’t think there are people I like less than those who stand up for something, stating boldly that they would never sell out and then do. There is a singer who said this. Quoted often for saying that she was fed up of being looked at as an object and that it was her music that she wanted to be known for. The long hair was cut shorter and jeans and t-shirt were the norm. A year or two later she fronted a television advertisement for a ‘revolutionary’ lipstick and frolicked around in tight clothes, her shiny locks trailing behind her. I felt sorry.
I think dogs would make great air hostesses. They’d wheel the trolleys down the cabin aisle on their hind legs, snuffling all the goodies as they went along. I’m sorry madam (in my thoughts they obviously have the power of speech) we’ve run out of bagels, I’m ever so sorry sir, we seem to be all out of apple juice. What do we have, well, there are some lovely raw 108
mushrooms here, it’s been a busy flight and we’ve been doing a few trips to the cockpit, the captain keeps demanding bacon baguettes.
Unions. I’m not sure how to take them. Regularly in the news there are firefighters, nurses, teachers, the list goes on. Now I am not disputing they do a good job but surely their wage is enough to live on. They don’t live in poverty. I was surprised when one of the workers on strike complained that they only earned
£30,000 a year. At the time I was earning £8,500 a year. Yes, I was always broke, I still am but my definition of broke is not being able to afford to go out, not being able to afford food I really like and having to eat cheap stuff and cutting down on cigarettes. Now and again, I can’t afford the rent but I get by. I shouldn’t say that I’m poor because I’m not in the grand scheme of things. I don’t have to rummage in bins, I don’t have to walk fifteen miles for water which could give me a disease, I don’t have holes in my shoes or have to walk barefoot over rough terrain, I don’t have protruding ribs because I haven’t had a scrap of food for days, or fall ill regularly with little or no medical treatment, I don’t have to sell my body to provide for my family or live in a shack which gets flooded every time it rains. I am privileged. I don’t like the society in which I live but I can provide for myself easily. I have time to ponder over things. I have an education which enables me to read fantastic books, a television to watch the news and learn about the world and the tools to let me write what I am feeling.
Sure, the emergency services and likewise are necessary to our way of life. Yet what of the aid workers who work on a voluntary basis in the most extreme of conditions? I wonder what they must think. I don’t know really what to make of it although 109
there are severe undertones of something not being right.
Ask people who’ve traveled the world what they’ve seen. There is a difference between those who say pristine beaches, exquisite hotels and those who say amazing culture, great people. There is a huge divide.
I went to a Greek Island and every day we got in our little hire car and explored the island. We found some wonderful deserted beaches, tiny tavernas where we sat all afternoon talking to the owner. It was fantastic.
Yet every day when we returned to the apartment, the same people were still sat around the pool. In the evening, we’d go down to the harbour and have a drink and sample the different restaurants, making a few local friends along the way. We’d head back to the apartments and see the same people in the bar there, talking to the English owner. They did this all week. I think they only stepped out of the complex to go over the road to the local mini-market to buy Carlsberg beer and Walkers crisps.
There is a similar breed, although this time, one with lots of money to languish. Folk who spend £5000
each on the flight alone to travel first class for a few hours, to be waited on to enhance their feelings of grandeur. They step off their flight into a limousine which carries them comfortably to their hotel down the roads which are most amiable. There they step out of the car to be met with a representative of the hotel, maybe even dancers and a welcome cocktail. Up to their glorious room which is far far bigger than necessary and usually equipped with dvd player, well stocked bar area, a balcony as big as a lounge and various jacuzzi features, often a lounge and even a dining area if they can’t be arsed to go down in the extremely effective lift to one of the six a la carte 110
restaurants. Outside, they lounge on the beach or by the pool under their private gazebo and spend the evenings drinking gin and tonic in the piano bar. Can these people class themselves of having seen the world? Do they even know that beyond the hotel grounds lies a very different way of life? Poverty and hunger may be lurking around the corner but as long as they are shielded from it, as long as they don’t see it, it doesn’t exist. I’m not saying people shouldn’t go on holiday, I just think it can be taken too far but I guess as long as people have too much money at their disposal with no useful way of using it then so be it.
I want to go in a spaceship. I’m not kidding, I truly do. I dream about going into space. Seeing the Earth from a great distance. Seeing what’s out there with my own eyes. Dwarf stars, gas clouds, the planets I know of and then onto those I’ve never imagined. I believe in Alien life. The statistics are phenomenal now we are getting some idea of just how huge the universe is and still expanding or so it seems. That is unless, as I mentioned earlier, the inward pull has started sending us all back to our demise when the crunch occurs and everything falls into a dense black hole as big as a ball-bearing. All hearsay. Theories never tested, of course, how could you? There simply must be life elsewhere, what kind of life has been the focus of much debate, from small amoebic lifeforms to technological super-races. Who knows. It would be nice to find out though wouldn’t it?
The space program is something to be admired. I was upset when the Pathfinder mission to Mars failed at the last hurdle. I feel it such a shame that government money is continually wasted and that the exploration of space is right at the back of the queue. When was 111
the last time a man stood on the moon? Why did it all stop. Funding is why. No, we’re in a position where even the space shuttles that are sent up to assist with the building of the International Space Station are so old that they run the risk of causing disaster, which happened not long ago. People with far too much money on their hands should consider funding such things. I’m sure some of them do but a lot more could delve down into their abundant bank accounts I’m sure. I think exploration of any area is fascinating, whether it be the depths of the oceans or the intimidating blackness of space. I don’t know why I put that in, I don’t find space intimidating at all, in fact it fills me with a sense of freedom, feeling that we are not all that there is in the Universe makes me smile a lot. Not many things do but that is one of them. It’s just strange to think that after such a surge of technology and scientific expansion that some things have more or less come to a halt. After the moon landings, we could have gone on to explore the other planets, we should be able to use the moon as a launch for exploratory craft. I’m doubtful that this will happen anytime soon. I hope in my lifetime, who knows but hey, we’ve got enough funding to put missiles in orbit in case we need to blow each others brains out in a horrible fucking mess. If any beings are tracking our progression, what must they see?
Canal boats are lovely. Little fishing boats are also lovely. I could live my life on a boat. Maybe. Dogs would enjoy living on a boat, especially if it was a country with warm weather. We could all relax, swim and sunbathe on the deck, moving to a new place whenever the mood took us.
The weather is doing unusual things at the moment.
Blue skies are followed by thunder and giant hale.
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Snow drifts cripple roads yet a short time later, there is no trace. Our climate is changing. It was a slow transition at first but I feel it speeding up. The effects are being felt everywhere. British summers hotter, winters wetter. Stuff and nonsense Eve, stuff and nonsense. I’m sorry, I was only saying.