Attractive.

Catching a train home on Saturday evening, I became mesmerised by the apparently random array of plant life growing over and around the barrier at the back of the platform.

Long grass interspersed with weeds curled lazily around the struts of the metal structure, and I stared intently at the arrangement for a good couple of minutes. My attention quickly wandered from the scene in front of me, however, and I introspected about the reason or reasons why I found the straggling, miserable greenery so compelling.

The answer lies in my mind's inability to spot a pattern; some principle of order that reigns over and above the chaotic feedback loop of nature. Such patterns do exist, but I only know of them because I've read about them - fractals, the golden ratio, for example. At the level of my own pathetic eyes, the only constant is the lack of a constant.

In western thought, the idea of ugliness implies precisely this lack of consistency. To negate this, agree upon a set of paramaters, and you can churn out objects of beauty indefinitely. To invert ugliness, you must pay homage to homogeneity.

The eye craves regularity, and so does the tongue. This much is given away in our spoken colloquialisms: You're out of order! Sort your head out! He needs to get back on the straight and narrow! Religious metaphors are the next step.

We have tenuously established, then, that abstract concepts like beauty and attraction are linked to concepts which can be resolved by the eye. If there is a structure and a rigidity at the atomic level, or on the basis of an equation or a mathematical theorem, it is likely to bypass my flimsy senses.

Yet our plant-life possessed something about it, some quality, that caused my eye to fix to it resolutely - but that quality was not westernised, typical beauty. (The terrible irony here of equating something beautiful with something typical! The fetching down of the extraordinary, and levelling it!)

What quality did it possess? I need to think about this, and report back at some point in the future. It is not yet clear to me why the antithesis of attraction should achieve that which it appears to negate, but it does....

Celebrity (II)

Scene: A couple sitting inside a bar. The music is low, low enough for them to be able to hear what the other is saying.

They are finding conversation difficult to come by (retrospectively, the bridge of their relationship had long since crumbled into its constituents) until the woman picks up a recent copy of Celeb! newspaper.

Woman: Have you read about that Paul Nogomet?

Man: What's he been doing this time - the bloody idiot?

W: Fighting with a photographer outside a nightclub, by the looks of things. The photographer's put a complaint in to the police. Ha ha!

M: They'll find him dead in a gutter one morning. Not that it makes any difference to me, of course. He can live or die for all I care.

W: I only wish I had his talent. If I had, I'd not waste it like him. Do you know I read that he once routed three sites in three hours? That's why they pay him £22,000 a year, I suppose!

M: Problem with earning that amount of money is that he's got more than he knows what to do with. So of course he's going to piss it away.

W: It's strange. I feel as though I know him. He's never out of the papers. I only wish Genericelectricretailer would sell tickets to watch him routing. I'd pay good money for that. Besides, when you work as hard as he does, you deserve to go out for a drink - or two.

M: You shouldn't become attached to these cretinous sods. They're no more real to you than the contents of a dream. The papers could write that Paul bloody Nogomet landed on earth in an alien craft, and you'd probably believe it.

W: You know, I remember when it was footballers and musicians whom we'd all watch chasing their tails. People like Nogga seem so much more accessible. There's actually not a great deal of distance between he and I.

M: Reg Lightwriter? What a stupid name for a photographer!

Collective.

I often survey the streets around here and feel that I don't belong - that the streets, slick with rainwater, are not me.

If these streets and I are not one, then I do not belong anywhere. Miserable buildings thrown together out of red bricks, skies roiling with an imminent deluge, and gobs of dog shit fastened to every pavement.

No, this town is an imposter: it is as if I have been scraped from the surface of the earth and splattered down elsewhere.

If I do not belong here, in this small town with its torn-up railway, ripped from the ground and flung afar as if by a giant, and its tiny post office, then the memories that were formed here, and the events that preceded them, do not belong here either.

The mistakes, pleasure and unrequited love experienced beneath the patch of sky which delimits the boundaries of 'here' could have been experienced anywhere else, at any other time.

Nothing is unique, or sacred. Memories are created as if on a conveyor belt, and implanted uniformly in human brains. This is why singers who sing about lost love make millions of pounds on occasion - because their words resonate the mass memory of experiencing lost love, and separate us inevitably from our money.

I belong nowhere, and my most cherished memories exist in the mass collective reflection of humanity itself. This is one of the traits of what it means to be a human being - I have a water
droplet of past events meandering in the sea of history, and my droplet is just like any other.

To know this and to accept it is to equate all sentient humans, each relinquishing their mirrory coagulation of memory into the limitless ocean.

Sick.

I only went to watch the cricket because South Africa were the visiting team.

England only had eight wickets in hand with two full days to play - I could see them hanging around until lunchtime, maybe half-an-hour after - so imminent defeat is as certain as it ever can be in a sporting contest.

The sun's gong thumped mercilessly over the city, sending all around scurrying for beer and suncream and wide-brimmed hats. Having negated the early-morning weather forecast, I had none of the aforementioned, and quickly began to suffer.

The condemned English batsmen, meanwhile, had mounted a strenuous defence. Only two more down by lunch, and those coming close to the end of the session. Two more down by tea when I, by now the colour of a stop light, decided to call it a day. I feared that if I remained in the furnace generated by the hottest day of the year, medical attention would be required.

Hours later, I lie in bed, trapped in a sweltering bubble of my own making. Arms inflated by the solar pump; head drumming remorselessly; neck cooked so severely that pulling a shirt over it resulted in tortured screams.

Paracetemol, fruit juice, donated aftersun.... all rebound pathetically from the heated wounds. Christ, I am sick! The sun is trapped beneath my skin, and beats in conjunction with my own heart. If the mad roar is extinguished, then I die with it, for it has overtaken me as music makes the dancer its subordinate.

I underestimated the high priest in his celestial pulpit, and he brought forth the might of the cosmos to burn away the arrogance and complacency that had been fattened by mankind.

Irrational.

In the minds of those who have been in some way damaged, effect does not necessarily follow cause in a smooth way.


Some event or events in the past caused predictability to break, and causes pair up with effects in novel combinations.


The result is an almost religious belief in the probability of unlikely events occurring, and no explanatory power when the expected effect does not follow the cause.


Some examples, in the form of 'if.... then....' statements, ones that have been known to flash through my mind on occasion:

• If I do not complete this workout in the gym (without pressing the stop button) then the woman I have an interest in will arbitrarily exit my life.
• If there are any plugs left in sockets anywhere in the house at the time I go to bed, then I shall die in a fire overnight. NB: The plug which sustains my alarm clock is exempt. It should be noted that plugs have an independent will, and can jump into sockets of their own volition - hence they must be repeatedly checked.

All such thoughts take the form if or if not x then.... some unwelcome fate will befall me, or someone close to me. The plugs example is from my teenage years, the first one is used as a motivating tool whilst on one of the machines which seemingly seeks to tear me apart on a twice or thrice weekly basis.

I am of the opinion that the second example is a classic case of burgeoning obsessive-compulsive disorder, somehow negated without the need for psychological assessment.

What happens should the 'if....' condition fail? If my weak leg gives way on the treadmill, and I have to pack up and come home without completing my session in the gym? Well, it has happened, and the woman I refer to in the 'then....' condition did not arbitrarily take leave.

This is why there's no explanatory power. The 'then....' condition always points to someone or something that I am unable to control, anyway, rendering the 'if....' part meaningless.

Taking the second bulleted example as our cue, there are four possible outcomes:

• No plugs are in sockets; I don't die in a fire.
• No plugs are in sockets; I die in a fire anyway.
• I accidentally leave a plug in a socket; I don't die in a fire.
• I accidentally leave a plug in a socket; I die in a fire.

I shrug my shoulders, vexed, when asked why outcomes 2 and 3 occurred. Such lack of an explanation is the reason that people invoke God or demons or spirits. I instead shrug my shoulders, for the atheist even lacks a sky-pixie to appeal to.

Tins.

One of the abiding memories of my childhood concerns my grandmother, and a very specific method of mischief that I would mete out to her on a regular basis.

Gran had cupboards stacked high with tinned food - everything from peaches to salmon to dog meat, all arrayed in neat piles in a cupboard close to ground level, where little hands plotting no end of misery could do their worst.

I would delightedly strip the labels from every tin I could reach, condemning the poor woman to a meal of custard with luncheon meat, or cherries in gravy.

'Do you realise what you did to me on Tuesday, love? Fruit cocktail, and the jelly that lines the inside of pork pies! Think of your poor old gran having to eat that!' Such revelations caused me to begin to cry - but with laughter.

Not once do I recall ever being admonished as I indulged her taste for combining food in unusual ways. I was instead confronted with a calm tolerance derived from a love which endures.

It was some 24 or 25 years ago when I discovered how fascinating a pastime it was to rob tinned food of its identity. My grandmother is still around, aged 87, and on her better days reminds me of the incidents I describe above.

I wish she could have more better days. My dominant emotion when I see her is: "If one person I can think of didn't deserve to be thus reduced, it is you."

On the occasions she recognises me (they correlate significantly with the occasions when she correctly takes the rainbow of prescribed pills) I keep the conversation light - you have no idea, gran, how upset I was when the cat woke me up at 5am the other morning, demanding breakfast! I oughtta make a pair of gloves out of him! Do you want to go racing down the corridor in your wheelchair? I can give you a push if you like, and see where you end up? She laughs, and the lady of 20 or more years ago is momentarily recovered.

You truly didn't deserve to be thus reduced. I can't even find the words - 'reduced' makes you sound like you're somehow a non-person - it's as flattering as the term 'invalid.' Another way of looking at it is that you are not reduced, but shifted - the world I inhabit is one you have grown tired of, and I can only expect you to return some of the time, and only on your terms.

The places you spend most of your time are alien and inacessible to me, but you can and do report back. You went to church four times on the same day last week, and also to the market, without so much as leaving your room. The church, apparently, was bloody awful, and you aren't going back there any time soon.

Nobody can invalidate the truth and complexity of those experiences. They are not the offspring of age, or illness - they are real, and we treat them as such. Tell me about the market? Was it busy? Did you buy anything nice? So it proceeds - broken pieces of experience rain down, and I listen intently. What a lousy church! You're probably better going to the one down the street next time....

Association.

I have been thinking about my ex-girlfriend a lot over the past couple of days.

There are two ways in which I can contemplate something - either actively, or inadvertently. When I think of something actively, it takes the form of a statement where I ascertain: "This is what we did," or "this is the part of the disagreement that we were unable to resolve."

Inadvertent contemplation is different. Like a dream, it takes its cue from clever associations that need to be worked out before their meaning can be fully derived.

A couple of facts need to be made apparent before I go on. The former partner to whom I refer first dropped into my life in May 2006. At that point she was living in Huddersfield, a town in northern England.
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It occurred to me a few hours ago that I'd not heard a particular piece of music for some time, a piece connected to the football club I support. It's not a problem, though - I know exactly where to go on the internet to find it.

I now direct you towards the following URL. Turn the sound down if you don't want to wake the neighbourhood!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnHHFWfpoYQ

The football match referred to in the above link took place in Huddersfield, in May 2006. At that point, my life revolved around the place - visiting my South African girl, and desperately trying to source tickets for the away section at the stadium.

This is inadvertent, or unthinking, thinking. My mind is for whatever reason directing itself back to May 2006, but it is not content to uncloak itself and produce a stream of statements to be ascertained. Instead, it pretends to divert itself from the process of conscious thought, only to complete the circularity with a reference to a two-year-old video on the internet.

Dreams.

There is a discontinuity that exists between the sleep-state and the waking state.

That is: a dream can appear to be real. It is as though the sequence of images are taking place not behind the eyelids of the sleeper, but in front. An analogy would be of a television programme breaking out of the screen, and the characters continuing their lives in your own home.

I speak of a discontinuity because, upon waking, I sometimes feel relief that I had 'only' been dreaming. No matter how realistic or terrible the images, I can no longer be pursued once my eyes snap open. Likewise, I can turn the television off, over, or leave it on, for there is a boundary that the people who live inside it cannot cross.

It is always the case that the inhabitants of the television can never cross their particular boundary. Is it not always strictly true, though, that dream-images cannot pass from their dimension into one more familiar. More succinctly, images, ideas or suggestions can pass, but their effects on the non-sleeping mind are short-lived, or subtle.
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I woke up on Friday morning convinced that I was screaming.

Certainly, in the dream that shook me from my torpor, I was screaming. Perhaps my mouth was open and nothing came out. I could hear myself, though - a loud emission of terror.

I had arranged it so that I could come out of my front door, take a couple of steps, and alight in an area of south London that I visited in April.

An acquaintance I have seen only fleetingly in the past decade or fifteen years accompanied me. Open the door in Yorkshire, step through it, and there's south London.

Despite this, an odd realisation struck us. Shit - it's a quarter to eleven! We have be in London for three at the very latest! If we don't get that next train, we'll never make it in time! The train then proceeded to pass through the front door, and arrive instantaneously at its destination.

All the while, the song Karma Chameleon played in the background.

I then woke up silently screaming. For a good five or ten seconds, the sleep-state persisted, tottering and fading away in such an alien environment. Hours later, I find myself whistling as the words 'you come and go....' reverberate through my mind.

Bridge.

I feel that a relationship is the yoking together of two people who had previously floated about independently.

Alternatively, it is the building of a bridge between the same two people. Neither individual has ownership of the bridge, and it is the task of both parties to prevent it from falling into disrepair, or from collapsing entirely.

Once it collapses, communication becomes impossible, and one of two outcomes occurs. The first is the realisation that we no longer have anything to talk about, resulting in immediate and extensive reparation to our bridge.

The second is the realisation that we need to talk - because we are aware that we are no longer feeling as we should - but when we try to enter dialogue, one person or the other is not listening. Dialogue is thus reduced to monologue. When I get better conversation from myself than I do from others, it's time to shed that other.

I bring to mind now the parents of an ex-girlfriend, one I was with some four or five years ago.

Their marriage had clocked up almost thirty years, and their relationship bridge had long since crumbled into its constituents. Conversation consisted of details of their respective working days, thereafter lulling into silence.

What, then, persists once silence dominates? Is it possible that a relationship can hang together on a series of non-verbal cues?

I imagine a situation where my partner finds me repellent, with the exception of one solitary gesture: say, the way I adjust my glasses when they fall down my nose. For my partner, that movement brings about a feeling of delight, passion, and love.

Can the weight of that delight, passion and love negate the loathing and pity apparent at all other times? I'll try to answer that question later....