What I Did On My Summer Holiday:

‘The last man nearly ruined this place/he didn’t know what to do with it/if you think this country’s bad off now/just wait till I get through with it’

-        From ‘Duck Soup’

Hello!  And sorry it’s been so long since the last post (six months to be precise).  Let me fill you in on what’s been happening. 

I’ve entered three short story competitions.  I’m still in one.  One proved extremely problematic, as the entry criteria stipulated ‘no sex, violence or bad language’.  Which was a bit of a stretch for me; something akin to asking Van Gogh to paint without yellow.  I’m really proud of them in any case, and they will form a post-Brexit collection of short stories, called ‘Leaving’.

I’ve rediscovered reading.  I couldn’t read at all last year, due to depression.  This year, so far I’ve read 33 books. Mainly old favourites, but I’ve had long afternoons, sitting in the latent Devon heat, occasionally with a Lapford Sling (a gin cocktail of my own invention).  Music is coming back slowly, but I’ve heard some great episodes of Desert Island Discs.  

Oh, Liverpool won the Champions League.  In a thrilling – yet tense – encounter with a spirited, but blunt-edged Spurs in Madrid.  I felt very Scouse and wished I was up in Liverpool.  We also missed out on the league by one point and I had a further reminder that Noel Gallagher is a graceless prick; who wouldn’t have a career without at least two Liverpool bands. 

Oh and Boris Johnson became Prime Minister.  Elected by 0.1% of the population, including teenagers. 

Theresa May subsumed her own opinions, to take power. She was always completely lacking in the necessary skills (judgement, empathy, compassion) to succeed.  Now, we have this buffoon-in-chief, implementing a PR strategy known as ‘unlimited rice pudding’.  He’s not played ‘dead cat’ yet, which is Trump’s favourite weapon. And the sad thing is: this was always going to happen.

I predicted all of this (he says, sagely) in an article called The Second War in May 2015.  I also called for a ‘radical socialist alternative’.  And we got Jeremy Corbyn. Now: I like Jeremy Corbyn.  I think he’s a decent man.  I joined The Labour Party.  I attended a Corbyn rally.  But when I saw Labour’s strategy on Brexit was ‘do nothing and then actively assist a right-wing government’, I decided enough was enough.  I resigned, privately not publically and despaired about the state of the country.  I worried about what was next.

But no, I’m going to be optimistic.  Not about Brexit, which will be an unmitigated disaster.  But isn’t it nice that The Tory Party has made the last five years about themselves? And now the next three generations? We are in the Brexit Endgame and The Avengers aren’t flying to the rescue.  But we have every reason to be keep the faith, some faith. 

Art reflects the times, as much as the human condition.  I recently re-watched The Entertainer. It’s bitter, bleak.  But then again, it’s a John Osbourne play.  Archie Rice believes in his country, more than he believes in himself.  His country gives him the gift of the corpse of his youngest son. A new version tours in the Autumn.  Next year, An Inspector Calls is touring.  A young girl dies and everyone is responsible.  It seems that art is giving us little reminders that the darkest times are about to fall and it is now time to wake up. 

I also recently re-watched the Marx Brothers in Duck Soup.  It’s Brexit in a nutshell, though in America it’s been seen as a metaphor for Trump.  If you’ve not seen it, the inept shyster Rufus T Firefly takes control of the almost-bankrupt country of Freedonia and declares war on neighbouring Sylvania. It ends in chaos.  Sounds familiar?

And I am warning you now, again: times will get dark.  We all need to reach out to the person next to us, go on a march, and donate to a foodbank… whatever.  Because ultimately Trump, Johnson and Brexit will fail; due to their own greed and their own stupidity.  To quote Bette Midler, ‘When Trump says something’s boring, it means he can’t eat it, or he can’t fuck it’. 

As someone once said, there is no alternative. Or maybe there is.  On our Summer Holiday in the Basque country, we visited the town of Sitges; which on road signs, describes itself as ‘Socialist, Feminist, Green And Anti-Fascist’.  Maybe we should all move there.  Or: we can stay here, with a positive passionate, but not Panglossian state of mind.

No circus, no Summer is forever. 

Crushes:

‘My kind of work is very intense.  The trouble with me; is that I completely fling myself into it.  I get giddy.  I get terrible crushes on jobs’

-        Maxine Peake. 

Today is St Valentine’s Day, when we officially celebrate the beloved in our lives.  Or maybe: we celebrate the possibility of those who may potentially become our beloved.  As a severely lapsed Catholic, I know it is unofficially a Saints Day, but not a Holy Day Of Obligation.  So, there is no potential responsibility for me to avoid meat.  Or have a crucifix of ashes on an ever receding forehead. 

As you may or may not know; St Valentine was executed by Claudius II, for marrying Christian couples in 496AD.  As with most of Catholicism; there is more than a hint of sleight of hand in what established people call; ‘the facts’.  He may not have existed at all.  There could be several Roman wedding planners.  But there he is, the patron saint of married/engaged couples.  And epilepsy. And Beekeeping.  And, if you’re completely cynical about the whole process: licenced harassment of someone you’d quite like to share a coffee with. 

Ah, a crush doesn’t quite cover it; does it?  It can go one of two ways: either, a potential car crash.  Or: A potential dangle; at the end of another person’s whim.  My first real crush was a girl in Sixth Form.  Encouraged and prodded by several of my so-called friends, I gave this person a Valentine’s Card.  Not knowing, of course that this was all part of a ‘hilarious’ prank.  For the remaining eighteen months of our A Levels, we never exchanged pleasantries.  I mean now as a real boy; rather than a fat teenage puppet; I understand that I had absolutely no chance.  The odds were roughly akin to; let’s say Jordan Pickford winning a juggling contest.  Or Theresa May fessing up that Brexit, was due to her fancying a chance at being Prime Minister. 

To paraphrase Emily Dickinson, if hope is ‘the thing with feathers’; stupidity is the fat boy with a Valentine. 

Fast forward to the halcyon days of ‘2013’.  A golden age, not of jet packs and lunar colonies.  But of trips to Manchester for journalism workshops with Jay Rayner.  Moving into a flat, on the trendy/damp side of Liverpool.  Having a Canadian Twitter crush, which I followed and then she followed me.  From this point on, follows a whole cavalcade of messages, emails, photos.  About six months later, I realised I was just the proverbial ‘bit of fun’; whilst something was rotten in the state of Quebec.

We stayed friends, but I was already feeling like the fat kid with a cheap card.   One day, the contact ceased.  Three months whizzed by.  Still nothing.  I did an extensive period of ghosting across every channel of social media.  On reflection, I realised I’d been taken for the proverbial sucker.  She emailed me (which I’d arranged to land in the Trash), explaining the reasons why and, told me that most empty of platitudes ‘that the person who I ended up with would be very lucky’.

I know.  Makes the heart sing and the flesh cringe at the same time; doesn’t it?#

They are funny things, crushes. The weird thing is, I still have them.  The names have been changed to protect the innocent.  I mean, I am friends with some of these people.  Time was, in my mid–twenties I’d have a crush on children’s/yoof TV presenters.  I mean, that is a weird one, isn’t it?  Both are designed for people who shouldn’t be watching TV in the first place; let alone have romantic inclinations. 

Now: it’s British Oscar Winning Actress.  I’ll watch anything she’s in, even if she does make the odd duffer.  Or: French Oscar Winning Actress.  A few years ago, she was highly praised for appearing in a dull/worthy film.  I found this film the Belgian equivalent of someone crying into a hanky.  But everytime she appeared, I thought: ‘there’s my crush’.

Regular readers will know that I’m a socialist/menace to society.  I also have political crushes.  Not just people that I agree with politically.  But also, people I find attractive.  In this bracket, Mancunian Actress. She’s extremely underrated, but I also find her attractive for her left-wing views; even though she’s not my type.  It’s a weird one that and I have several political crushes. The fun we could have, discussing the dismantling of capitalism.

What happens if you meet these people?  I worked in a low-paid call centre job for nine years.  In between being sworn at/accused of being the root cause of all that is wrong in society… occasionally, a celebrity called in.  Some people were really nice.  Daytime TV Quiz Show Host: lovely man.  1980’s Scouse DJ/Crush: exceptionally rude. 

Of course, once you meet your crush; there is the endless, burning, unspoken question.  Do I want to spend time with this person?  Is this someone I can share my dreams/ a living space with this person?  What is the potential of me having an argument over directions on a long car journey/the right department in Ikea? 

My wife is that person.  We met when I made a lame subtweet about Holby City, a programme I am now as emotionally invested in as her.  She, in her infinite wisdom has taught what real love is all about: Consensual.  Supportive.  The platinum level of friendship, with an immortality bolt-on.  We’ve been through as much bad times as we have good.  The good times, get better with time.  The bad times, fade away with as much an application of the same thing. 

A crush, to paraphrase Byron is friendship without the wings.  Love is a mystifying, delicious, scary, dizzying force. Be wary of your crushes, today and always.  But if you decide to take the chance and it works… you have found the rarest, most purest thing in this world. 

Why not give it a go? You have nothing to lose and conversely, much to gain.

Change:

Promise me you'll always remember: You're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.

-AA Milne

Retox.  Detox.  Repeat ad infinitum. 

So, I came through the festive season relatively unscathed.  I had the proverbial ‘good Christmas’, which Scouse readers will know is a euphemism for ‘you fat bastard’.  It had gotten to the point where if I had one more Celebration, I could have joined Kool And The Gang.  My mental health, after several counselling sessions was slowly improving.  The physical health was not being dragged along in its slipstream.

Therefore, something had to give.  I saw a picture of myself, on that great leveller Facebook.  I’m playing video games with my stepson.  I’m wearing an Arran sweater, and I look like a fat fisherman, mystified by this little box of delights.  I therefore decided that, something had to give. 

The mental health is slowly recovering.  And sometimes, this new sense of clarity is a struggle.  Sometimes, it’s easy.  I’m starting each day with stretching and breathing exercises. It makes my mind settle; birdlike in the tree of my soul.  I also do this before I start writing.  I’ve always seen this as a ritualistic process, maybe this is another iteration of the same thing, but it seems to get results.  I recognise an honesty in my writing, that I didn’t have five years ago.

I’m still walking, but going in a different direction.  Rather than downhill, towards the lurid lights and fleshpots of what most people call ‘the garage’.  But uphill, with the sheep and cattle wondering who the Scouser in the Star Wars hat and Liverpool FC gloves is.  The farm animals are the only thing out there; the valley dips and settles itself into the land.  The walks are longer, quieter, more reflective.  Occasionally, I stop to let the hourly bus pass me by.  More often, I pull myself into the bushes; as someone flies past – driving like Ed Sheeran, ninety miles an hour down country lanes.

 

I’ll stop at the signpost that points back to the village; or to the nearest market town of Tiverton.  It all helps with the weight loss, let alone the mental de-cluttering.

As readers will now, I am a stepfather to a ten year old boy.  Who never stops talking, never stops moving, never stops eating.  I have to take him to play football once a week, running around the long grass and pot holes, of what is laughably called ‘ the village park’ is much easier.  I’m still, eagerly awaiting the call from Jürgen Klopp, telling me that Mo Salah is injured.  Can I get up to Liverpool this afternoon? 

Boom. 

My boy is also growing up to be a thrillseeker.  He went zip wiring a few months ago and Papa had to come with him.  Now, that I am much lighter I am genuinely looking forward to the experience.  He’s also planning our trip to the one at The Eden Project, where you fly across the bio domes.  As he gets older, I have a feeling he’s going to be an extreme sports nutter, throwing himself out of planes listening to Soundgarden.  Maybe, I’ll join him.  Maybe, I’ll join him. 

I’ve fallen in love with books again.  I’m actually greedy for them, fascinated by them, spending in general a fortnight over them, dealing with deep, crisp, even prose. And then I want the next one.  I recently finished (and heartily recommend) Anthony Beevor’s book on Arnhem.  I’m going to start Detroit ‘67 by Stuart Cosgrove next, which looks an equally weighty, well-researched, luxuriant read.

That’s not to say, I’m going to read everything or experience everything to feel something.  I’ve taken a load of books and DVD’s to the charity shop.  It was a detox of negativity, the darkest books imaginable; the most harrowing films I had.    I don’t need to watch It’s A Wonderful Life for the umpteenth time, to make myself feel better.  I also did a digital detox, deleting the last four episodes of S2 of The Handmaid’s Tale I hadn’t seen from the TV box.  I recognise its craft, but at the same time what is going on is much darker, much more relevant, and more important.

If you look at this way: I live in a country, where my leader is an opportunist.  Her Plan A was shite; Plan B was an even shittier version of Plan A.  I’m seeing more RAF plans flying low, presumably practising for food drops.  Over in America, we have a toddler in fake tan, who has unleashed several kinds of hatred upon the world.  What’s going on in Gilead is a little less important. 

So, it’s a symbiotic process, making the mind and body a little better.  It’s the same process everyone goes through, at this time of the year.  Everyone in the universe, even those in distant, alien civilisations, light years away; wakes up on New Year’s Day and goes ‘What the fuck?’ I’m not a lifestyle guru.  I’m not Marie Kordo, who recently advocated getting rid of books that you’ve read.  In a book.  I’m not saying follow me.  I’m suspicious of people who need followers.  I’m just saying, in the words of a great Indian philosopher: ‘Is this the real life?  Is this just fantasy?’  If you want 2019, to be a year in which you make changes, change the world, change a habit… anything is possible.

Radio:

‘TV gives everyone an image, but radio gives birth to a million images in a million brains;

-        Peggy Noonan

If I can remember my first radio, it was among my late grandma’s possessions.  It was a weird beast, a mix of red leather and battered chrome.  On reflection now, it resembles the kind of thing that could be bought from a steampunk branch of Ann Summers.  It certainly gave me pleasure in bed, anyway.   I used to lay there, listening to late night Radio City, surreptitously beyond my bedtime. 

Radio City, was a glamourous name for the local station based in a dingy Liverpool backstreet.  It’s owned by the multimedia monster that is Bauer.  Its home now is what used to be St John’s Beacon, a Liverpool landmark and like all Bauer stations; playing Taylor Swift twelve times a day.  Back in the late 1970’s, it featured Alan Bleasdale doing a whole show as his creation; Franny Scully.  Social satire, with pop music in-between. 

It was followed by Keith Chegwin, so maybe nostalgia isn’t what it used to be.

Radio, is a reflection of personality.  I moved onto wunnerful Radio One, soon enough.  To my shame, I enjoyed the laddish bollocks of Chris Evans/Moyles.  Perhaps the two were interchangeable, like a Lego figure, where the head can be removed at the neck and what I can now recognise as men, behaving like teenage pricks and getting paid for it.  Your taste in all things, from religion to radio evolves as you get older.  Peel was always there.  Urbane, laconic and playing music that ranged from the Damascene; to the wildly uncommercial. 

Now, a quick clarification: I’m not one of these people who claim to have listened to Peel every night.  I don’t believe anyone actually did.  When I did, it was a metaphysical sound of someone wilfully setting their own boundaries; inviting us to the edge of what is sonically possible – let alone acceptable.  He continued this one week when he sat in for Jakki Brambles (again, ask Alexa); terrifying the populace by playing The Fall(uh) during daylight hours and taking off Chris Issak (Alexa, why did Chris Issak get a record deal?) midway through a plaintive/solipsistic ballad called Can’t Do A Thing (To Stop Me).

Maybe, radio is all down to personality.  Maybe you have to listen to something that suits your personality, reflects back your very soul.  Maybe that’s why I listen to 6Music so much, since I discovered it in the dim and distant past (or ‘2005’, as historians now call it), it’s been my go-to station. I’m a critical listener though.  I don’t like everything they play: there’s far too much Shenzhen Northern Soul and records that are both mentally and tonally stuck in 1984. I also find Mary Anne Hobbs massively pretentious.  Let’s see how her predilection for telling us about the sun rising over Salford Quays plays out mid-mornings. 

The converse is the grumpy wit of Shaun Keavney, now shifted from sunrise to lunchtime.  And there is that thread of DNA to Peel in Tom Ravenscroft.  He’s just as obstinate as his Dad, displaying the grit and steel of the Liverpool midfielder he’s named after.  Maybe as you get older, you develop your own taste, filtered through the tongues and speech of those around you.  You sort of notice the common threads of radio, the same nifty feature idea that everyone else had.  As we travel the country a lot, I can tell you that originality is in short supply.

For instance, everyone does a local radio phone-in.  That safety valve for the mentally distressed/Daily Mail readers.  They don’t incite debate or good radio; they just raise my blood pressure.  Particularly those with an hourly theme for calls.  We heard a BBC Somerset Phone-in where the theme was ‘If a vegetable was hidden under your mattress, would you know what it was?’  No, I’m not making this up.  See also: The Golden Hour.  Radio and TV signals travel into space.  I guarantee you in a star swept, dark corner of the galaxy; an alien civilisation can guess the year where these records were hits. 

Then again, Popmaster is the best quiz on the radio.  I also used to love Brain Of Devon (a crossword on the radio) on BBC Radio Devon.  I recently found out it has came to an end and I mourn its passing.  It’s replacement (yet to be announced at the time of writing), won’t be as good. I guarantee you.   

I have the radio on constantly, whether it’s on a bus, writing this blog  or doing the dishes.  It’s a constant friend and like a constant friend, it has an alternating current of joy/annoyance.  I love football, but hate listening to on the radio.  It’s one person’s opinions, spread thinly for ninety minutes, the mispronunciation of player names and a poor substitute for being there/watching it on telly.  It may well have been the origin of the phrase ‘back to square one’;  but it remains one of the things that boil my piss, to use a great Scouse phrase. 

How I listen to it, will change.  What I listen to… is never fixed in stone.  But the weird beast is still there, singing its siren songs.  Informing, educating and entertaining.  Turn it on. Now. You might learn something; you might hear yourself reflected back in a way you never knew.    

John:

‘It is important to feel the anger without judging it, without attempting to find meaning in it. It may take many forms: anger at the health-care system, at life, at your loved one for leaving. Life is unfair. Death is unfair. Anger is a natural reaction to the unfairness of loss’

Elizabeth Kubler-Ross

We were always the bookends of the family. I was always the youngest child: precious, indulged and protected by some kind of angel.  You were always the wayward one: always off doing something that was, in your own mind cool; but to the rest of us an ill-advised venture. 

I idolised you.  I don’t know whether you ever knew that, I think you did, in some deep, unfathomable way.  Our Mum worked shifts, weighing and checking boil-in-the-bag food.  You brought me up, got me up for school, and cooked my dinner when I came home at midday.  It’s because of you I don’t like tomato ketchup, as you used it to thicken tins of beans.  But no matter, you were a reliable presence in a mustard jumper and gray sweat pants. 

It was when I was a teenager when you became a more glamourous, exotic presence.  It wasn’t the fact that you had a girlfriend (your second, I believe).  It was the fact that you began writing for a local newspaper.  This led to you writing for the NME, whipping an acerbic tongue across the fragile dreams of indie bands.   You bought a stereo to review albums and this led into djaying.  I was attempting to revise for my A Levels; which I failed miserably with a backdrop of old school hip-hop coming from your bedroom.  It’s hard to understand the complexities of Bismarck’s foreign policy; when all you can hear from the bedroom next door is Biz Markie.

 

I became a writer myself, progressing up from the local rag to section editor of a local arts mag.  Your were progressing to bigger to better things; not just as a journalist but as a DJ.  You were part of the divine madness of The Hacienda, amongst other places.  I was coming out of writing and becoming more interested in being a teacher and a performance poet.  Still massively interested in music though.  In a way that was that little neural link that kept firing between us. I can remember my Mum and Dad going out to the parish club on a Saturday.  It was here, I heard stuff like Yes and ELP: although prog isn’t quite my bag, I was interested.  I also heard stuff with eloquence, intelligence and wit; such as Steely Dan and Joni Mitchell.  Later on, old school hip hop, but things like The Smiths and Prefab Sprout.  I also think you were one of the first people to write about Half Man Half Biscuit. 

You moved to Manchester, acquired a succession of ever more exotic girlfriends.  An American singer, tall, black, sassy: like a friendly version of Grace Jones.  A tiny Geordie, who worked in the trendiest record shop in Manchester (and supplied me with cheap CD’s),.    What’s not to love?  You visited us, occasionally. Quarterly, usually.  We talked about our lives, confessing our thoughts and sharing music to tea and biscuits.  I visited you, occasionally.  Usually on a six monthly basis.  I like Manchester and I had vague, unformed, plans to move there, once.  It never came to pass.  I like it, but it’s busy, wired like a teenager on coffee.  And anyway, I couldn’t afford the suburbs. 

You visited us every Christmas Day.  The day usually panned out in a familiar, annual fashion.  Mum cooked Christmas Dinner, which would be boiled into oblivion.  You generally rang about half twelve, having slept in after a heavy evening of drinking/djaying.  We usually saw you about two, just as Dad was getting pissed off and was deciding to sit down to dinner on his own.  We swapped pressies and talked, swapping secrets.  I felt an awful sense of loss when you left, but I always knew I would be seeing you again in the Spring.  Always knew. 

The last time we saw you, was Christmas Day, 2004.  The day passed, pretty much as it would do any Christmas.  A few small changes: you acquired both an iPod and an MacBook.  My musical suggestions went straight into waveforms.  You were able to rip me a CD, there and then; rather than give me a mixtape.

Oh brave new world, that hath such people in it.  

I listened to it, walking to work on a dark, cold, icy morning a few days later.  I didn’t know then, that it would be the last time I would physically see you.

I could and have gone over that day in microscopic detail a thousand times.  I cannot recall a word, a phrase, a look, a concept that would have offended you.  We parted as friends, with a hug and masculine expressions of love.    You haven’t contacted us, though we have tried to contact you.  Phone calls, letters and invitations go unanswered, into some sort of nameless, wordless void.  During that time, I have had seven house moves, three serious relationships and one marriage.  Have you a concept or inkling of the damage that causes a missing piece in a family machine?  The empty place at the table?  The extra, unfilled teacup?   

There are rumours, from my brothers about what has happened to you.  I’d rather hear it from your own mouth.  I’d listen, I wouldn’t judge.  Whatever it is, it’s not a problem.  However, this open door swings both ways.  Fourteen years is a long time to be absent.  You might have missed a chance and the door may never swing open again. 

But you’re my brother.  I think of you every day in some way, but Christmas most of all.  My hand is open, but the choice to take it is yours. 

Oh, and by the way: Merry Christmas. 

Blackberries:

‘So it is with blackberries. If you pull too hard, you may get the berry but you will lose the sweetness of it. On the other hand, if you leave it, it may be gone the next time you come by. Each person must find this point of equilibrium for himself’

-        Robert |Finch 

Black Pool.  Black Lake.  Black River.  Blackberries.

So, the inevitable happened.  I let three things flow into one thing and then it completely overwhelms me.  Firstly, the loss of a part time job at the beginning of this year.  Then the death of my Mother in law.  And then the subsequent fallout of trying to look after two grieving people’s emotions; whilst trying to avoid the radioactive dust of my own.

I know, heady cocktail of emotion isn’t it? 

This is not going to be a blog post with a small moment of triumph at the end of it.  I am still in some form of recovery, finally overcoming suicidal thoughts and treating the loss of possessions – from a gnome to a mobile phone – as some kind of major disaster.  I am in some kind of therapy, which I understand to be some form of CBT. It’s not the Rogerian therapy I was hoping for, but when you’re drowning, you’ll throw yourself into the nearest boat, regardless of the flag. 

However, sometimes the answer to your illness is at the end of your own fingertip.  Too much pressure will destroy it, but the lightest pressure will pluck it.  I am, of course talking about blackberry picking. 

There have been a lot of books in the last few years, which deal directly or indirectly about depression.  I’d recommend the lyrical brilliance of Helen MacDonald’s H Is For Hawk.  The bucolic ache of The Outrun by Amy Liptrot.  On a more practical basis, Saved By Cake by Marian Keyes is a cookery book, written out of a severe portion of the blues.

But no, blackberries.  In response to the impending facepalm of Brexit and the chance to eat healthier; we’ve been making our own chutneys and jams.  Like everything else in our relationship, it was a collobrative process.  These mainly took place in the late Summer, early Autumn days when you could still get away with wearing a t-shirt and a pair of trackies.  I go out, with an assortment of old ice cream tubs in my backpack.  Sometimes I would take my iPod, sometimes not.  This generally depends on the location.  I love Shaun Keavney, but I have no desire to get hit by a car; whilst I’m standing on an A Road, looking for blackberries. 

I go out for hours, sometimes to the extent that my wife would wo nder where I was.  I’d literally work my way through the village, down the backlanes and into the park.  Back up again, around the garage (always looking in for reduced food) and up the hill, across the railway bridge.  I’d come home, drenched in sweat, hands like a hangman.  But feeling relieved that I’d felt something, achieved something.  At this point in the system of the down, feeling a spark was just as good as the rumble of the engine.

It’s a sensory process, picking blackberries.  If it’s something you ever plan on doing, I would advise you to wear gloves.  This means you can test the ripeness of the fruit, but also means you can become adept at moving the thorny branches out of the way.  Watch out for spiders.  They don’t really bother me, but they will be there.  Sometimes these will accompany you home.  Washing one days picking, I saw at least three spiders rise from the lavender sea of the ice cream tub, like arthopodic submarines.  These met a watery grave, lest they disturb the fragile psyche of my wife and son. 

Make sure you cover up, that sun is fierce. In the late Summer days, the sun hangs dazzling low, poking through leaves and temporarily blinding you.  The Japanese have a word for it, Komorebi.  Once home, relax with a cup of tea.  Boil the berries once washed with jam sugar.  That in itself, is some sort of mystical process that I’ve only witnessed at a distance. I leave these arcane processes to Mrs McCready.  But like some sort of Preserver’s Apprentice, I’m learning quickly. 

This combination of a symbiotic/organic/sensory process has led to my brain, rebooting, reformatting.  I’ve actually enjoyed reading for the first time on months.  At the behest of my wife, I’ve read two Marian Keyes books.  I’ve also read a great little book about the history of redheads. Back to Japan again, Tsundoku means ‘books you’ve bought, but not read’.

 Music, is returning to me.  I’ve got that little auditory spark back, of hearing a great tune and wanting to download it immediately.  Current favourite is the new John Grant album; which is a grower.  It has taken several listens to appreciate both the rich, bitter tone of both his voice and writing. 

John Grant suffers from depression.  See also Marian Keyes.  It’s weird that something so corrosive is part of your psyche.  It’s also eldritch that you become drawn to people that are so like yourself.  That’s not to say you have to live there, or experience stuff that may send you over the edge.  I recently had a clearout of books, DVD and CD’s that I consider may send me over the edge.  There was a point when I watched It’s A Wonderful Life every Christmas, just to feel some sort of emotional release.  I’m past that now.  I’ll be watching The Apartment, which has better jokes. Or Die Hard, which has bigger explosions.  Or In Bruges, which has more swearing. 

If you want a point where everything began to make sense, it would be one Saturday in September.  I emerged from a bush in the park, wearing a pair of old trackies and a Liverpool FC shirt.  I’ve got scratches down my arm and I’m wearing a pair of gloves. A little girl on a swing enquires: ‘Excuse me, but what are you doing?’ She must have read too many Enid Blyton books, inquisitive little moppet.

‘Picking blackerries’, I said.  Because, ‘Re-acquainting myself with my own soul; through the process of making jam’ would have sounded weird.   Wouldn’t it?