|
 You find me in a basement in Camden town. There is a smell of decay,
of sweat, of many things unwashed of the grease of hopelessness. And
there is an atmosphere so sour you could squeeze enough out to pickle a
hundred weight of gherkins a day.
Just a moment ago it was six pm (by the sun's arc) and I was lying on a
beach watching the waves leap and tussle in play. Only a moment ago....
I won't explain how I came to be here. Let me just say that 'The
decision' arrived one afternoon and by his straight-to-business
demeanor I suspected that we ought at once to take a stroll into the
town square for a drink, to discuss terms. I remember the sun was quite
rude that day but that it was comfortable in the shade of the cafe's
awning. I remember thinking that there might still be some way out of
this as a good breeze began to dry the shirt off my back. When I learnt
of 'The Decision's' terms I was not sad but now I am. I miss my beach.
I miss my motorbike. The decision was smartly dressed and convinced me
with practised suggestiveness. I felt like I'd just been sold acres of
worthless off-plan real estate. His suit, I think that's what confused
me. But then that was also what, one might cruelly suggest, enticed me.
Now
is our summer of discontent made good by......... a cool, sunlit room
of diverse but spare decoration. I can hear the gulls barking outside.
I imagine one on a chimney stack. Its great white chest stuck out above
those preposterous legs that seem stuck on by a child's hand. When my
gull barks it sounds for a moment like a mule tied forgotten to a post
in the midday heat but then that perfect white neck stretches further,
that blooded beak opens wider and the call of the sea is hacked out
over again like a threat. I am happy here. I dined well last night and
there is a stash of hashish so abundant that it seems to grow, no
matter how hard I can convince it otherwise.
I am happy also because Harmony reclines in the room. When I
interrogate a rocking chair or a hanging carpet or an oriental wooden
birdcage, there is no jealous squabble and no word out of line for each
piece allows the other space to tell its own story. And some tell very
old stories, from distant places with long-dead rulers, but always with
each piece granting equal respect to its neighbour, to tell it well
once again, so that they all might grow happily older together.
Perhaps you might not like it. I know that my perspective, ardent but
desperately independent, is biased in this case. Back through my years
I have seen this room, wherever it may be, change like light through a
wood. But even now that there are two sets of eyes that have become
one, the room could only ever feel like this. The room has patience and
but one set of clothes, kept clean by salt spray and bleached by the
sun. The room has a clear mind and asked that I join it for an hour or
two of peaceful education and pleasure.
I must go and walk down by the water. I may even swim while the gulls
swoop and cackle up on the cliff. Histories can wait awhile,
restaurants for longer.
Tom
 |
Show/Hide comment form
to ensure you own the rights to any materials you publish, or agree the rights with the owner before publishing
and to provide accurate credits where you include quotes or exerts from other rights owners under standard fair use terms.
Then please don't hotlink pictures from my blog, in particular without asking me for permission if you can use my pictures.