I don’t wish you were here
Because…the pebble beach
The juvenile seagulls
The sand between my toes
The partly cloudy weather
The warm wine
The ice cream headache
The wise old collie
And the yappy little shihtzu
Remind me of you.
Category: Ruminations
Transformation
Me yesterday
Me today
It’s the Blackpool Punk Festival.
Rebellion Festival Blackpool 2018
Interesting, exciting and intriguing four day event with a great atmosphere. I hang out but I don’t go to the ‘festival’. It attracts a lot of Europeans, including Dutch and German punks. They are all sweet and lovely and polite. A lot of local punks don’t go to the festival, they just hang out by St. John’s Church or around the Winter Gardens. People want to bond or socialise or relate with like minded people. I had a chance to see P.I.L who are headlining on Sunday but I turned it down. Why would I want to see John Lydon in the flesh? He would only disappoint me. I have no interest in seeing my ‘heroes’, I would feel that it would be a let down in some way. I had a chance to see Theatre Of Hate tonight, but I have C.D’s and videos of them. Plus I’ve seen Kirk Brandon before. I don’t really get the ‘live’ thing. I just don’t get it. If I could have a decent, lively, intelligent conversation with these people instead, then I’d prefer that. What I’m concerned about though, is the young punks who are so drunk (by 9 p.m) that they can’t walk straight and are dropping their money and hairspray and lighters….and I’m wondering how they are going to get through the night. And I worry about them. I suppose I’m getting old and mothery.
There was one guy tonight and his mohican was very flaccid. He staggered over to the glass window of a shop (one of those behind me in the picture) He used it as a mirror and put hairspray on and kept dropping it. He was very drunk. He looked over at me once or twice and I wish I’d have just gone over and helped him put his hair up and sent him on his way. I really regret that because he was all alone and seemed a bit vulnerable. I hate it when I wish I’d helped people and didn’t because I dithered or procrastinated or was too slow.
Oh, well, there’s always tomorrow.
The Way Things Are
Murphy’s Law says, ‘If it can go wrong, it will go wrong’. As Thomas Hardy highlights in some of his work, Sod’s Law, in comparison, is all about the little ironies of fate, that torment us throughout our lives.
You’ve likely heard of them before and have been a victim one time or another. For example, you’re expecting a delivery man but when he eventually calls, after hours of waiting in, you will either be a) in the bathroom b) popped out for five minutes or c) a combination of both.
Your toast is always landing butter side down. But, would you still eat it, even if it’s landed the dry side down? Whichever way you look at it, it’s been on the floor. I suppose it depends on where it lands. Also, the butter could be weighing it down. Are you slathering it on? Are you putting it on with a trowel? Heavy butter could be the culprit in this circumstance.
That’s why cats land on their feet. They’re unbuttered. Butter their backs, theorectically and I’m sure we’d see an entirely different story. Although, don’t try this at home folks. I’m not advocatng putting butter on your local ginger tom, just to see if he lands butter side down.
After an hour of waiting at the bus stop, of desert wasteland and rolling tumbleweeds – three buses will all come along at once. Mummy bus, daddy bus and little baby bus. If you have a car, on a day when you have all the time in the world, the lights will seem to be permanenetly on green but when you desperately need to get somewhere, it’s red all the way. And if you wash your car on Friday, it will rain on Saturday. And after the rain, seagulls or pigeons, or some other wild bird, will find your car the most attractive perching post in the whole world. And it does rain more at the weekend. It’s been proven. It’s just the way things are.
Do Not Touch
Valuable things have labels
In expected places
Somebody picks up an item
Carelessly
Let’s it slip through their fingers
Nobody hears it smash
Or sees them kick the mess
Under the counter.
Fragile things
And delicate things
Have labels
All over the world
‘Do Not Touch’
But somebody always does.
A Brighter, Better Springtime
Let’s celebrate this season
It’s springtime at last
So far, we’ve had heat waves
And cold winter blasts
A spiritual awakening
A time for hope
A moment for faith
An era for growth
While we may not have sun
That’s warm enough to burn
The cycle of life
Has finally returned
There’s a bitter side to spring
Many people get depressed
Overwhelmed by expectations
To be their very best
Spring is when many
Mental battles are fought
And not just at Christmas
As is commonly thought
For some, spring is often
When morale takes a dive
It is also when people
Take their own lives
Outside is now thriving
But inside not so
The heart may be frozen
And cold just like snow
When I was summer
I resisted spring
But now I’m in Autumn
It’s a wonderful thing
I hope that they see
Through the dark and the grey
A light shining through
To a brighter day
I pray that all
Of the shadows are chased
For those who can’t smile
When the sun strokes their face.
-Sue Young
Vanished Into Thin Air
My 18 year old daughter got a job
as a magicians assistant
But one day came home
Sobbing
The magician had ‘too many hands’
“He’s like an octopus,” she said
and More Besides, but
She Wouldn’t Tell
And I delved into The Magic Circle
Learned some tricks
And armed with a rusty saw
Went to see the magician
And made him Vanish Into Thin Air
-Sue Young
I wrote this just lately but it is based on a real experience that happened twenty years ago. I was 26 and a colleague of mine was 18. We were both on a drama course and were given the opportunity to apply for a job as a magician’s assistant. I was going to apply but at the last moment had misgivings, can’t imagine why and I didn’t apply. The 18 year old girl applied and got the job very quickly and easily…
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I’m In Love With Today
I’ll have rage on the rocks with a bitter twisted lemon
Peanuts in a bowl, to kill the hunger in my soul
There. That’s better. First one down the hatch. Now I’m starting to get the feeling that’s it’s not going to be such a bad day after all.
Put something on the jukebox, something tribal, incoherent, no sad songs, or weary ballads.
Won’t you join me in a vodka tsunami?
Let’s put the world to rights. Problems solved in a flash
over liquid lunch and liquid dinner
Let’s bring water to this desert
Let’s bring foliage sweet and green
Because this day is turning out to be a great day
Oh, look, there’s an oasis
Oh no, it’s just a mirage
Of time lost
And people wasted
Or is the other way round?
It’s a lovely day today, don’t you think?
Come on, it’s your round, make it a double, or a pint.
Something to soak up this dried up emptied out hallowed out I’m-spitting-feathers sponge
Nothing left to say
Nothing left to do
But celebrate
Because I don’t know about you…but quite frankly
I’m so in love with today right now.
I can see the bottom of the glass
And I don’t want to see the end of anything
So keep ’em topped up
‘cos it’s a wonderful day
Have I mentioned this? Oh, I have?
My memory’s not too good lately
God know why.
It’s a mystery.
Well, I’ll say it again
I’m in love with today
But I’m going to hate tomorrow.
-Sue Young
PENPALS OF THE WORLD UNITE!
Does anyone remember pen pals? If you’re over forty you may. Pen pals (for those of you under the age of 40) are people who would write to each other, with actual pens, biro or fountain. We had to buy proper bonded writng paper from proper shops in those days because there were no pound shops. We would put a stamp on the envelope, in the top right hand corner, and then we would post it, into a red pillar box, and perhaps, wait two, maybe three weeks for an answer. We didn’t have computers then. I know, unthinkable, but we were in the ancient times.
Pen pals saved me from certain destruction. They helped me to deal with teenage angst. There was nothing quite like waiting for that fat juicy envelope to land on the mat on a Saturday morning. It always seemed to be a Saturday morning when it landed. Thank you God. I think my pen pals probably stopped me from committing suicide or from going crazy. Either way, I think psychologists have a lot to learn from them, not from fat envelopes landing on the mat…but from pen pals.
Between the ages of fourteen and eighteen, I had an amazing pen pal, who I will call Alice, because her name begins with the same letter, and sounds very similar. She was nineteen when I was fourteen, and taught me much. We were both heavily into Barry Manilow. I still think he’s the most underrated singer/songwriter of all time. That will never change for me. People can only ever offer up the titles Copacabana, Mandy, Could It Magic and Bermuda Triangle, and if they really think they know it all, they add, I Made It Through The Rain, but Barry has written and recorded hundreds of songs. It’s so surprising to me, when people can only ever think of three or four songs when referring to him.
Alice would write regularly and sometimes the content of the letters would border on the erotic. She was as innocent as I. We fantasized, as frustrated teenagers do. We let off steam in our letters. In the end, it probably had nothing to do with Barry. He was just the conduit. She would cover entire outer envelopes, and leave no white bits, with scribblings, like ‘I Wanna Do It With You Barry.’ and other double entendre which related to his song titles. Interestingly enough, now I think of it, he did have a lot of song titles that could be interpreted as double entrendre. To exacerbate the issue, she would write provocative messages to the postman, on the outside of the envelope, like, ‘Whip It Out Postie!’ and other salubrious invitations, which titillated both my fourteen year old self and particularly my forty year old mother, who was also a Barry fan.
But oh, the joy, the joy of her letters. She kept me going when all else failed. She was the buoy in my turbulent sea. It was all innocent fun, in our time of innocence.
I copied her antics and wrote ‘Whip It Out Postie!’ on my envelopes too. She was a bad influence. Of course, it got out among the postmen. ‘Oh, these sad, sexually frustrated teenagers, in love with Barry Manilow, what are we going to do?’ Well, thankfully, they didn’t do anything, except blush.
But, well, the crux of the matter is…pen pals, a dying art? A died art, a dead art? Are pen pals dead?
I had several pen pals after that, over the years, but what I realised was, male pen pals brought their own troubles. Many of them wanted a relationship, they weren’t writing for writing sake, for pen pal sake. Lines were blurred, communications obscured. It was less complicated writing to female pen pals and more fun. I think modern social media has cleared that up. Things are more cut and dried now. There’s no elusiveness, no ambiguity, no doubt as to people’s motivations and there’s certainly no time. You might be waiting for a letter for weeks back in the day. Nowadays, on social media, if people don’t get back to you in twenty four hours, you write them off. They’re history.
There’s no time to think any more, no time to chew the cud. It’s now or never.
I will say though, I have experienced a different ambience on line. It’s not so much about male and female any more. It’s just about people getting on. I’m probably being naive here, but I’m finding there is less predatory action in some environs, obviously more, in others. It’s all about environment. I have been pleasantly surprised at how males and females can get on in modern social media without gender coming into it. Oh, I think I mean sex.
Still, I think old school Pen pals would make a refreshing change. I might just look up these guys.
Sugar Mummy
Last night, I had a dream about Victoria Beckham. She was sitting on a stool at her breakfast bar, in her kitchen. (No idea if she has one of these in real life). She was in her scruff, un-straightened hair, baggy black t-shirt, the lot. Although she still looked nice. Vicky would look good dragged through a hedge backwards, wearing a bin bag. She wasn’t with David though, which upset me. She was with some bruiser.
Later on, still in my dream, I was in some nightclub thingy and she’s scrubbed up and walked in there with him. They began to have a tiff and it turned into a mega argument and I was tiptoeing around them. When people are having an argument in public, we pretend it’s not happening, suddenly, we become deaf, dumb and blind.
So, anyway, I left the nightclub thingy, as unobtrusively as possible, secretly bemoaning the fact that Vicky had split from David and was now with some sexist, gold-digging thug.
And then I woke up.
Space Invasion
Ever wondered why that person sat next to you on that empty bus? Yes, me too. It’s one of my pet hates. I’m pretty sure it’s one of yours. Space invasion. Why do they do it? Are they predators? I would surmise so, in some way. Do they have a need to control you? Yes, unfortunately, I think so. Are they sad? Yes. Are we being horrible by thinking they’re sad? Perhaps. Do they just want company? Yes. Are they lonely? Yes, no…I don’t know. All these questions are making me loco.
In a recent post, I talked about agoraphobia, briefly, and how I managed to get out on my own after three years of, well…not getting out on my own. I once did a seven year stint, but that’s another story, for another time.
I now go out for approximately two hours, all on my own, on weekend afternoons, to my local town centre…and I’m loving it! After the self imposed prison, there is freedom! And it’s sweet, so sweet.
I’m blessed enough to live less than two minutes walk away from a beach. I love the sea, so it should be easy. I’ve been keeping it up for about two months now, every Saturday, but something happened a couple of Saturday’s ago that almost stopped me getting back in the saddle.
My agoraphobia never felt like a waste, until lately. I’m starting to think, I’m almost fifty and I’ve let it rule me with an iron rod, all these years. I don’t want to carry that particular monkey on my back anymore. I’m sick and tired of it. I’m cheesed off, browned off, fed up.
For me, it’s a hereditary thing, both my parents suffer from it, particularly my dad, but he’d rather die than admit it. I’ve just outed him. Sorry dad. He’ll never read this anyway and I’m not saying anything bad about him and what I’m saying is the truth. Perhaps he never thought it was a problem. When I was sixteen, I knew I had a problem and I got the courage to talk to my dad about it after my mum had gone to bed. It was a nice, relaxed, cosy atmosphere, just us two, late at night, both reading. When I revealed my fears, he told me that I was just trying to make myself seem ‘special’.
After that, I never spoke about it again, until now. If this is ‘special’, I don’t want it.
I could have done without ‘special’ for my whole life.
Of course, when I met my husband, it all rubbed off on him and contaminated him. He had to deal with the fall out, which was considerable. I realise now that my father had to deal with his own agoraphobia and just couldn’t admit it, to himself, or to anyone else. And he certainly couldn’t admit that I had it too. He probably never will, and that’s okay. If he’s happy with that, then that’s fine. In fact, he has said that he’s very happy with hardly ever going out, but I’m not happy with it anymore. I don’t want to be crippled by it anymore. So, in my eyes, it’s not happening. Agoraphobia? What’s that? It’s not something in my experience. It’s something other people have. If you don’t admit it, it doesn’t exist. Right? Well, it does…but…now it’s a conscious effort. It’s psychological warfare. And I’m kitted out.
I was out at the beach recently, one innocuous Saturday afternoon, writing miscellaneous stuff and enjoying my freedom after several years and perhaps feeling a bit raw and vulnerable, but dealing with it, and there were plenty of empty seats, for miles around, yet, a couple came to sit on my bench.
I thought, okay, it’s a free country. You’ve got the WHOLE beach (with very many empty benches) and yet, you come and sit by me. But it didn’t end there. I was writing at the time, in my little pad, just writing crap, for comfort, and minding my own business and this very weird…don’t mean to be judgemental, but these guys were weird, or at least acting weird…there was an undertone that I didn’t like. Things like this just don’t happen on a sunny Saturday afternoon here. It was odd. Perverts are quite low on the ground here. Sweeping statement, I know, I can’t say that for sure but the Fylde coast (apart from tourists) has a good amount of retired or semi retired people, or at least people who are healthily interested in their own lives and their dogs. There’s a lot of dog lovers here. It’s a great place to have a dog, but people here are still interested in other people…to a point…perhaps not beyond that point. It’s a bit like Florida. Another sweeping statement.
Well, anyway, this guy was wearing a band type t-shirt, I don’t know, I didn’t pay too much attention, but he was the same age as me, roundabout, perhaps a bit older, and obviously thought himself as a ‘Peter Pan’, and the blonde woman with him, well, she had sunglasses on, so I couldn’t see her eyes. Ah, cowardly lion territory. That’s not playing the game, man.
After about a minute, of the man grinning, smiling and staring fixedly at me and throwing a few little comments in her direction, alarm bells began to ring. The lady in the couple positioned herself bodily, adjacent to me, and was staring, like I was an animal in a zoo.
Both of them were staring, unashamedly and fixedly, and I thought, what is your problem? Shall I sell you some tickets maybe? I continued writing and I admit, I was a bit impish in the end, because I decided to write, look at them and then write…to make them paranoid, like I was writing about them. Well, it would work for me. Then I thought, you know what, I’m getting a really sleazy vibe from you guys. I should stop trying to be clever. This is back firing. I’m outta here. The goods are not for sale. This stall is closed. Go swing somewhere else.
So I got up and walked on. Years ago, I would have thought, I don’t have the right to walk on, to walk away, or, I don’t have a right to stand my ground, or some such idiotic thinking. My instincts are starting to serve me well. I have at least gained some sense of self preservation after all these years. It felt so good to walk away. (I’m sure they were nice people really. Perhaps, it’s my problem for being so sensitive and paranoid)!
So I walked down the pier, found a very pleasing alternative position and never looked back. I spent a beautiful hour writing by the sea. However, I have become a bit paranoid since then and a bit apprehensive. Being in a more isolated part of the beach is a double edged sword. It may be nice to be alone but it can also make you vulnerable to predators. I have started to snarl at people when they come too close. Elvis lip. Maybe I snarl too much. How awful that I’ve become so defensive. But defensiveness can be the best form of attack.
Before that couple approached me, I remember thinking, how awful that we have become so unapproachable, through fear. I don’t know about you, but I am becoming less tolerable of predators as I get older. I’m relieved that I can call them out quicker, that I’m better at nipping it in the bud. That’s priceless, because they used to walk all over me.
The thing is, whatever happens, remember , there are people and forces who will try to STOP you progressing in your life journey. Isn’t it strange that they turn up at the most inopportune moments, when you are getting somewhere? You will find that they turn up at your most vulnerable moment.
Don’t let the bastards grind you down.
Walk on.
Things In My Head 