cycle over from putney to lavender hill to paint the front of a friend's house whilst the loved one heads for brixton by bus to meet people
about four or five hours into the job, as i arrive hot & tired at the top of a fully extended ladder with a brush and some masonry paint, the top of the ladder begins a very slow slide down the wall and i say to myself quietly but audibly, "something's wrong !"
gathering my wits after that awful second in which time slows to 10% of its normal speed, i begin to climb back down the steps of the moving ladder & to think about how to land, especially if it twists and throws me sideways
but then it stops sliding and as i climb down, the loved one's cheerful voice says "saved you" and she's standing with her foot against the bottom rung and her shopping bags in her hands, having just turned the corner in time to witness my predicament
of the seven deadly sins, the eighth and worst by far is emotional blackmail ... the diligent practise of this subtle and ancient art creates a constantly evolving darwinistic moral vacuum in which the brightest new manipulative ideas and stratagems flourish ... and which only you, or i, can fill !
Saturday, June 24, 2006
between waking and sleeping
the hyperactive talkaholic loved one arrives in the bed just after i've reached the point of deepest sleep
through my cerebral fog she's talking about the wedding we'll be attending in a couple of months
she says, with all the incandescent brightness of hope, "i'll need a new dress ... and a hat"
i mumble, whilst struggling back to semi-consciousness, "would you like to borrow my crash helmet?"
through my cerebral fog she's talking about the wedding we'll be attending in a couple of months
she says, with all the incandescent brightness of hope, "i'll need a new dress ... and a hat"
i mumble, whilst struggling back to semi-consciousness, "would you like to borrow my crash helmet?"
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Monday, June 19, 2006
Saturday, June 17, 2006
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Monday, June 12, 2006
we've been off the air whilst moving ....
... and whilst we were packing, i found the prototype model of my sister V's medal ... she'd first moulded it with chocolate instead of bronze, to see if the cast worked
... and then she'd given me the chocolate, wrapped in gold paper
... it suddenly seemed like a good time to "invoke the spirits" of the ancestors, not that they have ever seemed far away, and so after having owned it for fifteen months, i unwrapped it
... my mother had once told me how, when i was born in August 1949, my father had arrived at the hospital with a box of chocolates, a rarity for most people in the years of post-war rationing
... it was only a few days later, when she brought me home, that he confessed to having used up her own entire chocolate ration for the coming year
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
Tuesday, May 30, 2006
Monday, May 29, 2006
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