Well… after an extended period of bolo inertia, proof, if you needed it, that nothing ever changes under the sun:
Sitting on the train and the combined noises of a squawking kid, crying baby, parents cooing with delight at the noise their bastard progeny are making, plus the conversation between two ladies of the late thirties persuasion speculating on whether their respective idle and planless partners are going to pop the question imminently and whether in fact this will be the route to future eternal salvation and infinite dinner party furniture collecting joy. These two things are sending me insane. I keep looking down at my phone trying to pick up enough magic internet out of the air to get online to PayPal and pay my respective New York and Bucharest based freelancers and getting more and more frustrated when the dial keeps spinning and miniature pages fail to manifest on the tiny screen.
This is the modern paradigm for the erstwhile Groovertron, still clad in a hoody and fresh kicks, but sporting a sedate, business-friendly hair cut and these days moving in all the right circles to end up head of the Rotary Club, just like I always dreamed. Pulling enraged faces at the kids in front in an effort to instil enough fear in these kids to pipe down. Can a 3 year old sense how close they are to death? Can a 31 year old?
Don’t know why I try to cram work into every spare moment like the sound of silence is going to freak me out. Like the noise of my gentle breathing as I close my eyes and rock my head back in the seat is going to lead to disaster. Like the infinite pile of work that comes from running your own business is going to get usefully dealt with by never taking a break, by trying to type with my elbows trapped between the seat rests and praying the gods of t-mobile like the elders prayed for rain.
Oh well, the annoyance is certainly rising and the only answer seems to be to stick the headphones in, blessed foresight reminding me to stuff them in my pocket on the way out of the door. Bass cones fully blown and dirty as the day you were born, hepatitis C of the earbuds, but lets not quibble about someone else’s earwax lurgy. Stuff those fuckers in and turn the volume right up. Sound of babies quiet and sound of educated women sliding off the range as Sebastian Tellier cranks up and the head starts nodding again like nothing ever changed.
One track ends and before the next one comes in I hear from the ladies:
“This is the thing, I need to stop drinking, or I need to learn how to have a drop”.
Ah well, we’ve all thought that one. Not always at exactly the time we are pulling down our next door neighbours wall because it is attached to a Foxtons board that offends the sight of my drink addled brain, but the day after when you’re having the early morning pee and you look out of the frosted window as the night before starts to drift back and all you can see is crumbled mortar and bits of 100 year old brick. Damn, what is this bruise on my arm? Agh regrets, these are the foodstuff of the no longer young. The nourishment of the miserable.
Making a fool of yourself while drunk used to be, if not the aim of the game, one of the main attractions. These days I recoil from foolshness like it has left a stain on my sweatshirt. I carry the guilt and the shame like a badge of dishonour and I ruminate upon it while I am waiting for the bus. Maybe time to try that internet connection again. Less thinking, more drinking, stag-weekend fame and fortune beckons and what is it they say? Something like fortune favours the brave.