New light on the lounge

Woke up in the dark, mouth like a hay-barn. The result of drinking white burgundy too close to bedtime. Went downstairs and swigged chilled fizzy water from the fridge. Returned to bed. An hour later the same sensation and the same solution. I chose to sleep on the couch in the lounge to be nearer the fizzy water.

Woke at dawn with sunlight starting to peer through the fabric of the pull-down blinds in the lounge. A pleasing effect, never previously noticed. Mouth back to normal so I daydreamed.

Twenty years ago we’d just moved in, neither of us with a shred of talent for enhancing our living space. Where colour was an issue we always went for sage green, mainly because it was innocuous.

At the time we’d incidentally come into touch with a fledgling interior decorator service – two young women just starting out. Amazingly they charged peanuts and we gave them their head – well, more or less. It was they who specified the individual pull-down blinds and I for one have never thought to change.

The windows the blinds cover are in a bay recess and for that they specified a heavy wooden rail with permanently tied-back curtains at either side, implying the bay is a very shallow theatre stage. Corny? All I can we couldn’t have done better. They also spec’d the wall lights and the central light fitting to our satisfaction.

It’s taken me a full generation to notice the effect early morning sun has on the blinds and I’d like to compliment them. Alas, we may have been their first and last client since they fell out with each other and retreated into oblivion. Both perhaps rather too pretty.

Old age has made us timid. Doubt we’d ever again hire an interior decorator.

Heard world

Noises are not just sounds.

Early this morning I was raising the downstairs blinds and saw a black cat assessing my outdoor flower trough as suitable for faeces. Once I might have banged on the window, causing a low-frequency noise insignificant to cats. Accidentally my hand squeaked across the glass, the cat jerked round in gratifying horror, and sped away. High-frequency noise is bad karma to cats. Foolishly dogs growl at them, they should try whistling.

It's thundering now. Distant thunder is very low-frequency, emblematic of immeasurable power. Intellect tells me thunder is the sound of an admittedly destructive event but which has now happened. But I am not convinced. My guts have me imagine thunder ripping off my roof.

As a car tyre deflates its operative sound is transformed from an efficient whir into a hopeless squelch. Inanition personified. Looks bad too.

A wine glass topples from the drying rack. Having developed little momentum it glances off a metal pan and emits a pleasing melodic ping. Hitting the floor, a metre below, the shattering noise is much harsher. The difference between life and death.

Human infants depend on their looks (which encourage cuddling) and crying which, far from being piteous, consists mainly of relentless orders to obey. As difficult to ignore as a ringing phone.

Hard rain, without wind roar, soothes the mind. But only if you’re indoors.

The most unlovable sound occurs when the audio component of a streamed movie is briefly interfered with. Powerful amplifiers raise this uncongenial band of frequencies to a jagged, life-threatening extreme.

Might a jet engine be musically hermaphroditic? Waiting for take-off it grumbles like a very low basso profundo. As it climbs, and more fuel is burned quickly, it becomes a coloraturo soprano.

By the pricking of my thumbs...

Trumpian Plague notes 2

CORONAVIRUS RE-CHRISTENED Why, asked my ever-literal brother, did I choose Trumpian to identify the plague. I pointed out the virus is unpleasant, so’s Trump, they are in fact a matched pair. Quod erat demonstrandum.

MORE LAUGHTER PLEASE I sent this comment to a blog where things were getting serious.

Look, I lived through WW2. Aged 5 - 10 I wasn't at the height of my intellectual powers as I am now but I recognised that unrelieved gloom would be a destructive mono-diet. We didn't just hate Adolf, we laughed at him. To Colonel Bogey, the tune made even more famous in the movie Bridge Over the River Kwai, we sang:

Hitler has only got one ball,
Göring has two but very small,
Himmler
Is very similar,
While poor old Goebbels
Has no balls at all.

Which is why I maintain we are presently suffering from the Trumpian Plague.

If you think the vocabulary or the sentiments of the lyrics above may offend the sensibility of your readers feel free to use the Delete button. And erect a sign: "Look what testicular inadequacy did for them."

BUYING THE GUARDIAN We do it via pre-paid vouchers, it helps the paper’s cash flow. The nearest source is Tesco’s filling station. How might we reduce mutual infection risks? The staff agreed to use the night-payment “drawer” in the daytime. No change is involved, no breath intermingled, contact is minimal

Safe stronghold

About twice a year The Good Fairy appears in my dreams. The Good Fairy – GF – let’s call her Guffie - belongs to a severe period of austerity after WW2. When children’s books were vaguely and badly drawn and colour was used sparingly.

She isn’t much to look at. Her pink blob of a head lacks hair and a face. Her legs are even more attenuated, ending in points with no feet and resembling pink sticks of celery. She wears an anonymous long-sleeved white blouse and what was then called a gym skirt, made from compressed zig-zag material similar to the lungs of a piano accordion.

But looks aren’t everything. Guffie appears in dreams when I’m often at my lowest and needing support. She is, after all a young woman, and welcome for that. She speaks softly and encouragingly and her hands – if she had hands instead of sharp points – are used in supplication. Occasionally she has hair, mouse-brown and fine as spider’s web, and this is an especial bonus.

Her greatest asset is that she is willing to share my company. And by implication forgive me for the sins of my adolescence which were manifold and extreme. I infer she goes back into my history though this is never discussed. Her non-existent face carries a gentle – if non-existent – smile. And yes, I know this is hard to follow but this is how it is, I’m not aiming for the Booker Prize.

I’m grateful I have Guffie. She is prescient and knows when to arrive. Over Christmas I was ill and cast down, She was absent then because she has only psychological skills, nothing medical. Perhaps in March some time. I get the feeling she’s read my novels, even those as yet unwritten.

Suspense

Mosaics: Part one

On Fridays VR attends art group in Ewyas Harold (a village near the Welsh border). Today it’s mosaics and I got involved. Scouting the area for decorative ceramic tiles which I then smashed into mosaic-able fragments. Not forgetting grout to fill in the interstices. Ideas flitted. The interstices should not be too wide. The layout must be better than random. How about sub-designs? And mind the sharp edges of the tile shards.

Driving VR and daughter Professional Bleeder (here on a visit) to EW I became minatory. I would be very disappointed, I said, if I was unable to detect signs of intellectualism in the two finished mosaics. Hadn’t I scouted and smashed until knackered?

Above are the raw materials. In 45 minutes I shall leave to pick the two mosaic-ers. With their works.

To be continued.

Mosaics: Part two

Ooo...er, what's this? I drive down to EW and all I see is WIP (work in progress). The art group consists either of slow-learners or perfectionists. The revelations - if any - must be postponed a week. Meanwhile, how do I fill in the time? A sonnet? A short story centring on prettiness? A scandalous post about sexual solecism, vivid enough to disguise this administrative booboo.

To be continued (at least until Friday the 23rd)

RR on losing one's platform of stability

I'm frequently facetious; I find it helps. Had more people been facetious ("Inappropriately lacking seriousness in manner; flippant") towards El Trumpo  he might well have imploded. Convinced it was his nickname south of the Border.

In Spain they have a state lottery with a huge prize; they call it El Gordo (The Fat One). A fine caption for that photo when DT wore full soup-and-fish during dinner at Buckingham Palace.

Laughter can often be more effective than gloomy solemnity.

I hinted in comments to my previous post (The Spine Softens) my next post might be facetious. And here it is.

I'm starting with my toes. The fourth one along (on both feet) is hooked towards the big toe. Should that take capitals? Might Big Toe be another nickname for... No, that's enough about him.

Think of hooks and you think of fish. I once posted about people who dangle their feet into streams inviting fish to nibble away defective skin. I thought it was an admirable use of natural resources. Not many agreed. Misjudge facetiousness and it's egg on your face.

My feet are 10½ which is smallish given my height. VR's feet are a tiny 3. I occasionally wonder if I wore her feet whether I'd topple over, having lost much of my platform of stability (Thinks: I've never used that phrase. 'twould make a good post title.)

My big toe on the right suffers from gout. In my youth I didn't get on with my father and he had gout. It makes me wonder... Not a subject I discuss with my daughters, for obvious reasons.

When it comes to buying shoes I hate to spend more than £30 ($37.67). Don’t tell me I’m wrong, I’m pre-programmed. Socks? Does anyone know what they cost?

Is modesty good for you?

Been re-reading my earlier posts - see how pathetic my life has become.

Down the years more than one commenter has judged me guilty of "self-deprecation", always that phrase. In the nicest possible way, y'unnerstand.

Guilty, milud! What's more, the trope (First time I've used trope; I could have got it wrong.) was deliberate, the reason obvious. Adopting a self-deprecatory tone frees me from the opposite charge of self-approval. Otherwise smug, for smug is hard to sell.

Even so, I've got to pick my self-deprecatory spots. No use typing myself as ugly. For one thing I've posted portraits which prove it, for another at age eighty-three what else might one expect?

Another point. Tone Deaf's readership is much better educated than its author. Thus if I own up to being a lousy writer and frame the admission in a sentence of lapidary beauty I'll be seen immediately as a quack. And I'll deserve it.

Things can get really complicated. Seen from inside I may conclude I'm mean-spirited. Kind-hearted readers (and there aren't many of the other sort) may say this is irrelevant and proves my honesty. Self-deprecatory honesty, of course, but nevertheless a good thing.

How about this: "Circumstances force me to say I've read Joyce's Ulysses. But I deplore the implicit pat on the back." Self-deprecation is more difficult to recognise there, don't you agree?

You don't? Keep an eye on my next fifty posts, let’s see who wins.

I said I was pathetic. Should I add I’m desperate?

Opening the fridge door

When there’s a crisis in the UK the BBC sends out its doleful news-reader, Huw Edwards, in his suit, to add gravitas.

Gravitas (“solemnity of  manner”) is something Huw has lots of.

Huw is older now. Outside 10 Downing Street recently he was lit by BBC lights and, unfortunately for him, adjacent lights illuminating a reporter from another TV channel. This gave him a greenish pallor down one side, like a haddock left too long in the fridge. I think he uses Brylcreem.

I’ve posted a lot about Huw because he depresses me. But my eloquence is outshone by The Crow, a regular US commenter to Tone Deaf and its predecessor, Works Well, now quieter because of Trumpism. Here’s an apercu dating back to October 5, 20ll:

Huw... looks like Sam the Eagle from the Muppet Show - heavy browed scowl insinuating overweening sense of self-importance, which probably means he actually has low self-esteem, but puts on a good face.

Excellent! But this one, six days later, is not only funny but brilliantly observed:

His voice is like pablum, bland yet vaguely comforting. His body language is confusing, especially when he looks like he's having to hold the desk in place, leaning on it with one forearm while keeping it steady with the other outstretched arm, palm down. He did that for so many of the (YouTube) clips that I thought he must have a boil in his armpit and couldn’t keep his arm close to his torso.

If I have grossly insulted a beloved British icon... I apologize (for causing) you or your fellow citizens any anguish. I wouldn’t hurt any of you for all the pablum in the world.

No anguish whatsoever! Full marks for pablum!

Come back Crow, Tone Deaf needs you.

Doesn't it sting?

"I believe they're for eternity. Right, just the one please."

The thought of attaching inorganic bits to my body worries me. "Terrifies" may be better.

Pre-WW2 encyclopaedias showed African women who had stretched their neck by the addition of a column of rings. Others had extended their bottom lip by introducing a dinner plate. But my fears don't demand such extremes. When VR and I chose her wedding ring (at a jeweller's on Regent Street since you ask) there was no chance we'd be buying one for me. A ring represented restriction (physical not metaphorical). Suppose I wanted to take it off? And couldn't? A bad area to wield a hacksaw.

Now things have gone from bad to worse. Lewis Hamilton, an F1 driver, wears diamond ear studs. To do this someone must have drilled through his ear lobes. In my book that's self-harm even if he submitted to the process.

As to those who decorate their faces with permanently-attached gold balls I am in despair. I cannot rid myself of the conviction that some of these artefacts must screw directly into the skull. Aargh!

Nor is my fetish - perhaps non-fetish - consistent. Uneasily I must confess that women's ear studs can look OK. But danglers, no. Suppose they caught in something...? Double aargh!

Yes, this is uninformed prejudice but I am not comforted by explanations. The stuff I refer to, more at home in the workshop than the ensuite, are incompatible invaders. Which have been welcomed.

Post-Brexit? How about leg amputation so that a prosthetic, in platinum and styled in Paris, may be worn. Metaphorically a self-inflicted mutilation which many clamour for.

Magic, readily available

Blogs require raw material, ideally in the form of discovery. But suppose old age has brought you to the point where history greatly outweighs the expectation of anything new? You recycle your history, of course. Shuffle the facts, re-adjust the lighting, and raise the curtain on an updated anecdote.

I first blogged in 2008 and had lots to say about gearboxes and other nuts-and-bolts matters. But in 2008 I was 73 and already into recycling. One huge change (music) lay ahead but I wasn't to know that. Instead I was practising what the French call réchauffage, most familiarly the reheating of edible leftovers, less familiarly plagiarism.

There is, however, an alternative. Commenting elsewhere I made reference to the first short story I ever wrote when I was probably about ten. Doodling in time's minestrone I suddenly realised that made me Adolf Hitler's contemporary. Until, that is, his career was cut short by some unwise decisions.

That new alternative is imagination. With it I may liberate myself from the past's dull grinding-mills. I slip into Adolf's kitchen where he's preparing a vegetarian meal, whisper that his present policies will end in tears, that he'd be better off writing a book other than Mein Kampf. Why not Europe Goes Meatless? "It will," I say, "sell millions." Neglecting to add "by the time the oughties roll around." Were he still lecturing about tofu he'd be 130 but imagination easily resolves that inconsistency.

Imagination – such a powerful device! I find to my horror Huw Edwards will be spuming away at the Hay Festival for which I've already bought nearly seven-hundred-quid's-worth of tickets. A little invention added to a time warp and I'd have him reduced to a Noncomformist lay preacher based in Merthyr Tydfil.

Are you unhappy? I could imagine your happiness.

As the abyss

I continue to wear all-black: black polo-neck, black jeans, black gym shoes. A couple of months since my last visit to the hair salon and a great thatch has developed - fluffy white morphing into dull grey as the days slide by. I've never been ideological shampooer.

I'm not sure why black. Perhaps because I prefer villainy to antiquity. I get the feeling people stare more these days as I pick up The Guardian; imagining I'm out under licence with a tracker bolted to my ankle. I walk faster which may be menacing.

On Tuesday mornings, over our small Americanos at the Tesco café, I watch other male ancients arriving at the supermarket. Their clothes are unimaginative but always new. I suspect their wives are in control: "You may be old but there's no need to look shabby." The shirt sleeves often show ironed creases. The husbands visit the barber (always a barber never a salon) more often than I do. Perhaps the wives book the appointments.

Clothes are the easy bit but what expression should old men adopt? No doubt, some look defeated; hag-ridden by all those visits to the lav. Others, holding their ailments at bay, go for cranky surprise. "Youth's the stuff will not endure," except they've only just found out.

In The Seventh Seal Ingmar Bergman dresses Death in black and, not surprising, this gives the other characters the colly-wobbles. Significantly Death doesn't wear jeans so I'm off the hook for that.

One disadvantage: spilt food shows up on black. Being a messy eater undermines any benefits such clothing confers. Since I’ve still got my own teeth I eat apples and avoid the crumbs.

Small collision, nobody hurt

The door bell rang and there was The Believer, smiling, extending his hand, thanking me for my politeness.

Truth to tell I'd never seen him this close before. Couldn't be sure it was the same chap who'd once asked VR whether she believed in Jesus. To whom she'd said, no, but if he believed in Jesus that was OK by her. A quick thinker, VR.

But what was this about my politeness? Earlier that day I recalled standing in the driveway, about to get into my car and saying "Good morning." to a passing pedestrian. If that was The Believer he’d been walking a dalmatian. Which set me thinking about religiosity and black spots as symbols of sin. A bit tough on the dog, though.

How to react now? "I wasn't aware I was being polite," I said, quite truthfully for once.

"That was how it appeared to me," he replied, grasping my hand and handing over an envelope.

The note was addressed to both of us. "For your politeness and courtesy shown always to Me!" The capital M surprised me, but not as much as the final salutation:

"Roderick and family."

Mine is a moderately unusual given name. But not odd enough to form an impromptu clan. Was this whole encounter – which incidentally invokes the name of what the French call le Grand Seigneur – based on a belief that like names should stick together? I’m not looking forward to our next meeting: the options I face are too complex.

A time to be rude?

Succès d'estime?

Have you or I been a success in life?

What an opportunity to fib our hearts out! For who dares say no? Much easier to say: "I've (you've) been a huge success but the criteria are so fuzzy and so personal I can't be bothered to define them."

I suppose this question can only be addressed to someone the French would call "of a certain age" - sixtyish and beyond. But what about those vague criteria? None of that snuggling down under the literary duvet of: "I'm a success because I feel metaphorically warm, I love the human race, I have no self-admitted enemies and people don't shudder as I pass them in the supermarket."

There are rocks ahead. Success can be measured in age itself, conveniently ignoring whether those accumulated years were happy ones. Wealth is another criterion but you won't get many Brits making a meaningful statement here; North Americans are, in comparison, more refreshingly honest. Size of family gets the nod, as if sperm strength or fecundity somehow denoted superiority. But it is when we assess intellectual achievements that we sail very close to the Winds of Mendacity.

I think for success to be real it must be observable, and approved of, by others. Better too if it didn't depend on behaviour for that may have another, darker side. I have been told (though not in so many words) that my greatest success was in marrying VR. But would that be my success? Shouldn't she have a say?

I'm proud of two things which I regard as successes. I type at the same speed my mind works. And in choosing to take up singing at eighty (and then persisting for three years) I proved I was still open to sudden change.

Go on, I double dare you. But I'd advise you to take note of the caveats.

The tyrant's heel unmasked

In retirement we repeat ourselves: lurching out of bed, doing the necessary in the tiled room, dressing (Oh, for a one-piece garment with zip!), devising reasons for not gardening, browning the toast just-so for brunch... Our working days no doubt involved repetition but there were more distractions then. Beyond 65 (60 in my case) the novelty graph tends to flatline.
      
Repetition should not describe life. Life should have the potential for change. Change is best exemplified when we learn something new but “new” doesn’t always mean “happy”.
      
I lay on the couch faintly uncomfortable. Why? Because my feet seemed remote. Why? Because I was wearing shoes and didn’t want to risk mucking up the couch. Gradually it dawned.
      
When I stretch out on the couch my feet are supported on the floor by the heels of my shoes. The heels have comparatively sharp corners. A year ago we replaced the 20-year-old living room carpet because the backing was showing through the pile. But just in one place. You’ve guessed it! Exactly where my heels grind the pile.
      
What appalled me was the time it took to make the connection. As my heels rested on the new carpet they transmitted a sense of unease but left the reason vague. After several months I saw – in my mind’s eye – those heels doing their mindless destruction. Time to consider slippers indoors.
      
Some of us do conundrums for fun. VR used to do the Guardian cryptic crosswords but I was hopeless. Yet I can isolate a writer’s intentions in badly composed prose and make corrections.
      
Finally recognising the way heels threaten carpets made me feel stupid. More ominously that I’m being overtaken by age, a reminder I don’t need. How long would it have taken Isaac Newton...?

Q and A

Can you interview yourself? Answer honestly?

RR2: Your tee-shirt sports a quote from a Mozart duet. Showing off? RR1: I suppose so. I've sung the duet and I'd like the world to know.

RR2: It's in German. RR1: Yeah, my German isn't good enough to justify that. The duet's in German.

RR2: The sentiments of the quote (Trans: Husband and wife, together, reach for divinity.) - aren't they grandiose? RR1: I've been undeservedly lucky in marriage.

RR2: Undeservedly? RR1: I wasn't much cop during the early decades, now I’m up to mediocre. After I'd printed the tee-shirt I saw the quote as a tribute to VR. But only afterwards.

RR2: You're 82, are you preoccupied with death? RR1: The thought's never distant but's it's the dying that grips me. Might there be a kernel of consciousness in dementia? I had breathing problems when young and that would be a lousy - no, terrifying - way to go. But I'm curious.

RR2: Do you consider yourself handsome? RR1: In a tall, gaunt, wearied form, yes. But only others’ opinion matters.

RR2: Clever? RR1: Not in any worthwhile way. But I can hide this defect behind well-chosen prose.

RR2: Competitive? RR1: As a working journalist, yes. I needed to be. In all other senses I'm a wimp.

RR2: Ashamed? RR1: I pretended I was a rock-climber but I lacked the moxie. I overdo blogging banter and hurt people. I talk too much, straining for effect.

RR2: You boast about reading Proust and Joyce. RR1: Why the Hell not?

RR2: Some of your opinions seem prejudiced. RR1: I could defend this given another thousand words.

RR2: Are all the above answers truthful? RR1: They include qualifications, the first step towards lying.

Muted foghorn

Van Gogh made do with an ear (albeit bandaged) while Rembrandt, in the self-portraits, plotted the evolution of his knobbly nose. Bloggers who wait for arty subjects to come along are doomed to non-expression leading to permanent silence. Art is the transformation of reality and reality is all around us. The only thing that restricts me posting about my belly-button is the thought of a photograph.

Ears I’ve done, held tight against my head with Elastoplast in my babyhood. My hair’s wildness has been explored. As has my right hand, crucified by Dupuytren’s contracture. My Roman nose. How about my mouth?

How shy I’ve become. Mouths are intimate. Mine has kissed and whispered sweet nothings in its time. For the moment there is nothing bad to say and badness is a rich source of humour. There’s nothing funny about:

My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand
To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss

Might it even be pretty? Not weighed down with sandbags like my eyes. Ahh, here’s a mort of laughter: might I have been endowed with a woman’s mouth? Would it look better lipsticked? Those novels I’ve written where disadvantaged women rise triumphant - suppressed impulses?

Away with adolescent fancies. Through that same mouth has passed sarcasm, social solecisms and sesquipedalian slander. On the positive side it’s an orifice shaped for: “Now. Now that the sun has veiled his light...”  Dryden, set to music by Purcell. It’s not all androgyny.

Is the mouth the most significant single identifier? At 10 metres does it proclaim RR? Does it smile a lot? Only others can tell. I’d like to think it’s regularly turned down in a moue of disapproval because that seems more dignified.

Mind you I wouldn’t be without it. Where would the wine go?

Unmentionables

These are Ralph Lauren underpants, I suspect they
are expensive.. I did once wear Hilfiger pants but
they were a gift from my mother-in-law and were
 remaindered in a sale. The elastic was tight.

Hitler and I were of course on opposing sides during WW2. More surprising, I didn't wear underpants during the conflict; I can't speak for Hitler.

This will shock US citizens. As if I'd I'd fought on the same side as Hitler. Or confessed to spitting in church. Yes, I'm known to be an oddity but not that damned odd! Why I might have... infected people.

As far as I know my Father did wear underpants but then his life was a closed book to me. He was an adult at the time (as was Hitler), I was 5 - 10 years old.

But why? you will ask. Why did I risk the health of a nation? You've got to understand, since I didn't wear underpants I didn't question their absence. Any more than I wondered why there were no bananas or Coca Cola. Perhaps there were simply no underpants for kids. Perhaps - and this is comically possible - kids' underpants were thought to be a luxury in the traditionally under-privileged north of England.

Dimly I remember the transition period when I started to wear them (because I do of course wear them now). Can't say the year, time isn't important to kids. But there was a new bulkiness in and around my groin, as if I were over-dressed down there. A certain discomfort. But then kids were born into discomfort and I had other fardels to bear (WS quote!)
 
I buy underpants by the half-dozen and I am influenced by the pattern. I find this astonishing; I’d like to think I was above plaids and fuchsias alternating with lobelias but I’m not. This awareness cheapens my aspirations as a writer; my mind should be on words beginning with meta-. I am at heart trivial.

Gems from humdrum dross

Tuesday morning breakfast at Tesco's café is a way of passing time while Julie, our cleaning lady, has the house to herself. Elements of ritual are creeping in.

I try to make the order (Two small Americanos no milk, bacon bap with butter, plate carrying rasher of bacon, half-slice of fried bread, fried egg) without the check-out person having to ask a question. Yes, this is junk food. That's the point.

We push our empty plates way and discuss ominous topics. Trump has sustained us for a whole year.

Also we face the car park for advanced sociological research. I once owned a BMW and became as arrogant as all BMW owners, now under threat in the Arrogance Stakes from the Audi Bunch. Parking carelessly on tarmac striped in yellow to indicate No Parking. This inalienable right comes with the make of car, you see.

SUV-borne mothers bring their children. The sub-five girls walk past our window solemnly, conscious of their expensive clothes. The boys, packed with excess energy, attempt to walk along a low narrow wall that guards the window. They flap their arms, grinning at being out of balance.

People use the ATM differently. With motorbike riders there's all that palaver of getting through layers of leather to reach their wallet. Laddish youths with shaven heads stand away from the machine, uncaring about their PINs, daring others to rob them. Those in wheelchairs must plan their movements and work sideways on. Some users count the notes, others stuff them away.

When it's raining old people (ie, those our age) approach the building with pinched faces. Those who've shopped leave briskly, glad to be off. Security men with badges loiter, trying to be inconspicuous.

Terse judgments

Twenty everyday jobs worse than being retired (with reasons):

Horticulturalist. Bending.
Member of royal household. Obsequiousness.
Farm labourer. Hours, pay, future.
Pimp. Hell’s certainty.
London estate agent. Hell’s uncertainty
Passport inspector. Despair’s herald.
Brain surgeon. Odds against getting it right.
Catwalk model. Vacuity.
Bank clerk. Counting the notes; mis-counting the notes.
Shelf stacker. Supermarket customers.
Grave-digger. Six feet is a long way down.
UK language teacher. Futility,
Tyre fitter. Smell of rubber.
Hereford restaurant waiter. Size, or absence, of tips.
Palm reader. Who’s doing yours?
Barman. Wit of drunks.
Social service worker. Ever perceived as being wrong.
Prime minister. Transience.
F1 racer. Office space.
Deity. Believers’ demands.

Ten much rarer occupations better than being retired (with reasons)

Poet. Daily unreality.
Singing student. Self-hypnosis.
Fish-and-chip shop owner. Dispensing good value
Computer repairman. Prestidigitation.
Radio actor. Faces cease to matter
Manicurist. Faces cease to matter.
Asparagus grower. Delight on tap.
Train driver. Remoteness, free travel.
Political columnist. Making fiction work.
Being Stephanie Flanders. God loves me.

Life not as we would wish

This theme arrived, ready-made, at about three this morning. Is it in any sense original?  Viable? Interesting?

We fall in love. For now love is not returned but there is no animosity. We are, however, allowed the presence of the beloved.

The beloved stands before us and that is the reality: the looks, the predisposition, the intelligence, the good, the bad. But reality is a neutral state conferred by nature, uninvolved and unjudging. We are involved and we do judge, thus our version of reality is distorted. The longer we see and communicate with the beloved the greater the distortion.

We go away and, in tranquillity, ponder the beloved. Without any immediacy to rein in our thoughts we speculate and we fantasise. We invest the beloved with qualities that may not be supported by any form of reality, ours or the neutral one; we may even imagine an improved appearance.

We return to the beloved. We may be refreshed but those speculations and fantasies do not necessarily go away; they may even be augmented because by now our means of assessing the beloved are defective, compromised by our feelings.

These distortions may be the result of trying to imagine a "better" beloved. A disagreement between us may test this tendency and we may suppress its effects. But as any psychotherapist will say: suppressed tendencies merely move to another room.

Perhaps the beloved relents and loves us back. We unite and live together, each with our distorted versions of each other. At a later, sadder moment, a distortion is recognised for what it is. Recognised but not accepted as self-wrought. We call treachery, we seek to blame. But what or whom may we blame?