As I sit on the terrace looking up at the night sky over the Mediterranean, what’s going through my head?
1. I don’t do demonstrations any more – I’ve been charged by horses, clubbed with batons, narrowly avoided a lungful of something nasty and it didn’t really achieve much, to be honest. If I was out on the streets, I’d be stunting like this.
- How to Protest
2. History always favours the winners. There’s a fairly obvious connection between this and my lack of demonstration-ing, but it doesn’t really matter that much. It occurred to me only because I was listening to the mix “Recollections from Old London Town” on the HAFTW blog (direct download on mediafire). Best listened to with the windows open so that the noise outside and inside bleed together.
3. I sent a list of Things To Do to an American friend who’s visiting Old London Town for a few days. Trying to think of things that would be a) worth doing, b) not too obscure / alienating and c) not too obvious / depressing, I realised how much of London I miss and how much I don’t, and how long it’s been since I spent any time there. Everything could have been swept away by recession for all I know, although that would probably be an improvement on the non-dom hard currency package tour that it had become.
4. What am I doing, sitting on my terrace on a Saturday night after yet another action-packed week? Ah, but it wasn’t action-packed at all – they rarely are these days. I’m in exile, not just from London, but from a way of life. Did you know that? Probably you didn’t. I’ll tell you all about it some other time, although you’ll have to buy the drinks unless that UNICEF contract comes through. Nobody can give me any performance indicators for returning from exile.
5. It’s very difficult to distinguish between self-destructive behaviour and self-constructive behaviour. Right now there are no clouds in the sky to derail thought, the dogs have quietened for the night, the lights across the bay are ghosts on the water. Put your troubles to bed before you lay your own head down, and good night.
“I’ll tell you all about it some other time”
Feeling wistful ol’ chap? How’s the bay in June?
Thanks for that, Paul, and keep us posted. We need pioneers in ways of life. I’m in a state of exile myself, though a peripatetic one.