Iconoclasm in the UK.

I've just cried. Proper tears.

Alone. All on my own, unless you count the dogs who, of course, cleaned my tears straight from my cheeks. They just like the salt, I know this, but for now I'm happy to be under the delusion that they love me and wanted to help.

I cried with frustration. A sudden, overwhelming surge of rage and of disgust crashed over me and, I, fear, has dragged me under.

I came home, gamboling up the little walk I live on with a spring in my step and a smile on my face. I don't have a great deal to smile about these days, but there's always someone worse off and, even when at my lowest point, I pride myself on being able to focus on that. Others survive, I should too, so I just get on with it as best I can.

My neighbour was stood in his front garden. He was staring at his flowers and looking quite disheveled. I noticed him and said hello but I was carrying a sack of dog food on my shoulder and didn't stop.

My neighbour is by no means a friend of mine, I don't dislike him but I don't really know him. Last year, though, I helped him pick up some furniture and deliver it to a lady he knew who had lost her home and was starting afresh with nothing. He paid for the furniture and he paid for the fuel to move it. He enlisted my help and, without her having to do a thing, he ensured that she had chairs to sit on, a bed to lie on, a cooker to cook with, curtains at the window, a fridge and a freezer and even a television. All second hand, even the mattress, but she was so grateful.

When we'd finished he kissed her on the cheek and said goodbye. She didn't see us out, she was having to use her oxygen at that point and the pipe wasn't long enough to reach the door. On the way home he told me a bit of back story.

Thirty years ago he had left the army. As many ex-servicemen will testify this can be a difficult transition for some. My neighbour had found himself drinking too much, had become violent, had destroyed his marriage and had ended up homeless. Not "But I have a right to a council house and I won't leave the office until you get me one" homeless but living in the street and eating from bins homeless.

The lady that we'd just left had known him before he joined the forces and they bumped into each other, quite by chance, in the street one afternoon. By now she had a good job working for the council, a nice little house and a car. Between her husband and herself they had a nice little life. The odd night out, foreign holidays and enough expendable income to be able to smoke sixty cigarettes a day each. Oh, and Sky television.

Her husband knew my neighbour as well. In fact they had been at the same school, never friends but never enemies, and so when she returned home that night and told him, with tears in her eyes, how low he had sunk he went out alone to find him.

They put him up, only for a week or two, just while they helped him claim some benefits and find a bedsit that the council would pay for. By the time he moved out of their little home he had been elevated through the social classes from "beggar" to "dosser". From pond life to drift wood. From filthy scum to scrounging scum. Things were good.

And things got better, at least for my neighbour. He found work, relatively well paid it was too, and he bought a house. His ex-wife forgave him a while before she died. They became closer, and when she eventually passed away after a period of illness his daughter came to live with him. From the very lowest point in his life he had risen to the heady heights of home-ownership, a respectable father to a polite daughter but who sometimes got a little too pissed on Friday night. Things went from "good" to "bloody good".

Recently, though, I get the impression things haven't been quite so good, again. I know he's now unemployed and that he knocked on my door recently to ask if we had a spare TV as his was broken.

Once in my own kitchen I dumped the sack on my counter and gave the giddy dogs a tickle, as is obligatory so far as they're concerned. Then I popped the kettle on and put some toast under the grill. My plans for this afternoon were to sit down to re-write a chapter of my next book with which I have decided I'm unhappy.

Tea and toast in hand I slumped on the settee and switched on the laptop, glancing out the window as I did. There, at the bottom of the pane and, fortunately, on the outside, was an arse. A derriere, bottom, pair of buttocks, just staring at me. Toast still dangling from my mouth I stood back up to investigate.

Outside, doubled over, was my neighbour. In one hand he had a plastic carrier bag and he was using his other hand to rummage through the plants (Ok, weeds) in my front garden. I watched for a moment, not quite sure what to do, then went outside expecting to have to remonstrate with him.

He was collecting cigarette butts. Our little walk is like a wind tunnel and a good chunk of the litter and general detritus from the dirty streets of Horwich blows along it, becoming caught in the bushes to the right or the gardens to the left. His bag was almost half full with stinking, discarded cigarettes.

I asked if he was ok. He asked if I had any Rizla. I did, so I gave them him. I also had two cigarettes, my last two cigarettes. I offered him one, but he declined and looked ready to cry. He was desperate enough to crawl along dirty streets, in full view of his neighbours, picking up dimps, but he didn't want charity.

He was wearing a tee-shirt and I saw, on the crook of his left elbow, a dressing. It was hanging off and I could see the puncture marks beneath. On his wrist was a hospital wristband with his details on. I asked if he was okay, if he needed a doctor, if he wanted a hand with anything? He shook his head. Then he cried.

My neighbour is a big man. Ex-squaddy, ex-footballer, heavily tattooed and more than capable of looking after himself. But here he was, crying. Blubbering like a schoolgirl, right there in the street.

I didn't understand much of what else he said. He mentioned his mother, I think, and I'm sure a lot of it was reassurances, swearing he was alright and that he was sorry. He turned and went back home.

I don't like to interfere in anyone else's life, but I felt I had to tell someone. I didn't feel qualified to help myself and so I looked up the appropriate telephone number and made a call. I hope he's okay.

My tears were brief. They weren't for my neighbour, for his predicament, for his suffering. They weren't for mine either. Poverty has bitten hard in my household, but we're surviving much better than some, as my neighbour today proved.

My tears were anger, frustration and hatred of me and of us. All of us. We, the English, are pathetic. Weak. A waste of the Earth's natural resources. A wealthy country, with people starving. Not "oooh I am hungry" starving, not even having to make do with beans on toast AGAIN starving, properly starving. Their bodies panicking and attempting to digest their own internal organs starving. Here, in Britain. For that I'm ashamed.

It's not just dossers and layabouts either. I'm sure my neighbour has been no angel, but neither have I and neither have you (Unless you ARE an angel, in which case let me know so I can renounce my Atheistic beliefs.) but he worked, paid taxes and was comfortable. He did a fine job of raising a daughter, too. Then a bit of a hiccup, not his fault this time, just a downturn in the economy. Oh, and changes to benefits. Rising prices. That kind of thing. The things that we allow, all of us. Selfishly thinking balls to them, we're okay. Siding with the top, hating the bottom. Blaming those below for our little problems. We don't think it'll ever happen to us. If we're struggling we believe it'll be temporary, that at some point the rot will stop, reverse and then our futures will be brighter. Don't bet on it. Statistically you're probably going to be one of the many that die without leaving a lasting legacy. Maybe a few grand in a policy, a couple of ISAs, oh and any remaining debt against your name. But other than that you and I will almost certainly amount to nothing. We'll pay some taxes, die and leave behind a new generation to pay their taxes and die.

We can't afford the full Sky HD package, so that's the fault of the immigrants because without them we'd all be better paid.

If we can't afford to go to Florida and have to settle for Disneyland Paris it's probably because of those millions of workshy bastards claiming benefits paid for with our taxes. And they're all on the fiddle, you know?

We're apathetic with a capital "A", and even without the "a" it's still a fitting description. You and I (I'm now assuming my readers to be English) are all, to a man, responsible for what we have allowed to happen. It's not the fault of the bankers, it's ours. We let them off.

Cue the bleeding hearts... "No, the government let them off, the Tory bastards, it's their fault". Fair point, I suppose, except they're OUR government. Ours. We, the fucking morons we are, put them there. And anyway, the other lot had a big hand to play in all this shit we've stepped in.

All the while we let them. We even pay them. We're the customer and, just like all big corporations, they shit all over the us. All of us. For the wealth of the privileged to have any tangible value they need a huge, stinking pile of poor people below them. People to clean up their shit, to make their consumables and to teach their children. They daren't allow us to become more than we are, what if we become more than they are? Then who'll clean up their shit, spit in their steak tartare and despise their vile children.

But the cleaner uppers must then have people to hate, to blame for their temporary positions among the ranks of the perfectly ordinary and to ensure they don't pay too much attention to the lives of the powerful. They might stop cleaning up their shit. So, lets make sure there are even poorer people for the poor to Lord over.

It's okay though, because as we all know the wealth will trickle down. Rejoice, people, and give them bigger portions so that there might be more scraps for us. That will work. As long as they aren't greedy people, that they don't stuff their faces and makes pigs of themselves. Or put the leftovers in the fridge. Or bank.

They have a monopoly on power and we've given it to them. Our Grandparents would be disgusted with us. I'm proud to say that I am thoroughly ashamed of myself. I'm ashamed of all of us.

And now, just like you, I'm going to go away, check my Twitter or my Facebook account and put the telly on. Tonight I'll probably, at least for a while, forget all about my neighbour and his hellish existence. Even if I think about him I'll do nothing to help. I may offer him a cigarette whenever I see him, I may make more of an effort to stop and speak to him, but that's it. Nothing more. I'm in no position to help anyone. I'll not fight for him, I'll not fight for myself or for my children. I'll just bend over and take it.

Just like you.

J2H.

Footnote:
This post was written while the sorrow I felt for my neighbour was fresh in my mind. As I type, our encounter was three hours ago. I feel I may have wasted your time, caused you to read all this in the hope there would be some deep and insightful comment, or maybe a rallying call for all to rise up and overthrow the establishment. It's neither. It's a demonstration of my own shortcomings and a description of the shortcomings I see in my fellow man. The same shortcomings in either case. I'm going to take some time to think about my life and the lives of those around me. Hopefully, I'll have an epiphany, jump from my lethargy and share the answer with you all. But would you listen? And anyway, we all already know the answers. We just can't be arsed asking the questions.

Cheerful, cheery, merry, jolly, light-hearted, mirthful, jovial, glad,happy, bright, in good spirits, in high spirits, joyful, elated,exuberant, animated, lively, sprightly, vivacious, buoyant, bouncy,bubbly, perky, effervescent, playful and frolicsome.

I'm feeling really rather light hearted and care free today. It's a pleasant state to be in, all smiley, laid back and devil may care. It gives you a bit of a swagger, and a happy face is a far more attractive visage than any other. Yes, young ladies, even more attractive than a duck pout.

Light hearted and care free, how lovely. If only there was a shorter word for it so I didn't have to keep typing "light hearted and care free".

But hang on, there is. It's good to be light hearted and care free. It's good to be gay. I'm gay, as gay as a gay thing and then some. I'm not always gay, sometimes I'm a right miserable bastard, but today, sun in the sky and snoozy dogs at my feet, I'm maxing out the gaydar.

As mature as most of my peers are, I am very aware that if I walked into the pub declaring "I'm feeling really rather gay today" at least one person would mime lifting a purse to their chest and make a "woooooooo" sound. And I'd probably laugh. I like a good pun. I'd probably blow them a kiss and, at that point, as liberal and inoffensive as I generally am in real life, I would be transformed, in the eye's of some, from gay to homophobe in the blink of one of those aforementioned eyes.

Gay doesn't generally mean light hearted or care free anymore. As with many other words in the English language it has evolved. At some point in the mid twentieth century "gay" became an insult, a derogatory term for a homosexual. Then it evolved further. The homosexuals "reclaimed" it. I'm not sure "reclaimed" fits, since it didn't describe homosexuality in the first place, but that's the standard word used to describe the phenomenon and so that's the one I'll stick with.

So gay lost it's potency. Suddenly (over a period of many years) the statement "you're gay" came to be met with "yes, I am", so some other perfectly innocent words, which I'll not list, were hijacked by the small minded and hurled with venom instead. Languages, along with attitudes, are evolving in a similar way all the time. Now, if you're homosexual, you don't need describe yourself as such. Homosexual is a very clinical phrase, cumbersome on the tongue. Gay is so much nicer.

Nope, this isn't a rant about gay rights.

This is appreciation for the skillful and highly successful way in which the homosexual community won a, admittedly small, battle. Maybe not even a battle, just a skirmish. But it was won, and with panache. At the risk of pandering to stereotypes, panache, flair and probably a good deal of jazz hands to finish.

A successful campaign, and one that is being mirrored with other stolen words used by those that hate. However, I would argue, not with anything like the same level of success.

As many of you are aware there has been a right brouhaha in the media this week regarding a popular BBC television presenter and journalist, Jeremy Clarkson. Mr. Clarkson is no stranger to le grande faux pas. A northerner made good in the land of the privileged, that being "that London", he has accumulated great wealth and popularity (some may say notoriety) by portraying himself as, or by actually being, a no nonsense, down to earth, common sense kind of chap. He is now a parody of himself, and very good at it he is too.

Footage was acquired by the Daily Mirror newspaper of a piece to camera JC did two years ago in which he recited a nursery rhyme, "Eenie Meenie Minie Mo" (If I've spelled that wrong, please forgive me, I've never written it down before) when having to decide which was the better of two cars featured on his show. If you're my age, or even a little younger, you will be aware that in the 1970's playground's of Britain children would use this rhyme to decide on teams for lunchtime football, which sweet they were going to eat next or whether they were playing soldiers or cowboys and Indians. You will be further aware that, at that time, a particularly offensive word to describe a black person was included. The infamous "N" word.

The "dropped bollock" and the apology.

I've actually struggled to decide whether it would be acceptable for me to include the word itself or refer to it as the "N" word. I'm blogging about a real life situation to which this word is central, so it should be okay, but I'm also a bit of a shitbag. "N" word it is then.

This footage was never included in the show for which it was recorded, that being the BBC's incredibly popular "Top Gear", which JC presents. In the footage that has now come to light JC is heard reciting the rhyme almost in it's entirety, however when he reached the "N" word he mumbles almost incoherently. Unfortunately for Mr Clarkson, since syllables of the original word had to be emphasised so as to keep time with the rest of the rhyme and since the sound he makes to begin it is either an "N" sound or an "M" sound, it still appeared he said it. Sort of. A little bit. He didn't say it, but, as he mentions in his apology, it sounds like he might have. And what are words if not just sounds anyway? Yep, JC dropped a big bollock.

The footage was then edited, ultimately pointlessly since it was never aired anyway, to say "teacher" instead. This word chosen rather than the word "tinker", a word which itself is racist, (Goodness we were awful children) and which replaced the "N" word in some schoolyard versions.

I'm now wishing I'd been braver and used the actual word instead of the shitbag version for which I opted, using the shift key for the capital "N" and the speech marks is spoiling my typing rhythm. Goodness me, one day I'll get through one of these entries without digressing. Anyway...

Now I don't want to get bogged down in the whole debate about whether or not Mr Clarkson is an idiot, a racist, completely innocent or has been fitted up by Piers Morgan, disgraced one time editor of the Daily Mirror, after a series of petty spats in which JC has come off better. For what it's worth, I think he's been a bit of a dick, he's apologised and, in an ideal world, no one would give a toss about it all anyway. We have servicemen killing and dying abroad, we have no money, our NHS is being destroyed and the council only collect our bins once a fortnight, we have far bigger issues we should be addressing.

Debate, or what passes for debate in this age of social media, on these shenanigans is rife. Everyone has an opinion. The problem with opinions, like farts and children, is that everyone loves their own and hates everyone else's.

One debate that I've seen a lot of, but that I haven't become embroiled in, is that of whether or not the "N" word is ever acceptable, whoever says it. This is why I mention the transformation of  "gay" from common usage to homophobic slur and then to perfectly acceptable descriptive term.

With the gay example, everyone can use it to describe a homosexual. Gay, straight or with a little bit of curvature it doesn't matter. Gay means gay and nothing more. Brilliant.

Now, the "N" word. Some folk lean toward the word being totally unacceptable, whatever the circumstances and whatever the colour of the speaker, whereas (from my limited experience) a good majority of folk think it's ok, so long as the speaker is black. A few think it's ok whoever says it.

For the record, I think it's totally unacceptable, in any situation and by anyone, with the possible exception of drama and comedy. Proper comedy though, not Jim Davidson.

You see, this battle/skirmish began in similar fashion to that of the "G" word, but the tactics changed at some point, meaning the battle rages on. The "N" word was reclaimed (again, the word reclaimed doesn't fit, but it's the word we all use) but was then locked away and not everyone is allowed the key to the cabinet in which it's stored.

But if it's to lose it's potency everyone should be. We should either all be able to use it, or none should be able. Rap music and culture is littered with the word, but it hasn't become a description in the way gay did. It's sound and the formation of the lips around it lend themselves to anger and abuse. It's hard to say "gay" and sound aggressive, but the "N" word can be spat out of a face contorted with anger all too easily.

Maybe reclaiming that word was a poor idea, but reclaimed it was. In my social circles I never hear the word and I don't use it, but I hear it constantly on the television and radio. Whilst this is still the case the word will never die. Children, along with you and I, are hearing the "N" word constantly and by the time they're old enough to realise they're only hearing it from black mouths it's too late, they know what it means but they don't know the history of it, the offense it causes or that, if they're white, they must never use it. To a child, wouldn't that seem unfair? Like they were being discriminated against? A word only their black friends can use? Surely that's racist.

The word needs forgetting. The occasional slip by an aging buffoon, born and raised in a more racist period of our racist country's racist history, should raise an eyebrow, maybe summon a tut and a shake of the head, but surely nothing more than that. After all, they'll all be dead one day so we'll be free of the word forever. Thrusting the debate into the media, especially in the age of Twitter and Facebook, only leads to animosity and gives the true racists their moment in the sun. A word can't fade from use if we're constantly bombarded with it.

And to think, all this palaver could've been averted if he'd just tossed a coin. Strange behaviour indeed, but then...

...there's nowt so queer as folk.

J2H.

Waiting to inhale?

I have been inspired by a thread on the web. One which has given hope to many, and given meaning to one. I don't want to mention the thread in question. Indeed, it isn't even just a thread, that's just a clever ruse on my part to throw you off the scent. The story to which I refer is a a touching and inspirational story which belongs to a very special young man and to go into too much detail would feel like I was piggy-backing his incredible story to promote my own puerile rambling here. Some of you know the story, some of you don't and some of you will think you know but you won't.

What good is a good life without a good death? None of us have the experience of our own death from our own perspective. Most of us think we know what awaits us, but none of us actually know. We believe. All of us. For the most part that's enough.

Now read on, and don't worry, it get's less dark from here on in...

It was the early 1980's, I would have been twelve or thirteen years of age, and it was a glorious summer. This was one of the frequent, transitional, periods of my existence. I was toward the tail end of my transformation from snotty nosed, scabby kneed, street urchin to hormone driven, moody, teenager and I would either be hidden away in my bedroom, tapping away on a Sinclair Spectrum and dreaming of hacking the FBI's computers, inadvertently starting WWIII, or ham-fistedly attempting to remix a hip-hop track using my ghetto-blaster and an old, 1970's, Decca turntable. Or, as on this day, in the park. Smoking and drinking cider.

We had a choice of two parks in the area that I grew up in. One was a big and picturesque expanse of greenery with a petting zoo, a pitch-and-putt golf course, a museum and a boating lake which was, by this time, just a very muddy hole in the ground. The other, the one my mates and I would frequent, was a little less grand. It had climbing frames, twisted and snapped from years of neglect and wanton vandalism, a derelict park keeper's cottage, boarded up and spooky, and an over-grown football pitch dotted with dandelions, daisies and dog shit. It also had a clear view of both gates wherever you were stood, which meant we could get on our toes whenever the local council parks and gardens warden came puttering through on his pedal-and-pop motorcycle to admonish us for whatever misdemeanor we were currently committing.

This particular morning I, along with two of my friends, had wandered up to our favourite park with a football. It was already a hot day even before nine a.m. and our arms and necks were burnt, red and freckly, from the previous day's shenanigans, pissing about in the big, water filled hole in the ground on what is now the Manchester bound carriageway of the M602 but was, at that time, nothing more than a trench dug alongside the railway. 

Once in the confines of the park, and having met up with two of our other friends that had arrived even earlier, four of us began kicking the ball about whilst the fifth went looking for an adult prepared to give him a light for one of the eight cigarettes he had stolen from his mother on his way out of the door. As was the norm, this being the only half-decent pitch not festooned with used rubber Johnnies, discarded "glue bags", hypodermic needles and sex criminals in a very populous area, other kids came along with other balls and other sun-burnt arms and we got a chance for a proper kick around with lads we'd never met. 

I can play football. But I'm shit at it. 

As shit at the beautiful game as I was, I was also a good deal bigger than my peers and, playing in defence, had mastered my own, relatively successful, unique technique. It comprised of dropping my shoulder, screwing my eyes shut and angling myself with my hip toward the oncoming striker, foot slightly off the ground and body braced for impact.

On this particularly sunny morning my tried and tested tactic was proving ineffectual against a tank of a boy. Easily as tall as me but with the body density of a chimpanzee he scored three times in as many minutes, putting me on my arse each time. Encumbered as I was by a distinct lack of any discernible talent and without an ounce of skill there was only one thing for it. Straight from the restart the ball was sent wide to the tank who began his thunderous advance down the left wing. This time I ran to meet him with a hurriedly adapted new move clear in my head. I screwed my eyes shut and launched myself into a career halting, two-footed, tackle. I opened my eyes to see the tank somersault over me and land, hard, on the ground. He wasn't happy, but halfheartedly accepted my apology and off we went again.

Two more ridiculously dangerous tackles later and he was no longer prepared to accept my increasingly incredible apologies, and I could tell by the snarl and the look in his eyes that he was harbouring a number of petty minded notions of retribution. The game was on.

Shins, elbows and knees became bruised and battered as the first half wore on and both of us had both our own and each others nose-blood spattered on our shirts as a result of one particularly spectacular aerial challenge. Both of us had our eyes screwed shut that time and my nose and teeth had collided with his corresponding facial features bringing my participation in the match to a temporary halt while I smoked a cigarette and had a glug of Olde English. Like a pro. 

I came back on just as the first half was about to end. We had a girl with us, "Spunky Fingers" Simone, and she was what passed for a referee. Sat on her coat on the touchline with someone else's Casio digital watch, cupping her hand over it to occasionally check the sunlight-unfriendly red LED display. She didn't possess a whistle, so half time was signalled by her shouting "Eee-yarr".

I began to gently jog over to the kid with the cigarettes and alcohol who couldn't play because he had Asthma and had forgotten his inhaler. He kept himself busy by chain smoking the cigarettes, lighting each new cigarette with the dying embers of the last since we didn't have any matches.

Suddenly, from behind, struck the tank. He clipped my heel as I walked, causing me to stumble forward, and to aid me on my way Earthward he pushed me hard in my back. I landed chest first on the ball I'd been lazily dribbling before me and every last puff of wind was knocked from my chest. 

The tank sat on me and wrapped his fat fingers around my throat from behind, squeezing and pulling backwards. I found myself lay on my own hands, no air in my lungs and no prospect of getting any whilst tank was holding my airways shut. I panicked, unable to make a sound, take a breath or move an inch my brain began to become starved of oxygen.

I couldn't even move my head, and my eyes bulged. From where I lay I could see the metal railing around the park, the gently wafting branches of a big, old, sycamore tree, the roof and apex of a house and a single cloud in a bright blue sky. Silently screaming inside my own head, I realised I was about to die and there wasn't a single thing I could do about it.

Then "POP".

Just that, a pop, and everything changed. 

I didn't need to breath, it didn't hurt anymore. I was so excited. I couldn't wait to tell everyone they were wasting their time. That it was some kind of conspiracy, the powers that be were tricking us into thinking we needed to breath. But we didn't. I was elated.

And the sky, so blue. A blue so bright and deep, a blue I'd never seen before or since, but that I can still picture. A new blue, I'd discovered a new COLOUR. People were going to be so excited when I showed it them.

I could see the leaves on the sycamore tree, a good fifty metres away, in exquisite detail. Each leaf it's own particular shade of green, the veins along their backs in fine, high-definition detail. A ladybird on one.

The dorma-window on the roof I could see had a spider's web in the corner. A woman stood in the room, only her head and shoulders, in profile, were visible from that angle. She was smiling, and very beautiful. I decided I'd tell her about the new blue first.

Then the grey speckles, moving in from the periphery of my vision, fizzling and crackling and causing the image before me to fade. Except for the blue. The blue remained. And now came the memory.

A nothing memory. Two years old, sat on the back of the horse that was my baby walker in the middle of the living room in the house my sister was born in. I was looking out of the big, bay window as a bus, in the old Mancunian orange livery, coughed and spluttered by. I was waiting for my dad, due home from another hard day at Parker Rosser's timber yard, duffle bag on shoulder and smelling of sawdust. We had no carpet down, so the hard, plastic wheels on my horse made a harsh noise against the uneven floorboards. The black and white television was in the corner, turned off, and in it's dark tube I could see the reflection of myself and, behind me, my mother, stood framed in the doorway to the kitchen and drying a bowl with a checkered towel.

I was happy. Happier than I'd ever been before. The world was awesome, really awesome. If I'd died at that moment I would have died happy. But it wasn't time. A sudden explosion of noise from all around, children playing, birds singing, air brakes on buses "pississsing" in the distance. Until then I'd not realised how silent the world had become, but now the noise came back. Tank had let go, and my face fell against the cool grass below. Along with the noise came the fire.

My chest filled with air. Hot, thick, air, burning my throat and chest as it reinflated my lungs. I coughed and coughed, small chunks of what looked like croutons spraying from my throat and onto the football pitch. I looked up.

No more new blue. The sky was still crystal clear and beautiful, but it was back to being the old blue. It had been, and remained, a glorious summer's day, but in comparison to the world I'd just seen fizzle out of existence this was just another, ordinary day. Also, every inch of me hurt.

I'm an Atheist, not in the least spiritual and suffer from no superstition. I believe my brain was starved of oxygen and was playing tricks on me. Nothing more. A more pious individual may have believed it was a little glimpse of Heaven. Maybe a spiritualist would see it as proof of life after death.

For me, it was my ebbing consciousness giving me a reward for having put me through the pain of existing in the first place. A life of struggle, fear, loss, love and hope, and of spells of happiness found in the face of it all, complete, now a brief moment of sheer bliss. But that moment would have been my last, and so for me would have stretched off into eternity. A violent and painful demise, but a pleasant and everlasting death.

So who cares who's right and who's wrong? This is one instance in which there can be no argument, no debate, it just doesn't matter. Whatever will be, will be. Whether it's pleasant because your God made it so or pleasant because our brain just works that way, it's still pleasant. A rose, by any other name.

No one need fear death, no matter how it rears it's hooded head. 

Remember, when the inevitable happens and it's time to say goodbye to a loved one, they've already lived an eternity of happiness while you've been stood sniffling at the grave side. At the point we change states we won't have a care in the world, no matter what we leave behind us. Everything will be beautiful, you can check out that new blue I told you about, and like I said...

...you don't need to breathe.

J2H.

Rats, traps and two smoking barrels.

I dream a lot. I love dreams. Especially nightmares. A free and exclusive, personalised horror film, what's not to like?

Last night wasn't a nightmare night. Last night I dreamt I was young again. I visited places from my formative years in a weird, psychedelic way, flying on the back of a giant, pink moth. It was a good dream and a small section of it reminded me of a man I've not seen in well over a decade, a job I loved and a Tuesday morning in the pub.

I've changed the name of the man to protect the innocent. Or to prevent him from being charged. You'll see.

One of the many jobs that I have had throughout my pointless, meandering journey from cradle to grave was as a postman. When I look back on it, it was the perfect job for me. Early starts, early finishes, a good deal of eye-hand coordination when sorting, a friendly environment, a little bit of heavy lifting, chatting to people on my round and riding a push bike. I loved it. The only thing that prevents it being the "good" job that it always was is the management that came along after part-privatisation. No longer run by postmen that have worked their way up but now almost exclusively people that have been to university to learn how to juggle figures, blue sky think and wear cheap shoes. (A postman never wears cheap shoes, check it out.) These are the people that decided to rebrand the Royal Mail as "Consignia". I bet most of you didn't know that. It was Consignia for a good while, then they changed their minds and spent double the initial outlay changing it all back again. The Royal Mail made obscene amounts of money for the Crown. Then the Government took over (part privatisation, they were the only shareholder), put a load of post-graduates in management positions and wondered why overnight it began making ridiculously huge losses. It's not rocket-science.

But back to the story. Hopefully that mini-rant will be my only digression.

One particular morning I had to deliver to a back street pub on the border of Salford and Manchester. The area between our two great cities is akin to a no-man's land, a mile or so wide strip of derelict mills, unused car parks, a canal and some prostitutes. The pub in question belonged to Manny, a chap I'd known well since childhood, and I left his post until last so I could enjoy the pint he always offered me.

It was about nine a.m. when I arrived so officially the pub was still "closed", but business being so scarce in those days of pre-regeneration Manny ran a twenty four-seven operation. Thick, heavy black-out curtains covered the windows and were actually stapled shut so that no one could accidentally allow a chink of light to spill on to the street at three a.m. as there weren't even any street lights in the area back then, so the local constabulary (at least the ones that weren't in the pub getting pissed for free) would be able to spot it a mile off. Everyone knew to go around the back of the pub and come in through the kitchen, so in I went.

The pub was gloomy, dust motes dancing in the light from the open kitchen door, musty scented and deathly quite. Unusually, Manny wasn't behind the bar as he usually was, still in his slippers, cigarette in hand, perched on a wobbly bar stool and coughing into the sports section of the Daily Mirror while studying the form of the nags running that day. Slightly unnerved at this, I don't like change, I put my bag on the floor and crept through, up to the counter.

There, squatting on the floor and aiming a shotgun (unnecessarily since it had had the barrel sawed off) at a box of crisps on the bottom shelf was Manny, wearing one slipper, a bandage on the other foot and with trademark cigarette tucked behind his ear.

"Shhhh."

I shhhhhed.

"I've got a rat somewhere in the pub, and he's been nicking the crisps." Manny was lying in wait to ambush the rodent.

Manny's pub had always had rats. They would stream across the car park whenever the dray wagon arrived with his casks and kegs, and he didn't mind that. But now they were stealing from him. Manny didn't like that at all.

"Where'd you get THAT?" I whispered.

"Get what?" Manny remained staring at the crisp box.

"The fucking shotgun." Stupidly, I'd thought he'd know to what I was referring.

"Oh, some lads left it in the pool room." Manny was so "matter of fact" about it that I let it drop.

"Serve yourself, mate, if I move I just m..." There was a rustle from the box.


BADOOM!

The shotgun went off and Manny leapt to his feet. I shat myself.

"YESSS! Dirty little bastards." He walked toward the bar, completely unconcerned that his specially adapted firearm had just destroyed the crisps, a good eighty percent of the glasses on the shelves, the shelves themselves and his glass washer.

I shook my head and began to fill my glass.

"Awww fuck." Manny exclaimed eloquently.

Blood, fur, teeth and skull fragments, together with perforated crisp packets, cardboard and what looked like a little, blue collar, created a macabre Murial on the back of the bar. (That's right, "Murial", not "mural". There was an eye in the middle.)

Now as it transpired, Manny had been hunting this rat for a week or two. First he tried baited poison traps. The poison had been eaten but no dead rats had been found. Then he tried vicious rat traps, of the over-sized mouse trap variety, but had elected to remove these after treading on one while wearing his slippers.

Next, before resorting to heavy artillery, he had borrowed a Jack Russell Terrier from a customer which he had allowed free run of the pub for a few days. Still no dead rat, the crisps were now disappearing at an alarming rate.

It turned out that the very misleadingly named Jack Russell, "Lucky", like the prey on which he failed to prey, had a liking for crisps. He'd spent his nights eating Manny's stock and then sleeping with a full tummy behind the boxes of crisps on the bottom shelf

I wanted to recount this tale for no particular reason, and thought I might be able to tie it in with some deep, meaningful ending. Something clever, you know. A moral. I'm struggling, but I've tried my best. If you take one piece of advice from this entry, let it be this;

Never lend Manny your dog.

J2H

We're all doomed.

I saw another of those tweets that annoy me today. Not because of it's content so much, but because of it's presentation. It was a picture of Karl Marx alongside a list of reasons he was "wrong". Politics aside, there was one statement in the list that claimed he'd never had a job. This was factually incorrect, one-hundred per-cent untrue, and was the only "fact" in the list, all the other points being opinions on the man's character and his beliefs.

At this point I'd just like to say that I am not a Marxist. I don't class myself as anything in a political sense and, through the medium of Twitter, I've been described as both a Communist AND a Fascist. Hows that for a wide spread? I see some good in the left and some good in the right but the pigheadedness of both camps, their stubbornness and inability to ever allow themselves to see that an idea from the "opposing team", no matter how clever or righteous, has any validity, reminds me of the schoolyard and I have no intention in getting embroiled in a row which will only result in me getting my dad, who is considerably bigger than their dads, to beat them all up.

The thing I dislike about Tweets such as the one I began this post by mentioning is that they portray an air of validity due to the clever use of photo-shop (other photo editing software packages are available) and, when viewed by weaker minded individuals, are taken as fact. Verbatim. Twitter says so, so so it is. Twitter also says God exists and that he doesn't and that Manchester City are the greatest team in the world but Manchester United are too. When we see a badly speld (sic) argument espousing the rights of the left, the wrongs of the right or the innocence of the guilty we disregard it. He can't spell, he's thick, ignore it. But slap a pretty picture on it and use a spell checker then even the pimpliest, socially inept and awkward fourteen year old can make a spurious statement sound like it was spilled from the lips of JFK, Churchill or Stephen Fry. But it's still bollocks.

After pointing out the factual error in what was otherwise, I'm sure, a very pertinent and even sided argument I was taken to task by someone that saw what they believed to be my defence of, in their opinion, a dangerous and subversive ideology. I'd made no statement for or against Marxism, nor put forward an opinion on the other, more subjective, points made. Just that Mr Marx had, at times in his life, worked. After being told I was wrong I had to wait a short while until the chap returned from a Google search to admit that okay, I was right, but Marx was lazy and had had to rely on the cash of others to survive when he had very little himself so his notions were invalid. Invalid they may be, I offer no argument either way, but this chap, who was perfectly eloquent throughout the conversation and quite plainly educated to a decent standard, had taken that "fact" that had been slipped into a list of opinions, opinions that he already clearly believed in, as being evidence. It took a moment or two for him to find out it wasn't the complete truth, but had someone not attempted to point out the error/misinformation he wouldn't have checked and would have believed it.

All this got me thinking, what if we really SHOULD be taking more notice of made up words set to pretty pictures. What if the answers are all around us? I'm not talking about Tweets, that would be silly. Enough monkeys banging away at enough typewriters would give us the complete works of William Shakespeare, along with a ridiculous amount of gibberish. It's the same problem with Twitter. Some really great, life affirming, advice or insightful political thinking will be in there, but they remain hidden from view under a huge pile of banana skins and monkey shit.

No, Twitter is useless. What we need is a more concise collection of pictures with made up words added. A more organised library of lazy literature. What we need is...

...HOLLYWOOD.

(Or Pinewood, or Bollywood, or any of those other, wonderful, dream factories.)

Think about it, everything that could possibly go wrong has already been tackled, and overcome, on the big screen.

Russia bullying the world? British? Send for Bond, James Bond. If they invade the USA call for the Wolverines. (The '80s Wolverines, not the weak, flabby, 2012 team.) Dead but don't yet know it? Find a troubled pre-teen and damage him psychologically for life. The Nazis are attempting to steal your Arc of the Covenant? Call Indy.

Actually, no, don't call Indy. Indy does nothing.

In fact, why wait for disaster or war before we ask the Producers for an appropriately heroic and successful ending? Why not just take it on ourselves to live our lives like movies? Just imagine...

The good guy always winning (yes, yes, I know, but Hannibal Lecter is pretty cool).

After losing him/her briefly to a despicable cad, crying in the rain and spoiling the puppy you bought together and who now you secretly despise, you will end up living happily ever after with the man/woman (Oooh, you realise you just said "man stroke woman" in your head? That's rude.) of your dreams.

The local naughty boys home would be transformed from a grey, dark, lonely place of desperation to a technicolour sing-a-long with impromptu dancing and jolly old food fights.

If you're being chased by a murderous psycopath and you're a female, with hymen intact, you'll know you're going to be okay. Your boyfriend will save you in the end, after being thought dead and forgotten about for a good half hour.

Evil genius has captured you? It's ok, he's bound to leave you in a room with a single, incompetent, armed guard while he goes to prepares his killer-piranha-fish-death-ray-o-matic-tron for use. But not until after he's told you about his plans and revealed the one weak spot in his metallic, island fortress.

We know it all. What is, was and what will always be. We know God is a kindly chap with a sense of humour and who looks very much like Morgan Freeman. We know if we want to be a champion free-runner all we need to do is locate a radioactive spider and let it bite us. No means of escape from a perilous situation in an office block? Jump out of the window screaming, there'll be a massive pile of boxes in a skip to break our fall.

By the way, America, don't you watch your own movies. Armageddon? Deep Impact? If Hollywood's taught us anything it's that as soon as you elect a president that looks anything like Morgan Freeman then we're all doomed!

As ever, I'm both rambling and digressing wildly. Flailing my literary arms frantically attempting to get my point across while sinking below the foamy waves of coherence. I apologise. Hopefully you already do your research and refuse to believe something just because it was attached to a picture of a dead dolphin or a despotic leader. If you don't, hopefully you now will. If you won't, then let me show you a little picture I've been working on.

Now available in paperback and eBook.

Thank you all ever so much for taking the time to read my mental meanderings. And don't worry, folks, life isn't like the movies.


It's better than that.

J2H

Yes, I'm aware there's a spelling mistake, it's called "irony".

Toward the end of last year I wrote a book, The Ballad of Kissy Sizzle, and made it available as an eBook on Amazon. Earlier this week it came out in paperback and has had some very flattering sales figures already, along with some lovely reviews and comments. I also heard from a lot of people that they, too, have written books but that they haven't attempted to have them published. In my opinion, in this modern age, there's no reason why these folk shouldn't have a go. Publishing on Amazon is easy enough and won't cost you a penny even if you never sell a copy. If you don't fancy that then try Jottify.com where you can upload your work and have it published as a free eBook. There's no excuse, and what's the worst that could happen.

And so to the main part of today's blog, another bloody poem. Sorry.

Four decades ago or maybe more,
Whilst sat with my dad on our parlour floor
I began to learn the art of the pen
To get me set for that day when
I'd have to sit in a room full of peers
And spend the following twelve or so years
Filling my head with the knowledge of things
That'd help me to cope with the trials life brings
To spell, to read, to add up, to learn
The tools I'd need to be able to earn
A wage to keep a roof overhead
And make sure my loved ones were never unfed
To keep the clothes upon their backs
To be a consumer and pay all my tax

So there we sat, cross legged on the floor

I was aged three, or maybe four

My father wrote out the whole alphabet

Then slid me the page while he went to get

The bacon and eggs and hot cup of tea

My mother had waiting in the scullery

He sat at the table and watched my face

As I stuck out my tongue and started to trace

Those squiggles and scribbles that made no sense

But that if I copied out right would earn me ten pence

To spend as I wished in Mr Harris' sweet shop

On fizz bombs or bubbly or a bottle of pop

To take to my granddads where I was to stay

As I did every week so my parents could play

But back to the story I wanted to tell
Of Saturday mornings learning to spell
An hour or less of my fathers free time
That enabled me later to write down this rhyme
He planted the seeds for my teachers to feed
I was able to write before I could read
Now some might say that's arse over tit
Like learning to walk before you can sit
But at three years of age what would you rather,
Sit colouring in or learn from your father?
That man so big and smart and strong
Who, in your eyes, can do no wrong
Passing down to you his knowledge and skills
So that one day you can also pay bills

So I learnt the art of using a pen

Of writing my name and counting to ten

Then I fumbled and floundered through my education
And took my place in the land of taxation
Alongside my father and neighbours and friends
Scratching a living till the day it all ends
But along the way, a trillion thoughts thought
And scenery seen and small battles fought
Moments that pass in the blink of an eye
And fade in our memory as time passes by
But to lose such events to the annals of time
Would have to be a pointless crime
When armed with nothing but a pen
We can write them down to visit again

And better than that we can share those pages

Letting our story live throughout the ages

In diaries and journals or sprayed on a wall

Our scribblings and musings might outlive us all

Just write it down somehow my friend

And pass it on before you end

Every day's unique, no two ever the same

And only you see your own little frame

Of the beautiful picture that's played out before us

So share it with all in a wondrous chorus

Of words and of thoughts and of tales of lives spent

Scrabbling around and trying to pay rent

And making our way from cradle to crypt

Trying our best to stick to the script

So sit down and write your own version of what

You see and you do and you are and you're not

No matter what medium you write down the caper

Whether Twitter or Facebook or Blogspot or paper

So long as you share it your song will be sung

Long after your own last round bell has been rung
Don't worry about the grammer and spelling
The important parts all lie in the telling
We all have a tale of gladness and strife
Battles won and some lost in this war we call "life"
You may think that you're dull and that no one will care
What you thought or you did, but they will, so please share
Your dreams and your passions and all that you knew
Your take on this life, your own personal view

J2H

Derek's bench.

Once we're gone, dead, deceased, shuffled off this mortal coil, pushing up daisies and expired, for how long will we be remembered? Unless you have invented/will invent a cure for cancer or risen to power during our nation's darkest hour then it won't be for very long. Your kids, if you're unfortunate enough to have them, love you and I'm sure they'll remember you. If you survive long enough then your grandchildren will have time to get to know you and you'll be remembered a little longer.

An increasing number of us will get to meet our great-grandchildren. I remember one of my great-grandmothers, Nellie Hall. A lovely lady and the very epitome of a Salfordian pub landlady. Imagine Annie Walker of Coronation Street fame and you'll not be far off the mark. Of course, by the time I knew her she'd "retired" to Morecambe where she lived out her days in the big, old, pub that her daughter Dianne and Dianne's husband ran. I remember the pub fondly from my childhood, it always struck me as being a very grand place. I thought about Googling it whilst writing this, it was/is called the Queen's and it was/is on the coast road overlooking the beach, but I decided against it. Pubs aren't what they were and I like the image I carry in my head so, all things considered, I'd rather it remain unspoiled.

But, as ever, I digress.

Towards the end of her life great grannie Nellie became increasingly confused. Occasionally my father would get a phone call in the middle of the night from the police station on Salford Crescent. Nellie would be there having been picked up wandering the streets in her slippers. She never had any money with her and none of us ever found out how she managed to get herself from Morecambe all the way back to Salford at that time of night, but she did. The police knew her and knew my dad. He would bring her home, never once complaining and all the time being addressed by his deceased father-in-laws name, to the pub we lived in. She would have a little drink and sit happily, for an hour or two, chatting as if she were back in her hay day whilst my father yawned, smiled and longed for his bed. Then she'd retire to the spare room before being returned, safely, the following morning. The Queen of Sheba. Shamefully, sometimes she hadn't even been missed.

Nellie is long dead. My own mother is now the great grandmother of the family and is in fine fettle, well on target to see her granddaughter grow up. She'll be loved and remembered for a good while yet.

But once we're gone time ceases to matter. We were unborn for an eternity and will remain dead for another. We may live to be a hundred years old, maybe meeting our great, great, grandchildren. We may remain in living memory for a couple of hundred years, but as a percentage of eternity those two centuries can reasonably be described as "fuck all" time. Not even the blink of an eye. Once dead the eons will slip by as rapidly as the beat of a blue tit's heart, unnoticed.

These days we have social networking, a digital stamp that remains after death giving people the ability to remember you and to remind others that you lived and were loved. A good friend of mine died, a number of years back, from brain cancer. I still get the odd update from his mother or missus, a little note in the form of a message for him posted to Facebook. The messages aren't intended for his dead eyes. They're there to show the rest of us that he's not been forgotten yet and to remind us he was loved.

Memorial pages such as his may remain online for ever more. In the main they'll eventually become unread, possibly stumbled across occasionally by a school boy doing a history project or a descendant having a go at tracing the family tree and, at some point, they'll be totally forgotten about. Who knows, maybe that won't be for a thousand years but still, as a percentage of eternity, "fuck all" time.

A couple of days ago Patty and myself hopped in the van with our dogs and took a drive up to a place called Rivington Barn. A glorious day, sunny and warm, we set off up the path behind the barn and on to the mountain. It's a beautiful part of the world, full of history and quirks. A man made, Japanese style, lake is situated just below the folly. Caves, ducks, Oriental trees and shrubs and plenty of swimming for two hot, panty, pups after a long walk, we stopped there and let the dogs off their leads so they could be proper dogs for a little while.

There's a bench beneath a tree and facing the pretty lake. From the bench you get a lovely vista. The lake itself, along with it's little, rocky islands and caves on the opposite side, gallivanting dogs and panicking waterfowl dashing hither and thither, we stopped, sat and chatted, just enjoying the unseasonably good weather. We didn't even think to wonder why there was a park bench half way up a mountain, so ideally situated, for us to rest our backsides on.

Eventually I stood up to throw a stick or two for the hounds, whereupon I noticed the little, metal, plate screwed to the back of the bench that I'd been leaning against. "In loving memory of Derek James Jepson, 1949-2006". A simple, concise, elegant inscription dreamt up and paid for by a relative, possibly his newly widowed wife, before being thoughtfully placed in a beautiful setting. Functional, unobtrusive, silent and tasteful. Without the bench we'd have carried on walking, admiring the lake as we passed. We would have found somewhere else to sit and to enjoy wasting a bit of time and neither DickFingers nor myself would have ever have heard of Mr. Derek Jepson. But heard of him we now have, as have you. Some of you may live for another ninety years or more, carrying on the memory of a man you never met (or at least his name, date of birth and date of death) for a little while longer. You may never think of Derek again, but he's in there now. All because another man you've never known sat on a bench once.

I know next to nothing about Derek. I don't know if he was nice or nasty, generous or selfish, kind or spiteful, though if he was anything like the rest of us he'll be a good mix of all six. I built up a picture of him though, sat there while Patty tried in vain to wrestle our German Shepherd off an Irish Wolfhound (which took AGES). In my mind, Derek was :

Not particularly tall, he wore glasses for reading and should have worn them at all times but didn't. His hair was almost completely grey and his balding pate was usually hidden beneath a flat cap in the summer and a woolly hat by the end of October. He had a son and two daughters, each of whom now have children of their own. His eldest daughter's marriage broke down when her son was one year old and Derek became the main male role model in the little boy's life, taking him to watch Bolton Wanderers play occasionally in his last couple of years. His widow is a redhead who laughs like a loon when she's had a little too much to drink. He was a Christian and truly believed he was going to Heaven. After leaving school, aged fifteen, he got a job in a mill. The mill closed in the 70s, after which he joined the police force. He retired just a few years before his death, giving him just enough time to take his wife on a cruise and to buy a little, static, caravan in Rhyl where they spent most weekends. He drove a red Mondeo and his favourite meal was the roast dinner his wife made whenever the kids where visiting. (Except for the mash, she always made it too sloppy, but he never told her.) Derek had a dog, a Shi'tzu, called Bonnie. He pretended it was a gift for his wife and would "complain" that he had been lumbered with walking the "bloody thing", but in actual fact he loved Bonnie and would call her "Bonnie-boo-boo" while making kissy noises whenever they were alone. He was, to most that knew him, a good, honest, hard working man. To some he was a bit of a moaner and to a few he was a right pain in the arse, just like all the rest of us. He was very proud of the fact his son looks like him and he was grateful his daughters took after his wife. Bonnie misses him, she still thinks one day he'll come back.

If any of the previous paragraph is true I'd be very surprised, but I'll never know one way or the other so it doesn't matter. I spent the few minutes before I bothered to go and help DickFingers regain some semblance of control over the giddy dogs just thinking about Derek James Jepson. A bloke long dead before I knew him and now resting in peace, but who had touched someone so much in his allotted years that she/he had taken the time to remember him in such a way. A way that, years later, gave DickFingers and I a place to rest. In peace.

Thank you Derek.

J2H.

Footnote:

While sat on Derek's bench I was filming the dogs, frolicking and fucking about, in the lake. I thought it'd be nice to share it with you all and so I've edited it together and dedicated it to your friend and mine, the late Mr. Derek James Jepson. We never knew him, but we know he was loved.

Derek James Jepson

1949-2006

Enjoy the little things, folks.

S'very important.

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