Thoughts On Certain Faces Seen In London

 

 Bedlam Insane Asylum, engraving by William Hogarth

And there were others, strange, weird faces and forms and twisted monstrosities that shouldered me on every side, inconceivable types of sodden ugliness, the wrecks of society, the perambulating carcasses, the living deaths—women, blasted by disease and drink till their shame brought not tuppence in the open mart; and men, in fantastic rags, wrenched by hardship and exposure out of all semblance of men, their faces in a perpetual writhe of pain, grinning idiotically, shambling like apes, dying with every step they took and each breath they drew. 

     - The People of the Abyss, Jack London (1903)

It's not unusual in London to see people who look like the heirs of those poor souls described by Jack London 120 years ago, usually in Aldi. The main difference being attire, whereby 'fantastic rags' have been replaced by comfy leisurewear, the elasticated waistbands of which do a good job of accommodating (and disguising) weight increase. Yes, it's ironic that today's 'poor' look so well-fed, but then earlier versions didn't have the temptation of today's fast-food-lined high streets and a pizza delivery service.

If I joke, or worse appear to mock, I only do so as a defence against the horror of what I see and an awareness that I am only a few steps away from 'the Abyss' myself. So many of us live 'on the edge', whether through precarious mortgages or simply low wages. 

However, before I venture too far into economics and financial uncertainty today, I must address what disturbed me and lead to certain thoughts a few nights ago. I had emerged from the tube at Archway to catch a bus which, the sign informed me, wasn't due for another 13 minutes, so I began walking to stops further down the road. But even before that, I'd seen two examples of 'perambulating carcasses', to use London's harsh terminology. They hovered around the bus stop, doing so in a way which didn't suggest uncertainty about whether to wait or walk, as I did, but more an 'eternal' hovering, a listless, nowhere-to-go kind of hovering. More than that, since it's common enough to see people who are apparently detached from the city's normal flow of human traffic, their faces did indeed seem to be 'in a perpetual writhe of pain'.

It was their faces that struck me more than their shambolic attire. In them I seemed to see the Abyss of both financial and psychological ruin. Walking on, I encountered another, shuffling through the gate of a house. He literally shuffled in sandals with unkempt hair and baggy tracksuit bottoms. clutching a few bags of crisps in one hand. 

Walking on, I started thinking about these people and it struck me that whilst they must be noticed by many others, they stood out more now than ever before. Even street photos of London in the 1960s reveal some desperate-looking characters and barefoot kids. London of the 70s could be seen as extremely shabby compared to today, the difference being that now we have so much 'regeneration' and a mania for 'luxury' apartment blocks along with seemingly endless new 'developments' that the people of the Abyss stand in greater contrast to the big, shiny new world.

We are, after all, supposed to have progressed to the point where material progress is not only possible but commonplace. Compared to decades past, that's true. No-one lives in slum conditions and very few people genuinely starve to death in 'developed' countries. Still, it struck me that the assemblage of images and information highlighting 'success' via advertising, online 'influencers', magazines and TV serve to heighten to shock of seeing these tortured physiognomies. I don't mean their material failure, but their actual faces which, I suppose, reflect their social standing, although it's theoretically possible to appear tortured whilst being rich. An incredibly 'ugly' person could own a yacht, but have you ever seen one? 

I say 'ugly', but that doesn't really suit the kind of faces I saw. It was as if all the psychological and physical torture that could be experienced by a person had contorted the faces to mark their presence; written horror in their eyes and warped their skin to match. Unlike citizens of the early 20th century and much earlier, Londoners today are bombarded with pristine faces and healthy-looking bodies, on underground advertisements and yes, bus stops. These images are unavoidable. I would say that such images torment the unfortunate ones, but I suspect they long ago left the realm of common environmental awareness to inhabit their own alien form of inner space from which the outside world looks very different to the one you and I see. This I concluded, having walked to another bus stop. Perhaps it's wishful thinking but I hope, for their sake, it's true.

Not fit for purpose / Soul Train

RTomens, 2021

Wassup? 

Lying on my side in bed this morning I could feel my stomach gently nudging at the waistband of my comfy home wear slob about trews and I didn't like it. No, I didn't. It's not a new feeling. To be honest, I've had it since about July last year. So I lay in bed feeling a bit...fat. LJ is always saying I should do more exercise. She's right. 

People are right about a lot of lifestyle advice but do we obey them? Perhaps you do. Perhaps you're one of those Peloton addicts. Every other TV ad these days features people (mostly women) in lycra, exercising. Obviously, exercising is big during lockdown life. And jogging. It's a fad. People who would otherwise just get the bus to the tube and walk five minutes to the office running, running, running around as if that's what they'd do if they were working.  Annoying. 

LJ was also probably right whilst we were on a walk the other day and she predicted that London would one day be populated only by the middle classes and their immigrant servants (cleaners, nannies, delivery drivers etc). A cheery thought.

One sure way to cheer meself up is to watch a Soul Train dance clip. The fashion, style, attitude and, of course, music. The Temptations' Glass House has been a fave of mine since buying the album, A Song For You, in 1975. Everyone was slim in 1975.

Modernist architectural wreck

 

Came across this building whilst out for a stroll the other day. It stumped us. A modernist ruin? It looked too 'young' to be abandoned already. Neither of us could work out its age. Late-60s? Early-70s? I doubted it was even a house at first, such was its condition. It's to the side of a drive leading to a tower block so we thought it might have once been inhabited by the caretaker. Whatever, it's tragic modernist-dream-ruined state is, to me, mysterious. London's filled with great modernist houses, of course, but this is the first in 'ruin' that we've seen.

Paper collage: Redemption / Consumer culture

RTomens, 2021

Wassup? Been shopping recently? I mean, into a shop (other than the supermarket)? Me neither. I'm looking forward to charity shops reopening so I can get amongst the books again. The collage above isn't a specific comment on shopping and consumerism, the text torn from an old newspaper just had to go with an image of a 'Redemption Store'. 

Recently a friend on FB made a comment about 'zombie consumers' to accompany a photo of shopping trollies abandon in the sludge of a river. I warned him he was in danger of sounding like a 'communist', not knowing exactly what he meant, or even what I meant by the response. But I was reminded of the slogan: 'you'll own nothing and be happy'. Right. If you don't own anything, who does? Someone else. And they will control you through their ownership.

Signs here and there suggest a vogue for anti-materialist/post-Marxist, neo-socialist ideas. You know the kind. These things come and go in waves. Aside from millions of minds having gone mad over the last year or so, naturally, youth will be what they think is idealistic. Yeah, I would have shouted similar slogans 40 years ago. Maybe. 

Like those declaring the Covid-restricted world to be a better place, ecologically/socially. OK. Enjoy it whilst you can! I'll take the busy, normal world, thanks. 

I've never been a big consumer, except when it comes to books. When the shops open, I'm sure, as I kneel before the alter (shelves), I shall be redeemed!

Vispo/Drawing/Typewriter art: C Breaks Free / Be Thankful For What You Got?

RTomens, 2021

C Breaks Free was finished this morning since it was pure typing done a couple of days ago until I decided to add some ink lines. I haven't drawn a great deal on typewritten works but since thinking about it recently I'll be doing more. It's possible for a kind of tension to arise between the lines and typed letters, as well as lines enhancing letters, they could overwhelm them.  I shall be experimenting with the density of the lines. The background marks are from rain drops. When it started I thought, for a second, it would ruin the piece, but then I went with it, let it rain and smeared the drops. Turns out I like the effect.

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'Be thankful for what you got' sang William DeVaughn in the classic of the same name. It's something I try to remember when I get fed up. We all should, but it's not easy, having to admit that whatever's wrong about your life someone is suffering more. As I thought about this today I compared myself to my friend who's been on the doles for decades, then compared him to a rough sleeper, then him to a starving African and finally I skipped across to a very rich but thoroughly unhappy man. Imagine being able to own everything but happiness? Down from him on the material ladder I could see an upper middle-class type who was never fully satisfied because with one more leap he could join the super-rich. 'Below' him are the middle-class masses but it's impossible to generalise about, or really surmise, their overall state of well-being because there are too many variants, likewise with the working class. Then I realised I was going about it all wrong talking about classes and groups because contentment and success are individual traits although any surveys done would no doubt reveal patterns, even patterns within patterns, such as working-class people in the North compared to the South and internationally one country to another. Now I'm regretting ever starting this comparative misery thing. Note to self: just be thankful. (This tune was always in my DJ box though the 80s and 90s. I liked to play it at the end of the night).

Artwork: The Proletariat / My Turn To Cash In On The BBC Diversity Plan! But am I working class enough?

 

RTomens, 2017

As part of the BBC’s new Diversity and Inclusion plan they're on the hunt for more (they have three) working class employees. I don't think they'll be actively scouring the filthy housing estates inhabited by the proletariat but if they get desperate to fill the quota selected staff members might don safari outfits and, brandishing huge nets, set out to bag a few. There are too many university types at the BBC. They want a whiff of the football terrace and cheap takeaway food, along with the sight of haircuts as worn by famous footballers and clothes from JD Sports - yes! That'll liven up the office!

Since I'm unemployed I thought I'd apply. To swing it, aside from my working class credentials I'll be claiming to be non-binary.  I've thought about how I'll present myself. They're going to ask what my parents do (that really will be part of the process). Well, my Dad watched the kiln temperatures at a brick factory (check) and my Mum looked after the house (check).  It's my CV I've got to worry about. Will having written a book about Jazz be a mark against me? Thank god they can't see my book collection. Just having a book collection could see me out of the race straight away. I won't tell them I've read Moby-Dick, Don Quixote and one third of Ulysses, that's for sure.

What else do I have to avoid? Mustn't mention being a fan of Jean-Luc Godard. No mention of Art, either. I'll say nothing about making Art, of course. Is having two CSEs a little over-qualified? Then again, they're not looking for total idiots, are they? Should I just buy a tracksuit, turn up at the door and say, in my best Dick Van Dyke-in-Mary Poppins accent "Ello, matey! Gimme a job, gawd bless yah."  That might be overdoing it.

I'll have to tweak the CV. Being employed at a top audit firm as a proof reader for the last fifteen years could be construed as a bit too...privileged? I'd have to make it clear that I got the job without any  previous experience and only with the help of a working class friend in the department. The rest of my employment history is a positive - factory work, post room, stacking bricks, etc.

But hold on, which job am I applying for? I'm too old to learn journalism. DJ? Maybe. 

"What do you know about contemporary music, Robin?"

"Nothing."

"You wrote a book about Jazz?"

"Yes!"

"What do you know about contemporary Jazz?"

"Nothing."

"Thank you, we'll be in touch."

Someone once mistook me for Gilles Peterson on a Gozo beach. Fact. She told me later when we happened to share a boat trip. I don't think a passing resemblance to the famous World-Jazz-Fusion-Hipster-Hop-Beatz DJ will help much. I really need an insider to help. Someone who knows what's going on in the Quota Department. That way they can tip me off when the Working Class quota hasn't been filled in time to please the director-general, Tim Davie and they're desperate. Then I'll make my play. Wish me luck. 

Mental As Anything / Remembrance of Things Past

 

RTomens, 2019

Hello! Good to see you again! How are you? 

Last night I dreamt about an ex-girlfriend (1979-82) all because I'd played Elvis Costello that afternoon and she was a big fan of his. She was quite the literary girl, you know, hence the Attraction(s) of Costello's lyrical skills. She read Andre Gide and quoted him in letters to me. She loved Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir. In fact, at one point I think she even convinced herself that we were the contemporary equivalent - ha-ha! - despite her writing nothing and me just being a poet who'd made a few fanzines. Well, we can all indulge in fantasies, can't we? I probably played along, although such lofty aspirations were never openly stated.

Recently I lie in bed at night (or morning) getting all nostalgic...memories of specific people pour into the frontal awareness zone of my noodle from way back in the seemingly infinite box of marked 'biography'. Um, does that make sense? No matter. Thinking of this former girlfriend I recalled that we'd meet in the Wimpy Bar at Piccadilly Circus every Saturday morning. This was before I lived in London. How romantic, eh? I can't recall what we drank but I can still see us sat at a table window looking down on the people and traffic. I think we looked down on a lot of people. 

What made us so special? Absolutely nothing, but sometimes the armour of self-belief comes in handy. I needed it, especially since I worked in a factory. Trouble is, the armour wasn't wearable when I spent all day concocting what would become frozen food dishes. I was too weak to even lift it, metaphorically-speaking. But come the week-end, I was off to London! I wore what I thought was the hippest clothes. We went to see the hippest bands! We danced in clubs! We listened to Art Blakey LPs on her stereo. 

Three years later I was secretly seeing someone else. And so was she. Huh. That's life (and love). It didn't end well, as you can imagine. I burnt all her letters and rarely saw her again. She moved to Paris (typical!). She became a lesbian, which I tell myself was because after me she could never hope to find a better male lover....ha-ha-ha!

Today I listened to a lot of Kraftwerk, but never having dated a girl who was into them, I can't dream about one.

TTFN

10 Ways To Succeed As An Artist / 10 Ways To Remain An Obscure Artist

 

How duplicitous of me! I'm sorry, but I'm desperate for visitors. You know, the amount attracted by headlines like '10 Ways To Increase Blog Traffic', '10 Ways To Become Rich Quick' and '10 Ways To Be A Secret Trump Supporter' - that sort of thing. If I'm honest, I could write a genuine '10 Ways To Remain An Obscure Artist' post. In that, I am an expert. 

Apart from you, I do have one regular visitor. They frequently post comments about a service they offer but since I don't allow advertising I never publish them. Their thumbnail image shows a scantily-clad woman with what is, I must say, a very neatly trimmed beard. I'm sure 'her' service is a useful one. I feel a bit guilty since 'she' is so persistent...and beggars can't be choosers, but I have my limits.

I now feel inspired to provide an essential list which, I'm sure, will attract many visitors...

10 Ways To Remain An Obscure Artist

1. Be eclectic. By varying your styles and media people will not know how to categorise you and may suspect you of being schizophrenic.

2. Instead of painting, type Concrete Poetry. No-one understands it. And it's not Art.

3. Write about Concrete Poetry, Vispo, Typewriter Art.

4. Don't give useful tips. You don't have any anyway.

5. Don't obsessively post on Instagram. This, with the correct tags, can attract more followers.

6. Don't post much on Twitter either, not that Art gets much attention in the shadow of all-out warfare between SJWs and everyone else. 

7. Never use the word 'practice' when discussing (if you have to) your work.

8. If you went to Art college, pretend you didn't. Erase any sign of authority from your bio.

9. Avoid spreading your 'love' all over social media by 'liking' and gushing over every artist you happen to know even when you don't really like the piece they just posted. Such displays garner you 'likes' in return and could result in edging closer to recognition if, by chance, one such artist is connected to an influential curator. In other words, respond honestly, which means not responding.

10. Say you're a Trump supporter. A risky strategy because you may attract abuse, but you certainly won't be invited to exhibit...or dinner. You'll probably lose most art-friends too. 

That's that! You're welcome.

Print: Vispo-Visage / Book: Women In Concrete Poetry 1959-1979

 

RTomens, 2020

Women in concrete poetry? Who let them in? Oh well, I suppose, since they were given the vote, they should be allowed to be creative now and again! Joking aside, this is a very good collection, edited by Alex Balgiu and Monica de la Torre. Whether or not you believe that 'questions of identity, gender and power' could be 'activated - through the process of the materialization of  language' is another matter. Me, when it comes to identity politics and feminism, I just say what my partner tells me to...or else! 

As you'd expect there's a wide range of styles on display, from minimal to maximal, some incorporating collage, others photography. I've not had it long enough to have found favourites or looked at every page. These snaps are from random flick-and-pause where work caught my eye.

As you probably know, 'Concrete Poetry' is a virtually open form, as is 'Vispo'. Inclusions of certain pieces in other collections have, however, cause me to raise an eyebrow. There are a few here. I don't believe in strict parameters but...should there be limits? If were editing a book, yes, but such is the editor's prerogative, they can include what the hell they like. Content can stretch definition to an extent that the definition no longer applies. Was Ornette Coleman's Free Jazz album really Jazz? Answers on a postcard.

Meanwhile, I recommend this book.

Book: The Gallows Pole - Benjamin Myers / Painting: Untitled

"But you don't finish books, do you?" Asked my friend as we sat outside a Soho Cafe.

"Of course I do! Just not many...maybe two in ten."

I'm what might be called a 'fussy reader'. By which I mean if a novel doesn't impress me within the first 20 or so pages I close it for good. I've been told I'm 'too impatient' and that some novels must be 'given a proper chance'. That may be true, but I've seldom done it. I just know whether it'll be good, very quickly. Unfortunately, I've yet to master that art of discerning it's value when flicking through in a shop. That should be possible, though, shouldn't it? My mind plays a trick and convinces me a book's worth a punt, perhaps because of...the cover? Author? Premise? I don't know. Perhaps a part of me is trying to be optimistic rather than cynical. 

The Gallows Pole by Benjamin Myers caught my eye because the spine consists of black and pink stripes (so the designer must be congratulated on doing a good job). I think the cover's great too. This novel is inspired by the real-life 'coiners' of Yorkshire in the 18th century, who you can read about on this great site. Myers evokes the rural atmosphere brilliantly, the integration of land and living, the language, attitudes, hard life and lawlessness of people, many of whom were about to witness drastic changes in the form of the Industrial Revolution. Sometimes violent, frequently poetic, The Gallows Pole is a damned good read. It must be because I actually finished it.

Here's a painting of mine from 2018...

RTomens, 2018

Concrete Poetry: Typo 35 / The OCD Type / Typewriter Dance

Typo 35, RTomens, 2020

I  would love to say my fingers dance across the keys of the Remington in a flurry of inspiration but of course that's not usually how constructing concrete poetry happens. It can, for some, be an incredibly laborious process, the very careful positioning of the key before the strike. I rarely worry about such precision...and I like the chance element, or the slightly 'off' aspect of shapes or lines I may create. This apparent contrariness may be part of my character. 

Some people crave, and strive to create, precision. I cannot help but look at precisely constructed concrete poems without imaging their creators being the types whose desks are always in perfect order, as is their fridge and their wardrobe. They strike me as being OCD types (pun intended). 

Here are people literally dancing across the keys of a typewriter. 

 

Vispo/Text Art: There's Always More / Of Melancholy Lost

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How can I have lost my copy of Robert Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy? It's ridiculous! Our flat isn't that big and neither is my book collection, but Burton's book is, big I mean. It's 1392 pages long. I just read a review of a radio programme about it, which inspired me to dip in but it's nowhere to be found. Perhaps, I thought, I'd used it to prop up our handmade wardrobe which has taken to leaning precariously of late and needs books wedged between it and the handmade standing next to it. No, it's not there. Scan my bookshelves again...no. Not being able to find it has, I confess, made me feel pretty melancholic, as does the thought that I could ever have sold such a book. Burton himself may have appreciated the irony, but I don't think losing books was a subject he covered.

Kent Coast Minimalism / Mugged By A Seagull

If, as I'm sure you'd agree, London is Pop Art and Snowdonia is Abstract Expressionism, then Pegwell Bay on the Kent coast is Minimalism. As such, it may take a while to fully appreciate its beauty. So I found as we walked around it on Friday. Unlike the Snowdonian mountains, it's not a wham-bam landscape. One could actually wonder if it's even worth visiting; much like an exhibition of Minimalist art. But after a while the tranquillity and space seeps into your soul as surely as the distant sea at low tide returned to fill the wide expanse of sand.

Warning: don't carry food along the terrace at Broadstairs, the seagulls are brutal in their ability to mug humans! So I discovered as I naively entered the terrace from town whilst eating a croissant. There was only a mouthful left, but it was destined for the seagull's mouth, not mine. It came out of the blue, unseen by me, snapped the croissant in its beak and was gone in seconds to be harassed in flight for its prize by other gulls. I stood there in shock, feeling a sting on my finger. It's claw had nicked the last knuckle of my forefinger, drawing a drop of blood. Now I can totally empathise with Tippi Hedren, who was put through hell by Hitchcock in The Birds. My suffering was nothing compared to hers. But then, unlike hers, that incident will not secure my place in a great work of art!

We went to Sandwich for a week, straight out of the gate once people were allowed to stay somewhere overnight. It's a picture postcard village, fine for a week. What people say of London I feel the opposite about country places. I love to visit them but couldn't live there. I was born in the countryside, a Buckinghamshire village. It was a good place to grow up in but like a butterfly in a chrysalis once it proved to small I had to break out and fly away. That's not to say I became a splendid creature; more of a fly, perhaps, if I have to keep the winged insect analogy going. But unlike flies I haven't enjoyed the amount of shit I've encountered.

Butterfly at Pegwell Bay

Mark Leckey and the prole art threat.

RTomens, 2018

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Call on your own sensibility, the culture you come from; the art one isn’t more intelligent than that. Don’t let it overshadow or intimidate you. I think it’s really necessary to find a language to make art that’s not academic. We need more people to do that, without just being unthinkingly pop. I’m much more comfortable with music and part of the reason for that is there you can get to see working-class creativity on a phenomenal scale. I’m still waiting for the day where that filters across.
                                                                                                                               -  Mark Leckey

Yes, Mark, don't hold your breath, mate! (He's working class so I call him 'mate' because that's what us proles call each other, isn't it?). 

I don't mind, Mark Leckey. Do I damn him with feint praise? Well, you won't get strong opinions on contemporary artists from me because I don't pay them any attention. 

I came across an interview with him when I sourced a review of the album, Third Noise Principle: Formative North American Electronica 1975-1984, which I've just bought. He's right about music; it's been a bastion of prole creativity since forever. Why is that? Most obviously, especially since the DIY explosion of Punk, it became, along with zines, the ANYONE CAN HAVE A GO means of expression. The Street, from which virtually all great music emerged, knew that already. Most great music (non-Electronic) was born in the streets with Folk, Blues and Jazz, wasn't it? 

Pre-Punk, street players played anyway and if they were lucky/talented, got signed. But it was Punk that spawned the collective attitude that was deemed necessary because music had got all highfalutin, right? Music had 'grown up'. No, hold on, some music had grown up.  If you weren't there and have read a few things you might be under the impression that Prog muso dinosaurs dominated music in 76. They didn't. But their very existence along with, let's face, the heavy weight of musical history, needed blowing away. 

Christ, you don't need a musical history lesson!

The point I'm wandering towards is that music allowed prole liberation whereas Art rarely does. I mean, anyone can form a band or make music from their home but it's not quite as easy to mount an exhibition and the Art World is...so...precious...so academic. You're even supposed to have attended college! Imagine having to attend music college before being taken seriously. Yes, Classical musicians do, of course. 

Mark's dream of the day when working class art 'filters across' is born out of being part of The Art World. Good luck to him! Meanwhile, does he think about all the art being shown by 'nobodies' on the internet every day? Granted, it's not easy to grasp the phenomenon. For starters, it has nothing to do with his Art World. How can it? It is not marketable, has no Fine Art kudos and does not elevate the status of it's participants except in the eyes of a few followers. 

Who's going to recognise these prole artists? What kind of reception would they get from a gallery-owner, never mind a professional critic? Few of us can afford, or even want, to put on exhibitions. We're not connected to the 'right' people. We're the equivalent of players just strumming their guitars on porches in early-20th century America. Playing for the hell of it, because it's what we need or love to do. The difference is that nobody is ever going to discover us, sign us up and make us known.

Boo-hoo...

Today I finally got around to boxing up my art. It had been sitting in a pile for years. Boxing up the A4 art, that is (the A3 and other sizes went into bags which now sit on top of the wardrobe). A4? That's me, common as muck! But in the words of Mark Leckey, it is my 'own sensibility', the culture I come from. And it's far too common to ever 'filter across'!

Staring into space / The people of the internet / Are Facebook friends aliens?

RTomens, 2020

Being prone to 'staring into space' may or may not be a healthy trait but it's something I do regularly and have done since I was a child. What do I expect to see in that 'space', that somewhere beyond/between the physical world immediately surrounding me? Nothing, of course. It's not an act of 'looking'. It's having my eyes open but not seeing. 

So last night I had zoned out of the conscious world, staring at nothing from the comfort of my sofa when the people of the internet popped into my head. Is that what staring into space does? Allow anything to enter the consciousness once the normal barriers are down? 

'Who are the people of the internet?' I wondered, thinking of Facebook friends. I mean, really, they're mostly a complete mystery. Much has been written about online relationships and FB in particular but I wonder if anyone can solve the mystery of internet people...what do they want? Are they actually aliens? Are they beings from another dimension adopting names and in some cases human forms to carry out a social experiment?

We can't help knowing them as 'Friends' because that's what they are in the online realm. We know what real friends are and they are not, on the whole, Facebook's friends. I thought about where they would all be in ten years' time...would I still know some of them? If not, why? I could offend them to the point of being rejected as a Friend. Some could die. I could reject them, although I've never actually unFriended anyone, merely snoozed them for 30 days (get in the sin bin!) or Unfollowed. 

It's a fact that Friends can annoy the hell out of you, but unlike actual friends, you don't get to balance things out over beers or coffee and, you know, the interaction of physical gestures etc. No, the people of the internet just keep throwing things at your eyes. You get to 'know' them through a series of signifiers...music, art, personal photos, pets, political comments and, of course, memes. You don't know them, though. They aren't real. They are a collection of broadcasts in text and image.

I like to think I can read people well, usually, even if only through their FB posts. I've had a few surprises though, recently. A few Friends decided enough was enough from Robin Tomens! All I did was post photos of myself in my Klan outfit. Bloody snowflakes! (That is a joke, of course).

Internet people on Facebook are, ultimately, just like life - all life is there - minus the reality! They are perfect simulations of people in the tech universe. Is Facebook one big game that we don't know we're playing? If so, I hope it doesn't end just yet because I'd miss the internet people, some of whom  like and even buy my art. I realise this, in the eyes of some, makes me sad. I know people who aren't on FB and survive well enough. They must have enough real friends. I, meanwhile, sit on my sofa, staring into space...

'Working very well and producing a good standard' / Vispo

RTomens, 2020

So my Secondary school education began. Riding on the back of my success at Junior school which culminated in winning Pupil of the Year (it's true!) I was on an educational roll. I created 'Careful, thoughtful work' in English and 'work of a good standard' in Modern Studies. You know, I can't remember what the hell Modern Studies entailed. I guess it was History. Our History teacher had a prosthetic hand, which he always covered with a glove. He turned this into an advantage when whacking pupils' heads. It was a terrifying weapon which, thankfully, I never felt, mainly because I had seen it administered too often and had learnt enough to gauge by the sound it made on contact with a skull that it was considerably weighty. Other pupils either did not have the sense to work that out or just couldn't help being bad.

I, meanwhile, was good. As you can see. I was 'a cheerful, helpful member of the form' and 'an integral part of the community'.  The community? Hold on, that's not what I think of when recalling that school. I suppose that's the teacher's ideal, rather than reality. It's a nice idea, 'community'. What it actually was was a jungle of ferocious adolescent beasts intent on tearing each other apart at any opportunity. Cruel nicknames based on immutable physical characteristics, bullying and violence were common. I wouldn't say it was completely out of control, but by my fourth year I recall the school's toughest bully wearing a Head Boy badge which he didn't earn, obviously, but went unchallenged. 

Naturally I produced a 'good standard' in Visual Education. I say 'naturally' since I was never taught, or never paid attention, so where did it come from? Neither of my parents were creative. That's a deep subject which I'll put to one side for now. I enjoyed Visual Education, mostly through drawing and painted what I liked rather than applying any skills the teacher tried to teach us. I just didn't take to being told what to do, no matter how beneficial it would have been. Rebel without a cause, right? 

Well, the rebel streak grew stronger as I aged. By the fourth year I was a lost cause. One teacher thought I could be 'saved', took me to one side and asked 'What went wrong?'. To this day I don't know the answer to that.

The Art of Thelonious Monk

In Walked Bud, RTomens, 2020

On a day that the sun returns, so does Thelonious Monk. He's more reliable than the sun, it has to be said. I created the background to In Walked Bud a couple of days ago with a view to leaving it as it was. Today, however, I played the tune and felt it's creator should be added. The cut up music sheet is the actual tune, although how one is supposed to 'play Monk' I do not know.  It's unimaginable. The notes are the notes, yes, but surely there's something in the way Monk plays them? It is the bare bones of Bud Walked In, minus the improvisational magic, naturally. It's a cliche to call some music 'eternal' yet for me, Monk really does endure.

Three Leaps In Time

My past is bothering me, but not because it's interesting and filled with potentially dangerous secrets like that of a Patrick Modiano character. I wish that was the case. I often find myself wishing for another life. A tragic burden. No, because it's the past, that's all.

Reading The Gravediggers' Bread (Pushkin Vertigo) by Frédéric Dard this morning reminded me of  A Fairy Tale of New York by J.P. Donleavy and how, reading the funeral parlour section aloud to LJ in bed at her place on Bloomsbury St made us laugh so much. Yesterday I carried a box of old photos into the garden where we sat going through them. One packet from contained shots taken at Bloomsbury St. How young we looked. It was over 30 years ago. We laughed at the clothes and expressions. LJ pointed out items of furniture, recalling the layout of the place. There was the white plaster head I rescued from a skip at the back of the hospital where I worked as a porter. A death's head!?

The photos are still in the packets they came in, over the counter at Boots, probably. It does seem like another world. We who span the pre and post-PC world have a heightened sense of how times and technology change. Today it would be impossible to take a blurred photo such as the one of me above. Annoying as they were at the time, they now have the same kind of charm as crackling recordings and old stapled zines.

Whether having read three Modiano novels in a row prompted me to look at my past or not I don't know. What's certain is the way I felt after going through a few packets (holidays in Gozo, the cycle tour of Normandy). Sadness, yes. But why? Were they such happy times? They were times, if not just like any other, at least in the sense of us being happy, sad or plain content. 

I think of seeing photos in the 70s of my mother in her youth...how long ago and far away they seemed...Dad with his arm around her tiny waist...post-war happiness in regaining normal lives. It was the war, ironically, that brought them together. He was a refugee from Latvia. She worked in the canteen at the brick factory where he would spend the rest of his life tending the kilns. But what struck me this morning was the fact that she was also looking back 30 years just as I have been doing. Did her past seem as distant as ours? I suppose it did.

Three leaps in time; from now to the 80s, then to the 70s and finally to the 50s. Time as a relay in stages marked by people and places. The worst experiences may be eradicated (I hated my hospital job). Perhaps it must be that way. A life marked by it's worst components would be a terrible thing to bear. Time marks us all, physically. Was my hair really that dark once? How it marks us psychologically is harder to fathom.

I want Celine / Book-providers: key workers / Professional humans

Pulp, Charles Bukowski

There I was, applauding a key worker, but he didn't seem appreciative; in fact, he first looked mystified, then a little angry before finally keying the delivery details into his pad, turning and going back to his van.

I opened the gate to get my Amazon delivery, feeling disappointed in myself for not explaining to the man how grateful I was that he was still working. How genuine my applause was, rather than sarcastic, which I feel was his interpretation. I can't blame him. After all, although they are still lucky to have any employment, they are not so lucky as those of us being paid to work from home or better still, paid to do nothing because they cannot work from home. So they work, diligently steering their vans through the streets of London. That must be easier at least, the streets being less congested. They drive, they ring bells and drop packages. They deliver all manner of goods but what matters most to me is that they deliver my books, such as the most recent one, Celine's Journey To The End Of The Night.

Amazon, that commercial Goliath, despised by some for supposedly dubious treatment of workers and undeniable monopoly due to an unbeatable business model, must be a lifeline, of sorts, to millions during lockdown. DIY enthusiasts get their tools, crafting types get their materials...others simply get treats such as...perfume...and those of us enthralled by books get our fix!

Reading Celine's masterpiece again (I did read it many years ago but suspect I was not old enough to fully appreciate it and perhaps felt more compelled rather than naturally drawn towards it because in those days I was eager to impress not only friends but myself - "See, you read Celine! Well done!"). Now I read it differently? Have my eyes changed? Our minds do change, for sure. Not that we 'change our minds' so much, although that happens too, but our minds alter in ways enabling us to appreciate things better. Yes, the mind has undergone many things through experience. Realisation, knowledge, acceptance, fear, love...oh dear...I mean...yes, we experience all things as soon as we are able to comprehend...so what I mean is...how we process experience...is that it? Yes. 

I am older...am I wiser? I like to think so. Today I call this book 'a masterpiece' having read many more books than when I was a teenager, naturally. Am I wise only in knowing what I like, or knowing what constitutes great literature? They are not the same thing...unless...one is a professional critic? Even then, oh it pains me to deal with this can of worms, we know that it is impossible to eradicate subjectivity! I'm a professional...nothing...human? Yes! I am a professional human. I do it for a living! We're all professional humans although, it must be said, some are more amateurish at it than others. 

Nice is burning / Bukowski's Pulp

The Nazis set fire to Nice; I'd been tipped off that they would. I had to get the boat back to where a bus would bring me home. That was crucial. The agricultural show where I'd met some of my family had been enjoyable enough, not because of the machinery or animals on display, but because I'd not seen my nephew and sister for so long that we hugged, kissed and probably wept. I say 'probably' because such details of the dream are gone, blown away by a new day, as they always are. The sadness, heartbreak, call it what you will stayed with me though even as I woke up. That's also true of dreams in the semi-slumber/wakefulness moments when the emotion of a dream still has some hold on you.

I armed myself with a big stick in case I met any Nazis on the way to the boat. Luckily, I didn't. Boarding the boat I impressed my nephew by managing to ask for a ticket in French. We waved goodbye and the motor chugged its way through choppy Mediterranean waves. We weren't far from Nice. Nice was Nice and looked nothing like the real thing, the way people you know can populate dreams yet look nothing like them. As we entered the port I looked up at the ancient buildings, cracked colours faded by so much sun they seemed to be clambering onto each other's shoulders to get the best view of the sea. That isn't Nice port in reality. They are actually low-rise buildings, well-kept for the most part, forming an orderly line around the port.

Fire! There, high up, the bushes around one of the grander houses were ablaze....

It's no surprise I should dream of Nice, the finest city in the world, because I've been daydreaming of it ever since being imprisoned by the government. Not that we planned to go back this year but just not being able to made me pine even more for it. Perhaps the craving for something French resulted in me reading Patrick Modiano. Missing Person was a pretty good read. I must stop assessing everything as 'pretty good'. It's a verbal tic I've acquired. I said the other day that a film was 'pretty good'. It's become a default response. Missing Person is one man's search for his own identity. He goes from person-to-person, gathering names and photos until he slowly emerges. I won't say more in case you read it.

I hankered for 'alternative' crime novels. Not that there's much crime in Missing Person. I mentioned Bukowski's Pulp to someone online, having read it years ago, so I ordered it to read it again. I'm now halfway through. It's....more than pretty good, it's a brilliant satire of the pulp genre, full of Bukowski's wit; bawdy, brutish, absurd and goes at a hell of a pace. Bukowski's straight-talking prose was made for pulp. I'm surprised it took him so long to write one. One of the detective's jobs is to search for Celine, or rather, find out who Celine is, exactly, since he can't be the real Celine, the writer, can he? At one point the P.I. turns on his car radio from which someone starts talking to him. This must be taken from Jean Cocteau's Orpheus. Nice calls me again! Near to Nice we found the Chapelle de Saint-Pierre des Pecheurs, decorated by Cocteau.

So guess what I'm reading next? What else but Celine's Journey To The End Of The Night...