Twenty Four

I wrote this back in 1991, as a letter to a friend; I recently came across it and enjoyed reading it again, so I thought I’d post it here, too. I recently moved back into the area, and I have been making the same journey. The sights are the same, twenty years on, though the buses have changed…

The everyday thing - this happens everyday - every working day, anyhow, and a few times at weekends too. Going to work - a simple process, but fascinating: watching the world go by. It interests me, this process - partly because I see motion and movement as crucial to my character - one reason perhaps I will never truly settle (until, perhaps, I find someone with whom I want to settle?) - and I define myself in part by movement, by walking, and by watching things change as I move. (They move too, of course, in their own speed, in their way; sometime watching me change as I pass by.)

There are two ways to get to work, and each of those has two alternative routes. I prefer the bus, but when if I am busy at work, I will take the tube; it gets me there about half an hour earlier, and is more hurried, more intense, so I think I may arrive at my desk slightly more flustered, but more ready to do battle with the phones and computers.

The bus: the bus down to the office leaves from South End Green, five minutes away. I walk passed nurses coming off their night shift, looking tired, almost hostile, as if the world has just been too painful for the last twelve hours that the one thing they can't bear to see are the trees in the sunshine. I walk passed the smell of freshly baked bread - always tempted to go in and buy a donut - and across the zebra crossing; I cross the road arrogantly, daring the cars not to stop - though they always do - and I barely look at them.

( Cut for length; lots of words but no more pictures... )

Twenty Four

I wrote this back in 1991, as a letter to a friend; I recently came across it and enjoyed reading it again, so I thought I’d post it here, too. I recently moved back into the area, and I have been making the same journey. The sights are the same, twenty years on, though the buses have changed…

The everyday thing - this happens everyday - every working day, anyhow, and a few times at weekends too. Going to work - a simple process, but fascinating: watching the world go by. It interests me, this process - partly because I see motion and movement as crucial to my character - one reason perhaps I will never truly settle (until, perhaps, I find someone with whom I want to settle?) - and I define myself in part by movement, by walking, and by watching things change as I move. (They move too, of course, in their own speed, in their way; sometime watching me change as I pass by.)

There are two ways to get to work, and each of those has two alternative routes. I prefer the bus, but when if I am busy at work, I will take the tube; it gets me there about half an hour earlier, and is more hurried, more intense, so I think I may arrive at my desk slightly more flustered, but more ready to do battle with the phones and computers.

The bus: the bus down to the office leaves from South End Green, five minutes away. I walk passed nurses coming off their night shift, looking tired, almost hostile, as if the world has just been too painful for the last twelve hours that the one thing they can't bear to see are the trees in the sunshine. I walk passed the smell of freshly baked bread - always tempted to go in and buy a donut - and across the zebra crossing; I cross the road arrogantly, daring the cars not to stop - though they always do - and I barely look at them.

( Cut for length; lots of words but no more pictures... )

Hospital and a dinner party.

This is the second part of a letter I wrote nearly twenty years ago...

The second story I have to tell is simpler; it begins where the first ended, in my office. I was leaning against a doorway, talking to a computer guy, talking spreadsheets maybe, and memory, and as he walked away, I pushed against the doorway. In a second, I was on the floor in agony, and a fire-extinguisher was on my ankle. Rolling on the carpet. I stood on my other leg, and hopped - and I thought I was all right I was fine, me I'm all smiles.

I was sitting at my desk a few minutes later when I realized my foot felt damp; my sock was red and blood filled my shoe. Oh my - the pictures swing and fall. I phone the first aid girl, a secretary who sits with a friend, and ask to come over. She does it by the book - I don't see - and calls me a cab to take me to the hospital. (The grapevine moves quickly; when I get in on the following Monday, suddenly everyone knows my face, and asks if I am ok.)

I still don't think I am hurt; I hop down four flights of stairs, because I get irritated waiting for the lift (on the eighth floor, of course); I hop into the taxi. I walk into the hospital, down on Dean Ryle Street; I know it well: my grandmother - a sickly woman - was there a lot. I talk to the nurse on the casualty desk, and she gives me a form or two to fill in (always a dilemma: I call myself Mr). I sit on an uncomfortable seat, my leg stretched out in front or tucked under as I feel easier.
( ...lots more words... )

Hospital and a dinner party.

This is the second part of a letter I wrote nearly twenty years ago...

The second story I have to tell is simpler; it begins where the first ended, in my office. I was leaning against a doorway, talking to a computer guy, talking spreadsheets maybe, and memory, and as he walked away, I pushed against the doorway. In a second, I was on the floor in agony, and a fire-extinguisher was on my ankle. Rolling on the carpet. I stood on my other leg, and hopped - and I thought I was all right I was fine, me I'm all smiles.

I was sitting at my desk a few minutes later when I realized my foot felt damp; my sock was red and blood filled my shoe. Oh my - the pictures swing and fall. I phone the first aid girl, a secretary who sits with a friend, and ask to come over. She does it by the book - I don't see - and calls me a cab to take me to the hospital. (The grapevine moves quickly; when I get in on the following Monday, suddenly everyone knows my face, and asks if I am ok.)

I still don't think I am hurt; I hop down four flights of stairs, because I get irritated waiting for the lift (on the eighth floor, of course); I hop into the taxi. I walk into the hospital, down on Dean Ryle Street; I know it well: my grandmother - a sickly woman - was there a lot. I talk to the nurse on the casualty desk, and she gives me a form or two to fill in (always a dilemma: I call myself Mr). I sit on an uncomfortable seat, my leg stretched out in front or tucked under as I feel easier.
( ...lots more words... )