Got the time

Silence. Still in bed. All the noise is internal. His dream slowly coalesces in his consciousness. It is not a dream he wishes to share. He lies there dehydrated, head aching as well as his wrist that clearly now needs some shiatsu attention, too much time spent sitting at the device of infinite dithering, he thinks. Something lingering from the dream is suggesting that his bookshelf offers some kind of evidence of innocence and it is a feeling of being in someone's arms, a spell of confusion and illogic that is broken by the weight of his body on the bed, the crushing force of skin on sheet, not a spark travels his nerves with the slightest intention of movement. The impossible climb to the edge of bed. He wonders what it is he is avoiding and his mind skates off to think of something else, although not before one single neurone fires its message of "its the paintings again, dummy" and he is best described as being quite hacked off with that thorny old bastard of a feeling.

With no small amount of effort, he not only gets out of his bed but also leaves his house to buy necessary things, although his definition of what today counts as necessary is a long way wide of what most would consider as such. His first call is to pick up more facial scrub and moisturiser, pretty common place purchases. His second call, however, is to get more face paints, having almost already run out of those bought less than a fortnight previous. But what's this? Is that a wig in his bag as well? Why on earth would he want to buy that? His deviation from the norm here is pretty far and is not helped by his last purchases of the day, his regular helping of comics, his fix for the week, made late due to his recent inability to organise his life.

Walking home now, cunningly by a different route to his outbound one, although taken at the same flâneur-like pace, as if his speed was set?by?means?of?a?tortoise on?a?lead, a light shower of rain passes across the old town just after he has left the comic shop and it is not all that cold, almost, indeed, refreshing, as light as the indeterminate misting of an under-powered electric shower. He savours it, does not bother to seek shelter or turn up his collar, and it is over within scant minutes, by which time he has reached the spine of the city and is walked lock-step to the third and final version of Mannish Boy, fiercely pounding in his ears. The line I shoot will never miss. In a cheerful, out-of-the-house spirit, he decides it is high time that he treated himself to lunch in his favourite café.

Crossing over the main shopping thoroughfare, he sees a multitude of people and perceives them as a constellation of universes, each and every one a different set of beliefs, ideas, perceptions, a vapourous soap-sud bubble wobble of reality above and around each of their heads, as they go about their day in the now bright sun, that shines and sparkles from the battered and ill-cared for streets and pavements, drying away the brief rainfall. Something in the reflected light reminds him of the last garden he owned, and the tulip bulbs he planted there, brought back from a weekend on the continent, yes, tulips from Amsterdam, the bulbs that should have flowered black and white yet failed to do so, blossoming instead into disappointing purples and yellows.

At the café he is able to sit at the window, facing out onto the street. It is his preferred seat, where he is able to watch as life passes by. As he waits for his food to arrive, one of many buses passes, bearing an advertisement for a science fiction film which has a world in it called 'Pandora' and he is once again thankful that he did not waste any money going to see such hackneyed old toss. He also notes that the locally-owned bus is painted in the new fleet livery, a livery that is unquestionably dull and drab, a degredational and pointless replacement, making the vehicles look less inviting. Perhaps, his conspiratorial shoulder demon whispers, that is the point.

Behind him, at the central table, three woman are trying to work out where to take a vegetarian friend for food, seemingly not content with visiting a vegetarian restaurant themselves, they appear to be going through options of where might make something for them. It is by no means an exhaustive list and he has to restrain himself from pointing out any of their obvious omissions. In front of him, a window spar is exactly at his eye level, where it obscures most of the heads and upper torsos of the passing pedestrians, causing him to either dip or raise his head to see past it. He moves three seats to his left when another patron leaves, to get a seat in the sun, his all-time favourite seat in the café, one that he has sat in countless times. He surveys the shops opposite, some having changed in the watching-his-money times since he last sat here. A new print shop has opened, as well as a small pizzeria but more shops seem to have closed, a clothes shop, a taxicab office, an Indian food store. Happily the curiously-named Indian fashion boutique is still open, a shop name that will often bring a juvenile smile to his lips.

The people passing fascinate him, their sizes, their shapes, their clothes, their luggage, their conversations and their destinations. He watches them whilst he eats the creamy, thick goats cheese, moist roast vegetables and pesto in a toasted warp, along with a tomato, seed and leaf salad. There is a smokiness in the combined flavour that is impossible to trace to any one element, a meta-taste unachievable through any other means and distinct to this one dish at this one time, never to be repeated. He savours it whilst trying to tune out the women's conversation that has how turned to the mistakes that can be made using the flippant abbreviation 'lol' and to a popular online social network. In one of the two endeavours he is quite successful and has only to suffer the inadequacies of his attempts at the other for a few more minutes, as the women finish their lunch and leave. However, with the passing of the women, the lone male voice behind him that is ceaselessly blabbering away at a mobile phone is now revealed. Luckily, he seems to be the lesser party of the conversation, his silences sounding to be the longer and is therefore less bothersome. A passing man outside, large and unshaven, yawns massively and makes no attempt to cover it up, even though it lasts for more than ten steps, just letting his meaty arms swing on. In the other direction walks a woman at the steep end middle age, wearing an incredibly blue coat over a frighteningly mutton-dressed skirt, her skin a shade of orange unknown in nature and sporting pink sunglasses. She is quite fascinating if rather beyond the boundaries of taste. Another woman passes in flip-flops, which seem odd given the turbulent climate, sporting a low-cut top and mesmerising cleavage. As he looks away, not wanting to stare, he catches a glimpse of a raised arm to lips with cigarette and is instantly disinterested, curious as to how such small things make a world of difference. Behind her walk a couple of teenagers, pushing a pram, both talking into their mobile phones. Phone man leave soon after, surprisingly with a female friend, clearly a very soft-spoken woman.

In the evening he goes to see Gil Scott Heron in concert. He has seen him twice before, in the middle of the nineties, and in unavoidable comparison finds this concert disappointing, not only from the lessening in band members but also from the total absence of music from his new album, which this tour is supposedly supporting. The audience is overwhelmingly and loudly on-side from the very outset, their rapturous applause seeming to be affected little by any of the qualities, or lack, or the performance, rather more seeming just to be for the man himself regardless and, whist he is good, the vague and rhythm-light surrounding is unforgivable for a standing concert. This time there is no dancing in the aisles, as the whole audience take to their feet, instead there are a few nodding heads and a lot of aching legs and lower backs. Without a full rhythm section, Heron's sense of timing seems off, with the other band members notably having to skip to keep up at times and although the night passes quite quickly, it is nonetheless a relief when he only performs one more samey-sounding song as an encore.

During his walk home along the late night quiet streets, his aching frame finds it hard to move properly to the beat of any of the songs he tries. He is glad that he went to the concert, solely because if he had missed it he would have never known what he had missed.

(5-2386)