It's alright not being alright..

I haven't posted for a while, just haven't. no particular reason other than I just haven't.

It's been like that for a while. I've  found it difficult to write. I've wanted to and at some points, I've almost broke out the keyboard and slammed some shit down about social injustice or never changing situations that I find myself in all the time.
See why I didn't ?
Recently, I've been going through some kind of personal inner upheaval. I've had to start looking at how I'm doing things and what it is I actually do.  I don't mean as in work or hobbies or the like, I mean in what I actually do in the personal and professional interactions I take part in all the time. I've discovered that I don't really deal with a lot of things in a very good way . I don't think or try to change things in a positive and more beneficial way. I am what's commonly known as a passive aggressive.
I've had to talk about some stuff, some stuff that kind of turned me inside out and a little upside down. I'm doing something that ,hopefully, will allow me to move out of the slowly decaying and ultimately dead ended world I've inhabited for God knows how long.
 Issues surrounding mental health and well being are still something we don't  want to deal with ,even those of us who find ourselves looking at the edges of them without having known we've been looking at them for a long time. The admitting, even to yourself, that you have a problem with how you deal with things and it's to do with how you are is always going to be too much for some people. I've reached the point where if I don't ,I'll self destruct. That's kind of sealed the deal for me
now.
 
I've written and spoke to others about the feelings that have dwelt in me for a long time and in all that time, I've never really got to the point and ...the point is this.
Some times, I'm not OK. Sometimes, the way I deal with and feel about things makes me do stuff that's not really good for me. Sometimes, I get angry and let it turn in on myself and then wait until it bursts out in ways that are way out of proportion to the situation I'm actually in. Sometimes, I can't separate work from real life because I'm a person and I don't always have the capacity to distinguish between what's right and wrong in a given situation. Sometimes, I let others take advantage of me because I want their affirmation and this makes me feel less like being positive and more like being miserable and drinking too much because inside, I'm screaming at myself for not being the way I want to be in these situations and how many more times am I going to let his happen? Sometimes, I think about short, sharp ends. Sometimes...I'm really, really happy.

This last few  months, I've started to do some things about it all. I've taken the first steps in changing how I deal with some of the things I've been reluctant to even think about. It's a slow process and it can be a difficult one but I'm on the road now and I've got some good people in my corner. One of the most important things I've learnt so far, is that it's alright not to be alright. It's OK not being OK .
 The first step in fixing a problem is admitting that you've got a problem. I've had a problem for a while and it's been me. I know I won't cure it but I'm starting to get the know how to manage it.
I know there's plenty more out there who'll go to work tomorrow and they be fine and tell everyone that they're OK. They'll sit at desks or deliver sessions, or give advice and guidance to others and all the time, there'll be that voice somewhere,whispering, telling them what's really going inside.
I'd advise them to listen to it because at some point, it'll turn into a shout.

It's a difficult trip but it's alright to admit that you're not alright..that's the first step..

     

Job,
Purpose,
Routine.
The marks of the 21st century Western man.
Without any of the above, we are deemed to be unfulfilled in our lives

There are people risking theirs to find out what the above can give them.
The World is changing itself.
The last age of man awaits...

Sincerely Yours..

When you grow up, your heart dies.
A film from the middle of the eighties, young people realising who they are because of a Saturday morning detention. Their real selves eventually shown through their shared experience and ,of course, from their sharing of Judd Nelson's secret stash. Always a winner that  a secret stash.

For everything we show as our public face there are a thousand things that we don't.
Growing up kills so much of what we are.

The saddest thing in this modern first world hemisphere is that aspiration now comes down to getting a job and a house.
Anything else seems to have been misplaced.

I preferred Ally Sheedy when she was all in black.

For anyone who's interested

See you next Saturday....       

Here comes summer.

People drive their cars like they live their lives, erratically.
Summer heat brings on the urgency to get home and the roads become a snarling twisted hell of potential tragedy.
We all think we're safe in our metal boxes and we go for it..full pelt. It only increases the tension and the number of times you hear the sirens coming up from behind.
All is stop start and back sweat slowly making its way down to the cold puddle it's making in the seat of your trousers.
Yes, summer's here and the time is right...

some sort of freedom.

Sitting in the late evening sun, the new way of writing in my hand. It's amazing how such a small leap forward can make such a big difference. No longer restrained by my own set limits, mobile and able to write as and when I feel.
You convince yourself you're one thing and you're mostly lying to yourself.
Turning points...don't look for them.
Just recognise them when they show up..

That's the thing with catching up with technology, you realise what you've been missing.
Imagine Bukowski with a mobile...

I ain't done nuffin...

The problem with asking some of the questions I have to ask during my daily round of joy is I already know the answers I'm going to get.
Example,
If I'm asking the question "You see someone stealing from the warehouse you work in. What would you do?"
Let me point some things out before we continue.
The questions I'm asking have been written by people who've never seen a warehouse let alone had to ask that very question to people who've been sacked from warehouses for doing that very thing.
Answers always range from "I'm in on it" to " I'm not a fucking grass" followed by a hard stare  as if I'm actually challenging them on their real life past or their whole moral outlook on life.

I then have to go on  to explain that in the sensible and grown up world, the one where the present government want them to be gainfully employed, people will kind of expect them to go for the reasonable answer that relates to them protecting company property and having company interests at heart. It's a shock for them but what can you do? In all honesty, I couldn't really give a shit what they'd do.

Convincing malcontents that the path to social redemption lies in them  being honest about witnessing warehouse based crime and instantly reporting it to their superiors, as in a set out question written by right thinking types in distant offices, isn't something that I'm fully in line with. Persuading them that  filling a wagon full of stolen electrical cable, whilst being parked under a security camera, and then wondering why they got sacked from previously said warehouse, perhaps wasn't the best decision they've ever made, is something I'd rather spend time in bringing to their attentions. Crime pays when you're good at it. How many more times?
It's all relative.

This of course is just an example of the questions I am responsible for the asking of in an ordinary day's setting. Some of them do actually make some sort of sense. Some are just ridiculous and reflect the gap between those that write them and those they're aimed at. The difference in moving through a life with some structure and an idea of what you want to be and a life that's.....different.

To be honest, I always enjoy the stories that come out of me asking these questions. They give an unforgettable insight into the real lives of some of the more interesting people I get to meet.

When someone tells you that they did three days down the block for an errant Manchester Tart liberated from a prison kitchen, you kind of know a made up question aimed at testing their knowledge of  how to behave just isn't going to make much difference.

They already know what they'll do...I already know the answer.... 

The train now arriving....

Travelling sitting facing backwards on a train feels like being fired from a rifle without ever leaving the barrel.
You get the sense of moving, of the great amount of speed but you can see where you're moving from more than where you're moving to. Lift your feet off the floor and it's as though you're being pushed by some unseen mighty hand, holding you up and literally thrusting you into your future.

Bring it back to reality and it's seats and aisles that are just a bit too narrow, the clicky click of laptops and The World's biggest selection of ring tones. The conversations that people have with those they work and live with, overheard by everyone. The important things that keep us all on the right track and let us continue with the everyday so that we don't fall off the edge of sensible and into the dark chasm of the unknown and uncertain. All this hurtling towards one decaying city centre after the other on a daily basis.

Stations that look like outposts of some post disaster world where things stopped around the mid eighties. Pebble dash, looking more like rotting bone now, and faded paint declaring the names of cities that have the same looking centre but with different shop names. Ideas of the planner and the architect, constructed when new meant ripping down the old and rebuilding it without any acknowledgement of where things came from, what people might of felt. Now these places echo with the sounds of the discontented and the displaced. Each one has, somewhere, an unsteady and unkempt figure who lurches around a karaoke system set on instrumental, sending out tremulous and heartfelt words of longing to some forgotten love, hoping that this will pull the heartstrings of  those around him enough, the fellow lost, the lonely,so they'll put their hands in their pockets and give him enough so he can afford to forget what ever he wants to forget for just long enough.

It's no surprise when we really look at the way some of the people have been crammed together and just left to become a stain on society. Left to become the scape goats of the system we love so much. Left to their cigarettes, their shit diets ,their low expectations and their lives we can scorn them for living. We do this partly because they don't make any money and mostly because they just don't give a shit which, as  we all know, is something you just have to give. Add this to miserable grey cafes, too many charity shops and the overwhelming feeling that it's all just holding on through sheer willpower, you get to see why people just give up on moving at all and surrender to living as they do.

The trains keep moving, we all keep queueing. We all sit staring at the small screens and tapping, we all keep talking into the little boxes or we stare at others doing it or we
just stare out of the window as the future becomes the past.

We all stick on our own side of the tracks but some of us will always be on the wrong side....

until we switch the signals.     

R.I.P Mr Pratchett

For all the magic, all the colours and the chaos.

For giving us The Night Watch, The Small Gods and the wonderful ladies of Lancre.

 For writing about people are in a way that most others cannot even touch.

Thank you

The turtle moves...

remains..

She went down

Somewhere in the middle of a three day storm

All hands lost

The space that was left

Nature and habit filled

Love brought grieving

Friendship found drunken tears and slack mouths

Words of comfort given about the mysteries of God’s ways

Hymns sung

Sent to unsettle the dust on high rafters

At the back of the church yard small wooden crosses

In this at least

Flowers could be left somewhere

And memories could be held

But no goodbyes ever got said

No personal belongings were ever held

No wedding rings, watches, the everyday that fills pockets

To be kept in drawers

No dead faces turned to stone touched

No last kisses for hollowed cheeks  

No remains

Days like these

Some days are good. The ones that you never expect anything from for instance. The ones when someone says something that makes you think about what it is you're doing and ,perhaps more importantly, why you do it. I suppose the thing is, that you reach a point when you don't think about it so much any more.

Today was just such a day. 

When you work with people whose lives are a collection of unhappy events rather than the smooth expected run of the made up world we think we live in , you can start to lose sight of what it is that's really important or even what's going on. Sometimes, you get a reminder of the effect you can have on others and how they start to look at themselves when given the perspective of one who can perhaps see the person they could be if they'd give themselves half a chance, that's the biggest problem with this game I call a job, people think they have to be one thing when really they just need to be helped towards being what they actually can be, themselves with a bit more confidence and a little more idea of the things that might help them get there.
The small things make big changes. 
When someone tells you that you've given them the confidence to do something positive, something that most people would do on an everyday basis without thinking, then you get a sense of what it is you're actually doing for people. 

This should never be about numbers or how much money is being made, it should always be about the things it's purported to be about. Journeys, people growing, situations improving and life being a little more sunshine than shit.

There are those out there ,pilgrims in an unholy land, who like myself do it for the people thing. It's hard, sometimes unforgiving and you get to see the underside of this swirling, muddled, fucked up mess we call society.

 But it's all worth it for a glimpse of  the possible..   
  

Imagine if dust caused trains to stop running. What if the accumulated daily shedding from our slowly decaying selves made rail travel impossible ?
 The 07.36 to Derby is cancelled due to a build up of people dust.


All things are dust , even the trains,waiting to give up their own ghosts, lose their form and go somewhere else. Nothing is really solid but still we cling to the  solidity of our decisions and the certainty of how things will turn out.
 Even when we half joke about nothing lasting for ever and how we can't be sure of anything, we're still not fully aware of what we're saying to each other.
I know this will happen and so do you. Doesn't really help ....does it?


As with a lot of things, best not to think about it too much before it starts happening before my eyes.


 Anyway....any more fairs please.