Tuesday 16 June 2015
Wednesday 18 January 2012
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IN your dreams, man!
In my waking world I am a slave to rules, routine, and
tiresome responsibilities. The people are stuck up and boring, so anxious to
make the right impression. My surroundings are wishy-washy shades of grey. No,
give me my dream world any time.
In my dream world I’m on a well-lit movie set, vibrant
with colour. Anything is possible, everything is just waiting to happen. The
freedom is breathtaking. The people can be unpleasant, downright weird, or just
plain defective--but never boring. And I ask myself, now who in their sane mind
would rather live in their waking world?
When I was 13 my dad took me bear-hunting in the
Himalayas. We climbed to 14,000 feet and trudged through old snow in the middle
of summer. My dad had a .375 Magnum Winchester rifle that went off like a
cannon, but we never shot any bears. I’m glad about that.
In the night we slept in an empty shepherd’s hut. At
that height the sky is crystal clear, the stars a dense carpet of pulsing
pin-prick lights. Everywhere it’s almost as bright as a football stadium.
Forget the moon. You hardly notice it.
While my dad snored in his sleeping bag I lay reading
about how Sherlock Holmes set about attacking The Speckled Band with nothing
but a thin, wooden cane. But so magical was the night that after a while I put
my book aside and simply gazed up at the dazzling, swirling, canopy of stars.
It’s unbelievable how many satellites were wandering past. I began imagining
that one of them was a 1957 Cadillac Eldorado, just about the most beautiful
car in the world, cruising sedately along a diamond-strewn highway.
But in the end even this sublime moment couldn’t keep
me away from my dream world.
Besides, I was really tired. So my eyelids drooped
shut and I dreamed, as always, of faraway places and fantastic goings-on;
fierce creatures in dense jungles, tank brigades swooping across rolling
battle-plains (you’d be amazed at how fast a modern tank can go!). Of riding a
1200cc Yamaha bike with my babe sitting behind. When I accelerated powerfully
she clutched me tight and gasped and squealed in my ear. Then I was deep sea
fishing with blisters blooming on my hands as I wrestled, Ernest Hemingway
style, with a giant marlin at the end of a heavy-gauge fishing line. Hang
gliding over war-torn mountains where bearded outlaws fired up at me, their
spent bullets only reaching far enough to clink harmlessly off the aluminium
struts of my glider…I couldn’t believe it when morning came and our guides
spoilt it all by shaking us awake with steaming mugs of tea. I’d been having
such fun! My dad smiled sleepily and pointed at the horizon. Ice cream
mountain-tops were turning to pink sugar confections under a honey-gold sun. It
was my turn to gasp (I try not to squeal too often!), because I had never seen
anything so mind-blowingly lovely.
On the way back
down we breakfasted off cherry trees and later we caught trout from a mountain
stream. They tasted fantastic after we’d tossed them in flour and fried them in
butter.
Yes, this was
the only time in my life when my waking world managed to be every bit as good
as my dream world. I’ll never forget it…if only there were more moments like
that then I wouldn’t get tired of my waking world so often.
Sometimes in my dreams I can fly. Yes, fly, simply by
climbing an invisible staircase and just sort of, well, taking off from the
top. Once, half awake, I got up from bed and stubbed my toe when I tried to
climb. It really hurt!
I find anything is preferable to the disappointing
reality of my waking world – – but I can
only sleep so much. So what about when I’m not sleepy any more? Well, I have
this marvellous companion called a lapdog. Lapdog? Sorry, laptop, which
has far more interesting worlds nestling within its cute little 14 inch face
than all the spreading vistas of human struggle outside my front door. Hey,
listen, it might not be for everyone, my kind of life. Or even good for
everyone. I think I can handle it, though; my books, my sheets of lined, A4
paper for writing stories...stories that just keep tumbling around inside my brain. A
warm kettle and a nearby bed are everything else I need. And to anyone who says
to me, hey, get a life, man! I say, thank you very much, I already have one.
And you, man?
Welcome to my website (click)
Welcome to my website (click)
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