Friends Come and Go

Falling in love can be like droplets of rain falling to the earth, especially when you are young. At least it was for me; I never knew what I wanted exactly but loved the feeling of immersion in another person's life, enveloping your own inside theirs so the two became interchangeable.

It's 1994 still and I'm surrounded by uncertainty across the globe. A lot happened in Europe in this period and I often felt I was outside of it when I should have been inside it. As usual finding consolation in wine and books.

Falling in love made the boredam of life and being on the outside go away, it gave reading books a sort of meaningless equation - books were not the means to an end. Literature simply delayed the inevitable destruction of oneself.

We were all growing distant, each of us trying to struggle in our way through the vagaries of experience, and some were better than it than others. Finding a lover, someone to share more depth and intimacy with sort of produced an intense feeling of calmness.

The only problem was when that calmness came crashing down to be replaced with its oposite on the spectrum - deep anger and loss - life felt pointless. That's the wonderful feeling of being young, one can pick oneself up so easily.

When relationships end you understand just how much you love a person, and whether or not it's worth fighting for. On this ocassion it was not, despite my feeling of loss and isolation.

It spurned me ever onwards to find that escape route away from the boredam and stagnation.

Epiphany

It happened and things changed. Don't they always?

You look around you and so many things appear clear but when you delve further you notice the elements in each object or person. Everything is subjective and pays tribute to our interpretations, without which nothing would exist.

Whether you are depressed or joyful, you sometimes get a moment of self-realisation. An epiphany. Why didn't I think of that before?

It's been a long time coming but I'm back. Joy caused it, not depression.

I had an epiphany - a self realisation moment that it was time again to engage.

A lot had changed but I going back again to revisit the past and catch up with the future.

I love semiotics. I love literature even more. What is love? Do we have love juice like link juice that we can share? Can you give too much love, so that you die?

Back then I had no idea the vehicle I'm using now would begin to shape my life as much as it has.

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Expostulation and Reply

"Why, William, on that old grey stone,

Thus for the length of half a day,

Why William, sit you thus alone,

And dream your time away?"

William Wordsworth 1798

That's what we were doing, not quite in the Lake District but trapped in the towns, suffocating and choking from the degredation and loss, dreaming was part of the survival; and our literary pretentions were part of that dreaming. It was our escape to reach Windemere and Coniston before the Spring's end and reach it we did, in a clapped out car, carrying a tent with holes, and pitched it exactly where we wanted. It was some small fortune to be so lucky for a change.

The air was fresh and minds were cleansed - sounds odd to say that now but it was true, in spite of the amount of cigarettes smoked and beer drank. But everybody knew that our paths may not cross again and indeed they didn't. All that was important was the literature and the symbols around us, the signs in the trees and rivers, the postures and expressions of the campers and locals in the pubs. All the signs gave us were more questions.

The Tables Turned

Up! Up! my Friend, and quit your books;

Or surely you'll grow double:

Up! Up! my Friend, and clear your looks;

Why all this toil and trouble?

William Wordsworth 1798

It is a dull and endless strife thinking of the return but the feeling of release while climbing the hills was unique and not felt again for a long time. It was probably the sense of freedom, leaving that well trodden path to Trough of Bowland at the weekends... this was different and the company was important. And what was very funny was inadvertantly seeing and meeting symbols you recognised that moved in the same circles and spoke with humour. That surely can't be matched again? The Tables had turned and what was left were the summer weeks to enjoy by the metaphorical fire, drinking mulled wine and cherry brandy, smoking in the garden and thinking of those simple pleasures lost, and a fear rose up in our breasts that the change would be calamitous.