Symbolic Forest

Do you go through phases of liking different sorts of art, different fashions, as you get older?

The other day someone said to me: “all teenage boys go through a surrealist phase”. And, it’s true, I had a surrealist phase when I was a teenager. Some of them – Salvador Dalí, for example – never grow out of it.^* Most do, though, and go on to other things. When I was small, I was also a Heath Robinson fan, and it took me a while to realise that he had ever done anything other than the bizarre machinery cartoons which made him a household name.^**

So, did you go through art phases when you were younger? What artists did you like then that you really don’t care about now? I want to see if this is true in general, or if it just applies to floating rocks and lobster telephones.

* Magritte, on the other hand, did grow up – I assume he just had strange fetishes for bowler hats and sleighbells.

** I have more to write about Heath Robinson soon, but no time to write it now.

Keyword noise: art, artists, fashion, Heath Robinson, phases, Salvador Dalí, surrealism.

Time for a news roundup. Today in the news: Ellenor Bland, a Conservative councillor and parliamentary candidate has been caught forwarding an unfunny poem about illegal immigrants. She said it might have been her husband that did it, not her; but he’s also a Tory councillor, so it doesn’t really make much difference.

I don’t particularly care that some Conservatives might enjoy racist jokes – it’s hardly recent news, after all. I’m more worried that they have such a poor sense of humour. The “poem” has been going around for some time now – several of my colleagues were circulating the email a few weeks back – so it’s hardly news either. The worst thing is what she said to attack the rival politicans who broke the story:

[S]he claimed that the leak was “an infringement of my life”, adding: “I’m finding this all rather tiresome.”

I’m sorry? You want to be a politician, don’t you? If you want to be a politician, even a local councillor, you have to expect people to want to know what your opinions are.^* If you do something that seems to demonstrate you have an opinion on a political topic, you can hardly complain when people want to talk to you about it. You can’t pick and choose which opinions you want to discuss.

In other news: someone has been searching the web recently for: “symbolic forest pressure group”. Which is clearly a sign that I should set up a pressure group of my own; I’m just not entirely sure what I want to campaign for (or against). Suggestions, please! Maybe I should campaign for more single-issue campaigns.

* even though, like most politicans, you may well end up straining as hard as you can to prevent people finding them out.

Keyword noise: Ellenor Bland, immigration, opinion, privacy, racism, Tories, unfunny.

My most recent visit to London, and I was waiting to meet someone at Waterloo Station. Looking around nervously, scanning across everyone who walked past.

A bunch of football supporters walked past, shouting and chanting on the way to a match. Closer to me passed a couple, looking at them too. As they passed, one said: “I hate people.”

My friend Vee has a phrase she uses a lot: “PAC”.^* Often, I have to agree with her. But they don’t always do it deliberately. They do it by accident, out of ignorance and rudeness. People are bad just because they don’t notice other people. They don’t think about other people, and they don’t think about the consequences of their actions. They don’t think about what other people are feeling.

Not all people, of course. I like to think I don’t do it, at least, not as much as average. I like to think I pay attention. Most of the rudeness in the world isn’t deliberate; it’s caused just by not noticing the people around you. Like the football supporters in Waterloo Station, striding across the concourse chanting and not noticing everyone else backing away.

* it starts “People Are…”

Keyword noise: awareness, ignorance, London, observation, people, rudeness, Waterloo.

It’s dark outside. It’s not night, but rain-gloomy and grey. It feels dark. Winter is on its way. Soon, it will be dark.

Lots of things have come to an end in the past year; but lots more have begun. The year may be coming to a close, but the next one will be just around the corner. So much has changed for me in the past 12 months, that for the first time in a while I’m thinking like an optimist. I’m a changed person. I might not still be sure who I am, what I’m looking for, and where I’m going, but I’ve taken several steps along the path. I’ve made mistakes, but I don’t regret making any of them.

I can’t say where I would be if I hadn’t done X, or Y, or Z. You never know how things would have changed if you’d taken a different path one morning. Driving to work today, I saw a car parked on a sharp bend, and slowed down. Its driver was stood by on the phone, and an unconscious biker was laid by the side of the road. The ambulance was still on its way. Maybe, if I’d left home five minutes earlier, it would have been my crash.

This isn’t meant to be a melancholic post, by the way. I don’t know what’s coming round the next corner, and I’m not sure I want to. I’m just going to see what happens, and make decisions as I get to them. I don’t have a strategy; I don’t have a plan. I’m probably going to make more mistakes at some point, but that doesn’t bother me. I’m not going to stop anyone else making mistakes either, because they deserve to learn things too.

Keyword noise: autumn, change, future, mistakes, seasons, weather, winter.

Ambling around the house the other morning with the radio on, I heard a trailer for a documentary about Denis Diderot, the French Enlightenment philosopher, writer, and general all-round expert on everything. Indeed, the trailer described him as a “true polymath”, an expert at any field he turned his hand to.

Which set me thinking: is it possible to be a polymath any more? Can you really be an expert in a huge range of fields any more, or is the field of human knowledge just too wide? If you want to be a real in-depth expert in anything, it can be a full-time job just keeping up with everybody else. You might be able to skim the surface of another field, but how can you find the time to probe it deeply? Two hundred years ago, even, it was probably barely possible. Today, it’s not – the best you can do is know how to learn things quickly.

Then again, was it possible two hundred years ago? Was Diderot himself really a polymath? A philosopher and a writer, an art critic, but a polymath? How much did he know about science? He edited an encyclopedia, but didn’t write it all. From the point of view of someone whose main field of interest is philosophy or politics, or literature, he might seem like a polymath, just because he knew more than one of those fields; but he wasn’t an expert at everything. Was being a polymath ever possible? Could you ever be a master of all trades? How far back do you have to go?

Keyword noise: Diderot, expert, history, knowledge, philosopher, polymath.

It’s Friday afternoon, regular reader K is texting me at regular intervals to tell me she’s safely driving up to Scotland on her own, and I’m here at the office watching the clock tick around ready for my own weekend to start. Nothing much ever happens on a Friday afternoon. Noone phones up and reports faults; noone breaks anything very serious. The other staff always claim that this is because they’re far too busy on Fridays to report faults; I’ve always suspected that it’s because they’re not doing enough work to break anything.

Room 3B – our office – is full of banging and crashing, as we finally get air conditioning fitted. I’m glad there aren’t any oysters about, because the noisy noise…

An oyster writes: The idea that “noisy noise annoys an oyster” is, as it happens, a common misconception. I myself am a Stereolab fan, and have attended several gigs. The music there, whilst being too melodic to be pure noise, is certainly very loud, and…

A Towers Of London fan writes: Bah!

An oyster writes: Well have you ever been to a Stereolab gig?

The Plain People Of The Internet: Stop talking rubbish! We know there aren’t really any oysters writing to you! They don’t have arms! They can’t speak! They all live just outside Whitstable and Herne Bay! Whoever heard of anyone in Whitstable liking Stereolab? I know silliness makes a change from in-jokes, but … I mean, really.

There’s still an hour and a half left until the weekend. I’m not going to anticipate anything, I’m just going to see what happens. Barking, I know.

Keyword noise: colleagues, nonsense, Stereolab, The Plain People Of The Internet.

Samhain is coming up, so here are two vows for the next year.

Avoid getting close to people you don’t trust utterly. If you’re wary about somebody, you’re wary for a reason. The closer you let yourself get to somebody, the more you’re risking being hurt, even if neither of you realise it at the time.

Let people make their own mistakes. Some things can’t be taught; they have to be learned. Even if you can see they’re going to hurt themselves, sometimes you have to stand back and let them. If you try to stop them, they’re not going to listen, and you’re only going to make things worse.

This isn’t about you. Sometimes, when I post here, all I’m doing is talking to myself.

Keyword noise: introspection, mistakes, people, trust.

After I whinged to her about life for a while, my friend (and regular reader) K set me a challenge. Think of six happy memories, and the places they happened. It took me a long time, but here they are:

• The first night I spent with another person (in a flat on South Clerk St, Edinburgh).
• The Shimura Curves gig I went to with regular reader Miranda (at the Notting Hill Arts Club).
• The first time I escorted someone on a kissogram job (in a bar in Castleford)
• Climbing a hill in Dumfriesshire with friends
• Going to an event in London a couple of months back with my friend Wendy (in the catacombs beneath London Bridge station).
• Snuggling up to my then-boyfriend Gareth, in his kitchen, which was painted bright blue and yellow (on Mayfield Road, Edinburgh).

There are probably more happy memories, somewhere, that aren’t too tainted by bad things. These were the first six that came to mind, though.

I was supposed to be off up to Scotland again this weekend, incidentally, with K. She was planning a trip up there to visit various places with another friend, who had to drop out, so she invited me along to take up the spare bedroom. Annoyingly, though, I can’t get the time off work. “Oh, no, you can’t have that day off,” said Big Dave, “I booked it months ago.” Grrrr.

Keyword noise: happiness, memories, Big Dave.

Glasgow just wasn’t Glasgow last Saturday. Why? We walked down Queen Street, and there weren’t any goths or skater kids standing around outside the art gallery. None. Not one. The pavements, though, were wet. “They must have all just been hosed away,” said C. We looked around the art gallery, but the main gallery was closed off for installation, and none of the rest was particularly impressive. Being too lazy to get on the subway and go out to Kelvingrove, we ambled back up Sauchiehall Street and got ready for our night out.

Sunday morning, I drove C to her ferry, out along the Clyde shore. I tried to admire the scenery, but it was full of mist. We stopped off at a supermarket in Greenock for breakfast, and talked about ourselves, each other, and everything. I worried I was being a bore, or a geek, and then worried I was worrying too much. “You worry too much,” said C.

I dropped her off at the ferry terminal. Feeling suddenly at a loss, I got out the camera, before setting off for the drive home.

Keyword noise: Glasgow, holiday, photography, Scotland, travel, Wemyss Bay, railway station.

Today’s big news item: the National Wildlife Crime Unit has been launched. Based in North Berwick, a small village on the coast east of Edinburgh, it’s the first specialist police unit devoted solely to wildlife crime. I can’t wait until the police dramas start…

“What’s on the menu today, Sarge?”

“It’s a bad one today, chief. A dead goose in Clarence Gardens. All the signs are, a couple of squirrels ganged up on it, then got away up the Haxby Road. There’s something a bit suspicious about it, though, can’t quite put my finger on it.”

“Don’t trust the signs, Sarge. Remember the Pocklington case – all the signs pointed to sheep, but it turned out to be wolves all along. Round up a few of the local squirrels, just for show, but bring some rats down to the station too – they’ll know what’s going on. What’s next?”

“Three badgers held up an off-license in Netherthong, got away with the contents of the till and a few cartons of fags.”

“I don’t care about that, let the local cops sort it. Anything else?”

“One other thing, chief: a stoat holding three gerbils and a priest hostage in Wemyss Bay. Wants a week’s supply of rabbits, immunity from prosecution, a fast car and a ticket for the ferry.”

“Sarge, it’s a hard job we’ve got, and if there’s one thing these years on the force have taught me… Sarge? Are you listening? Stop daydreaming, man!”

“Sir!”

“If there’s one thing these years have taught me, Sarge, it’s never trust a stoat. They’ll weasel their way out of anything. Let’s get to work!”

Keyword noise: crime, drama, police, wildlife.