Skip to main content

Musings on a Sunny Day


 

I write for a fairly successful blog. Not in term of numbers or followers, but in terms of content: a well-written and balanced page of writing. The blog is composed of 2 fiction writers and a poet, it has a good variety of topics that might interest fellow writers and readers in equal measure. But lately I’ve felt the need to go solo. I cannot emphasize enough the feeling of freedom that writing anonymously gives you. Not knowing who is going to read you, not being judged by the people you know.  A desire for invisibility, or just freedom. Not expecting anything back. The list goes on, not to mention other unpleasant side effects of working with others. 

 

In the middle of the lockdown I feel that the solitude I have been confined to is not enough, and I am trying to disengage from those few people I am still in touch with. Odd as it might seem I feel like breaking free from those few relationships I still have. As Sartre put it so well, ‘Hell is Other People’. But why? What has been happening during these days of self-isolation? I have developed a taste for living free from conflicts, compromises, always biting the reins. Having to limit myself at every turn. I simply don’t want to do it anymore. 

 

I have been away from this blog for a while and now it feels like my salvation. Yesterday I tried to think of people I could talk to, to explain how I felt, and why I have reached such a low point of tolerance, but I couldn’t think of anyone who would listen without giving me advice or contradicting me (omg I sound like a psychopath). What’s wrong? It’s just little things. Yesterday I got almost run over by a bicycle on the pavement, the guy didn’t even bat an eyelid, he just carried on at maximum speed while I turned around and looked at him in disbelief. I was walking to the library and the pavement was littered with disposable masks. I just don’t get it.  Why is there so much stupidity around us? Have you ever felt it? But if you say anything the reaction is always the same, ‘c’est la vie.’ ‘Just relax and ignore it’. Or, ‘find the good side in people.’

 

There were days when I liked people, but those were the days when those I knew were special in many ways, I just didn’t know they were. I thought that the all world was like that. That’s the problem with growing up in an intellectually privileged environment. You will feel surrounded by stupidity for the rest of your life. I can’t even begin to imagine what Chomsky must feel like. Usually I can cope with it, but not this week. I feel vulnerable, and alone. And Chomsky won’t talk to me…

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ageism and Women

In the last couple of days a debate about ageism and women broadcasters has been going on TV and all the major newspapers in the UK. A well known BBC presenter dismissed from her job because of her age (over 50), at least so she claims, has submitted her case to an employment tribunal  and has won it for unfair dismissal. Such a victory should worm every woman's heart for a few seconds at least. But does it? Ageism towards women starts at a very early age. Remember the old song "Sweet Sixteen"? If you were in your 20s at the time you probably thought that your love life was already over and that men were too busy chasing after 16 years old in school uniforms to even notice you in your jeans and old jumper. In my opinion ageism is not the right word, reality is much uglier then that. What if you are young but are not, shall we say, "photogenic" (remember this word?) could you ever become a TV presenter. I think not. If we make a list in our head of all TV presen...
Post a Comment
Read more

WHERE NO WIND BLOWS...

I LOVE WORDS I like words so much that I had to learn a new language to double them up, so that I could write each one not once but twice. Hundreds of words,  like  people reflected in a distorted mirror, where a big man sees himself thin and a skinny woman sees herself fat. With words it was just the same, some became very long in the other language, others became shorter. It was good to have such an infinite variety. I imagined them all locked up in shining little boxes. Each word with its reflexed image. One in gold and the other one in silver. One long and the other one short. One all curled up in the shape of a half moon, the other one sitting flat in the middle. Always happy to be together. It didn't matter how big or small they were. They would always fit in the little box together, forming different shapes in a long DNA chain as strong as steel, climbing up all the way to the moon whenever I opened the little box. I could see myself walking each step till I reached t...
Post a Comment
Read more

LADY CATERINA (a day in the country…estate)

When I was about 12, Lady Caterina, that's how we addressed her, took me, my sister and her nephews, who happened to be my cousins, to an old country estate partly in ruins, which had belonged to her family since 1861. My cousins and I used to spend a lot of our pleasurable time with her and we loved her very much; everything about Lady Caterina was fun and an adventure. She could be bossy at times −used as she was at giving orders− but she laughed a lot and liked children. The appearance was that of a prima donna and her manners matched her looks: her silvery hair had a strange touch of purple, she talked incessantly in a high pitch voice and was always ready for action, which could take the form of an exquisite cake, a trip to the country or improvised sonatas on the grand piano in her sitting room. That day she came around with her driver in her big car and took us to a sunny, remote and enchanted place. There, the smells and the light, the barking of dogs and the whis...
Post a Comment
Read more