The Dreams of My Younger Self

I'm depressed today. I found a crumpled note in the back of my filing cabinet written by my younger self, aged ten. The little Jarred was full of ambition and idealism. Somehow in the course of growing up and becoming responsible, I've lost sight of the dreams that the ten year old Jarred with a red crayon and a goal decided to capture in a simple, maybe naive, to-do list. I am impressed that at that young age, I had the foresight to establish my ultimate goal and devise the necessary preceding steps to achieve it. So, today, in honour of that precocious child, I pledge to no longer neglect the dreams of my younger self. I've tacked above my desk little Jarred's simple list of things to achieve and I'm going to do him proud: 1. Get Rich, 2. Become Above the Law, 3. Raise Private Army and 4.(my goal) Hunt Man for Sport.

The Emperor's New Season

I happened to be in Paris during their fashion week. I highly recommend it, but not for the reasons you might think. We spent the afternoon sitting outside the Café Ruc. As our bottles emptied, our laughter got louder and our pointing became less discrete. There was of course a share of truly beautiful and well-dressed individuals, but they were a rarity. More often it looked like the circus was in town and the clowns had gotten hold of fake tan and Botox. The flow of fashionista wannabes tended to totter up the Rue Saint Honoré. Out of the hope they were massing in one place like neon-colored ladybugs with eating disorders, we followed. Our hopes were fulfilled at a shop called Colette. S_ went inside. I stayed out.
A large black Mercedes docked at the curb side. The driver got out and opened the back door. A well-heeled gentleman stepped from the car and disappeared into the shop in a swish of camel hair.
A man in a bicycle courier's outfit put his nose against the glass and searched the interior of the car, examining the occupants. He did the same to the passengers in the backseat then back to the front. He did this over and over. They stared forward and pretended that he didn't exist. The lips of the woman in the front seat pursed like an asshole under her perfect quaff.
"Anybody interesting?" I asked the courier.
"No. Just piles of shit in a car," he responded and led his bike away.

Jump to the Left, Put Your Hands on Your Hips, And...

I was ten the first time I saw Rocky Horror Picture Show live. I know now that I have a genetic pre-disposition to deviance and weirdness but that night, although I didn't understand most of what was happening, I knew what I witnessed in the theater aisles and on the screen were right and good.
My best friend at the time ruled his mother with a bratty whine and temper tantrums that pierced the ear. She bought us near-beer and gained a promise that I wouldn't tell my mother as a comprise when he started in on his dad's supply of Milwaukee's Best. Somehow he had heard about the Rocky Horror Picture Show and decided that it was something he also wanted.
Back then (am I really old enough to use that phrase), Rocky Horror was only shown in shabby dollar movie theaters at midnight.
Dutifully she drove us to the theater, bought us tickets and popcorn and sat down with us for the show. His mom was a southern Belle of the genteel persuasion. Her perfect coif was shipped directly from the fifties. She spoke in the most polite and honeyed southern tones.
The show started and I had found my world. I leaned forward eyes wide, darting to and fro the costumed people in the audience throwing hot dogs, doing the time warp, trying to fuck the narrator's butt chin. Beside me my friend greedily chomped at his popcorn and chuckled at the tits on screen. The mom didn't move. She tried to entreat her son to leave but he silenced her with a 'shut up, Mom'. She gripped the theater seat and squeezed her eyes shut the entire time. On the occasions she opened them, there would be a huff and an 'oh my god'. I tried to feel guilty but the pull of weirdness was too much for my ten year old soul.
As I got older I became more refined in my tastes for the odd but that first Rocky Horror, like a first love, will never be forgotten.
When the lights went up and we dusted the rice and confetti from our laps, the crowd began to leave and one of the audience members dressed as Frank-N-Furter pointed us out and yelled, “Holy shit, this lady brought her kids.” They all laughed. The mom was horrified. I felt like the baddest ass ten year old in the world.

Accion Mutante!

The other night I was out with the Japanese heart throb known as Lone-u Wolf-u, aka S_. Beside us sat a group of disability rights activists. A nice bunch with their hearts in the right place, but they declined my suggestions at using direct action tactics. I outlined a plan for blowing up the staircases in prominent buildings around London. I thought the wheat pasting of a sign saying "If we can't leave the ground floor, neither can you" on the targeted buildings was a nice touch but they said they'll stick with drafting a strongly worded petition. I think they are missing a trick there.

Comprend-ay, amigo?

Human communication is a sophisticated and sublime thing. The other day I was driving and a motorcyclist with a toot of his horn, a point to his turn signal and a rude gesture communicated his displeasure at my lane changing technique.

horn toot + point point + rude gesture = "Excuse me, may I have your attention, I feel that you did not sufficiently use your turn signal, you wanker."

Incredible, no? And with a gentle tap of my bumper to his back tire I made my rebuttal that we both tacitly agreed ended the discussion.

Boo Hoo. Noone Understands Me.

Writers are a bunch a whining ingrates. Only at this moment in the history of mankind can we entertain the possibility that sitting in front of a machine, which costs more money than what the majority of people on the planet need to stay alive, to make up stories is justified. Two favourite moans of writers is that it is lonely (boo hoo) and really hard work (ah, you're breaking my heart now).
Let's clarify things.
Lonely is solitary confinement in prison. When you are writing you are alone. That's it. When you are done, you go to the pub or you kiss your wife on the cheek. Writing being lonely is not even close to being true. The modest things I have achieved thus far with my writing is because I have surrounded myself with talented people with whom I share my work and discuss the process of writing and celebrate our shared passion for these squiggling black lines that, better than any other art form, explain what it means to be human.
As for writing being hard work, hard work is being ten and sorting coal in a mine. Writing is about getting things right, being meticulous. And it's a privilege that my life has accumulated enough comfort to afford the hours wasted doing so.
Since I count myself as a writer and therefore by definition a whining ingrate, I will share with you my greatest complaint. I am exhausted by people confusing their desire to be an author as one desires to be a doctor or politician rather than desiring to write. You're an idiot if you think writing is a career choice.

Dear Neda, I'm Sorry

If you find online the video of the murder of Neda, "The Angel of Iran", you will see death; worse, you will see dying; worse still, you will see and hear humans witnessing one of their young dying. There is a moment when those around her understand, from a sign unseen, that the motionless figure beneath them has ceased being a living human being. From them a keening rises, a sound unique to the witnessing of dying becoming death, which will haunt me for weeks.

I am naïve about politics, and I am completely ignorant about politics in Iran. I don't know if Mousavi will be as bat shit crazy as the last guy. For all I know he will continue to squander a young nation's greatest resource, it's people.

However, I know tyranny when I see it. It's easy to spot. It's predictable and unimaginative. It's men with power and hunger but no vision. Power and hunger, no better than a beast. Ahmadinejad and the Supreme Leader (the hint is in the name) have little more than that, never mind the ideology they drape over themselves.

So for that reason alone, let us pray that these disturbing videos like the one of Neda's murder will become artefacts of a historical moment in time.

Let the tyrants fall and come what may.