Tis God that lifts our comforts high
Or sinks them in the grave,
He gives and takes bless’d be his name
He takes but what he gave.
(1799).

[Diary entry, 1994]

The imbecilic drone of the radio continues long after the kitchen has emptied. Undaunted, unaware like some self-important attention-basking airhead punctuating her inane utterings with a laugh or a coquettish flick of her long hair back over her shoulder from whence it had strayed. To test them. Determine whether they still listen to her. Now the students sit around the communal table draped in striped plastic; seven colours, each for a separate section of the daily, chipped mugs of coffee, bowls of cereal, crumbs from a long-digested repast peeping from under the pages. Minding their own business. Anxious youths, shy and stumbling. Unsure.

The leaves are starting to turn, the climbing frame empty, trucks and pieces of toy race track lie abandoned in the sandpit. Sparrows perch for a moment on the handlebars, saddles and pedals of the bicycles wedged into the stands. Chained to prevent theft. Pine cones litter the path. It smells like home. Damp, cool, fertile, autumn. Home: a bridge over the gorge, Soldier’s Leap, the forest’s embrace, the shore of the loch, ferns and drifts of ancient needles, the type of wind a tourist brochure would refer to as ‘bracing’. Slippery lichen-clad rocks worn by the sturdy hiking bots of the nouveau riche subscribing to a fantasy of untamed wilderness. The Barbour brigade with their Range Rovers and statutory Golden Labradors. Tweed hats with the tail feather of a native bird, thick woollen socks and possibly binoculars – rambling lords of the countryside with their coarse blankets to spread beneath the spruce. Flasks. Cut sandwiches. Unnecessarily raised voices. Off to the pub for a pint with the quaint locals. Buy them a round, colonial magnanimousness. Where can a man hire a boat in these parts? Is the fishing good? Do I need a permit? Down to the yacht club’s fee-paying cosiness. Whistler prints in cheap reproduction frames, red-stained Chesterfields. Antiseptic. They will never suffer the indignity of non-absorbent, arse-slicing oven-ready greaseproof masquerading as toilet paper or dripped-on seats in musty, purpose-built Forestry Commission chalets. Intruders and unwelcome, except perhaps for the aforementioned glass of Seventy Shilling, still, what a price tag, at least half an hour’s bragging. You can picture the husband posing with a four pound trout, the camera unable to pick out the detail of rainbow flecking, but more than equal to the challenge of immortalising the regality of his smile.

And there are those whose very clay was extracted from the mountain slopes. Whose defect was ignorance and poverty. Sheep farming. Tending the estates. Planting trees, carrying the saplings up on their backs and glorying in the sweat. Helpless to stop the invasion. For hundreds of years their tenancy was secure and now they are ousted for the sake of a cash-glutted city dweller’s notion of romance, a beautiful view kept at bay by the double glazing, a snip at ₤300,000. The headstones in the drystane dyke-enclosed churchyard lean in resignation, gathering moss, rain obscuring the inscriptions. Who remembers them? They will come, prophesies the real estate agent, they will come and seek planning permission for their extensions, conservatories, verandas and terraces. Any verily I say unto thee, they shall plant potatoes and sprouts and cabbages and roses shall climb the iron trellises. Let there be cable TV, satellite dishes. Their offspring will bide their time until inheritance, death duties sapping their enthusiasm, or perhaps they will sell when the market is right. Colourful characters a strong selling point.

Have you noticed how middle-class aspirations have stupefied us all? The humble council house now a well-appointed private dwelling. Even the most wretched slum in P has been spruced up. No longer do the inhabitants torch the place when they want to jump the resettlement queue – now Austrian lace curtains and porcelain knick-knacks are the staple. The broken tinted glass, stray crushed cans and bloodstains dripped along the pavement, which you can trail to an unresolved end still testify silently to the casual brutishness that infects the estates. Stabbings, drink driving. Tut, tut, the wagging finger of the moralist not yet redundant. My Father’s disgust at an incident our neighbour recounted: the driver of a battered wreck of a van was accosted by a traffic warden and issued a ticket for overstaying his welcome on a set of double yellow lines contemptuously produced a thick wad of ₤20 notes, the teeth revealed by his grin at the authority figure’s expression of amazement little more than blackened stumps.

The canal behind the street that marked the boundary with the disused marshalling yard (doubtless now converted into a retail park with premier sales opportunities, anonymous sheds crammed with consumer durables) was choked with discards: prams, doll torsos, tyres, corned beef tins, rags, none of which deterred the ducks or, presumably, the minnows.

Every Saturday at about ten o’ clock the doorbell would ring and there would be Mr. T, local grocer, with a cardboard box heavy enough to make his eyes bulge and his cheeks flush red. Sometimes I would answer the door and he would stagger in and deposit it on the kitchen table (we had linoleum floor covering then, now it’s durable carpet). Helping to convey its contents to pantry, fridge and cupboard was one chore my brother and I could be relied upon to carry out without complaint. Then we knew how many packets of Golden Wonder salt and vinegar flavour there were to squabble over. Whether there were any spare bars of Cadbury’s or whether Fry’s Chocolate Cream, my Mother’s bedtime treat, represented the entire plunder. She has dentures, so it didn’t matter. She used to take out the set and put them on top of the mantelpiece and never washed them before putting them in again. There was no choice when she was young: one twinge of toothache and the dentist whipped out the whole lot to save having to make a loss on the plebeian. She never bothered about the fluff or dust on which they rested. Varicose veins and cigarette smoke. Blood in the toilet when my persistent nagging reduced her to capitulation and she let me in for a pee. Small white tube. It frightened me. She must be ill.

Ice cream van, paper van, lemonade van, fish van, chip van. On holiday at Tummel the weekly visit of the mobile shop with its counter and shelves. G’s excitement at the tune. He runs to the window, straining to see: “Mummy, Mummy, ice cream van!” Nothing changes save location.

There are two photographs – one of both parents, one of my Mother. They were young, but we never noticed at the time. The first is in a boat on Loch Tummel. Both smile. He looks directly at you, protesting that he doesn’t know what the joke is – she looks at him and it is impossible to tell what she is thinking. The second is of her astride a Clydesdale, bareback, clad in a Coronation Street pinnie, her hair tied back in a headscarf, 50s style. She waves: mischief, vitality, revelling and I know what I have inherited from her. Her laugh. Her irrepressible humour.

I used to get annoyed whenever she and I went anywhere together. Inevitably, some aftershave or alcohol-reeking male would attempt to foist himself upon her, soppy and dog-eyed. She (as I now comprehend) was the perfect ambassador, tactful, but firm, turning down their offers without bruising their pride. They never retreated crestfallen.

They are strangers to me, the parents who put breath in me and nurtured me and guided me. They never rowed or exchanged so much as a harsh or critical word in our presence (and it would have been extremely difficult to conceal aggression in such a small and thin-walled house as ours). We were embarrassed when they cuddled, prising them apart. I know that I will never bear the loss of them, nor will such a bond exist with any other. Is it simply time? Or once dependence? Two years back I was shocked to the core when I heard her complain of some flaws in her spouse. I had always confronted him about them, as children do, but to hear the faintest murmur of regret was deeply disturbing. I who screech and yelp at the tiniest injustice had foolishly assumed that the projected idyll was pristine, intact, inviolable. Not that she was scathing, simply sighing a little. This magnificent woman, generous and kind, serious and clear-sighted might be unhappy. No, but frustrated. She always did what was required. Washed clothes and dishes, ironed, cleaned, dusted and polished the brass ornaments, weeded the garden, worked part time at the hospital from 16.30 to 21.00 Monday to Friday throughout my adolescence and made the tea. Where did her energy come from? A trip to the library to stock up on the latest romances (not the sludgy Cartland stuff, more the earthy Cookson working class heroines overcoming the odds or croft and shawl melodramas). In my 15-year old prudery (teenagers feel revulsion at the idea of their parents copulating, preferring to think of them as past it) I opened the pages of one at random. It was all rape and trickling sperm, some wicked landowner abusing his position and seducing a milkmaid. Flicking further, I found bursting bodices and heaving breasts, dark curly-locked hero kneeling at his mistress’ feet and so on. At work, my Father had been pestered by female colleagues about the frequency of performing marital duties, which he parried by joking that at his age (he was only approaching fifty) he was more interested in a cup of tea and the archetypal Scottish housewife’s night off fare, the fish supper. He has always been painfully shy about affection. Private, introverted, a typical Highland boy of his generation. No bawdiness. Undiluted romanticism. Tee-total. Not one drop of alcohol has ever passed his lips. If communion wine were offered him, he would not take it. She was the brains, the talent, the silent commander, the temperamental one (of course, the mood swings of the menopause were another mystery to the uninitiated). Recently she surprised me again. We never normally discuss “personal” maters, but she indicated that she believes everything I value about myself comes from him. I have known for years that he wrote, as did his father before him, but she told me the passion comes from him, the surfeit of feelings, the restlessness, the melancholy, even the intelligence. I could not resist a sceptical laugh, asking what I had received from her. “The fat,” she replied.

Yes, she was undervalued, thwarted and impeded at every turn. Her mother would not allow her to attend P Academy in spite of her having won a coveted (and rare) scholarship to cover the fees on the pretext that the uniform was too expensive, but really because she could not bear her daughter enjoying an opportunity she had not been given. Wandering farm hands, ploughman and mate, P, B of E and the carse on the way to D. Even her children have failed my Mother until now. A classic case of boy gravitating to mother and girl to father. I still do not know when or how my parents met. There are letters, but I will not read them until they are gone. Until he is scattered from the summit of Schiehallion to survey the fields where once he harvested, a potato-faced boy in awkward grey flannel shorts and cardigan.

How could she accept it? That she could lose her rag we had felt on stung backsides. Once we had tasted the belt, the threat of it sufficed as a deterrent. God, children hate their nearest and dearest sometimes. Meekness? Resignation? She wanted more progeny. Good Catholic stock, but she was afflicted by a rare condition, Cushing’s syndrome. Although she eventually recovered, starting a family had been delayed. What amazes her is that the longer they are together (41 years so far) the more he loves her – inexhaustibly, unquestioningly, reverently. “I have been lucky”. I do not think it odd, yet am torn by it. I am not monogamous by inclination, yet cherish a notion of its inherent desirability, the harmonious example they set. He bought her an eternity ring. Two Christmases in a row. Identical, same shop. I laughed when he told me (I had been enquiring so that I could avoid purchasing the same gift by mistake). His conclusion: “I must be getting dottle [senile, confused]”. Rather than tease (as I might have done) that she would never escape his clutches (two eternities!), she smiled, proclaiming that she would wear one on weekdays and the other on weekends only. I still replicate their habit of buying objects as a demonstration of love, no longer disparaging them for it.

Kungshamra. Been to the supermarket. The vegetables are wilted and shrink-wrapped packs of fish and prawns outnumber cuts of meat. Seafaring nation. Slightly dingy aisles. Little choice compared to the palatial emporiums at home (not that we were always so spoilt). In the tunnelbana. Yesterday, on returning from the Monologue Festival a woman stepped out of the train. Her skirt, leather, barely long enough to conceal her underwear, a zip, full length to open it, matching jacket and boots. She couldn’t walk straight and kept putting her hand over her eyes to screen out the unwanted stares from the waiting platform occupants. Or to gain respite from the clinical whiteness of neon reflected on tile. She reached the escalator and was gone. The muttering occasioned by her subsided. Quarter to midnight. Mörby centrum.

Verdi’s requiem rises through the floor. Played at the correct speed, my previous acquaintance with it from a scratched 78 rpm played at 33⅓. Surreal and swamplike, a crossed over creature out of synch with this dimension trying to communicate. “Moonlight Serenade” drowns out the orchestra and chorus below. Then “A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square”. The columns of the British Museum. Tap, tap, tap, an anonymous hand is bouncing a ball off the wall to the right in a rhythm so vapid and consistent that it impinges on my concentration. My desk is healthily cluttered with dictionary, vocabulary book, cinema tickets, bills from cafés, scissors, postcards and photocopies. The dregs of coffee have curdled, churlish, in my cup.

[1994]

Brända Tomten/Kindstugatan. Underneath the spreading chestnut tree.

Will a Newtonian chestnut drop and remind my outraged skull of the laws that constrain us? The frost retreats before the crisp Baltic light, clinging obstinately to a few inches of shade. A pigeon hobbles on malformed stumps, the overhanging vines withering slowly. It could be Vienna but for the lack of tourists, the throngs having completed their pilgrimages and returned to the warmth, cleansed. A blue communion goblet in an atelier window. No price tag – ominous. You can’t bribe God. “Grant us your peace”. Peace, peace. Dark waters, cold tugging, towing down – heavy limbs and sodden garments. Empty the bladder one last time. Don’t struggle. Collectable cars not for grubby fingers in miniature. Spoons and thimbles. My breath steams, but my hands are warm. Cyclists. A girl pushed by in a wheelchair. I’m being watched from a window. “This country is kind to its old people”. Heels. Faltering on the unevenness. Long, black velvet skirt and shawl. My God, a taxi! She takes out her wallet and counts. It isn’t a purse so much as a flat, masculine leather moneyfold – the driver helps her with infant and door opening. My pigeon friend preens a wing. There is a large nest in this tree, like a stork’s: undisciplined, spread amply. Candlesticks of every conceivable variety line the windowsills. A single decorative concept allowing for individuality. A red flower – in a window box on a slender stalk, bending with the weight of its own effort. It is almost silent. A peal of church bells intrudes. Copper gargoyles launch themselves in attack from the corners of the spire, tongues extended in fury. The fallen chestnuts are brown, shiny and smooth. A young man walks past, eyes down, blond hair still wet from the shower, a holdall with the fluorescent handle of a tennis or perhaps a squash racket exposing itself. Helicopter. A group of non-native English speakers admire the square – they want me to move, but do not approach with a petition. The cameras flash greedily. I stay put. I am older and sourer and I have every right to be here. Whistlestop steeping. Again, cold comfort from elitism. I did not savour their exasperation. Surely I did not destroy their composition? I have been the exclusive subject of artistic adoration. What do they see? A disturbance? A jarring discontinuity? I belong here more than they do. They have left, yet still they haunt me. No alternatives, no real choices. The Commission representative said, in impeccable mixed metaphor: “Stuck between a rock and the deep blue sea”.

At the church on Sunday, the fur coat and perfect grooming. Flawless exterior. Her way. The blood of Christ, shed for you. You cannot eliminate distortion. A blue chalice. At a loss now. The leaves stir.

I was happier before I became sexually active. I was happier when life had some other purpose. I can never be good enough to bed the number or commune with the men I would like to, but I know at the same time – the irony that lashes – that I am probably more skilled at the art of coitus – they have their beauty as a snare and do not need to please – their beauty itself the aphrodisiac, the sweet taste of conquest. I can satisfy a man, but they do not require to put in any effort, physically or emotionally. Being good is a scourge. The evil prosper. I am a selfish sham. The pigeon returns with mate. Still no closer knowing. Limbo, purgatory. There is, however, no redemption. God loved the sinners, but what is there to commend the blameless? I should conclude a truce, sue for a ceasefire. And the weary shall find no rest.

When Thatcher was appointed Prime Minister, I admired her boundlessly. Not because of her electoral promises, but because she had proven that women could attain the highest office (Gy was also entranced by her: in his estimation she was the only woman more intelligent than him, a comment for which I really ought to have kicked him out of the bed). Soaring unemployment and the gradual whittling down of social security payments were the warning signals: she was attempting nothing less than the complete overhaul of the social structure (pandering to the crassest instincts, glorifying gain). Students could no longer apply for unemployment benefit during the summer break (I had summer jobs as a general kitchen skivvy in a palace, where I vengefully picked my nose whilst making sandwiches for the coach-spewed hordes and then as a bilingual tourist guide in a Highland castle). All claimants were under automatic suspicion of cheating the system, degrading questionnaires designed to catch them out. The definition of living together as opposed to merely sharing the same accommodation narrowed to the extent that if you vacuum-cleaned the other person’s half of the carpet, picked their soiled underpants off the floor or washed their dirty dishes along with your own you were stripped of your entitlement. Allowing council tenants to purchase their own houses was, however, a stroke of genius, satisfying aspirations for social advancement (virtually everyone could now buy into the middle-class dream of solid brick and mortar respectability) whilst simultaneously offloading poor quality stock, thereby sparing local authorities the inevitable repair bills. Her particular brand of ruthlessness and aggression was beautifully captured in the image of handbag-swinging, the one inalienable token of her enduring femininity (in spite of all efforts at masculinising her, thereby suggesting that only by betraying her true nature could she aspire to and retain power, traditionally a male privilege). For me, the abolition of student grants was the last straw. For all his sanctimonious declarations about admitting 50% of the population into higher education (without a thought devoted to how this might devalue the currency for all graduates), Blair has succeeded in pushing through top-up fees, which threaten to put the cost of obtaining a degree beyond the financial wherewithal of all but the wealthiest. Had I been born a mere handful of years later I would never have been able to follow my current path. I would never have taken the risk of going to university had the prospect of long-term indebtedness hung over my head. Instead, I was free to pursue my academic interests and nurture my talents. There is no more effective way to promote the elitism Blair has vowed to combat. The working class will be content to accept their subordinate lot, preferable as it is to the alternative in this precarious, solidarity-expunged contemporary Britain: well done Tony, even Maggie in her heyday could not have pulled off such a masterstroke!

The measure of civilisation (reason over brute strength, the dethronement and demystification of biology as a role-determinant) is to be found in female emancipation. Not that we have achieved full equality in even the most secular and prosperous societies: the notorious glass ceiling but one of the hidden mechanisms conniving at our exclusion from genuine power. Background culture (the scaffolding of society and cognition) and prevailing attitudes (for example, Godfrey Bloom’s declaration that as an employer, he would never recruit a woman of child-bearing age, although polemical in intent articulates the secret prejudices of many – women are still assumed to be working for pin money, although in reality current lifestyle aspirations are predicated on their contribution to the family income. In unvarnished terms: most households could not subsist if the female partner did not perform remunerated and unremunerated – Bloom’s “cleaning behind the fridge” – work. Low wage part-time jobs are still justified on grounds of the flexibility they offer to child-rearers. That female-dominated professions continue to be afflicted by a chronic lack of status was highlighted once again by the recent statement to that effect made by the president of the Royal College of Physicians, Professor Carol Black. Women are still considered expendable members of the labour force, a soft target for redundancies) count for far more than simple economics.

Gellner’s lucid and penetrating analysis of the traits of advanced industrial society is relevant here: “Its economic foundation is altogether different: it is self-consciously based on sustained, continuous innovation, and on an exponential growth in productive resources and output. It is committed to a theory of knowledge which makes nature intelligible without recourse to Revelation, and thus also renders nature effectively manipulable and a source of ever-growing affluence. At the same time, nature is no longer available as a source of legitimating principles of the social order. In fact, economic growth is the first principle of legitimacy of this kind of society: any regime which fails to attain and maintain it is in trouble. (…)
This society is no longer Malthusian: economic growth eventually outstrips demographic growth, which, for independent reasons, diminishes or disappears altogether. Its culture no longer values offspring so highly, if at all: sheer labour power or brawn is of little consequence, either for authorities or for individuals, either productively or militarily. (…) Human beings are usable only if educated, and education is expensive. Quality not quantity of personnel counts, and quality depends on the machinery of cultural production of men, in other words on ‘education’. Offspring are not valued by authority for their military or productive potential, or by parents as a form of insurance. Offspring are expensive and must compete, often unsuccessfully, with other forms of satisfaction and indulgence”.

For Gellner, the demographic decline that so exercises the minds of our politicians (worried about how to manage state finances in such a way as to cover the costs of pensions and health care for the elderly) is the corollary of structural (and institutionalised) literacy, technical evolution, mechanisation and enhanced productivity. His argument needs to be complemented by the mindset cultivated (and deliberately encouraged) by consumerism and the impact of greater social opportunities being extended to women, the former intimately linked to the loss of a transcendental dimension. Consumerism is both egotistical and nihilistic, reducing us to our purchasing power: we can rely only upon ourselves for our own happiness (thus the issue of structural inequalities in access to resources is conveniently obscured; ambitions are curbed by the weight of disapproval – what is deemed appropriate in any given milieu for a girl as opposed to a boy a case in point, sending her to university may undermine her marriageability, or the investment involved may appear disproportionate given that she will probably sacrifice a career for obedient spousehood – by a ‘realistic’ assessment of prospects in an environment where gas-fitters can look ahead to a more secure livelihood and greater financial reward than academics), we must remain young, fit and attractive in order to compete, we must revel in the here and now as nothing lies beyond the grave. New improved products forever hold out the promise of enhancing our enjoyment: boost your orgasm, put your healthy bank balance on display in the form of inanimate objects and trophy-partners. Dump everything that keeps you back: last year’s model the ultimate humiliation, everything from the sagging wife to the wrinkled face that greets you in the mirror can be traded in for something better.

The message for women is equally clear: we are taught to covet the masculine ideal of freedom, power and fulfilment. The long hours required to progress through the ranks are incompatible with reproduction, presenting us with a choice: either pursue the male definition of the good life (where old boy networks and testosterone-drenched business practices, such as providing entertainment for top executives in the form of lap dancers or escort girls or taking part in team member bonding late night drinking sessions effectively exclude women anyway, the value of professional expertise or merit never having been the sole or even the primary determinant of promotion in spite of protestations to the contrary) or accept the kitchen sink, dirty nappies and menial chores without complaint. Small wonder that the biological imperative of perpetuating the genes loses out in the desirability stakes. A newspaper article calculated the cost of raising a child to adulthood as being equivalent to a top range Porsche. If our earthly existence is all we have and the years prior to being consigned to the dumping ground of the old people’s home with its dribbling and incoherent residents rush by can it come as any surprise that ever more women subscribe to the materialist rather than the drudgery option particularly now that they at least stand a chance, however limited, of gaining a foothold? Clearly, more than the meagre financial incentives hitherto proposed are called for if the population decline is to be reversed.

My former lovers have left enduring traces in my life. I cover my eyes when rinsing my hair in the shower so that the warm water does not run over my eyelids, THAK having told me that it causes cataracts. I never sleep on my left hand side for fear of putting unnecessary strain on my heart (THAK’s influence again). The most profound imprint was left by Gy, however. By introducing me to Durkheim, he finally liberated me from religion’s baleful dominion. The proverbial scales fell from my eyes: I was exonerated, all my previous experiences suddenly made sense, my biography placed in a new narrative framework. The extent to which our subsequent trajectories are determined by our starting position and genetically inherited inclination was nothing short of a revelation. Likewise, the extent to which society penetrates and colonises our innermost being, colours and directs our thoughts, hopes and desires both empowered me and sharpened my critical faculties. What avenue of intellectual enquiry could be more exciting than investigating how that most complex human artefact, society functions?

Apart from its unacceptable premise of innate, divinely ordained and institutionally enforced female inferiority religion is little more than a compensatory mechanism (justice in the hereafter making up for the disappointments and injustices of the present), a means of quelling our most deep-seated anxieties, an emotional prop in life’s bitter struggles. In my teenage fragility, the church accepted me (at any rate as long as I rigorously obeyed its every prescript and was willing to swallow whole its every doctrine), rescuing me from my shunned outcast condition, providing me with the social context and social network I had lacked. I now attribute the continuing hold religion exerts over minds to the solution it offers for the terrifying arbitrariness of the world. Like society, it comforts us, deludes us that we have some modicum of control over events, that we can ward off disaster through compliance with moral standards; like society, it creates meaning; it endeavours to account for suffering (although its success can only be partial, the tormented cry of “Why me?” ultimately unanswerable) and it takes the sting out of the enormity of our mortality, masking the overwhelming futility of our miserably short lifespan, probably the most important factor in its appeal. History is indifferent to our all-engrossing demise, filing her nails, legs crossed. Even the administrative record we leave behind is preserved on perishable paper or disc. Statistics on date of birth and death, marital status, occupation, crimes committed, titles awarded hardly capture our essence, the extinction of which so appals us. The tears, the laughter, the wit, the inimitable voice. For many, the notion of some pristine repository of the self endowed with magical longevity, a soul, supplies ample reassurance in contemplating death. My headstone will gradually erode, untended in the shade of some tree. I am who I am only through interaction: humanity consists of fulfilling an active social function.

[Diary entry, 28th January, 1995]

Just disturbed AB in his neat new pyjamas, hair tousled like a 19th century lunatic’s, dodging mosquitoes that deprived him of his sleep. The hotel room is spectacularly puce. My windows are tight shut. Room 334 with a view on to palms and exotic trees with diminutive, trumpet-shaped orange blossoms. A familiar sparrow-like chirping blends with the non-European cries. It amuses me that for all his experience of extra-European travel, and my technicolour paranoia, I am calm and reasonably relaxed whilst he is jet-lagged and dishevelled. The room stinks of the blue chemical they used to disinfect public toilets. The mattress was a trampoline in a former life, sagging round my contours. But at 1 a.m. after a 13-hour flight and drive, who cares? On arrival, we were herded into the courtesy bus and VIP lounge to let them round up our luggage (I didn’t have anything beyond my compact cabin baggage) and slog through the passport formalities. Then I discovered that my neighbour on the jet from Rome was an Italian extreme right-winger: she was certainly laden with designer accessories and obviously dyed blonde styled locks. In my sexism, I had assumed she was V’s assistant. We laughed together and she was more than courteous. Dozens of hitch-hikers lined the roads as we were driven in from the airport.

[To JMCD, 28th January to 3rd February, 1995, unsent]

Darling,

I’m in the lobby waiting for the shuttle bus to convey me back to the Islamic magnificence of the (Saudi-funded) hotel where McC and co. have been lodged. I prefer this place, even though it is several notches below the marble-paved air-conditioned opulence of the members’ hang-out. You walk straight in off the road, though we are walled off and hedge-screened for good measure from the locals. The architecture a cross between a barn and a Nordic stave-church with a few tacky thatched beach-huts around the pool to lounge in and order cocktails. Some of the rafters are painted with geometrical designs. My room is the only one free of mosquitoes. I slept badly, not knowing the exact time: the alarm clock has an irritating habit of stopping when I pack it in my black canvas bag these days and I was forced to reset it on spec. As it turned out this morning I was only fifteen minutes “off” the actual time. I’m writing to stave off the pangs for you. My body is a repository of you, your seed alive within.

It was a pleasant surprise to slide back the shutters this morning. They are most effective – not the merest chink of light intruded. I almost expected it to be dark and gloomy as in [Waffleland], but swaying palms – the requisite cliché of custom-built tourist accommodation – greeted my bloodshot apprehensiveness. Of course arriving as late as we did the only impression to be had was that of swivelling lighthouse beams and lamp-lined avenues where there had been hundreds of miles of void. The trip was turbulent. I sat next to an immaculately groomed designer-wrapped Italian. You know the kind: Gucci headscarf, bangles, rings, unsmudged make-up, petite but slender, polite yet intimidating in the extreme. We opened our courtesy toilet bags, sniggering together over the contents – toothbrush with instructions for assembling and a mystery bag, which she informed me was no use to us, as it held a razor (betraying the institutionalised sexism of airlines – women are still not expected to travel business class). I commented that we could always shave our legs with them. A colleague has just walked by inquiring about the bus, a copy of David Lodge’s most recent fictional outing, “Paradise News” in her hand. My hardback version preserved dust-free in a packing box in my bedroom. I subsequently discovered that she is a member of Forza Italia, but we got along fine in the context of being thrown side by side on a plane. She was kind enough to act as my personal interpreter because the staff couldn’t speak anything other than the language of Dante and, although I understood, I could not reply. I copied her choice of meal: the veal-crate protestors would have lynched us. Never mind.

It is pleasant: warm, but not enough to make you prickle with sweat, the sea breeze constant. The pace of life is sedate, relaxed. By comparison we seem to be high on speed. I hover on the brink of depression. If left alone I will probably mope, but at the same time I glow when I think of you. I want to have Imre/Ildi as soon as I get back. Sod it.

Meanwhile…it’s Monday. Things proceed smoothly, more attuned to the surroundings, although the organisation could have been handled better by a Brown Owl or a Sunday school teacher. Wherever you go, you are incessantly greeted. If you respond to the “Bonjour”, a “Çava?” immediately follows and it escalates from there. The best parry is a giggle. The staff remove their flip-flops and bow in the direction of Mecca, my only concession to geography. Amidst the sands, arid planes and peanut-shell littered paths neat rows of bricks cordon off an unsoiled prayer-patch in every village and township. There are no street lights – processions of pylons stretch into the endless scrub, the edge of the tarmac crumbles, nibbled at by the wind and dust.

The members are holed up in the cleanest and swishest hotel, which doubles as the conference centre. I’m sure no mosquitoes disturb their slumber. I, however, am blotched red and itching. I have a swollen lump above my left eye, as if a bride of Frankenstein bolt had been surgically removed. Our quarters are more comfortable in the sense of less ostentatious and therefore also less inhibiting, less elitist, more Yamaha organ than grand piano.

There are not many tourists here. We’ve taken over the entire hotel. Most of the colleagues have complained so vociferously about the poor standards here that they have been given permission to move to the members’ flopdown – too snotty by half. Indeed, an Italian colleague waved a filthy towel under Lord P’s nose (he runs the show, but does not lower himself to show interest in the conditions we menials have to put up with) by way of an in-your-face illustration of the squalor we are compelled to tolerate. She then implored him to intervene. A further outbreak of squabbling ensued when it transpired that the C-category staff have been housed with the members whereas we are exiled a good half hour’s drive away (at safe quarantine distance, presumably so that we are unable to witness their many indiscretions). NL’s comment on the towel-brandishing episode that at least she had not found a handful of someone else’s pubes stuck to her sheets.

We are segregated from the populace at large, given the proverbial red carpet treatment – indeed, we set foot on a real red carpet yesterday at the presidential palace where I shook the head of state’s hand. He is very tall, taller even than you, greying and slim. Like a willow branch, dignified and patient. We trooped in one by one for the reception nibbles. In the garden, McC promised me mosquito wipes. A blaze of pink and orange blossom pointed towards the sea, a huge mosaic of a lion the backdrop. There is little by way of civic sculpture or artwork at all, although this hardly matters when everyone crowding the streets is swathed in richly decorated fabric, the bright colours more warming than the afternoon sun. Near the museum of African art a couple stand on a pedestal, highly stylised, she bare breasted. Symptoms of exhaustion peep through the general good humour.

I couldn’t resist a flirt with McC. He’s lovely, really. “There are no flies on you, especially since you’re wearing a kilt” I teased on hearing that he had acquired a knowledge of Hungarian extending to three words: “magyar” [Hungarian], “Magyarország” [Hungary] and “szeretlek” [I love you]. When I repeated the latter in an effort to correct his pronunciation, he feigned a blush, “Aww shucks!” He is a skilled politician, giving you his full attention when you chat. I make him laugh. In the grip of a bout of homesickness I was up and down like a yo-yo. He asked why I wasn’t drinking, to which I replied that I’d ingested enough fizz to explode. He asked me to wait until he had retreated far enough, as he wouldn’t be able to explain the dry-cleaning bill: “I’m all heart, eh?” He let me trail round with him. It seems he enjoys my company – it was he who insisted that I join him in the photograph taken to fulfil the lifelong ambition of a fellow guest to pose with someone in a kilt. When I had to leave he kissed my hand debonairly. I am fond of that picture because he is laughing genuinely. I could clearly see the difference between it and some of the others taken for political or publicity purposes where the slight twinkle is absent. He’s the perfect diplomat, working away quietly and discretely. “I’ll tell you an intimate story now, F” he grinned, relating an incident from the Oktoberfest in Munich. The stein’s were clunking away when he suddenly felt a hand groping his thigh in search of a non-existent pocket until a withdrawal was forced, the sporran unplundered. “The first time you go to Africa it’s overwhelming” he pointed out, adding that Senegal was a good introduction since it was not as humid and pungent as Libreville [the previous year’s destination]. Apparently the poverty here is not as grinding, nor does the chasm between rich and poor yawn so widely. The air moisture levels do not make it “the white man’s grave” as he put it and he would have to force himself to visit the island of Goree, “the black man’s grave” steeped in the anguish of slavery. The whole place is permeated with a nauseating stench of human faeces and rotting hay. There is no other way to describe it – even the cooking smells of it, though the food is excellent. Restaurants are thin on the ground.

It would be a paradise if you were here, my love. NL phrased it differently: “It’s alright as a job. We’re paid 150 grand to lounge about on a beach and scratch our scrotes all day”. I’m verging on the Teutonic in my compartmentalisation: the free hours have been spent exercising, swimming in the ocean and socialising. Never being alone in my waking hours is gradually getting to me, though. I long for Europe. So desperate was I for chocolate that I splashed out 700 Central African francs on a miniature Milky Way – one bite and it was gone, the most transitory of pleasures. Although most of the colleagues have sought refuge in the more upmarket hotel, I prefer to stay put despite the air conditioning unit being louder than the engines of the Alitalia jumbo revved up during takeoff and the operating instructions in Russian. Never mind, it cooled slightly yesterday.

NL and I ventured further afield, hiring a taxi at a haggled price during the lunch break. When NL lifted up the filthy mat from beneath our feet, curiosity aroused by the strange draught, we were treated to the alarming sight of a gaping hole where rust had completely eaten away the vehicle. The driver’s eyes were milky with cataracts. As he gesticulated towards the sights, the car swerved precariously close to the cliff-edge and the jagged rocks buffeted by breakers. I did not have any expectations of the capital, having listened to the horror stories of more seasoned colleagues. In the event, it was both safer and more attractive than I had imagined. No grass, just yellowed brush. .The scale of the deprivation is what strikes you. The buildings, predominantly in art deco idiom with a sprinkling of Greek columns, are crying out for a fresh lick of paint. Glass is very rare. In spite of having seen such cities countless times on TV, Dakar seemed strangely unreal. I felt oddly at ease, even as we wandered through the two markets, the vendors ignored me, sidling up to NL instead. I ambled along a few submissive paces behind him, eyes modestly cast to the ground. One of the stallholders thought I was pregnant (“Elle attend le petit!”) rather than merely well-nourished. Dozens of crates were laden with fruit. I watched as the contents were expertly peeled with very sharp knives. NL had warned that we would be thronged, harangued and touched up, probingly, lightly, the pickpockets checking us like security guards carrying out a frisk. Cripples loomed out of nowhere. A persistent purveyor of obscenely yellow leggings pursued us all the way round the market, shoving his arm through the taxi window as we were about to pull away, offering a last ditch rock bottom price of 1,000 to no avail. We managed to escape unscathed, but parched, purses, wallets and bags unmolested.

News reached us of flooding in the Netherlands. It hardly seems conceivable that mass evacuations of humans and livestock are taking place whilst we smear in the sun cream. You’d adore haggling; in fact you’d shine at it. I would rather forgo trinkets than engage in it, however. Whereas you would succeed in bargaining them right down, I’d rather be despised as stupid for paying the asking price, or let you do the dirty work for me!

I spoke to a Danish administrator from DG Development who lives in L. [In reality, I threw myself into a highly visible affair with him, which earned me the disapproval of the frustrated older female colleagues. Only my friend NL gave me unconditional support, although even he could not resist a gentle prod or two. I threw caution to the winds, disregarding the warning signs that he might not be suitable – his remarks concerning the sun, palms and warm climate rather than my personal charms swelling his desire. One morning as I was returning to my room after breakfast I simply could not make the key turn in the lock. Behind me a portly gentleman volunteered assistance, which I gratefully accepted. Having opened the door, he grabbed me by the breast and crotch, pushing me towards the bed. So incensed was I at his temerity, that I elbowed him hard in the ample guts. Having extricated myself from his unwanted embrace, I slammed the door in his face, shaking like a leaf on the bed. It was at that juncture that I realised my conversion to feminism had borne fruit: rather than chiding myself as I would have done in my devout days when I accepted the doctrine that women were the root of all evil, I seethed with anger at his presumptuousness. Feeling suddenly vulnerable – he could have overpowered me – I could not face spending the remainder of the mission in that room. My fling was happy to oblige, putting me up in his wide bed. In Waffleland he spent one evening with me, raiding my fridge for the one bottle of champagne – “We drink the stuff every night at home” – he could not get it up. Having listened attentively to my gracious reassurances, he informed me brusquely that I was not his type anyway, that I would be more appealing to a Green than a Conservative like himself with my disdain for make-up, baggy skirts, ragged nails and splay feet. Besides, I was fat, the whole sordid tryst had been the fault of the balmy, star-studded, poolside nights…lo and behold, this torrent of abuse had resurrected his pathetic manhood. He rolled on top of me and when he had convulsed the last drop of his ejaculate between my impassive thighs, pulled on his trousers, never having taken off his socks, and excused himself as his wife might try to reach him back at his hotel. The saddest aspect – apart from my not having roused myself to plunge a kitchen knife between his shoulder blades as he went through the front door – was that he did not understand why I turned down his every subsequent invitation. The humiliation had turned him on, as it does any common rapist]. He contrasted Africa with Asia, sighing at the elite for siphoning off most of the aid money to purchase fleets of gleaming Roll Royces or helicopters, castigating the local population for not taking action and for showing no incentive: “They don’t want to improve things, they don’t want to show initiative and earn money,” he railed.

I am eating approximately half the quantity I usually do and exercising more than I have done for months on end, surrounded by mirrors that mock and ridicule me. I can’t avoid seeing my body in all its loathsome mass, the bud of confidence nipped. I’m disgusting, repulsive and if I eat normally and exercise myself into the ground at the same time I’ll go back to being the way I was in the Budapest video. How can I be found attractive? I detest beaches. All those shapely women spread elegantly over towels and then me. Yuk! How can I show my face, let alone anything else? Fighting against the genes is a losing battle. NL liked my “frock” (the witch dress). I know I am nothing, but I do love you, heart and soul. I hate my flaws and imperfections being under public scrutiny, held up for contempt. I want to be in your arms, safe, loved. It’s worse knowing there is no way to see you, no shelter to find.

“Hunger reduces you to an utterly spineless, brainless condition, more like the after-effects of influenza than anything else. It is as though one had been turned into a jellyfish, or as though all one’s blood had been pumped out and luke-warm water substituted. Complete inertia is my chief memory of hunger; that and being obliged to spit very frequently, and the spittle being curiously white and flocculent, like cuckoo-spit”
George Orwell, “Down and Out in Paris and London”.

Being fat can be a positive act of protest, rebellion, defiance, an eschewal of the dominant culture’s values (although at the price of marginalization and ridicule – deviation must always be punished). Being the majority does not help (look at the continued barriers to complete fulfilment for women and the unequal concentration of power in male hands – we roly-polys do not yet determine the content of representations, even the models for “outsize” clothes are carefully selected size 16s, not a spare tyre in sight). Relish the heroic sacrifice of eating five meringues for breakfast or a midmorning snack. It is like refusing to wear deodorant (my solution being to spray the garment direct with perfume, thereby reducing skin contact to the minimum – usually Hugo Boss Woman with its unpretentious packaging, which the make-up encrusted twenty-year-old behind the counter assured me was musky, Gy having given me the benefit of his authoritative pronouncement that I was a bit on the old side for the Laura Ashley fragrances of my personal preference). Outcast status is also accompanied by the standard pollution-markers: fat people are stupid, indolent, ugly, clumsy, dirty, smelly, low class, loud, crude, they sweat copiously. What struck me when I saw the Venus of Willensdorf is how prominent her cunt is (every photograph of the artefact I have clapped eyes on is taken from an angle that casts a discrete shadow over the vital nether regions of the life-giver). The celebrants of the magnificent goddess of fertility were not inhibited by false prudery, as the loving detail demonstrates. Rolls of fat elicit shudders of disgust as a result of our glossy-magazine, commerce-based aesthetic inculcation. When only the elite could afford to be generously-proportioned, luscious curves were the ideal. Now that rich, calorie-laden delights may be purchased by all the elite prefers to sport washboard-chic (ausgemergelt). The prohibition against being overweight so potent that it elicits resentment (some lucky individuals can get away with shovelling down inordinately huge quantities of food without gaining an ounce) and self-loathing. Nobody feels sorry for you when you are fat: you have only your weak-willed self to blame. Measuring big means not measuring up. I used to keep my hair tied back, scared that my face would otherwise resemble a blob of badly-kneaded dough. Corpulence has traditionally been associated with jolliness. We are expected to allow fun to be poked at us, always responding with equanimity (your extra layers presumed to render you impervious to insult and hurt). After a certain age threshold, the brushing aside, forgiving designation “puppy fat” is ousted by the unequivocal term of disapproval “beef”. The instant invisibility and relegation to the sidelines of voicelessness, which followed in the wake of accumulating an extra thirty kilos during pregnancy proved traumatic at first. After all, I was the same person underneath. I learned to take comfort in the belief that the voluptuous padding doubled as a buffer to dissuade the creeps and unscrupulous spongers I had previously been plagued with. I could walk down the street without a single wolf-whistle. Never take a sideways glance at the shop-front in case you inadvertently catch a glimpse of yourself. You are not entitled to be content in your own body. The consolation to be found in munching treats is self-defeating: the unhappier you become about your appearance, the greater the temptation to compensate for the isolation and self-pity with a quick fix. I am fed up with my private life being made the object of speculation, value-judgements, condemnation, condescending moralising (the salt in the wound being that all too often the criticism emanates from my intellectual inferiors) or public debate. On the pretext of championing the welfare of the foetus I was carrying doctors constantly bullied me, dismissing my stalwart rejection of their allegations. Yes, I was a vegetarian, but I did not soak every meal in cream. No, I did not subsist on fizzy drinks (with the exception of carbonated mineral water). The angry purple of my stretch marks faded, now they resemble worm trails in the sand. Having resumed work ten days after the birth for financial reasons (in those days a freelance paid in accordance with the number of days of toil, excluded from the carefree ranks of officials with the privilege of three months maternity leave on full pay), I could not shed the excess through breast-feeding, although I did my best to express the milk with an electric and a hand-held pump. G soon refused my nipple, preferring the lesser effort of a plastic teat. In my bleaker moments, I attributed the fat to a covert death wish. I never participate in the endless (and endlessly tedious) discussions amongst colleagues concerning the relative merits of one diet over another. Without fail only those who make Kate Moss look clinically obese ritually starve themselves. Mortification of the flesh: the ancient dualist loathing of the carnal rears its ugly head in the new guise of ascetic regimes of punishing exercise (the “no pain, no gain” maxim conjuring up images of processions of flagellants publicly proclaiming their repentance) and renunciation for a temporal reward. Let their bones crumble with osteoporosis, their skin chafe and flake with dryness!

Don’t stray blind into the trap of gullibility: the current anti-flab crusade has nothing to do with a caring, paternalistic (for which read conformity-enforcing), responsible attitude on the part of government, but is instead the by-product of the demographic trend towards increased longevity combined with anxiety concerning spiralling health-care costs.

This society is phobic about any natural bodily excretion – the ultimate folly the invention of vaginal sprays to cut out the odour of excitement (unsurprisingly they destroy the essential health-maintaining flora). Another skin-burning aberration scented toilet paper. Similarly those indicators of sexual maturity, pubic hairs (underarm and lower) are agonised over, plucked out, legs are bathed in astringent creams or shaved for extra smoothness, moustaches fussed over, unsightliness the ultimate sign of “letting yourself go”, withdrawing from the flesh market. Preening, primping and pampering for the sake of enhancing allure is as old as the species, yet consumerism has heralded a new era of embarrassment and product-niche induced burning cheeks. Millions of pounds are wasted on futile age-reversal potions (often by women who have ruined their skin by smoking or drenching their almost completely uncovered selves in UV on beaches or basting benches complete with goggles).

To me, announcing “I am a born-again Christian,” is similar to boasting “I have terrible halitosis”. Both are equally endearing, although the latter complaint can be more easily remedied: by handing the suffering wretch an extra-strong mint.

Twenty-four hour supermarket shopping, wander down the aisles between the smoked bacon and pasteurised milk, the washing powder and multi-coloured fizzy drinks, the cat food in plastic pouches and the greetings cards, row upon row of glossy magazines and coffee granules in jars. The local bakery with Scotch pies: greyish meat of indeterminate origin bulked with rice, a taste of pepper (the more decorative varieties, which did not exist in my youth, topped with baked beans and mashed potato or melted cheese). Battenberg from Mr. Kipling of the “exceedingly good cakes”, Bakewell tart, white icing and glace cherry. Flapjacks the respectably low-sugar, middle-class, hands folded demurely in lap and a dainty plate to catch the crumbs version of sinful indulgence. The trifles with artificial cream banished from refrigerated displays. Tate and Lyle Golden Syrup, bees swarming out of the fallen lion, millionaire shortbread with a thick layer of caramel and chocolate, strawberry tarts, meringues, éclairs, coconut slices and tattie scones. Used teabags tied in a sandwich bag on the draining board for composting. The red van, purveyors of fine quality fish, Arbroath smokies every Friday, the high-pitched horn audible from streets away. Satellite dishes sprouting like grey fungus from the pebble-dash walls. Every morning my Father microwaves me porridge for breakfast. With the exception of Sunday, his morning fare has for decades consisted of All Bran sprinkled initially with sugar, then (when it became available) with sweetener to ensure a proper fibre intake.

My Mother used to keep her dentures on the top of the cabinet beside the stereo speaker, slipping them in when visitors arrived. Her nail varnish, hair dye, moisturiser cream and half-empty perfume bottles silently observe the occupants of the bathroom from their shelves. The seat and grab rail fitted into the shower compartment never touched.

From the day of his birth I was mortally jealous of my brother. He followed me everywhere like a puppy, doing my bidding, his blind obedience a constant source of fascination. He meekly imbibed the mug of earth tea I stirred fresh from the border and swallowed the worm from the bait jar on my command. When he went to Johnny’s (the Italian grocers) with his friend to steal penny chews, I sat on the concrete steps not wishing to be dragged into the crime, yet happy to accept a share of the proceeds (McCowan’s Highland Toffee). One afternoon he was more grubby than usual, having smeared coal dust into his cheeks. I was supposed to be looking after him, but we quarrelled and he ran out into the middle of the road where he was struck by a car, the screech of the driver’s brakes loud enough to bring all the curler-patting housewives for miles around to their front doors. Having ascertained that no serious damage had been done, he turned to me.
“Is he with you?”
“I don’t know that little black boy,” my icy reply.

Only a few minutes walk from the house, we would run wild through the school grounds and peer through the classroom windows at the collages and drawings of younger pupils. Inspecting the churned mud of the playing fields for lost marbles, admiring the latest graffiti (YLT, the insignia of the district’s notorious yet invisible gang, and SPUNK the most frequent scrawls) and climbing the metal fire escapes, which vibrated menacingly with every step, our favourite diversions. Next to the tuck-shop hatch and dining hall lay a sunken garden with ornamental bushes and shrubs. Annoyed by my brother’s continued presence in spite of my order to return home and leave me in peace I finally cracked, shoving him down the six-foot drop to the unyielding paving stones below. Paying not the slightest heed to his howls I turned and marched back myself. A couple of hours later, the neighbour’s elder daughter E rang our doorbell with a tear-streaked R in tow. He had not “split his head open” (the injury that aroused most excitement amongst us children) after all.

Although cruel to him, I would never permit anyone else to do him harm. Opposite us nearer the end of the street lived Lanky, so nicknamed for being unusually tall and skinny for his age. R and I were engrossed in a game of The Time Machine in the front garden, which involved the wooden shaft and handle of a shovel (my Father having removed the blade) as our craft (expensive toys not possessing their latter-day advertising-driven allure – balsa wood gliders and figures of knights in armour on horseback more than sufficient to entertain us, the heart-pounding rush of acquisitiveness only afflicting us in the run-up to Christmas when my Mother would present us with the catalogue, never betraying even a flicker of dismay when we flicked through the sensible clothes section as quickly as possible to scribble Mousetrap, Spirograph, Fuzzy Felt and Buckaroo on our wish lists). Lanky’s insinuating, nasal voice drifted over the wall with his customary taunts about my brother’s weight and the gaps between his teeth. Wrenching the implement away from R, I swung it through the air with every ounce of strength I could muster, clobbering Lanky on the skull with it. He never pestered R again. Later, however, once I had lost my pre-pubescent early development advantage I was unable to protect R from the bullying of his peers. The worst incident occurred when the eldest Bruscaglia boy (an incoming family whom we referred to in private either as the Scally-aglis or the Scallywags) took a belt to him, beating him almost senseless and leaving his legs and lower body covered with bruises and buckle-shaped weals. My Father was so incensed that he called the police who did nothing more than issue a stern warning.

During his teenage rebellion phase my brother’s passion was Ska and punk: Madness, King Kurt, The Sex Pistols and The Exploited blared relentlessly up from his bedroom, disrupting my study schedule. He turned skinhead, donning the mandatory bomber jacket and bovver boots. Renouncing the linoleum-floored corridors of education as soon as legally released from the compulsion, he joined the ranks of the professionally unemployed, brazenly declaring that he would never look for a job as long as my parents were alive to scrounge off, a precept to which he has rigorously adhered. As soon as his benefits ran out he would be round mooching petrol and cigarette money. Even now my Father pays his car (and the insurance) in instalments.

In his tearaway days he would down countless pints of beer and cider mixed with aspirins, crash out after brewing hallucinogenic potions of magic mushrooms or rake manically through the contents of the pantry, piling half a dozen cheese slices on limp slices of white bread to subdue the LSD and speed-induced munchies. Nowadays he fuels his paranoia on cannabis, a community of welfare-recipients having set up a hash pool, taking turns to purchase the goods, his stable long-term relationship and the mischievous coyness of his five-year-old daughter finally calming him down. His girlfriend, Shelley, was brought up by an alcoholic mother. Her teeth have been ruined by the combined ravages of bulimia and anorexia. Pregnancy did not deter her from drug-taking and E had to be weaned off tranquilisers at birth (in the early stages of their association Shelley rifled my Father’s bedside chest of drawers in search of painkillers, which she gulped down by the handful). A tattoo of a massive dagger-pierced skull covers her right upper arm, her bottle-blonde hair close-cropped. Social Services have encouraged R to stay at home as the cost of maintaining them at state expense is far cheaper than footing the bill for rehabilitation should Shelley go off the rails again (to his credit he was also the first man in her life not to lash out with his fists when she looked at him the wrong way, obviating the need for her son, D, to be taken into care). Fortunately, years have elapsed since I last witnessed the unedifying spectacle of Shelley out of her face, eyeballs rolling uncontrollably, snapping at her little girl and shoving her aside, unable to cope with the demands for attention. I have introduced her to the pleasure of good quality wine in moderation (previously she would not touch the stuff for fear of succumbing to her mother’s habit) and her boosted self-confidence has stimulated a healthier appetite. She supplements the income by going out to clean, the women for whom she works funding a mobile phone, her book club membership and the pirate DVDs they gather round the TV set to watch (a full set of cinema tickets being beyond their budget).

[To JMCD, 1994]

There you lay, tracing isobars on my pillow – the interplay of warm and cold fronts and why can’t the announcers read at dictation speed? You depart and I sleep, visiting the bridge of a ship in heavy swell and there you are, they all depend on you. I retreat further into my cocoon. “Byzantium” on Victoria Street, ironwork twisted to form bound sheaves, angels, clouds – the ceiling beams of red and gold, tables put together out of Singer sewing machine stands and a murky canvas of two women in a vineyard, hair restrained in headscarves thrusting another, splay-legged into a tub of grapes. I ask the price, but the girls in the café can’t tell me. Abuse of women. There’s nothing like cold tatties from the pot – a stray memory of my Father and the sailor, his Father walking past the front window on pension day, once a fortnight without fail, navy blazer, battered brogues and striped shopping bag with clothesline handles – but I won’t return there. Nor to the house we stripped when he died. Nor will I acknowledge that one day I will face that task again, but alone, or with my brother.

Focus, concentrate.

“Was that with Rachael? I thought he had plenty of money. Must have cost him a fortune. I did one of those studies with glycerol trinitrate. Did you do one?”

Fairy rings stain the grass. Traffic cones and beer bottles fatigued and stranded. “Andrew, I’m in Fortunes” in black crayon on the bicycle path. Did he notice? Did he bother to look? I pass beneath the whale’s jawbone towards the university library. Time bends. European History One. Morning lecture. JD in the row in front of me. Curiosity. Usually she sits with another girl. Now she’s alone. I worked my way down from the centre seat midway back to the extreme right second row right behind her. Long, naturally curling brown hair. She is not tall. Blue eyes. Asymmetrical features. Green woollen coat. She smiles. I offer her a poem (of dubious quality) for her opinion. “Let’s go for coffee”. “On to Jerusalem!” the bulbous lecturer finishes on a high note, the crusade about to begin.

Never, never will I walk with you beneath the blossom-rejoicing boughs in spring warmth – no room for the sky, the exuberant pink obscuring all else. Now there are gaps and the saplings lie snapped and uprooted – a testimony to the crudest, cruellest streak of human nature. The spire of Berkeley’s Church, red doors, steps where I have often sat at dusk to watch the spectacle of other lives and expectations. I who have not been to the hairdresser’s in nine and a half years, whose eyelids have not been darkened (but for bruises) by artificial means, whose legs have never felt the glide of the razor, whose movements are masculine – she of the disproportionately small hands jotting on inexhaustible sensory notepaper. Until a patrol car circled once too often for comfort. (Or the time when the American tourist demanded “shit” and wouldn’t take no for an answer).

I rest. One of the legs of the bench has been sawn off. A girl in tracksuit bottoms and sweatshirt lets her collie’s leash dangle from her shoulder. A group of gulls advances before a morning walker. By the dairy the serious runners in their minimum drag second skins grit for a personal best. The whole street was empty, you know, the blackbirds and my heels filling everything. Not even a bus – Sunday timetable. Morning rolls, fresh daily – a bit overdone and dry usually, but that baker’s is still the handiest. The swing in the playground squeals with the toddler. Mummy slips her jacket off and goes back to pushing. The elms listen, drinking from abundantly fertilized soil, mushrooms nestling amongst their roots. An ambulance, blue lights flashing. Churchgoers, fox-slung shoulders, hats, veils, feathers, gloves, tweeds, fresh perms, lipstick, vanity’s full regalia. The traffic has started again. Stray tourists puzzle over maps, the sun greedily tongues rubber plants in the bay windows. Brass picture frames. Allowing your dog to foul public areas is an offence the sign informs us – certainly it’s offensive, except to the bluebottles who have acquired a taste for it. Teeing off on the links, no injuries sustained by passers-by. L-plates stuck on a windscreen, red on white like a barber’s pole, blood and bandages. September – the leaves haven’t started to turn. An early shopper, clenching a bag of tatties. Yellow skips piled high with old mattresses and masonry. Drifting thistle down: a fairy godmother, catch her, wish, let her go. I wish, I wish.

“You write with panache,” HP told me. I was under the impression it was pen and ink myself. Panache: sneeze-inducing cheap scent in a clumsy mass-produced bottle – the type grannies buy for Xmas presents if handkerchiefs (of the lace-edged variety) are out of stock. He’s stowed the letters in a drawer, in his desk, but I’ll bet she’s read them. On your knees, woman, confess that you have more than met your match in me and be off with you. I don’t really care any more.

All-pervasive fermenting malt. A city free of preoccupations, though I am afraid to think, I wait. For Laz and Lor. I miss you. One day to go. Tomorrow, tomorrow. Coffee’s lure. Must move on. I will sit upstairs. I don’t want to see her. Imbibe liquid darkness. Mugs shatter with unheard TV frequencies, spikes protrude from fluffy teddy bears, drunk drivers overlook pedestrian crossings – chilly now. For sale. For sale, contact -. Four walls enclosing my sanity. Java, steaming vegetation and nightmare insects – mountain blend. Croissants in paper bags. First to the cashline. Insert card to begin. Insert, impale me, love’s arrow. I want you. Tomorrow. Tomorrow. We’d go for a pint at Greyfriar’s Bobby’s Bar in spite of its having been filleted and faked up for the Americans to ga-ga over quaintness and forged antiquity. My old haunts haunt me. There I first heard “The Masochism Tango”, believing that the in-house guitarist had penned it himself. Mine’s a Much Mackle, but a Merrydown will do. Onward. I drop a pound coin into a beggar’s cap. Cross-legged on a tartan rug he sits by the entrance to the Elim Pentecostal and the congregation ignore him, perhaps for fear of appearing Pharisaical. He blows fag smoke appreciatively, rubbing the eye that doesn’t have an outsized swab taped over it.
“Got a coin, pal?”
Refusal.
“Nae problem”.
Remo’s Ristorante. It used to be a greasy spoon where I breakfasted full-gowned just before my graduation. Fried egg roll.

A flock of starlings congregates around the chimney pot, some perching on the defunct aerial. I pour water into the single-portion Rombouts filter. Medium Columbian. When House of Fraser opened its department store in P many years ago the top floor café served these. Instant coffee had been the norm, one flavour only in jars barely occupying a single shelf in the supermarket. The new Belgian product was synonymous with Continental sophistication, combining the fresh ground taste of filter with the speed and convenience of the traditional teaspoonful of powdered. My Father’s dentures were steeping in a plastic bowl decorated by a hare atop a tree stump conducting a ragtag orchestra comprising a cymbal-clashing frog, a trumpet-blowing squirrel, a fluffy rabbit with an accordion and a saxophone-playing tortoise, originally used for feeding me and my brother with crushed rusks soaked in warm milk. When my Mother was nearing the end of her teens she visited the dentist who removed all her beautiful, gleaming teeth. Standard practice for working class patients who would never generate much by way of income. The same fate awaited my Father. Not that such corruption and incompetence amongst Scottish practitioners is dead: my brother narrowly escaped similar arrogant and arbitrary treatment due to my Mother’s tenacity alone. One of our childhood games, attacking the monster, would not have been so appealing had this injustice never been perpetrated. Armed with cushions, we would batter my Father, as he swayed towards us menacingly, bottom teeth jutting outwards, single eye lolling, cardigan pulled up over his head, his back bent. Whenever new friends visited for the first time, he would wear his glass eye, interrupting our chatter by sneezing loudly. “Hang on, what’s this?” he would ask, clutching his hand to his face before taking out the eye and offering it to them on outstretched palm. It never failed to make them jump. The empty, red socket both repelled and fascinated them. I never gave it a second thought. He lost his right eye in the Korean War. When his comrade was shot dead in the trench next to him, the grenade he had been about to throw injured my Father instead, gouging out flesh all down one side, severely damaging the leg. Every day he patiently slides his calliper into his shoe before tying the laces and tapping the barometer in the hall.

The neighbourhood has gone steadily downhill as the old neighbours have drifted away or been trundled out by the undertakers. In my youth, I would ardently pray that Mrs. B with her corset-stiff Wee Free starchiness would not come out into the garden whilst I was feeding the birds. Her sublimated energies were entirely devoted to cultivating potatoes, rhubarb, tomatoes, cabbages and strawberries, the latter jealously guarded beneath a green net. Archie, her husband of the murmuring lilt, was blessed with a stoical nature, sitting on the bench with a knotted handkerchief to protect his balding scalp from the sun, trading science fiction paperbacks with my Father. We never saw much of their children Colin (who went on to become a minister) and Marianne (a university lecturer in Old French). When Mrs. B died, weeds took over the vegetable patch and my Mother no longer hung a carrier bag with the Sunday papers (collected on Mrs. B’s behalf from the delivery van) on the fence. The house (built and run by a trust specifically for disabled war veterans and not purchasable by occupants, regardless of length of tenancy) stood forlorn until Tam moved in. Although he has sustained no discernable wounds he lives off his invalid’s pension (“He’s never seen so much as an angry butterfly” my Father’s wry comment on Tam’s military record), illegally supplementing his income by selling cheap clothes (his living-room filled with rack upon rack of flower-patterned dresses and coats sheathed in plastic visible from the street until common sense finally prompted him to conceal his dubious activities by fitting net curtains) and furniture (no car ever having been deposited in his garage). His move to the more genteel working-class suburb from the smashed window panes, burnt out shell, abandoned car, gang-swaggering, graffiti-scrawled, open-lawned badlands of flood-prone NM had been justified by his wife’s alcoholism, although nobody in the administration bothered to check whether the relationship existed except on paper.

Having gloried in the positions of unchallenged ruler of his estate, chief fixer and con-merchant, Tam was at a loss to comprehend the disdain with which his pushy mannerisms and uncouth boisterousness were greeted, adaptation to local mores a concept as alien to his cognitive universe as a navvy in mud-coated boots frequenting a wine bar. Ever polite, my Mother deflected his every effort to pry into our family business (he had grasped the principle that information equals power). My preferred method of blanking him involved focusing all my attention on the open page in front of me. When not disturbing us by drilling at all hours, he would bawl down the phone on the back porch, extension cable tangled round his feet, or leave the radio blaring on the step unheeded. Having eventually tired of the constant surveillance, intrusive queries and football lobbing urchins my Father erected a wooden panel fence, nicknamed the Berlin Wall. Unimpressed by Tam’s threats of dire retribution from the council (my Father had been careful to seek permission first) he painted an attractive shade of blue. At least my Mother was able to enjoy the patio again (not that Tam gave up, lugging his television set into the garden to turn up full, his most recent acquisition a parrot, the only creature on God’s earth that squawks louder than he does, although it is a mite more coherent).

Tam’s great passion is pigeons. Not the loft-sheltered racing variety, but columba livia, more commonly known as “flying rats”, which respect neither architecture nor social standing when leaving their calling cards. Normally a tolerant man, my Father took the unprecedented step of reporting him to the local authorities (complete with photographic evidence of our feather-choked roof gutters, the prevailing winds blowing the mess in our direction, thus sparing our neighbour the chore of clearing it away), having counted sixty birds on the roof one afternoon waiting for Tam to scatter seeds and breadcrumbs on the lawn. He has invented two highly effective pigeon-scarers, one mobile and one static, both made from lengths of greenhouse cane. The mobile version is the simpler of the two, consisting of three polythene bags (a particularly menacing bright red one followed by two more in blue and white Tesco-livery) attached by knotting the handles as well as masking tape for added durability. When shaken, the bags billow with trapped air, rustling their warning. It is advisable to keep waving the implement energetically as the pigeons to circle a few times before assuming that they have been frightened off definitively. The deluxe static scarer, destined for the roof, boasts a row of six CDs suspended from strings on a spar.

With resentment at a massive win of seven million pounds by a convicted rapist fuelling demands that such individuals be barred from purchasing tickets, undeserving recipients of lottery cash have been unintentionally assisting journalists in filling their column inches during the traditional summer news slump. Ironically, Tam and his “fancy woman” recently landed a respectable £200,000 in the bingo, a sum they proceeded to split down the middle. Rather than investing in some property of his own, Tam transferred the money to his son’s name so that he could continue to draw his various benefits.

The news informed us that the best time to watch the meteor shower would be between eleven and midnight and that it would be the most spectacular display in a decade. At about eleven thirty, we unlatched the back door, spreading the blanket on the dampening lawn to lie back and stare upwards. Mosquitoes whining directly above my eye, I counted the satellites in their steady orbits. We had positioned ourselves strategically in the shadow of the house to cut out the orange glow from the street lamps, but our observations were thwarted by a blanket of cloud so thick even the navigation lights of the circling planes could not penetrate it as it gradually concealed all but the brightest stars from our view. Two swiftly vanishing trails our reward.

Like all the other computer programmers I have ever become acquainted with, my lover is fuelled by Coca-Cola, bleary-eyed and lethargic until late afternoon. Able to memorise numbers instantly, names evade him (hence the inanimate and non-human members of our family, such as the car and the hamster always share the generic appellation Dezső). During his teenage years he once telephoned the girl he had been going out with for over a month to arrange their next date, his opening line: “Hello, it’s Zs. Don’t be annoyed with me for asking, but what’s your name again?” She forgave him, having been warned in advance of his particular deficiency.

Advised against drinking coffee by the doctor, his real weakness is for dairy products, stirring dollops of sour cream into his goulash or spreading it over a mound of pasta before pouring melted bacon fat on top. Ice cream, especially pistachio flavour, his favourite desert. With the notable exception of the banana, he detests fruits, grapes in any form (sultanas, raisins and wine) leaving him physically sick. Almost every night indigestion propels him into the kitchen to mix Andrews powders for relief.

Their residue has sedimented in my memory. HP has a habit of smelling his fingers (in those days unwashed after our passionate writhings) that persists to this day. “I used to think I had a good sex life until I met you. Once a week without fail. I never knew it could be like this”. Or JMCD teaching me how to peel prawns: jab the fork in just above the tail fan (uropods) to hold it steady before sliding the knife blade beneath the carapace and lifting the shell in a single piece. His pride about being in possession of many skills that others made careers out of (driving in particular). I would leave small gifts of Frisk in his glove compartment to preserve him from falling victim to driver’s fatigue (warmed by the knowledge of having left a subversive token of my presence when Liz occupied the passenger seat beside him).

The rain pours down from a sullen sky. My brother’s ground floor flat is in danger of being flooded and he refused to transfer the insurance policy when he moved. The caravan park nearby already evacuated, sandbags provide little defence against the rising waters.

[In which Chameleon lights the fuse before retreating to her safe distance. What follows is the unvarnished account of two affairs with HP (2nd May-4th June 1994, resumed in September of the same year) and JMCD, elsewhere abbreviated to M (18th January 1994-4th November 1996). Whereas HP is a colleague, my first encounter with JMCD was due to the pure accident of being allocated a seat next to him on a flight between Waffle Central and Edinburgh. The repetitiveness of the letters to JMCD faithfully reflect the psychologically devastating effects of an unalterable situation, the rut so deep that no amount of clawing into its muddy walls could lift me high enough to glimpse the field beyond]

[Diary entry, 18th January 1994]

Went out with JMCD. He’s 52. Lives in R. We walked round the old town before going to Pizzeria Giorgio’s followed by a pub, The George and Dragon. L reminds me of Vienna, Budapest and parts of Denmark, though on a smaller scale. It’s very quiet, but charming. I’m really very fond of this man already. I’d love to stay here, but can see the sense in rationing it out. For once I’m not worried about competition – he’s married for God’s sake: if he can find time for me once he can do it again. It would suit me fine to have him down here. He has a great charm about him. I’m glad he didn’t slime me – start off with wandering hands, etc. He didn’t buy me or presume I could be had for nothing; I just gave him two pecks on the lips, once in the car and once on the way in to the hotel. I am an incurable romantic and need very little to throw off the distractions of material worry and, yes, I know that like Mr. Côte d’Or wanker “I have the power”. I can do it. I can change my life and that’s why I called. He was a smooth talker. I was a bit worried on the phone in the morning – “he’s a smooth bastard”, a dirty old man. I’m a slag who’s missed out on her vocation, I know. There was an aching wistfulness and stolen quality about it which is completely addictive. He respected me too and I didn’t apologize to him for any of my opinions, nor did he expect me to – he has a lot of experience of the world and is no more of an opportunist than I am. I had a craving for the human warmth of waking up with a podgy body beside me. The hug factor. I didn’t feel particularly randy until towards the parting. R is ten miles or so outside of L. We both had to go to work. I’d rather fuck the life out of him and myself with no work the next day. I’m the same age as his daughters. He teased me very mildly now and then, when he was talking about the experiments with the “Archimedes screw” I grinned and it was all I could do to keep from laughing when I asked him to explain it to me. Or when he persuaded me to eat chocolate mousse for dessert (not that it was a great challenge to do so) and said: “So I can lead you astray,” a warm twinkle in his eye. There were flashes of vulnerability. I reckon I’m far more cynical about the prospects. I just let him talk and occasionally talked too. He seems to be interested in me as a human being, not forgetting to ask about G, i.e. not just a “bum, tits and cunt” approach of Jean’s mentioning. He thanked me, making it seem as if not exactly that I was doing him a favour, but that he valued the time I had decided to spend on him. He certainly wasn’t in a hurry. I felt he was trying to stay in my company as long as possible, yet he didn’t go to bed with me! He was very gentlemanly, opening the car door for me, taking my coat, helping me with it back on, not starting to eat until my food arrived and so on. He certainly knows how to go about things in the right way if his aim is to add another mistress to his harem. I’m so glad I called him. I almost didn’t because I thought he wouldn’t be interested having used the throwaway “I’ll give you a call” and, of course, hadn’t. There was no awkwardness involved in the evening at all. I didn’t want to get out of the car. He even asked if he should accompany me to the hotel entrance and I said yes. I ache for more. I’ve been in hibernation since I had G and he’s just the sort of man I’ve always needed. Always wanted, instead of the carousel of insecure, misogynistic arseholes. If only I could get into a relationship with him: as long as circumstances allowed I’d keep it up. The yearning is more fun than the doing. He collects the sugar sachets at restaurants, a Hamstern habit he picked up during the war and has never been able to shake. He describes himself as mean and stingy (wassergetriebenes Schaf, hydraulic ram), yet he insisted on footing the bill. I got to bed around midnight. Not that I slept very well. I’m on the train now and really don’t want to be going back to real life and responsibility. It tears me up, especially since I could stay here. After all, I have two days without work and God knows when I’ll ever get the chance to come back to L again! He’ll be here. I’d scare him off if all he wants is to be friends. In my past life I would have expressed myself. I’m sure I went about it the right way, though. It’s awful that such a little attention, kindness and decency can elicit such a heftig response in me, I’m so starved of affection. I’m not bitter: it’s like a redemption. I can be who I want to be at last and go into a relationship as an equal, even if it is to be an equal opportunist or sexist! He gave me exactly what I wanted. After all, there is room for development. It’s not as if I find him attractive or anything. Why do I feel so sad? I find my priorities change. I could act out this fantasy of powerful youth or mistress (not even his first), already I think in terms of a relationship. I’m desperate to see him again, for him to phone me, the dormant, or rather cudgelled (to the point of amputation) emotional side of me has been stirred, prodded to see if it can still move – and it does – I am still and indeed shall always be a creature of feeling and passion. I need to rethink my life. I need a few days at home, or somewhere alone. I’d already been looking forward to seeing him on the plane again [we met when assigned seats next to each other on a flight from Waffle Central to Edinburgh] at Xmas. This opens up new avenues of possibility. I don’t know if he fancies me. I hope he does, then, for once, all the elements would be in place. God, maybe it’s just the rush of hurt: I’ve withdrawn after all from everything that makes life worthwhile, abstained from life itself out of fear, the perpetual self-loathing it seems I cannot escape. Sluice gate syndrome. The petty cares that keep me tossing and turning recede into their true perspective – they are just distractions keeping me from full-frontal despair. There never is someone like him. I should be glad I met him rather than this embarrassed brushing away of tears. It was “fate”. I know nothing lasts and that is the tragedy of human existence that is why we end up destroying the environment, we’ve given up hope and cannot see beyond our own mortality. We don’t care in a way. We won’t suffer the consequences of our actions and though we wouldn’t wish the possible catastrophe on our children we can’t help ourselves. The mystical fate did not catch us in its talons, perhaps they might also escape. It is in the unseen and impenetrable beyond, the shaded realm, the vague discomfort we are so adept at suppressing because in our hygienic (sterile!) reality we have lost contact with death and dirt is revulsion. Some avoid confronting the likelihood of others doing penance for our sins. We would spare them and wish them greater prosperity. There is no hope you know. We are surrounded with despair, violence, horror, callousness and we ourselves are calloused. Can I reach the essence of my desire, of my warmth and fondness through physical penetration? This is not my life, it is slumber. Can I reach him through caressing? Will he elude me? Will he be transformed into a phial of bitterness? Does he desire me? Does he even think of me? He has seeped into the walnut grooves of my brain where he breathes and lives and speaks again, every minute of the day. I have already charted possible futures, made plan upon labyrinthine plan. Is this the chasm separating male from female? The teaching that our lives should centre on them, whereas we are accessory to them. “Accesory”, “adornment”. Have I ever truly met a man who loved women? I have never fucked an experienced man, nor have I ever fucked a multi-lingual, multicultural, non-isolated man. There’s a bit of bravado to him, as there is to me, pound out the shells and whatever’s left standing won’t be in a fit state to show hostility. God, I even imagine his funeral! To be finally deprived. I have a searing need to be sexually wanted by him. He UNDERSTANDS me. Not that he has seen much of me (in more ways than one), but he understands my concerns, my way of thinking, in my dream I held his hand, that being the symbol of acceptance. There was little physical contact: he put his arm around me in a comradely way and then there were the pecks – the hint of something deeper. I get bored of men when I have them all to myself. Perhaps it would be better knowing that even in intimacy he is unattainable. That I could go so far in my demands without being able to appropriate everything and that works in both directions.

[To JMCD, 13th February, 1994]

An exorcism?

Meeting you was like waking up in a coffin. Not that I panicked, reducing my fingers to bleeding stubs – no, I was far too pleasantly surprised to discover that I was indeed still alive. The despair took a while to permeate my conscious mind: alive, yet trapped, the bleak inevitability of knowledge, recognition of bland fact, how many feet under? The proverbial six, perhaps, but without the aid of magic (let’s face it, even a shovel wouldn’t be much use in this situation) the weight of the earth and daisies was merely academic. No, in these waking moments what could I do but remember and there’s the rub: perchance to dream – it was a physical sensation. A resurrection for naught. Like the nagging tingle of an amputated limb, a haunting of longing – or, in this case, a ghost attribute. I couldn’t continue life with it, you see. It impeded, it interfered. To survive the danger, to stave off the gangrenous ooze that might have set in, it had to go. How else could I bear to work in this environment, this petrified forest, this stunted “how nice to see you, let’s indulge in a ritual three pecks on the cheek to ward off genuine affection” land of almost soggy chips with mayonnaise whose prudery reeks of whalebone corsets and coal tar soap with a hint of the sea that can’t quite be banished – brass chandeliers and dingy wallpaper, the ordered formality of the mortuary. So they are shambling travesties of humanity too inhibited to experience any joy but the dim afterglow of superiority, the secreted inward grin at the fallacies of another; Yorkshire terriers with lavender-perfumed suppositories, scarlet ribbons to manacle undisciplined canine forelocks, but they shit over the pavement just the same, spreading their foulness. How else could I bear to sacrifice my freedom? Selfishness in selflessness? Let’s hear it for her, ladies and gentlemen, there’s no heavenly reward after all, this is all you’ve got, this miserable sky like an upturned 1950s aluminium pot complete with Bakelite handle, good old-fashioned virtue out of necessity. I can do what I like at a price: I can travel, I can desert my progeny for a few snatched hours, but what does it mean? The itch of a previous incarnation. I must’ve put a karmic size ten in it! I believed in cosmic forces that plotted to bring two Weetabix eaters together. I believed in airport lounges and lingering over telephone numbers. I should give up and drift again into slumber in my casket of oak, dolled up in my lovely shroud, those engaging floral tributes adorning my feet. OK? So embalming fluid isn’t the most endearing of perfumes to dab on for your first date, but corpses can’t be choosers. You inhabit my thoughts, you’re a bleeding squatter there and all the water-canon jet of reason can’t make you budge. This is not the worst humiliation I’ve faced in this land of chastisement. God knows being consigned to the ranks of the Disappeared for nearly three years is worse (marginally). I must protest. I will be heard. I’m not designed to be left to draw my own conclusions. No torture is worse than speculation – give me that old drip, drip, drip any day (the sleep-deprivation I’ve gone through anyway). Regret is cyanide to the soul. Good intentions, masks of coolness have shrivelled in the heat of normality. Exiled to myself, attributed no feelings because of the buttress of flab, the halo of motherhood, you reminded me. Maybe you didn’t do me a disservice, but where am I to channel this impotent energy? Not just anyone would have done. Leeches have sucked me drier than the mummies in the British Museum, and though it’s only their nature to do so I despise them for it. With a passion, as in everything. I didn’t expect a saviour, a resurrection from maggot-ridden, slow decomposition, some affection would have done nicely. One telephone call can go a long way, but way not long enough. I imagine the [Vienna] Hofburg in May, with blossom-laden arches. Fiaker and mélange, the opera balcony looking down on passing cars and wondering why anyone would even conceive of wanting to go anywhere else, reveries of a distant unreality as cruel as the grape bunches to Tantalus. Even that is too much. I have inhabited that space, but not exactly as I would have wanted. The rocket’s red and green flash is a few blinks away from oblivion. Nose-diving. It’s chilly here, though velvet-lined. Release me from this fitfulness. From the pulsing of desire. From speculation. Put this in the recycling bin along with the bottle it came in (coloured glass only, please). Make some allowances for prolonged enforced confinement and take the compliment. I may be a foaming sentimentalist, though credit me at least with sincerity. You can frost this bud with a clear conscience; it can shrivel back on the stalk and will look the same as before. Hell, I don’t want the usual pat on the head, the “Don’t worry, you’re a nice girl really, but no thanks” consolation prize, but I have learned (though it took a while) that you can’t bludgeon reciprocity from another. I’m starting to feel drowsy again. Must be the oxygen running out at last. At least I won’t have to stump up for a second send-off. I see Italian paintings protected by plastic screens and traffic on a large red bridge – is this Freudian? Wasn’t that a train whooshing into a tunnel? Wine like stale arterial blood. There’s nothing to prove, no need to vaunt or boast, the yielding of skin, the reciprocal laying down of arms, relinquishing hostilities – a kiss. It’s dark in here, I’m floating, boundless…

[To JMCD, 24th April, 1994]

Even [Waffle Central] is kinder: the cherries weep their blossom and the lilac droops heavy over the fence, just out of reach. I can wring a smile from the driest of lips, the mask cracks, a flicker of non-hostility. I ache for you and fear that in reaching out you will recede, mocking me with the echo of a laugh. I dare to approach, no flinching, no yellowed bruises or crusted scars, but confident. I ache for you. Listen. I am the blackbird whose swelling song pierces your windowpane in the morning sun; I am the swaying branch of the tree in your neighbour’s garden, beckoning; I am the church bell that punctuates the passing of the day; I am the warm spring rain that trickles down your face when you pause at the door; I am the trout in the rocky pool that catches the light before darting away; I am the cat that scorns the smoothness of the slates whilst crossing the roof; I am the forest that shelters and hides, whose secret pathways you wander. I crave you. I long to feel your weight as I arch beneath you, to lick the sweat from the nape of your neck, to stroke your thigh with my tongue and clasp you in my mouth. Enter me, plunder me, smother me, engulf me, let me cling to you and quench this desire, conceal me, suffocate me, release me until my breath eddies away, carried on a dark tide. The embers stirred, the glow fades as I, wrenched back, enjoy the velvet flow that glides between my legs as I stride, restless, through concrete streets whose net-curtained windows neither sneer nor reproach, the city and I each indifferent to the other as I await you.

A shard of daily existence intrudes: greetings from the mortuary! Tomorrow I walk among the shambling corpses, embalming fluid flowing through their veins. The stench of putrefaction lingers in my nostrils and my hair. Even the cockroaches had a go at devouring me, so I bought a bed. I have to wait six to eight weeks for it as it is made to order and unique: a solid cherry wood futon resting on four blocks of marble, frivolously expensive and waiting for a test run. I invested in the sturdiest slats, wooden rods to bear the load, purchasing a sofa bed in the meantime to keep me safe from marauding insects! God, I want you (in case you hadn’t noticed!). I need a dose of bromide so big: the sort of dose to cool the ardour of a full crew of virile young sailors about to be cooped up for six months on a tour of duty underwater. God help you when I finally get my gluttonous hands on you again!

[To HP, Sunday 22nd May, 1994. HP and I first made love on 2nd May]

It seemed fitting to commit this to a sheet of hotel notepaper!

Meet my Muse, or Banality’s Bloody Revenge

Have I introduced you yet? Yes, that’s her over there, the tall, graceful blonde one with the glinting eyes. Sinister? Now and then. Don’t let her give you the creeps, though, even if she does overstate the case, she means well, you see, really she does. I’ve grown to know her well over the years since she first bludgeoned her way into my existence, since I learned to form the letters of the alphabet, shakily. I was flattered by the attention then. She put her arm around my shoulders and gently said: “Try it, go ahead, let me show you what we can do…” We never looked back. She would prod and bully me until I relented, spouting ink over paper. She would pester and coax, harangue and cajole, screech and soothe, a ferocious taskmistress impelled by a manic glee, a formidable maiden: my dear, eternally youthful and unwrinkled Muse – my companion in delight and contemplation. She would always get her way, by turns pleading, smouldering, haughty, pouting, posturing and pompous, coldly rational, sassy and boisterous, luxuriantly testing her mettle, as caustic as a bath in concentrated sulphuric acid (and as fun to read!). I could always rely on her – she with her out of place robes and laughing tresses, the mischievous smile that could muster my wit on every occasion – until now. Until you chanced along. You dumbfounded her, gobsmacked her, verily I say unto ye, you temporarily deprived her of the power of creative expression.

First I saw her frown in consternation. She folded her arms and I’d swear that luscious bottom lip began to tremble petulantly before she turned her back on me! I tried to calm her, but she shrugged my outstretched arm away and started pacing up and down with the sheer exasperation of it! Which left me to chew my pen and puzzle over why my inspiration had abandoned me when I craved it most.

Dear me, what a tizz she’s got herself into now – banging that divine, imperishable brow against the brutish, unyielding wall, stamping her exquisitely manicured feet on the parquet, but to no avail: the words strangle in her throat, inarticulate, powerless.

So now she sits, bound and gagged in the corner. I disapprove of such drastic measures normally, but it really is for her own good (perhaps my own too). She’d cringe in agony or guffaw to drown me out if she could rather than suffer what I want to say, so let’s get it over with, put her out of her misery. I absolve her. This isn’t her doing, it’s mine. I’m alone and guttering with no lamp-bearer to proceed before me and give me a guided tour of the earthly delights I have tasted and enjoyed so well.

I’m scared to tell you, as if to let it pass my lips would dissipate it and so I shelter it inside where none can reach and despoil. I yearn for you, for the warmth of your infinite eyes, the vulnerable moments of bliss with you beside me, resting. I approach you, thirsting, supplicant for release, you in whom I am at last fulfilled, you who have revealed to me the tongues of angels, their wings brushing my soul, bearing me upwards to rapture – intoxicated – sure enough, she’s struggling, positively squirming, experience has robbed us both of our eloquence, whatever I write is a parody of what I feel, a miserable platitude not worthy of utterance so completely have you vanquished me with the giddy sweetness of your caress.

So let me desist.

Don’t be harsh on my Muse, the poor dear. She’s reduced to a gibbering wreck, a shadow of her former self, etc. – cavorting in cliché and semi-romanticized Biblical idiom, consorting beneath her station with all sorts of hackneyed phraseology, as you can plainly see. Do forgive us, but we are rather weak-kneed and swooning with desire, not the ideal circumstances for making an acquaintance.

What’s that?

Yes, I’ll put the pen down for a minute. Why are you rolling up my sleeve? What’s that hypodermic for? It’s just a literary expression of affection and erotic desire and l— ooh, my head’s spinning. Don’t we have the freedom of speech anymore………?

[Second letter to HP, 1994]

Imagine me reading this to you: my lips brushing gently against your earlobe, my incense-perfumed hair against your neck. Feel my damp and lingering kisses on your forehead and close your eyes. Remember the World Trade Centre in the drizzle. I see you in the car next to me, nowhere to park, the laughter of despair welling up inside me uncontrollably. Your slight agitation. Wrenched apart, I am waiting for the lights to change and you are gone…this is the account of my journey there and back on Saturday morning:
Hosing down the pavements outside their glass palaces, disinfecting the footprints of the disaffected, cleansing streams nudging cigarette butts into the gutter, and the smell of fresh-mown grass tarrying in the tree shade like a memory, the dying echo of a moment of warmth in the afternoon, some undefined refuge in time, captured, pinioned, in which to dwell; under their cold stare I walk, separate and yearning, the balconies flushed with barely discernable blooms, the children kicking plastic balls amongst the shards of glass, the contorted wires and rubble – the protest and anguish, the pride and misplaced affiliation graffitied loudly on the pores of unbreathing concrete; there are no cars, no straying mongrels, even the litter lies listless where it first was discarded, no relief…
I pass by under the docile gaze of women watching from their doorsteps, tranquil in resignation, their bright robes wrapped lovingly like a shroud’s tight embrace – do they laugh inwardly in shadowy rooms caught between the scrubbed and polished floors, the gleaming bars of the banisters and the brass door handles? Do they cry out? Do they weep?
The butcher’s and baker’s windows clamour for attention, emblazoned with gaudy letters, brazenly proclaiming their trade and battered old men sprawl over wood and wicker chairs with coffee and compatriots, the thick, sweet air of pipe smoke furring their lungs, drowsed in second-hand consolation. Where is the rain? The city is hushed in anticipation, the blackbird shrieks away at sudden intrusion.
Half-waking in exile I imagine you are there, then I remember. An afterglow of your touch delights my skin. The walls incline towards me, listening with benevolent curiosity to my pleasure. The clouds break open.
There is only you…

[Fragment]

The day taunts and the night enfolds – how I welcome her pitiless advances. She traps me with her inducements and I sink into her, surrendering to her ministrations as she wipes the wasted hours from my brow and carries me, weary as I am, to her chamber. I do not object, though her whisperings cannot soothe me. Nor do her tender kisses douse the secret of you buried deep in my womb. I overflow. Posturings cease. I no longer invite the passers-by to admire me, I no longer display. Dimly, reluctantly I dwell in the memory of your kind eyes and half smile, inhaling the sweat of your body. I stir, for she is insistent in her advances and I would not appear sullen, nor do I wish to give offence. She is jealous, knowing that the dawn will snatch me from her. Even the knowledge of my certain return does not appease her.

The touch of your lips against mine and the taste of you. I am torn and offer you my blood as a libation. Sweet precariousness. The cat muses on the garage roof amongst the puddles, remnants of the storm. Crows pursue each other between the high rises, diving to peck, peck, peck. I have paid in full for every moment, do not scorn me. Take them, my tears shed for you, this, the strength of my body opened for you, this, the joy you have released in me – they belong to no other.

I surface, the air is cold and I am alone. We are animals with language, struggling to reconcile the rational with the instinctive, the spiritual and the physical. Perhaps we indeed have no souls. How much keener then my need for the earthly reward? Love, s small word, and how much havoc it contains. How much torment. How much ecstasy. I will never enter your house to view the rooms which are your own. What books are there? What ornaments? Not a dingy repository like this. Not a virtual mausoleum of unpacked boxes and a pseudo-life.

[Diary entry from 1st June, 1994]

My initial reaction was dismay. Then anger. I had to bite my lip to the point of drawing blood. I screamed: “Silly sod!” running round the room, kicking everything that had the misfortune to be within reach of my feet. If only I knew what was going on in his head. I went into the bedroom, picked up a pillow, wrapped it round my face and screeched with every ounce of unleashed fury and passion, pouring, pouring, pouring it out. I couldn’t think straight. “She took it very well”. I have to take my hat off to her for her composure. She must have so much self-confidence. I, on the other hand, do not know what to have faith in. In my love for him? Unshakeable faith. In his love for me? I can’t answer. At lunchtime, afterwards, in the kitchen, nude on the bench, eating our sannies, he said: “It’s not good enough, is it?” I agreed. He was happy yesterday. So was I until catapulted into solitude – own devices territory. I cracked. I sobbed my heart out. Undiluted hysteria. I just gave the ultimate proof of the absoluteness of my love for him: I let him go. How could I have done it? I let him go. I so desperately wanted him to phone me last night and I wanted to phone him, to cross swords with her, my nemesis, the woman who is ruining my life. Inadvertently? Not now that she is made culpable through taking action. Even remaining calm and impassive is a form of action. The hurtful thing is knowing that she knows – she must be inwardly gloating, inwardly triumphant – she can wait on him hand and foot, play on his guilt (she knows he must feel guilty, or she wouldn’t have reminded him of the events of nine years ago [when she confessed to him she had been having an affair, which completely gutted him], she knows how bad he felt then and can pretend she feels equally bad now). She can make things so good he would be a fool to pack his bags and she can poison the minds of his children against me – she probably expects me to spew it all out first. Hopefully I can infuriate her enough to make sure she has the worst brought out in her first – I’m in limbo. I too have to ride out the storm.
He spilled the beans too soon. If only he had given us more of a chance. He didn’t want to lie to her. Is he happy with things the way they are? He gets the best of both worlds, surely she won’t put up with that?! Surely he must make a decision. I can’t bear the idea of losing him. She has all the time in the world, but how long can it be before the situation becomes untenable at home?
At lunchtime I tried to state my case: I said I didn’t want anyone (im Klartext: him) to shit on me; that the odds are stacked against me; that without time with me how can he really know what he feels? That there is only one thing he needs to realize: that he must ignore the clamouring from all those who have or think they have a claim on him and instead has to decide for himself. Banish all thought of what they say. I can’t compete without time.
Things had come to a head, but there has been no relief of the tension for me. I don’t think much will have happened by Friday.
I’m not going to take it lying down.
Ich gebe mich nicht zufrieden damit.
SM used the expression “stringing along”. HP must spend more time with me, otherwise he’s shitting on me after all.
Meek, mild and martyred.
I have to demand some time at the weekend.
If he claims it’s impossible then he lied to me about what he really feels. Maybe he can’t face up to what he’s done.
Crucifying me – he’s not giving me any support at this vital crossroads (or parting of the ways?!) – the concours.
He doesn’t have a God-given right to everything – if she protests, then…
No one is calling him to account. He is not being asked to pay. You cannot appreciate the value of something you haven’t had to pay for.
If I were her I wouldn’t put up with it.
She has the trump card – the children.
Maybe he’d harboured a sneaking hope she’d take the decision for him – that things would erupt around him and then die down.
Why should I retire to an empty bed at night?
SM thinks I should get an evening or two at least.
I could wait forever for matters to become clear.
It could just be the “lazy sod” side of him, or perhaps he doesn’t really take our relationship seriously.
Against my better judgement? My critical faculties are temporarily impaired.
The parameters have changed. She knows about me and still we have no time together. There’s the rub. He’s not willing to spend time with me. Originally I was determined to get not just the evening, but the whole night – why not? Bang in the next nail. Placate, pacify, appease, no wonder she’s brimming with self-confidence, no wonder she doesn’t think of me as a serious threat. It’s not a fair fight. It’s not on equal terms. I’m not just a decoration to be put back in the box. I don’t require pacification, just love. I am not a raging God that demands sacrifice, quivering (a knee-trembler!).

[Diary entry draft, 28th June, 1994, never written up]

When narcissus died, the pond dried up.

Maria was “dreading” coming back to [Waffle Central] because she knew he’d be able to see me every day and she resents how easy it is for him to see me (cf. her and her bit on the side).
Drinking escapades on Holy Island. Twenty years together, including two years before they married. He said he’d been “festering” and “stewing in my own juice” on Holy Island.
He wants to introduce me to them as a friend, the kids, yes. Her? No. I replied: “I value my eyes”.
He told me we were in limbo, neither friends nor lovers.
He should fuck me or leave me – let me get on with my life.
He wants things to “sort themselves out”. I.e. passively on his part, no intervention, waiting for something to give, either me or her.
He says he’s still “torn”. He should make up his mind. According to M, I am his “insurance policy” and that if I were going to have him I would have had him by now (i.e. he would have definitively left her). Only if she throws him out will he come to me.
“I want to save my marriage”, but he comes here when he’s not allowed. He must have lied to her about that after all, proving he can indeed lie. He hides behind concern about me not having a life, but he’s keeping me warm and willing in case home becomes unbearable. He’s being cruel and he actually knows it. Beginning to suss that he must “put the boot in” or “stick the knife in” as a mercy killing. That coming back to [Waffle Central] has been far harder than he anticipated. Paradox and irony riddling, saturating our whole relationship. I’m not teasing him – I would stick by him. AB called it an “awesome responsibility”. I would have to make it work between us because THAK would have to go. He has a sister a year younger than me. I’m playing a game now, too. Wearing down his resistance. It only hurts me. I should leave him alone. He’s so arrogant he honestly believes he’s fucked me up. He claims to be fucked up himself. He has nothing to lose by it and what power it gives him. He claims to respect us both whilst respecting neither, he only loves himself (M). M argued he has a greater emotional commitment than HP to me and that I’d stand a better chance of landing him, which:
a) means I don’t stand a chance in hell with HP, but
b) he added: “Did you hear that?”. In other words, he meant it in a positive way, like and admission of guilt or susceptibility.
If HP did introduce me to the kids it’d be a major step. The other school of thought, AG’s and Shilamat’s (male versus female intuition) reasons that it’s a huge decision to take and he can’t take it overnight – it’s his whole life. Once he’s severed thatlink he’s adrift. There’s no such thing as irrevocable, a tug of war, if he withdraws it’ll be like being dumped again. I wouldn’t care about the gossip or anyone if I were together with him, you know, he won’t even phone me today, even though he owes it to me to stop me worrying about when we can meet again. I should put an end to it and switch on the frost. I say “I love you” but I don’t love him any more. It’s not the same and never will be – it would work out if we both wanted it to, but he doesn’t want it to – I’m struggling. I should leave him in peace, yet I can only see him at work. M reminded me of the phrase “when hell freezes over”.

[Undated]

Monologue to JMCD and HP

I want you to love me and normally would feel insulted that you in your primacy, your position, do not. Yet, if you did, you would become vulnerable. I could make inroads and once annexation and appropriation had started where would they cease? Reason dethroned, malleability and manipulativeness. Do I ever respect those whom I love? I respected H and look where that got me. Even having been immersed in the tide of love, emerging salt-crusted and bedraggled. I do not believe that there is only one avenue. If I were to admit that, the only logical and possible choice would be extinction. Why do you withhold your love from me? Paradox upon paradox. You laid out the limits, a chalk circle whose bounds could not be overstepped. I resented them on different levels: as a slight upon my intellectual capacity, as a rejection of any future budding, as rank arrogance concerning my attraction, yet they have been helpful. I did not expect too much. You did not offer everything like H did and then snatch it all away, scorn and desecrate it with gloating sprayed-on slogans. You have prodded me a little, advised and given attention and nurturing. I’m glad it is how it is, I matter. Is that not love? Why is it that I am never in power, the other always holding sway over me? A greater balance is required. I thought I had found it. The abruptness sent me reeling. Wednesday: “I love you”. Friday: all over. Saturday: go. Abandoned. Not the joy that my gift of unconditional love should have brought to us both, H. This is a non-life now. Worse than nothing. Worse even than death. Because of the acute, racking awareness – not the sordid awareness that I have passed through a crisis and managed to retain a loosening grasp on what is termed by the majority and the unenquiring as sanity, but because I emerged if not vindicated, victorious. You latched on to the phrase “bounce back”, H. Irritatingly enough. I have realized this for quite some while. It is the female in me. It can never be an excuse, an escape clause or, for me, a consolation. Barrenness, sterility engulf me and I become faint. I am trapped: worst of all, the mind is alert and aware, but a mind does not have a pair of hands or feet to do its dirty work. The circuit is broken, power disengaged.

[Draft letter to JMCD, 12th June, 1994, unsent]

Let me begin with a scream: AAAAAAAARGH!

What I need is rage, what I need is someone to hit instead of me. What I desperately require is someone to tell me it’s alright. A good liar, someone whose eyes I can drown in for an instant of solace. I am a gaping wound. I bleed, it spurts everywhere, redecorating the room with the agony of a thwarted passion. I really do wish I was dead. Instead I cringe, coward, despicable coward that I am, in a corner. It should be a padded cell, then I could let go, but I can’t, I can’t, I can’t…

This is worse than death. When I was in slumber it dulled the awareness. Now I have dared, dared to reach for my dream and it pulled back, mocking and there was nothing I could do. The very best of me wasn’t good enough it seems and now I’m cast back, lashed and torn and spat upon and unredeemed.

I can’t even blame you. You woke me up, but not deliberately. Now I have less than nothing, when for a brief half hour or so I had it all.

I fell in love, M. For the first time in my mortal span I fell in love. I wouldn’t have done it before I met you. I might have admired or wasted away in inaction, but this happened by accident. I can never have him again and I face journey after journey to S knowing that he and I have nothing better to do, but that he still won’t come back to me. I could have left it as a week’s fling, but no, he made me fall in love with him, just to prove that he could. Yes, he loves me, but he loves the two children more. That’s right, what a fool, falling (hard, coastal rocks jagged hard) for a married man. Neither a bastard nor a shit, maybe a hint of a bastard. He gave me my life back then snatched it away, shattering it. I’m walking barefoot over the shards without noticing the cuts, I’m so numb.

How can I fight to regain my life? I tried to kill myself, but see, it didn’t work. I want to get angry. I can’t see beyond him. I want my life back, M. What the fuck am I going to do? It happened in S. When I last saw you I knew I’d be going to Maastricht with him the following Wednesday. I had to fuck you to get through that weekend of hell when I wouldn’t see him and to give me the confidence to make sure something would happen on that mission. He’d been wavering. Now I have no relief.

I didn’t know what it could be like, you know. I’ve had far in excess of my fair share of unrequitedness, rejection and unhappy attempts. I’m damaged. I was happy – I knew bliss – I was happy for the first time in my entire life. Ashes, ashes. Don’t worry, I won’t fall in love with you on the rebound. I need to fuck you now more than ever before, but with kindness as well as lust. I love you in my own way, a fond love, but it is not the kind of love that breaks your ground rules. I’m so glad that you laid down the law, though it blighted the beginning for me. Imagine if it had been like this…Let me tell you what I have learned. I have learned that I am capable of far more than I ever had the faintest glimmer of – my sexuality was unfettered for the first time and I hadn’t a clue. I’ve been in the dark. Poor, inept THAK, I went running home for lack of anywhere else to go – he couldn’t cope with my true identity, it terrified him. There is nothing between me and him any more. I must fuck someone who is alive, who can take it. Can you take it, M? I don’t know. I hurt too much to be truly aware of anything else. Accept me. What I must have is acceptance. Else I will seek my nemesis from someone who will give me what I deserve, black and blue again, chained, raped, despised as well as despicable.

I’ve lost my grip on sanity.

The door is sealed – I can give, but I cannot take. There’s nothing left to give – he got it all.

I resented you for a while. Because I had poured the wasteland years into the “asbestos” letter and felt I had run dry. But what I wrote him would have eclipsed anything.

What else have I learned? That I deserve more than being forced by my own stupidity to sit and wait and wait for phone calls, more than to see a lover who doesn’t really care for me once a month or less. Yes, I know this contradicts what I wrote a mere couple of paragraphs ago, but the two are not mutually exclusive in this emotional mudpit.

Why did I have to wake up? Why?

You are all that I fucking well have now. Irony of it all. I wouldn’t even want you to leave your wife, even if you would, which you never would. I don’t want to be wicked, it’s not what lies beneath the anguished layers of deadwood. I am good. I don’t want to exploit, I don’t want to be an opportunist, though we both have the latter in common. I don’t want to be bitter, nor do I ever, ever want to cause anyone pain. All I can see is wreckage, shrapnel, despair and bitterness.

It’s beautiful here today, the sun, warmth. I have only two or three days to go without G and I haven’t got the self-confidence to leave the house. I’m trapped. Some bastard lowered the bars again whilst I was momentarily distracted – it’s all the worse a confinement now for knowing what life could be.

[Second draft letter to JMCD, 12th June, 1994, unsent]

I want to be humiliated and loved.

Are you really as trite as some of your sayings [for example: “There’s the sleep of the just and the sleep of the just after”; “I miss you, sort of” and “Put your paranoia back in its box!”] or is that just the barrier that I’ve put my blowtorch on? I’m sorry.

Can you see me? I need to talk to someone who understands – I need to talk to a lover!

I have so much to give, so much passion and uncompromising and unconditional love – don’t crack, don’t let me wear you down – I realise my healing can only come from within.

Help me! Let me pretend, let me act out the fantasy of the powerful mistress – I’m no cheap tart or slut and I’m worth immeasurably more than a “scalp”, a notch on the bedpost, a bit on the side. You know that, don’t you? So don’t worry, I know it’s untenable. I want you. What I’d like is not so to be fucked, but to be made love to. Is that possible without love? I know you don’t owe me a thing, except perhaps contempt. Yes, I am wretched and contemptible. Give it to me – come to [Waffle Central] or I’ll come to L and let me have it! I want to let go, to really fuck you, to find my own extinction.

I found and lost everything. Please read this letter in the light of these inalterable facts. You’re not stupid and I have always instinctively known that you understand – you charming, dangerous man.

Listen – I passed the concours. Another trick Fate/God has played on me. HP abandoned me on the Saturday. I wanted to slit my jugular, but went home to Scotland until Tuesday evening instead. The concours was Wednesday morning. I don’t know whether I’ll get a job out of it yet. Maybe I’ll find out (though unofficially) tomorrow. Pray that I do. If not I’m going to steal some insulin to inject after a cocktail of paracetamol and that’s that, be done with it. Sleep, sleep (people who talk about it never do it, stupid cunt!).

I’ve never been so scared in all my life.

I have the concours party on 23rd June (19.00). A Thursday. You’re not there. I wish you could be, but I won’t entertain ideas above my station.

Look, I enclosed a tape. I hope you’ll give it a hearing. I’ve always had an urge to communicate and commune with you, in spite of all the obstacles you erect. I don’t have any books [he had presented me with a paperback copy of Heinlein’s “Time Enough for Love”]. It’d be too intimate for me to share Mahler with you. I gave that to HP. In any song, I prefer the lyrics to the melodies themselves. They must have substance, passion, spirit and not be dull, insipid, whining and trite like Abba (who so neatly package themselves as to be a cynical mockery of the feelings they purport to encapsulate). I would have pictured us listening to the tape in bed, or at least in a warm embrace if you weren’t so frenetic.

I need relief. Wipe my brow, once you’ve made it sweat.

P.S. I enjoyed the Heinlein, especially the first chapter, which was so thoroughly you. It’s chronic, you know (me trying to brighten up my own hell) – it’s only just dawned on me that I actually want sex, and let me tell you, it’s all I want – fifty times a day wouldn’t be enough. I have years to catch up on. I’m not interested in anything else at all. Like I said – crass! Thanks a bundle!

[To JMCD, 13th June, 1994]

You know who
You know where
Here’s when: 13th July, 1994

Dear M,

Thanks for the surprise postcard. I passed the concours and will be offered a permanent contract sometime, maybe January next year, maybe even later, I don’t know, but sometime. I was called in to see the boss today and he dished out a monumental bollocking, an assassination of my entire being coupled with a completely unprovoked and unjustified assault on my professional ethics and integrity. A sample: “You may very well be a card-carrying Trotskyite, but I don’t want you proclaiming it at the bars”. Two aspirins and a good cry remedied a lot. I asked him at the end of it: “So I do have a career, then?” to which he replied indeed, a very bright future awaited me provided I conformed, was a good, sweet, nice little girl, stopped wearing trousers and biting my nails and washed my mouth out with carbolic, so there’s nothing for it but to manacle those big feet and tie that tongue, at least until the nine month probation period is over.

I need to talk life, the universe and everything, as you put it. Since we last met, my worst nightmare has come inexorably true and, though I’m still on the planet and my soul has not been loosed from this mordant lump of flesh that obligingly lugs it around everywhere, from experience to experience, I need some therapy, the benefit of your vast knowledge of this mortal coil and a jolly good fuck into the bargain. Don’t worry, I haven’t fallen in love with you or anything and I’m still curious to know what you wanted to talk to me about.

Waste of time though it is, I’m inviting you to my mega party. I know you can’t come, since it’s a Thursday, but it’s a bit of a shame really. It’s a threefold celebration: a return of the prodigal mother, G’s birthday bash; a piss-up over managing not to fail the big C and (if the bloody thing arrives on schedule), my bed-warming celebration. I’m also inviting you to “christen” the bed with me, but that’s another occasion. My real friends will be there. Some colleagues and assorted hangers-on as well. It’d be nice to have you there, but never mind…

I won’t say I was outright dismayed to discover that you like Abba, but I will “treat” you, nolens volens, to why they leave me stone cold. My reaction to them is: so what? Even at their miserable, dreary best they do nothing for me, it’s so well-packaged that it radiates cynicism and manipulation, catchy melodies wrapped around trite and rancid lyrics, squeeze every last drop from the record-buying public to pay those exorbitant Swedish taxes. They are completely devoid of sincerity, saccharine, limpid, vapid, vacuous (you don’t know it, but in my personal vocabulary, that’s the most scathing term I could ever use!), hollow, superficial, parading out suffering as melodrama, ripples on the breeze-kissed pond that leave no lasting impression. They are a mockery and travesty of the feelings they purport to encapsulate. There is no substance to them. I do believe I find them offensive, grating with those whining “harmonies”, nauseating. No poetry, no soul.

So I proudly present: the alternative collection [the letter accompanied a tape]. As much fire, anguish, misery, despair, anxiety, desire and gut-wrenching passion as you could hope for. And that is only the merest “udpluk” to use a good Danish expression.

“The Unforgettable Fire” is the song I want played at my funeral. To me, it represents the ultimate distillation of separation anxiety, the homeward, upward striving of the severed spirit, the urge for a re-embracing with the eternal core, God. It’s undiluted, uncompromising and contains all the fire, all the seething, flailing, aching, ecstatic life in me.

I’m going to Scotland to pick up G on the 15th and will be returning on the 18th (back by lunchtime). I’d dearly like to see you. You only have to say the word and I’ll be on that train, wretch that I am. It’s restlessness more than anything. I need both the lightning conductor and the shoulder to cry on, someone who is stalwartly immune, but a little compassionate. If that’s too much, OK. I could do with a shag, though I’d prefer to make love. I need relief.

[At the African Museum, July 3rd, 1994]

Rusting sphinxes gaze serene, yet bemused at the cavorting of bare-chested youths with Frisbee and football, basking in the smug admiration of their attendant women feigning disinterest. Shuttlecocks tap against rackets; the most eager of dogs have ceased prancing and retrieving and lie panting, slumped in the merciful shade of the leafy avenues. From the lake the splashing of gaudy paddle boats and the insistent bell calling for their return to shore. Deckchairs, blankets and sunshades adorn the lawns, the props of blissful idleness. The afternoon yawns. The occasional jogger in pursuit of serious leisure plods past, a girl glances up from her paperback and smiles. Here I rest on the embankment amongst the daisies and clover, scorched grass and last year’s leaves. I watch them, each one of them a separate world: the toddlers chased by anxious parents, the cyclists, the couples. Haunted by you, I sigh. The flowers have withered, the butterfly drops, the sun lost its warmth.

[To HP, 15th July, 1994]

Sorry this letter is the written equivalent of incoherent rambling, but I haven’t the wherewithal for anything better right now – I’d like to, but sorry.

Dear H,

I sit in uninspiring surroundings, the rest room in the B, looking on to the clinic’s concrete dullness, the hiss of the air conditioning soothing me into semi-slumber. What a pity about the letter and tape – I posted them before you left for the island. Thank you for the postcard. The harbour seems like a haven. How marvellous it would be to have a retreat amongst the mists and ferns and woodland, how I long to escape from here.

I’m still waiting for meaning. I carry on, the heart beats dutifully, the body exists, but I am not alive. It’s not wallowing in misery. I’m at a low ebb, with no energy or incentive, knowing that the potential for happiness is there, aware that I do not have the key within myself – well, I do, but someone has to pick it up, insert and turn it, yep, what a phallic way of viewing things, rude, innit? I have learned that everything depends on how you perceive it – crassly – I’ve been confined at home against my will, without confidence, strength or surplus to leave. The sun was shining, it was warm, viscous and easy, but because of my state of mind I was/am excluded from all pleasure or appreciation of it, except to appreciate how different it could be. I feel inadequate, as you know, but also insufficient and incomplete.

You reminded me I wasn’t happy before we “met” – but that smacks of a paltry excuse. I was in bliss, divine grace and contentment with you, God help me. I have purged my life of negative emotions, such as resentment and jealousy. I never allowed myself to become angry. I got no more than I deserved (in being hurt), I, the most disgusting and unworthy, it’s not true, though, is it? Maybe the shortcoming is not mine. I want to move on, but I love you. Even if you were shallow, insincere and arrogant I’d still love you. I have no hope, but a surfeit of love. I want to give love. I want to fuck you. I never got that massage, having bought some oil as a statement of faith, not that you’d use it on me, but that I could use it on someone. It isn’t just about a fuck, though, which is why you won’t give it to me. You can have us both, as long as you conceal it from her. I’ve been cut so low, scythed so that I would tolerate anything, anything to staunch the flow of life away. You can have us both because I would put up with it. It is not what I wanted then, but I have seen the ideal, seen what I need, it’s more. So what the fuck am I supposed to do in the meantime? I could perhaps find someone else, and need to before I become too frantic or frenzied in myself and my search so that I repel them, scare them off. The only reason you can’t have both is your belief that you can’t, so say I don’t want to have you both. OK, that’s the last thing I want to hear, even now, but you could, you daft bugger, you could get away with it, maybe I’d feel undermined, but no, not really, you have a wife and a family after all, I’d share you with them, just not with another mistress. I can take it and it would stop me looking elsewhere, so I wouldn’t be pining or falling victim to false hope, but you’d give me a lot of relief in the interim. Now, without even the vaguest prospect of such a scenario, eternity gapes ahead, grey, grey, worse by far than death. You stirred in me something I had no idea about: how callous to expect me to deny myself once I had become aware. I can be ruthless; I wouldn’t kid myself you’d ever leave. Now I feel ugly, undesirable, unwanted. For those weeks you let me see something different, but then by casting me away you made me feel I’d been deceiving myself.

I’m manacled. I can see it from your point of view for a moment, then the pain overwhelms me again. Like lighting a match in a dark, windowless room.

I smoked my first joint the other day. The first time I’ve smoked anything at all. I loved it, but I won’t do it again until I can share that high with a lover, a bit of a waste otherwise. It made me hyper randy, but relaxed, filling me with benevolent energy. JR was the one who “led me astray”. She bought it in Maastricht, oh, city of joy! (joy remembered). I need a guilt-free fuck. Yes, ultimately I want a relationship, a partner, but now what I need is to fuck. Or at least have the prospect of a fuck in the not-undefined future (and not just a meaningless, anonymous fuck, either, not a sordid selfish fluid exchange with a total stranger, there’s the rub, it has to be mutual). You’ve ruined me, you have!

Sweden soon. I dread it. Still haven’t sorted out accommodation yet (a way of denying that I’m actually going). I don’t want to go, H. I tried to suppress/deny/turn my back on my love: I can’t. It’s not intended to accuse you, make you feel guilty or whatever, I’m merely telling you the way it is – don’t ridicule or detest me for it, it is alive, fond, unfading.

[To JMCD, July, 1994]

Hi,

I’m sending you a copy of [David Lodge’s] “How Far Can You Go?” uninscribed so you can keep it without awkward questions being asked. A reminder of my existence. Thanks for the call on Saturday. I have just received HP’s “nasty” letter, although it isn’t nasty, just dense (as in dim). It’s made me feel like downing the proverbial paracetamol and insulin cocktail. He says he feels depressed, but can – apparently – turn it off, whereas I have lost all control over my life. I have not the power to abate the pain, it’s all I can do to ignore it and it destroys everything for me. He gave me the same advice as most other people have done, but I can’t accept it from him. I wish he’d leave me be, but he wants my address in Sweden. His wife will read any letter I send him in August anyway. I haven’t the strength not to keep in touch with him. It’s not that the knight-in-shining-armour syndrome had belied my experience or atrophied my brain, but it doesn’t seem worth continuing any more, that’s all it is, naked survival, so I’m no better off than an animal, a worm in the border, it’s self-continuing to no useful end (brute instinct). Yes, I have the female curse of “sensibleness”, but also an “artistic temperament”. Sometimes I wish I was chronically shallow or stupid. Everyone seems to assume I’ll pair myself off in Sweden, fools! What I want is to be loved and though the Rangy Lil horniness is there, it’s a poor substitute (not a substitute at all), and it whets the keenness of the need even sharper. It’s something I use to protect my core, a tragic-comic mask. Last time we were together, you showed me that HP isn’t the only man who can make me happy or satisfy me, but what good does it do me to know that, really? I still love him and can’t love you. I can, but I can’t afford it, in other words, nor do I have any wish to alter the way it is between us, don’t panic. I’d like more time, that’s all. You don’t get plunged into the low I do – left behind, etc. It’s the nature of the beast and it’s only HP that makes it so bad. I know you care, so I don’t need you to love me. You admitted you could, that’s enough.

[To HP, July, 1994]

“The supreme vice is shallowness” – Oscar Wilde, “De Profundis”.

You said on the phone I should not write until I had something to say. I have just received your second letter. Back comes the tide of grief, unabated, undiminished. I am not shallow, H. That is one vice I cannot be accused of. I might hold up a mask to take in the dim-witted or the uncaring with my masterful dissimulation, we must all shield ourselves to an extent – how often have I listened to disbelieving “but you appear so cheerful”. Now they say: “But you’re getting over it, aren’t you?” Let them delude themselves. It is my acid test. If they cannot see beyond the act they are not my friends. What you said did not offend me. You don’t understand, do you? You could tell me anything and I would nod meekly and swallow it and digest it and it would become the gospel to me. It would not occur to me to doubt it, because it passed your lips. The irony about this is that although you are not a bastard (because you are not a bastard), you pierced me, skewered me, they could not, did not do that. They couldn’t touch me, couldn’t come close, I was unassailable, the iron core. In the end, you see, the tables always turned. They ended up in my thrall, I prevailed, the triumph I “enjoyed” was to forsake them. I have vowed never to repeat that because it is vain (i.e. barren). A Pyrrhic victory. I opened up to you. When I was assaulted I sealed off my sexuality, using it only as a weapon, a means of control, despising any man who let himself be swayed by it. I found it incredulous and distasteful that they derived any pleasure from the act with me and sooner or later I communicated this to them, subtly at first, then humiliatingly, that I felt towards them as I would a dog rubbing itself up and down on my calf. They might as well have been jerking themselves off for all the response I gave them – not that they cared to make an attempt before it reached that crucial intensity to see whether I liked it. I suppose they were arrogant. I never faked it, you know, the silence and rigidity were ignored, then gnawed at their egos like an insidious worm. What did I care? If they were idiot enough to have dealings with me, they reaped what they had sown. No, I wasn’t happy. Reason may try her best to slap me in the face and scold me to pull myself together, but none of this is about reason. Reason will nag me to heal, to recuperate that, yes, you do care, yes, you do love me, but no, it cannot be that all I have lost with you is sex, that I can have the rest unchanged, but I have lost everything. I can’t divorce love from sex. That’s what feminists usually yell at men about. Despicable men, interested in gonads’ discharge and precious little else. I’m a feminist because of circumstances – I never needed to be one before. I had no shortage of lovers before arriving in [Waffle Central], but here I have been shoved aside, relegated to the ranks of the sexually inactive without so much as a by your leave. You have changed me, as I told you. I see the nihilism, the futility and self-perpetuating misery of the relationships of the past. Yet I gave you that sexuality I had denied even myself – I let you in – and look what happened to me. Do you get a glimmer now, H? Unless you have suffered, you can empathise, but cannot feel, I appreciate that. Suffering builds character, as the proverb states, but I want to be loved, H, I’ve had my fill of suffering and don’t want to wreak havoc on unfortunates any more. I want to be loved in full. I want to give it all. Like I did. I’ve been rejected countless times, by men who weren’t bastards (maybe they were, but I was never given the chance to sink into disillusionment). How does that make me feel? All the ones who cared about me didn’t want it to go beyond the friendship or companionship, reinforcing the message that my sexuality was undesirable and worthless. But they rejected me without fucking me first. I know that people like me and care about me, but the entire population of the planet could write and tell me what a “wonderful person” I am and I’d still not listen because not one of them would love me in the way I need to be loved.

And it isn’t that you can’t, it’s that you won’t.

I don’t see it as a contest between me and Maria, or me and your children. I know that you can’t conceal and I know your confessing was the cause of what happened. I had to say it for a start, because it’s a fact that no one would be any the wiser about an illicit week once a month in S. But you would know, and I’m not dense, I realise that’s the point. It’s your nature, not merely commendable, but attractive. What M would brand a lack of “sophistication”. It would affect things at home and you’ve made your choice. I have to learn to live with that. But I still wish you’d relent even that much. Don’t start thinking this letter is “horrible”. You always start thinking of our conversations or other communications as “horrible” whenever I indicate I still want you. Maybe that’s subconscious on your part, but I can’t help but pick up on it, since it confirms my fears about being repulsive, unwantable and unlovable, etc. about my sexuality being like some wart or leprosy. Have I become so physically repugnant to you in the meantime? I suppose it’s “relief”. I can’t find it with an anonymous partner or someone I don’t love. It’s like being thirsty, but having no money to buy a drink on a square surrounded by pubs. It’s not randiness. I could wank a million times a day and still be this unsatisfied. Don’t get angry with me. I’m not asking you to change your mind in one way, i.e. I’ve given up on the idea that I could have you in the absolute sense (i.e. you leaving home), but I suppose I haven’t given up trying to squeeze a week a month out of you! Take it as a compliment if you like, but don’t ridicule me for it.

Being depressed is not something you can shake yourself out of, by the way. You can’t decide to enjoy a day if you’re depressed. I am. I have lost all power over my own destiny. I know that I need to take up the stretching exercises again, stop eating or whatever, but I feel paralysed, I can’t stop “moping”. It engulfs you, it is a state of being. If a psychiatrist were reading this, he’d probably recommend EST. It’s waking up in the morning and being – literally – unable to move. I only do what I must. To support my son. Work in other words. Yes, I went to AT’s for the weekend, but I couldn’t get out of it, nor would he let me. It’s like extreme lethargy. Unless you are afflicted in this way, you are not truly depressed. I’m not pooh-poohing what you are going through. In danger of becoming a little smug about how much worse it is at my end, I’ll stop it.

There was one part of the letter that bugged, yep, you’ve guessed it, the “career woman” bit. Do you really think that I want to be? In a way, yes, simply because of that damn intellect of mine craving occupation. But more restless even than my mind is my heart (not my loins!). God, I wish I were shallow, H, I could get my life back then. It sounded like “There’s a good little girl, play at dressing up and put your make up on, your beads and your baubles and someone will take pity on you”. Need I say more?

That was the indignant me. Part of me would like to deceive you and part of me would like to taunt you to force you to put the boot in. But that’s not what I really want. I want you back. No different to how it was during those three weeks, but I am aware that I can’t have it. The sure and certain knowledge doesn’t stop me wanting, though. The abject me, the huddled homeless in a doorway in the lashing rain me. You are a good man, that’s precisely what has destroyed me, filleted me. I don’t feel worthy of you, you know and now I’m crying again.

What you wrote in the letter was sound advice. I can take it from a friend and you are my friend (thank God, I am both relieved and grateful), but still I can’t accept it from you. Odd, but not odd.

Please forgive me, H. Please try to understand. I assume that because you don’t want me, you don’t feel anything at all for me, the all or nothing syndrome. I just don’t know what to do or where to turn – everywhere I look there is nothing but scorn and mockery, nothing but pain. I want it to be different, but am incapable of altering it. I need reassurance (which I won’t get through becoming entangled with someone who doesn’t love me and I won’t get through meaningless sex) and I need to be told that I’m not the despicable, rotten, evil creature I perceive myself to be, but I’ll believe it only from that elusive lover. That’s the dilemma. Yes, I’m becoming obsessive, but I never truly bared myself before. That’s why I’m laid low. That’s why I’m being stupid, thick.

I had to tell you the naked truth again. Please don’t hate me. I hate me enough for all the world. I’m at work now, so I have to finish.

[To HP, 19th July, 1994]

Paradise Revisited

Bees bend the flower heads, eager in plundering, the guardian sphinx purses her lips, an echo of Byzantine wrath wrought seasons ago on her noseless face, kindred creature brazenly exotic – puddles of sunshine rest on the opulent lawns – birch and copper beech stretch branches to the sky, blackbird and sparrow vie with pneumatic drill to fill the ear – wood pigeon’s sensuous cooing distracts – a mother breastfeeds on a neighbouring bench – the air is humid – parched and brittle leaves are strewn about the paths in a premonition of autumn. I cannot eliminate the loss or the sweetness of my return to where I passed my happy time – this gentle sanctuary of nature, carefully sculpted to satisfy the aesthetic sensibilities of a vanished generation is now inherited by tourists and gawping strollers, tended, venerated, enjoyed – it is but an extension of my awareness, without me it would cease to exist – each filter of perception is unique and so we wander each through our separate universe, irreconcilable, distinct. A youth accosted me for a cigarette – neither threateningly nor imploringly, with a politeness you only expect from someone seeking a favour in this sad place. A spider negotiates the leather handles of my bag – “Scotland the Brave” from the SNP demo in front of the Palais interrupts my thoughts.

I acknowledge that you cannot have us both – it is not permitted you, nor do you permit yourself, though you know I would permit – I love you, but must learn to accept, must remind myself that I will forever be deprived you. M said that you were insincere that although he (JMCD) does not love me, still he could never do to me what you did…but M has not been immersed in the beauty of your eyes, nor has he felt your tender embrace, nor has he been gladdened by your laugh.

I could have done with your support today: isolated and reviled I felt, though it was a simple, unintended error – it was like some terrible confirmation of my own failings to me. Perhaps – undoubtedly – I am a fool, but love you I do – what had you to gain by lying to me? Would that you had used me H, then my love might have withered – instead you, the only man I have ever truly loved, the only man who treated me with kindness and respect, proved it by hurling me away, consigning me to the darkness of my own dark soul – you acted to save yourself (your marriage), out of fear, but you honoured me with honesty – fool that I am, I love you all the more for it – and hopelessly. Yes, I am your friend, never question it. I will never speak ill of you, I will always intervene on your behalf, I will defend you ferociously, you will enjoy my absolute loyalty. Even if everyone else were to turn their backs on you, I would not, I will listen and comfort, I will give any help you may ask of me – this is what you may expect and I shall expect the same in return. Friendship cannot be forced, it must develop over months and years.

I admit that the last two letters were slightly unfair, intended to goad and provoke you into taking notice, into rethinking. I cannot let go. I refuse to lie to you and why should I ease the transition for you when it is torment upon torment for me? You have changed me, H. Good will come of it, unless despair prevails. The onset of despair I cannot avert – I must be loved, I need to be loved more than ever – my doctrine has always been thus, but never have I known it more keenly: life is love and nothing more – love is everything. In love we merge our bodies and from this we are conceived (sadly rare I concede, but ideals are the object of these deliberations) – to the loving, soothing embrace of the infinite we return, surrendering all that we ever were, but leaving our pattern behind – no deed, however trivial or innocent in intent is without consequence – one random event may redeem or lay waste, as you know.

I love you with every ounce of strength I possess and with every drop of blood that flows through me. Take them. I make no demands of you. I do not wish to exact anything from you. Unless freely given a gift is worthless. Let us laugh together again, but do not forget me, H. Do not let anything or anyone blot out the love we shared. Do not let it be despoiled or belittled, do not deny it even to protect yourself. If I could but mould myself in the image you had of me I could live again.

There is nothing I dread more than the thought of your being indifferent to me – don’t shun me – be patient with me. I will never wound you, H. I couldn’t, even if I wanted to.

Don’t remind me of my inexhaustible strength or capacity to recover – would that I did not have them. Would that I had the courage of my love and forsook everything rather than endure stupidly. Endure, endure. Is that why I was born?

I see you in the hired car on the way to Maastricht, brushing back your hair. I smell your jacket as we walked in search of an eatery, interlocked. I watch the oil-tainted eddies of the river here, waving at the children in the open-topped boat, recalling how I burned to touch you. The taste of your tongue in my mouth. Your caress.

Strange, isn’t it, how we don’t really know each other and yet understand the deepest, best concealed, most secret selves. Intimacy’s paradox.

I am empty again. Off to the bunker to check my programme.

[To JMCD, 2nd August, 1994]

Here I am, stranded and penniless in Stockholm, suffering from a bout of “Wish you were here, we could have a lovely time” etc. I haven’t a clue what to do with myself apart from hiding in these 17.5 square metres that I have rented for the duration. Typical student shack – no pillow, no sheets, no duvet (not that the latter is required, the temperature exceeding 30°C). Tiny, narrow bed, refugee furniture (refugee from another era and lifestyle). This is a golden opportunity that I ought not to squander. I was too preoccupied (even psychologically) to prepare for this trip. Do you have any recommendations as to where I should go? What should I visit? There’s no one here. Maybe that’ll remedy itself, maybe not. I haven’t got the guts to go to the student pub and the corridor is deserted. Argh! AB gave me a box of condoms (48 glorious rubbers!), though I don’t suppose I’ll get a chance to use even one. OK, it’s only the second day, but I wouldn’t have the nerve to sit in a bar on my own. I never have had the nerve.

It seems a beautiful city, several notches up the grandeur scale from Copenhagen without being threateningly imposing. Brick and “soft” carved granite, water. The course-“mates” have all lived here for yonks and are interested solely in improving the mind (rather than sharing the body).

I suspected it would be like this. Back in debt (in a big way since I have a month with zero income), unable to withdraw cash from the machines, I have a couple of hundred kronor and 24 days – I hope that telex from my bank gets through, for what? I could have a lovely time, but there we are.

I’d beg and plead for a letter right now because there is no telephone here, unless I get my own one, which would take a week to arrange (I inquired) with no guarantee I could foot the bill!

[To HP, 7th August, 1994]

Am in a small cove on a large rock. I slipped and skinned my knees, not injured enough for it to detract. This is the island of Sandhamn: butterflies sun themselves, grasshoppers flee, the water laps peacefully on the shore. Pools betray how high the sea rises when the tide is in, red veins of granite variegate the stone. Three and a half hours sailing time from Stockholm. I’ve arrived at the “beach”, the sand has that mudlike, waterlogged Northern consistency reminiscent of home. It could almost be Scotland – birch and pine, heather and blueberries (they’re sourer here), the lack of ferns and birdsong the signs of otherness. Dogs and people bathe – if only I’d thought to bring my costume. The Swedish lilt suits the landscape, like a brooding forest, often light, but impenetrable a few steps beyond the clearing. The sky seems to curve more than usual here. Seaweed browns in heaps, beer cans lie glinting here and there, cigarette butts bob like buoys, “civilisation” intruding. A couple in their late 40s sport in the water like teenagers. Chalets peep through the branches, almost awkwardly, knowing they are out of place. A radio has just been switched on. The news. Patches of lichen provide evidence of the air’s purity. More and more tourists converge on us and the inevitable mobile phone petulantly demands attention. The occasional strand of a cobweb catches the light. The forest beckons. Laughter. Exposed skin. Not the flesh and sun tan lotion market of Klampenborg. Ears of bleached wheatlike grass, a scrap of wool. Wading sounds, and then the slap of bare foot on boulder. Insects, attracted to bright clothes, investigating, foraging. Yachts and speedboats plough through the waves, leaving ghostly furrows. Grey clouds gather behind like nagging worries, yet they cannot obscure the light. If only you were here, my once lover, to feel the inquisitive brush of the wind, to observe the scurrying of the ants’ scavengings, to be at peace with me in a barely tainted haven such as this. With me. That I might taste those lips again, take refuge in your smile, you who surround me even when absent, whose voice I cannot banish from my mind.

[To HP, 9th August, 1994]

This is an outburst by the way (here I am, apologising already!).

It’s 1.10 a.m., the 9th of August I suppose. I can’t sleep. My pillow is soaked. Not sweat. What can I write? I can’t describe how it feels. I don’t care about anything else, you know. I remember that Saturday morning. God, you were so cruel, you hurt me so deeply, I can’t begin to recover and here I am, I still love you – you who took everything and threw it away. Yes, without glee, without delight – but so harshly, not leaving me with anything and still I love you. I wish I could lose my mind, so that I could at least escape from this reality, which I cannot bear. It’s not that I don’t understand your need to protect yourself – you chose, I know, it’s just how can I live with that choice? How can I bear it? It really is like a record stuck in a groove. No one can hear it. Or maybe they’re too preoccupied, or maybe they’re paralysed or apathetic or merely indifferent. JR told me that God (or the Great Spirit or whatever name you want to give it) doesn’t care how we learn, whether through pleasure or pain, so that we can either learn by running away from pain or running towards pleasure, neither is intrinsically superior to the other, or more moral, God doesn’t care, full stop. It’s not that you weren’t blunt or clear enough. You can tell me a million times over and I will hear, but it won’t penetrate. There’s nothing left for me any more, just growing older and less desirable. I have no life any more, H, I really haven’t, it’s poison-galled. Imagine eating having lost your sense of taste, but remembering what it was like, hoping against hope as you shovel down your favourite dishes that somehow the sheer willpower involved in the act of wishing would restore the flavour, but the pounds pile on, the effort, the strain is without effect, so you go on hunger strike instead, being forced to consume a taunt, an insult, how can I resign myself to that? I know I’m not worth it, but please give me a reason to go on, all I mean is, there is no reason. I have seen thousands of people here (without exaggeration), the “Water Festival” is in full swing, the streets are choked with crowds, it’s a worse squash than at the front during a big name pop concert (the only time I ever stood near the stage I almost fainted, not through joy at proximity to the idol, but through being so tightly jammed against others that my feet literally left the ground and I was borne, helpless, on the surge, right and left, like a squall). Not one of them noticed my existence except as an obstacle to their progress – not one smile, not one acknowledgement, but do you know I don’t give a fuck, not really, not if I’m honest. I’ve been watching the men. Most of them are paired off, but I let them pass by, amble through my field of vision. Some are particularly handsome and often unaware of it, which under normal circumstances would render them more attractive to me than some wanker strutting along thinking he’s God’s greatest gift (not that there is necessarily a connection – often the ugliest men are the most vain in my experience). Conceit never was high on the aphrodisiac scale. I want to be able to pick someone up. I know I need Bestätigung, confirmation of being appealing, of being alive, yet I don’t even try, not because of my lack of self-confidence, but because I don’t care about any of them, not one. You know I could so easily be ripped to shreds at work over you and me. Maybe I have blabbed so that someone will kick me when I’m down, smash those teeth, break that nose, gouge out those eyes. I don’t want to be gossiped about, though. You said (and it echoes round my brain): “We could never live together. I’d want to be somewhere else and I’d end up blaming you”. I know. I know it can’t be, and I don’t know what to do with this stupid fucking life of mine, I don’t want it, yes, perhaps I am being petulant, but you can’t see me. I’m glad: it looks horrible, my eyes red, my nose dripping. I can’t get over it, I can’t. I never let anyone get so close and they all would have stayed with me, regardless of how I mistreated them. I left them all to rot. Taste of my own medicine. I’ve vowed never to do that again. It wasn’t deliberate either: I always believed at the start that I loved them, like I say, I didn’t know what the word meant. Do they haunt me? No, I have no conscience over them, but they wounded me. I retaliated in kind. Perhaps the only one I was unfair to was Manfred.

Tell me, H, after all that’s happened, why should I be your friend? Why should you be mine? I am the victim. I am the one who has been crushed (you have crushed me, you know), a steamroller would award you an honorary degree in crushing you did the profession so proud. No, I am not angry: that was a feeble attempt at humour, not that I think this is funny. I’m not angry with you, but I do love you. What the fuck am I going to do? I’m not saintly or noble. I’m not trying to persuade you…at least I don’t think I am – Jesus, I’d take any humiliation, any abasement, you know it. You can hide behind humaneness: “Better to be cruel, it’s only kind”. I don’t want you to tell me you’re sorry, why the fuck apologise? I don’t want to suffer anymore. I’ve never been able to live for myself, which is why I’m unhappy in [Waffle Central]. I have only ever lived for love (or what I mistook for it), the career was a convenient way of getting out of debt. I don’t want to be a martyr, not even for you. I want to be loved by you, as Marilyn once sang (and look what happened to her). I reckon I’m being selfish writing this – you said to me on the phone you were being selfish: ten out of ten! Pass go and collect £200, stick that gold star in your jotter, but the difference is, you’re allowed to be, you’ve got to be, to make the choice stick. I’m not even angry about that, simply acknowledging a fact. You’re entitled to it. 2 a.m. As surely as you cannot let go of Maria I cannot let go of you, not within myself. If I could, then nothing would stop us from being all chummy-chummy, best buddies, didn’t we have a nice time, darling?-style. I can no more stop loving you than I can stop writing to you, even though when you reply it cuts me up, disappoints me, shovels quicklime into the wound. It’s as much fun as being eaten alive by writhing maggots – can love be quantified, rationed? Can it be controlled or tamed? My head aches, I can’t think straight. Why, H? Tell me why – well don’t, as it’s bound to be because I failed you somehow. I love and that is all that I know. There are good reasons for me to cease loving, but I’m overpowered, overwhelmed: love cannot be extinguished and if you can somehow snuff it out it was never genuine in the first place. You are safe now, safe in your family. They all love you, anger will ebb, God, you can wipe away any tears, comfort and give solace. I’m glad it is so, you know I love you, you know I want you to thrive and be happy and that is why I’m a fool to keep harping on about my own pain and yes, I’m sorry and the last thing I want is for you to back away, no matter how slowly, but again I scream: I have lost everything and I don’t know what to do. I swear I will never give myself again, never again as with you, you don’t need electric fences or Rottweilers to keep me out, you just need to ignore me. There is no balm, no ointment or remedy for me – time? PAH!! Time has no power to blunt the keenness of this and you will be with me, a living thorn, a living reminder of my loss, yes, I’ll cope, fucking hell, I always do, but does that justify continuing? I will never find anything to surpass much less replace. What I felt in that less than a month (out of 29 years!). The Guiness Book of Records can confirm that lightning strikes up to eight times, but Cupid dealt me a mortal wound when he fired that bow in my direction, and the dart looks so harmless, a little toy. Just to catch you off guard, naturally, if he weren’t such a cunning chubby-cheeked devil the human race would not exist. I feel incomplete again. Lost. Incomplete – an “affair” that was incompleted – not allowed to run its course, it has left me S U S P E N D E D – in suspended animation too, for that matter, or, better, in a coma, or the droning, dull-brained aftermath of EST, exhausted, you still possess every drop of blood, every nerve ending, every cell, but, more perniciously for me, my soul, still, my soul, and you don’t even bloody well want it. “Life can be good,” you reassure, yes, you demonstrated as much. It came as a revelation. God, I want you to care about me, I want you to be my friend, do you understand it means more than anything? Not that such a consolation prize is what I truly seek. You’ve left me with no choice, impotent! Really IMPOTENT. You called all the shots and still do. Which isn’t fair. I used to think there was some divine justice in everything that happened, no matter how random or trivial or obscure in moral lesson. I was misled, brainwashed into that point of view, but I had a doubt, I always believed that God was a tormentor who only gave you something in order to take it away, funny, isn’t it?! Have you read Oscar Wilde’s children’s stories? I can’t read either “The Happy Prince” or “The Selfish Giant” without dissolving in tears. One of the tales concerns a student who laments not being able to court this girl who’s a rich bitch, selfish little cunt, which we realize, but he doesn’t. Anyway, the nightingale outside his window overhears him and loves him so deeply that she skewers herself on a thorn, singing all night long, all through the agony, to transform a white rose to red. I won’t tell you how it ends. Here is my blood-quickened rose.

Oscar also wrote this: “The gods are strange. It is not our vices only they make instruments to scourge us. They bring us ruin through what in us is good, gentle, humane, loving”.
And: “To regret one’s own experiences is to arrest one’s own development. To deny one’s experiences is to put a lie into the lips of one’s own life. It is no less than a denial of the soul”.

I’m going to have to stop this very soon, it’s 2.30. Hey, I know this won’t endear me to you. These are the warts. It doesn’t get any worse. I’m no scheming bitch, you know that, it’s just the PAIN and the hopelessness of it, and this love. You want me to be self-sacrificing, yet do not realize what you are demanding of me – to destroy (what cannot be destroyed) the most precious and secret thing in my life, to turn my back on what I love. I have to give you up, renounce you in me, that’s what you’re asking, but you symbolize love, life, hope, sex, the lot. That is what you are asking me to deny, deny what I have discovered for the first time, a pretty fucking tall order, but I have to put my love where I insist it is and leave you be. I won’t say, i.e. physically, with my mouth, my pen never lies, I value your friendship too much to jeopardize it, so I won’t nag – again, you’ve left me with no choice, you can withdraw and then I would have to leave [Waffle Central], fuck the job. I couldn’t take it, God knows I can’t take it now.

This is me. Naked. Very much blemished. I want to be good enough, to live up to your requirements. I’m terrified of disappointing you or letting you down.
Be kind to me, H.
Be patient with me.
Don’t think badly of me or “less” of me.
My only sin, my sole transgression is that I love you. This love dominates every waking moment, so I seek sleep, blessed sleep for a few moments, though that does not mean my love has diminished.
2.45 a.m., class tomorrow, shit!

[To JMCD, 15th August, 1994]

Hello again from Stockholm!

Thank you for the letter, I’d been looking forward to it for days on end. It arrived with an epistle from HP. Not that what he sent could accurately be described as an epistle – it was even flimsier and belangloser than I expected: banal, feeble, fumbling, awkward and apologetic. He is in the process of “rebuilding”. I didn’t doubt it for a moment. She wouldn’t have the nerve to ditch him after so many years and I don’t blame her for that – it takes real guts to throw someone off. But if I had invested so long and so much in someone I’d feel verarscht, not to mention devastated if they did that to me. So I don’t intend to commit myself in that exclusive way. Sod it with a blunt instrument. Enough about him, except to lament the fact that I’ve exhausted my creative impulses on a 12 sheet epic to him. 24 sides of this stuff, leaving you with second best, which I regret because he hasn’t a fucking clue about most of what I’ve written, from moral philosophy to art and its role in society to film analysis (he hasn’t got a TV nor does he go to the cinema, except occasionally with his children), things of the soul. I know you’d appreciate the parody section on Stockholm, but I can’t repeat it. Sorry. I have to let go of him, but I don’t know how. I’m still frustrated and unattached here. Spent free hours meandering through the Water Festival’s hustle and drunken bustle with a girl from the class.

I remembered you were coming in October. When you write “But I must go and see my nanny” does that mean I can’t come and visit you? Hell, I’d like to make the trip with you. I’ve never actually “holidayed” with anyone who had it together. Always been alone or babysitting (i.e. with THAK). That is a request, tentatively put. You know I can pay my way. Now, switch off those alarm bells, don’t get paranoid like me. I’m grateful for the ground rules and I’m glad you stated them when you did. They have saved me much distress. I can do without any more pain now, I’ve had more than enough for the duration of this particular stretch of imprisonment in the mortal realm – anyway, I’m perfectly content with things as they are – my only complaint is time. I’d get some time and a change of scene from [Waffle Central] as well as a holiday. So that’s all I’m saying. If it’s not on, fair enough, please just take the trouble to reassure me it’s not some shortcoming in me. You know this inadequacy lark is shit. I’m sick and tired of feeling like a failure (the HP thing again).

As I wrote, mostly I’ve been trailing from stall to stall and fireworks display to fireworks display and watching the shuffling crowds as they do the same. I really want to fuck you, by the way. Even sitting here gives me the swells! Incorrigible, ain’t I?! If you come to [Waffle Central] in the week of 2nd September you will indeed be christening my raft of dreams, my work of art bed. I’m torn between wanting to get back and hating the idea of a return to [Waffle Central]. I never felt comfortable there until the H thing. Now there is no H thing. I don’t want to relapse into a comatose state where acquisition is the overriding purpose and sole consolation. You’ve listened to “The Epic [of Sharmadrask”, the novel I wrote aged 19 and which I recorded at GH’S]. Did you enjoy it? I hope so. It’s very revealing of my preoccupations. A pre-trauma (almost) F. I think that individual is still there if you peel away enough layers of cynicism and disappointment. I’m still in foetal huddle right now. Protective reflex. Lip-quiveringly arrogant. I need to be different in order to justify my petty little existence. I have to be better to stand a chance of communicating. Though I squander my brain space, mostly. I have to scrape together a sense of humour. You’re a healing influence on me. God, I hope I give something back, I feel so indebted. Take what you like (which is not an empty offer). Yep, back to [Waffle Central] that incestuous world of status and pecking orders. My eyes have been opened: it’s seething with corruption, positively crawling with maggots! In the best tradition of tacky B-movies.

[Undated draft diary entry, August 1994]

“But God help me if I ever humiliate you,” he remarked. But that’s what he does, every day. His honesty is his justification, his escape from guilt and blame. If I’m stupid enough to pursue it, then God help me. I cannot let him in and have nothing. It was better with HP. Then the dilemma: particularly if I’m pregnant I’ll need to fuck, fuck, fuck, and if no one’s there? I went through a pregnancy with no one there before, but I was discovering, being reconciled to my own innate and unscathable purity. A woman is worth immeasurably more than her man. M has a tiny dick and can’t get me to come [after our long sessions I would send him to the shower first so that I could finish manually what he had started. Ironically, even HP did not once succeed in bringing me to orgasm, although, to his credit, he did his best. This was the root cause of my insatiable sexual appetite at the time. A product of my repressed Scottish Protestant upbringing, I was too mortally shy and embarrassed to broach the subject of digital stimulation. With hindsight it reminds me of the joke: What is the difference between a pub and the clitoris? A drunk man will always find the pub]. He’s old and pig-headed and right-wing and opinionated, why bother with him? Why bother? Now I’d like to go out with his colleague tonight so I can be a brazen hussy. I want to wind M up. I’d share a bed with them both. Heinlein polluted my mind with that seed. I’m ruthless, the colleague is weak – he’d never overcome the guilt at his wife being ill and him enjoying my favours. “No Pants D”. Look out Eunice, you ain’t got nothing on me and I haven’t had more than the merest taster of what you’ve had. I’d be better off dead. I will NOT continue to make a laughing stock out of myself with him. I want to put on very bright red lipstick and whiten my face like a geisha. He doesn’t own me. At last I can swallow without pain. I’m mended. I’ll never be satisfied with anything in life. All I’d need to do would be to go to the bridge next to the palace, turn and face Riksdagen, climb the railings and launch myself into the bitter, bitter cold.
M is a fool, a damned fool, and is it I who am inadequate? I am the one who invests and trusts. Young men don’t want me and it’s mutual. Except that I envy the virility of a young man. I’m sorely tempted to lash out at M, but if I ever do, I’m finished. Unwise. Why do I seek to punish myself thus? All I ever do is reinforce his worst misconceptions about himself and I resent the company. I resent the state of affairs that allows him to prosper and thrive. The broken hearts and lives he believes he has repaired. I resent the positive influence he has had. Rebellion, uproar, tumult, revolt, protest, seething, seething…
He’d better subdue me. Put a territorial marker on me. Because he’s had many I know I’m good. But does he think I’m good simply because I’ve accommodated myself so much to suit him?

[28th August 1994, 3.30 p.m.]

G lies, half sprawled, half huddled on those much abused cushions he ordered me to push together. It is cold here. He’d like to go somewhere on the tram, for the tram’s sake, not the destination’s. I need a destination, though, as if every action had to have a purpose rather than being acceptable in itself.

Meanwhile I have cleared enough of a patch to wedge this John Menzies pad on to my desk. Now I shall assemble the cast and characters: Forlorn F in her baggy T-shirt and slightly less than soignée leggings and the chorus of mourners who are fairly taciturn as far as structured sentences go, but whose variety of gesticulations, thudding, hair-tearing, screeching, yelping, howling and sympathetic (they are well paid and I’m a regular client) bleatings lend a distinct flavour to the atmosphere I am loathe to dispense with. Who else could we have? That my long-standing companion Misery should look on from the sidelines is inevitable: a more droop-mouthed, sag-shouldered, sombre character you could scarcely hope to encounter. He doesn’t say much either, keeping himself to himself. He doesn’t need to. Flowers wilt; leaves wither brown and curl at his passing. Iron grey clouds scrum around the sun unassailable, the springs dry up, heads of wheat blacken. He’s a real party-pooper. Then we can conjure up JD with her endless telephone prophecies and single-mindedness, that’ll do for now.

Scene: an empty stage (it is contemporary drama after all and since I’m an unknown the reserves of venture capital were never going to be squandered on my premiere), no painted backdrop, brightly lit, however.
Enter Forlorn F…

[To JMCD, 29th August 1994]

Dear M,

Once again I embark on an epistle, which I fear will be doltishly inadequate. I started one yesterday afternoon, but gave up after the first two paragraphs and joined G on the old bed to doze for a couple of hours. We didn’t go for a walk. I phoned JD in Orléans to ask if I could visit next weekend. I haven’t seen her for two and a half years – she’s been too close for it to be an expedition and too far for it to be entirely as cheap as I’d like. She’s going to try for the “aggrégation”, which would enable her to teach in a secondary school or even in first year at university. She’s been reading “Ulysses”. In Stockholm I saw Molly Bloom’s monologue performed in Swedish. J mumbled about telepathy, so G and I will set off down there on Thursday (just been contacted by the second-in-command who has recruited me for Thursday!). She’s still engaged in the typically feminine activity of analysing every word her examiners said to her during the oral – it’s left traces – the short story she dissected is not one I’d ever choose to read – about man’s inhumanity to woman – a catalogue of sadism and the main character (female) lashing out at a helpless bedridden male at the end. Her conclusion after nearly two months of pondering: women are at the mercy of men and either submit or become outcasts, and women’s only power or bargaining chip is their sexuality (so I butted in) and once the blossom starts to fade…

She then asked whether lesbians are simply women who don’t subscribe to those structures in society. I laughed in replay: it is more complicated than that. Not only is she the one woman I have ever been involved with, but she was the first true feminist I encountered. In those days, I dismissed it all as nonsense. I didn’t need it then.

After that call, I went into convulsions. She’d flung a titbit into the monster’s cage and its olfactory organ stimulated it into waking. Its whining and baying distracted me the rest of the day and I fought not to lift up the receiver. I won. I turned to Eva instead, good old no nonsense Eva who puts me back in line, thank God. Asking awkward questions like: why do you insist on presenting them with your whole life? You’re bound to be disappointed. Dismay: I thought I’d wrested myself free from the Redeemer Syndrome. She further cheered me by saying that AT’s Wheelchair Olympics comment is true – in part – the part about restoring one’s dignity. RELAX, she said; don’t try to compete on AG’s patch (being sexy). I couldn’t let that one pass, so I wrote a little list in my notebook over the attributes I possess and project (more importantly) to the outside (i.e. male) world:

Yes
Arrogant
Headstrong
Impetuous
Playful
Boisterous
Witty
Sparkling
Luxuriant
Imperious/-al
Generous
(full of) energy
heart with head
naughty
teasing
voracious (as in lebensgierig)
kind
funny

No
Drab
Dull
Boring
Conventional
Seductive
sexy

OK, some of it is probably wishful thinking, but to me it’s my essence. Note the last two items in the “No” column. They simply do not reflect the way I perceive myself.

So she reiterated all the dire Cassandra-calls and warnings about me being desperate and how there’s nothing more efficient at stifling any interest. Then she used a striking metaphor: Jesus, it sounds like you’re drowning over that H. Drowning – that’s what it’s like – the sea is relatively calm, but there are two boats aside me, one captained by THAK, the other by HP and they’re blasting me with water canons. Meanwhile I thrash and flail and clutch at any object that has the misfortune to float idly by. When these sink out of reach, it redoubles my panic. I should just stop and go under it seems. Save much exhausting effort.

I had begun to believe that it was just a fankle, but these rejections, based on a reinflated ego’s trying to attain its wish, have given rise to a vicious circle (as Eva put it). I’m struggling against what I dread as inevitable (being alone doesn’t frighten me, but being unloved does), being unwanted – it’s the not being able to do anything about it, much less prevent it. Oddly I don’t really want to live with anyone anyway. THAK put me off that, but because when you live with someone they can’t help but impose everything on you (and you, in turn, on them, so conflict ensues). I hate conflict, but biting one’s tongue breeds resentment. Overwhelming resentment, of a strength that makes the Furies seem like three demure flower-frocked, greying, leather handbag-wielding (though Maggie Thatcher proved the reticule could be a formidable weapon), church guild cup cake-baking, Yorkshire terrier-dragging old biddies.

I couldn’t argue with a single word you said to me. The reason it didn’t appear as if I was listening was that I couldn’t let it sink in. The THAK theme in particular. You’re right. If you weren’t I would not have put the cheque in a safety deposit box for the best part of a decade and deliberately forgotten the password to redeem it. No, I don’t relish the role I’m being forced/forcing myself to play in his life. The slight compensation it gave for our disagreements of the past has long since disappeared in a curl of stale smoke. The ultimate horror was being dependent on THAK, of making a commitment to him. I’ll digress to explain what that innocent-sounding concept means. Even though we (the sisterhood, Ministering Angels Inc., womankind) have made a modicum of progress in gaining opportunities for access to finances (under siege in a recession and illusory in boom time as long as the principle of equal pay remains a dead letter), society is still structured around a putative family unit, or, much more insidiously, around the male, and we are taught in many subtle ways that we depend on them not simply for emotional sustenance, but for status. Our worth is defined in terms of our relations to them. True, we have our support network amongst ourselves, but the reality is that we are rivals, divide and rule, in the scramble for a male, you can’t stoop too low. You might not be satisfied when you net one, but that’s not the point. Our supposed allies in the media, women’s magazines, are a bunch of turncoats, the bait our anxiety. Let me quote an example or two from the front cover of “Company”: “You’re a big girl now, career, relationship, responsibility, you’ve got what you wanted, so why are you so scared?” Then: “Good looks, higher salary”, and: “Raped on holiday – why young British women are a target abroad” (note the personal touch). Even when we have it all, we can still never be good enough, so we resort to the magical age-reversing potions lavishly and colourfully advertised on the other glossy pages. They pander to our deepest doubts: do we measure up? Whilst shamming concern – tut, tut, these men, look at what they’re up to now, keeping us down, aren’t they terrible, etc. Small wonder our entire cunning is invested in trapping a man: it’s easier to keep hold on a one-to-one basis – give him some slack and you can reel him in. Make ourselves perfect, indispensable, stick it out, we’ll get under their skin and they won’t slough us like a dead, constricting shell. It is our fate to endure, isn’t it? Like mules? God, I shouldn’t complain, look at the grinding plight of women in the Third World, incubator and forager, we tend to men, keep them happy, bear their children and even the children betray us loving their spouses instead, and (increasingly the way this society is going) locking away the bearer of the womb that gave them breath when she gets too gross to look at, or incontinent or her mind starts to wander, etc.

Now I must face the shattering of my most cherished illusion: THAK. It’s one thing for me to know in my heart that it’s not a viable solution, but quite another to hear it from someone else. Strange that my friends can tell me for years, then you mention it once and I froth and foam and sour the whole day so that G cries and then I cry and then he does again etc. “Have you lost something, Mummy? Did you lose milk, Mummy?” I had to laugh. You see THAK has been the one solace: the safety net (insurance policy), the one CERTAINTY. I could rely on him, he’d salvage the wreck. I know you can ultimately only rely on yourself (as Eva reminded me) and that each one of us is alone. That’s another reason I reckon marriage has survived so long, you don’t feel quite so exposed to fate. There’s a soul mate with whom you can share ageing, face the end with, in the reassurance of mutual affection, ideally, but often people cling because there’s no alternative. I don’t know if it’s only women who cling, I don’t believe so, meanwhile I abhor the concept, just the mere notion of my parents dying. Then I will be alone in the bleakest sense of the word. The imbalance comes into play: THAK can’t rely on me, but you can and HP can too. It’s one-sided again. Everything is organised for the maximum convenience and benefit of the male and if a female derives some benefit it is contingent incidental. Which is what I meant by my comment about never being “unreservedly” happy. I must learn to live for the moment, not any old moment indiscriminately, but the good moments. I never relax in my waking hours. I realised in Sweden how wound up I am. One more turn of the key and the mechanism will snap. So it nags round my head: “Was I good enough?” I must perform. In general. Though I try to be myself, can’t avoid it. Never did like hypocrisy. To return: even hazing into positive moments is dangerous, preventing me from taking action. It lulls, like THAK always has, into delusion, a house built on sand.

Then Eva asked: “Why are you so obsessed about sex these days?” The irony! Wherever I turn there’s a sarcastically grinning nurse with a spoonful of caster oil, taste your own medicine, gal! It’s yukky, innit?! What you said is true: chasing a relationship through the physical is approaching the problem the wrong way round. Better to be friends first. You never knew me before. Sex was a weapon, a tool, something they demanded, but which could be exploited as a means of control. I thought it the deepest humiliation to admit to enjoying it, but thankfully I never did. I never even masturbated until pregnant, the inhibition against it from church days too great. I was in Munich, in the guest bed at Manfred’s brother’s. Overnight I had gone off Weizenbier, though I did not give this occurrence a second thought. He had gone for a shower after we made love, the sun was streaming through the curtains and I was overcome by the urge to reach downwards. I simply could not suppress it. I want another kid, but it must be with a lover around because I turn Horn Factor Stampede when baking buns. Before I could take it or leave it, now I can’t get enough. I was suspicious of pleasure for its own sake in puritanical killjoy bonnet and brooch style. Sunday worst. Anyway there have never been half measures for me – it’s always all or nothing. So I have a huge appetite for sex I never had before. I want to share my body and my youth and my vitality and my joy and my soul. To taste these from another. I didn’t need it before, performing contortions, veritable acrobatics to get out of it. God, I dented so much male pride. What you remarked about “dead arsing” is right. The trouble was, the men I had were so hopeless they wouldn’t see that it was my way of asking them to let me go. I won’t leave THAK. He’s like my husband. I have to, though. But I have to reach the stage where I do it for my own sake, even though it is more imperative for G’s sake than my own. I don’t want to sell my soul, but save it. Easier to cash the cheque and have it bounce than never try to redeem it.

You said to me once: “Whoever told you life was fair?” I responded by acknowledging it ain’t. In my defence I was taught it was fair (another way of oppressing women) by the church. What a bunch of liars they are, but they don’t hold sway except as residual anger or doubt sporadically. I must think it is with my faith in “balance” and the “soul pool”. Balance is the overriding principle, for happiness there must be sadness, if life is unfair there is no meaning to any event and it becomes so stunningly arbitrary the thought lines my gusset brown. Intellectually I can see how cruel and desperate it is. Simple. By accident I was born here rather than, say, Ethiopia, where dreams would not be thwarted because I would not have the apparatus to aspire to them in their present form. I’d probably never have the opportunity to question anything. Whilst in Sweden, a girl was struck by lightning. Typical Scandinavian sense for the macabre and melancholy they reported on the incident at length. Photo of the remains of her shoes in the tabloids. She is deaf and blind now. Crippled. Where’s the fairness in that? We’re skilled at fooling ourselves there is some divine or arranging power behind it all [this letter was written before I encountered Durkheim and came to the realization that the society’s principle concern is with the manufacture of meaning, including rules by which fairness and unfairness can be gauged]. Which absolves us from responsibility for our actions and gives us justification/backing for almost anything we’d care to do. Very dodgy. Leads to fatwas and witch hunts. Better to have no ideals, but how without them can we ever rise above brute and mechanical survival? So systems are necessary to regulate behaviour after all. Square one. The bias is wrong. Heinlein saw that, but I can’t help feeling he takes the positive view of female sexuality and free love in a lecherous way – it lets him get what he wants without the pangs of conscience or remorse. It’s fairer, though. He likes women, as you do. You were the first man I came across who does have a positive image of women: you don’t see our sex as tainted from conception, you delight in us, but at the same time, you must admit, you delight in using us (us vs. you, sorry!). I use you, so I’m no better. This whole letter is in a way an illustration of my argument about unfairness: there you are, the only man who has played me fair and here I am, dumping this on your doorstep. I’m not lashing out at you, I must write. I haven’t ulterior motives. No stratagems. I’m lost and scared – yep, I know you’re no lifebuoy. Annoyingly, I’ve always felt you understand me. Better than anyone else I’ve met. I am not asking for help (if I’d called yesterday it would have been that). You are the final sanity in my life, however. God, I crave for reassurance that HP and AT are wrong. I was so uptight yesterday. I had to prove to you (by getting you to read) that I am worth something that I’m not porridge between the ears (I had to do it for me). I have been systematically and scientifically stripped of everything, the jantelov effect. I deluded myself that I was good at something after all and now I’ve been laid low for my pride yet again. I was acutely aware of the threat hanging over me (if I get boring or stop being fun etc.) you will disappear. It’s horrible. It’s true of any relationship, but no one’s ever told me bluntly before, they’ve just gazed, eyes glazed with infatuation and lied, lied, lied. Every time could be the last. I don’t relish that thought and now, focusing on the realities instead of the cocooning hallucinations and deceptions I see the last floorboards disappear beneath my emulsion-covered brush, leaving me stranded in the proverbial corner. The awareness bothers me. Being a mistress is simply an amplification (or exacerbation) of the norm. I rather like it: none of the mundane chores of slavery, sock-washing, dish-washing (look how much water they involve), but the insecurity is the price. I feel so dreadfully insecure. Magnified by my pessimism (not your fault). Anxiety. Far easier when other prospects existed – the lights are going out all over Europe (!). I hate it. An Elend ausgeliefert. Elend. Whenever I found myself in an unrequited love situation and whenever I actually got as far as a relationship, I always strove to demonstrate how disgusting I am, giving the perfect pretext to desert me. They didn’t. And I had an excuse to explain away the unrequitedness (the vast majority in my existence has been entirely fruitless). I do my best to sabotage and otherwise ruin my relationships. I don’t know why. Maybe because I worry if they start to get serious instead of taking it easy and enjoying it I take it too seriously (as you pointed out). Maybe in writing this I am going through the same routine, picking up that sliver of glass and digging it deep into my carotid, dispassionately observing the ebb. Look, it’s not what I want. What I do want is to indicate how it is – I feel the water pouring down my throat, unstopped by epiglottis, but I don’t want to scare you away, really that’s the last thing. Who did I end up with? (THAK and present addressee excepted). Opinionated, vain, brutal, ugly, insensitive, lecturing are some of the attributes that immediately occur to me. THAK is more complicated in that we have a past. We have a sweet and undemanding (?) trysting. I have to keep that barbed wire up and those briars tended. Same as you do. THAK was the man who loved me – that was my article of faith – HP vowed he did, but doesn’t and didn’t, so much better then to have someone who doesn’t and says they don’t so that there is no scope for disappointment. But guess what? It hurts anyway. Why do this to myself? Just because it’s better than numbness? Why this addiction to Shakespearian histrionics and breast-beating tragedy? Why not thank you and thank God? Is it that demoralizing? You come here, after all. I must mean something. You have protected me in an honourable way. I have to protest gently sometimes, not at you personally, but at the fabric. The curtain I would rent in two and herald a new age as surely as the renting in the temple on God’s death. Three men, two men, one man and no dog and the one man doesn’t love me, boo hoo, get out your paper hankie, silly girl. Often it seems demoralizing, but really you have done me a lot of good, for which I thank you. It gets hard for me because there is no one else, nor is there a prospect of anyone else, now I know I can’t call in that debt. So what the fuck do I do? I have to answer that. The awful thing about the HP experience was discovering that I could be on the receiving end of what I had dished out to men all the time and that no matter how much love I poured in, no matter how much I begged and pleaded and abased myself, it wouldn’t make any difference. Yet it is impossible to live knowing that you are worthless. That’s how it feels, M. It consumes me, gorges on me, gluts on me, drains me of everything I hold dear. You tell me I’m not. You come here. I’m glad. Sometimes, though, when you go, the opposite message becomes compounded. I’m worth a few hours’ drive and a fuck. Better than nothing, I suppose. I don’t want to say anything. I’m taking it out on you a bit, instead of on the bastards. Or myself. HP would label it my self-destructive streak and brush it aside. Let me apologize. Apologizing is all I ever seem to do these days – sorry I’m alive, sorry I’m not a genius, sorry I’m not skinny, sorry G for shouting at you in frustration, sorry, sorry, sorry, but here it is justified. I’m not complaining at you. Just explaining at you, my beloved father-confessor. Absolve me: let me kiss the hem of your priestly robe. I’m not bitter. Trying to stop you from worrying, believe it or not. I was trying when I last saw you. It didn’t help that I felt as sexy as a bag of smelly socks worn by a sufferer of athlete’s foot. I worry myself sick, that’s all. About whether I’m up to scratch, make the grade, have something to look forward to. I do and I don’t love you. I will and I won’t. Sometimes I wonder if what you really want of me is worship or admiration (affirmation?) or one-sided love so that you have a good reason never to come back. Rhetorical question: what will I do with my life? Being an opportunist, I ought to take it for what it is. It’s the other things that are impinging, not you. The constant drizzle in my head. No refreshing downpour, but the iron grey monotony. Put it down to a bad bout of [Waffle Central] blues. If I’m withdrawn or “difficult” I’m wrestling with circumstances, it’s not you. I want to please and be pleased. Since HP I’ve lost direction and purpose. Must force myself to resume where I left off – living. He can’t give me my life back, nor can THAK (gulp!). In Sweden, a sunny interlude during which I could depict myself to others as I wished, no “single mother” or “desperate woman” tags, I thrived, but had no one to depict myself to. Why do I persist in writing myself off just because I have no partner? It’s stupid. I didn’t set out to inflict all this on you. Conclusion: I had to rant and get it off my chest. I worry and can’t stand worrying. I don’t want you to be driven away by me. I won’t convince myself that you are the one for me, so must face my own cynicism in pursuing you nevertheless (let’s face it, even if you were Mr. Right, what good would it do me? It’d just make the whole sorry saga of my life more untenable, though then I’d buckle under the strain). Am I deranged? (No reply required). I’m genuinely sorry. Way out of line, but I must be permitted to express myself, purging the insecurity.

P.S. Should you not be put off for all eternity by this could you let me know when in October you are away. I’ll go to Scotland then. On the one hand I don’t want to rot there, on the other I don’t want to forego an opportunity to see you.

P.P.S. I’m so consumed by paranoia I have to keep adding and adding to the letter! Maybe it’s more honest to say I don’t, but I want to. Tug of war internally. Because I so much want to be loved, because I have one outlet for that type of emotion (not counting the maternal side of life), because that outlet becomes a symbol…or whatever rationalization fits. I don’t want barge-poling or bailing out. I’m obedient really. I rebel, just to remind myself I exist. It’s being lost. Everything permanently on hold, waiting for an uncertain future, knowing I can’t even shape it. They say every mistress secretly wants the husband to leave the wife. I don’t. I did with HP, but I’m never, ever going to let anyone in there again. Shouldn’t make rash promises, but I won’t let anyone in. Better death of the kind I die every day. Self pity, or what? No one else will feel sorry for me. You once said we were compatible. Maybe we are. How can I lighten up? I’d like to be profligate and not suffer. Is it wrong? Isn’t it what countless men have? I hope I give you something, that I’m not a leech fastened on, a leech that can swell and swell and never drink its fill. What I’m doing is running for shelter in the past. There is no alternative. The present is intolerable, the future may be robbed me yet. Here’s something I wanted you to read, but you conked out. It’s deliberately stylized and decorative, but look at what it’s saying before you dismiss it because of its pre-Raphaelite idiom and Wildean bejewelled prose:
‘Behold, I have looked upon the face of God, His hair flax, His hands diamonds, His eyes blue. Softly He sang and from His mouth flowed rivers to form the pillars of His dwelling, and from His breath sprouted trees to praise Him amongst the stars.
“You shall seek me and I will conceal myself from you; I will cast down stones upon you and though you bleed I will not show you mercy. I will lay waste to your heart, your orchards shall bear no fruit, but for that which I shall decree, your barns will lie empty. You shall adore me alone, for I am your God and apart from me there is nothing”.
Indeed, I could scarce endure the pierce of His jealous eyes, yet my every breath was an offering to Him, in fulfilment of His command. He shone from a spiral of angels; their wingtips brushed my cheeks as I soared amongst them. I longed to be purified, to spill my blood for Him, releasing the scarlet of my veins to mingle with Him. The lion and the lamb, the bull and the eagle thus were spattered and transformed to dust and ash. He lifted the crown from my brow and feasted on my flesh.
My heart was filled with despair for my God had forsaken me. My path leads to death for, though I may burn for Him, still He will not descend to me’.
And: ‘She walks, her smile the spring frost to chill the buds, her eyes despair, her breath the whining of the autumn gales, whose fists pound weak fitments and suffocate the weary. Twigs crack branchbound, bushes burst aflame, the deer rut and comets are pulled from their paths with longing, longing. She bends the river waters from their course and fills those with sickness who look upon her, gathering the rubies of rapture, the emeralds of hate from the hearts of the unwary. Her trail is chaos, birds plummet from flight, adders writhe to clasp her ankles, worms are her amulets and sustenance, her tongue is coated with the slime of the deceased where she has licked them clean of embalming oils, uproot and replenish, reveal to us your majesty, sacred whore, rear stallions to underhoof us, let us expire for you alone, for you’.
They date back to 1987, expressing what I have elsewhere. More palatably? Who knows? What are we going to do with her? I don’t want to give you a hard time, you don’t deserve it. I could end up the middle-class equivalent of a bag lady: a tote bag or home delivery lady, trudging through palaces of baubles and pretty, mass produced, tastefully designed household items, lining my walls with them until they tumble down under the accumulation of dust. I’m decaying. Allow me to hide for a while in my foetal huddle. Don’t hit me, even though I’m doing my Dan dance, being selfish and naughty and asking for it. What will I do? Thoughts plague and drive in nails, one by one. Carve a name on my forehead. The abomination, the outcast, the leper:
The careful hand of an embalmer
Slips over skin;
Praying for preservation
The greedy lover gasps for more.
“I want!” she cries like her son. To fuck. To love someone. To be loved. Like everyone else. A fuck will do though. But when? But, but, but. Before I go, thank you for not adding a “but” when we got in the car outside the restaurant, that was immeasurably valuable.

[Diary entry, 10th September, 1994]

It is a dead end because of a fault in his circumstances and I forced myself to admit that I do care for him, I am fond of him and though I am not in love with him, I do love him. Today is what the weatherman would cheerfully describe as overcast. I am drenched – not because of rain or the threat of rain, but saturated in reflectiveness, a tolerance for confinement, willingly trapped, content not to struggle. He is tidying his flat for the first time in months, it having reached the state where it is not a chore, but necessary to contain the disgust and irritation. He uncovered a candle wax stain on the carpet and is taking an iron to it, has washed the floors and the chairs are piled up on the table, the kitchen spotless and he’s wiped the pee marks around the toilet. I told him I’m “at peace”, which is true, else I could not rope in even these straying thoughts. But when I put the phone down I wept. I always weep when I acknowledge my love. I spoke to THAK not long afterwards, an hour or so, after looking through the diary. M said it would be “a week or three” before we meet again. I tried to extract a clear answer “by that I mean several”. When I look through at the marked weeks, the definitely nots, “nae chancers” there is so little left over, especially in December. I’d go down to L in the November holiday rather than go home. Strange how mood determines perception. How handsome he looked in the restaurant last night when he was at his sternest and watching me from a distance, not softening to my smile. THAK wants to come over for a month, but that’s impossible, I can’t forego one opportunity to see M. And I won’t. A month too far! THAK sensed that something was up. I didn’t try to smother him in reassurances. So I have a choice between selling my soul and a dead end with nauseating nothingness. He gave me a lot – I confronted him. He refuses to deceive me, not wanting me to be hurt further. I was glad he broke his timetable to get back – the extra two hours (including the one and a half hour fuck) made the difference. He said his instinct was right: his wife phoned at 10.30 a.m. to check up on him – after the episode with the sonnet – and the second incident was when she phoned between 10.30 p.m. and 1 a.m. and he still wasn’t home. There was a “stooshie”. She never had any evidence before, I suspect. He reckons she’ll make more frequent checks in future. She never phoned before. Irony and paradox are the two queens of my existence at the moment; a whale of a time is being had by them. They need a constant supply of paper hankies to wipe away the tears of mirth. Bricks in the wall of memory. We carry them with us. They cannot be dislodged and we take them with us. The laughter, the shuffling gait. I house them, I tend them, even though I distort them. I cherish them. M knows. He loves all his women inside that wall around his heart. They languish in his warmth, he is penetrating them. I watched him. It made me giddy. Swelling, fecund, bursting. I want his child. Twin daughters of flame, Laz and Lor [Heinlein] and God help the world and God help anyone who gets in their way or resists their haughty charms. “You would put my daughters into a world like this”. It chokes me. He was joking, he wants it, he’ll help me with my “nefarious” plan. He doesn’t want to be the main cause (he’s not worried about me trying to trap him), the “residual commitment” aspect irks, but he’d do it anyway. He hasn’t made any commitment to me. Nor did HP, but they couldn’t differ more. He told me that he may be forced to leave me, but that if he did he would do it without glee or relish or enjoyment, but with a certain hollowness. That if he can’t see me, it is not due to a shortcoming in me. A “mutual admiration society” is what he will accept. If he felt I was madly in love with him, it would increase his reluctance to see me. I said I wasn’t, but I loved him. The canary in the generous cage stretched its wings and ruffled its feathers. We were in Rue des Tongres in the Neuhaus there. Coffee, then hot chocolate with whipped cream. The extra hour and a half was well worth it, in spite of his nearly falling asleep two or three times on the journey back. He always has “somebody on stand-by”. Just in case. Which is every bit as bad as HP, or would be, but he doesn’t pretend to tease or prod. Every time he fucks me, he said, it is “soul emptying”. When he fucks me he isn’t thinking or dreaming of anyone else, just of me, feeling me respond to every stroke, which he enjoys. That he knew I didn’t think of anyone else. I prefer the intimacy of the night, the safety of it, the arms of darkness. I cannot hide in the glare of the day. JD told me when she arrived back after I’d left that the flat seemed empty and forlorn that she misses me and felt lonely after I’d departed. M agreed with that. Him doing housework, like a domesticated wildcat. I see him, pushing in hard and deep, supported on his palms, a look, which is cruel and not cruel at the same time, commanding, controlling my pleasure.

[Another fragment from approximately 12th September, 1994]

“Sounds like he can’t be without a woman”, JD’s verdict on JMCD. I’ll stop thinking with my pudendum, like JMCD asked, but does he really want me to apply the sledgehammer of my analytical faculties to our relationship? It will powder at a single blow. I made a conscious choice not to analyse, though if the eyes are receptive even the conscious mind can’t ignore. I saw it in my stories before I admitted to it in real life. I have the strength after my meeting with JMCD. I feel strong. The same way I did when HP fell for me. I want to make him fuck me, then drop him in cold blood. Easier than following JMCD’s advice to saw him off without anaesthetic. I must do it not even through brain function recognition, but because I want to do it. So I am torn. Yet he angers me. Predictably, I knew he would, he phoned as soon as Maria had left, when it suited him. If he had the tiniest vestige of compassion for me as a human being then he’d have phoned on Friday or whenever. She must have let the nagging subside. He feels “a lot better” – the gall of it! He’s sleeping again and the tension has gone from his back, of course, his little insurance policy is faithfully sacrificing her life, not that it’s much of a sacrifice, it stops me numbing over again, it makes me interesting to myself. If I take that flight on Friday I will spare myself much anguish if I simply relax and enjoy JMCD’s skill at flirting: “I chat up on principle”. After all, he’s not screwing them, but he would, that’s what chafes. The only reason he doesn’t is to save his own skin. Why don’t men leave their wives? I could leave THAK. I know that now. I won’t – yet, but I’m not scared witless of my own company, like HP is. I am only scared of not having a choice about my own company. I don’t want JMCD here. I should be brutally honest and say that means I don’t love him, but I do. Not in the Mills and Boon way, as he’d put it. I want his child because I can’t bear the idea of the vacuum it’ll leave when he dies. The rain thumps down in a sudden tantrum, pelting down the dead leaves, abducting them unprotesting into the gutter. HP will be getting very wet and his hair will be straggling. I comprehend his fascination, though I don’t share it. Purely one-sided. With JMCD it is very ambiguous. I should stop taking life so seriously and I’d enjoy it. Full stop. I weep as it is, even if it is several hours after he’s left, yet I wouldn’t want him to have turned around in the meantime. JMCD is more vulnerable than he’ll admit if, as he says, he always has someone on stand-by. The loneliness probably appals him as much as it sends me into a chilled-sweat panic. As long as it’s voluntary it’s OK. It was voluntary sitting by the phone yesterday, or throughout the whole HP episode. I didn’t want JMCD to call me until the evening yesterday. He set me free for the day, which was honourable, but I didn’t want to lose that tension. Non-confrontational. Speak to him in bed. Why should JMCD give me any more when he can have absolutely everything from me for nothing in return? Who can blame him? He doesn’t deserve it! The blue is back. Iron rod in me. My cunt, strong, muscular, rigid or yielding, my womb I will not stab. My fantasy: his child in me, I take the insulin overdose, going into a coma as he fucks me. I’ll take them all with me, those whom I’ve loved, parents, brother, granny, granddad. I owe them everything and nothing.

HP and I fucked. We made love (truly) three times. About an hour after I wrote the above. The first time since the split. He wanted to look at me and touch me. He’d fantasized about it. I’ve corrupted him, annihilating the innocence which was the most beautiful part of him, which I loved the dearest. I love him. His eyes are kind and I only feel safe in his arms. The bed was warm and comfortable. I felt his sweat trickle down. “Enjoy the moment,” he whispered and “You should feel this through your whole body”. The soft face, the wrinkles I traced. I pay for it at such a price, the price of my life. I might be high for an hour or two, but it condenses me into tears. AG said it wouldn’t do in the long term. Maybe not, maybe I need my head looking at, but I love him. These women who loved M apart from me, they all really loved him, or else they would not have let him go. Perhaps they cut him off once they found partners, with a certain triumphal crow? I don’t understand why he stays with his wife. The again, why do I stay with THAK, however notionally? M does not deserve such love when he gives none in return (yet he does).

[Jotted notes in diary, 12th September]

HP came round at about 20 past 12. He left at quarter to four. We fucked three times, though he only came twice. His dick is so much bigger than M’s – hard (rigid), yet soft and gently probing at the same time. He tastes so good. Our month together was, in his words, “a month of bliss” which “we will always remember, even when we are old and grey”. The first time he set eyes on me, he remembers, I was wearing a long green [Laura Ashley floral print] skirt and a hat. It was five to three and I was looking at the programme. Then it was [the standard of] my work, above all, my use of English that attracted him. It would be wrong and he would feel he was using me, but how can something so good feel wrong? He would feel guilty now, not wanting to put me through hell again. “How long have you had to wait?” he sighed. He had been fantasising about this moment. “I’m scared of losing Maria”. I told him his eyes are beautiful and kind and they are. “The first time we made love, you wouldn’t open your eyes. Then you did and you saw mine. Maybe that’s why you have a thing about them”.

[Excerpt from diary scribblings, 20th September, 1994]

HP came round on an earlier train than last time. We fucked our statutory three times. He brought a bunch of red carnations. He’s happy. He had scratches on his back (!) “I hope they fade”. “I could kiss you forever,” he grinned.

[Another unprocessed diary entry draft from approximately 25th September, 1994]

If this all seems very banal and rough it is because it cannot be otherwise, because it is so raw. M gave me three options last Sunday:
a) sit at home and cry
b) take G in the tram and go for a long walk in the park (his recommended option)
c) take notes, for use as “a novel in about ten years’ time”.
It is not a case of his wish being my command. It’s sore: no one can kiss it better.
So – to events (RC’s eye witness version): on Friday when he arrived back at work, his meeting had been cancelled. He had to go home and was “very agitated”. Obviously thinking about me. Maria’s birthday is on Wednesday (RC told me). They were meant to celebrate it before he left for S. Having gone out for a drink, they started arguing. She threw him out on Saturday morning, started hitting him again without injuring him. Told him to get out. Told Catherine (which made him angry) that he was going out and not coming back. He phoned RC, saying he was in trouble. Maria dropped him off there [on 24th September]. Apparently she was in a real state too, not just him. She barked at him not to bother phoning until he had sorted himself out. RC’s impression was that he was not ready to take a genuine decision: she forced it on him and they both panicked. That he never intended to do anything other than get back home, but he was distressed, in a desperately unhappy frame of mind, distraught, “dreading” talking to me. He wanted to come round to see me, but that would have been too radical a step. If he had come around he would not have left. When he is with me, he cannot resist me. He wasn’t ready to take that step either. On the phone to me he informed me he was “shaking like a leaf”: “What you wanted was for us to be friends and make love occasionally, but I can’t do it”. He confided in RC, told him everything, it seems. That he felt guilty about my concours. “I never wished you any harm,” he assured me last night as we parted “Try to sleep”. I couldn’t. That he only spoke of me in the highest possible terms. RC warned him: “It’ll never be the same at home again”. H didn’t explicitly agree, but he didn’t argue either. So he knows. I suppose you could construe it all as a damage limitation exercise, or as M would put it “contributing to the sum total of human happiness in the world”. Not only am I the victim, but I also am – not the willing victim, not just the expendable one, but the one of whom most is asked: the one who is being requested to show love and the one who shows love the most. He is being selfish. I was being selfish starting it off again, but I had to do it. I had to know it wasn’t a shortcoming in me. In a way, I needed that power. “I’m weak-willed” he sighed. That is the problem. Also that he is loving. RC stated this clearly: “He is sincere with his feelings for you. If he weren’t sincere, he’d be a bastard”. He never did just use me, that’s the paradox. You see, he is exactly the type of man I want, more so than M, though in an odd way I have a dark suspicion I’d be happier, or freer with M. I wanted those shackles. I am ready to commit. I never was before and resented those who tried to force me to commit to them (THAK, CC, Torsten) and those who would not commit to me. I need a man like HP. I want to be in a stable and even monogamous relationship. With someone who is there, whom I can cherish. I panic when I can’t fuck. Three years of enforced celibacy poisoned me. I faltered. I agree entirely with the conclusion in “I Will Fear No Evil”: “It is good to fuck and to be fucked and it is not good to be too long without it”. I’m torn over Laz and Lor. I want them because I love M and I don’t want there to be nothing left of him. Some of the urgency has evaporated. I don’t want to ruin my prospects or flay myself any longer. There’s been too much of that already.
I must return to describing events again.
Thrash-mode, as in thrash to avoid sinking. I do love M, but HP is everything and I cannot have him. RC: “It is no reflection on you”. I am not an inadequate failure. I’m not: HP confirmed. He also confirmed it’s not because I’m crap in bed either. Quite the opposite: I was too good, that’s why he was taking me home (metaphorically) with him. When he was meant to be with her, his mind was with me. Stamped out – fire – blanket – smothered. She noticed. He cannot handle two lovers. Cannot compartmentalise. Cannot use. RC urged me to stop seeing it as a competition.

[Diary jottings, 1st October, 1994]

Fucked first thing. Pottered around a bit. Breakfast. To supermarket – he bought a TV set and a satellite receiver and we purchased a couple of small pressies for G. Ate at a restaurant on the riverbank in T, “Alte zur Lauben”. Fucked in the woods in Germany. Drove around for ages trying to find an appropriate spot. He had a couple of blankets in the car. By a fallen log, half way down a grass track, amongst the pine needles and ferns. Huge black beetles with sticky-looking wing cases. He hadn’t done it outdoors in years and nor have I. Got bitten by midges, so had to curtail it. Home. Talked to him about writing and art. Got out for chips and Coke in R, sitting on a bench to nosh. When he went back for a second bag of chips he got them free. I showed him how I saw the perfect photograph of the bushes and lamps. He took me up a narrow passageway, like a maze, between gardens. Back at the flat I gave him a massage, which he lapped up. It did him good, relaxing him totally. He almost fell asleep. What more can I do? I fuck in the way I know he likes, gaze at him adoringly, we engage in intellectual sparring matches, I broaden his sphere of interests, I culture him, we clash amiably, I never give him cause for offence, I bolster his ego. “I don’t deserve you,” he announces solemnly and he’s right. I’m going through my existential crisis. He claimed he would never do anything to hurt me, unless it came to choosing between me and Liz. I don’t want him to talk about her or any of his other women. Although he doesn’t mind me fucking other men, he doesn’t want me “to rub [his] nose in it”. Yet he talks to me about all his past lovers. I, though, am the only one he can share these memories with. He can’t discuss them with his wife or family, he doesn’t gravitate towards other men or glory in bar-propping, Red Baron chalking up of victories, finding such behaviour repugnant, which is both endearing and something of a relief. He mentioned in the car that my pubic hair is far redder than the hair on my head (HP also commented on this).

[Diary excerpt, 2nd October, 1994]

When I woke up I desperately wanted him. Was so switched on, yet had to wait from 6.30 until just after 8.00. He listened to Alistair Cooke and I sent him to the shower first. Wanked. I still had my legs open when he came back, towel wrapped around his waist. He lay down on me, scolding: “You’re a terrible woman” and complained about the friction burns on his willie.
[…] He’s paranoid because he can’t tell whether I’ve had an orgasm or not – he says he can’t identify a time when I’ve come and he’s known about it. I shut up. He told me he can’t imagine anything more bitterly disappointing than him stopping just at the critical moment. He supports himself on his arms and I fondle his nipples, clasping him hard with my cunt until he comes. He isn’t loud. I love it when he gives a slight moan.

[To JMCD, undated, possibly from around 21st May, 1995]

And there was the trip in the chairlift near V up the cliffside over the road and the river and I snuggled up to you but was too scared to swing my legs and had no notion of the mechanics of it but you did so I could giggle and you could put yourself at the mercy of cables and human ingenuity even though the Duchy has a higher rate of mental retardation than anywhere else in Europe and on the whole they’re a pretty uninspiring lot who can’t drive properly – everyone looks down on them the backwater people with their exorbitant rents, provincial habits, tiresome three hour train journey away overrun with Portuguese labourers (they have large families you know) the hotels are a bit run down without tea-making facilities the generic prints are dingier than usual but you do get MTV and do you know they’ve put J whom I love in the looney-bin they’ll drug her with lithium and make her sterile and squeeze out the pleasure with the pain to keep her docile and I wish I was on that chairlift again swaying a little fingering your wedding ring I’d lick it to taste the bitter dental-filling metallic taste of it let me hide from the hostile stares and do you remember when I undressed with the light off and the window open the cool air and the blossoms on the cherry tree coffee and overwarm croissants God I want you I must feel you what if I woke up one day and you were dead beside me that happened to my Granddad she had gone cold and he didn’t notice until morning and my Dad in a coffin before being cremated I have to scatter him from the top of Schiehallion like budgie millet on the rocks and now I know that HP uses me as a mirror he can’t stop looking because he is so fascinated at his reflection in my eyes he’s never had a love letter in his life I’ll bet and JD told me all men are animals who lack entirely any spiritual dimension and she read me an excerpt from a short story by some Irish author I’d never heard of to prove it and the boys raped a frog with a stem and we laughed until we cried at the boys imagining keeping girls as slaves and whipping them and there’s JD with her commanding blue eyes in a spangled leotard making them stand up and do a little dance balance on a beach ball on their heads or flick-flack round the ring and my bronchitis came back at the weekend so I couldn’t sleep again and my chest ached with the effort of breathing breathing and should I miss you I saw eight types of mushroom in the forest and caught a grasshopper we saw a ruined cottage and G drew tracks in the dust stomping ants I rescued a butterfly setting it down on a head of clover and I worried about your call and HP is pathetic really he says Maria is worried he’ll come running to me but we all know he won’t and I’m seeing him tomorrow I live my life through others God how I want you short thrusts said JD short thrusts in the exam as she offered her intellectual vagina for them to plunder but they passed her so it was nearly worth it and she believes all men are cruel to women she wants one now to ravage her infundibulum so she’s stopped eating and has looked out her old clothes as she sighs for stimulating company (that’s me) her friends are very nice but very dull and I am the young lady from the comparative metropolis but she’s the one who can drive and all the men insist on taking over strange but her car is like her body and she doesn’t want them behind the wheel but they nag and pout and leave her no polite alternative you must be tired by now JD let me she has a blue Peugeot 205 called Marina that she leaves at the public car park where vandals kicked in an indicator I want to love I want to be subdued and taken I want to feel a baby growing in me instead of this slack hollowness and sod KC [my boss] he doesn’t own me but I can’t until the probation period is over and I miss you too I don’t care about Maria I wish he’d leave her and I’d drop him wouldn’t I? I’ll be disappointed and he said “I’m doing what I think I ought to do but my feelings are still the same” because he’s going through a bad patch of course he phoned me as soon as he got back to [Waffle Central] but I wasn’t there but he tried again the second she walked out the door he won’t leave her I wonder if he truly feels anything for me I want to be in Scotland and November was when we met on the plane and I was able to talk to you and though I have a collection of business men’s cards I never bothered to get in touch with any of them before and we’re in touch and taste and Biblical knowledge I must try to sleep soon but I’m restless I have to wank today three whole days without it God I never used to I want you in my bed when you withdraw and I know that you’ll go in again I nearly expire with the enjoyment of it slow and hectic and you keep an arm around me and I’m afraid to wake you but I want you so much the sheets combust with it I still have the stains from our last sweaty encounter the keel is even again I ache for your soft hair your warm tongue press against you you are tall and I feel graceful and supple and I want to give you everything I have because I know you can appreciate its worth I want you to take it listen to my abandonment welling up take it take it with me feel the surge of my joy my joy my strength for you my joy

[To HP, undated]

Yesterday I was at AT’s with G. He persuaded me to go cycling despite the lamentable fact I hadn’t been near a bike in over ten years. He lives in a typical leafy suburb on the fringes of an ostentatious villa quarter. I met his wife and family. I had to leave early, taking a taxi all the way back to [Waffle Central] to arrive back in time for M. It was odd seeing AT and his wife interact. He seemed almost shy. Not the bumptious cheeky Scot he often is. I liked her. She told me how fed up she gets with the two dogs and the two children and how she’d like to work, but can’t because of baby-sitting difficulties. I told her in return that life is not a dress rehearsal for anything else and so she ought to follow her inclinations, in a sisterly fashion. Kind and undemanding, not expecting to be entertained. I envied them, yet know that such a set-up would be intolerably stifling, so what do I do? Here I sit at the African Museum. M left at midday, too early and too late. I with this worthless scrap of a Sunday, which we could have spent together. We exchange gifts, he and I, he understands me and I don’t want him (in the absolute sense), yet still he wounds me. I give him what he wants in return for the attention I would otherwise lack. I won’t see him perhaps until October. He is callous and caring in one: would drop me like a stone should he ever become too attached or bored. So we have another proof of woman’s subordination and meek submission, as it if were needed. The privilege of the mistress, suffer and serve. Snatch, snatch, snatch, nothing is certain. I can hardly breather it’s so hot. I wonder what you’re doing – sitting outside with a cold beer? I spent the entire weekend cooped up, waiting. M had promised to call and did, on Saturday morning. October – is that when I’ll get my next fuck? What a prospect!

I’m drained, H. Not nearly numb enough. I can’t make do with M any more. A breeze! I love you. I love you for your eyes, your smile, your laugh, your warmth, your vulgar sense of humour, you who are at peace with yourself and content – you gave me rest – you let me accept myself, however briefly and now again I am tormented by contempt. I glimpsed the full potential, the garden of delight, how it could be if only love were present. How endlessly jaded then is this, how despicable.

M is the usual selfish bastard I end up with when it comes to screwing (his verb for what we do). Yet I’d do anything he wanted. I let them all do whatever they wish, rape me, chain me, lock me away, humiliate me in a myriad ways, and how much more would I have done for you, the only unselfish lover I have ever had? I would have died for you and I don’t say that lightly. I’m tired of weeping. I never want to cause pain to another again. I’m sorry about the harsh things we said when last we met: compensatory arrogance. There’s nothing left for me, H, nothing left. If I believed any of the crap about me I spouted at you I’d be bitter already and that would be the end. They’re all drifting home now. God, H, I do love you, I never want you to doubt that. This will fade, everyone tells me so. I want you to care about me, for me. I don’t want to be an object of indifference or scorn or secret ridicule, muffled laughter escaping from behind the door. Yes I will settle for being your friend – loving you as I do how could I give you less? I’m not ready to let slip yet, though. I still cling to a half-hearted mirage of a dull evening in S. The future does not beckon, it stretches bleak, unwanted, unfathomable, indeterminate, but hostile. Don’t despise me, I implore you. I already maim and stab myself a thousand times a day as punishment for my own inadequacy. I love you, but to say so gives me no pleasure. It is a snare, a leg hold trap against which I struggle, but the steel jaws remain closed. I love you and that is the one thing you will not permit me to do. Do not demand the tribute of flattery and compliments from me. I may offer it freely, but don’t pry – don’t tell me what others have praised you for to see if I agree (as you did). It mocks me, it wrongs me. M said I had committed a sin in getting entangled with someone from work. He explained that when it gets out (as it likely will), the colleagues who want to try it on with me will do so, thinking I’m a safe bet and fair game, and the wives will loathe me because I’ve proven that I’m a danger to them and I will never be sure whether someone’s friendliness is a mask to stave off possible ill or whether to glean information. He reckons I’ll be the ultimate persona non grata, shunned, isolated, universally condemned (all that and I’m a single mother to boot, with the attendant prejudice and enmity!). Maybe he underestimates colleagues – he takes a very dim view of our profession in general. You, fully integrated as you are and having proven you’re not a shit by abandoning me and not brutally walking out on your wife have me as evidence of how attractive you are and virile (or whatever other clichéd slant is put on it). You stand to gain. I endure the stigma of the seduced and the unwanted. My words are not tinged with accusation, it’s the way things are – wrongly so. Do you have the wherewithal to protect me from that? My reputation is the one asset I have – no gossip has been occasioned by my conduct up to now – not a juicy tale of lust and intrigue like they could make out of this at any rate! Does it bother you? Yes, you could justifiably retort, why should I waste energy on it, it’s not my concern? I stick up for my friends and never a gratuitously cruel word about them ever passes my lips. A gentle jest now and then if they can take it. No more. Yes, you’ve got it – M has made me paranoid. “Fate” takes a bow amidst thunder claps with a few added forked lightning bolts for good measure and heightened dramatic intensity. I can’t escape from the simple fact that I love you. I would take anything I could get, including sacrificing self-respect, including being a lunch break fuck, and don’t tell me you wouldn’t find it irritating sooner or later if I demeaned myself. A litany of “if onlys” rattles ceaselessly through my skull. I’m sorry again. I want you to be vulnerable to me, I don’t want you to be unyielding and insensitive as the lead casing of a nuclear bomb shelter. I have to let myself recover. This letter is proof of why it is good for me to see you. I demonise you otherwise, falling victim to my raging paranoia. Assume you feel about me the way I feel about me, God forbid! I know you are gentle and kind and wise and that you wish me no harm, bear me no malice. That is a privilege. I treasure it indeed, though in the throes of anguish, I forget. I want your memories of me to be sweet and unsoured, unsullied. I loved you, I love you, part of me will always love you. Unconditionally in past, present and future tenses. You were and are worth my love. You did give me something good, H, the mistake was to take it away so soon and so completely. I can write no more for the moment. What more is there? I lack the power to heal myself. I am incapable of allowing myself to heal (so much the worse!). I hope that I am good enough and worthy enough to be your friend. I’m not being a demanding shrew. I must have my life back, even for your sake that you might be spared, but especially for G who has to live with my moods and doesn’t understand them. Forgive me my weakness. I’m smitten, as you know.

[JMCD’s flat, 20th July, 1995]

The afternoon sunbeams hurl themselves through the windows, pleading, beseeching me for attention. Exasperated by the heat, I spurn them, but still they persist. Now the time beckons when my beloved will depart from me and become a photograph, a smile and protective arm on paper, whilst I, in the agony of my confinement will sit and swell with grief and speculation, excluded from the slope of his bed, abandoned to restlessness. So shall the shelter of friends envelop him, the laughter and resting, the greens, the bunkers and six irons, the binoculared, the fanatical, wrapped against the chill in fashionable tartan rugs. But I will carry him within, in the summer shade he will dwell in me, while the dandelions shed their seed and the nettles brush their spiteful poisons against the bare arm of the infant. In my sleep he will visit me and I will sigh. The moth flutters around the scorch of the bulb, the balloon string slips from the grasp of the distracted, the rails shudder at the approach of the express and the platform releases the despairing who has long, long waited. Ordinary disappointments.

I wait as if by waiting I will overcome these years, but who am I to surpass the smiling of a distant rock-investigating morning, the tangle of unruly red locks in the playful breeze? Who am I to grudge a joy once imparted? But there they stand, on the gravel path with the daffodils and spaniels, a fiction that curdles my wakefulness, granting no respite. Were I to forfeit his affections, what then? What now?

[To JMCD, 2nd September, 1995, unsent]

An Embittered Note

Once again there is nothing but tears and despair for me.
Once again you have betrayed me, plunging my head beneath the waves of despair, battering my body against the pier.
“Enjoy yourself,” you said in the cheerful voice, which you adopt when you know you are being most hurtful.
Whilst I sat and waited Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and did not venture beyond the garden.
Saturday – the weather matches the mood – rain, rain, rain, whilst you celebrate and flirt and rekindle the old, fond memories and ponder past fucks, your crotch swelling with delight. And I weep and weep and weep whilst believing every tear will be the last. Trapped by meteorological caprice and confined again.
St. Andrews. I took the bus to its medieval stones and insisted on walking to the Royal and Ancient to see the flat where you watched the crowds and the golfers. With a comforting whisky and a group of friends and admirers, surveying the kingdom you have made, the prosperity you have worked for.
An entourage of admirers and a warder to keep all but your mind from straying.
You have destroyed me. You have sullied my last refuge and now there is nowhere I can find peace. And my foolish father bought me a couple of business class tickets. Four hundred pounds of foolishness for the chance to be let down by you again. I might send you the bill, although if this were a paying relationship you could not afford me.
“Let’s be sensible for once,” is not what it claims it means “You would put me at risk, you would threaten my empire and I cannot permit that”.
I could have phoned. I could have taken a taxi to your front door and only a police car would have removed me.
As it is, it is no credit to me to refrain.
You have left me without even a means of retaliation.
So enjoy your nostalgia and your suave urbanity and sophistication. Your happy memories and your success.
I will wipe my eyes and nose on the pillow again, sleep alone again.
Every minute of this Scotland trip was spent in anticipation. Even the stabs about infidelities, the stings about G’s presumed origin [fromTHAK] could be soothed by the balm of hope. Not one minute was occupied by a thought other than the thought of you. It would only ever have been two or three hours and it seems I was not worth even that much. Would it have disturbed your equilibrium so? Are you evil, my only love? Or simply selfish? Or stupid? My country, Scotland. It is my country, not yours, and you have contaminated even that.
What is worst is knowing that you do not reciprocate. If you did, nothing could have held you back, nothing prevented our meeting.
No, I am the victim again, sacrificed for your greater comfort (behag) and convenience. How can you comfort me, then? Why should I let you enter my body and violate me? There is nothing for me without you. The days in D [with THAK] confirmed that there is no one else. There is no one else like you, yet you treat me as negligible, my feelings meaningless, irrelevant, I am discounted, brushed aside when it suits. God, not even DA was so cruel. What is worse is knowing I don’t deserve it. I am not fundamentally flawed and rotten and oozing half-putrid.
You have once again banished my hopes.
“There are a lot of things we should do,” you have admitted, but whenever the opportunity presents itself, you fail me. So when, when will we ever do those things? Is it bait to induce me to spread my legs?”
I’ll have a much greater chance of getting away if I’m over there for ten days”. So I released my grip on ten precious days to join the other days that have been robbed from me. I have had an even worse summer this year than last. You’d love to make all this my responsibility, wouldn’t you? Beat me with the cudgel of the ground rules: “You can’t even sue me for breach of promise”. No, you’re happy to let me pursue life whilst enduring a pseudo-existence rendered meaningless. My only fantasies are of dangling over the edge of some quay, a rope from the navigation light with a lovely view of the castle ruins in the bay and the waves raging below my feet, licking my cold limbs with their salty tongues. You may maintain that my reasoning is faulty or console yourself in your boundless arrogance that little girls shouldn’t bother having sex at all unless they’re sure, ignoring the very nature and meaning of sex and of little girls (unless a picture of licentiousness and insatiability entices and salves). So, once again, you have lacerated me, once again, I kiss the palm of your hand and, once again, I look forward to the few pitiful moments this morning you condescend to grant me before you are torn away from me again.
I don’t want to sleep alone again. I don’t want to sleep alone this week.
I’d come through tonight if you’d let me, but it knackers your routine and you really should stay late in the office and you’ll just be ill-graced enough to take it out on me, demanding that the relationship be even more on your terms, and who took the time off, by the way? Not me, I wanted you to stay in L. Yet again I am paying for decisions taken to preserve your stinking marriage.
I should have gone back to [Waffle Central] according to the original plan. At least then I wouldn’t have been tortured by your proximity and what you choose to label (as a means of hobbling me) my “integrity”. And you, in your marital bed, with a licensed and sanctioned cunt to fill, joylessly, and I sobbing with no release and no relief.
You always say you’d be willing to sleep next to me, just holding me. I don’t doubt it. But I would only be punishing myself, wouldn’t I? You can go elsewhere, after all, whereas I am bound to you and my reward is suffering.
But I caution you that just because I come from the origins I do, from this grime and filth does not give you a right to treat me like a filthy cheap little whore. Just because I was born without money. In fact, having risen to where I am now, against all expectations and prejudices, you should be prostrated at my feet in admiration.
I feel discounted. You dismissed me, dismissed my hurt, deeming it negligible (in comparison with yours, presumably, had you attempted to see me), knowing that I would forgive you. You never let any of the wounds you inflict on me heal, scab over before tearing me afresh. Then you are surprised at my insatiable appetite for reassurances. Yes, it is the craving of the fool to hear that she is in truth not a fool. What other conclusion am I to draw than that ultimately you are indifferent (at best) or don’t care (at worst). Don’t think I’m blind: I may blindfold myself, but the fabric is not opaque, you’re getting the best of me anyway, without having to pay, you can walk away and still I will not strike out against you. You have me, you have Liz, you are surrounded by all your possessions (God, I’d rather be destitute than value mere objects above the life of another), why should you alter the circumstances? You’d only have me then: “It depends on my pain threshold” you stated, and: “It’s the Number 17 bus or nothing”. Indeed you have everything and I have only this, pitiful pleas on paper: why should you renounce your worldly goods to love me as I deserve? The world would deride you as a fool, as it does me already and you are so terribly concerned about what the world thinks. So, logically, what other conclusion can I draw, but that you do not care? That you are exploiting me. That you prefer to ignore my love for you, which is stronger than the love you have received from anyone else because it is not bricks and mortar and pages and jewels and green-printed cotton mixtures with regal and national symbols? It is only love that I can offer you, after all and you have love anyway as circumstances are at present. Yes, you have it regardless, so why should you value it? Intangible assets. Yes, you have inspired it in many. Your past is not my responsibility, as mine is not yours (but for the shared past). God, I have lost everything. No face saving. No arm around the shoulders. Plenty of: “I told you sos”. Plenty of numbness, plenty of nothingness. Yes, my love is freely given, but how can it flourish without hope? Because you know full well that this hurting is not what I want. Because you know full well that this is not enough even for the most selfless and generous – don’t kid yourself that you did not hurt your other mistresses – the illicit excitement soon wears off. They might not resent you, but that is merely an indicator of their lack of judgement, their lack of common sense or basic intelligence.
In one sense the way I feel is squarely your responsibility. In the most fundamental sense: if I were your wife, it would not be like this. I don’t seek any of your belongings; I don’t want to be an unwaged, parasitical housekeeper. I want you, I want your love. Do you seriously thing I care about anything else? Why else would you cripple me so? Yes, you are clever and can outmanoeuvre me and my objections. You accuse me of being manipulative, but God, I am an amateur compared with you. It is easy to manipulate me. All it takes is a smile. A good mood because I cannot resist your charm, even when aware of the purpose of its deployment. You ensnare me by saying my love must be freely given – but what about Liz?
Perhaps I am a selfish, spoilt little girl. A spoilt little girl who has had everyone kick her around the floor, tied up and spat upon. When she finds someone who (apparently) appreciates her qualities without being threatened by them she is expected to do what no other would and not want to live with that person? Cries when she doesn’t get her own way. I bewailed that arrogance in front of Ungit, but without it where would I be? Just silenced, without status.
And as for Laz and Lor you said circumstances do not allow them. I agree. Because I have revealed my hand and my complete impotence you act as you wish. You’re not ever going to let me have them, are you? It’s going to be like K Hill, a lovely idea, a lovely experience that will never happen. God, I don’t want to be alive any more. Why do you think I spend the whole day sleeping in your flat? What good is being awake to me? I can see you keeping me waiting until I am too old to have them or compromised in how I feel and then I will never have any more children because there is no one else but you. How easily you squander the love that is given you, how easily you trample it underfoot! You pay attention to this argument because you like to breed. You are totally without mercy, aren’t you? In Sweden there was a notice above the telephone, which translates as: No one is so rich he can afford to lose a friend. You cannot stop me from feeling as I do about you, but you can honour it. After you left the message on the machine (when you wanted me to do something for you): “See you next week”. You allowed my faith in you to breathe. I told you in the car I would be heartbroken if you didn’t. It was not a self-fulfilling prophecy, but a hope you’d honour me, the only consolation for losing all the time I’d arranged to see you. Why don’t you change the circumstances except that you do not love me enough? You’ve had chances at alternative happiness before and turned them all down. You’re a veteran. Again cutting me down to size. What makes me think I’m so fucking special or brilliant? Then you murmur something about being in the business of increasing the sum total of human happiness and boosting self-esteem. No, I can never make plans and this should be a salutary lesson to me. All I can do is hit upon a substitute for what you have withheld from me. Empty activities, all of which are poisoned by the knowledge that they are gap-fillers, distractions from the empty life, the empty cunt, the empty soul, infected by their status as second-bests. “You don’t need M Mummy, you need me. I need you”. THAK’s snideness that all such remarks are attention-seeking ploys. But even my son, my very flesh, takes second place to you. I have truly forsaken all others to cleave to you. The tragedy is that it makes no difference. Not in any practical sense of the word.

[To JMCD, unsent, Barcelona, between 5th to 10th March, 1995]

“The second evening they made love in his bed, she had an orgasm. She didn’t know at first what was happening. She cried out, then felt embarrassed. When he realized the experience was new to her, he was amused. He teased her, asking her if she liked it well enough to want to do it again, saying that now she would be insatiable”.

Barcelona, Tuesday

So far, my visit to Barcelona has been a painful and humiliating reminder of my own insurmountable inadequacy. I feel grossly inadequate and inadequately gross. This is my one free afternoon and I’m in the hotel room, reviewing in my mind many of our past exchanges, overwhelmed by my own helplessness and despair. I always dreamed of coming here and now that I am here the bedevilling sense of my failure keeps me locked up in my room. I can’t go anywhere alone. That is not your problem, my darling, nor is it your fault, though I can’t help but think how different it would be if you were here to take me round these buildings, these streets [Gaudi being my favourite architect].

I had a brief one and a half hours with AB at lunchtime. I made the mistake of looking up at a façade rather than keeping my gaze downward and nearly broke my ankle. Serves me right. It reminds me of my exclusion, my isolation, my dependence, imprisoned. It reminds me that in order to love you I have to give up these dreams of mine. I don’t know what to do, my love, I really don’t. No matter what I say or do I will never be good enough, it seems. No matter how much energy or effort or intellectual investment I put in, you will never spend any more time with me, nor will you let me come any closer to you. How cruel. Should I fear the future when I am already in the furnace? I know why – for in growing older and more feeble even fewer will listen to me than now. I am sick of this anguish in my life and want the release. The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. The little freedom I have is delicate and precarious and will not last, since it is an attribute of my youth and desirability to others – a realization, which makes me the more frantic for my release, in my struggle against fate. What good does it do me to know that the Church was wrong when I cannot win back those squandered years? What good does it do me to know that it is not necessarily a fault in me personally that drives people away when I still cannot do anything to counteract my solitude? Am I to be muzzled as well as manacled? My darling, I know these words will not endear me to you. You prefer – for which I do not reproach you – to look at the surface, the exterior, for its apparent calm absolves you, allowing you to pretend that you merely heal – the paradox being that the harder you try to heal, the deeper the blade sinks in. Reading those letters has not helped. It makes me feel I have lost the power of expression – whenever I sit down to write I am confronted by the bleakness of the reality – my ink streams have run dry because I have been so sapped and discouraged. Patience was never my strong point. There have been some changes since the Copenhagen days, but in absolute terms I am still no further forward. Why was I not born dull-witted? Then I could have followed a dreary, conventional life and been content, or at least absorbed by fighting for survival or pacified by consumer fantasies or alternative TV realities instead of cowering from life and terrified of failure. I cannot live of myself, I can only live through another. In an odd irony, it is inimical to my creative impulse to accept myself. I’ve been defused. When I looked upon women with disdain (counting myself an honorific male) as evil or dirty, I had to elevate myself above them as a group – the primary source of my writings being the need to purge myself, to wash away the stain of my own indelible iniquity – to confess, to demonstrate my blamelessness. It is dangerous for me to believe I’m worth something, szeretett, because I cannot be worth half something. The day you told me the story of your fifth child in Pizza Hut it changed my perception, but I despise that woman, simply because the only unique gift I could have given you she has debased by giving you first. The difference is that she did not plan with you to have your child. I need to be more to you, somehow and I can’t explain what I mean. It disgusts me that other women have seen in you what I have and that you’ve been able to drop them all. It’s so fucking simple for you, isn’t it? Because you don’t really love any of us, it appears. You can’t restrain love, I don’t think it’s possible. I won’t have what I’m saying dismissed or written off as simple jealousy. I never have shown anyone as much respect as I have you. That much is unique. I have loved before, but I do not think that can be cited to discount what I feel for you. Yes, I have deceived myself with each and every one of my lovers in the past (bar three or four very short affairs that were doomed, including Dakar) that they were the ones I would throw my lot in with. Thankfully I never did: it would have been disastrous. You told me that every one of them had a vested interest in keeping me down, damn right, but again the danger for me is that although it is qualitatively different with you, although I have always given you the very best of myself, unlike all my previous lovers (with the exception of HP – but then again, how long did that last and could he appreciate it beyond a certain frisson at my mind?) – in spite of it all, you don’t let me near you – you take me seriously, all the indicators corroborate that you do, more than anyone else before and I was blossoming under it, yet you still brush me aside as it suits you, you deprive me of you, you take me and leave me as convenient for you. I am not sufficient within myself and you know how I have been abused – you claim you want to make me more sufficient, so you can walk away the easier? So that you can pat yourself on the back for having been the crutch until the cripple could walk again? To salve your conscience? But at least I know I am loved. Or at least I could delude myself that I am loved in order to continue. Rob and my friends keep telling me that I must sort out within myself what I want from life. On board the plane here, I had a frightening revelation. I want to unfold myself as a sexual being (after those years of repression because it isn’t wrong or filthy or polluting) and I cannot exist without being cherished and loved – I have experienced a fatal reconciliation with my physical being and now a need exists where before I had a weapon and a tool – I wasn’t vulnerable to the same extent before – God, I want to be able to express my love and my vitality – I didn’t care before, I could defend myself in layers of fat and sullenness – I didn’t want to deny my very vital energy, so when I cannot see you and be with you I cannot express my love or myself nor can I transfuse my energy – no one else wants to share that with me anyway. You are the only one who sees it in me, you are the only one who has ever told me I’m a good fuck for crying out loud and I’m scared, scared of being cut off from life because life is so pitifully short, because reproductive (or rather, sexually active) life (for women) is so short and I’m not getting younger plus I’ve wasted so much time already since no one else has seen in me what you do, or they’ve never admitted to it. I’m not complaining, but it fucks me up all the more to put it in HP idiom. I was ruthless before because I just didn’t care, I could walk away. Only since I met you have I woken up to my responsibility. Remember the first sentence I ever wrote to you about waking up in a coffin – you stirred the dormant potential within me and every time you leave me you let me down, every time you part from me you take it all away. I’m sorry, but you know it’s true and I bet it’s uncomfortable. I’m dripping so much I can hardly make out the page. I included the “insatiable” quote because it seemed so apt in present context – it’s an older man and a younger woman in the cheap novel I’m reading to kill the time. At least I know I’m loved and that the problem is a clash in the terms of reference and I do want to be different from my predecessors because I need to be – I don’t understand why, but I am better than them. I hope you won’t have the contempt for me to withdraw anything you said: one of my faults is always having to prove myself. I have to be different to survive, by which I mean survive at all, not just with you. I’m not trying to provoke your anger or hatred, but I can’t get round this “status” problem (for lack of a better label) – only your positive disposition towards me grants me the privilege of your time and it is a privilege, I’m aware of that. I’m in turmoil whenever time is denied me. Chasing after you is like chasing after “redemption”, a spectre. Children are a threat to me, I was right to be wary of them, but your children would be in some ways a physical manifestation of my craving for love. More children would deprive me of time to an even greater extent, how could I do what I must then? HP thinks you are a total bastard if you reproduce through me, that they will ruin my life chances forever. Yet I want them – a yearning for which there is no rational explanation, love being superior to reason. I want you to know what it would involve, what it would mean and I don’t want to throw everything away for nothing. You tell me I have strength and courage – I don’t doubt it for a moment, but again don’t advance that certainty as an excuse. My doctrine has always been that love is the highest good, the ultimate goal and striving. I believe that more strongly than ever before, wretched though I am. I will be your widow too, one day. I don’t want to be an evil, nasty, selfish, grasping, hard bitch, I just want to be permitted to love you, but love is extinguished in a vacuum. As you are so much older than me and I will have to live so many years without you as it is, but what I want is ashes, cyanide and dust unless it is something you are willing to give. How can you tell me it is circumstances and keep rejecting me? There are no guarantees in life, although humans have an inborn need for security and order; our societies are founded on a fiction of control, so we impose order on unruly nature, claiming divine sanction for a convenient psychological mechanism. It is terrifying to concede that everything is arbitrary and we can so easily be wiped out.

I am now in S and will continue to write this wild, undisciplined plea. I woke up this morning thinking of HP, merely because it is almost a year since our “month of bliss”, as he dubbed it. I couldn’t drift back to sleep, though it was a good hour before the alarm was due to go off. Another futile objection I launched at him was: “I’m sick if irony”. Alles ist mit tiefster Ironie durchtränkt.

Feelings surge, szeretett and must be expressed, lest I succumb. It’s like the geyser “Old Faithful”, gushing forth reliably – this whole missive is what Rob would term “gush” (he is intimidated by meltdown). You’ll be amused to learn that he used to let my letters “mature”, putting them on the mantelpiece for a few days or even weeks after receiving them until he could cope, having undergone the necessary mental preparation for the onslaught. I’m uncharitable enough to hand you the sheets one by one, sitting there like an accusation incarnate whilst you read. All I can do is love in despair and despair in love. You must predicate my polemics on that. I am confronted by my pain every instant I am forced to draw breath apart from you – why should you escape? Why should you be immune? You don’t have to make compromises or concessions like I do, one of the many structural imbalances and unfair aspects of the set-up – concede listening for a moment to what is uncomfortable. Fiction is comfortable, which is why I am addicted to it. I must cultivate a hope, O.D. on it, surround myself with a cloud of unknowing for the sake of my survival. Do not cast me in the role of villain or vindictive spurned. You say I won’t regret my actions: help me then.

One of THAK’s eternal complaints was over how distorted a perception I have when apart. You sounded surprised that I go into crisis mode whenever you are “thousands of miles away and unable to do anything about it”. Pause to consider the problem logically: the crisis is precipitated if not directly caused by your absence. Left to myself, I attribute reasons for the deprivation, lacerate myself. It’s not that I think you will go off me in the meantime, more that I have time to dwell on the anguish, to analyse my predicament. Would that I could suck the teat of ignorance, gulp down the milk of unawareness. Suddenly I hear your words as if for the first time: trite and hollow and condemning, those fucking ground rules that I so readily accepted not knowing any better, because you can’t buy me, because I do not callously scheme or launch campaigns, because I didn’t have a fucking clue that we would be compatible, that I would love you deeper and longer than anyone, that I would choose to surrender my everything to you. “Brillo pad woman” speaks, but then again reality is ugly, painful, harsh and abrasive for me. I have to provoke, or die. Comfort is inimical. My life lacks purpose when you are not there. Above all, I want to give, but (paradoxically) I cannot do so without some “compensation”. I’m increasingly confident that you won’t just dump me, although you can’t afford to listen to what I am saying any more than I can. When I lived with THAK I needed to indulge in serial side-stepping to body-swerve the numbing restrictiveness of exclusivity. To find elsewhere what I could not share with him, and I am to be condemned for that? Now you (and HP) have altered me beyond recognition. I cannot cease to be true to myself. I cannot sell out to THAK. I have turned my back on all the principles I so rigidly applied without the sky falling down. In many ways it is as if I am still reprocessing the fall out from HP. You remarked casually that “anything is better than nothing”. Small wonder that ageing holds such unmentionable horror for me. A good mistress must be loving, submissive and flexible by definition. You shelter abused and damaged women, restoring them that they might triumph over every adversity and setback, escorting them along the path towards a partner who will nurture them. Fine. Laudable enough, if only it were that simple. Neither you nor anyone else can boost my self-esteem directly. The longer I am with you, the more the ground rules take on the appearance of a shabby pretext to shrug me off. Yes, I am attacking your self-image, iconoclast that I am. Raging against the inevitable. My last stand.

[To JD, undated, but mid-March, 1995]

“Up until the middle of the 19th century it is rare to find a female writer who did not have to pay for her intellectual productivity with a distorted and unhappy life. Whether women had to forgo their sexual lives in order to have leisure and permission to think, imagine and create, whether they had to abandon marriage and motherhood in order to be free to concentrate on themselves and their intellectual product – they faced more obstacles than did their brothers in the pursuit of similar aims”.

“Women, because of educational deprivation and the absence of a usable past, tended to rely more heavily on their own experience in developing their ideas than did men. Wifehood and motherhood were the experiences most females had in common with other females. But wifehood, under patriarchy, involved women in competition with other women, both to secure and find a man who would offer them support and protection and, once they had married him, to hold him”.

“Further, up until the end of the 19th century in Europe and the US, women in order to be educated had to forgo their sexual and reproductive lives – they had to choose between wifehood and motherhood on the one hand and education on the other. No group of men in history ever had to make such a choice or pay such a price for intellectual growth”.

“‘A bit of a hound, but so are most men. Perhaps it’s their best quality’.”

“‘Age, Henry, may a little modify our emotions – it does not destroy them’.”

(The two latter quotes are from “Travels with my Aunt” by Graham Greene, the others from “The Creation of Feminist Consciousness” by Gerda Lerner).

Spring has come to S – blossom dances over the paving stones, adorning the twisted, dark almost charred wood of the city’s trees. I sit at my usual desk at the library; the flags of the Member States hang listless from their poles. There was a little light rain and a burst of hail earlier. I completed a “kitchen sink” novel today, the first I’ve read in a while. I’ve always disdained anything other than the celebrated, the passionate, the pathetic, the tragedy in these commercial (modest) successes was too ordinary, reminding me of the suffocating banality of the domestic sphere, “Fairy Liquid” ads, kind on hands, won’t make your skin rough up and peel, from the female domain, the “Women’s Realm”, the sanctity of the home, “Brasso” for polishing the souvenir shop ornaments – miniature kettles and flat irons – thimble collections in custom-built racks on the woodchip wallpaper – lace handkerchiefs and shopping lists, encyclopaedias testifying to the obstinacy of the salesman, tins for flour and sugar, chopping boards and scrubbing brushes, from the kitchen window washing lines over the daisy-strewn lawn down to the rose beds and the lilac. I never understood then and I still don’t understand now what keeps them going. The purposelessness of those thousands of rows of terraced and semi-detached houses with their (now largely) decorative chimneys and fake log effect gas fires still haunts me. Does it become irrelevant, a habit after a certain age? Graham Greene doesn’t think so. I watched the film version with M in L and he commented (it was intended as a compliment) that he could see me at Aunt Agatha’s age getting up to what she does. I was flattered and offended. Not offended by the comparison, for Aunt A is wonderful and outrageous, but by the inference that I will still be alone and chasing after spectres even then. I yearn for safety, for the mythical resting place. I yearn to achieve that bliss with him, from thence to be fulfilled and fulfilling my creativity, which is more than the simple generation of flesh. Aunt A is irrepressible, undominated, untameable, vulgar, radiant – he believes us to be similar. I lack her courage, or perhaps her self-confidence. If I thought I were attractive enough I could model myself on her. The book is very amusing.

My other book, by Marge Piercy (“The Longings of Women”) was absorbing in its own way, written exclusively from a female viewpoint, about three central woman characters and their spouses, lovers, children. The literary equivalent of a soap opera, laying no claims to art. I believe in purity and force of emotion in writing, but still enjoyed what I read. It charted a divorce from a man remarkably similar to M. Even this shameless entertainment tried to elevate itself with a serious theme – homelessness. Each of the women had centred themselves entirely on a man. One lost everything and was forced on to the streets. The message clear: find independence and financial security, take care of your own interests and then, if you wish, venture into a relationship. The author attempts to demonstrate that there are valid, viable alternatives for women provided they stick together. I am relieved after reading this account, which was “realistic” that you passed the capesse, so much the better when you have your aggrégation behind you, then you will be unassailable. You can devote your energies to whatever you wish and no one can steal the fruits of your efforts from you. The book was frightening, reminding women of the precariousness of our situation. Power still rests with men: we need (crass though it sounds) equal pay for work of equal value to employ the stilted terms of the Treaty – we need full-time jobs which offer at least a modicum of security. Much of the progress that has been made has been a natural offshoot of demographic change, the falling birth rate in the Western world (as an ideological concept) has encouraged, however reluctantly, women into the labour market. The feminist members here decry what they mockingly (and accurately) label a “symbolic genuflection” to principle. M thinks women should be entirely free to choose whether to work or stay at home. I resent his wife not only for depriving me of time with him (and ultimately of him), but also for sitting around at home all day in Scotland with the leisure I could put to far more productive use than she is capable of imagining – he pays her to luxuriate idly. She moans in her Xmas letter about the hard work she puts into maintaining their numerous properties, boo hoo, violins play “Hearts and Flowers” – still, she’s welcome to her stultification. I couldn’t tolerate not working, yet would thrive on less with more spare moments to indulge in writing such as this. I don’t normally fester in bitterness over her. Usually I ignore her existence. I don’t care about her. I owe her nothing. I don’t wish her any ill. AB, in typical crass lack of understanding asked: “Why have you got it in for her, F? Why do you want to take her husband away from her? You’re still young after all, but at her age, what prospects does she have?” By the time I become M’s widow, however, I will no longer be young myself. I do want him to leave her, though. I know with my rational mind that he will not, unless she sends him packing. She will be too scared to divorce him, though. I would be, unless radical transformations continue apace. Better to cling to some old wreckage than swim for the unknown shore. This society loathes ageing and despises nothing more than an ageing woman – a by-product of the obsession with sex and outward appearances…A sexuality is refused to an older woman in the mainstream, with very few exceptions. It is considered distasteful, deemed inappropriate. That is a form of dehumanization – I agree with the last Greene quote, which is why I find it so disquieting and bleak: we are shut out from that which makes us human and vulnerable, from that which allows us to live and share life – such callousness! You see, the feelings don’t fade. I thought they would if I had a baby, but they don’t. The baby is all-engrossing at first (and unremitting toil to boot!), but I had looked upon giving birth as a rebirth, some mystical dissolving of the tainted self into a higher unity or good – what CRAP! I was severely misled. I thought a baby would be enough, that it would liberate me, unshackle me from men. Sadly no. Infants prevent you from having time to formulate worthwhile ideas whilst dismally failing to prevent you from thinking. I worry often that G is not self-confident enough. He must surely know that he is loved and accepted in his entirety, but he is often withdrawn and full of anger. I too rage. Often at him, mostly at myself. It is a symptom of impotence.

I wonder sometimes if he fucks Liz as much as he does me? I feel sick to think about them fucking at all. What do they do together then? She is a scientist by training, he a scientist and a linguist. She has no spark about her like me. None of his immediate family speaks or understands a word of Hungarian – it has been my prerogative to cultivate that side of him, to put him back in touch with his roots. He has told me that we have broken his previous record for the number of consecutive fucks he has had in a 24 hour period. He says I “fuck like a dream”, that I am the best fuck in Christendom, or, at any rate, the best fuck he has ever had the privilege to have. I worry that may be because I have taken trouble to ensure that I give him it entirely and exclusively as he wants it – that my style of fucking has been adapted to suit him. He says: “You have the most deliciously mobile cunt that I have ever come across” and that I “exude sex from every pore”. He doesn’t praise my looks, only my bed technique, my intellect, my personality. He believes I am good. What binds us is a “communality of interest” I suspect he has not found elsewhere. I need to hear what he has to tell me. I have never been told these things by any other lover – none of them have been interested in building me up. That could be why I am so at ease with him, attached to him. I have had better fucks than him. He has a smallish penis and I have noticed that when I fuck a guy with a bigger one I find it more stimulating. It’s less sweat! Sex with him is eine Umklammerung, an embrace; he feigns “cruelty” and “rape” in a gentle way. He takes me as he wishes and his power is his ecstasy. It is another enactment of the balance in the relationship – not a conflict, but a resolution. I have sex with him to reach him, yet he remains inexorably, steel-shutteredly beyond my grasp. It is him that I seek. His core. He has penetrated my core as literally and as fiercely as he has penetrated my body. He is not fond of foreplay – my breast might as well not exist: “I’m a cunt man,” as he put it. He focuses entirely on entering and teases me (as I so relish) by withdrawing and waiting until I can’t stand it before plunging back. Before I left for Barcelona, I was inconsolable. I wanted him so badly. We did go to bed, of course. Once more than I had anticipated. I fucked as never before – whereas I let HP serve me, because he wanted to please me. I gave M everything I had. He noticed. He knew. At least on that occasion I was the one who had to depart afterwards. I couldn’t stop kissing him. With the greatest passion and ravenousness. He “conks out” immediately after sex, literally disengaging and rolling over asleep! He didn’t then because I was kissing him so long and avidly. He let me, without returning it with equal fervour. I never lifted out of the overwhelming sadness that sapped me as I boarded the plane. I spent virtually the entire stay in Barcelona in my hotel bedroom, admittedly a palatial, sumptuous and opulent setting in which to succumb to all-consuming woe. I didn’t have the nerve to go downstairs to the restaurants or even to order room service. I felt too embarrassed over how I look, over even daring to exist. S, thankfully, is familiar ground. Enduring the ten-day incommunicado imposed on me by Liz’s presence (they are skiing in Andorra) is easier here.

He loves me. I do not delude myself that I have special merits to commend myself for better treatment than my “predecessors” (God rot them all!). I know it is circumstances that grant me access. He does love me. Not exclusively. It is his exclusive love that I crave. He can fuck on the side with other women, but if he loves them, then… One of the most painful aspects is the simplest – that he does not love me enough. He gives me the best of everything when he is there (in the naïve assumption that I will be content to leave it at that and that it will tide me over until our next tryst – that I will not want what he cannot give, namely guarantees, security and himself), but he is not there often enough. I will by needs withstand our separations, but – perhaps it could have been so with HP, but HP lacks the mettle, depth and unconventionality of M – for the first time, the more time I spend with my lover, the more time I want to spend with him. I am showing no signs of cooling down, of being bored, restless or dissatisfied. True, I have had others in the meantime, but they have been nothing more than a pleasant sheet-warmer to stave off resentment at my unwanted exile from my real lover. I do not sizzle with unbridled lust as I did with HP – the feelings run deeper. Yet HP retreated because he knew his won limitations and was not willing to sacrifice his house and children and would not exploit my love for him – he could not give me what he knew I wanted, what he knew I deserved and rather than keep on hurting me and disappointing me he cast me away. Not a rejection of me, but a cutting of losses before there was no way back home. It was honest. It was not reprehensible, though I am not convinced I have fully recovered even yet, almost a year on. I ate dinner alone with HP last night at a fairly rough and ready, family run, cheap and cheerful restaurant “La Victoire”. Before I went to meet him at the Driver’s Bar one of my colleagues, of whom I would say that she is a substitute mother, SN, aged 52, asked who I was going out with. She admonished me for not making him come upstairs to the Press Bar. By her own admission, she has had over a hundred men in her time – a remarkable lady who hitched and roaded her way around the States before Jack Kerouac had the idea, hence her words carry the weight of authority: “The trick with men is not to make yourself too available to them” she scolded, then smiled: “But he’s worth it, I think”. To which I replied: “I’m very fond of H”. Her reply: “He’s very fond of you too, you can see it. Perhaps it’s because you’re not chasing him”. Thankfully the episode is still not in the public lore.

I never want to be coerced into spending three weeks without my szeretett again. At last, as if the remarks had fallen on deaf ears, some of the initial things he said to me haunt me still. Now that I grasp his apology to me at the outset, for example on reading the letter I wrote to him, the one he dubbed an “asbestos letter”, which began: “Meeting you was like waking up in a coffin”. I’ve been in a stupefying slumber of illusion all along – I awake for the first time, but being awake, being conscious is something I can’t afford. His phrases were well-rehearsed, trite, hollow, his conscience escape-clause – he reminds me periodically that I never was given any promises by him, he has never deceived me. Big deal. So what. The more he lets me love him, basking in its benefits, the more the ground rules seem like a tawdry and shabby excuse. “I still have a small amount of emotional capital to invest,” he declared in the car. So I am entitled to his scraps, his crumbs, his leftovers (an aside: when he saw me off at the airport that Sunday after our parting fuck he said that he felt he’d been so well fucked that I deserved him taking the risk of arriving back in L slightly late – it was my “reward” for being a good girl – and at what immeasurable cost to myself?). “Divorce is not any easier for children, even when they’re in their 20s” (three of his legitimate children are in their twenties, the youngest twelve). I have been finding it increasingly unbearable, crying every visit. I cry for days and weeks on end when he is not there and am constantly irritable, particularly with G because he is in an even weaker position than me, i.e. he is subject to my exclusive authority, which I feel guilty about. He is the only vent I have for the paralysing frustration. Classic plight for the good mistress. We mistresses by definition must love our men, in fact by definition we have to be more attractive, sexier, tolerant, interesting, available, pleasing, kind and loving than any wife. Once we cease to be these things, if we become too assertive or demanding, when we can no longer bite back and submit we’re out, gone, ditched, dumped. Or – even if we succeed in self-sacrifice – because that is what it amounts to in practice given the structure and emphasis of society nowadays – we have no security. No piece of paper that entitles us free and unrestricted access and at least a share of the proceeds on a split. “I always have one on standby”. I lust after status, proof that I am better than the opposition. The galling truth is that he has done everything before. There is nothing I can give him that someone else hasn’t given before me. Even if I give it better. I believed he had left my rival, the one who bore his illegitimate child, in cold blood. He told me the story, which altered the complexion of matters, of my perception of the affair. She had been married to a man who abused her. If he came home and didn’t like the taste of her Yorkshire puddings he would throw her to the floor, cover her with a mattress (to prevent visible bruising) and beat her unconscious. M worked with her in a firm in Scotland – I don’t know if she was his secretary or what (I have a need to be her intellectual superior, though M has asserted he would never fuck someone whose mind he did not respect), which limited activities to driving out in the lunch break and screwing in the car. He went away on holiday for several weeks and when he returned there was a palpable tension in the air – she had stopped smoking and looked very anxious. She said she had something to tell him, he anticipated by replying: “I know, you’re pregnant”. She was amazed – how could he know? “It was the only thing that would ever have stopped you smoking”. The essential snippet of information I have withheld until now. According to M, the doctors had informed her she could never have children. He never presumes ill faith. I, however, am not so charitable and don’t lend credence to the wretched woman, mixing her possible motives with mine. She probably believed she could “trap” him (“If you are trying to get a little piece of me by having my child, forget it, it won’t work, if I believed that I wouldn’t agree to it. You can’t trap a man by having his child, men’s minds don’t work that way” he warned). He shunned all fatherly duty and responsibility, but provided financial support. He even sent her off on a coach holiday. On return, she broke off all communication. I attribute that to a disenchantment with him: he let her down (it strikes a chord in me). She informed him when he tentatively called a few weeks later that she’d married the bus driver! M’s daughter from that association, Christine, knows him, but he hasn’t severed links with them, nor has he been in touch for a few months. He said he felt like he was getting the better part of the bargain, that she had a few miserable lunch hours which wasn’t enough, yet she told him he was the only man for her and that there would never be anyone else. It depresses me on her behalf and on my own behalf and on behalf of women everywhere that so little can inspire so much – just a little care and respect, so rare from man to woman, and you’re hooked, a real goner. Well, dismally enough, I feel that way about him too, only there’s more empirical evidence to support it! That’s why writing this is making me nauseous. I despise her. The one unique thing M and I could have shared has been ruined, despoiled. Yet he thinks there is an immeasurably great difference between having a child by accident and having one by design. I ought to feel flattered. He is dizzyingly afraid of the responsibility (even now, without an offspring by me). “I’ve never told that story to anyone else,” he stated meaningfully. “But to be harsh for a moment, who else could you have told it to, szeretett?” I deflected with uncharacteristic bluntness.

I try to inflict hurt on him sometimes. Why should it be so simple for him? Why should he escape calm and unscathed? Why should he not pay as I do? “I don’t have mistresses simultaneously, but consecutively”. I must have as the principle article of faith of my dogma that I will wrest him, prise him away from his wife one day, or it cannot continue. Why should I desire to be the one he lies to, the one he deceives, the dupe? I want a partner. I am better off than his wife, though. I do not have to demean myself by slaving for him, washing for him, mowing his many lawns – she has to live apart from him too – but then again she can snap her fingers and he will return to her obediently. She can announce a visit and stay as long as she pleases. Being a mistress is a round of anxieties, paradoxes, inherent ironies – it is undiluted bitterness. I want equal access to him, equal rights. Like some obdurate and embattled suffragette: “JMCD for FMD” on banners, chaining myself to the railings outside his block of flats, campaigning tirelessly, stalwartly. A few Sundays ago I waited for almost two hours in his car in the car park outside his office in L. He can telephone free all over the world and said he wanted to call his mother. I could somehow tell when he came back that he’s phoned Scotland too. He mentioned it much later. I blurted hoarsely: “I knew it, I could just tell you had!” He misinterpreted the outburst as a jibe – it was an exclamation to myself that I had noticed, that I can credit myself with a little more perspicacity than I had accorded myself in my normal assessment. “Better that I phone home occasionally, darling, than that the whole thing unravel”. I burst into tears. “Thank you for putting me in my place,” I retorted. He grabbed me and shook me until I looked up at him, protesting that he didn’t mean it like that, but nothing he can say reassures me any more. It has dawned on me again these last three days or so that yes, I was being warned off, if I become a threat to his happy little home, if I am a risk, a danger, a liability he will drop me like the proverbial stone. “You wouldn’t want me to throw you off that cliff, would you?” was how he phrased his response. The following day, before he told me about Christine, I issued a counter warning: “If you throw me off that cliff, my dear, I fully intend to take you with me. I’m not going down alone. I promise I will take you down with me”. Again, I was bawling. He was mortally embarrassed: it was in the middle of Pizza Hut. Sadly, I know it was a bluff. It is highly unlikely I would in fact carry out the threat. Even though it is a purely retaliatory one. I fantasize now and then about sending a letter to Liz, but it’d be over between me and M if I ever did, therefore suffering remains my lot. JR, one of my close friends in [Waffle Central], laughed and said it would probably strengthen his relationship with Liz if I sent her a copy of any text, regardless of content, because he’d probably beg and plead forgiveness, swearing blind never to go astray again. She’d watch his every move, though and he’d hate that.

It’s all very well for him to fall back on the ground rules. When I openly challenged them, he told me he did not want to change them, pointing out that I’d accepted them. Indeed I did, but in ignorance and ingenuousness. I never dreamed we would enter into a relationship. I saw him as nothing but a transitory fuck, a welcome distraction, a relief from celibacy. The more I invest, the more excruciating it becomes. He cannot cope with my tears – they are the undeniable, physical manifestation of my grief. He would deny me even them. “My philosophy in life is to contribute to the sum total of human happiness in the world. If I feel that I am doing more harm than good, I will leave”. When I asked him why he wouldn’t leave his family, he replied: “Simple head count. The happiness of five against the happiness of two” (leaving himself out of the calculation). A fatuous argument, a cop out, no more, no less. It is an insult to my “awesome” intelligence, yet I have to accept it – it is the bottom line. HP’s reaction to M’s argument was elegantly simple and succinct: “Bollocks!” I don’t mean to be negative about M: he detests causing pain – he won’t want to hurt his wife and I think that he does love her. He has a deeply internalised sense of duty and propriety, though he cocks a snook at accepted morals since it suits his purposes to do so. Suits his purposes. He takes me and leaves me at his convenience – my life orbits his timetable. I can’t do anything, go anywhere if it means missing an opportunity to be with him. He prefers to pretend everything is wonderful in our relationship and is offended at my protestations and implorings. The surface is what he dares not peer beyond. Then he would be left with no option other than to acknowledge his share of the responsibility. For me that is difficult to put up with: I will not be ignored, I will not have my pain written off as immaterial. I abandon all my dreams for him – my dreams of devoting myself to my loved ones, my dreams of happiness, of the safety I mentioned before, of travel, of LIVING. “You always pick having a crisis when I’m thousands of miles away and can’t do anything to reassure you,” he laments, failing to appreciate that the crisis is the direct outcome of his absence, and therefore precipitated by it. When alone there is nothing for me to do but speculate, worry, small wonder I am buffeted, mauled, immolated by doubt and envy because he makes the choice for his wife, which is the choice to betray me every time he walks out the door, every weekend he goes to Fife, because I give him my best love, my best thoughts, my respect, my consideration, my all, my very soul, my breath, my life, and he can walk away without a sigh, without a single regret, without a twinge of remorse and I can never be good enough for him. How can he expect me to be strong? Do you know what compounds and exacerbates it all? He is the only man who sees my potential, who takes me seriously and who wants to share it – HP saw it, maybe even sees it still, but is not able or willing to do anything about it. H and M have changed me – I am more vulnerable and more easily wounded than ever before. I cannot live any longer deprived of sex, of love, of touch. The prospect of celibacy, even for a fortnight, is unspeakable dread and puts me in such a frenzy of panic that I am simply not in a frame of mind to think of anything else, to appreciate time with G or anyone else. I long for release. I want to unfold myself as a sexual being in intimacy and confidence, not embark on still more sordid and damaging (primarily to me) adventures with a bunch of “grade A shits”. I could tolerate it before. That safety net has been cut away below me. I know for a fact that I cannot attain mythical grail-quest-like fulfilment without a solid, secure base. M is reliable, but can’t venture far enough. What is worse is that he has made me fussier. I can have a wild fling with Niels or Rigobert, but I wouldn’t live with them. No, I want to establish my little family and then start achieving again – the time and the energy that has been siphoned off by men can be spent elsewhere to the greater good. I am no longer willing to be alone. It’s too frightening. Yet I am a strong person. Equally, I am blighted by a sense of my own inadequacy. M’s great merit and cardinal error has been to offer me encouragement as a human being. To show me respect. To take me seriously. To compete on a friendly footing. To stimulate. “All the others, including THAK, have a vested interest in keeping you down”. Let me conclude this section of the letter by a few more reflections on Laz and Lor. Unlike G, they will be planned. Unlike G, I love their father. M said: “There will be two differences. Firstly, you have financial security, which you did not have then. Secondly you can count on me for emotional support”. I originally conceived the idea because I could not bear contemplating his death. I had to perpetuate him. I had to give life to him and to his love with me. It swelled up inside, I had to tell him. “There are two privileges a woman can grant. I already enjoy one of them – you have just offered me the other”. It made a difference to us both. Everything has subtly shifted. I date it back to the Stockholm trip. The child is now a bargaining chip. I know that having his child will irrevocably alter things for me. They won’t for him, because he has stayed immune before, albeit having conceded that the child was not planned, by him at any rate, which is what counts. In some sense I seek a validation of our union that the outside world will accept, set a seal on it, but in many ways I need another baby “like a hole in the head”, as he expressed it. His theory – I digress again already – is that women take a grey-matter nosedive when they have kiddies – it doesn’t wear off until a decade after the last infant is born – because of a switch in priorities, interests and preoccupations, which may or may not have an actual physical grounding, or be a biological imperative. Women as eternal victims, even of nature, hopefully not an argument to condone our continued subordination. I know what it means to have a baby now. In terms of slog, in terms of commitment. I’m prepared for it and prepared to do it for him. What am I not prepared to do for him, when it comes to it? That is not the worst: the worst is the implications for THAK. Please don’t tear your hair out in disbelief. He isn’t out of my system. You must understand that none of my feelings towards him have any relationship to him personally, rather they have to be viewed as attitudes and assumptions, whether they be fictional or level-headed, about his SYMBOLIC role – it is what he represents to me that has to be apprehended in order to explain the immensity of the step I intend to take. One of M’s best features is that I can be honest with him (although even that honesty knows limits because neither he nor myself in present parameters would withstand total, unvarnished truth). With THAK, all is artifice: God knows I’ve bitten my tongue to a bloody stump with him, suppressed criticism, rage, disappointment, that is what I objected to most when I lived with him, explaining also why I was so insatiable and untiring in my quest for an alternative outlet for and source of love, affection – a struggle for survival, for life, such as I am still engaged in – I have never committed myself exclusively to one man. If I make that choice I am bound by it, I would stick to it: the very dependence of which I am so sphincter-releasingly, pants-wettingly terrified is what I live in now. I grasp for life, I hunger for it. In having M’s child I would be doing what he himself cringes from doing, the difference being that I do not love THAK and M loves Liz. I would be relinquishing my spouse. THAK is my spouse, my mate, faithful against all odds and adversities – he is totally reliable in his faithfulness. He has never fucked anyone but me, in spite of offers. I would be cutting myself loose from the one opportunity I have and indeed will ever have of finding a faithful partner. I would be giving up, for the sake of a man who belongs to someone else and who has stated point blank that he will not come to me, the chance of reaching that which I would stop at nothing to obtain. That M is selfish ought not to surprise me. He is not interested in babies, would not help me. “You are constantly looking over your shoulder. You never know what might happen. Never say never”. How unkind to proffer me hope if he doesn’t mean it. I shouldn’t read anything into those words, but I must. His other women must have gone so far and decided to get out while the going was good. Another colleague, Lisa, who was in the thrall of a married man for a couple of years gave her verdict: there comes a point where the pain exceeds the gain and then it is time to cut one’s losses and run. She reckons I have nine months left at the outermost. Nine months, a significant number. For me, J, asking me to “saw off” THAK (particularly when I’m not really ready within myself to do so) he is calling upon me to condemn myself to complete dependence, to utter wretchedness, misery and lose the one chance of a husband I will ever have. It’s our age dear, as I wrote in the story, which I want to entitle “Redemption Blues”, it’s only the dregs that are free now. “The good ones were all snapped up at university,” as another single female colleague astutely sighed. I would be a fool to have his child. He’s not twisting my arm, he said I could withdraw the offer and there would be no negative repercussions, he would not be bitter: “The magic would still be there”. I can feel it is true. “Stop thinking of the glass as half empty, when it’s half full”. Conclusion: fucking a married man is heartbreak, heartmince served up on a silver platter – don’t do it, it’s OK, as long as it’s sex and no more, but beware! Sex, particularly for women, has an irritating propensity to metamorphose into something greater and less resistible. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Part Two: The Great Lie and Other Small Hypocrisies.
The Dominant and the Deviant – the deviant defy the definitions of the dominant.

It is now Thursday lunchtime. After a hard morning’s Plenary I return to the same desk in an uncharacteristically quiet and underpatronised library. I’ve decided that I simply must commute between [Waffle Central] and L on Monday and Tuesday, even though I will scarcely see him, as it is inhumane to expect me to go without him a moment longer. On the way here, I sat in the buffet car of the train with FW, one of the relentless social climbers who of needs starts on the bottom rung of exile in L (ah, envy!). She puts on her Ray Bans whilst I squint over the cafés au lait in meagre thimble cups and we dissect the disintegration of yet another marriage. […]

I was pondering some of the old circular arguments regularly trooped out to berate women. One of them gave rise to the heading: women as devious and deviant, women as nagging shrews or cast-iron bitches. As long as women are barred from real power and freedom to flourish and thrive, as long as status is withheld from us, what alternative do we have to native cunning? We have to subsist on our wits, our so-called “women’s wiles”. The nagging is our sole outlet for the disappointment and tooth-grinding resentment, the feminine restraint, which is our lot. We smoulder beneath. Like an incense stick, we burn slowly, our wrath kindled, but without a target we can safely discharge at. This society values women for their sexuality and their sexuality alone. What a surprise! Nothing new – this brings me back to the revulsion at older women we have had inculcated into us so that it has become a buried reflex – browse through a magazine, switch on the TV, sex, sex, sex. Sex between the young and aesthetically pleasing: banished are the double-chins, the spare tyres, the cellulite, the wrinkles, the wheelchairs, disabilities of any sort – if the occasional older model appears it can be put down to a shift in purchasing power and, again, demography (the famous pyramid slowly inverting). Why is there such an obsession with sex? It is not because of the “democratic” nature of it as a free pleasure, available (theoretically) to all. Partly it’s commercial: everyone’s interested in it, after all. It’s an eye-catcher on a front cover. No, sex is not freely accessible to all. We see it used for oppression and manipulation: if you don’t have a lover, you are made to feel like an outcast, a failure, abnormal, unwanted, undesirable, “spinster syndrome”. The element of economic necessity has gone from marriage (no longer compulsory for women to pair off to scrape by). Now women can support themselves, though competition over resources is increasingly cutthroat and our earning power undermined by part time work, but supporting yourself often involves being condemned to solitude. It can be cast as a choice to defy, a woman not leeching off a man, but happily spared one, resulting in stigma. It is abjured as any activity not distinguished by the sanction of the generality – tut, tut, poor thing, glad it’s not me even if my other half blackens my eye for me when he staggers back after eight pints of stout on a Saturday night. She never was very pretty or she cared only about her career, making the unfortunate wallow in sapping misery instead of blossoming. It’s amusing to observe how the media distorts and incorporates (grudgingly) the least contentious elements of progress. Take the example of the transformation of the film heroine. Now she can do more than sob or simper or scream or flutter her false eyelashes seductively, baring a bit of calf. These days she can tote a Kalashnikov (if she’s done her body building, had a crew cut, dressed up in combat gear and thoroughly de-feminised herself first), spitting obscenities with the best of them. She is no longer Penelope Pitstop bound to the tracks by the masked villain with the 13.35 from Islington steaming towards her, but still, when peril assails her she still relies on her womanly charms for distraction or bribe, her basic resourcefulness is still “primitive”. Perhaps that cultural paradigm is immutable. I saw two seminal works again recently: “Der fliegende Holländer” by Wagner, a paean of praise to “Treue”, extolling that particular virtue. The sole redemption for the doomed captain and his crew is an unsullied love that is willing to renounce even life itself, exclusive in its focus. The second, “Dr. Mabuse der Spieler” by Fritz Lang. It is a variation on the Liebestod, Cara Carozza poisoning herself at Mabuse’s bidding because he has tired of her and found fresh prey for his degenerate bestiality. The corruption of the innocent. From that comes another quote: “There is no such thing as love, only desire and the will to possess that which one desires most”. Mabuse, arch criminal, genius of supernatural persuasive abilities driving a misguided woman to her demise without the merest reside of remorse. Carozza I empathise with: she is fettered by her love, unable to see beyond it, utterly consumed by it and loyal to it. There is nothing to exceed, supersede it. The Countess, ironically responsible for ousting Carozza, accepts the latter’s argument as a woman. She apologises for trying to trick Carozza into revealing Mabuse’s name, abandoning the attempt. For centuries we women have been intoxicated by men and men have been our nemesis – dissipating us, distracting us, exploiting us, enslaving us and we persist in loving them. We are shouted at from every radio, TV set, novel, newspaper and magazine that men are our destiny and highest good. Who can stand firm against this stupefying din? JR bought a TV and wishes she hadn’t because all it does is show her what’s wrong with her, how defective she is, to cite her. She talked about a column by Germaine Greer in “The Guardian”. She didn’t read it herself, only the responses to it the following day. The Great Lie: the only relationship of relevance in the society we inhabit is the heterosexual male-female one: relationships between mothers and children, grandparents and grandchildren, men and men, women and women simply don’t count. She took the comedy “Kindergarten Cop” to illustrate: it ends with Arnold Schwarzenegger smooching the female lead in a highly unlikely pairing off, the dramatic resolution to a plot filmmakers always have to have their happy ending in those terms. “Is it all a lie, F? One woman I spoke to said she liked it cos it’s like real life. I objected. It’s not”. You’re right, J my dear, it’s not. But it’s so much easier to capitulate to the “done thing”. Unless you are innately well-balanced and willing to do without what everyone else clamours for and still stand tall. I personally am too weak. What a compliment you paid me when you compared me to Andrena, calling me a “sexually liberated woman”! I’m as much an addict of the collective delusion sketched out above at my “marshmallow” (or, as M called it, “Mills and Boon”) core as the next poor girl. If I could but use men and suck them dry, discarding the leftover husk, how much simpler it would be!

I’ll end, since I must desist if I am to post this tomorrow – I’ve run out of stamina and concentration for the day – with another Greene “Travels with my Aunt” gem: “‘I made many economies in my youth and they were fairly painless because the young do not particularly care for luxury. They have other interests than spending and can make love satisfactorily on a Coca-Cola, a drink which is nauseating in age. They have little idea of real pleasure: even their love-making is apt to be hurried and incomplete. Luckily in middle age pleasure begins, pleasure in love, in wine, in food…Love-making too provides as a rule more prolonged and varied pleasure after forty-five’.”

[Undated diary entries written during a stay in Sweden between 14th and 25th August, 1995]

Thursday

“But fate can be strange. Fate can be fickle. Fate can be wandering by one day. Aloof, uninterested, kicking a tin can along the promenade. Nothing to do because it’s all been ordained. And fate can suddenly stop, and stare, and almost smile”
- Helen Zahavi, “Dirty Weekend”.

So love begins: for those who have not loved, with a knife and a cleansing. Love is a wound and a stabbing and a drop of precious blood on a sheet to be monitored by the guardians of virtue, to howl to the dogs outside the city gate, to exalt in shortcoming, to protect and nurture – so love begins with a tear and a tear and a wrench – so love begins. Why expect mercy from love? Love scorns, love blights, love is harsh and unkind and spits mucous on the pavement; love is indifferent to pleas and beseechings and laughs at the weak and afflicted. Love pushes you off the window ledge, gossips your most secret longings, pretending it doesn’t know when you are down on your luck, hanging up on your sobbing. Love takes no account of your feelings. It is better not to love. Not to be open or needing. It is better not to love. Not to soak the pillow, blow snot on the pyjama sleeves. It is better not to love. Not to give and have everything taken. It is better not to love. Not to feel the waters close above your head or the rope biting at your neck. It is better not to love.

A grey-hooded crow walks along the bank in front of the blinds and gobbles evening insects in the strimmed grass. A bland, orange-brown frond pattern repeats monotonously over the fabric of the curtains. Fresh towels on the bed, which is made for me every morning. Moss-trunked oaks lean towards me, without tenderness.

There is nothing above you and yet you are not God.
There is nothing above you.

A clock radio to haul me back to light and birch-perfumed air. Gripsholms slot – a lake with lilies. There is so much ugliness. The desk is scratched, but not by deliberate compass etching of initials or biro brutality – the bookshelves generous and two slim volumes of fiction huddling in the topmost right-hand corner – safety in numbers.

There is nothing above Love.
There is nothing above it.

“Your father is on ops and won’t be back until Monday. Have a fun time”. Judit the friendly-as-ever. The unprompted, gratuitously friendly. [17th August]
“Have a fun time”.
My son, my little son, take care of my little son who sprouted from me, who slid into the midwives’ hands and did not bawl – whose eyes looked at me as I clasped him to my breast, who knew of the sorrows that awaited him, who picked up the wineglass shards and admonished me. My son who took my blood and my bone and my grandfather’s eyes.

The bough and the bed sheet.

Was it deliberate or merely thoughtless? Was it callous? Was it a punishment? Naughty girl, weary of your whining, of your endless poking, your slack-toothing of the situation I deign not to alter. Was it to prove that indeed it is better to greasepaint a smile than endure an ignoring?
Ah, but I didn’t know the switchboard could take a message.
Ah, but I didn’t know it’d happen like this, it was so sudden and you didn’t call me on Wednesday morning, else you would have found out.

Wednesday – old people’s home – study visit – coffee and home bakes with a relative of Myrdal – a balcony with a trailing vine and tomatoes, elegant sofa and chairs from the manor and how widowhood descended. He went into the kitchen, saying: “Now gubben must have a smörgås” and never returned. We laugh politely at the demonstration of the alarm cord, which could be mistaken for toilet chain. Vi hard et bra här. Vi hard et så ofatteligt bra.

You weren’t going to be there in the afternoon.
Unexpected change of plan – thrust upon me – how could I refuse? I couldn’t get into work because the car was in for a major service, so I decided to take the day off. It was easier. How could I refuse? Buzzing excuses, like a hive of angry wasps swirling, swirling in my head.
Was it deliberate?
Love walks away, scuffing leather.
Was it a punishment for being too upset? See, girlie, it can be worse, far worse, I can make it worse. You depend on me, not vice versa.
But F, you see it in black and white, where is your colour vision? Subtle gradations of guilt and culpability. These are the rules. Fuck the rules – I spray-paint in red, bold letters. Rules are a conscience-analgesic. Rules are a front. Love will not tolerate constraint. Love will not tolerate restraint. Love will tolerate maltreatment. For a while. Love will forgive. For a while.

Tell me this – ask yourself: if Liz knew what you were really like, do you think she would love you? (Does she love you anyway or operate around your existence, presence not being an accurate term here, out of habit and lack of alternative?) Yet I know you better than you have allowed anyone else to know you and still I persist in loving you. Good for you, F, you win the booby prize. It is not that I couldn’t have someone else, in spite of self-doubt. They have all paired off (in as much as a group of twenty straight women plus six men can) and I hadn’t even noticed. Too much in pain. Too absorbed in you. Wrapped in you, like a corset I cannot unfasten that squeezes my vital organs and does not allow me to breathe – oh, pass me the smelling salts, there’s a dear – I’m feeling giddy.
The bough and the bed sheet.
Two juvenile crows search side by side.
Do you honestly and sincerely and testifiably believe, hand on heart, à la Oliver North (his boyish, dog-eyed look, his drawling, his heavenward, martyr-pious face) that I could have even one second’s respite or peace of mind, free from worry? Knowing the state I have been in, you abandoned me to speculation. Do I deserve that? Do I deserve to be a gutter-whore, a mistress, a tart, a stigmatized single mother, I who have loved you more and better and more faithfully and longer and more truly? I who have given you the best of everything I possess, of every ability? Do you care so LITTLE about me? Am I so WORTHLESS to you? Is my love so negligible that you can cast it aside?
Just because I have nothing to offer you but love. No fortune, no flats overlooking the eighteenth hole, no well-appointed properties, no powerful and rich relatives in high places. I sometimes wonder what you would do if I came by a few million! Yes that was cruel, but really, it is not I who am cruel. There is nothing that I could do that would hurt you enough. I would seek to devastate forever, to lay waste, as you have laid me low. You have destroyed me, my darling, and I refuse to let you deny it. I will not be the same again. There is nothing I could do to cause even the remotest, dullest echo of the pain you have caused me by denying me. By reducing me to dependency. By betraying me again, again, again. Revenge can be had only once. A blow from which there is no recovery. For surely I can never recover from this love that has ravaged me. For there is no other who is you – there is none above you.

Sunday.

The Said and the Unsaid
This my flowering, the interlude between child and dotage free from the arbitrary commands of others, free to organise and order and decide. This is my blossoming, the bud opened, the petals spread wide, the fragrance abroad.

You do not believe life is passing me by – yet you do not allow me to live – no Skärgård, no Gellért, no honeymoon, no ring, no baby, just constantly running after you – is that life? When I do not wish to be celibate for a single day. Yet my celibacy and my faithfulness are no merits, they do nothing to commend me, least of all to myself. So life passes me by and I am shackled, watching – you hold the key on your tongue, but will not pass it to me with a kiss that the locks may be undone.

I am incapable of pleasure and enjoyment for I am in the thrall of my desire and of the life that could be, if you would only relent – and this state of being is not life, merely persisting to no end and that only barely.

Yes, it seems I have been forced into confronting you with your responsibility until you take action. When each time I risk the action you do take being that of putting down the receiver and never answering again, except for your unfounded twinge of fear over blackmail. You must surely realize, as I have done in the past few days, that my impotence is so complete that I cannot take revenge.
You will not be a happy memory.
“I want to pout things into perspective” was the catalyst. So everything you have said has been a platitude designed to appease, a string-along, as my mother told me – you “can’t see it getting that far” and in one sentence you demolish the construction I have been slaving over, deriving sustenance from for months – bricks from straw, bricks from straw. You insist you are not hard, but you lie. To be so completely ruthless and selfish takes a stoniness I can barely conceive of. And you are a failure. An abject failure as a husband, an abject failure as an honourable, decent person. It is not just me that you let down. You disappoint me again and again, expecting me to forgive – but is my store of forgiveness depleted? Is it not running low? I realize that, on the outside, little has changed, but something has changed within me. I cannot give you the affirmation and endless adoration that you crave, that you can indeed only receive from your children who have never, as yet, had to bear the brunt of your arrogance and greed.

I will not allow you to forget. You must be made to face up to your responsibility, or else I must conclude that your motives are purely evil and malicious and that you deliberately seek to harm, in which case I need no longer have any conscience in striking out against you.

Every minute with me is a bonus. Yet you do not behave as if it were so. It echoes in my mind, hollow, insincere. Your bonus has a price tag soaked in tears. It is easy for you, but you do not cherish me, you do not appreciate me or you would not hesitate.

It is no credit to me that I am still alive. It is no credit to me that I did not roll off the bed with the sheet round my neck, fastened tight to the ceiling. It would have been enough – I could scarcely draw breath and my pulse was bursting my eardrums. It is persistence without hope. Do you not see that I have built my whole life around you? I have no desire to see that edifice razed.

It was convenient for you to believe that I was “cuntstruck” before we met. No, it’s not that simple – you and HP made me transform, metamorphose into one who can no longer bear to be alone and without status. Waiting and weeping, the lot of the mistress. Now things are worse for me than when HP dumped me.

You have bled me dry. I have no tears left, empty of all but despair and I’m sure you’d do anything to prove it is all my fault, so that you, as usual, will emerge exonerated, blameless, not a spot of dirt in the cracks of your palms – those ground rules are as handy as they are transparent and despicable. You gave me Hungary, but it would be taken away again and I would be stuck with something I loathed in order to save face amongst colleagues. I have been faithful to you in mind as well as body, taking every opportunity to mention you, to praise you, to praise Hungarian, you see, you have indeed left me with but one option, that of self-destruction. It is easy for you to aver you see no resolution because you are too happy having it all. What prompted my attempt on my life was that knowledge – yes, no problem, board the train for L at 5 a.m., fork out for the hotel, go through all the hassle, the draining effort – it suits me fine. I am NOT your servant, I am not a sexual relief outlet, I am NOT a sperm dump, I will not be milked of love and succour and I will not be labelled dishonourable for defending myself. You are delighted to let me flatter you by chasing after you, but that is all you will allow me to do. “I’m not worth it” you remind me, but if we could be together it would be worth all the effort, that is my personal tragedy. You yourself have confessed, unless of course it was nothing more than a shabby male tactic to plunder a slit, that you have never loved more intensely – you ARE NOT GOD, even if I genuflect before you, still you are NOT God. You have been exceptionally fortunate in finding good women who have been so low on self-esteem that they have allowed you to kid yourself you’ve been doing them a great favour – no man who keeps a mistress does her a favour. He may salve his conscience by giving her financial support (and, let’s face it, you’re a major financial drain on me), but even then, he does not grant her what he pretends to himself he does and, if he buys her, she is nothing more than a glorified whore. Not that I disrespect whores: I find them infinitely morally superior to their clients who are often to be pitied when they are not brutal. I clip this digression.

Another point that struck me in Mariefred, or should that be Marie’s Turmoil, was that I would never be entirely free of Liz as long as I live, even if you were to wake up and throw yourself into my warm and comforting embrace. Indeed, she will always be part of you, but it is not this to which I refer, rather that you will always have to maintain links with her through the children. And it doesn’t really help for you to tell me the truth about Liz – that you don’t love her like you do me, that it is duty, or – für meine Begriffe, acquisitiveness that lashes you to her. No, she doesn’t deserve to be hurt, I won’t have that imputed to me, but still you don’t act, still you preserve the status quo, are you trying to drive me away from you? Are you trying to extinguish my love, or my very life? It no longer acts as a comfort, but it makes your choice ever less palatable, ever less bearable, ever less comprehensible and ever more reprehensible to me. Your conduct towards me is such that it doesn’t surprise me any longer that all my friends advise me to leave you.

Yes, my accusations become the more vehement the more bitter and hopeless I become. Not that I want you to lie to me. It would almost be easier. And my love for you is far stronger and all-encompassing than the feelings I have nurtured for anyone else.

I can see things from your point of view, if I couldn’t I would have withdrawn long ago. I am not a domineering monster. What can I do but reiterate my plea that you mull over whether you truly value our relationship? I implore you, darling, do not consign me to this fate, for I will be unable to resist hating you with the blackest, darkest, most passionate and everlasting hatred ever ushered into a human heart. I throw myself at your feet.

I know there is more to it – but you steadfastly discount my pain, the worm that vitiates all that is good within me. I have no voice but to lament, you have crushed my larynx, banished me from your light, your tenderness, leaving me nothing but the hard crust of despondency. There I am, in the white gown my spectre will wear, on the altar of your convenience, waiting for the knife to plunge, pale, pale. No one touches me. There is no arm to slip around my shoulders, no sex to exorcise the doubt. Sex is love to me. I used to believe it was a weapon, a tool for obtaining and preserving the affections of a male, or at least attracting his attention. Now I know it is the perfect binding when the bodies involved are owned by two who love. I cannot live without communing in this furnace-searing purity with your soul. Yet, even when I give you everything I possess and far more than I can afford, still you elude me, still you evade me. I am never permitted to reach you. I am but one of many, whereas you are only one. And all I want is to give and to love and to cherish and to breathe and to have the good that is within released. That I may achieve what I was born for.

I am not a plaything. I am not made of steel or granite. I can splinter and break. I can bleed.

[Undated notes on JMCD.]

“I don’t mind being normal, but I do mind being ordinary”.
Don’t wait for a reward for doing what’s expected of you. The more you do what’s expected, the more will be taken for granted and the more severe the pummelling of the moral sanction when you desist.

“All men want is an open, available cunt”.
Even stripped down to that anatomical feature I am not good enough it seems.

“What are we going to do with you, impossible infant?”
Reducing me to the tutelary subordination of the charge.

“So, what do you live for?” he asked.
“Love”.
Carozza as kindred spirit, her defiance masking her pain, deflecting the probings of her interrogators. Love as her strength and her doom. My reply a rejection of his insistence on duty (a remnant of Gordonstoun and the naval reserve). The antithesis of love. I would do my duty if it were a duty of love, springing from love, e.g. G, but where love is replaced by duty I no longer see the point.

“What you need is to find someone who is your intellectual equal and who finds you attractive”.
I asked him to look in the mirror. He dislikes me being dependent on him almost as much as I do.

“You don’t have to give up your dreams, damnit. I’m not worth that much”.

“The harder you chase, the less likely you are to get”.

It is not that the wives look down on us (mistresses), but that “their cunts dry up with sheer terror” at the thought of us in flagrante with their spouses. We challenge their idyll, their domestic bliss bought at the price of their souls. They sold out to get what they wanted and don’t like such tranquillity threatened.

I lived for the love of God, now I live for the love of man, to be enveloped and cocooned by an external force, greater than myself. To be extinguished.

“All men are bastards, but some are shits as well”.

He is honest and upright and gentle and kind and voracious and empowering. He points out that I have been very unsuccessful with men. I’ve failed miserable in finding one who wasn’t either a hit or stupid. I’ve also failed miserably in keeping a man.

Pay a man a grossly exaggerated compliment and he’ll swallow every syllable and boast it everywhere. Praise a woman modestly and she’ll glow, but disbelieve every word and sift through it to reveal the hidden jibe.

[To JMCD, undated and unsent]

Lelkem, my soul,

Our relationship began with a letter and shall end with two, as is only fitting, for the unacknowledged third partner in the proceedings, your beloved spouse, co-administrator of your joint worldly accumulations, she who has assumed your name and appropriated your rank, has been an ineluctable presence in our shared existence – the time we have spent together having been dictated by her whims, or, more accurately, your desire to placate her (satisfy does not seem apt). – or, if you prefer, by her conjugal rights, her justified entitlement according to the contract you signed so long ago based on a fiction of everlasting joy and companionship.

However much the bleak knowledge of her may have lent an urgency and pathos to our love at the beginning, it has surely undermined my faith in you know: what is left smacks of rank cowardice (towards us both) and stale exploitation. Stale, sour.

Do not deceive yourself in your wrath that I am a bitch or merely evil. In the past, you have castigated me for my perceived lack of nuance and subtlety, but ambiguity does not equal absolution. It would be too palatable and convenient a means of shrugging me off – remember that it is you who have betrayed and disappointed me in virtually every conceivable way through your failure to act. The irony is that I have permitted you to know me longer, more intimately and better than any other in the mistaken conceit that he, to whom I entrusted my precious soul, must be worthy of that gift that he could not be shallow and weak. This bitterness, which is so overwhelming and all-pervasive that I am at a loss to express it fully is a product of your refusal to change circumstances and it is you alone who must carry the burden of responsibility for the squandering and spoiling of our love. Until the end of your days. Yes, M, you are a weak and pathetic man who has remained unmoved by my sufferings and entreaties, but I have had my fill. It is you who must plead and shed solitary tears now – as you rewarded me, so shall you be rewarded.

You may claim that your choice was determined by concerns of morality (whereas I would contend you are morally bankrupt, spiritually and emotionally impoverished), of duty – but ponder this: Has your sense of duty earned Liz’s gratitude? Has doing your duty made her happy, or you happy? Happy with her?

Let me briefly examine the fruits of our encounter, as I am conscious of them:
2) I have become more dependent. Where I was capable of standing alone, proud, I am now needy and yearn for a partner.
3) I am aware of my sexuality – but what good is this awareness if I am deprived of the means of its expression? It is a torment – again I am forced to rely on others for fulfilment. I am no longer content.
4) That to give generously and show commitment, to invest anything in a relationship is to court misery and pain.
5) More perniciously in personal terms even than the above – the erosion of belief I once had. I have lost my God and lost my trust in justice. There is no relief, no bliss but what we find here – now I have been robbed of my substitute – the essential replacement that could still my anguish and uncertainty, that could instil hope in me, hope and purpose.
Love has been the ordering principle, love as the only compensation for having wretchedness thrust upon us by birth. I have let Love reign supreme, subordinated everything to it, sought it above all else, worshipped it, venerated it – Love has lifted me from the roadside dust, cooled my brow and given me vitality. Not even DA was able to knock my belief in Love’s redeeming power out of me. But you have. And so thoroughly, with such neat absoluteness, with such shattering finality. So what is left for me? What? Rejection and withdrawal. Who will heal me? Who will rescue me? Who will dare to look beyond the inevitable resentment, anger and hostility? Perhaps you, in raising my standards and expectations, have dealt me a mortal blow. I have never found encouragement elsewhere, I have never found praise or acceptance or tenderness elsewhere. As I blurted down the phone, I have never found a viable partner elsewhere. How else could I have endured so long?

Why should you be surprised then that I simply cannot allow you to preserve intact what you have fought for, or at least what you have resisted all alternatives to retain? Although you have sought to assure me that I am worthy, that I am not second best, although you have admitted to me that I outstrip her in all respects, still you persist in attaching greater value to her, still it is I who must return to a cold and empty bed. I who could achieve so much with a little time and support, do not have the luxury of tending plants in a cottage-cocoon, in idle leisure in the land of my birth; I do not even have the luxury of loving my son as I ought. Is that fair? Does she merit these advantages more than I? Innately? I possess greater gifts by dint of a genetic accident and am barred from the opportunity of developing them fully by dint of an accident of privilege. Your awareness of all this merely serves to render you more culpable in your complicity with it.

My anguish in one respect is an echo of the frustration she feels. Her generation was indoctrinated to believe in marriage as the true purpose of female life – marriage would release her from dependence on parents, would release her into mutual love and respect and provide her with a home, a refuge of tranquillity, children to nurture and cherish, a role, a place in a community. The family idyll has long since been debunked for the myth it ever was, fragmentation and struggle have emerged in the reality of a worsening climate of economic and personal deterioration. She made up her mind to select you as the individual most likely to provide her succour, fulfil her and she feels duped. The fact that society has unwittingly let her down (I am not positing an exclusively male conspiracy) and that she has let herself down by allowing herself to be persuaded that she could live vicariously through you is immaterial. She will not face up to her own shortcomings, preferring to deflect them on to you. In revealing to her the full extent to which you have breached your original marriage agreement I will perhaps have made it unbearable for her to continue it, which does not necessarily do her a disservice.

Perhaps, ultimately, I am meeting your deepest need – that of liberty – we shall see, but I am familiar with your terror of loneliness. Perhaps I should stay my hand. Perhaps I should take comfort in the efficacy of my own example. Perhaps, you see, condemning you to her would be the direst punishment I could lete out, yet it would not permit me to give full vent to my ire. My pointing to the truths will lead to your desertion of me. Better surely to be abandoned in this way than ignominiously should you return to Scotland because you “lack the emotional strength to renegotiate a new set of relationships”, not having found a job.

It has taken you over fifty years to meet anyone like me. I could characterise myself as a person of excess – excessive appetite, excessive feeling, excessive gifts. You may prefer the comfortableness and lack of challenge that mediocrity implies. You may feel you do not have the energy or wit to keep up, but how can you genuinely be content with someone who has displayed less sensitivity, less empathy, less love, less appreciation, less awareness, less inventiveness, less humour, less vitality? It is my very vitality, that strength of personality and being which makes me attractive. My excess that informs my intelligence and wit. Her only creations come from her loins (and indeed even these were only hers in part), a passive and secondary act of the body, not of the mind. You will not meet anyone like me again – it is unlikely at any rate and even less likely that you will be loved by anyone like me again. It amuses me to realize that I will have been the most extraordinary thing in your life. “He is clever with words,” said JD “and heis very charming”. I could list other qualities and drawbacks: semi-articulate, pompous, self-important, patronizing. Your imperfections made you human; your lack of self-confidence mirrored my won, giving me courage. Vulnerability is always appealing to the female, the blessing/curse of the maternal. You have seldom let me crack the façade of the “impenetrable exterior”, you have reciprocated, up to a point. But you have also destroyed, though unintentionally. Yours is a tragedy of god intentions that foundered on your incapacity to love and to dare. How hollow ring your words about being “in the business of increasing the sum total of human happiness”.

There can be no forgiveness and no further tormenting through contact. If you write to me, I will destroy the letter unopened. I do not want to listen to explanations which are disguised excuses. You have known me and professed to love me, but whatever I have been and done it has not been enough and I cannot bear to be sacrificed any longer for the sake of a sham or because of fear. I cannot bear the implication that she is “more” or “better”.

You have poisoned me, blighted my life and emptied me of will and of self-respect. I deceived myself into thinking I was loved and now must face my greatest moment of need unloved, alone and embittered. How can I bear the knowing that I am unloved? How can I bear it? So I will wander, alone – with whom can I share my dreams if not with you? Whom can I desire if not you? Thank God there is no pathetic fallacy, for surely the world would be dark and bleak, the sparrows would plummet from the sky, the streams turn to gall, the roses wither and lose their scent, the laughter of children would cease.

Farewell, my love,

Your faithful mistress.

[Letter to Liz, JMCD’s wife, 15th December, 1995, unsent]

Dear Liz,

I am your self-confessed worst nightmare. Not only am I younger, more attractive, more successful (indeed, my successes are entirely my own as opposed to inherited), more intelligent and more creative than you, but I have known and loved your husband better in these past two and a half years than you have in the last thirty two.

It is not your fault that you are ill-suited to him, nor do I condemn you for that. Nor are you to blame for his nature, but still you refuse to give him up. Never mind, for your very stubbornness (coupled with his cowardice) has been your triumph. Yes, contrary to what you might initially think or feel, even though the humiliation is all yours, the bitterness is mine.

In a bout of clarity I can ill afford in my position (that of mistress), I have wearied of him, wearied of his failure or refusal to accept the implications of what he has repeated to me whenever I have issued him with a challenge, namely that he made the wrong choice years ago that he has never been happy or satisfied in his marriage that he has had a more fulfilling (in every way) relationship with me. He does not know whether he loves either of us. It is fear (and maybe habit) that binds him to you and I suspect equally fear that binds you to him in turn, fear of solitude gnawing at you both.

Yes, I have loved him and I am not the first. Do not delude yourself that I will be the last either, no matter how searing your outbursts of temper no matter what admonitions or threats you direct against him. You cannot control him, nor ultimately change him without sapping him, diminishing him and so you will have to confront the knowledge that he has loved others – in as much as he is capable of that emotion – though, over the years, the vent of pleasure and support elsewhere has allowed you to remain the unassailable Queen. It is easier to tolerate misery when you are aware that you have an alternative to turn to. The others, including the one that bore his child, have been too meek, too self-effacing to enlighten you, but then, in so believing, I of course make an assumption about how perceptive and sensitive you are. I could be seriously misled by my own empathic sense. You, in my estimation, have been too arrogant or fearful to admit the possibility to yourself. My predecessors accepted the rules he sought to impose and he relied on their goodwill, making it a point of their personal honour to refrain from seeking revenge.

I am not baser than them, merely stronger and more ruthless. I do not imagine that this letter will endear me to him and, frankly, I do not care about the effect it will have on you. In setting pen to paper I relinquish him, I abandon him, I exorcise him like a bad dream, but I will not be ignored. Remember this: he is a selfish man. Remember also that he will recover from this blow: even if you divorce him he will find another, perhaps another two at once. If you give refuge and succour to him, do not expect gratitude as your reward. It will not be a proof of innate generosity or a capacity to forgive on your part, but an admission of weakness, the aforementioned dread of abandonment. Maybe I am too harsh, but my knowledge of you comes from him.

You are entirely safe. He will not allow himself to lose control of his passions for anyone, nor will he allow his life to revolve around another’s. Instead we are his satellites, he determines our orbits. Our needs are forever subordinated to, secondary to his and has he not treated us accordingly? You may think yourself morally superior (or more deserving of his affections), but a wretched piece of paper betokening spousehood is a flimsy guarantee of anything – is it not?

To him, you are the wrathful and fulminating goddess to be appeased. I cannot imagine why he balks at losing you, since, by his own admission, I eclipse and surpass you in every conceivable way. I know that he will never again come across another individual like me. Although he has never been faithful to you sexually, he has never tolerated any threat to his marriage, founded on lies and deceptions as it is. He prefers it to any alternative. Rather he prefers to remain within the confines of the familiar (albeit inferior) as the price he would have to pay for superior bliss is too high for him (particularly in material terms), again a giveaway concerning his weakness. He clings to his marriage, putting enough into it to maintain it and very little more. I surmise, having scanned your weary epistles of woe at Christmas time that it must be linked to the security it represents, or the comfort – what incentive does he have to change circumstances radically, particularly since there has been no shortage of fools like myself, willing to service his sexual and emotional needs over the years? We, who have wept over him, pleaded with him, loved him, given ourselves to him, body and soul. And we have lost. A mistress is, by definition, more loving, more tolerant, kind, generous and self-sacrificing than a wife.

I am no longer his mistress, but he enjoyed fucking me and he never met my equal.

What irritates me about you most is your complacency, your blinkered state – do you shelter in illusion because it does not challenge your cherished assumptions? We are all the same in that, I suppose, even I.

We should be allies, ironically, having suffered such anguish and grief at the same hands. You can at least bleed him financially, continuing your certificate-sanctioned parasitical existence. Not that I ever wanted anything from him but himself, all of my achievements are the fruits of my own labour and I am not poor either – I was not born into cosseted privilege, but fought for everything I possess – nobility is not of the blood or the purse, but the spirit and if I am niggardly then it is he who has reduced me to this.

You can sit in your cosy cottage in your cosy village with your cosy spaniels and your cosy, mind-dulling chats about daffodils and dahlias, sweating over your ornamental borders, mowing your lawns and managing the properties you own jointly, but you have never lived. Take my advice, unwelcome though it is, take a lover – God knows I pity you almost as much as you fill me with loathing – do not let the man whose name you have adopted be your sole relief – continence is a blunt blade, the guilt it generates fickle and liable to be forgotten when passion is aroused – your “innocence” and “heart of gold” have not restrained him.

By now you will have realised that often our worse fears recede into triviality when we face them. I will find someone else. I am, after all, barely older than your eldest daughter. My only regret is that I cannot wound him, not even slyly, through wounding you. Neither can you wound him. He is impervious to us. He claims to have loved only once, aged 16, his first girlfriend. She left him. Where does that leave us?

You may gloat over me, but do not slip further into smug apathy – by revealing to you the full extent of his betrayal of both of us, I have given you an opportunity to rally strength and live, but do not forget the sting of this victory, the poison which will never leave your veins. When you call him and the answering machine replies, where is he? Who is he with, Liz? If not with me, then with whom? Even his lunch breaks at Stewart’s were spent with his secretary for eight years, in lay-bys on the back seat of your car, in her flat…Remember his attachment for duty. The tables have turned. He has begged me to give him more time, not wishing to face life without me, and, failing that has implored me to depart silently. So crushing mediocrity once more carries the day, as so often in human dealings. You deserve him, so I shall depart. If you embrace him now, be sure you will not regret it – realise the measure of tolerance he requires – do not seek merely to stifle him, for then you would be an even greater fool than I, which would afford me a minor consolation,

Yours,

His former mistress.

[E-mail to JMCD, 2nd December 1996]

Siegfried’s Chink

I hope you have the decency to read these two mails.

Just in case the reference means nothing to you, Siegfried was the great Teutonic hero who rendered himself invincible by bathing in the blood of the dragon he slew. Unfortunately, he was too absorbed in the task of soaking himself to notice a tiny leaf fall and stick to his skin, leaving one patch dry, which, needless to say, was where the spear that eventually dispatched him struck.

The abiding and stinging recollection I have that has done much to obliterate the positive memories of our association is that of the phone call on Thursday. I would not have called except under extreme provocation, much as I continue to be under duress now, witness these missives. Remember this: that it was your family that did not respect your ability to make an adult and rational decision on your own behalf about what you believed would make you happy. I respected you, however, though the moral vindication does me no good, as it is not I who enjoys the benefits of a relationship.

Were you seeking to make a gesture of conciliation by giving that bag to Judit? No amends may be made whilst I am condemned to solitude and wretchedness. To know that you are thinking of me is not to ease my pain, but to heighten it, if that is indeed possible, for it throws my loss into sharper relief, holding up to my face the emptiness, the purposelessness, the triumph that she has reaped.

Am I to sacrifice my life for a principle? But it was you who told me that I have no hope. Hope of what? To be your mistress, your plaything to do with as you please? I must meditate instead on all the endless hours of waiting by the telephone that refused to ring, all the frustrations. Can I leave an opening now? True, it is difficult to know that you are in L without me. There is a certain temptation involved since I still love you and I cannot even begin to conceive of a replacement, actually, I cannot even begin to conceive of the full enormity of what you have done to me, much less begin to come to terms with it.

Do you believe for one minute that I wish to be alone?

I do not understand why you are still in L. Presumably because you do not really, in the depths of your heart, wish to be with her, or perhaps it is a further manifestation of your complete and comprehensive selfishness, since you have everything there: freedom from surveillance that you might continue in your serial adultery with some less risky individual, with someone who is not such a challenge to your established habits as myself. That is what constantly plagues me. Even that you can recover from losing me, that you can be happy and prosper and thrive without me sears me, offends me, not that I will you misery. I would not even will for Liz what you have done to me.

You decided to give them a chance instead of me. I was a rare blossom that required too much tending. Just as I was beginning to flower, after all the long and difficult years, the water that had coaxed the petals to emerge was cut off, abruptly. Without it, without the encouragement, the bloom has withered, the petals shrivelled and fallen. You made a serious tactical error that Thursday evening. You deprived me of all hope, of any prospect of release or fulfilment in my life. I have no cause now to stay my hand, and yet I continue to show restraint. I could have telephoned you in Scotland. You have left me without appeal. I ask you to afford me a measure of the same respect I have unfailingly shown towards you.

If you want me, you must pay the price. You know what it is. If you are not willing to pay, then you must release me and cease all attempts to placate me through others. If you want to comfort me, do it to my face, but there can be no absolution.

[JMCD to Liz, Lille, 1984]

Take every chance to live and love,
Drink deep the wells of Life’s rich brew,
Each creature ever walked the earth
Could teach some strange or novel view.

Each friend could male the future sure
Were you prepared to chance the smart
Of walking hand in hand if near,
Else cherishing memories in your heart.

Though I’m no more a callow youth
The night we met my skipping heart
Drew me to you: a bond was formed
That never more can fall apart.

I’ve never lived for constancy
Yet hope still true to count my heart.

[The following a note in Liz’s handwriting, which I found almost ten years after the affair in the envelope containing the originals of my letters JMCD handed over to a mutual friend. She must have slipped it in hoping that I would find it whilst still raw. After he returned to her, a number of mysterious, garbled messages were left on my answering machine in a slurred woman’s voice. I was also informed by a colleague that Liz had accosted one of the local Members on a flight to Scotland, inquiring whether he knew me before regaling him with a detailed version of events from her perspective, an act both spiteful (she erroneously assumed it would damage my career) and irrational, which served only to embarrass the listener. Although I was aware of JMCD’s home address I never did send the letters reproduced above, their purpose being cathartic, purgatives to restore my emotional balance. I have never sought contact with JMCD since the split. The spelling and grammatical errors are all in the original]

[Her Pathetic Barb]

May 16 1965

‘A honest woman’ were the words
I heard you say so long ago
To make it legal was your plan
I remember it, I loved you so.

May the 16th was that day
Twentynine years ago
A lot has happened since that time
But still I love you so.

For another ‘your heart skipped a beat’
Not so long ago
‘A bond was formed’ you hoped ‘never to part’
But your boring wife loved you so.

You ‘never lived for constancy’
Said not so long ago
But our marriage is still strong
Because I love you so.

There are so many things you own
Some bought so long ago
You cherish them and will not part
Because you love them so.

I hope one day to be like them
We did meet long ago
I so want to belong to you
Because I love you so.

May 10 1994

She is a ROTTER.
I don’t think much of her
From me she stole
Which was not nice at all

Me, YOU did deceive
That I find hard to believe
It was not very kind
And I think I DO mind.

This is not very fair
Because now I do know you care
You will want to know why
I am making you cry

But I must get it out
Inside it will sprout
Making me more suspicious
And even possibly malicious

She is a ROTTER
I don’t think much of her
From me she stole
And left a bruised soul.

Men tend to think that the only way to show love is physical. So you feel you have done nothing wrong.

Women tend to be woo’ed with the written and spoken word and little presents and P.C.s [the reference is to an Apple Mac laptop he bought for me in London during our final weekend. He had already made up his mind that he would end our relationship, but did not inform me until the Monday once he had put a safe distance between us in L]. That is as much ‘making love’ to us. She took that from you – so the ‘friendship’ hurts me so much.

The fact that you feel you did nothing wrong is therefore unsettling for me, because it means you can have these ‘friendships’ more often. I think I am jealous.

She had an unfair advantage. I was raising 4 children [in reality, the children were packed off as boarders to Gordonstoun as early as possible] in a large and difficult to run house and garden, leaving me little energy to be as fascination as she was.

I hate her for what she took and had with you. But my poem helps! She is a rotter!

Time does heal, but I will remain vulnerable for a while especially as secrets were involved – originally used to avoid hurting me, but now when I am vulnerable I wonder how many more white lies there are.

I do know you love me. I have no worries about our marriage – I’m just explaing why I think I am behaving the way I am.

I tried to like her [we never met], because you obviously did, but I can’t. Jelousy is funny – I hate her. I chant my poem in my head. That helps!!

[1994]

“I could murder a cup of tea,” she would say, heading for the kitchen. “The house of the ever boiling kettle” as my then boyfriend dubbed it. Tea for welcome. Rich Tea, Digestive, custard creams. Tea for comfort, tea for study. Tea for contemplation. Tea with three Hermesetas and two sugars for my Dad. Tea with a thimbleful of milk and no sugar for my Mum. Instant coffee for my brother, though now he’s graduated to filter, infected by my continental tastes. Amongst the sodden crusts and bacon rinds on the draining board with yesterday’s midnight cigarette butt stands the cafetière, gleaming, clogged with grounds. Lyon’s medium blend in a battered packet with tokens to collect and send off in an envelope with a postal order to cover postage and packing. He shares the flat with Val. Her flat. Unauthorised sub-letting on the first floor of a housing association building. A hand-me-down unit with snapshots in plastic frames of cousins and illegitimate babies grinning, dribbling, unkempt, gravy-stained in endless sunshine. Bookshelves with no books. The inevitable two-bar heater. Unwashed socks stuffed half way down the back of the sofa. Ashtrays of glass and metal, a mannequin piss dispensing a solidified stream that would not extinguish a match. Bottle openers and guitar plectrums. Records and a ghetto-blaster (without CD player). Glum, unlaced Doc Martens beneath a poster of Loch Tummel. A bedroom with walls painted black and a sheep’s skull with a bulb behind the eye sockets – a stale, crumpled duvet and well-trodden biscuit crumbs – view to the warehouses and pavements and orange street lights that flicker on at sunset. You can hear the neighbours rowing or partying. The cars driving into the tarmacked courtyard. Autumn is coming – put more coins in the electric meter – don’t waste the hot water, we can’t afford to switch the immersion on during the day. Val is a swimmer who has earned every award for endurance, distance and lifesaving. She enjoys plain food with no trimmings. H.P. sauce is too exotic. Mince and tatties, fried egg rolls and chips. None of us understand how she puts up with him. Now he’s having an affair and she doesn’t know.

When they came to [Waffle Central] for the first time, she impressed upon him the need to exercise self-restraint when irritated by the ignorance of others: “Dinnae ye batter naebody”. He had combed down his Mohican specially, but the combat jacket and slashed jeans were a dead giveaway. On arrival at Central Station a mob of adolescent Turks jeered and spat at them until the full fury of Val was unleashed upon them. Throwing down the overstuffed canvas travel bags with a vehemence that ruptured the delicate insides of the thermos, she challenged them: “I’ll tak’ yeez on, ye wee bastards!” They fled in astonishment. It was she who dredged up enough school French to keep them fed in their wanderings, she who tracked down the cheapest postcards amongst the display stands.

I took them to Pablo’s for an evening meal. A pleasant, run-of-the-mill painted wooden parrot and Corona joint, fans rotating endlessly from the ceiling like misplaced propellers, striped sombreros slumped on the sill behind the bar. A mid-price, generous portion place where they let you talk when the glasses were drained and the bill had already been paid. To them it was the giddiest opulence, the finest food: R even ate the salad.

Glossy leaves and disinfectant, windowsill cats and no entry signs. The ice cream van has departed, having sold no cones or tubs, 9.15 p.m. not being a commercially sound proposition in the September darkness. Not that G’s enthusiasm has dwindled. Summoned by the chimes, he climbs eagerly to watch the obstinate vehicle pause by the kerb. Does the driver spot him and hope for a wearing down of parental resistance? Our ice cream vans came far earlier in the days when the street was still populated by children. Crisps, lollipops (“Kojaks”), bubblegum, sherbet fountains, chocolate, even cigarettes (candy and tobacco varieties, insidious encouragement to the pure-lunged infants). Wait your turn in the queue to spend the last of your pocket money. Gobstoppers. Penny chews. Highland toffee.
A bluebottle buzzes around the study, bashing against the walls in a frenzy of aimlessness. Gormlessness. I’ll find it in a month or so, on its back, legs curled, behind one of the cardboard boxes stuffed with notes I’ve never re-read: the history of Schleswig-Holstein. The pipes are noisy in this flat. At first I thought an intruder had stopped to wash his hands before the foul deed, then, eyes rolling, eased back into slumber. A jet now trembles the window panes. Where is it going? Beyond the garages a naked bulb illuminates a neighbour’s wardrobe. Statutory net curtains do not disappoint the prying curiosity of an evening. Less eventful than a Hitchcock plot, no one lowers a shivering pooch in a basket. No one throws down a gauntlet to the world with smooth-chested nudity or waves as a rebuttal. The balconies are empty, the washing gathered in to fend off the dampness in the air, the parasols redundant in the moonlight. Up early tomorrow to coax my son to school.

[To Gy, December 1997]

The train journey to Edinburgh from P was fairly uneventful. It was a calm morning, the great cranes silhouetted against the golden skies merged into the golden ripple of the sea. Frost covered the roof-slates and highlighted the patterns carved into the wooden panels on the Victorian station buildings. From Markinch the seat next to me was taken by a sullen woman in her early fifties with the obligatory uniform of trainers, track suit bottoms, Barbour jacket and the close-cropped curly hair that defines her as upper middle-class “country set”, the type who could easily afford to travel first class, but are too stingy to do so, preferring instead to communicate their disapproval of the remainder of humanity whilst travelling beside them instead. She buried herself in a large-format tabloid whilst I continued to muse on p.299 [of Hannah Arendt's The Origins of Totalitarianism] and our disillusionment concerning who is actually qualified to determine what is good for us.

It was to be a day of nostalgia, a service in the cause of friendship with JD, who is setting foot in Scotland for the first time in five years. In spite of a tentative arrangement for her to stay in P with me, she decided to spend the available five days with her sole living relative, her brother, Clifford, sampling the delights of his pet shop in Greenock, furiously marking essays produced by her pupils to remind herself that she has a life elsewhere and is no longer bound body and soul to the Auld Country. She carries her red folder everywhere with her as a talisman.

We met in Waverley Station. The first port of call was to be Salisbury Green House, part of Pollock Halls of residence, where she spent her days at university. A substantial proportion of all graduates of Edinburgh resided there for at least a year, but I was an exception, living in a flat in the genteel surroundings of Marchmont, perhaps ten minutes’ walk from the university through the Meadows, a park that has more recently become notorious for the spate of murders committed there, the victims almost invariably being students returning home late and not entirely sober. Apart from the main path which is lined on both sides by mighty elms and incorporates a bicycle lane, there are three smaller paths flanked by cherry trees and it is usually here that criminals strike, opportunistically, I would imagine. What has always made the walk sinister in the hours of darkness is not that the park is deserted, nor that it is isolated, for one of the city’s main hospitals is situated at one end, whilst, from the walks, the main road is visible at all times, rather it is the feeling of absolute exposure and vulnerability created by the lighting arrangements. Between each pair of trees is a powerful streetlamp. Apart from these, there is no other lighting for the playing fields which the paths traverse. The result is that, whilst on the path, you are blinded by the bright orange arcs. You cannot see if anyone is lurking on the grass expanses, nor can you determine whether anyone is waiting to lunge at you from behind one of the tree trunks. Potential attackers, on the contrary, are hereby afforded every possible advantage. You are lit up, plain for all to see.

Above the front entrance of Salisbury House, originally a merchants’ dwelling, extended over the years with a new wing and Gothic features added when they were all the rage, the inscription reads: “For every house is builded by some man. But He that built all things is God”, a typically stern Scottish admonition to the inhabitants not to forget their temporary occupancy of the mortal sphere.

From there, we proceeded to the campus, the David Hume Tower, William Robertson Building and Teviot Row (where we would queue every lunchtime for the school-dinner-style meals consisting of overcooked vegetables unceremoniously slapped onto undecorated, chipped plates), then on by Greyfriar’s Bobby to the Royal Mile and along Princes’ Street to the New Town, studiously avoiding Polwarth, where I visited her to sip hot chocolate in the living-room with its bay windows and sink with her into the sprawl of the beanbags, kissing her pale neck through the tangle of her hair.

I had over an hour and a half to wait for my train back, as I had heeded her request to see her off on the platform. She waved as the train pulled away, having kept her eyes firmly fixed on the clock that coldly counted down the final seconds. Thankfully, though, I managed to find out where the Scotrail bound for Inverness was due to depart from and was the first to board the train. It quickly filled up with disgruntled passengers whose attempts to arrive at Inverness by the early afternoon had been well and truly thwarted by an accident on the line in England already and the failure of the relevant company to provide meals as compensation as well as ensuring a swift onward connection. I had acquired two carrier bags full of books in the meantime, which I strategically placed on the seat next to me to avoid disturbance. It might have worked, but for the festive season’s magnetic effect that draws the cast-offs of England northwards to bask in the whisky-induced glow of our sentimentality and the myth of couthy Hogmanays past. My compartment companions swapped tales of the perils of their almost abandoned journey. I gave up leafing through one of my new purchases which criticises Bourdieu along remarkably similar lines to what I recently sent, though my vague uneasiness is expressed more clearly by the American professor (who calls him “the last Marxist”, ah, untainted and blissfully innocent am I, who still knows next to nothing about what old Karl preached and cares even less, though I am aware that this interlude in my life cannot last forever if I am to understand anything of what happened in Hungary post-1945). I was both comforted and depressed, since said professor bandies about almost every sociological term and school of thought thus far invented to flaunt his erudition. On the one hand it proves that my critical faculties are not so blunt that I cannot compete, whilst, on the other, it shows that I have not yet reached a stage at which I can produce a truly inventive argument. Sigh. So, I rummaged about in the depths of my handbag for Hannah and, no sooner had I become oblivious to the view of the Bank of Scotland building and the tree donated by the eternally grateful citizens of Norway, than I was hauled back into the immediacy of my surroundings by a gruff, English voice: “Mind if I sit here, love?” I did not pay him the courtesy of looking at him, merely reached for the neglected remnants of the day’s plunder and let him join me, having glanced around to ensure it really WAS the last available place.

The train jolted into motion. I was on the wrong side for the Scott monument in its semi-decayed, floodlit splendour and had no wish to converse, having already sacrificed a day’s study for J.

Shortly after Haymarket, the buffet trolley made its first trip down the aisle. My neighbour stopped it, asking for three cans of Lager, having been informed that Guinness was not available. My dismay turned to mild amusement when he enquired about hotels in Inverness. The trolley-attendant asked whether he had a booking, to which he replied that he did not, that he had never been to Inverness before and then wanted to pick her brains about whether there was a taxi rank near the station. She could offer little help, but this did not dampen his cheerfulness. He was up for a real Scottish Hogmanay and it was evident that he had the money to enjoy it, judging by the wad of £20 notes he fished out of his pocket to pay for his booze. From the corner of my eye I could see enough for an initial appraisal: he was in his late thirties, with a beard and a moustache, dressed in a black leather jacket, pale and slim and was without luggage, not carrying even so much as a sports bag. He did not resemble your average lager-lout, though his behaviour verged on the obnoxious. It was not until later that I realised that his problem was not simple anti-social leanings or misogyny, but insanity.

With a loud sigh of anticipation, he wrenched the ring off the can, hastily pouring the contents, prime McEwan’s Export into the plastic cup provided. Too hastily. To his delight, it began to froth over the edge, spilling over the already filthy pull-down tray. He mopped it up with the help of the trolley attendant. Between greedy gulps and the burps that followed them, unexcused, he giggled at a grubby paperback he had retrieved from an inside pocket. It did not look like a novel. Indeed, it looked suspiciously like an academic textbook. I could not restrain myself and, waiting until he was engrossed in the task of pouring some more alcohol on a swaying bend, stole a look at the title. It was by Ayer: “The Foundations of Empirical Knowledge”. I had, however, been caught out. He grinned: “Does this train stop in St. Andrews?” I blushed. “Not as far as I know. I think it is the train to Aberdeen that stops there. You can change on the way back to Edinburgh and see it then, but the town is nowhere near the station, which is in the middle of a field and quite a distance away.”
“Do I have to take a taxi then?”
“No, you can take a bus.”
“I want to have a look at the university. I haven’t done Edinburgh yet and I want to do the one in Inverness.”
“I don’t think there is a university in Inverness, unless they have upgraded an old polytechnic under the new rules. You might be getting it mixed up with Aberdeen, which is one of the oldest universities in Scotland.”
“Yes, I must go there too. I am travelling around all the universities in Britain, starting on the East coast in Scotland, but I have already been to all the universities in England.”
“That is quite unusual. Why are you doing that?”
“That’s a very long story. Why do we do anything?”
[I never did find out why, in spite of repeating the question several times].
He paused for a swig of beer.
“I am also going round all the psychiatric hospitals in Britain,” he laughed, “My occupational therapist thought it would be a good idea for me to give my Mum a break for a while. I had to come here, as I am part Irish and part Welsh. Did you hear about that man who was sleeping in a field in Ireland? The Celtic blood! They shot him in the head, you know.”
“At least he wouldn’t have suffered, he wouldn’t have known anything about it. Tell me, what is so funny about Ayers’ book, what makes you laugh at something called “The Foundations of Empirical Knowledge”?”
“Of course, you know, Ayers was a Jew. He was in the British secret service and he was over in France. He was caught with two colleagues, but thankfully they didn’t blow the gaffe about him being Jewish. I’m Jewish, you know. After that, I kept seeing people with big noses. I wrote to him, to Ayers, before he passed away a couple of years ago. I wrote that I was Professor of Philosophy at Cornwall and that I would like him to send me a signed copy of his most recent book. He never replied.”

By then, my fellow-traveller had drained the dregs of his second can.

“My mother lives in Nottingham. During the war, she was bombed. A bomb hit the garden and all the windows were smashed. She told me that what has always haunted her was the idea that someone wanted to kill her. She couldn’t deal with that.”
“Yes, but it was nothing personal, it was just the strategy…”
“Total war,” he interrupted.
“Yes, total war, wiping out as many civilians as possible to sap the country of morale. She ought to think of it in those terms.”

We drifted back on to the subject of universities. He had apparently embarked on a degree twice, but never gone beyond the end of the first year because of “becoming episodic”. What fascinated and exhausted me about chatting with him was not the complete openness and trust in a total stranger, but his complete inability to concentrate on one subject for more than a paragraph at a stretch, his restless straying on to new ground with a ceaseless stream of non-sequitors. He was extremely well-read and gave the impression of being too fragile for his own brightness. Nothing seemed beyond him. He too is a Hume fan. He recommended that I read: “Against Empiricism” by Holland of Leeds, although he found it predictable and unexciting. Particularly the chapter on suicide. In turn, I suggested he read Durkheim, “Forms” as well as “Suicide”, so that he could grasp the social component of everything we experience. We discussed what it is like to want to “jack yourself in”. I confessed the wild exhilaration I felt after stabbing myself. He has tried to end it all on more than one occasion, but, “after I was introduced to hallucinogenic drugs, and this was before I had them for therapeutic purposes I realised that you can’t do it or you won’t go to heaven.” A voice in his head had told him. For this, I teased him mercilessly: “You don’t believe in that, do you? You probably believe in reincarnation as well, do you?”
Surprise, surprise, he did. He had even been a Pentecostal. I stated my lack of such convictions bluntly: there is no life after death and, in life, there is no justice.

He sought reassurance that he would be safe once he arrived in Inverness.
“I only have this,” he said, showing me his bank card, “You swipe it and everything is paid for.” It is from this confidence that I know his name, J. Davies. Without a credit card, I did not rate his chances, so I changed the subject: “If it’s drink you’re after, you’ve come to the right place.”
“That’s it, lass, drink, drink, drink, cheers,” and he staggered off to the toilet.

When he returned, we were drawing near to P, so I put on my coat, regretting not having begun to speak to him earlier.
“At the school I went to, all the children were gifted, you know, reading “The Lord of the Rings” aged 11, that kind of thing. I was way out of place there.”
“Oh come on,” I retorted, “don’t do yourself down, it is as much a question of their background as anything else. If they came from an educated, cosy little middle-class family, they were probably encouraged to read such books at an earlier age than someone brought up by parents whose cultural vistas did not stretch beyond “The Beatles”.”
He grinned: “You’re the born sceptic. It all comes down to your mother in the end, doesn’t it? I keep telling my psychiatrist that red is for mother, but he refuses to understand it, he just cannot see it at all. My friends sat me down and told me that what my mother wants is for me to have children, but I don’t think it’s easy to have children.”
“Red is an eminently sensible colour for mothers, the colour of menstrual blood, the colour of birth blood, of passion. It is the easiest thing in the world to have children, it’s just what you do with them afterwards that isn’t quite so simple.”
We were already entering the station.
“My girlfriend, wherever she is, is covered in red spots, they are all over her skin and, since I have no medical knowledge, I haven’t a clue what’s wrong with her, I don’t have a name for it. Do you know what it might be?”
“Could be a form of eczema, but I don’t know either.”
“Yes,” he insisted, “but it’s so strange, it’s everywhere.”
“I have to go.”
“Take care, then and don’t go doing yourself in, bye.”

I am sure the other passengers were relieved. Occasionally, their heads would turn when we roared with laughter and the graphic descriptions of self-mutilation and drug taking must have disturbed them. Our conversation had been lively, animated and punctuated by rich language as well as his many conspiratorial nudges. He claims to have met many friends on the course of his wanderings and I believe him. He was deeply sympathetic, without the remotest trace of arrogance. I hope that someone takes pity on him in the spartan wastes of the north.

[To Gy, 28th March, 1997]

God and the Decline in Moral Standards

Being a Tragi-comedy in 5 acts.

Prologue in Heaven.

God (in a four poster bed with the curtains drawn): ZZZZZZ.

Archangel Gabriel (enters the Inner Sanctum with a cup of tea): Honestly, these feathers will be the fall from grace of me! In choir practise, just when I was getting enthusiastic about conducting the heavenly chorus, it’s a big day tomorrow, you know, Easter, we have to be in good voice or it’ll all end in tears, well, I was trying out a flourish when one of my flight feathers came loose and off it went, up a seraphim’s nostril and achoo!, scores blown right off the stands, chaos, disharmony, I ask you, it’s too much for me these days. Still, mustn’t let this get cold. (He clears his throat). Oh Ancient of Days, Lord of Hosts…

God: ZZZZZ.

Gabriel: …may it please You in Your infinite wisdom and divine grace to bestow Your kindness upon me and receive this most humble offering from the kitchen, brew of specially selected, carefully blended minced leaves, lovingly mixed with the waters of eternal life…

God: ZZZZZ.

Gabriel: Oh God Almighty, wake up and pour this down Your gullet!

God (with a start): What was that?

Gabriel (opens the curtains, bows low): Your Majesty, your morning cuppa.

God: Thank you. Is it really morning already?

Gabriel: As surely as You ordained it, so shall it be, forever and ever, Amen.

God: Well, quite. Never mind all that. What’s on my schedule today? Anything in my in-tray?

Gabriel: Let me see, I have a list. No rest for the Virtuous. We have assorted incidents of blasphemy. A carpenter struck his thumb with a hammer and took Thy Name in vain. Then there was the prostitute who called upon You in flagrante delicto. I think she was rather surprised, actually, she wasn’t expecting to be so turned on by her client. Then there was…

God: Yes, yes, the usual petty breaches. Anything that requires more serious retribution?

Gabriel: An outbreak of idolatry, sporadic cases of bestiality, Temple sackings and pillagings…

God: Routine. They don’t get much more imaginative, do they? What about my in-tray then?

Gabriel: There’s another poem from David, oh Fountain of Grace and Compassion.

God (sighs): What’s the old rogue been up to now? Eyeing up someone else’s lawful wedded, no doubt. Let’s hear it.

Gabriel: Judging by the tone, I’d say he’d done more than just eye her up. Here we go:

Merciful Father, incline Thy ear towards me, for I have sinned against Thee and my bones are weary. Veritably, my body is covered in sores that ooze foul puss so that my brothers shun me. Tears are my bread and the light of the desert sun does not warm me. I am an outcast and shall know no rest until Thou doth forgive me. Thy chastisements are just, but I implore Thee to remember that we are as the blossom on the branches of the trees, our beauty is brief and we fade. Our lifetimes are but a moment to You, our splendour futile and transitory, whilst Thy Glory continues forever. Hear me, oh Lord, forgive Thy servant who has built Thee a house, the envy of the world.

God: There must be some fellatio in there somewhere, or maybe that brat Jonathan has been batting his eyelids at him again, why don’t we take a look? (God gestures and we see the royal palace with David reclining on a couch, sipping a goblet of wine). Let’s hear what he’s thinking, shall we?

David (still sipping wine): Bloody cow, she said she wasn’t a pro. I thought she fancied me, too, what with my legendary experience, my fabulous wealth, and now I’ve gone and got the clap. Stick to your own wives. That smug old physician, it’s all right for him, he’s well past it. And what about that foul potion he’s asked me to drink? Surely the Old Bloke will let me off again. I am the apple of his eye, glossy on the outside, rotten to the core. Surely He liked that verse I penned Him? It’s bound to become a classic, Thy rod and Thy staff and all that schmaltz. Hey, You Old Codger, have You gone deaf, where are You? I know I’ve been a naughty boy, but there’s no need to sulk. Aren’t You satisfied with that pile I had constructed for Your precious Ark? Oi!

God: That young man certainly has a way with words, well, I reckon he should be made to sweat it out a little longer. I feel much more awake now, fighting fit and ready to take on the cosmos, funny that, eh? The tea was lovely. How was choir practise?

Gabriel (stammers): Funny You should mention that. Another cup of tea, perhaps, or something stronger?

Act One. A wee while later. Oh, how marvellous to take liberties with time and space, verily I say unto thee, the writer’s vocation is a liberating one! Obligatory crowd scene. Heaven. Audience chamber. God on a rather fabulous throne supported by a winged lion, an eagle, a winged bull and a handsome male figure in a medieval gown. God frowns, arms folded, surveying the crowd that has gathered before Him. They are bickering.

God: Well, what have you got to say for yourselves, then?

(A tall, athletic man in Greek garb steps forward, straightening the crown of laurels fashioned from gold that adorns his fair brow). Zeus: I don’t need an introduction, you know fine who I am. On behalf of my fellow Olympians, my offspring, I wish to protest, and if you want to step outside with me for a moment, we can settle it with a thunderbolt contest, best of three, wouldn’t you say that was a reasonable course of action? We were just starting to enjoy ourselves, we’d moved to other climes, changed our names so the locals would be more amenable to us, we’d had a few blind poets sing our praises, a real hit it was too, a really neat way of creating the world in our anthropomorphic image and then that rabble had to come along. First it was Mithras, then it was that shower and then you and your cuckold barging into the limelight. What’s so original about knocking up a human female anyway? I was doing it way before that sandalled upstart came along! And with much more style. I was a swan, a bull, a shower of gold, and what were you? You never even bothered to seduce her! You and your mortification of the flesh. Poor girl, one minute she’s minding her own business, taking a little breather in the garden and the next thing she knows some messenger is telling her she’s up the stick and she hadn’t noticed. You didn’t have the nerve to tell her face to face. Well, whatever faults I had, at least I gave them a good time. And as for the youngster, what a fashion victim! Doesn’t even have enough imagination to invent his own footwear! We were big, we were prime time and you pulled the plug on us when our ratings were good!

God: Next!

An English gentleman, timidly: Oh dear, if I have caused offence, I’m terribly sorry, but I had to publish that paper, and, actually, I’m rather glad that I did, it made me terribly famous. This seven days business. It simply doesn’t make sense. It cannot be verified by empirical observation. In a rational age, who can believe in it? If I hadn’t measured those beaks and watched how species adapt to fit in with their surroundings, someone else would have. The end result would have been the same. If you didn’t want us to arrive at that conclusion, why did you endow us with the faculty of reason in the first place? Why did you leave such obvious clues? Why the primates? Sorry, old chap, don’t let it upset you. In ideas as much as in life it’s the survival of the fittest and your days were numbered. Can’t be helped. Chin up, there’s a good man. Someone will always put their faith in you; you’ll never be quite redundant.

God (blowing His nose in a handkerchief, attempting to conceal His embarrassment): You over there in the corner! Yes, you.

Figure huddled, rocking, turns: You leave me out of this. Don’t you try to talk to me, you’re dead and I won’t be having any of it!

God (having recovered His composure): Anyone else?

Karl: Yes, me! You ought to be locked up, consigned to the scrapheap of history. You’re nothing but a drug-dealer, the people have been high on you for far too long, distracting them from the truth, it’s irresponsible, reprehensible! You are an enemy of the people. You warp their minds with your false consciousness telling them everything will be better in the life to come. Well, look at this place, is this what they died for? Never mind this figment of the imagination, what we need is to stir the passions against the true evil, capitalism, the bourgeoisie!

At this juncture, a diminutive man in a uniform and a neatly trimmed moustache pulls out a revolver and fires it in the air: Gott im Himmel!

God: You called?

The dictator: Silence! I have had my fill of all this talk from you Jewish intellectuals. I thought I had had done with your filthy Red propaganda when I had my bonfires. Line up, over there, move! Nothing shall stand in the way of my Thousand-Year Empire, if I have to sacrifice the lives of all my underlings! Well, what are you waiting for? (He turns to God). Get off that ridiculous chair, Schweinhund, and line up with the rest of them!

God: Are you addressing me, by any chance?

The dictator, menacingly: Yes, you, you despicable product of Jewish fantasy, get over there with the rest of your degenerate race. I shall purge the world of your conspiracy once and for all.

God: If that’s how you feel, I think it’s time for me to bid you farewell. You can sort yourselves out if you don’t need me. See how you get on without me. Fuck this for a laugh, you ungrateful shower. Deus exeunt machina! (He dematerialises. After a second’s pause, anarchy breaks loose, with Karl lunging for the dictator. Shots are fired. The cast scatter. More blood than your average Shakespearian tragedy. In the midst of this, the curtain sedately drops).

Act 2. Earth. The present. A flat in Buda. The bedroom. Sparsely furnished, the rag that passes for a curtain shutting out as much of the daylight as possible. A movement beneath the duvet as the occupants of the bed embrace. Who can tell whether their closeness springs from a mutual passion or whether it is merely the most pleasant way of avoiding hypothermia?

[Chameleon]: Run that one past me again, would you, darling?

Emile: Mon petit chou, cherie, I know I am French, but I do not think I have the energy. Still… (he pulls her even closer towards him. She giggles). Mais quoi alors? Qu’est-ce qu’il-y-a? Darling, you have such beautiful eyes, green like a soggy hillside in the spring rain, your breasts…

[Chameleon]: No, darling, not that, tell me about God.

Emile (huffily): If you insist. You English are not very good at the theory, are you?

[Chameleon]: Emile, how could you? Take that back at once, otherwise I’ll have you copy out the text of the Declaration of Arbroath 500 times!

Emile (grinning): I knew I could make you screech. (Kisses her on the forehead). Darling, you know that God is society. Religious forces are human forces, moral forces. Probably because collective feelings become conscious of themselves only by settling upon external objects, those very forces could not organise themselves without taking some of their traits from things…Not bad, eh, cherie? Cherie, what’s wrong? Have you fallen asleep?

[Chameleon]: I love it when you talk dirty to me. Come here, you old devil…

And the light fades discretely. Meanwhile, in a parallel thought universe, God, Samsonite traveller bag in hand, wearily stares up at the pink flashing neon sign of the establishment in front of Him. He is wearing a shabby raincoat and a pair of Ray Bans so that no-one will recognise Him. For the less attentive among you, this is Act 3, OK?

God (muttering): Hmph! Marginally better than a stable and manger, but then, I am older than the tyke. (He wipes His shoes on the back of His trouser legs for that added shine of confidence and heads for the lobby. At the reception desk, a young man stands, peering into a mirror, combing back his hair. He pays not the slightest attention to the new arrival, so engrossed in his preening ritual is he. God turns to contemplate His surroundings. After all, He does believe that patience is a virtue…The walls are festooned with portraits and photographs, so much so that barely an inch remains uncovered. Beneath the largest of them monogrammed candles drip away their substance, peacefully, concealing the letters, EP. His curiosity aroused, God crosses to an alabaster font. It is filled with brown liquid. He dips in a finger cautiously, withdraws it and is about to taste the drop He has salvaged when a shout from the young man startles Him).

Receptionist (vaulting over the counter): Don’t do that! Don’t you know it’s sacrilege to drink Holy Cola?

God: Sorry, I had no idea, I just wanted to see what it was.

Receptionist: You’re not from round here, are you? (Frowns, looking God up and down). What a way to dress! Where are your jeans, where is your leather jacket? Why, I’ll bet you don’t even have regulation celebratory gowns in your suitcase, tut, tut.

God (stammers): I confess that I am not familiar with the customs in these parts, but, if you would be so kind as to give me a helping hand, I’m sure we can avoid any faux pas in the future.

Receptionist: Huh?

God: I had to leave home in a hurry, so I didn’t have time to pack everything I needed. What are the house rules?

Receptionist: Are you checking in? (God nods resignedly, whereupon the young man produces a microphone and some two dozen teenage girls in tight tops and loose skirts come rushing in). Let’s rock, babes! Welcome to Heartbreak Hotel, home of the one true King, blessed be His Pelvis (the girls scream as the receptionist rotates his hips suggestively), may your stay here be sweet! Here are the house rules: number one, don’t step on my blue suede shoes! Two: hair must be worn thus (a voluptuous blonde hands him a comb so that he can slick his locks back for the umpteenth time). Three: compulsory exercise classes take place after breakfast so you can swivel with the best of them (the girls plant lipstick kisses all over his cheeks), and, finally, if you want to visit our quality restaurant for refreshment for the body and the soul – our burgers are priced very competitively and are prepared according to the King’s own favourite recipe – please note that contour-hugging white satin is de rigeur…(the girls gasp at the authentic twang to the foreign words. The receptionist curls his lips in a half-sneer. One girl faints). It’s the spirit, man. On the music channel you can listen to the greatest hits 24 hours a day, I’d never miss “Wooden Heart” myself, and on the TV you can watch all the Gospels, up to the Final Concert. (A moment’s reverential solemnity ensues). If you have enjoyed this presentation, you may show your appreciation now. (He holds out a hand. God rummages through His pockets to no avail).

God: What is the local currency?

Receptionist (in disbelief): Why, the Elvis, of course (crosses himself at the mention of the Sacred Name).

God: Will this do? (offers him an American Express Triple Platinum Buttlick Card, gilt-edged, accepted anywhere with extreme obsequiousness, God being a seasoned traveller throughout several dimensions).

Receptionist: Nicely, y’all. (The girls crowd round God, one on either side linking His arms).

Girls (in unison): If there is anything we can do to make your stay more pleasant…

God (embarrassed, thinks): Women, why did I bother…?

Act 4. Mood swing. Pitch black, not a thing to be seen. The Void.

Monologue: I am cold. The stars have been extinguished, but were their kind light to shine upon me, what good would it do? It would not comfort me. What could it do but reveal the depth of my loneliness? What could it do but mock me with the memory of what I have lost? I am blind. My senses have failed me. Sometimes, from a great distance, I am tormented by an echo of laughter and I weep the bitter tears of my exile. Dimly, like the final gutterings of a candle’s stump, an image flickers. The city, the river, primary colours, ribbons of commemoration, a lawn bordered with pansies, children somersaulting, tumbling, burgundy wine, my blood spreading in the water. How I prayed that dawn would not come, that I would not be cast out from his presence, that I could rest a little longer in his arms, that his warmth would banish this ice from my breath, that I might be worthy of his mercy. But, fool that I was, I drove him from me and I was left to wander, to wander, the dust stinging my eyes as the wrath of the storm buffeted against me. And I stood on the bridge, staring at the sullen eddies and swirls of the dark water. Did I hear you call me? Did you call me back from the parapet, bid me climb down? Those whom I love reject me and there is none who loves me. How could I worship another God when you were there before me? When I could taste you, when you were close to me? How could I worship a God who became a man to suffer the pangs of need yet who overcame them? Who was reviled and destroyed that we might admire Him for sloughing off a mortal frame to ascend to bliss eternal. How could I admire such a God who sacrificed something of no value, who laid down what is hateful and full of suffering, the joyless hours, the endless joyless hours…? Where is His virtue, what could commend Him to me? In that city I once looked down from the castle and the smile that played across my lips was for another. Deaf to everything but my own disbelief, I heard not a word that he said to me, so possessed by grief at what I knew was a betrayal. What of it now? Consigned to this dark place, what of it now? My lover’s touch was all that I craved, his eloquence my desire. “I am not your god,” he told me. “There is no god” he repeated as the dusk drew near. My lover’s complexion is pale, yet he is strong. His lips are cold. Beloved, I gazed into your eyes and saw no reflection, only the darkness of my own soul. Have mercy on me, have mercy, for even in your embrace I am alone.

Act 5. A cramped room full of lit mirrors and spartan seats. Tubes of face cream, half-squeezed, lipstick and clouds of talcum from the many powder puffs. A man of slight build and flamboyant dress (waistcoat patterned with printed daffodils, massive bow tie, black leather trousers) flits about nervously. God sits morosely, white plastic gown protecting His clothes.

Make-up Artiste (note the “e” on the end of the word, dear reader, it is a status marker. No mere slap-it-on and smear it, this. Living transformation, purveyor of metamorphosis, from the unastonishing to the camera-dazzling in a few painstaking stages): Just LOOK at that hair, what IS a man to do?! (Fingers a lock with an obvious blend of fascination and despair). I don’t believe I have seen such neglect in all my born days. Dry, dry, dry. Have you never heard of conditioner? And as for this beard, well, a trim is in order, young client. Straggle, straggle, we can’t have this unevenness. You want them to sit up and take notice. He may be an antique, but he’s still sexy. Trust me and I’ll have them clamouring for your number as soon as you go off air. Well, what do you say?

God: Hmmmph. (Shrugs).

Artiste: We are the strong silent type, aren’t we? I’ll take that as a “yes”. Let’s get you washed, then…

(Location switch to TV studio. Tension mounts amongst the live audience as they are coached on when to laugh – a card with the word “LAUGH” printed on it is held up, and when to applaud – a card marked “APPLAUD NOW”. Two minutes to air time. In the wings we have the host, Bob Smoothbottom in his Armani suit. A luscious floor executive – who also happens to be his mistress, though this amount of detail is entirely extraneous and this is the last we shall hear of her, except to note that she wasn’t doing it for her career, she actually genuinely admired him, always the worst possible scenario – checks for creases and fluff. God clears His throat as the Artiste fixes his mike and stands back to gaze on his handiwork. He glows with satisfaction. Indeed, even God is rather pleased with the result, though He’d never admit it. His hair has been tied back in a long ponytail a-la-Sean-Connery, His beard neat rather than tangled; He is in casual wear, a thin polo-necked jersey and tweed jacket with trousers in natural fibre. The artiste, who had scuttled off for a moment returns with a pink carnation and inserts it into God’s buttonhole. God grins. Emboldened, the Artiste plucks a card from his pocket, hastily scribbling a number on the back.

Artiste: That’s my private number (nudges God). If you ever fancy a bit of….

(He is pushed aside brusquely by the Senator surrounded by his entourage of sycophants and image-makers).

Aide: Now, sir, if you have any difficulties remembering the speech, never fear, with this earpiece we can prompt you at any distance. Martha here will be keeping close track of the debate and we have our team of repartee experts on hand. Sock it to them, sir. (The senator nods, dumbly).

Producer: T minus ten and counting. Bob, you ready for your cue? (From the studio, frantic applause). GO! (Clutching his clipboard, Bob assumes a broad grin and saunters off into the glare of attention).

Bob: (settling into his plush armchair). Thank you, thank you, I’m touched. Welcome to tonight’s show. I’m your host, Bob Smoothbottom and you will join me, I hope for the next hour for our thought-provoking chat on the future of organised worship in this country. My guests are Senator Butt Addlebrains from Virginia and someone we are very honoured to have in our midst, something of a first in broadcasting history indeed. To find out who, stay tuned, we’ll be back after these messages.

Voiceover: Yes, stay with us for this special extended edition of “Who gives a Toss, anyway?”

(Meanwhile, God is ushered into His seat, opposite Bob, whose grin has never faded, next to the Senator).

Bob: Welcome back. It is my great pleasure to introduce to you our special guest, the Alpha and Omega, the great big Daddy of them all, Jehovah! (”APPLAUD NOW” triggering appropriate response. Bob leans towards his guests to create an atmosphere of intimacy). Gentlemen, I’d like you both to take a look at this tape and give me your opinion on it.

(Voiceover, for the benefit of the hard of thinking in the studio: This is a farewell tape recorded by members of the UFO-obsessed sect who committed suicide en masse at the weekend. On screen we see footage shot from a circling helicopter of a villa, wedding-cake fantasy school of architecture complete with sprawling grounds and outdoor swimming pool. Cut to an emaciated, elderly, kindly looking man who has an uncanny habit of staring directly into the viewer’s eyes, unblinking. He speaks: We are but containers, vehicles. Our flesh passes away but our spirits are free to roam. As you know, the comet is making its way towards us even as I address you. In its wake our craft awaits. To escape the disasters that the heavenly body shall inflict upon this planet, we have decided to board the ship and move to our true home in the new dimension. Do not mourn for us, for we shall be free and we shall remember you in your sufferings. Mary, a word. A woman in her late forties comes into view. She smiles: For the vehicle’s offspring. You would not listen to the truth, the truth I heard that night when I listened to Doe here. I had to leave you then. My life is now complete, offspring, do not grieve. Doe: Thank you. Come to me, my children. The shot changes to show the entire group of 39. They are all identically dressed in black with close-cropped hair and they all seem blissfully happy sitting in the brilliant sunshine. Voiceover: As you can see, they were intelligent and articulate. Over the past couple of days, testimonials as to their considerate behaviour have been flooding in. They lived peacefully, abstaining from coffee, alcohol, meat and sex. Inhabitants of the town who knew them were anxious to make it known that they do not think these people were deranged or psychotic. Back to you, Bob).

Bob (attempting to inject a note of sincerity and solemnity into his voice, though the strain of the effort exposes his actual feelings as a lewd image floats past his mind’s eye at the mention of carnal congress): Thank you. Senator, what caused this tragedy in your opinion?

The Senator (intently poking at his ear): Well, Bob, if you ask me… (pauses to gather someone else’s thoughts)…it’s the decline in moral standards caused by our disdain for and rejection of traditional values. It’s not something that can be remedied overnight, it’s been building up for years, decades. I’ll bet that these people were Nam protesters, liberals, pot-smokers (a gasp from the audience, which eggs on the Senator), and now they’ve paid for it, by God (God raises an eyebrow but refrains from commenting). We’ve turned our backs on the sanctity of the home, our women go out to work, taking the jobs away from the men who should be the providers, leaving the children to wander the streets – is it any wonder there are so many abductions? – becoming promiscuous, doing as they please. And you seem surprised that everything is falling apart at the seams? Get the women out of the universities, out of the offices and back into the kitchen where they belong and get the families back into the churches. Those poor devils must have been looking for something that society had failed to give. It is our duty, our priority in the Unity Party of America to restore our traditions to their rightful place. They made this nation great, they made this nation the strongest in the world, the envy of the world and now, God help us, we can’t even enforce them at home, let alone export them. What a sorry state of affairs! (He nods, folds his arms defensively and sits back in his chair).

Bob: Strong, admonishing words there from the Senator. Let’s move on to our other guest. God, some might say that you have to bear a large part of the responsibility for these events. You are alleged to have created this entire planet in the first place. What is your reaction?

God: Bob, son, look. All I ever hear from you is complaints and requests. Give me this, give me that. Why do the good suffer and the evil prosper? Why did my hamster die? Blame, blame, blame. You make up your purification rites, I give a bit of friendly advice and guidance and let you get on with it, and what thanks do I get in return? Oppressive patriarch, unyielding old clockmaker. You fight wars in my name, you pretend that I love your countries more than all the rest, that I give my blessing to your every action, you use me as an excuse for every brand of violence and brutality and when things are not going your way, you deny my very existence. Then you wonder why you are unhappy, why it all goes down the pan and you are flushing? I did my best. I tried to make you treat each other decently. Don’t steal, don’t kill, don’t lust after your neighbour’s wife, but that was too boring, too staid for you. Go ahead, throw me out, but it won’t make you feel better. I told you so. Now, I’ve decided to go into voluntary retirement, enjoy some of the finer pursuits I invented for you. Don’t come looking for me, I’m not leaving a forwarding address. You can sort yourselves out, on your own, I’ve had enough of taking responsibility for you, it’s up to you. If you’ll excuse me, Lulu, come on down, before we vanish into the sunset, I’d like to introduce you to my little redhead. (One of the teenagers from the Heartbreak Hotel makes her way to the end of a row and steps down gingerly, beaming with happiness as she crosses the floor to her true love). We only met recently and there’s quite an age gap between us, but I had no idea what a favour I’d done you ungrateful lot when I gifted you with this capacity for emotions. I’m taking it steady, not letting myself get carried away, who knows how long it will last, and, frankly, who cares? You’re cool about it, aren’t you, honey-nectar? (She nods shyly, nestling closer to Him) That’s it, then. That’s all I have to say to you, good luck and adieu! Not au revoir, but good-bye! (He kisses Lulu and they ascend through the studio ceiling to the accompaniment of harps).

Pensioner in the audience (dabbing her eyes with a handkerchief): Reminds me of Herbert when he was young. I do love a happy ending, don’t you?

Schluss. Fin. Konnyec filma.

My Strange Reverse Career (or Decline to Grandeur? F bukása es tündöklése).

Writing about identity seems to have sparked off my own personal identity crisis. Solitude to lonliness [concepts drawn from Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism]. Confidence to despair. Arrogance to humiliation.

Two fragments. Summer evening, Scotland in the late Seventies. Craving space. Head buzzing with facts, refuge in the back garden. I’m just going out for a while. They didn’t mind. It was safer then. Half girl, half woman in body, limbs stirred by the drive for freedom. The back garden, fenced in flower beds and daisy-strewn lawn, outer perimeter of the safe and familiar world. From the bench with its peeling green paint I could look beyond the mossy slates of the council houses towards the hill with its grazing sheep and hear the melancholy toll of the school bell from beyond the crest. Trudge up there every morning, would I meet those girls who bullied me? The back garden and the silent bench. Creosoted shed for the tools, the sharp blades that disciplined the growth of the roses. Crab apple tree, lilacs. No vegetables, only a midden for the trimmings and pruning waste. I could hear the news from the living room. Every day they would return from work and sit in front of the screen, the only interruption to drink tea. For my father three Hermesetas and two sugars (before Candarel was marketed). For my mother, a spot of milk, not too much now (though she would drink it anyway). She worked from four thirty to nine every weekday, leaving us to our own devices when I was old enough to be left with my brother. The door was locked and we were to open it to no-one. So we would watch TV or hide in terror from the creakings of the house when we were not engaged in combat. Cushion fights escalated into chair pushing fights into full blown fisticuffs, but, in spite of our mutual recriminations and threats, we made always made peace before her key could be heard in the front door. My father worked night shift mostly, for the money. Warm, a gentle breeze, song thrushes and wood pigeons (before the authorities decided that tall trees were too great a hazard and had them cut down). Sunset. Entertainment from within the house. I had to move. I had to hide somewhere, feel the soil, touch the delicate bark of the ornamental shrubs. So I climbed over to our neighbour’s garden. He was a traffic warden, married to a German who still spoke with a strong accent after all these years. He employed a succession of gardeners, none of whom appeared to have any understanding of the undesirability of weeds. Hiding amongst the bushes, serenity descended like the dusk. Suddenly, the porch light went on. Though I had dressed for the occasion in dark green, I had to choke back my panic. What would they say? There would be trouble if they discovered me there. The crisis passed as quickly as it had arrived. He let the cat out. Lucky Star, a black neutered tom, who came straight to me to purr in my lap. My parents were oblivious to my absence. When I heard the back door rattling, I knew it was time to return from the damp air and the secretiveness.

I had certainty then and a destiny. It was my destiny to escape, to be different, to write. None of this I doubted for a moment. When nagged about housework or how disinterested in knitting or sewing or cooking I was, I would merely reply that I did not care about those activities because when I grew up, I would pay someone to do them for me (!). I would not marry and I certainly would not have children. I could not countenance the idea of wasting my precious efforts on looking after some incompetent male whose greatest pleasure in life would be to subordinate me. Tidy up after him, you must be joking?! Marriage was tantamount to a lobotomy and I said so and wrote so on many occasions. Ironic that according to those dim and vapid teenage notions I am living the way I always intended, yet paradise is unhappy. My contempt for all those around me, for their weakness and compromise has mellowed. The only contempt left is the contempt I have for myself for having failed so abysmally to live up to the standards I set myself. Solitude amidst sordidness was my strength. I had a battle to win.

Loneliness became my travelling companion at a later stage, when I found that my determination did not endear me to my peers who certainly did not share my hunger to flee (they came from staunchly middle class backgrounds and to my eyes were rich), whose interests did not coincide with mine. We sat together day after day. They threw paper at me, poked me with pencils, nipped me until I bruised, none of which petty acts daunted or intimidated me, merely increasing my hatred of them, bolstering my determination. It gradually dawned on me that I was good at something. My French teachers started fawning on me (which is incidentally why I don’t like French. I always scored the best marks in French, but the price I had to pay in seething hostility was not worth it), asking me in front of the others if I knew such and such. “Well, if F doesn’t know, then I don’t know who does.” Then my German teacher would consult me on vocabulary in German and in English. “You have a gift,” he would say, to which I remained mute and embarrassed. At least he had the sense not to show favouritism during class. The tools which I could use to break out of my social confines were thus given to me. I was completely isolated. My parents were very discreet. I quickly learned that to keep them in line, all I had to do was disappear upstairs to my room and study. They wouldn’t disturb me then. They never pushed me or my brother (he responded by rebelling against their rules. He is bright but squanders his talents, preferring sex and drinking and drug-taking to learning. My brother still lives at home and has confessed to me that he will bleed my parents dry as long as they live and that he won’t worry about looking for a job until they die. He has my mother on a string, which is a source of some amusement, since G is already a practised manipulator. My brother and I are of the same stuff, we understand each other thoroughly, the same hopeless excess of energy and appetite ravages us both, we simply have different strategies for channelling it), but it was obvious that they wanted us to be educated. They bought me the books I asked them for, but they could not provide any input further to that. My father left school at fourteen to work on the farm and my mother was sent to a department store in P. She had won a scholarship to the school I eventually went to (which had turned comprehensive) but her mother wanted the income she could bring and so refused to let her go, proffering the excuse that she could not afford to pay for the uniform.

There I was, reviled by my rivals, left to my own devices at home, burning with loneliness. God chanced along. God quelled my loneliness and I was ecstatic, God was there and I was liberated from this terrible aloneness. He loved me and I reciprocated unconditionally. Now the superabundance of emotion could be targeted, it would no longer turn on me like a wild beast, tearing at my flesh, slashing me. God placed limits on me, told me how to behave, what was right and what was wrong. God placed me in a community of listeners, carers. Provided that I never questioned their commands, their support was absolute. They were articulate and confident. When I left them, I knew that in their eyes I was damned, irredeemable. I had to fashion an alternative structure for the sake of my sanity. It was then that I seriously attempted suicide. Very Durkheimian. Trapped in life, my vegetarianism took on a new meaning. I was pure. No matter what accusations they hurled at me, no matter how hard they tried to entice me back, I could turn to them and prove that I was pure. I had my own rituals, my own observances. If asked, I would call myself a pantheist, that God is present in all living things, that suffering was necessary to sustain the cosmic balance, for every sensation of joy there had to be an equally intense sensation of pain, that death entails an absolute extinction of the individual, the individual’s memories and what the individual represented, but that the number of souls was finite and each would return. though they would not be aware of their past experiences except in brief seconds of déjà vu, that there was no good and no evil in absolute moral terms, simply experience, that therefore there was no punishment for wickedness, we perceived some actions as good and some as evil but both were valid for the purposes of the balance. Love was the best motive for action, to strive to show love in all deeds was surely the best course for easing the trials of existence, though it would bring no reward. That negative emotions gathered in some undefined place to manifest themselves as demons, so that it was better to avoid anger and hate, they would eventually avenge themselves. Much of which is riddled with inconsistency, but it built itself up over time, barely noticed and barely reflected on. My alternative creed, which has haunted me ever since. I grew out of the urgency for it and now the ideal of love is all that remains. As long as there is love it does not matter what people do or how they express that love (I reconciled myself to my homosexual side in this way, I’m no saint), love imposes its own restraints, to reiterate the principle. The poison of that sect corrodes me still from within. Still I have to vindicate myself, still I have to apologise for existing.

Occasionally a pang of longing tempts me into a church, though not to worship. In Catholic churches I buy a candle to place alongside the others, usually accompanying this with a prayer of some kind, whether it be to ask for protection for those I love or as an offering of thanks. Communion is the only ceremony that exerts a pull. Purification. If only I were pure, perhaps it would ward off disaster, if only I were pure perhaps I would be worthy of love. During the longest spell we ever managed to spend together, in Stockholm where we had ten days (though, just my luck, he fell ill after the first three days and would not even allow me to nurse him), JMCD made the mistake of taking me to the English Church with him. His father is buried there, a plaque on the wall commemorates him. Unfortunately, JMCD wanted to attend the service. I agreed to go because I knew that he had not been back in thirty years and that it was therefore highly significant in symbolic terms that he invited me to accompany him. He has never been to Sweden with his family. Needless to say, the entire experience had a very detrimental effect on me. I was deeply offended by his hypocrisy. He hedges his bets to appease avenging spirits on an occasional basis or to wheedle good fortune out of them, as he used to put it, avoiding the need to pay the price for as long as possible. It was easy for him to participate in the hymns, the eating of the wafer, the sipping of the wine. Far riskier for me. As I stood at the altar to please him, I made sure not one drop of the wine passed my lips. Afterwards, when I was almost comatose with grief and guilt and wrath and sadness, he vowed that he would never let me darken the door of a church again. He genuinely failed to either anticipate that it might be a problem for me or to understand why it should continue to be a problem.

I am becoming increasingly fatalistic. The more often I am thwarted, the more fatalistic I become, the more difficult and costly it becomes to live, the more difficult and costly it becomes to treat others with respect and consideration. much is to be gained from ruthlessness and exploitation. Nothing that I do makes any difference. I can be witty or intelligent or kind or generous or compassionate, I can staunchly refuse to manipulate or lie or cheat or conceal my true feelings but it makes no difference. Such pathetic comfort it is to retort, but I am not like the rest and I can prove it. The deeper these wounds become, the more impotent and marginalised I feel, the more fatalistic I become….Maybe it is luck. Maybe in trying to follow the one avenue for escape available to me, chasing after an education, I threw away my chances. It seems that the price of an education is to be condemned to celibacy. Men, it seems to me are not called upon to pay this price. They have an endless supply of women no matter what they do. The more highly educated the man, the more popular as a potential partner he becomes, whereas for the woman, the opposite holds. This could be diverting blame. You claim you are not afraid of me, which means you are uniquely placed to give me a reply: what is wrong with me?

Visit to a memorial.

[To Gy’s grandfather] The nation preserves the memory of its geniuses who have enhanced the reputation of the whole with their individual exertions and triumphs. A debt of gratitude, immortality. I am glad that it is so. Úgy illik. Where shall I find succour? From the dull and ruminating crowd? From my own stock? I, who cannot match the matchless, but who can wonder at their achievements. Perhaps in one respect I am unique. Perhaps of all those you have known (euphemism) I am the one who can appreciate most what it would mean to extend that line. What cost would have been too great? You may inform me that there have been others who have spoken this tongue more skilfully than I, you may inform me that I am unable to assess the contribution, but as surely as I realised what a mistake it had been for me to pay homage (reminding me of the absolute boundaries that have been set) as surely do I know that I love this country and this people and this culture and this language, so keenly do I love them that it becomes unbearable. So ardently, so passionately. And I know in my heart that I will always love them. For themselves, with their flaws, their authoritarianism, their blemishes and no amount of rejection will ever taint or sully this love. It is independent of those who kindled my interest. No-one can ever deprive me of it. I cannot account for it rationally. I have loved other places, been at ease in other cities, amongst other nations, but somehow none have held such sway. In that respect alone, I am unique.

“It is in his family, in his blood and you, in your gratitude prostrate yourself before him, adore him,” was E-néni’s resigned appraisal. “De tényleg szereted, lányom?”. I was adamant.

The Invisible Generation.

With the fading of our physical powers comes the fading of our social prominence, our visibility. You become invisible. Instantly classified as “old”, your past is forgotten or ignored. It counts for nothing, except to you. Instead of being a valuable contributor, you become an expendable problem, a burden. When at your most vulnerable, when fragile and prone to illness, you are cast aside in favour of the young. If you have created, and here procreation is not nearly enough, perhaps you will be honoured. Otherwise, you cease to exist long before you die. We women have to face the final blow of Nature against our sex: our slightly greater longevity is not a blessing, but a curse. Choices are narrowed. We are not granted the dignity even of choosing where to die. Confined to homes with people who are not our friends, where the rhythm of the day is determined by others, ripped away from our own surroundings, our own accumulated clutter, or, worse, in a public ward, to be dressed by nurses, to be visited grudgingly only during certain hours, a prison cell would be more humane, at least there is some privacy there. They shout at us, as if we were deaf or stupid. We do not have names, “dear”, devoid of affection. It is better not to grow old these days.

There is one faithful lover who will not abandon us, who will not shrink back in revulsion at the prominent veins and the parchment skin and she is knowledge. Knowledge is blind to age. She will patiently sit by you as you reflect on the ceaseless activity that ebbs and flows and foams about you, that consumes the hours and days and months of strength of the passionate who deny that you ever felt the stirring of passion in your heart. She will watch over you in the sleepless heat of the summer and will remain by your side in the season of frost. You look towards her and she shares your amusement, reassuring you that this too will come to them, they who are so arrogant in their ripening. And what of you, Gy? That shining divinity is your preferred mistress. I have seen you together, listened to your billing and cooing. She adores you. You caress her cheek and she blushes, her lips swell, red as a briar rose. You joke with her and she rises to the challenge. With me, she is slightly sullen. I have ignored her so long and so assiduously that it will take many a long day to persuade her that I truly repent, I truly seek her company. Haughtily, she dispenses such portions of her wisdom as she sees fit. What can the poor girl cope with, let me see? She mutters to herself. You have influence with her, darling, could you not nudge her or coax her to be a little more forthcoming with me. All you need to do is take her by the hand, look into her eyes and say:”Comme je t’adore” and she’s all yours. Ah, knowledge, imperishable muse, wipe my fevered brow. Stay with me now and though even you cannot turn away death, stroke my hand as I lie fretting and close my eyelids when I can see no more.

Alkonypir.

Responsibility, more precisely, the responsibility of the individual seems to be a key issue of our time. We are steeped in the cult of the individual, the adulation of a series of icons intended to persuade us that we can rise above our circumstances, that each one of us can alter the course of our own destinies and perhaps, in so doing, shape the destinies of others as well. The myth of the self-sustaining community competes for our attention with the myth of decay and collapse, of total fragmentation. Our attention span is short, however, and the quantity of available information clamouring to be heard dazes us into accepting what is rather than questioning why it should be. Wars and rumours of wars. It takes a Dunblane massacre or the abduction and murder of two little girls to shudder us out of our apathy. (Rape and theft and neglect and abuse of the elderly are not sufficient to rouse us any longer). So many remedies, but the panic always subsides. Normality, the consensus of acceptance. “I don’t see society, all I see is individuals,” thundered the Iron Lady. We have to take responsibility for ourselves and then for our nearest and dearest and then there will be no need for the state to act as a nanny, a nursemaid. “Get on your bike and get a job,” distraction number two. There are no jobs to be had. What of those who cannot take responsibility for themselves and whose children are too tied up in making ends meet for themselves? The pensioners who toiled, paid their dues, their taxes in the expectation that they would be looked after. They did their duty but receive no thanks. The faceless masses. Ram raiders, joy riders, ecstasy-takers, burger-munchers, selfish, foolish youngsters. Crime as the ultimate freedom, the ultimate statement of individuality. (Cf. “Pulp Fiction”, “The Usual Suspects”, the new ultra-violent genre of films).
(Run out of time! Watch this space).

Every evening I would wave from the living room window as my Mother departed for work in her second-hand car. Her shifts were regular: four thirty to nine in P Royal Infirmary where she was a domestic (through going to college she later gained the qualifications to be appointed domestic supervisor. We looked forward to the trips to D where she studied at evening classes, weighed down with ring binders full of cross section diagrams of pipes and toilet bowls, because it meant fish suppers with salt and vinegar eaten on the back seat, newsprint rubbing off on grease-soaked fingers. Her new status entitled her to an office with her name on the door, although she still spent much of her time patrolling the polished linoleum corridors as her subordinates found her far more approachable than her colleagues. With a name badge pinned on to her navy blue uniform, she would nip outside for a quick puff with the girls during breaks. On returning home she would stand in the kitchen for hours with my Father, reporting every detail of the gossip and intrigues). When my Grandfather was not available to baby-sit I was left in charge of my brother, my Father more often than not on nightshift to top up his meagre earnings as an orthopaedic nurse. A light sleeper, any upset or argument between R and myself would suffice to disturb him, in spite of the wax ear plugs he carefully moulded to block out all sounds. Soon after we arrived back from school we were served our tea (mince and tatties) before she put on her lipstick, ran a brush through her hair and headed out the door with an admonition to be good. Supper from the bakery (a yum-yum or some other sticky pastry) laid out on a plate to be scoffed around seven with a glass of milk. If we grew peckish in the meantime I would make us “pieces” with Sandwich Spread or Shipham’s chicken paste. I was a fan of the quiz show Ask the Family presented by Robert Robinson, but the opening titles terrified me. One image in particular, forever engraved on my consciousness as The Scissor Man, seemed to radiate pure evil. I would sit in the armchair, cuddling into the dog (Sheila, a brown and white Pomeranian), legs crossed, convinced that if my feet touched the floor whilst the creature was on screen he would slice off my toes with his vicious blades. Even when both my parents were downstairs I would fling myself into bed in case he reached out from underneath, cackling manically and snip, snip, snipping.

We would jump up and down boisterously on R’s mattress, singing the praises of Coca-Cola at the top of our voices. Another favourite game was Boomerang, in which we imagined captaining a sycamore seed in erratic flight, buffeted by the wind. As the shadows gathered we would retreat from the hallway afraid to tarry there any longer. In order to bend my impressionable brother’s will more effectively I had invented an invisible, malevolent presence known as The Man, which inhabited the boley hole in my parents’ bedroom, a narrow space stretching the length of the house between the interior and exterior walls, originally uncovered, gaping open. Used primarily for storage, its eternal black stare fascinated and repelled me and the slightest unexplained creak from its depths would send me hurtling down the stairs in an instant. Although I loved to rake through my Mother’s jewellery, watching the little ballerina dance to the tune that played when the drawer of the box was opened I could not stay there long if alone, preferring the reassurance of her busy beside me, making the beds, dusting and polishing the mirrors. I had summoned The Man so often that He took on a life of His own. He was the rattling in the water pipes, the eerie tapping at the window. No longer under my control I could sense Him on the landing, eavesdropping outside the living room door, or peering through the curtain-chink in the bathroom or kitchen. If he was feeling particularly cocky, my brother would muster the courage to take a peek through the keyhole, but more often than not we hid behind the sofa or under the sideboard, barricaded in with cushions, wielding steak knives for protection, colanders from the pantry our helmets. Our other favourite hiding place and fortress was the cupboard in my brother’s room where we crouched on the floor behind the rail of coats, holding the doors closed, hearts pounding, barely daring to breathe.

We did not feel safe unless the lights were on, but to be absolutely sure He could not ambush us we would send the dog scouting before running to the toilet. Whenever the phone rang I was gripped by a particular dread (although in all likelihood it was my Mother checking that we were behaving). Not only did it mean venturing into The Man’s hostile domain, but what if it were a crank call such as my neighbour Edith had described? For years after her tales of heavy breathers I had been plagued by a nightmare of putting the receiver to my reluctant ear to be greeted by a thin, crackling voice muttering obscenities, so frozen with fear that I was unable to hang up. My anxiety was compounded by my Father’s annual New Year’s Eve ritual of taking the phone off the hook and wrapping the mouthpiece in several layers of cardigans to prevent being disturbed by drunks who might dial the wrong number.

The Loft, however, was the most petrifying of all. A crawl-through hatch leading to the roof, it would slide open unannounced in high winds, or snap angrily if the gust was not quite strong enough to lift it fully. No matter how often my Father would patiently explain that there was nothing up there but a mallet and the occasional roosting pigeon, that my Grandfather had once explored it, putting a foot through the ceiling when testing his weight on the plaster between the rafters I was never convinced. The Man had taken up residence there, ready to pounce when I switched off the bedside lamp. In the end my Father fitted a series of hooks to the little door, tying it fast with the chain from the bath, plug removed, when the enamelled tub was replaced by a shower. From beneath my covers, I shuddered at the mournful cries of trains in the marshalling yard whilst drifting off to sleep.

Walking through the veranda in the middle of the night to reach the toilet, my eyes stray towards the garden shed with its single window and curtain pulled half aside. Did it twitch? My lover snores oblivious as I pick my way around the piles of clothing, magazines and other obstacles strewn across the parquet. No hand grabs my ankle to drag me beneath the futon and choke me on slut’s wool.

[Fragment]

This being the twentieth day of January 1989, we have reason to report the most morally uplifting tale: Malice in Blunderland, Or, Why It Is Inadvisable to Ingest Certain Fungi Known in the Vernacular as Magic Mushrooms.

“How pleasant it is to picnic, to savour the voluptuous curves of mince pies topped with whipped cream before chewing them to bits, to be transported with the delightful melodies of woodland’s heralds, until they crap in your hair, summer, summer afternoon, the haze before the downpour, the hum of the bees, the frisk of the squirrels, the plumping of acorns, the focused green of the leaves, drowsy, drowsy repetition, poppy opium, drowse, drowse, carpets of primroses, bluebells, snowdrops, holly, ivy, mistletoe – wait – muddling, drowse, haze –“
BUMP!
“Bugger you, bugger you, time to get up, bugger you!”
“That was a rude awakening”.
(Woodland. Tree trunks, very, very, very, very tall, branches begin only very, very, very, very high up, where the needles are very, very, very, very dense and so it is very, very, very, very dark, but it is very, very, very, very much like the wood the main character (of indeterminate gender, not having reached puberty yet and so not having spent much thought on the matter really) has just left, so it proceeds in the firm belief that nothing was amiss or amister (if we are to remain neuter).

Letter to Tips W, 19th January.

Rådhuspladsen, Kopenhagen.
Donnerstag (19. Januar), 4.20 p.m.

Cold city, cold stone. What’d make a girl come to a place like this? Anonymity of a capital? Night life? Where’s my lighter? Straighten your hat, Humph, or else it’ll blow away fast. Find George she said and I’ll pay you 300 kroner. Chickenfeed. Well, pigeon feed actually. He’s very distinctive, should be no bother. What’s the population here? Guy’s a cop, plain clothes, maybe they’re still mustard-swiping from the hot dog stand. Tivoli. All the while here and never visited the place. For kids and dumb broads. What would make a girl come to a place like this? Rust red, pink about the neck, white patch round the right eye, limp in left leg. Geeze, eight million of them. Where do they hang out? Yep, intuition never failed you yet. No need for the revolver, breadcrumbs ought to do it. Warm air vent. Few dozen. Wait, yeah, it’s him alright, busy too. Throw a few, that ought to distract her – yep, here they come. Gotcha! Don’t struggle now, I know it’s you. Nice dame. Sorry, honey, this man’s needed – urgently. Breach of contract don’t sound too good, bub. Yeah, that’s better. You’re gonna behave pretty, real pretty, I’m telling you – one crap and you’re a goner, understand?
(Humph slips Walter into his overcoat and hails a taxi).
“Oh most wondrous chariot, salve! Pray conduct me to Ms. D’s apartment, 3817 G-vej!”

“Here he is, Ma’am. Real tough old bird. No good in a pie – hope you know what you’re doin’ and that’ll be 350 kroner, please”.
“350?”
“Taxi fare included Ma’am”.
“Fine”.
“Here’s lookin’ at you, kids!”
(Exit Humph).

“I hope you’re, coo, satisfied. I’ll have you, coo, know, there I was in mid-courtship dance, just getting into step, tail-feathers fanned, neck-feathers preened and puffed, head dipped low when your, coo, man comes along with a free meal, coo, you know what the stubborn ones are like, think they’re on to a better thing, makes the egg shells stronger, why she’d been squat-minded for a while, you, coo, should try that dance sometime, very tedious after the 36th refusal, even with refinements, why she could’ve been my one and only gal, my partner for life, coo, coo!”
“But Walter, it’s important”.
(She gives him a handful of honey-coated millet to sweeten him up).
“Easy for you, coo, to say. I’m still ruffled” (running a casual beak through his plumage).
She gives him popcorn.
“You, coo, can’t get round me that easily”.
She presents him with a thimbleful of Jakob’s Kaffee.
“What do you want me to do, coo?”
“Walter, you’re an angel”.
“No, coo, just the best post-carrier on wings”.
“It’s this…”
Unbeknownst to them, a sinister, bearded figure was lurking at the door, eavesdropping. When the eave clattered too loudly, he listened secretly instead. Having gathered enough information he took it into his room, placing it on the table to sort it out into an evil plot – this, dear reader, was none other than the wicked Klodse, or Klude, as he is more commonly known, all together now, boo hiss! A horrible, misshapen being trapped in a pre-human stage of evolution taking revenge for his ugliness by corrupting innocent souls, spreading vile gossip, hanging around when not wanted and refusing to take the hint, generally behaving in a boo-hissworthy fashion. Klaus Klodse Klude (KKK) was determined to thwart our heroine’s plan, the easiest way to do so being to hinder Walter in the performance of his duty, so he determined to look the word pigeon up in the dictionary.
8 p.m.
P-I-D-G-I-N
8.15 p.m.
P-I-G-G-E-A-N
8.30 p.m.
P-I-J-J-E-N
9p.m.
P-I-G-E-O-N
The entry read: “The navigational sense of these birds is renowned. Scientists have discovered two reasons for their incredible accuracy (see homing instinct). Firstly, there is a tiny lump of iron in their brain, which allows them to locate north and secondly, their highly developed sense of smell”.
KKK sniggers malevolently.

Next morning.
“Oh, Walter, how can I ever thank you?”
“Don’t mention it, sweetheart” (puffs out his breast-feathers).
“Do your best to be quick”.
She plants a kiss on his beak.
“Coo, coo”, he flies off.

Half an hour into the journey.
“What’s that approaching? A gyrocopter? Maybe I can hitch a lift. Hello, coo, where are you going? Anywhere near Kiel?”
“Kiel England or Kiel, Vesttyskland?”
“Germany, naturally, you spell Keele, England like that, coo!”
“Kiel. Let me offer you some sustenance – you have a long rejse ahead”.
The pilot of the gyrocopter takes out some oozingly ripe Danish Blue – at least, that’s what Walter thinks it is – in fact it is ultra-heavy, constipatory Edam with garlic (gasp, the sheer villainy!) and miniature magnet-filings (gasp again, how devious!).
“Don’t mind if I do, coo, most kind”.
“Eat up, I don’t want to spise anyway”.
“Thank you, coo, must be off now, coo, coo”.
“Coo, coo to you too, cuckoo!”
“Coo, what a strange t
h
i
n
g
to
s
a
a
y
c
o
o
o
o
o
!
“
What will happen to our intrepid friend? He was bird-brained enough to forget the first rule of safety: never accept gifts from strangers. To continue (momentarily) in a moralistic vein: KKK was so full of glee, mirth and jolly wicked Schadenfreude that he splatted into Block 4 on the return trip, leaving behind a stain on the concrete that may be seen from that day to this.
“
c
o
o
w
h
a
t
s
h
a
l
l
I
d
o
,
c
o
o
?
“
Gentle reader, as I assume you have no particular wish for a sad end to this tale I, the omnipotent, omniscient narrator do dictate that the Wirkung of the cheese most corrupt and perfidious doth cease when Walter is precisely 2.5 centimetres above the earth, his frantic flapping thus assuring him a gentle, if somewhat undignified, landing. On the way, however, to Walter’s later dismay, most of the sheets of paper containing news were blown out of the satchel. Stammering excuses all he could remember was that she had been to Cambridge (this c/o his Aunt Euphemia who lived on a ledge near the bridge) and had only a month to complete the first chapter of her thesis and so had to respectfully inform the recipient of her desire to report orally to said recipient at a certain date in, but nay! This is the foulest of foul misdeeds, anticipation of the outcome! What a transgression against good style! Back down to earth at once!
Walter’s stomach was full for two whole days. Worms, grains, nothing held interest for him. Even after so much time had elapsed he could still only smell garlic and his head ached! Recalling the urgency of his commission, the gallant Vogel mounted the winds again.
“Honk, honk! Out of the way, honk!”
“Coo, what a fright! Excuse me, I think I’m confused, coo, can you, coo, tell me which direction Germany lies in?”
“Honk, honk, well, honky-tonk, we’re off to Canada for the winter’s end, honk! We stop off in Scotland, honk! You don’t want to go to Germany, though; they eat the likes of us for Xmas dinner. You don’t want to follow us, though, honk! You want to go south. What’s the matter anyway, honk? We usually get our directions from your colleagues”
“I’ve a terrible headache”.
“Honk, that’s what they all say, lovey-dovey!”
Walter dredges up his geography lesson about Scotland being to the north west of Denmark and changes course.

Next morning (sunrise).
Walter stretches his wings, does some preliminary preening (ground check prior to take-off). The sun shines weakly; it is as warm as January can be. Walter is happy, listening to the hectic chatter of sparrows and blackbirds, the best of all possible worlds for him at this moment, he can truly imagine nothing better, poor thing! He knows not what’s in store (or sky) for him. Wind currents favourable, carrying him effortlessly in his chosen direction, so effortlessly that he incautiously closes his eyes. Opening them, he thinks he discerns a shadow, but he is deceived: the talons of a kestrel bear down upon him. He swerves, they strike, one wing is almost disabled and he plummets to the ground at such a speed and in such a chaotic spiral that the predator cannot keep pace until – THUD! He lands upon a window sill.
A beautiful princess sits at her desk, her golden tresses straggly and neglected. Her supply of chocolate is nearly exhausted and still the pile of books the heartless tutors demand she slave through seems never to diminish. Her handsome prince is afvisende, blinded by the spell of an enchantress since youth. No letters dwell in her box. She is fairly pissed off, actually. The thud on her window sill shakes her out of her daydream. There lies an injured bird. It pecks at the pane. She opens the window, taking it in out of pity, but before she can tend to it, it coos: “[Chameleon] sends all her love to you, coo. She has news for you too, coo. Nothing very interesting I don’t think, so it can wait, coo. She wants to know, coo, when in February? She can’t make it before the 20th”.
“Thank you, little bird, you look like you could do with some Jakobs”.

[To Maggie, 21st January, 1989]

11.40 p.m.
Beneath, electric guitar practice. Neighbour in Room 18, partying. Neighbour in Room 16 banging the floor to stop electric guitar practice beneath. From outside, the thud of the all-night discotheque in the Grønjordskollegiet pub. Two half mugs of black coffee and I’m a wreck, exhausted, yet unfit for sleep. No music of my own to rescue me. The unwelcome thoughts kept at bay by activity creep from the recesses. The constant doubt – two weeks from the first chapter, three volumes of correspondence, one volume of memoirs, one box of archival papers first. Thoughts for analysis, yes, plenty. Nothing can be concluded that has not before been concluded. I refuse to force it into an ideological framework, prefer to be hampered only by my own internalised values, my assumptions, God knows they’re deceptive enough. The big F – Future. Time’s already begun its mad race, the contest of the active years of contributing to society, 20 to 60. Fighting with a God whose tyranny I renounced, but whose message leaves me troubled. Vegetarian. Still loved by THAK whom I resent precisely because he still loves me, yet love back for fear he is the only one who will ever love me. Seven unsuccessful attempts to flee him. Seven, favourite number, Saviour’s number. There is no salvation, no forgiveness. Kyokushinkai. The similarities amuse, only I am later than you! Achievements? Nothing. Not even the purity I demand of myself. Although I adore my friend Tips, I hate women in general, surrounding myself with men. Male sexuality is repulsive. Drama college? Articles? The authorship I was always convinced was the path? Norwegian is the world’s most beautiful language. Confusion of compassion and sentimentality. Pleasure: I had to admit I enjoyed myself at the royal ballet. Create another life? Parasite, stealing blood, draining calcium, sustenance, soul developing beyond rational control, yet the ultimate creation, a living being, a spirit, an independent, beautiful…economic trap. Who could be the father? Squander time on it? I have not changed, only the masks I assume have become more sophisticated, only my role-playing more accomplished after so much rehearsing. You? Ché and combat? Enlighten, reveal, open. Not an exchange merely of news, but of consciousness. Fertilize the arid waste of my thoughts, plant seeds, rain soak. Tell me of sisterhood, of death, of the processes of life: for your ways are not my ways and your thoughts are higher than mine. I do not sanctify you, but your moral position is stronger than mine: you heal, bring hope, comfort. You are active. I, passively gnawing, fretting, scrabbling for a talisman to ward off my mediocrity, but unable to escape my limitations. Be my wings, even should the flight prove Icarian.
Incense lingers in memory. Nostalgia binds even those who, unlike us, were enemies.

[To THAK, 22nd January, 1989]

I’ve been to see The Presidio starring Sean Connery. I went with Mette, the girl next door (Room 16). It was crap, apart from Sean, and even he didn’t suit the patriotic American shit he was supposed to spout. On Friday, however, I saw something far better, Death in Venice, for the fifth time with the new girl, Rikke, resident of Room 15. This time round I thought the boy less cruel than before [I had misread it as a fable of unrequited love with Tadzio taunting von Aschenbach] – what could he do after all? He would never be permitted to talk to a complete stranger and Gustav could not bring himself to interrupt his piano-playing, which would otherwise have been the perfect opportunity. Was it the last socially-imposed restraint? Was it fear of rejection or that they could not communicate? The awe of worshipper for idol? The boy is aware of the composer’s fascination in the film, more clearly than I remember from the story. What he could do was ignore his admirer, turn his back. As it is, he seems to wish to exchange something. As it is, however, he is exquisitely, excruciatingly cruel, the cruelty of beauty and nobility, placing himself in his tantalising perfection before his lover, challenging him to reach out and defy convention, giving him no respite, no chance to overlook: he is fascinated by his effect on Gustav. In returning to the city in spite of the plague warnings, Gustav is condemning himself to death, although such a risk is banished from his mind at the moment of happiness, strength, decision, letting go, the fortunate culmination of circumstances he was complicit in manufacturing. Death is omnipresent: the man collapsing at the station, his fantasies and tragic recollections. He is surrounded it, confronted by it, yet succeeds in pushing it to the back of his mind. Imagine the cost of an admission of love: the repressive moral prescripts of the age, the distastefulness of revealing emotion in public (even towards one’s wife, the acceptable channel of the erotic drive as depicted in the breakfast scene); his own strictly imposed code (which he has transgressed – Esmerelda, also the name of the steamship which brought him to Venice). He pays the supreme price, admitting that all he had believed concerning art was false, that which he had become ill for baseless, his previous life a mere sham. There is no reason to pity him on one level, since he mustered the strength to pursue the path dictated by his heart, rejecting the social pressure towards conformity. He lives for the boy, happy to be near him, to exist alongside him, to breathe the air of the same room. I am convinced that Gustav loves the boy rather than merely lusting after him, which is why I pity the ageing artist, hoping that the love will be requited.
Since Albion Road you have been the more creative in this partnership by far. I don’t resent this, but seldom have inspiration anymore. Before I was carried away on a flow of madness. Now, the voice of God stilled, the world brutish and unfair, there is no peace. To show mercy I must be shown mercy and show myself mercy. Dad told me on the phone that he sees CC at church every Sunday. He is back at university, commuting back and forth every day because he has no grant and cannot afford to live in a hall of residence, eating one meal a day. Doesn’t your heart just bleed for him? One, two, three….aaawwww! I don’t feel malice enough towards him to scorn him openly. He is no longer a part of my life. Having said that, he deserves every bit of shit dropping in his direction, so I’m not neutral and certainly not a saint. What has God’s church ever done but wound me? How can I be part of an organization riddled with little hypocrites like him? I should be humble, remembering my own faults I know: this is how the message of Christ crucifies me, stunts my development, binds me hand and foot. I need God’s mercy to show mercy of my own to others, yet I have no compassion for others, as I show none for myself. Hence I will continue to disregard feelings and cause pain. There is no power within me to change. The ritual of the church is what attracts me to it. My own pagan rituals are of greater weight and importance to me, yet, since they are not established or recognised and since I feel abandoned by God, judged and cast out, I also feel that my rituals are unacceptable to Him. I seek purity. So that I will not cause harm, so that I may have peace within myself and the balance that would stop me from swinging between arrogance and the despair of inferiority.
On Friday I was in the restless mood, the pre-work restless mood that used to assail me in Albion Road on Sundays when we would walk round the park at the foot of Arthur’s Seat or go for a coffee in Waverly Market even when we were completely penniless and had no choice but to walk there and back as the bus fare was too expensive. Remember? Window-shopping on Leith Walk or strolling up and down the sunken streets with basement gardens and steps up to the front doors at street level.
I am firmly convinced that I’d be better off writing this chapter at Albion Road. If only you could stay there. I hate the idea of you sharing a flat with flirtatious student types and would feel slightly awkward sharing a room with you in an all-male flat. Albion Road, no matter how shitty a landlady we had to endure, was still our first home together. I’d like us to live somewhere secure, where no one can chuck us out on a whim, but I don’t think my salary will ever stretch to a mortgage, so what are we to do? There’s a ship to be built, a temple too, a house in stave-church-style, films to be directed – how? Why did God give us the gifts, ideas and will, but deny us the means? As for Cassiel, Freder and Russell they are easily begotten, but can I afford the burden they represent? Do I even want them? I certainly do not want them to be the only creations I am responsible for. Before any money can be earned we must write, so we need an Apple Mac of our own upon which to work, undisturbed by deadlines. That was the reason I wanted the job (plus the ability to pay off my £500 debt to my Dad and get my parents a holiday to Berlin before they are too old to appreciate it, for my Dad must see the Funkturm again before he dies and we must go there together).
I need you to be with me and kiss me and sleep in the same bed, to spend time with me, doing nothing but being. Will I ever have so much time? I detest the humiliation of unemployment, but a doctorate would inure me from the derision of petty officials at the Buroo. I would also, however, like to go to drama school and to write. What’s to be done? Neither of us has the financial independence necessary to be permitted choice.
I went to the ballet, alone, to see Månerenen, Jeu de Cartes, Lieder ohne Worte and L’Après-Midi d’un Faun. There is a young dancer, Nicolai Hübbe, a star already. According to Politiken: “There is nothing he cannot do”. From what I could tell (as you know, I have no knowledge of the language and aesthetics of ballet), he surpassed all the other dancers in grace and acting ability, both sensitive and sympathetic. Only 21. See what he has achieved and I have achieved nothing. I have lost my single-mindedness, become dissipated, my work no longer my true vocation, yet I am trapped. The degree is the only escape economically. It is the only path to honour and vindication for my parents – failure can only mean suicide. Perhaps it is only the weight of this awareness that renders me unhappy. I am terrified to write a single word because it limits me, it can be judged, I cannot hide from myself and my failings any longer, so much hinges upon it. And there are those who want me to fail. Klaus Kludder, for example. He tries to put me down at every turn, to criticize my every action and I have done nothing to offend him. I know he’s a dumb bastard, but it still drags me down. Especially since I haven’t published for years or possess no tangible distinctions (not even of the pastry variety) to prove my superiority. He always tries to make me out to be nothing special (i.e. like himself), to haul me down to his own level. Yet I know I am superior to him and fear God wants to punish me for this lack of humility. I am better than him: more intelligent, more pleasant, even better-looking. He would vehemently deny all this. He refuses to accept I am inspired, that my charisma can transform, transubstantiate me into a being not entirely human, although I admit I am often unbearable to others in that state. I long for the tide of divine inspiration, for the mute spirit to sing through me. I long to return to normality, but each successive blow drives me further away. I drown in self-pity.
That I love you, you should not doubt. Separation blinds me to your true feelings for me, cuts me off, makes me paranoid, distrustful towards everyone I know. You must make me feel worthy or I cannot give. I had already begun to return to you a love far greater than I had felt for you in many, many months and then we were forced to part again. Every time I am about to see you again I wonder whether you really love me. Is it all words? Can he truly mean it? AL was right when he described to me what it was.

[To AL, 1st February, 1989]

Rigsarkivet, København.

Dearest Brother,

At last I break the silence – if one may be said to break a silence when the recipient of the paper is most likely to read it in silence and the paper itself does not speak (at least audibly). That I have not written is inexcusable. It was taking advantage of the security of the bond – the relationship is always present no matter what the geographical location, no matter how much time elapses between communications or meetings. At the moment I am sitting at plads 19, one seat at a long desk, light switched on, papers open in front of me – at last I have completed my reading for one topic! At home (well, in Edinburgh) I was commanded by my Professor to write the first chapter of the thesis in three weeks, max. four. Now that I have been forced to concentrate on one thing I have had to organize reading and thought, instead of flitting from one theme to the next as I am wont to do when unchallenged prompted by mood and interest, which gives me a broad field of knowledge, yet denies the possibility of writing on the specific. I’m waiting for three boxes of papers which will enable me to finish the chapter, three weeks precisely since I returned, one week to re-read and write up, it’s insanity, so poor old T will be presented with the unenviable task of evaluating part of a chapter out of context. I am able to write it because I am aware of the wider framework and it forms a separate unit within: a critical examination of the press reaction to Marcus Rubin’s article in Preussische Jahrbücher in Denmark, Germany and elsewhere.
The first week back I completely squandered. I did go to see my first ballet – rather four short pieces, Månerenen, Jeu de Cartes, Lieder ohne Worte, L’Après-Midi d’un Faun, a good introduction to the art form. A black belt could perform a ballet with a little practice! So it was that I could appreciate the skill and effort, the athleticism and superb grace, the control and power each dancer displayed. Julio Bocca and Nicolai Hübbe excelled. Coppelia is on the programme, but before then Madame Butterfly, a Norse-Danish co-production. I’m a theatre-addict, always was, but never glutted myself so much with it! I sat there and realized, yes, I enjoy the sheer self-indulgence of it. Add to this the fact that Denmark is a far more democratic society with fewer of the loud-mouthed braggarts you meet in Britain whose insistence on picking apart the production (regardless of its quality) can quite ruin an otherwise peaceful interval.
Do you remember the opera passage? The Kongelige Theater, in particular the Gamle Scene, is like a mini-udgave of my imagined opera house, lacking only the pagan statuary and boxes for the use of others apart from royalty. Imagine it then, this gilded celebration of elitism, where my character feels completely at ease, more so than anywhere on earth, because the stage offers him no real challenge with what it depicts. You have probably been in there, so you know what it is like. Picture me going to this theatre swathed in my black velvet cloak and 19th century-style clothes (with the exception of the shoes) playing my character in all his negative glory, trying to think my way into his mind. Alone. Not (alas) in a box, but in the most expensive section nevertheless: a unique opportunity to live a fiction. It’s wonderfully abstracting, distracting from the impiety of the flesh. I worship Art as the God. Probably dangerous to immerse myself in that atmosphere, mood, emotion too often. I bought a small notebook yesterday to take with me to the theatre. They’ll think I am a reviewer or something, men det er lige meget.
Let me tell you about my time at home. I was in Cambridge for three days staying with Donald who accompanied me to L’s ball at my request. Following that visit I am eternally grateful that there is nothing going on between us. England could not be more different, the countryside in the south, the architecture, subdued, “quaint”, touristy (Scotland suffers from the latter disease, but we make no compromises – you come with sturdy hiking boots, are served by grim, cigarette-end chewing women in grimy plastic-garden-furniture cafés, you are bled half dry by midges, rained on copiously with locals grinning at the wetness, you are treated as a foreigner, yet the hospitality extended to you exceeds that of the southern brigade, assuming almost legendary proportions – why do they insist on perpetuating the meanness myth?). I know it is utter folly to attempt such comparisons on the basis of such flimsy evidence, but I am a fool, so here goes! There are, I suspect, just as many churches in Scotland as in England, proportionally speaking, but in England they make their presence felt. The Anglican liturgy is so much a part of their lifestyle (I was thinking of church a lot, staying with two radical Christians plus one unknown quantity as far as religion was concerned), cathedral spires cast their shadows across village greens and huddles of thatched cottages seeking sanctuary: shepherd and sheep, the circle of superstition. War memorials seem out of place in their echoing naves. Perhaps that is unfair: churches are houses for the dead, at any rate for those obsessed by their welfare after death.
At the ball, Donald and I became vertieft in a discussion over whether or not my soul needed saving in the course of which I sank into despondency and he accused me of being like the servant who buried the talents. He has become so rigid in his dogma that he refuses to even countenance the debate of alternative viewpoints, of a world without God – it is simply inconceivable to him. Not only that, but he hid behind a screen of false humility, a retreat tactic and an effective one at that, as pressing the point takes on an air of arrogance. I went to communion at eight one morning and the priest said: “This is the body of Christ broken for you, F” and “This is the blood of Christ spilled for you, F”. I have a hunger for a church. It is not the faith, but the ritual. The rituals of humiliation, or rather humility, of surrender, sacrifice, of repentance and forgiveness, of cleansing, PURIFICATION that lifts one above the limitations and burdens of humanity. The church and all it stands for is, however, inhuman (or, more accurately, anti-human). To attend its sermons an act of self-flagellation. I can never go back to a church for anything other than the purging ritual, so it will have to be a big church and I’ll have to avoid getting to know anyone, presuming I can stick it out that long in the first instance. This endless droning about peace and love where neither is achieved or demonstrated: the congregation troops through the gothic arches to conform to notions of respectability or the expectations of their class and social station, or simply out of habit. No, I can never return to the church because it is an all or nothing commitment, poisoning the mind. Look at Donald: before he was a free-thinker, of equal capacity to R, now he is without identity.
It’s the eleventh and I’m in my room. When I am in work-Fassung my will for all else evaporates. I have not yet begun the writing of the chapter that was meant to be submitted last Wednesday at the latest. I’m still reading through the pile of notes and photocopies, having just awakened from a recurring dream: sentenced to death for a murder I did not commit and waiting in my straw-strewn cell to be led out to the place of execution after my escape bid failed. I am visited by those closest to me. Betraying me one by one they listen sympathetically to my protestations of innocence, not believing a word. As the door swings open I awake. I am sure that the trigger was the bad news I received on the phone: my old border collie Tighson, nearly blind and as good as deaf by now as well, has picked up an infection. He will be taken to the vet on Monday and the recommendation will most likely be to put him to sleep, as the euphemism goes. I am, needless to say, unhappy about this.
T (my supervisor) wants me to return to Britain as soon as possible, presumably because he wants me to finish my thesis within three years. I’m digging in my heels because I’m afraid of finishing, dreading the future. At the same time I’d like to be finished, to feel that I have arrived somewhere. I have a huge longing to be with my parents. If they’ll let me, I’d like to live with them for three months or so to write down all the memories of the house (because it does not belong to them and when they are gone I will have to empty it). You see I want to be with them before I have to look after them. When we can still go for walks together. Three days ago I woke with a start in the middle of the night, wondering why I am not there with them. I sensed a threat enveloping the household. I dread the pain of their deaths, indeed the deaths of anyone I know and love, even my old dog.
Some plans for the future (frivolous and less frivolous): return to Copenhagen and study the generalkonsulatens arkiv – the one concerning Leith as only one book has been written on this so far and Leith was an important independent harbour in the 19th century (I could maybe even apply for Erasmus funding); work towards a Danish doctorate (long-term); go to drama college; together with L and whoever else is interested (maximum of seven) purchase a bus, convert it into a leisure vehicle of the type Hollywood stars in the 1920s used and explore Norway, India and China (an idea born of being asked directions at approximately 10 p.m. in Kiel in company of THAK by a group of Norwegians driving just such a contraption and in search of a camping ground to park overnight); give up all hope of an interesting existence and giving birth to two sons, build a temple by the water-mill at Loch Tummel and retiring there as a watchperson. Upon all those ideas I have squandered a great deal of thought (particularly on the less likely options!). Sure I could indulge myself with the latter if I were extremely wealthy, but, as we know, the odds are stacked against me. The drama college derives not from delusions of talent, but because I would like to express myself in that manner as well.
What do you think of Visconti’s Death in Venice? I have watched it four times now and reckon it is the best film ever made.
I hope to be in Kiel before the end of the month. It all depends on when Tips wants me to come.

[To THAK, 12th February, 1989]

It was raining cigarette stubs. Why must old women empty ashtrays on to the street? At this hour too, when the drunk are too drunk, the weary too weary and the introverted too wrapped up in themselves to pay attention to what side of the road they are walking on. The cyclists on their wretched paths indistinguishable from ordinary pavements to travellers of the above categories as well as mine, that is, the aimless wanderers. The goldfish had stopped swimming and floated to the surface in the oily bowl, the tower blocks were sagging, so I stepped out of the ninth floor window four feet above ground level to crawl to the city centre. Only campanologists, masseurs and tenders of the sick of every nation in profitable employ. The day when we must all be decked out in finery, with noble miens, where serious words are to be yawned over in the disguise of a contorted smile before being forgotten in the lunacy of the intervening time span. Regular, regular, regulated. I wanted to make a daisy chain, but the season was wrong. A yellow bus drove by and a dog pissed against the stop pole. Cod can be graceful in the water, but spawning on a car bonnet is unaesthetic to me at least. I coughed up a lump of lung, handing it to the brothel keeper in payment of an ancient debt. A fox knocked over an aluminium dustbin, yelping to shelter when I snatched away its prey, the centre pages of a newspaper. The abandoned factory spat out tramps in long tweed coats with spewed on, fingerless gloves: that’s how you recognize them here. Some restaurants were open for guts and liver, the healthy stayed at home. My breath sliced the fog around me. I was supposed to be meeting someone. Grass pavements, now there’s an idea. We’d churn them to mud in no time, interjected the cynic. Who would be an idealist today? They tell you what to buy, how to feel, but not how to react. My hands sought comfort. Temporary occupancy of white, mould-cast chairs for the price of a coffee. Elixir of adrenalin, mixed with udder-juice and extract of bee. A blind man tripped over the kerb, reaching for his cane as a lunatic slobbered in the darkness. I unzipped my flies to examine the contents of my trousers. The waiter brought the coffee, expecting payment. I spat in his navel, which sufficed. He brought me croissants and whipped cream. The moon was veiled by a cloud and a pale-faced woman joined me. This table was the edge of a precipice. I took her hand, her lips twitched, but she allowed herself to do my bidding. It smelt better than her customary perfume, she could wipe it on the palms of her gloves, a thin, aromatic film. I was supposed to be meeting someone, not there in the graveyard amongst the stone-proppers, nor in the curve of the rainbow. I stood in the steam from the drain grate until my shoes melted. Perhaps it might pour. The birds are in their nests and hedgerows, the eyeballs in their sockets and aren’t we all happy, sing tra-la-la. The Mayor counted the links in his chain whilst scoffing three hamburgers with limp lettuce leaves and quadruple mayonnaise. The cow lost her tail and the spoon stirred up a commotion in the pedestrian precinct. The harmony of a stable and well-organised society. Bogart kissed Bacal and they too lived happily ever after. I prefer the wild passage through a flume, but a flautist’s melodies swept me off course into the purpose of listening. A tin was raped by a sharp metal object to the strains of local radio. I saw an angel rise from eye-level to the Holy Father drenched in blue light, but I didn’t catch the name, so my hands sought comfort in warmth. No seat for the penniless. I couldn’t stop moving or else I would expire of hypothermia, still not knowing where I would find her. Progress towards an uncertain – aim? What would I say to her? Would she smile at me, or just spew? Could I clasp my mouth about her nose? Would she slash my wrists or boil me water for coffee? Elements of continuity. The landscape of barbed wire in spiked curls ended. There was nothing. No hope, no despair, no colour, no light, no sound: who could comprehend the beauty of it? Time to return. My feet were stuck fast, the concrete had set. I waited for them to lift me and throw me off the end of the pier, but I relaxed and so could move again. A nightingale warbled: it was three o’ clock in the morning. When I arrived, the pigeons had whitened my window-ledge, but the ladder just wouldn’t reach. Some bastard had watered the building, what for it but the stairs. This the bed made for me, this the sleep to redeem me.

From dust you were created, to dust you shall return, scatter these ashes of mortal remains upon this, the immortal wind. See them spill over the grate, embers glow, yes, warmth is synonymous with life in your understanding. The children sleep, flushed beneath their sheepskins and furs, with only fond thoughts for the snow. The old man crouches, raven laughs hoarsely, effuses and flaps off. What chill is there to compare with the chill at the sight of the waxy complexion, the dwelling quit, the spirit fled? The fingers that once lifted, gripped, held pen, passed food, create no more. The living compose laments for the dead: keen, keen women, smite at your breasts, bruise upon bruise, let the grief flow publicly and be rid of it. Howl, howl said the wolf. I wander for blood.

Parchment is durable when kept under the correct environmental conditions, though some scrolls have been found after centuries of burial, surely not ideal. Dry, dry. Wetness produces mould and arthritis. These pitifully thin sheets will scarcely last a lifetime. So they must not be thumbed or fingered by nose-pickers and coffee mugs must not be placed on top of them. They must not be over-exposed to daylight and certainly not to temperatures approaching Fahrenheit 451, browned and curled like a vain pensioner at the hairdresser’s. Language is an inadequate medium, its boundaries matching those of the established world. True, I could say: “That man is fartynoxulous” and it would be understood to be unpleasant, a humorous compound made up of familiar components (farty, noxious), the distortion present not sufficient to render the original concept indeterminable. “That man is a sleurbellapap” might bring to mind Italian beauties well-endowed in the breast department, but does it mean he can pull them? Or that I approve of him? You might even think it his profession. A context or a facial expression is required to complete the meaning. Aha, you object, what of nonsense poetry/prose? Not merely of the ridiculous situation/description type, but more in the Jabberwocky mode? Although it is atmospheric and gives rein to our imagination, it does not convey information which our conscious mind can logically interpret. What is my conclusion? Bransteria, avlot mempa gro whotshulate.

Enough of bile-churning fiction!

Here are some facts:
1) I haven’t finished the reading for the chapter yet, another way of putting it being: I haven’t started to write the chapter yet. Thank you for your words of reassurance.
2) I have £51 to last me until April (the April rent of £83.70 due before then), yet I am meant to visit Tips in the next fortnight.
3) Tighson has an infection and will probably be put down on Monday. He will not be picked up again until burial time.
4) I have a terrible headache and indeed have had it most of the day.
5) I will be extremely angry if this letter is lost in the post by the British postal dis-service.
6) I require another letter, soon!
7) I am depressed.
I don’t want my old doggie to die.
9) I went to the cinema with Mette to see Midt om Natten, the first film in Danish I have watched right the way through, about a group of squatters.
10) I’d like to come over in the holidays if it’s not too near your exams. We certainly must see each other before September. Surely it’s not too far for J to feed and water the mice and bonsais?
11) My parents don’t seem to mind you going up some weekend for a visit, though my Mum told me you have a washing machine in the new flat. She did not say you could not do washing at home, though.
12) I’m worried about where we are going to stay when I return. Student halls are different in Britain to here – cleaners enter them every day, it’s not possible to smuggle anyone in. Besides, they’re very cramped. Premature to anticipate hassle, I know.
13) …is a number I don’t like.
14) I’ve been swimming twice now – I hope to go more often, the main obstacle being that I can’t be bothered to get up at 6.20 and go through with the rest of the day.
15) I have elclosed the note for Sybil.
16) I’d like to be in Albion Road one last time.
17) I hope that the house moving went well.

[To JD, 4th March, 1989]

The summit winds blow melancholy to cut off attention from all but themselves as cars plunge down the cliff faces because they did not take the proper precautions. Rock-climbers with experience would sigh impatiently if I reported the amateur quality of knots chosen and tied, fit only for mudguards, not door handles, so I’ll restrict myself to effects, not causes. It generally takes eight to ten seconds for an unwanted descent, the number of glancings in direct proportion to the weight of the vehicle. Explosions? Well very few and far between, depending how much is in the tank and whether sparks are flying. The occasional dramatic spectacle does brighten up the life of the observer. I saw a Volkswagen minibus with nine passengers transform into a fireball, one chunk of flaming metal landing nearby, I kept it as a souvenir, bit black, but it did melt into an interesting shape, don’t you think? I call it “torture”, as if I had sculpted it myself, playing on the stressing it went through and adding the dash of pathos indispensable for the true work of art, slightly sentimental I admit, but justified when you consider the fate of the family and their guests. Our mountaineers have the best reputation in all of Europe, which is to say the world, really, I mean the Americans are all glitz and no risk whilst the Japanese have developed those special vertical hold gizmos, cheating really and we’d have beaten them to it if our scientists weren’t chronically starved of investment. Remember the pianos in the good old days? The descending scales in particular were my favourites. One of the players gave a highly original rendition of the first few bars of the unfinished symphony, fairly finished himself by the end of it, though. If I could raise enough cash, I could start off a toilet bowl society, imagine the thrill, the flush of excitement, it’d truly be one of the last challenges known to man and cheaper than the space shuttle roulette with engine failure every few take-offs. No one is willing to pay for imagination these days. Stick a remote control in their sweaty palms and they’ll shoot the neighbour’s cat in 3-D video-death replay. Some of us were born brilliant with no financial clout to match our ambitions. My other hobbies? Interesting you should ask that – I finished a daisy chain this morning to add to my other steamroller pressings.

If you asked me, I would say:
When the grey dawn incises its rays through the curtains I would either
a) belch loudly
b) clean my teeth
c) relieve myself in the wash hand basin – improves lower arm strength, especially if constipated.
Then it would be:
a) breakfast
b) breakfast TV
Then an hour or so washing the exertions away before:
a) working
b) eating again.
Logical progression from food to sleep and food to sleep, the two most rewarding activities with a little displeasure in between.

But you didn’t ask me. And I cannot speak. And when the ink runs out, I cease to e-x-i-s-

For maximum effect, the wisdom of the Orient suggests five deep thrusts alternated with five shallow. To avoid unfortunate side-effects, useage of the back passage is most advisable.

An Experiment

Regulations
1) Dress. Must be long and loose-fitting with wide spaces between the buttons and waterproof. Hats may be worn, preferably wide-brimmed.
2) Site. At own discretion.
3) Method. Digital, or at own discretion, not too conspicuous.
4) Footwear. Sneakers or Wellingtons, high heels or steel toe-capped battle boots.

Building sites are very convenient in my experience. Cement mixers relaxing to watch, purposeful motion, yes, a kind of brotherhood. At night, you must be careful to check for guard dogs – they aren’t called Doberman PINSCHERS for nothing. Central or peripheral, you can always rely on someone to come by sooner or later. Especially if you like immigrant workers, muscular, sweaty, deliciously foreign. I have a penchant for telephone boxes myself. I would never be so vulgar as to call. The drawback is that you have to select your neighbourhood quite carefully, else they’re more of a public convenience. If they’re well-frequented and. Particularly, if they’re well-lit, you can always find a challenge, to conceal or to reveal. Toilets, now that I mention them, only if they don’t have an attendant and are intended for the opposite sex. Act casually and watch them quiver with insecurity – they assume themselves mistaken, the icing on the cake! Opera houses only provoke scandal and arrest. Pubs can be dull if you arrive late on when alcohol-poisoning has reached an advanced stage. Hospitals will have you interned, some police-stations – well, you wouldn’t believe…The more clichéd the uniform, the less they expect it. And don’t forget the lollipops, if you’re that way inclined.

Pleasant words are greeted with scepticism. They are more purposeful, more considered than the stream of impersonal insults or wagging superficialism we usually exchange. And this is a song played more often than any other, a challenge to hear, to invent, to tread the path every individual has known at least once, excepting those who vowed celibacy. If you enquire as to why I am so beautiful, I will reply: because your desire endows me with this quality, your loneliness and my willingness conspire to disguise their union as fate – what chance then do we mortals have, poor pieces of animated flesh? We sigh as fortune turns, we sigh as we breathe, we sigh as we touch, life is born of a sigh and ends with another, the escape of the spirit when the cold lungs deflate. Creation is pain. The whys, the wherefores, the nows and the whens, being is interrogative – do you never tire of the endless questioning? Fiction within fiction, the bottom reached, nothing further to probe. The acquisition of knowledge does not satisfy. There is nothing unknown, nothing born of mystery. Our wishes are always conspicuous and transmitted. Events flow by in a stream. Active or passive?

“I like bacon,” announced Mr. Jones, “especially the fatty varieties. They remind me of my first wife on our trip down the Congo. Captured by cannibals we were and I bartered her in exchange for my safety and a new canoe. She was big enough for both requests, you see. And they let me in on the feast. I remember the glazed look in her eyes before they were gouged out. She didn’t plead with me – the incision was small, but effective. I contracted malaria on that trip too. Bloody mosquitoes”.

“Steak reminds me of my second wife,” declared Mr. Jones, “but they’re bad in summer, drip on the wallpaper more than the bacon, difficult to find a good frame for them, and the flies tend to maggot them. Had a good rump that lass, her anal passage was most accommodating. Pity I had to hatchet her, but it was the winter of ‘79 and I had nothing for Xmas dinner. The mills had just closed down and the relatives wanted a good scoff. Skinny ones are truly insubstantial: no good for love or basting”.

“Calves’ brains are very small,” mused Mr. Jones, “which reminds me of my third wife – a silly cow if ever there was one. Big breasts she had, though, fair wobbled when she was flat on her back, you could suffocate between them. She snapped her neck when I dropped her out the upstairs window. It being an insurance claim I threw a bucket and cloth at the same time, police never suspected anything. Now I can comfortably afford my other interests – care to see my pigeon loft?”

“Aye,” concluded Mr. Jones, “it’d be a sorry old world without the women”.

“Love is a chemical reaction,” stated the doctor as he carefully inserted the thermometer into the posterior of his patient.
“Love is pain,” sighed the Bohemian as he pulled the trigger, spreading his brains liberally over the wall behind him.
“Love is good business,” winked the prostitute as she sucked on the 58th penis of the evening.
“Love is sex,” whispered the nymphomaniac as he lurked in the bushes awaiting the dog walkers.
“Love is revolution,” cried the freedom fighter as he cleaned his sub machine gun.
“Love is kind,” intoned the martyr as he forgave the stone throwers.
“Love’s a con,” grumbled the secretary as she bit her nails, legs clamped together.
“Love is a gourmet meal,” smiled the fat man as he tenderly spread peanut butter over the jam-coated, limp white slices of bread.

Here I am, FMD, in the corridor (Flur), doing Telefondienst. Kim Ju-Myon was meant to call me this morning. It’s now 5.06 in the evening and I’m still waiting. Every call to this building comes via my phone. If I were an arsehole, I’d pretend the person had the wrong number: “Hallo, Lufthansa Orgasmusberatung”, or: “Guten Abend Schätzchen, ich bin heiß auf dich, laß uns doch gleich anfangen, zieh die Hose aus, mmm, wie bequem”, etc. etc. etc. as a Siamese monarch once intoned in a Hollywood musical. Tips is working at the clinic. I feel empty. The presence of God has quit the temple. Only Wednesday and the fangs bit to inject the honey. Five and a half hours of uninterrupted sexual activity, vaginal, oral, anal, no wonder I slept for thirteen hours. And he refused to put on a condom. Those little bastards live for days and I entered the danger zone on Wednesday night. On 20th we’ll see. Expect multiple emergency phone calls.
Cold here. Cyclists, roller skaters, skate boarders, horse riders, drivers, walkers, joggers all passing by. The weather was spazierenreif, to coin a word, but I could not take advantage of it. I am not in love – a novel thing to admit. In the very few hours of restfulness I know his warmth beside me and would remain there if I weren’t sick with frustrated arousal. He is not ashamed of his body. Hence I do not find it embarrassing to have the breath fucked out of me by a total stranger. He could be slightly sadistic and did not like me to look at him, though he with the light on pushes me to a position where he can better observe his glidings in a detached manner, as if his member belonged to someone else. He wished me ten children. Pleaded poverty, stupidity and boringness. If you ask me, I will say no, there is no betrayal, I seek no escape with him, BJ, D, they were betrayals. Double irony, Kim lived in my old corridor in EOH, opposite TK, my other lover. He is from South Korea, where my Father was fought and injured.
I intend on residence until 22nd March, when Tips goes to London for five days on holiday (and when she discovers whether or not she has won the scholarship to America). Ring, phone, ring for me! The right to indignation is mine. He has no phone. R has a job as a translator in Brussels, leaving the academic world “to its own hopeless inadequacy”. I miss Bo in the archives. Bo is 23, a blond, blue-eyed historian. We chat for anything between one and a half to three hours each day when he’s there. Apart from him, I miss old Geodesics and Frossel, an author in his mid-seventies who, upon my request, gave me a signed copy of his Fra dufternes verden, a history of perfume. The Americans here are very quiet this year and don’t mix with us lot at all. They are, on average, four to five years younger than the other lot. Shall the tiger and the crocodile meet? Yes, the superficial chat of the royal library is better than the challenge I will issue Kim tonight should he relent and contact me.
“What would you do if I were pregnant?” a question I could not in all honesty answer if you put it to me. Learn Korean? Suffer an “artificial” miscarriage?
What I hope, my dearest sister, is what you would hope the most ardently for yourself. My thoughts are with you; do not be deceived by the fickleness of the pen. May success be your handmaiden and contentment your lover.

[To DE, 12th March, 1989]

The tree in the cornfield surveys the slope of the fields, cutting the air with twig and bud, unseasonal weather enticing it to blossom prematurely, but there’s no relief, only the skylark and the roar of endless engines from the motorway flyover.

The city corner props a child who has long since forgotten the relief, filling his lungs instead with nicotine-laden clouds. Perhaps some sentimental elder will pity him and bestow money without demanding further services. Or perhaps the flick-knife, illegally obtained, will scar his face.

The bench supports the bag lady whose portable relief sloshes, temporary and imperfect, in the spirits bottle, a cliché haunting the collective imagination of first world settlements everywhere.

The embracing take pleasure in the relief. It is for them that the spring has come early. Rain would not detract, but the sunshine enhances. Partly exhibitionism, partly acknowledgement, they neither hurry nor contemplate. Time, as always, passes as do all artificial inventions. The abandoned wait for nightfall as ardently.

Relief, sleep, relief, sleep, sleep.

I sit by the seashore. Not out of longing for a symbol of life’s origin or eternity, but because an entire ocean separates me from him I long for, him with whom I walked, whose empty room I watch though he is gone. The seas are simply a drop, the gulf that separates us far wider. Perhaps not indifference or thoughtlessness, no, not these, but non-reciprocation. The widest gulf. Unnavigable, uncrossable. I speculate, projecting possibilities. Perhaps he is loved and loving, perhaps his work weighs on him, perhaps the frost has come.

I returned to K on February 22nd. Strange to be in PHH again. This year, the Penn Staters are all far younger, the oldest 21. One of them, Eric, reminds me strongly of you. The same style of dressing, right down to the disgusting old training shoes; the outsiderhood, the critical spirit. But he is not you, and I am disappointed. I am attracted to this Eric, but he is no substitute for you. I have banished love from my heart for all but the few, yourself, Tips, A. And I am weak. The choice looms nearer with each passing day, the choice of future. Two weeks ago I met Kim, a South Korean who has been interested in me for a while. I was not sure if this was the case, so I accepted his invitation to the opera, sleeping with him afterwards. Interesting experience because:
a) it’s been a long time
b) I wasn’t trying to pretend to myself I even especially liked him, let alone loved him.
It is over, in the Past, yet I still have a yearning to be loved: er hat mich vereinsamt. Perhaps also a yearning for the physical side, which I had always been able to despise before. There are men in K I could sleep with if I wanted, but I can’t be bothered with the effort. I’d rather at least be attracted to them. I know I speak of people as pawns, the depersonalizing aspect. The depression stemming from knowing that even liking another is more than I can afford. I must bury myself in work. If I must live, then let it be creatively. As Oscar Wilde said: “You must either be a work of art or wear one”. I want to combine both. Not that I’d cultivate eccentricity, just let the latent eccentricity flow out. What kind of a room will you read this in? What time of day? I shall sink into penury and obscurity. What choice is there? Unless I retreat to a Buddhist convent. Somehow I must escape the short-term inevitable, the ultimate inevitabilities of ageing and death sufficient. To you, my entire and unfailing love.

[To John D, unspecified day in March, 1989]

K, Sunday in March, 1989. Very clement weather indeed.

“Good evening, Ladies and Gentlemen and welcome to tonight’s edition of Thirty Irrelevant Questions. I’m your host, Oho Smarmyslime filling in for Knickerless Parsnip who broke his collarbone whilst attempting to remove it from the hot water tap in his bathtub. If you’re watching in traction, Knickerless, wouldn’t you be better off in bed?”
Cue jolly laughter and applause.
“Our first contestant for the evening who I’m sure would love to go home with the Big Prize, is – what’s your name?”
“F McScurvybrain”.
“Would that be Mr., Mrs. or Miss?”
“Ms., actually”.
“Allrightie, Ms. Scurvybrain, you’ve scored two out of two so far. Keep this up and the Big Prize might be within your grasp”.
(Oho flashes his pearly whites at the audience: a further cue is thrown across the studio by Steve Davies, their frantic applause reaching fever pitch when it hits the sound technician’s boom).
“Tell us, Ms. Scurvybrain, what are the most exciting experiences you have had this week?”
“Receiving an unexpected letter from my friend John Scabies, em, finding a juicy 20-year-old American to worship from afar and chucking my South Korean Leckerbissen because a true connoisseur of sexual activity is rather tiring”.
“Ahem, yes,” Oho mutters agitatedly under his breath “You were supposed to say reading Os