Once Upon a Time in the West

Once upon a time there was a little boy who could do anything, achieve anything and believed that anything was possible.

It doesn't matter that he was a boy, could of been a girl or a combination of both.

What happened to that boy? Where did he go?
Was he subsumed by the daily inanities of life?

In the back of the little boy's mind was a dream, a vision of how he wanted things to be that gradually unfolded.

With hindsight that little boy saw that all his actions in time were allied towards one basic form, they all had a similar theme to them.

The little boy grew into a man, but inside he was still the same boy looking up at giants beating him with belts. He was still the little boy fighting back against bullies and trying to not become a bully himself.

In his mind's eye that little boy believed that there must be something more to all this than what most people believe.

In his mind's eye that boy still retains a vision of what he wants and what he wants to give to the world and even though he sometimes finds it very difficult to maintain that vision in the face of adversity in many forms, it's still there, bright spark as ever.

Is the little boy or girl inside of you still calling out for you to follow your true purpose?

The Crab Apple

Och you know sometimes life throws you so many curveballs, you start thinking your balls are curved.

I mean take relationships right. What can you do? Sometimes they, other people, completely do your head in right?

You think that you're going along making some headway, building something between two folks, ships in the night, chips wrapped in the same paper, angst wrapped in new knickers and then wham, you're not in the picture anymore.

Suddenly we, is no longer. After all in matters of the heart mostly, regardless of any supposed definites, all you've really got is hope and a prayer.

You meet someone, you like them , there are a few obstacles in the way, you get over those obstacles, you see that person again, maybe you think too much about the situation and then you make a decision.

The decision you make is that you really really like someone and you are going to go for it, you are gonna commit to that person, get to know them much much better, laugh with them, be ridiculous with them and see if they are indeed 'the one'.

And then 'kablowey' 'kaboom' 'karrrccrrrunch', holy cuttlefish batman you are no longer in the picture, it turns out that you have in fact been turned out, as in, no longer the apple of the other's eye, more like the crab apple that nobody wants.

Ah if my heart wasn't set for bursting, it would of burst already.

Rejection comes in threes apparently.

Kenneth Griffith films a wedding

I saw a wedding in the village church yesterday, I almost blubbed.

What is it about weddings that turn us into creampuffs? (Or is it just me?).

Probably because they all look so happy and we wonder will we ever be that happy? Or able to commit? To take that leap of faith?

In the graveyard of the church of the wedding, that I walk past most days, lies the actor, filmmaker etc Kenneth Griffith.

When I first moved to London, I lived in the part of Hoxton that is in Islington. About three hundred yards away, Kenneth Griffith had the office of his film company.

Now that I currently live where I do, Kenneth Griffith has his film office about three hundred years away from me, down the hill, in the graveyard, still no doubt planning his next film, his next performance and his next piece of agit-prop.

I was going to go in and ask him for some advice, but the last time I tried that was in Montmartre cemetery, Paris in Nov 2003, when I sought Truffaut's grave, touched the black marble slab that is over his grave and asked him for some advice regarding my filmmaking.

He replied in a cod-french accent, 'You just have to keep going, mon ami'.

Thanks a bunch Francois. But in his simplisticness, he was right. You just have to keep going, mon ami.

Love in a Gluten-Free World

This week I have mostly been achieving...

I want it so much that that crazy glint in my eye is not Dr. Draze and his new consumer eye test. I want it so much that I feel the very fundament of my soul resonating at the speed of the universe. In short, it shall be mine.

But what are these riches, baubles and trinkets I talk of?

Success.

But what is success? Surely success is everything to everybody.

Example, I used to go out with a girl and the the only thing she ever wanted in life was a Jaguar XJS. That's pretty much it, a Jaguar XJS, oh and never having to take the bus, ever again.

Now they were nice cars, they guzzled a bit, but as far as something that handled like a boat on a sea of slimy cheese, hey why not?

She went on and on about getting a Jaguar XJS, every time we would see one, she'd say, 'i'm going to have one of those'. Preferably a red one.

Now goals are great and important if you are ever going to achieve anything, even if it is to buy what is essentially a toy.

Anyway she probably did get that Jaguar XJS and then mayhap got bored with it or realised that it wasn't really handy around town or that hey sometimes catching the bus is okay, even rewarding and in cities, often a better way of getting around.

But to her getting that Jaguar equalled success, it meant that she had arrived, she had made it, look at me world, I am a success, I don't have to take the bus hahaha (and she used to accuse me of being a snob).

So a couple of weeks after we split up I was walking down the road.

I had a decent amount of cash coming to me and I wanted to invest most of it, but as I passed a car lot, a funny mischievous thought popped into my head and I liked it.

Said ex-girlfriend called me a few days later, mostly as an excuse to see how I was doing.

You know, one of those 'hey I hope that you are doing great'.

But secretly hoping that I was, even just briefly;

'a wasted husk of emotional wreckage doomed to wander the landscape in a state of learned helplessness'.

Anyway I agreed to go over and give her back a couple of books that I had of hers. Yes it's true that the books were a metaphor for 'a damn good seeing to', but I really did have some of her books.

So I pull up in my new car, shiny, polished, waxed and gleaming, it's a nice new car, didn't cost me that much, as you can pick up those things pretty cheaply.

And she is waiting for me on the doorstep and the look on her face says more than I could ever impart to you in a lifetime.

As I glided seamlessly up to the kerb in my beautiful, sleak, powerful, red, Jaguar XJS...

Foreign Correspondent

The contagion spread. Just like 28 Days Later.

It's bechamel sauce trying to be too clever metaphor got out of hand and the next minute we knew, we were two moldy friends left out in the rain.

So there we were, me and my subconscious standing at the bus stop waiting for the mythical X30 service to 'Future Aspirations via Irrelevant Trivia'.

Like a Souffle

Today I am learning to step outside of time.

'WTF?' some of you might be thinking. But bear with me a minute.

Is it a luxury to be able to work on yourself and make yourself better? A better person? In whichever way you find that works for you?

In a physical, financial, spiritual, emotional etc way?

Surely society, your friends, neighbours, family etc all benefit from having a better, more productive you in their lives?

So how is this 'better you' meant to manifest itself, if the prevailing attitude is one of not allowing such 'daft things' to come into your life in the first place. To just knuckle down and accept the prevailing idea that 'that's reality' 'that's the way it is' etc.

Apparently to most people in 'this' culture or mindset, the answer is no, that is not allowed, it's not 'normal', it's self-indulgent to engage in such things. And then we wonder why so many people are apparently being prescribed anti-depressants (Cause and Effect in plain action).

Apparently you should just get on with it and stop thinking about such things, settle for the lowest common denominator, the turgid mass of non-stop glottal flummery.

The idea being that you should be a good little worker and soldier on through years and years of mundanity and delirium in order to reach some middling ground of half-arsed ideas.

Retire then die, being not only utterly unfulfilled as a person, but also never having allowed yourself to ask the powerful questions that matter, or rather never allowing yourself to seek answers.

I'm not painting a bleak picture here, i'm suggesting that there is more available to me and you if we want it, that the majority of content of the mainstream of society is vapid useless crap, just watch the news on any big corporation 'the voice of authority'. It turns your power down.

It saddens me to think that most people would consider any time spent on bettering themself in any way, other than the purely financial (and that is usually the straight trade of time for money) as being self-indulgent or in some way lazy, not right etc. Are their minds really that small?

It's difficult to not be effected by it, you have to charge your batteries with a different way of thinking.

Not normal? Normal is Boring. Not Reality? Reality is boring.

In the words of a whole bunch of wise people 'The past does not equal the future'.

As in my past, your past, our past, does not equal the future. Rise Up.

Once Upon a Time in Wetwang

Years ago when I still owned a house and ate take-away vegetable birianis, I had a fantasy (one of the only ones that didn't involve x-rated content), which was to get a camper van and travel to all the places in the British Isles and beyond, that had amusing, daft or interesting names.

I yearned to see Upper and Lower Slaughter in Gloucestershire, England. My loins ached to hit the streets of Dyfatty in Carmarthenshire, Wales (yes, achieved it, tick it off my list) and I had to go down on Cuntis, Galicia, Spain (yes it exists-have a look for yourself).

It later became a whim, downgraded from fantasy to something I would do someday (not even in the days of the week).

Had I failed to realise a burning desire?? Not really, goals change and some things aren't really that important.

I would like to point out that I have in fact been to Upper and Lower Slaughter, although not in a camper van, and I have yet to savour the pleasures of Cuntis, but hey soon mayhap?

My point is that some things are the eternal desires within us which drive me/you/us to achieve certain things, to break through our limitations.

These are musts. As in I (me personally) must write scripts and screenplays every day because I am compelled to, even though there have been many occassions, where it would of been far more practicable for me to have been a plumber, carpenter or double-glazing salesman.

But no, none of these remotely interest me, whereas living a creative wonderful life does. Gosh am I deluded, should I lower my expectations?

Short answer: No.

Will I ever get do my tour of the British Isles in a Camper Van visiting all those places with daft place names? Yes, in fact I've done quite a bit of it, again, not yet in a camper van, but the camper van will come when I want it enough.

In fact I might just get a camper van and forget about buying another house for the time being, after all if you don't like the view in Dyfatty, you can always move to Machynlleth or for that matter Wetwang (it's in the north of Yorkshire, England).

For the record I also like Garstang (also in that North Yorkshire/ Cumbria/ County Durham nexus), whose name refers to stabbing someone with a spear (i'm not just a pretty face you know?).