The Reek of Wrongness
Hail,
As the more perceptive amongst you have probably guessed, not feeling one hundred percent lately, moodwise. It's the usual unholy trinity of poor sleep, poor concentration and poor motivation, and my muse is not visiting me. In fact, I rather suspect that she has taken an restraining order of some sorts out on me.
You know, if your muse is an incarnation of what makes you write, I don't think she'd be some dignified Apollonian figure clad in flowing linen. Most writers I know write in response to darker urges: subsumed regrets, occult egotisms, hidden terrors, covert rage. My muse (and I suspect the vast majority of muses) would be some Dionysian figure, twigs in hair and scratches on the skin, her face and mouth stained with some unidentifiable substance, her eyes wild and deep.
Or maybe those eyes would be different - blank and pitiless, maybe endless lines of text scrolling across each iris. I have a friend, the most gifted writer I know, who goes through multiple agonies over single words. He would say he loves words and writing, and he's certainly been granted some remarkable gifts, but I don't know that his muse cares greatly for him.
Anyhow. Enough deep blue. What to do about the moods?
Well, one thing would be to get a better fucking job, that's for sure. I am aware that this seems markedly at odds with what I have written before. But I reckon if you want to forget your worries, pack up your troubles in the old doctor's bag and smile, smile, smile... this is't the place to do it.
I will leave the more ER of today's cases for another, calmer time, probably in the late 2240s. Instead, a very biref synopsis of two of the creepier things I have thought about n the last few days.
Mrs Poe, a large-framed woman, previously a widow, and her new husband, Mr Blancmange, a small and inoffensive sort- and the fact that late at night Mrs Poe made Mr Blancmange dress up in the clothes previously occupied by the late Mr Poe.
Now I don't know why that's wrong, but it is.
But not as wrong, not as fleshcreepy, as one anecdote involving my wife Sarah's ex. Before she met me she went out with a tall, lugubrious man, someone who always seemed despondent - despite what I feel was his great good fortune at even knowing Sarah was alive. Now Brad, as I shall call him, apparently played classical guitar (badly, I am informed), but was impaired in his pursuit of excellence by the fact that he bit his nails. He used to bite his nails down to the quick, and you need those long, delicate nails to pluck the strings.
So he made Sarah grow her nails and then cut them off, and he glued her nails to his fingers, and played the guitar like that.
See, how does fiction compete? Thank God he didn't go bald, he could have made her get a haircut and glued her hair onto his head.
Anyway, off to bed. The ED has not been very pick-me-uppy lately, a lto fo what I will call 'outliers' - the subject of a forthcoming post, once the tide rises again. I will get back to reading, writing and suchlike in the shortest possible time.
Thanks for reading,
John
As the more perceptive amongst you have probably guessed, not feeling one hundred percent lately, moodwise. It's the usual unholy trinity of poor sleep, poor concentration and poor motivation, and my muse is not visiting me. In fact, I rather suspect that she has taken an restraining order of some sorts out on me.
You know, if your muse is an incarnation of what makes you write, I don't think she'd be some dignified Apollonian figure clad in flowing linen. Most writers I know write in response to darker urges: subsumed regrets, occult egotisms, hidden terrors, covert rage. My muse (and I suspect the vast majority of muses) would be some Dionysian figure, twigs in hair and scratches on the skin, her face and mouth stained with some unidentifiable substance, her eyes wild and deep.
Or maybe those eyes would be different - blank and pitiless, maybe endless lines of text scrolling across each iris. I have a friend, the most gifted writer I know, who goes through multiple agonies over single words. He would say he loves words and writing, and he's certainly been granted some remarkable gifts, but I don't know that his muse cares greatly for him.
Anyhow. Enough deep blue. What to do about the moods?
Well, one thing would be to get a better fucking job, that's for sure. I am aware that this seems markedly at odds with what I have written before. But I reckon if you want to forget your worries, pack up your troubles in the old doctor's bag and smile, smile, smile... this is't the place to do it.
I will leave the more ER of today's cases for another, calmer time, probably in the late 2240s. Instead, a very biref synopsis of two of the creepier things I have thought about n the last few days.
Mrs Poe, a large-framed woman, previously a widow, and her new husband, Mr Blancmange, a small and inoffensive sort- and the fact that late at night Mrs Poe made Mr Blancmange dress up in the clothes previously occupied by the late Mr Poe.
Now I don't know why that's wrong, but it is.
But not as wrong, not as fleshcreepy, as one anecdote involving my wife Sarah's ex. Before she met me she went out with a tall, lugubrious man, someone who always seemed despondent - despite what I feel was his great good fortune at even knowing Sarah was alive. Now Brad, as I shall call him, apparently played classical guitar (badly, I am informed), but was impaired in his pursuit of excellence by the fact that he bit his nails. He used to bite his nails down to the quick, and you need those long, delicate nails to pluck the strings.
So he made Sarah grow her nails and then cut them off, and he glued her nails to his fingers, and played the guitar like that.
See, how does fiction compete? Thank God he didn't go bald, he could have made her get a haircut and glued her hair onto his head.
Anyway, off to bed. The ED has not been very pick-me-uppy lately, a lto fo what I will call 'outliers' - the subject of a forthcoming post, once the tide rises again. I will get back to reading, writing and suchlike in the shortest possible time.
Thanks for reading,
John
posted by Bronze John at 11:28 PM
7 Comments:
Okay, that tops anything PdeFF has ever asked me to do . . . Thank god I'm the part of our ex-couple who plays the guitar badly. Ewww. Where do we pick up these psycho-men? Is there an aisle at the supermarket? At least she has you now.
P.S. I hope you feel better. Chocolate always helps me. Or a good book. Or sex (you'll have to check with Sarah about that, I believe). Just saying. If all else fails, a nice long walk (or run, if you don't care about your joints). Oh! A hot bath with a glass of wine, or if that's too poofter-y or pommy, a can of beer.
He made her do it??? How does someone get made to do such a thing? Besides, isn't it far easier just to go to the drugstore and get a set of fake nails?
I think she made this up just to entertain you.
I suppose a similar thing may be seen in confessionals, but in regard to what people are capable of doing to other people, the nail thing hardly surprises me a bit (I don't know Sarah Chatnoir's ex). Some of the stories I have heard as a medico from patients...
FW as for BJ his poison is a nice glass of Black Stump Bordeaux, (athought I suspect he secretly likes a nice "Perth Pink"), personally I don't think you can go past a perfect "Chateau Chunder" myself.
Ah yes, the fine fighting wines of Australia. Well, after a few workdays like BJ has had, he can drink whatever he wants without comment from me. As long as he sobers up and blogs more afterwards. Once again, I am grateful that my lack of math and science aptitude kept me out of the medical profession.
Prom - it's true! Sarah didn't actually think as weird as I did. As to the bigger question... I don't know. I thought carefully about the phrase "made her do", and in the end it seemed the best one to use. I think there are ways (assertive? aggressive? what's the word...) people can get less assertive people to do things they otherwise would not countenance - that horrible experiment by Stanley Milgram, for example. Especially people who lack confidence in certain areas. Anyway,
John
And thanks to everyone for the encouraging comments. Very much appreciated.
On the subject of alcohl, after only a few weeks treating the assembled alcoholics of the city, I am now almost blase when people tell me they drink five litres of wine a day.
Five bloody litres! Usually of some god-awful cheap sweet white that you wouldn't use to make industrial vinegar!! I've detained people for less suicidal behaviour than that.
John
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