Bliss.

I talk about racism with my other white friends.
We know it's bad but not how it feels.

After an appearance at a benefit for refugees,
I lay in the sun ,in my garden, to relax,solidarity is tiring.

I know I shouldn't ,but sometimes I look suspiciously at people I don't know.

The best moments never involve too many people, always just enough for the occasion.


When I was young from about age eleven, I used to love going on long walks. I always took the back roads, the country lanes. Our council estate was at the edge of town, urban chaos on one side, green fields and endless hedgerows on the other. I would walk to Thornbury, a 24 km round trip,first task, try to find a stick, a boy on a walk needs a stick, a stick used to be anything then in the days of fertile imagination.
Those were probably the best moments of my youth, to get out, get away ,walk and daydream. It must have been then that I also realized that solitude is a good companion a friend to be seeked out now and again. Solitude makes it possible for thoughts to flow freely without judgement, interference or mockery, solitude gives the stage to the 'me' in my head, the one that gets blocked out and ignored when in group.
The walks were great because it was just me, trying to come to terms with me, a relationship that would last for a lifetime.
I wasn't aware of wars in far off places, social injustice or poverty even though I lived in it. The bliss of ignorance.
At 11 years old it wasn't my task to be irate, angry or  indignant, I just had to be home by tea-time.