2 The Place.

Getting on.

I’m stuck between the confusion of our times, trying to find meaning where there is none, if there is meaning it’s just the fact that we are born, we live, we don’t want to die, and yet we know that it one day will be. 

So I stumble on, from one trend to the other, from one mood to the other. Half reading books, the books that someone said had to be on all our bookshelves, so I bought it and put it there, now what? 

I heard a rumour that all cool people will be at that demo, the demo where you had to be, it was in a square with that nice looking little coffee bar, with laptop warriors and baristas with art school backgrounds. 

The demo went well, we all shouted what the problem was with that ‘thing’ it was about, then we rounded it off with a fair trade Latté served by a spotted minimum wager, in the bar where the wifi is perfect. 

The anarchists had a good turn-out I felt, some old commie with hammer and sickle badge was selling ‘class war’ coasters, the gays were out in numbers, there was some tensions between the Trans and the Feminists, but all stayed peaceful.

On the way home I was feeling ecstatic so I treated myself to a new T-shirt the guy with the stall was selling, a percentage of the profit was going to a project in Africa, where ironically the T-shirt will be heading soon in some landfill. I shouldn’t wear T-shirts with slogans at my age, I shouldn’t even have slogans, or ideas let alone ideals. My generation needs to just ‘go away’ I heard some multicoloured hair girl say. 

But it was a good day, and I went home alone, as I had left. Then the confusion popped it’s grotty little head up. The certainties that had pepped me up at the demo fell away, the ‘hypocrites guilt’ hit home. I switched on the telly for the news , maybe I was filmed at the demo, proof that all ages were there, but there was no mention. 

Just some politician convincing the couch spuds that it is in their best interest to tighten their belts, “no belts needed for ‘trackies’” I thought.

The ‘what’s it all about’ question went round and round in my head again  just after ‘celebrity chefs’ , “we actually sit and watch people who can’t really cook, cooking meals we probably couldn’t afford, I mean WT actual F is going on. An hour watching telly-more fat on the belly. 

We lose ourselves watching what is presented as being ‘the real life’. There won’t be many celebrity chefs down the food bank tomorrow morning. 

Should I be ‘making something’ of my life? If so why? and more so what? If I was just to sit home and watch telly I wouldn’t be harming anyone, this life could come and go, no effort. 

Another week gone by, waiting for the delivery of stuff I think I need, getting by on beans on toast and the occasional egg. I walked back down to the square where the demo had been, no history made here, the badge and flag stalls were gone, making way for the homeless and the addicted to reclaim their space. The Barista gave me a strange look, I was still wearing the black t-shirt with call to arms slogan, ‘so last week man, living in the past, move on, what do you want?’ “A latté “ I said, but meaning I need anything, anything that would give meaning. Anything that would help me stop thinking, give me a cause. 

The coffee was fair trade, I gave money and got coffee in return, fair. On the way out I told the Barista that I hadn’t ‘seen a man bun since last summer, move on’. He smiled with the arrogance of somebody convinced that they are probably the next ‘thing’ the next ‘celeb’ the next ‘person who knows’, where in reality, the people outside are saving a place on the bench for his old age, when the Barista gets old and goes from ‘soup and tea’ deals to free hand outs at the church. 

This is it ,

where I live, 

what it’s become, 

thinking we have it all,

‘it’ being none.