Sometimes you get a bit ahead of yourself: I was so caught up in reviews and tasters of the latest Cohen album that I forgot it doesn’t come out till tomorrow! I wondered why Amazon hadn’t got any… Not that I want to buy from Amazon; I’m probably going to head into town and get it from an Actual Shop while they still exist – but it’s probably just as well I didn’t go and do that today…
Anyway, I’ve been tinkering with the memoir, finishing off little bits I’m still unhappy with; and when I’d finished I realised it was only four o’clock! So getting ahead of myself seems to be the theme for today.
With writing the memoir I’ve learned a lot of things. One is that although I try to write consecutively it doesn’t really work. You get ahead of yourself and have to go back: for example when I was writing about all the houses I’ve lived in, I got as far as our last one – which I’ve called ‘the house that should have been knocked down’ – and realised I was married with children and I hadn’t even written about meeting Mark yet! So back I went…
The other thing I’ve learned is that the process of memory, and writing about memory, is cyclical. You may think you’re going in a straight line, but you’re actually travelling in circles; or perhaps in spirals, where you keep coming back to the same places again and again. And then of course there is the irony of writing a memoir about memory-loss…
Another way I’ve got ahead of myself today is in reading Don de Lillo. I’m getting through it, but it’s loooooooooong – about 830 pages, all in American – and I hadn’t realised it was published pre-9/11 so I got a little jolt when he mentions seeing the Twin Towers. And that started me thinking about Islamic fundies. Al Qaida were bad enough, but even they think Islamic State are beyond the pale. What is the matter with these people? I cannot comprehend them. I’d say they were hired by Richard Dawkins to make religion look bad, but it’s way beyond that sort of joke. It’s beyond anything.
So tonight, to take my mind off all that, I’m going to a discussion at the Ale Wagon about Scotland and the aftermath. It should be interesting; particularly in view of the can of worms Cameron has opened with all this Devo Max stuff. When an MP for Wiltshire complains that his constituents are being ‘done down’ by deals with Scotland, you know he’s in trouble: it’s one thing to go haring North of the border scattering election promises left, right and centre (sorry, I mean ‘right, right and centre’) – it’s another to go home again and deal with the fallout.
Hm – Devo Max. Didn’t they have a hit some time in the ’80’s?
Kirk out
Sarada Gray 