I’d written off the 25th of November long before I ever got the plane to California. The day after Annie’s birthday party, I’d imagined, would be an empty one: spinning heads and groaning and human duvet-mounds shuffling back and forth between sofa, bathroom and fridge.
Continue readingCalifornia Pt 5 | Stork
Because of my tendency to roam around, I have only celebrated one of Annie’s birthdays with her since we met: her 23rd. That birthday party – which involved acid tabs, public nudity, rooftop falls, a dildo covered in glitter, leather harnesses and quite a lot of blood – was, it’s safe to say, the reason for my anxiety on the morning of her 30th birthday party in Oakland.
Continue readingCalifornia Pt 4 | Collegiate
The USA is unlike France in every way but one: when you’re there, you can’t help but keep thinking about the fact that you’re there. You’re not just drinking a coffee – you’re drinking a coffee in Paris. You’re not just eating a burger – you’re eating a burger in America. This knowledge alone, with all its fabulous, glamorous connotations – those accumulated over a lifetime of books and stories and songs and late-night Wikipedia trawls – shunts the mundane towards the mythical. I’m blowing my nose – in America!
Continue readingCalifornia Pt 3 | In ‘n’ Out
The ‘bomb cyclone’ beating up the west coast intensified on the second day of my visit: silver sheets of rain coming down, pooling on street corners and running rivers around the wheels of parked cars – leaves and newspapers and single flip-flops floating by forlornly, coming to standstills halfway up driveways or plastered across kerbs. The greens and reds of traffic lights and headlights blurred over sodden asphalt, drawing down buildings and billboards into long strange reflections.
Continue readingCalifornia Pt 2 | Artificial Impertinence
I’m always sheepish when I see friends for the first time in a while – and it wasn’t even that long of a while! But I don’t know; I’m not very good at hellos, and I’m atrocious at goodbyes. I think as I get older I’m increasingly wary of sentimentality. A cautious counter, I think, to the oversentimentality of years gone by – of alienating people, weirding people out with my emotional intensity. I’ve learned, quite subconsciously it seems, to say less. Maybe that’s what happens to a lot of boys when they’re little – maybe that’s why so many men are so stoic and silent and struggle to know what’s going on in their own heads. For some reason it happened to me much later on. I never know how much emotion is appropriate, so it’s safer to just be pragmatic.
Continue readingCalifornia Pt 1 | Scaredy Cat
Before I went to California there was a lot of to-ing and fro-ing over whether it was a good idea. There were a few factors: after Colombia I seem to have developed some sort of post-shitshow travel anxiety, plus at 31 I was unsure whether I’d be able to keep up with the debauchery I felt sure Annie would have planned for her birthday.
Continue readingItaly | Serenità
Italy in autumn – hills that roll with the regularity of those back home, but rise a little higher, sink a little lower. Tall cypress trees looming from the mist that sits in the mornings like water in a basin. A cemetery on a lone hilltop at night, flickering in orange candlelight. Deer in the fields, roaming in pairs. Hunters in camo gear, also in pairs, loading rifles onto quad bikes and sipping from flasks. Hares in the forest. Porcupines too – as big as a dog, fans of white quills like monsters.
Continue readingLondon | Oh Just Chatting Away Really
I’ve started writing on my hand again – I used to do that when I was a teenager. I also did it in my early twenties. Then I stopped for a while. Not sure why I stopped – I just did. And now, at 31, the back of my left hand says ‘Call Vic’, because I need to call her, along with a hastily added ‘+ Dad’ underneath, because I need to call him too.
Continue readingLondon | Tubby, Or Not Tubby
I continue my slow, sensual crip walk into eccentricity. I’m certainly going through a bit of a ‘phase’, but I’m not really sure how to define it. I’m just sort of… exploring things. Finding new pursuits.
Continue readingA Sliver of Book, A Side of Chatter
Alright. Let us begin with:
The Siege of Pugglemunt, Chapter Seventeen: An Excerpt
They had crested the horizon: the view was clear from the Magic Tower. In one great, rippling, flesh-and-leather coloured mass, the dark horde was approaching from the west, moving fast across the fields surrounding Pugglemunt. Thin plumes of black smoke went up from every home and hovel they rode past. I was glad I’d given the order to summon all surrounding villagers to the keep. Actually, hang on a second—
“Quince, did I give the order to summon all surrounding villagers to the keep?”
“No, my liege.”
“Oh GOD. SHIT.”
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