Saturday, May 18, 2013
Sex and chips and the effect of creative happiness
Last night I dreamt I was running to catch a train.
And I caught it. Which astonished me. Astonished me because in the dream I could run.
These days pains in my knees and sometimes in my hips too, coupled with a general draining of strength from my legs, means I can’t run any more. And almost certainly will never run again.
This morning this frightened and distressed me; and, almost certainly as a result, my knees were especially sore as I walked to the station.
My train was at the far end of a distant platform and when I eventually subsided into my seat I felt ready to weep.
I was going to Charing Cross on the western side of Glasgow, and that meant catching a different train from the main line one to Queen St.
On the main line you get tables to write on and even wi fi sometimes and someone comes round to sell you refreshments on a trolley.
These trains are a bit shabbier, and there are no tables and certainly no refreshments and you go through a landscape both urban and rural that looks a bit wilder and more bleak.
A young couple got on at Drumgealloch who were unusual in that they were both wearing brand new clothes. He was powerfully built with a shaven head, a good looking guy with an individual, intelligent kind of face. She wore a silver metallic puffer type jacket with a corsetted waist, immaculate white jeans and a metallic handbag to match. She had elaborately styled blonde hair and immaculate make-up and spent the whole journey looking at her phone. He was clearly attracted to her and sat as close to her as he could; but she ignored him.
I was listening to Brandenburg concertos on my big Bose headphones and almost certainly not looking my best and the one time she really looked up from her phone she saw me and I guess clocked me as a transsexual woman because she laughed in my face. And then made some probably derogatory remark to her companion which I couldn’t hear, and didn’t want to, but flashed the somewhat aggressive smile with full eye contact I employ on these occasions and she immediately took refuge in her phone.
I took refuge in dear Mr. Bach and some entirely fanciful calculation about how many people might have seen my plays or heard them on the radio, both of which also made me feel better.
I spent my day filming scenes with my dear and talented Sex Chips and the Holy Ghost colleagues and companions, marvelling at the quality of the pictures and the capacity we now possess to transmit them all over the world...
Staggering a little from tiredness on my way back home I encountered two Gallus Glasgow ladies on their way home from the matinee at the King’s theatre, a lovely show it had been, and one asked the other if she wanted to sit down while they waited for the train. “The bench is awful cold” she said at which point her friend spread out her raincoat so she could sit on it.
And there they were sitting close together and one said “People might think we’re gay” and they both giggled at the prospect.
And we all smiled in easy companionship and the train pulled in and I felt happy and thankful for the whole journey home.
Something about the joy of being collectively creative, I guess, and also the sheer pleasure of being able to live as a woman and through that, somehow, being able to take such pleasure in a day of filming.
And as I walked back from the station to my house my knees hardly hurt at all.
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