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mrThis story may contain adult content. |
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| Written by ian | |
| Tuesday, 19 February 2008 | |
As my foot hits the pavement and the sun burns my retinas, the starting chords of voodoo chile by Jimi Hendrix resonate through my head. My knees bend slightly, my arms start to swing gently and I begin to bounce down the street. A gentle breeze wafts of the sea and the city to my nose. I’m home and going painting in windmill lane for the first time in years.
“stand up next to the mountain , chop it down with the edge of my hand” sings Jimi and that’s how I feel , like I could grow to the size of a mountain and change the way the world is viewed by a simple act. I am the sun god trapped in human form and everywhere I go joy and love rise up like spring daffodils after a heavy winter.
I have planned for today with my usual sporadic approach to everything I do. I have a play list of music made up on my mp3 player, chosen to keep me happy and calm for the train journey and walks in between my house and windmill lane. The calm is as important as the happy. If you let your mind and eyes wander in the city these days you will find something that will make your blood boil. Such is progress and modernisation of the world, that while from afar it looks beautiful, but if you look closely, then like a Monet painting you sees the dots. However unlike a Monet the dots of reality are not perfect little dots but cancerous lumps and bumps which shock and depress you into a fug of loathing and pity for the weak and defenceless of the world. As with most city living souls I have trained my eyes not to see what is there and my mind to replace what my eyes don’t see with a perfect image of the world I live. So the music is important, because even in a city where no one wants to know your name crying on public transport is a beacon for other people who would like to cry on the train and you don’t want to talk to them! believe me.
After the last note of Hendrix dies in my ears there is only a second of calm before seven nation army by the White Stripes starts to fill my ears. But in that second I hear the reason for my large outer ear headphones
“Na man, im going down Thomas Street, have to meet your man and pick up some gear”
Fuckin junkies I hate them unlike most people who think you should feel sorry for them. Well I don’t! They don’t deserve my pity. They deserve to be shot or maybe hung drawn and quartered. I know it’s fashionable these days to say that its not there fault and they had a hard life and blah di blah blah. That’s bullshit any four year old knows that needles aren’t a good thing so why should I fell sorry for someone who intent ally sticks one in themselves to get a rush. Then goes out and robs somebody to do it again. Now im no saint I have taken drugs and I have drunk more than I should for long periods. But every morning I got up and went to work to earn the money and the right to abuse my body the way I see fit. I have never robbed anybody to get my fix and not because I didn’t need to.
So ill just take a little walk down the platform and spark up the spliff I rolled before leaving. I can’t hear the junkies any more because of the music and headphones but I don’t want to share. There is a nice piece by FED just off the platform. It is his usual style that he has been using for years. Nice flowing lines, compact letters and a clean outline. This time he has used a green and brown fill with a royal blue outline with electric pink and white highlights. He is good but predictable. The hand holding the spliff unconiousily traces the hand movements that I would have used to create the piece. The white stripes have left to be replaced by GOMEZ’S “whipping Piccadilly” a song guaranteed to get me excited and leave me smiling. Dart time says it will be 5 minutes till the next train to bray. But this being dart time I know to use the lights to judge when the train is going to arrive, orange so it’s at raheny and will be here in 2 minutes
So the train approaches and I go to my usual spot to be right in front of the doors, but of course I have forgotten about the new carriages so have got it wrong. I have to run like a fool to the door. Them dart drivers don’t hang around anymore. Its stop, open, 1 heartbeat, 2 heartbeats, close and drive off. The choice of side to sit on is very important because different sides show more or less Graff at different times. I sit on the left hand side of the train to catch the walls at the back of the flats at killester/clontarf. There is usually at least one throw up there. “ and we all fall down, there is not enough hours in our trip” in that gravely voice and the lurch of the train moving off happen simultaneously as I settle in for the third part of my journey.
Something strange is happening to my mp3 player. It is skipping which is strange for a solid media storage device, it is nearly impossible for them to skip unless the c.d. it was recorded off was really bad because most computers will smooth out any small skips in most c.d’s. I try to change the song but it goes to random and a track by the Wu tang clan comes on. I don’t have the name saved but I know the song. It has the usual heavy beat of the Wu but with a haunting violin riff through and it triggers a wave of paranoia to wash over me.
The sky has darkened and the wind has picked up. The day of twenty minutes ago is fighting for survival with the day of now and it is a violent fight. The sky is cris crossed with slashes of baby blue competing with the growing banks of oppressive black clouds. The effect is like looking at the aftermath of a rodeo in a two tone paint shop. I keep my fingers crossed and slightly become the one man cheerleading squad for the day of twenty minutes ago. I need some good weather to paint. Rain would definitely stop play. Not even a lot of rain is needed, because the walls are so slick after twenty years of paint coated on them, that trying to put a new coat of paint on in the rain, would be like trying to get your piss to stick to a urinal.
Fuck it! There it is rain, great! That’s plan a punnily enough down the toilet. ill still head down and see what’s down there and if there is a dry wall I could possibly do a throw up , a quick outline of a piece with no colour . I would be happy with that; it would be something to show for the day.
Plan b would be to do some heart breaking window shopping in town. No money but lots of thing to buy. I could give Ed, Mick or David a ring for a few pints and some smokes. It would be a close run thing as to which would cost me more. Window shopping is expensive for someone with no impulse control. I will leave that decision until I get to windmill lane and see what way the land lies.
The Wu have hipity hopity’ed of my headphones to be replaced by Organ Donor by DJ shadow. One of my top 5 can never hear enough of tracks. It has a lurching start to it, like a baby’s first steps that turn into the loping stride of a cross country runner. And just as the cross country runner’s foot springs off the ground for the first time, the train pulls in to Tara street station, my stop. A coincidental occurrence like maybe fate has stuck his foot in my day.
As I make a weaving line for the exit stairs, I spot the two junkies out of the corner of my eye. not an unusual occurrence , Tara street is the most popular station for people going shopping in town, as it is on the quays, so in the middle as it where. It is in-between Connolly and Pearse stations. Two beautiful buildings separated by what appears to be monstrosity of Irish fondness for Americana.
I’m bouncing down the street when shadow leaves me to the mercy of an mp3 player stuck on random. I’m pleasantly surprised by the sound of a soft gentle thump and a slightly scratchy hiss. I recorded some of my dads’ old records onto my mp3 player by hooking up my record player to a computer with audio recording capabilities. It did a fantastic job but it’s not the same. The song starting was Suzanne by Leonard Cohen. The rain has gotten worse as I trudge along the now soaked quays towards windmill lane. As I look around it looks like the city is in a big brother bubble of control and obedience, there is no colour except that irregular beat to your heart that is trying to change the tempo of the world around it
Comments (3) |
 02-19-2008 11:06, I like this because it's about a journey through dublin.I'd put that in it. I can see alot of you in it ian.I think its good. Darts are train if any one did'nt know and windmill lane is where U2 started out but correct me if im wrong ian.Post more stuff now ian. » Reply to this comment...  02-19-2008 19:25, The first paragraph was truly great. You have a very accessible style that really engages me as a reader. Grammatical miscues were a distracting feature of the piece but the flow of it was excellent. » Reply to this comment...  02-19-2008 23:07, i agree with christian, that was a nice walk... enjoyed it a lot. just threw my last mp3 player away last week - it got a little big headed and decided it would not change out the music i had in it. write on! » Reply to this comment... |
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