Days yet to come

It is possible, of course, that this is the earliest ever …. for me.

Yesterday, I ordered the first Christmas present for F. And, today another! So that’s two presents down.

But that’s not why I’m writing today.

I’m writing because I’m quite concerned. I am concerned that, in our desire to be correctly politically correct, we are forgetting some basic truths.

One that IS important is about rape, for example.

Let’s get one thing straight, in a perfect world, anyone should be able to walk down the street wearing what they want; to get drunk without fear of being raped, etc. The message (generally to men) shouldn’t have to be “Don’t Rape”” because, to be frank, it shouldn’t be necessary.

Unfortunately, this is NOT an ideal world. The message that should go out more should be “Don’t Rape” and with that message should be the education about what is rape and what is consent. But, in the same way that we tell people not to steal and not to drink & drive, there are some people who don’t seem to understand and, therefore, still do it.

Of course, we should try to educate them and get them to understand that what they are doing is wrong. But, sometimes, it is too late for they have already committed rape. And there are people out there who will, in the next few day, week, months, years, commit rape.

So, how is it possible to stop this without resorting to Minority Report-style policing? If we are unable to stop some men from thinking it’s OK to rape some women, what can we do to help? If you cannot stop the perpetrator, what else can we do? The only thing left is to address the victims. What can they do to help stop this? Well, for example, wearing a skirt which barely covers your arse, doesn’t help, surely. Drunkenly weaving about the street may also not help. Neither of these things will, necessarily, save you but it might just help a bit.

And, yet, were I to say those things out of context, they would certainly be taken the wrong way.

And so, I feel a little bit sorry for Matt Damon. Unfortunately, there IS discrimination against gay people, in spite of any legislation you may care to pass. In the same way, there is discrimination against women. But he was correct in saying that the best thing to do in his business, is to keep silent (about being gay – it’s a bit more difficult to be silent about being a woman, if you ARE one.) Again, don’t get me wrong. It shouldn’t be necessary. In an ideal world, who you go to bed with shouldn’t make a blind bit of difference to the work you attract as an actor. But it is. Certain people can “get away with it” but certain people cannot and, if you’re at the start of your career, don’t go coming out, was his message.

And now, some people are saying he’s wrong and homophobic. See, I don’t see it that way. He was stating a fact about the world as it is, not the perfect world that it should be.

On the other hand, if no one came out, ever, than things would never change. So we should applaud those who do it for they are the trailblazers for young people coming up. They are brave and they have, almost certainly, sacrificed their career and possibly millions of dollars by simply saying that they are gay.

It IS a changing world but I don’t think it’s right to jump down the throats of those people who are saying something that applies to the real, here-and-now world that we inhabit.

One day, I hope within my lifetime, a girl/woman will be safe to walk down the street and not get raped – even if she is wearing nothing at all, should she wish. And, one day, no one will be secretly penalised for not being “normal”.

But that day is yet to come.

p.s. The song, from one of my favourite artists, 2Pac, called Better Dayz came up when I was looking for a picture to post at the top of the post. So, instead, you got the song :-)

Which hat do I want?

Sometimes I feel I should have taken a Hippocratic Oath. Or that it should be a requirement of the job. Or that it should fall under the Confessions to a Priest thing.

For, at times, I am advisor, office assistant, writer of fine words, solver of problems, sounding board and priest-like listener doling out tea and sympathy (metaphorically speaking.)

Of course, there are the “straight” students. The ones for whom it is a matter of grammar and vocabulary. But there are the occasional ones where you get, over a period of weeks and months, to be let in on the most secret of secrets. And, I take it seriously. I don’t tell anyone, not even F.

But, tonight, possibly, comes the role of “voice coach”. I don’t actually know yet. Someone (who is a “someone important” for an important Italian company) has to make a presentation. It was originally thought to have to be in Italian but, at the last minute this person learned that it was to be in English.

It might be a writing of a presentation in English. Or, it might have already been written and it’s a matter of pronunciation and cadence and inflection. I don’t know. Yet.

Of course, one single hour is not enough time for whatever it is, but it’s all I have so it will have to do. It will be better than nothing, I suppose. We shall see. And, of course, it’s for a friend of a friend/student so I couldn’t really say “no”, could I?

But I wonder which hat, of the many hats I use, I should don tonight?

Same thing, different country.

“Not one of them is Italian!”

“None of them?”

It seems not. Except the “foreman” or someone like that. Or, at least, he speaks Italian.

I ask what they are. I am told Romanian. Ah yes, of course.

There are lots of tut-tutting and shaking of heads. What is the world coming to?

I say that this is similar to the UK. A lot of builders are Polish or Romanian (I have read).

Except that, as an immigrant myself, I don’t tut-tut nor shake my head. I also know that there are many Italians who would rather not do this type of work – carrying heavy windows up the stairs, balancing precariously on the ledge where the old window was whilst fitting the new window. And, anyway, these people will be cheaper, I’m sure.

It’s not a job that I’d like to do and quite possibly, I would be crap at it anyway.

My old hairdresser was Romanian. I doubt if he could have gone round fitting windows either. A waitress (until the end of the month when she goes to be an air hostess) in one of the local restaurants that we like is Romanian. Romanians are everywhere and in all sorts of service jobs. It doesn’t make them bad people.

Still, the reaction from the Italians is much the same as I’ve seen from the British.

I am saddened by it.

Literary things

My last (finished) book of the season would seem to have been Matt Haig’s The Radleys. I finished it in less that 2 days. I like Matt’s writing it’s a good but easy read and the ideas are interesting. It was written before The Humans but again the theme is seemingly ordinary people who can’t quite fit in (to normal life). Very enjoyable.

Then, a couple of weekends ago was the Mantova Festivaletturatura. I went only for the Saturday. I had hoped that Lola would be with me and, there was a ever-so-slight chance that F would be able to come. In the end, it was just me.

I arrived sometime after 10. I went to the office to see M and S, booked lunch at the Griffone Bianco (as always) and noticed that Kenzuo Ishiguro was on. Given that I had read The Buried Giant on holiday as one of my books, I thought I’d go along to see him.

He was quite interesting but I’m glad that I had already read the book as it made what he had to say more understandable.

I left just after they had started asking questions from the audience as I had lunch booked and the venue was quite a few minutes walk away.

I sat outside – the day was very warm, the sun shining and, to be honest, a typical Mantova day.

I had chosen my food but not yet ordered when Peter Florence appeared. He asked if he could join me and, of course, it was a pleasure. We talked about mutual friends, the Hay Festival and his son 8who was about to leave for Veterinary College) and his family and recent holiday. And, possibly, we mentioned something about me and my life but it’s hardly as interesting, as my regular readers know.

Of course, he had to prepare for his interview and I had to, as ordered by Lola, to go and see Jo Nesbø. I had read one of his books (his first) last summer. Unfortunately, lunch with Peter took a little longer than I had anticipated and so I came into the venue only just before it started and so there wasn’t a seat to be had. I ended up right at the back, sitting on a stone ledge against the back wall, looking over a sea of heads to figures that could have been anyone to be frank.

Still, it was an interesting talk – about his latest book.

Having said goodbye to the my Festival friends, I wandered back to the station via a couple of beers and made the train. I wasn’t too late back but learnt, on the way, that F had “done his back in”. I was grateful it was now rather than during the summer like last year but I couldn’t help but think that if he’d been with me, he wouldn’t have had a bad back!

And I’m now reading Colm Tóibín’s Nora Webster which I am enjoying. I’m about three-quarters of the way through.

Also, the other day, I received my T-shirt and paperback copy of the book Papercuts – which came through my Kickstarter funding. I have read a pdf copy of it but I will still read the print version. after all, the real book has got to be so much better. So that’s me set after Nora Webster.

Time Warp

The whine by my ear and my futile attempt to bat it away wakes me up.

I look at the clock. It’s about 3. I thought it was later. I wished it were later.

I tuck myself into the bed. The bugger can’t get me now.

But, it’s far too hot. I just can’t sleep. I keep my eyes closed but I get hotter. I worry that, once again, I can’t bloody sleep. Of course, in addition, I have this fear that I’ll go to sleep and become so hot that I’ll automatically put my arms outside the bed and then the little bastard mosquito will get me. Minutes go by.

I hear the clocks strike 4. Surely, it can’t be four? I didn’t think I’d been to sleep and yet the hour seems to have passed too quickly.

I can’t get to sleep. I can’t stand the heat of the covers but I daren’t put my arms out. I just have to fit in one of the little tablets (or, rather two – one each side of the bed) so that the mosquito will go away or die. I get up. I fit the tablet things into the little holders and plug them in.

But then I have to wash my hands. This is really not helping. As long as I don’t wake up enough, I can get back to sleep but fitting the tablets, washing my hands and then going to the kitchen for a quick drink will probably make me too awake.

I try to get back to sleep. Already it’s half past four. Next it’s 5. It still seems I haven’t been asleep and yet half an hour seems to have raced by like 10 minutes!

But, now it’s nearly time for the alarm. I lie in bed, awake, like it seems I have been since around 3, my eyes closed, waiting for the alarm.

The alarm goes off. I put it on snooze for 5 minutes thinking that I may be able to snooze for 5 minutes and knowing that I’ll never be able to snooze for 5 minutes. It’s just wishful thinking. A minute before the alarm goes off again, I get up.

It is warm in the flat, even if almost all the windows are open with the shutters not quite down, so that the dogs can go out onto the balconies, where the normally sleep. I had put a pair of socks out the night before, thinking it would be a tad cold in the morning but it seems not. But, should I risk it or not?

Of course, my powers of deduction and rational, logical thinking are not good when I am still asleep. But, what the hell, it really is quite warm in the flat. I put on my short-sleeved shirt and my sandals (without socks, of course) and take the dogs out.

Even when we’re in the lift, I realise that I may have made a mistake. Whereas it’s not cold, this is 5.30 in the morning and it’s September – there’s a definite chill in the air.

We go outside. It’s too late to go back now. the dogs simply wouldn’t understand. I’ll survive.

The roads seem unusually busy. More like 7 or 8 o’clock than 5.30. I check some traffic lights that I can see in the distance. My mind struggles to compute that, if the orange lights are blinking then it has to be – what time? Well, before 6 for sure. At 6, they go back to normal operation.

But, as we reach the main road there’s a tram that’s quite full of people. How come, at this time in the morning?, I question. It seems strange.

Nothing about the night or this morning feels quite right. It’s as if there’s been some sort of time warp.

Inevitable.

Inevitable

Have I ever mentioned that I’ve been smoking for over 46 years?

And that I smoke around 30 cigarettes a day? (Although, obviously, I didn’t start by smoking 30 a day – but I’ve probably been smoking 30 a day for about 35 years.)

And, yes, of course I should have given up by now. in fact, I rue the day I started and wish I never had.

But, such is the way of things.

So, at some point, probably, I’m going to suffer some disease as a result of all this smoking. And, at some point, I shall tell you that I have said disease, like, for example, lung cancer. Being the nice person that you are, you would, no doubt say how sorry you were and how dreadful it was, wouldn’t you? And, assuming I had treatment, you would hope that I would recover and, as they say (although I don’t feel it is the right word), “beat” it.

But, if you’re being honest with yourself, you would also think, “I’m not really surprised.” In fact, you might say this to anyone you talk to about it, although, probably, not say this to me. You might even think/say, “Well, it had to happen sooner or later.”

And you would, of course, be right.

And I would “only have myself to blame” so, really, I should not look for nor expect much real sympathy.

So, this thing that is “only a matter of time” has actually happened to a friend who is about 10 years older than me.

And, of course, it’s an awful thing and I hope it can be treated and that he comes out of it OK.

And, yet, of course, I am not surprised and it was only a matter of time and living long enough and was bound to happen sooner or later – none of which I could actually say to his wife and nor would I say to him.

But, it is/was inevitable, wasn’t it?

But in order that this isn’t too maudlin, there’s a nice picture of Brad Pitt at the top :-D

20 days!

“20 days!?”

20 days!

It’s impossible to hide my shock and unhappiness.

I am, at once, jealous, happy for him and really quite pissed off. He sees this. I wish he could see that I am happy for him. I recover. A bit.

“Well, if I didn’t know you better, I would say that at least you’d have some great food.” Except I DO know him and I know he doesn’t really like their food. It’s why I’m jealous though. One of the countries is one I would love to go to – just for the food. He says he hopes the girlfriend will come too so that he doesn’t have to spend all the time with M, his boss. But I suspect that won’t happen. It’s not that he doesn’t like his boss, it’s just that he also likes to do his own thing.

He says they will probably go around the 3rd October (which probably means it WILL be 3rd October – a Saturday.) “That will mean you’re away for nearly all of October?” Again, I can’t keep my feeling of panic out of my voice. He’s disappointed, I see. I want to be encouraging but he’s just sprung this on me. I knew it was all a possibility and I was very pleased for him – am very pleased for him – but I was thinking a couple of weeks, maximum. 20 days just seems such a long time.

I know. It’s selfish. My first thought was I’ve got 20 days of doing the dogs; getting up very early; all my lessons; just 20 days of hell – after which I will be so tired – and that’s assuming nothing really dramatic happens (which, after a call this morning, is always possible.)

Later, when I’ve had time to recover a bit from my initial reaction, I’m able to say, “Good babe”, as that’s what I really think. This is a great opportunity for him, and I am genuinely pleased for him. It’s a long trip though, to the other side of the world. It will exhaust him, for sure.

And, I know, in the end, it won’t be so bad. The time will fly as I will be really busy.

“I’ll be away for our anniversary,” he says, pulling a face that looks like he will cry. “Don’t worry, babe, we’ll celebrate when you’re back.” It’s OK. But now I’ll give him the model of Dino for when he gets back. It will cheer him up.

I will get the cleaner to do a special clean for when he gets back.

But, still, I will miss him. And the dogs will miss him for sure, not really understanding that he’s only away for a little while.

Still, 20 days!!!