What the future might be.
On a red-bricked courtyard of some neglected council estate, the sun shone without mercy and a small wind blew caresses through the hanging baskets and grasses. 3 months of gestation had produced, unfathomably, my pregnancy. Encased in 9 balloons, and carried above my head like a pet project, the elephant in the room, a mantra that follows you. This was the dormant reality of it. That babies were produced inside balloons, tender balloons. Perhaps it is significant that I momentarily entrusted these Russian Doll incubator balloons to my Father, but within minutes the external 8 of them had been popped in a fit of hilarity; a scene that owes as much to Laurel and Hardy as it does the well-invested pain of near-losing a child. The solitary balloon remained, a translucent blue shell floating above, held taut by brown twine- the kind you saw in the fifties. Presuming that all was well, in hope that the forgone 8 balloons previous were only some form of protection; a foetus' nine lives, I turned to the balloon and saw that inside were disparate body parts, wrought from clay. A small grey head lay against the side. Arms turned to dust. Fingers became brittle and were worn down. A solitary leg, for example. I woke as I contemplated telling the child's mother, a lady with whom good terms had not been reestablished.
Fortune would have it that last night I found myself at Notting Hill Gate station; a sprawling mauselum of faded 80s colour carried through tiled walls and unnaturally bright light. The place is vast and unseemly. I had been drinking of the elixir. A wonderful monotone filled the dead air and drew me to it down escalators, in the murk. A tall and slight man in a kilt, with a disproportionately large ginger beard and dark sunglasses that blocked sight to his eyes entirely was stood playing the bagpipes. And the sound would pour through the corridors and be ignored by passers by and the staff. I'm not usually one for bagpipes, perhaps it had been the toxins in my blood, but I found myself compelled. I sat opposite him on the tube floor for 10 minute or so until he stopped, and offered him a fiver. It was a moment shared, and I was touched.
Fortune would have it that last night I found myself at Notting Hill Gate station; a sprawling mauselum of faded 80s colour carried through tiled walls and unnaturally bright light. The place is vast and unseemly. I had been drinking of the elixir. A wonderful monotone filled the dead air and drew me to it down escalators, in the murk. A tall and slight man in a kilt, with a disproportionately large ginger beard and dark sunglasses that blocked sight to his eyes entirely was stood playing the bagpipes. And the sound would pour through the corridors and be ignored by passers by and the staff. I'm not usually one for bagpipes, perhaps it had been the toxins in my blood, but I found myself compelled. I sat opposite him on the tube floor for 10 minute or so until he stopped, and offered him a fiver. It was a moment shared, and I was touched.