The Tundra

Ten o'clock in the morning, a pot of Earl Grey on the go. I'm in the dining room which is also my office. Outside the lillies are rotting in their pot, petals scattered across the decking by the wind and rain. It has been raining for weeks because its August and its Northern Ireland. 

No e-mails. 

The usual nonsense on Facebook: birthdays to be acknowledged, a thin smattering of "likes", being tagged in long impersonal posts. Nothing on Twitter. Never is. I don't do Insta. I look at what I've written the previous day. I delete part of it. Polish it. Tidy it up. Its alright. Its probably riddled with mistakes that I can't see yet. I'm oblivious to any but the most glaring errors at this stage. They will become clear only on publication. I'm writing a lot of things at the moment but it feels like I'm just marking time. I'm writing thirty three and a third stories about music. Why am I doing this? No one has asked me to. Who would want to read these? Two of them reference the Cure. Liam Gallagher is in one and this is in no way an endorsement Liam Gallagher. They are neither edgily cool nor sensibly mainstream. I have no idea why I am writing them other than I had the idea and they may, with teasing care, turn out to be nicely done. Is that a good enough reason? 

No e-mails. 

I've been re-writing the first short story I ever wrote. It was originally called Careful Dracula and it was about the domestic routine of that vampire living in North London. I wrote it at the same time as a story called The Jess Franco Story which is now lost forever. I remember taking a printed version of Careful Dracula to the Crown and Greyhound in Dulwich and was surprised none of my friends wanted to read it. They seemed embarrassed by the idea that I would even want to write a short story. It was in bad taste. To this day I find it very hard to get notes. My friends do not want to read the things I write. I'm assuming this is down to my appalling personality or the dreadful people I pick as friends. I've been lucky that people I don't know are much keener on my work and often seem to value it. The kindness of strangers, then. Careful Dracula is now Count Backwards and it's slightly tweaked. It is odd the changes you have to make: one of the characters was called Karen but calling someone Karen in a fictional context seems too loaded now. She has been given a more sociological neutral name. Sorry Karen. 

I try to get Alexa to play Alizee's "Les Gourmandises". Alexa replies she cannot find "Lego Mondays" in my record library. This happens three times and I give up. I don't tend to listen to music when I'm writing these days anyway. I need silence. I never used to. 

No e-mails. 

I'm waiting for e-mails. I'm waiting for several e-mails. I'm owed e-mails, even if its just out of courtesy. I'm working on several projects and the lifeblood of those projects is continued collaboration with people. I've done Zooms and phone-calls but e-mails are the real deal. They are precise. They are retrievable. They have weight. 

But my in-box is empty. It is an icy tundra. A silent void. No one writes to the Colonel. I do some work. I stare at my inbox. I do some more work. I stare at my inbox. I ring my mum and then check in on my inbox. I go for a walk but I take my phone with me to check on the inbox. It remains stubbornly empty. I re-read the last e-mails I've sent to see if I've involuntarily been incredibly offensive but they seem largely benign, possibly a bit needy. They have a forced jocularity that sounds a bit desperate. I don't sound like a captain of industry but I do sound like someone who will do the work, who wants to do the work. 

I thought that by writing this the gods of irony would clog my e-mail account with hundreds of minty fresh communiques. But you can never second guess the gods of irony - the field is barren, the crop blighted and my many, many children will starve.