No man is an archipelago.

 I'm not sure I'm capable of enjoying myself any more. I mean, I'm perfectly happy most of the time. Am I watching "Circus of Horrors" or an Emma Peel Avengers episode? Then I'm having a good time. Am I writing something I think is good but which seems unlikely to ever be embraced by a mass audience? I'm in hog heaven. (I actually think of myself as a rather conservative and populist writer. It's other people who respectfully disagree, sometimes using swear words) Am I walking around a beautiful old city, marveling at it's architecture and briefly doing whatever the opposite of slumming it is (toffing it?) in anticipation of a slap-up feed I can ill-afford but - hey- I'm on holiday. C'mon. I love that. 

Yeah, I'm usually having a great time. 

But of course, all of those things are either solo activities, or done in tandem with Susan. They're slow paced, memory rich, hand held.

It's the other stuff: the going out, the meeting people, the talking to them, the drinking. That's the stuff I no longer seem to enjoy. I used to be brilliant at it. In fact I wasted about twenty years of my life working on my "going out" skills. Meeting "the lads", drinking vast amounts of beer, dancing the night away, meeting girls. On a Friday night it would be contact lenses in, hair teased, scent drenched, Roxy Music's "Same Old Scene" on the stereo - unaware of the irony - and I would be out on the town. I wouldn't leave for the pub until nine in the evening, and wouldn't be back till early the next morning: sweaty, button free, red eyed, my contact lenses gluey and opaque, reeking of lager and shame. 

Now I get the bus home from the pub at ten. Not even the last bus. I go out early, complain about the crowds, the queue at the bar, the people I'm meeting being late, about not being able to have a conversation over the noise of the DJ, and when there is conversation I'm appalled other people insist on talking about themselves, so I'm forced to wait for my turn to speak, and then they fucking interrupt me when I'm in full flow...Don't they know who I am? 

Its the lock-down. It's the hideous repercussions of the lock-down. I've unlearned all my social programming. I used to be able to work a room. Now I can barely work a chair. I used to be the life and soul, as opposed to a lifeless arsehole. But then I suppose I used to have more social utility. A fifty year old man has less effect on the party atmosphere than an unplugged Glade Plug In. I'm a social vacuum - I look like someone who'd rather be reading the paper with a farting dog warming his toes beneath the table. I have big Dad-Come-To-Pick-You-Up-After-The-Party energy.  When I have energy.

A friend of mine was talking the other day about how desperately protective she felt for her younger self, her reckless, foolish youth - breaking hearts and making mistakes - concluding that she is no longer the same person, but would like to put her arms around that feral little stranger. I don't feel that way. Maybe it's because I'm not a parent, but I feel umbilicaly connected to my idiot younger self. There seems practically no distance between us, except the obvious physical distention. And the fact I'm marginally nicer and far less charming. I am that fool. I own that foolishness. Society has swept away in directions he couldn't process and here I am on my desert island, waiting for the flood. Praying for rain. 

And I live in Northern Ireland. I don't have to pray too hard.