born by katharine eastman
Probably nothing more boring than a fake-muso wittering on about My Struggle - but everything else about my life is even more boring, so this is as good as it can get = I built this one yesterday from things of mine that already exist and I liked it but it made me tired and I didn't publish it.
Today, hearing it still malingering in Drafts, it immediately sounded terrible and I thought Thank God You Never Put This Thing Out There, Your Music Career Could Never Survive Such Embarrassment - and on and on it played and even before I realised the ludicrousity of me worrying about my music career the music started to sound good and now that I have actually heard some of this (about 15 mins so far) I think it is rather lovely and one of my better things. (Advice for the Listener = play neither too loud nor too quiet - at the safe ignorable middling volume it turns off the days clock, and the day's pain, and the day's boredom.)
That shows you how quickly a mind can change. Another example - yet again I am breaking my promise to forget Folkestone - the cover pic is one of Anthony Gormley's rusty naked men over there in that town. I am still planning on living there one day.
And while I am thinking about my uncertain mind, here is a comment from underneath a YouTube thingy which has brought me up short:
"""""@andyjax9215
2 days ago
I'm 70 next year and don't buy into the marketing of retirement, there is nothing that robs you of time and money more than hobbies, travel, volunteering, pointless walks, pointless friends and useless toys. Oh yes and spending time with other retirees.""""""
Yes as you can see, the algorithm is currently bombarding me with vids of old blokes talking about what to do now they're pensioners. I am nowhere near being a pensioner yet, but it seems to be something I am pondering. The weird thing is that although I drone on forever about my lovely long walks, I do very much agree with AndyJax9215. I plan to have a retirement with none of the usual bullshit that everyone else is telling me is going to be soooo fulfilling.
No hobbies for me. Please don't tell me that music-making is a hobby. It is my very Life, my calling, my vocation, my religion ..... am I serious ? - I don't know. But it's not a hobby like bird-watching or collecting Clarice Cliff. No travel for me. Yes there was Folkestone - but that feels (and is) just a few days' walk along the beach. It's no more proper travel than walking upstairs is mountaineering. Volunteering. Well I have come to hate "my" country and I certainly have compassion fatigue and I have no wish to help the idiots of this stupid nation out of the shithole that they have dug for themselves.
Now we come to "pointless walks". Yessir - agree. And no my own walks are never pointless. This morning I walked to Winchester - by my standards a short stroll -about four and a half hours from my front door to the Montezuma shop on Winchester High Street, there to get urgent supplies of 100% dark. One of the most un-pointless walks ever undertaken by any woman or man, living or dead. And I will add, to my surprise, that everyone I met and chatted to this morning along the way was happy - this was one of those mornings when I had to forget my big moan about how everyone is so bloody miserable and frightened.
Well obviously "pointless friends" are pointless and there is no point in having them in your retirement. I only have pointed friends, just a very few people, I am quite good at making friends, but alas I am brilliant-brilliant-brilliant at letting it all slide and losing friends, all down to my own laziness. But no - perhaps it's because I am an introvert, but I do have problems believing that a full rich vibrant social life is one of the keys to a happy old age. For me, people are hard work, and the pleasure I get from nearly all of them is outweighed by the boredom.
Useless toys ? I'm not sure what Andy means here, but I'll guess that it's gadgets and a camper van and a bigger TV. Well, you only have to say those things .... And so yes, my retirement is gearing up to be lots of reading and eating chocolate and I shall always make music and it will all be identical to how life is now, how life has been ever since I was 23, when I decided that my degree was worthless, that my brief taste of a "career" was enough to ensure that I would never have a career, that I would rather be poor than be in a cage, that I would rather be this gadgetless nearly-friendless near-stop-in than be out there in Starbucks talking to some poor trapped twat about my holidays and A.I.
