weirdmonger
THE LAST BALCONY (www.nemonymous.com)
Lewicide (2)
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“I shot myself in the foot,” he said to me out of the blue. Out of the blue, but within a ‘musical’ ruckus that left me cupping my hand under my ear like a radar-aid.
I had only met him half an hour before in the crowded room. We shook hands politely, neither of us, I believe, being able to hear the introduction to each other by a mutual friend. So it is not surprising that I didn’t catch his name ... nor he mine. Our jobs and reasons-for-being-there were lost, too, as well as any other information imparted. Parties were often like that. Including certain small parties like him and me who often tended to attend big parties. Only being there for the cider or for the chance of romance or simply to forget oneself in a large dynamic gathering or to role-play the loner you always knew you happened to be or for other more semi-conspiratorial reasons of effect or cause.
A dimly-lit gathering, too. Full of other even more amorphous shapes than us.
But I did manage to make an initial sweep of his features. Not a good impression, I must say. He was, I thought, a mealy-mouthed office-worker type, with breadcrumbs doubtlessly in the turn-ups of his trousers. The fact that we then soon parted on our own respective paths amid the many other voluntary or involuntary paths of the party probably meant I had also not made a good impression on him. Yet, as I earlier hinted to you – and whether by chance or design – we ended up, half an hour later, standing next to each other again ... this time further from the loud-speakers that still gave forth of strident grey noise.
We no longer needed a mutual friend as life’s interpreter.
“I shot myself in the foot,” he said. This time more clearly. I somehow believed that, in real-time, I was suffering from déjà vu. In hindsight, it was nothing of the sort, as everyone can surely tell from the order of my words.
“Oh, yes?” I said politely, readying myself for escape towards the makeshift bar in the kitchen.
“I’m in a pretty pickle. I just said the wrong thing to my boss. And I’ll probably get the sack on Monday morning. If not before...” He looked around sheepishly as if expecting the air itself to turn into cartoon suicide bombers that party music often fuelled. Raiders of the Last Haw-Haw.
I shrugged. “There’s a lot of it about,” I said glibly. Words, whatever their harmless intrinsic nature, could be worse than bullets.
The last I saw of him was being carried off on a stretcher, one very large foot upright where the top of the blanket ended - with its instep eyes staring sightlessly and so pitifully at me. As if we had known each other for years.
Alone now, I hopped desultorily towards the middle of the temporary dance-floor where other party-goers were no longer amorphous shapes but shadows of shapes.
All strictly come dancing. The music second nature. No mean faith. The party is everything.
The party of parts that make each of us. Staccato is only one step from poetry.
====================================
Lewicide (1) (Lewicidal Tendencies): HERE
Lewicide (3): HERE
“I shot myself in the foot,” he said to me out of the blue. Out of the blue, but within a ‘musical’ ruckus that left me cupping my hand under my ear like a radar-aid.
I had only met him half an hour before in the crowded room. We shook hands politely, neither of us, I believe, being able to hear the introduction to each other by a mutual friend. So it is not surprising that I didn’t catch his name ... nor he mine. Our jobs and reasons-for-being-there were lost, too, as well as any other information imparted. Parties were often like that. Including certain small parties like him and me who often tended to attend big parties. Only being there for the cider or for the chance of romance or simply to forget oneself in a large dynamic gathering or to role-play the loner you always knew you happened to be or for other more semi-conspiratorial reasons of effect or cause.
A dimly-lit gathering, too. Full of other even more amorphous shapes than us.
But I did manage to make an initial sweep of his features. Not a good impression, I must say. He was, I thought, a mealy-mouthed office-worker type, with breadcrumbs doubtlessly in the turn-ups of his trousers. The fact that we then soon parted on our own respective paths amid the many other voluntary or involuntary paths of the party probably meant I had also not made a good impression on him. Yet, as I earlier hinted to you – and whether by chance or design – we ended up, half an hour later, standing next to each other again ... this time further from the loud-speakers that still gave forth of strident grey noise.
We no longer needed a mutual friend as life’s interpreter.
“I shot myself in the foot,” he said. This time more clearly. I somehow believed that, in real-time, I was suffering from déjà vu. In hindsight, it was nothing of the sort, as everyone can surely tell from the order of my words.
“Oh, yes?” I said politely, readying myself for escape towards the makeshift bar in the kitchen.
“I’m in a pretty pickle. I just said the wrong thing to my boss. And I’ll probably get the sack on Monday morning. If not before...” He looked around sheepishly as if expecting the air itself to turn into cartoon suicide bombers that party music often fuelled. Raiders of the Last Haw-Haw.
I shrugged. “There’s a lot of it about,” I said glibly. Words, whatever their harmless intrinsic nature, could be worse than bullets.
The last I saw of him was being carried off on a stretcher, one very large foot upright where the top of the blanket ended - with its instep eyes staring sightlessly and so pitifully at me. As if we had known each other for years.
Alone now, I hopped desultorily towards the middle of the temporary dance-floor where other party-goers were no longer amorphous shapes but shadows of shapes.
All strictly come dancing. The music second nature. No mean faith. The party is everything.
The party of parts that make each of us. Staccato is only one step from poetry.
====================================
Lewicide (1) (Lewicidal Tendencies): HERE
Lewicide (3): HERE
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