David Hadley's Blog, page 178

Stories and Strangers

You emerged out of the mist-shrouded distances onto the early morning path where I was walking.

'Come with me,' you said and took me back along paths of mist and dawn to a place you knew.

You said you had spent the evening before listening to the stories I told of the women who know how to take the mornings into their hands and shape worlds out of them for men like me to walk though. You spoke of how I told the story of one such morning where a woman came to me out of the mist-shrouded distances and brought me to a room like this.

It is a room where the bed lies open and waiting, ready for us to fall together. You said you liked those stories that tell of strange meetings between mysterious strangers who meet on mist-shrouded paths and walk away together into some new tale where neither of them knows how it will end.

You let your clothes fall and then took me out of mine and led me back to that bed where you dream of mist-shrouded mornings and strangers who know how to tell the stories you long to hear.

There you began to unravel the tale of our bodies and how they came together; while outside the mists cleared and the morning turned into another fine day.

Wednesday Story: The Sexiest Elbows I had ever Seen

When we first met she was Emeritus Professor of Post-Colonial Marmalade at the University of Ffestiniog, and she had the sexiest elbows I had ever seen. We met at the Annual Ffestiniog Tapioca-Ignoring Convention, back in the late summer of '83. At the time neither of us had a Tapioca-Ignoring partner, so naturally – once we found our handicaps were compatible – we teamed up for that autumn's preliminary Tapioca-Ignoring Cup rounds. Of course, with both of us being amateurs we never expected to get to the finals.

Her name was Plenitude Cleavage and she came from the Welsh valleys, in fact she had quite a Welsh valley herself, never in my experience had I ever seen such a splendid example of nominative determinism in a woman's body before and I promised myself I would make it my lifetime's wan… work to study it in all its wondrous depths, especially its deep sonorous echo when I buried my head deep inside that valley and called out her name in wonder and desire.

Although Plenitude had some experience as a teenager of ignoring sago and I had once walked past a rice pudding, both of us were still fairly new to tapioca-ignoring, especially in a competitive setting. But whenever she adopted the traditional tapioca ignoring stance with those oh-so-sexy elbows thrust out in front of her, I knew we were in with a good chance of making the finals, even though every time she did it I had to excuse myself to go and engage in some solitary meditation on my own approach to the game.

Everything went well until the semi-finals when we were drawn against the AntenDec a strange mutant double-foreheaded beast from the wild and untamed Geordie shoreline who had won worldwide fame for the way it blithely stood next to a bread and butter pudding for a whole week without once acknowledging – in any way – the presence of the pudding in the creature's near vicinity.

The night before the match as we lay in bed together in my Ffestiniog hotel room, Plenitude and I knew the next day would severely test both of us and our ability to disregard a nearby pudding. After I licked the last of that day's training tapioca from those oh-so-sexy elbows of hers, Plenitude gave me the comfort of her Welsh valley to rest my head as she stroked my worried brow with those still slightly-damp elbows.

The next day's semi-final was the hardest tapioca-ignoring contest we had ever participated in up until then. The sweat was pouring down the AntenDec's multiple foreheads as the unnatural creature did its best to exclude the sight of the two bowls of tapioca, on the table in front of it, from its consciousness.

I was staring hard at Plenitude's elbows as the rested either side of the dish of tapioca she was ignoring, while she concentrated on solving quadratic equations in her head as a way of avoiding any acknowledgement of the existence of the tapioca in front of her.

Twelve hours later, just as the TV station covering the event live went to an advertising break, there was an unearthly scream from the AntenDec beast as it stood on the tapioca-ignoring table, stripped off its clothing and dived heads-first into the now stone-cold tapioca dish on its left before smearing the contents of its other tapioca dish over its genitalia as it got up and strode towards the female celebrity judge, licking its lips and demanding perverse sexual favours, there and then, live on the auditorium stage.

Fortunately, the AntenDec's keepers were able to throw one of their restraining nets over the rampaging creature before it got too close to the judge. They sedated it and took it away in a wheelbarrow back to its cage ready for the long journey back to the Geordie wilderness where it made its home.

This meant that Plenitude and I were through to the final. That night we celebrated alone together in my hotel room, with Plenitude dipping those sexy elbows of hers in the champagne, they had presented to us for winning the semi-final, for me to lick off as she did that special thing she did with the castanets and the Shrewsbury & Telford A-Z Street Atlas.

The next day was the final. We realised we would be facing the most fearsome tapioca-ignorer in the world. We knew we needed a good night's sleep. We needed to be rested and ready for what would be the greatest day of our short tapioca-ignoring career. It took some time for us to fall asleep, lying there in each others arms. I kissed her elbows – one after the other – and fell into an uneasy sleep where dreams of huge man-eating elbows rampaged through carnage-strewn city streets awash with tsunami-waves of boiling-hot tapioca.

The next day, when I woke up from my troubled dreams, Plenitude was gone. There was a note on her pillow, signed with the imprint of her left elbow, my favourite and easily the sexier of the two.

It seemed Plenitude had gone back to her summer house in exotic Walsall, leaving Ffestiniog until the new academic year began. Unable to cope with the pressure of the contest she felt that she would be unable to ignore even the smallest bowl of tapioca ever again. Of course, I thought about going after her, but I'd attempted to leave Wales once before and only barely escaped being press-ganged into one of the wild itinerant roaming male-voice choirs that run amok through those wild, lawless valleys.

One day, I knew we'd meet again, especially as she'd left her competition elbow pads on the pillow next to mine.

I packed my things, deciding to leave the hotel too, tears already forming in my eyes, and – this time, for once – it was not because I'd received one of Plenitude's elbows in a delicate area during our frantic bouts of love-making that had already forced the hotel maintenance staff to re-plaster the ceiling of the room immediately below mine.

As I walked into the hotel lobby, I glanced over at the room where the Tapioca-Ignoring final was about to take place. There was a suitcase there I recognised and standing next to it was Plenitude.

'I got to the station…' she said, tears in her eyes. '…but I just couldn't leave.'

I nodded; I knew what the rail service to Walsall was like.

'I came back to you,' she said. 'No-one has ever licked my elbows the way you do.' There was a look in her eyes that suggested that maybe we ought to tell the hotel staff to begin mixing some fresh ceiling plaster.

Just then, the Tapioca-ignoring competition organiser appeared, telling us to prepare ourselves for the final.

I looked at Plenitude; she looked at me… then nodded. 'Why not?' she said.

'Yeah, why not.' I agreed.

Facing us in the Tapioca-Ignoring final, we knew, was the world solo tapioca-ignoring champion, the Dread Prescott, Lord of All Pies, whose ability to ignore any foodstuff without a thick pastry crust was the stuff of legend. Even now, long after he once stalked the land causing fear, dread and total incomprehension in the populace, harassed mothers still warned their children that if they did not behave the Dread Prescott would come and gobble them all up.

The Dread Prescott strode into the tapioca-ignoring pit, flanked by his pie flunkies and his elaborately made-up and coiffured floozies. He stood in the centre of the pit as his floozies removed his bight-red silk ceremonial pie-eating cape with a flourish, while he raised his hands above his head, acknowledging the indifference of the crowd as they busied themselves with their flasks of hot tea and cheese sandwiches.

The room was packed to the rafters with people eager to see this final. I tried courting them all, but had to give up after twelve when I ran out of fingers, toes and other countable appendages.

In the ignoring pit, the Dread Prescott made a short speech in its own language, which – it seemed – no-one there could speak, not even his floozies why exchanged confused looks as they folded up his ceremonial pie-eating cape and exited the pit, ready for the match to begin.

The Dread Prescott, of course, as a solo player would have only the one bowl of tapioca to ignore, while we in the other half of the pitch would have two bowls on our table, which meant that we only had limited room for manoeuvre to avoid having to accidentally notice each other's bowl of tapioca.

The referee blew his whistle for the first half and we were off, the Dread Prescott's floozies immediately sat down on the edge of the gaming pit and pulled out their knitting, obviously expecting this to be a long match. The connoisseurs of the game, seated in the high auditorium immediately leant forward to study the close-up monitors mounted above the pit, eager to examine our opening stratagems. There were audible gasps from all around the auditorium when they realised that Plenitude was using the always-tricky semi-erect Garfunkel posture opening, which – as we all know – places a great deal of stress on the left elbow as well as making the eyes unusually bright. I looked across at her, concern on my face, wondering if my favourite sexy elbow could stand the pressure, I wondered what I would do that night were Plenitude to injure that elbow, for I knew it would mean a night without the castanets.

I could feel my attention wandering to the bowl of tapioca, half of me wanting to end it, end it now, before Plenitude could damage that oh-so-sexy elbow beyond repair.

A mere three hours later the Dread Prescott said something to the team of invigilators in his own language, possibly about the use of pickled onions in Northamptonshire brothels, the invigilators looked at each other and shrugged, dismissing the claim by the Dread Prescott… whatever it was. The Dread Prescott turned to his floozies, wanting one of them to – no doubt – translate his utterance, but they were both too engrossed in their knitting to notice him. The Dread Prescott cursed – possibly – and gave up trying to attract their attention.

Meanwhile on the tables in front of us the tapioca sat, waiting for one of us to break and take a look at it as it lay so temptingly in the official competition-size bowls.

Suddenly, a mere 18 hours into the opening moves of this tapioca-ignoring final, the Dread Prescott gave a weird keening ululation as his eyes scanned the rows of spectators, his nostrils twitched and his hands opened and closed convulsively on the tapioca-ignoring table in front of him. Everyone in the auditorium turned to see what had caught the Dread Prescott's eye. Up high on the balcony, I saw, a member of the audience had just pulled a Cornish pasty from his lunch box.

Down here, on the edge of the tapioca-ignoring pit, the Dread Prescott's floozies hugged each other in terror as his pie flunkies donned their protective headgear and mastication-proof gloves.

With an unearthly cry, the Dread Prescott launched himself from his seat and rumbled across to one of the balcony supporting pillars. He leapt at the pillar and began to climb. Meanwhile up in the balcony the audience member dropped his pasty and fled in terror. Unfortunately the pillar was only strong enough to support a fully-laden 400 seat balcony, so it was no match for the weight of the Dread Prescott. With an almighty groan the pillar tore away from the balcony, as the balcony crashed down on the now-bewildered Dread Prescott, flinging him from the pillar he was climbing and burying him under its rubble pouring down on him.

Plenitude screamed and I turned to see her clutching a bloodied elbow where a piece of decorative coving from the balcony had struck her. I grabbed her around the waist and pulled her behind the protection of the tapioca-ignoring table as another balcony pillar crashed down on the seat she'd been sitting in only seconds before.

Together, we made a run for the auditorium door as dust billowed around us and fragments of shattered balcony ricocheted around our heads.

Outside the auditorium the Dread Prescott's floozies, wrapped in the dead beast's cloak were being comforted by his pie flunkies.

Luckily, all of those who had been on the balcony for the competition had fled when they heard the Dread Prescott's initial frustrated roar when his pie-sensitive nose had first detected the pasty and by the time of his abortive attempt to scale the pillar the balcony was deserted, except for the lone pasty dropped by the fleeing audience member.

A medic came across to check on Plenitude's bleeding elbow and to check over the various cuts, scratches and bruises I'd suffered under the hail of flying masonry.

Of course, some time later we were presented with the trophy for winning the competition in a rather subdued ceremony, although some argued that - because we'd won by our semi-final and the final through our opposition forfeiting the game by leaving the ignoring pit – our victory was not as clear-cut or as decisive as the competition organisers claimed.

Still, Plenitude and I had the winning cheque for the sum of nearly nine whole pounds to share between us, which we knew could enable us to afford to hire then best suite in the Ffestiniog hotel for a whole fortnight of unbridled passion, sexy elbows and castanet-induced exhaustion, despite Plenitude's left arm still being in a sling.

Three days later, in a day of national mourning, the Dread Prescott was buried with full military honours by a nation grateful that he was finally out of the way, while the Dread Prescott's floozies and his pie flunkies immediately flew off to Bangkok together to set home together in exile.

Later that same month, Plenitude and I married in a small ceremony at the Ffestiniog register office and set off for a luxury honeymoon in the bright lights of Walsall, deciding that our days of ignoring tapioca together were now over for ever.

Inadequate Aphorisms

She came out of the mists of morning, roller-skating naked into our lives with all the… er… with all the… well, like some woman with no clothes on roller-skating… in the mist. You have to admit that folk wisdom is a bit short on similes for such occurrences, not only because most of those aphorisms and sayings seem to date from some distant agrarian past, or to be a load of cock about misfiring muskets, dodgy seafaring mishaps and so forth, they all seem to predate roller-skates… and casual nudity.

However, I suppose I could have come up with some sort of comparison to Lady Godiva, but it is a bit late for that now we are past the moment. Anyway, roller-skates and nudity would probably – in those days of yore – be regarded as akin to witchcraft or something like that. One minute she'd be feeling the air rushing past, ruffling her bush, next thing you know she's tied to a stake in the village square and starting to smoulder.

Not a great start to the morning by anyone's standards.

Well, when I say naked – she had socks on… under the skating boot things… as someone who has never roller-skated – even as a child - my knowledge of such accoutrements is limited. As it happens, I wasn't paying that much attention to the skates… or the socks… or the mist… at the time.

Anyway, before I could even formulate some sort of suitable greeting for such a meeting so early on a misty morning, she was gone… off into the mist almost as if I'd imagined the whole thing… except for the bruise on my cheek where I'd walked into the lamppost as she sped past.

The Poet

Back then, I pretended to be a poet so I could trade words for your clothes until my poem ended and you were naked. I would scatter lines across the floor of your days for you to dance along and into my waiting arms. I would kiss rhymes onto your lips and entangle your tongue around my rhythms.

Back then, I knew how to make you dance for me. Back then, I knew the shaman's secret spells that would unlock your desires and turn them towards me.

I thought I knew all the secrets of language and how to get it to perform for me. All I ever wanted, though, was to feel the warmth of your skin against me and feel as though each of those breaths you took were all for me.

I thought I could take you by the hand down to watch that river running by, or take you to the beach and hold you as you looked out across that infinite sea. I thought that all these words would become a magic spell that would capture you for me.

I thought I could do all these things and still you would not know that was only pretending to be a poet so that you could pretend to love me for a while, until the day came when I ran out of soft words to whisper in your ear.

Of All the Fish and Chip Shops in All the World

Of all the fish and chip shops in all the world, she had to walk into mine. Of course, I remembered her from that time in Luton – after all, no-one can ever forget Luton – but she hadn't changed. I still remembered that walk, the way she looked at you as if she knew all your secrets and your dreams and would quite like to have a go at a few of them with you, especially the ones involving a large tin bath, nudity and a jug of warm custard.

Most of all, though, I remembered her attitude towards underwear and how she didn't think much of it, especially when the draft from opening the chip shop door caused her skirt to fly up. I'd always known she was a natural blonde, but now the rest of the chip shop queue knew too.

Still, that night I'd been drinking, drinking to forget. It had worked, at least as far as my legs were concerned; they seemed to have forgotten how to walk. I'd made it to the chip shop though, and was about to be served.

She walked up to me, there at the head of the queue. 'Let me order for you, Joe,' she whispered. She stroked my chin with the tip of her finger. 'I remember just what you like.' I remembered that perfume, so did the rest of my body. She glanced down. ' So, you do remember me, Joe. Well…. Some of you does.'

She smiled. 'Quite a lot of you, if I remember correctly… and I never forget a… face.'

She turned to the chip shop owner, waiting behind the counter. 'Fish and chips, Steve… and… oh… plenty of vinegar on the chips.'

I smiled too… she did remember.

She turned back to me. 'I also remember about the tin bath… and I've got some custard back at my place. Interested?'

I was.

A Certain Amount of Dexterity

Of course, she was the love of my life. I could but not admire her dexterity with the tambourine, if nothing else. I mean, when it comes to balancing a tambourine on the back of a galloping antelope whilst filling in a questionnaire about the mating habits of the trainee supermarket manager, you could not help but be impressed.

Although, as we lay together as the sun set over the smouldering remains of the last feral banker her tribe had feasted upon that night, I had to ask her just what is the use of these - and other such traditional skills - in this day and age….

I mean, riding a bareback seamstress whilst grating cheese into a bucket does require a certain amount of dexterity, but these days it is easier to get a mobile phone app for it, than to go all the way through the forest to the secluded clearings where her tribe camps, just to see it done.

The, of course, she turned on me, anger in her eyes, saying how little I knew of her people, their traditions, their ways and how the women of the tribe we taught how to kill a man with their bare hands and how to incapacitate a man utilising a special trick with the thighs.

I apologised and she let me go… in the end.

One day I hope I will be able to walk normally again, but in the meantime I spend my days polishing my teaspoons, waiting for the darkness to fall and dreaming of revenge.

Sometimes

What is there to say?

Sometimes the words are no use, empty and just noises in the air that have no meaning. Sometimes the words are too heavy, reluctant to fall out into the air and hang there. Sometimes there are just no words; even though the silence seems wrong with too many corners and dark shadowed hiding-places for the misunderstandings to lurk and wait.

Sometimes the words lack the eloquence of a gesture; the delicacy of a hand reaching out across the universes of difference that lie between us.

Sometimes the words are no use, sometimes the stories we tell, thinking those stories are what the other wants to hear, are just words on the wind, light and meaningless, floating away over the hills and lost.

Sometimes there are times when it is only the silence that we have left to hold on to, everything else having fallen useless from our hands. Sometimes even those hands are useless too; incapable of reaching, touching, when the space between is too great.

Sometimes though, it is only the words that can whisper those things we long to say, saying those words we long to hear. Sometimes it is only words that can tell of love and loss and distance and the importance of being close. Sometimes too, it is only words that can ever say sorry.

That Way Anarchy Lies

Then, sometimes, you realise that you have been discussing the wrong pre-Socratic philosopher all along which explains the way the rest of the impromptu discussion panel in the checkout queue stare at you. Although, I suppose that is only to be expected in the more downmarket supermarkets. In the posh supermarkets, people would be too polite to stare at such a faux pas. They'd just take a sudden deep interest in the quantities of organic humus they had in their trolleys or something like that, or begin discussing with their life-partner whether they had enough finger bowls for their next informal dinner party or something equally fascinating.

Obviously, if you had been discussing classical philosophy somewhere else you would expect someone to point out that it was in fact Heraclitus who first made the remark about foreign cheeses and sell-by dates you erroneously accredited to Pythagoras, without the slightest embarrassment and you could have laughed it off, made an apology and moved on. But supermarket checkout queues are not that forgiving, remember the armed siege that broke out in Littlehampton Safeway back in the 1980s when someone with nine items attempted to enter the 6 items or less (sic) queue?

That way anarchy lies (if you take the third exit from the roundabout and then carry straight on to the traffic lights).

Consequently, my advice is that if you are not completely confident about accrediting your philosophical quotation sources, it is probably best to let the wife do all the routine supermarket shopping on her own in future.

Naked Hopscotch

Here and now.

So, anyway, I said to him, I said, "And anyway, it isn't right, is it?" Still, as they say.

But anyway, here am I keeping the goat-stretching device all to myself, when this is the first Thursday when you've had a chance to wear the mittens since…. Oh, I don't know how long.

What do you use for spatulas when the donkey is not feeling well?

I don't know how it happened, but the orange marmoset maintenance engineering spanner just broke. It came apart in my hand. Ah, well, I suppose you just have to expect that sort of thing, these days.

Of course, now that it is open on Tuesdays I can have the ceremonial turkey basting shorts professionally ironed the day before, even though it does tend to play havoc with the scheduling of the tadpole sorting excursions with the boys from the Naked Hopscotch club. Never mind though, as they say, it will all come out in the wash.

Now, as I wasn't saying: Hamsters, where do you buy yours? I must get through a good half-dozen a so every fortnight now the bookshelves have been varnished. Sometimes I think it is a good job they do grow on trees.

But, don't laugh; it will be Wednesday again before you know it and we'll have to wheel all the old ladies out onto the motorway… again.

Faced with the Forces of Doom

Don't think about it. Just do it.

Excellent advice, no doubt, but when you are faced with the Forces of Doom a little bit of trepidation is probably not that uncommon. I suppose it depends, though, on just how often the Forces of Doom have a habit of turning up in the course of your life.

All in a day's work for the crime-fighting superhero, you would imagine; maybe not quite so much if you are an insurance loss adjuster, or if you work in a cake shop.

Although, on the other hand you would expect that the rampaging hordes of doom would have some effect on the insurance premiums; a bit like those houses that always seem to end up flooded and on the news when it rains a bit. Although, this being Britain, you'd think people would have worked out how the rain works by now, what with all the experience we get.

You could, perhaps, understand someone in the Gobi or the Sahara being more than a little surprised to see his kitchen under two feet of water one morning, but in Britain?

Anyway….

I suppose the same must apply to the cake shop assistant too. Most people, I imagine, would assume that even rampaging hordes of doom fancy a cake, or maybe a sandwich, or a hot sausage roll every now and then.

I doubt if they'd form much of an orderly queue though. It would be death and destruction, rape and pillage if the shop ran out of chocolate éclairs while half the horde were still waiting to be served. Let alone what would happen if they all wanted change for a tenner or something, or they didn't think much of the watery coffee.

So, yes – in the end – maybe it is not just superheroes, after all.