It takes one small event to cause a seismic change. Like a picture hook falling from my wall. Or a spark from a baker’s in Pudding Lane causing the Great Fire of London and bringing the Plague to an end. I’ve quoted a Ray Bradbury story before, but he’s a great writer ( and not just in his genre of Science Fiction either, Dandelion Wine is a fine novel…. and not a bad idea either given the huge amount I’ve just paid to have a dozen bottles of kosher wine delivered…. Backsberg, Unorthodox and O’Dwyer in case you are interested ) so let’s give him another mention. Just before I do, I ordered the book “ Unorthodox “ which was recently adapted into a truly amazing Netflix series which made Hassidic black coats, huge hats and ringlets seem cool. And Amazon, bless them duly delivered it. Unfortunately I had ordered the German version by mistake and now I have to find a way to return it.
In one of the Bradbury stories there are time travel trips to the past ( wish there was one back to 2019 ) and every participant is told to keep to the narrow time path. One guy sees an insect or maybe a butterfly I can’t recall , but it makes no difference and I am sorry I even mentioned it ) , steps off the path and squashes it. When he returns to his own time he finds that his brother has married his wife, that he has no children and that the bad guy is now mayor of his town. You get the picture. I suppose the equivalent would be for us to return and find Jeremy Corbyn as Prime Minister, and Trump as President ( whoops, that’s actually happened hasn’t it so somebody, somewhere, must have stepped off the trail at some time ) The point I am making is that every action has a consequence.
And a picture hook fell off my wall. The immediate consequence is that I have a gap on my wall and the secondary consequence is that I have had a moment ( well, more than a moment really, because we writers seize any distraction we can as an excuse to break off from our literary masterpieces) to consider all my walls and the pictures on them. On that subject I was delighted to see in the Sunday Times that one should take off five minutes after every twenty-five spent looking at a screen. I think I might well try to reverse that. ( Breaking off for a coffee and a banana now…. all part of my morning routine… already done my 45 minutes work-out on my newly oiled treadmill… no, of course I didn’t oil it myself, don’t be silly. ) But, I am thinking of putting up another picture hook. Thinking about it very slowly as it’s going to be a big undertaking for me. Forget the pyramids and The Great Wall of China, Mel Stein finding a hammer ( not sure what that is nor even what they really look like ) then finding a hook and a couple of nails or tacks is a far more adventurous challenge.
So, while I am thinking about that and when I might do it ( don’t worry, you will be the first to know…. actually my wife might be the first to know as I am still hoping she might do it for me ) I took the opportunity to see if I could give my little microcosm of a world a make-over. This all started when the painting we recently brought back from South Africa went up on the wall in our dining room. It should have gone up in the tv room, but that would also have involved putting up a picture hook. Now, those of you who haven’t lost the will to live and are still following this will have spotted the flaw in the logical sequence of events. If he ( or his missus ) can put up a hook in his office why on earth can’t he knock one into the wall downstairs? I was going to leave a page blank so you could work that out ( there was once a football biography by a player called Len Shackleton which contained a chapter entitled “The Average Football Knowledge of a Club Director ) and he left it blank. Caused a huge furore at the time, but now nobody would blink an eyelid, they’d merely wonder why he bothered to point out the bleeding obvious)
Anyway, I think that’s quite enough time so put down your pens and hand in your paper. The answer is that the wall in my office is plywood and the wall in the tv room is solid and load bearing so I think I might need all sorts of things like a drill and a spirit level and special screws and the like of which I don’t even know the names to tell you. Anyway, so a picture had to come down to enable the lovely painting of African women and children on their way to or from market to go up and the immediate casualty was a print of a blazing sun with tortured figures as its spokes symbolizing the Exodus and the Holocaust ( I think ) We know how to cheer each other up whilst we eat , for sure.
Continuing the theme of every action having a consequence the consequence was that the blazing sun picture moved around the corner necessitating another picture coming down to make way for it. That happened to be a photo ( a very nice one I may say and if I ever find a way of adding pics to this blog you will see it ) of me holding the Vanarama National League trophy after Barnet had won it a few years ago with the signatures ( illegible, of course, aren’t they always on items like that ) of the whole squad. So where to put that? Where better than my office so I can look at myself sharing the moment of glory with one of the teams I love, whenever I choose? I know, a bit narcisstic ( I had to do a spell on that and even now not sure it’s right )
And to accommodate that photo I had to take down a framed poster of an advert for the Underground commemorating an FA Cup Final between Newcastle United and Arsenal in the 1950’s ( which The Toon won by the way ) and that’s when the hook fell out of the wall.
I could leave that part of the blog right there and you might say, wow what a great bit of writing. Your mouths might open in awe at the symbolism of that whole event. Just how does he do that, you might ask ( where does the question mark go in that sentence? After “ that “ or “ after “ ask “ or not at all ? I had cause to censor Sam’s grammar last week when he said, “ Me and Rachel will do it tomorrow “ I texted back and said it should have been “ Rachel and I “ and asked him just what he was being taught at school and then remembered that his school is closed and he hasn’t been for weeks. Before I could dwell on that he texted back with his usual scathing sarcasm and said, “ Well, you understood what I meant didn’t you ? So, it doesn’t really matter how I put it. “ No arguing with that, I suppose. The philosophy of Samuel Harrison Sloneem Stein ( big name for a little boy, but we all have high hopes for him and if you are going to be famous then you need a name like that ) aged 11 and a quarter. Bit like Adrian Mole and on that subject I had to cut my own bloody toe nails again today. And I took a razor to the back of my neck. And my beard trimmer. Not really sure why as nobody ever sees it as I always keep my face to the screen on zoom.
But, I just can’t leave it there. I always have a fascination for peering into people’s houses as I walk along. My Cotswold village is perfect for that as all the houses front onto the road and there are virtually no pavements. That’s why I love Zoom so much. You actually see where people work from, whilst home and it’s quite illuminating. There are some people I speak to regularly on the phone, but have never met and now I’ve tiptoed past their front doors I know an awful lot about them . I even know what they look like. Everybody seems to have a backdrop of a bookcase ( and they’re not virtual either) When I visit a house for the first time the bookcase is the first thing I look at it. A five minute review of their collection,tells you more about a person than a two hour conversation. If all they’ve got is Jeffrey Archer, Agatha Christie and Dan Brown then you might as well find an excuse to leave.
If I am having a zoom meeting from my office then my back-drop is a huge Barnet shirt ( signed again and with the Number 70 and my name… not that I ever played for Barnet though having seen some of their performances I might well have done better on occasions ) Under that I have a lovely photo of Newlands cricket ground in Cape Town taken during a match between England and South Africa ( I think England won although my friend Daphne may correct me ) and then to my right I have a framed poster for the movie “ The Outlaw “ signed by its star Jane Russell ( given to me years ago as a birthday present ) and the rest of the wall is taken up by a massive action photo of Bruce Springsteen and the E St Band that my wife bought surreptitiously in Key West and had transported home for another birthday. It’s got Clarence playing the sax so very special since he passed away.
Moving to another wall ( lots of wall and I’m not done yet ) I’ve two original framed cartoons of Gazza. One shows Gazza crying and says “ Mel Stein spent his pocket money on Hartlepool “ Love the celebrity fame brings. I was once half the answer to a question on “ Mastermind “ when they asked who are Paul Gascoigne’s managers. The other half was my pal Len Lazarus, but the contestant didn’t get either of us right, so no real fame there after all.
Underneath Gazza is a family photo of my maternal grandparent. My mother was born in 1913 and she looks about six or seven in this, posing with her parents and her two brothers and sister ( there was another boy and girl to follow, twins but not yet born. They are obviously affluent ( my grandfather had a very successful furniture manufacturing business and a maid and a car and a chauffeur and a farm in Surrey, but maybe more about how all that was lost some time ) The fact is that I am fascinated by the smaller details of the photo, the furniture, my aunt at a grand piano, the ornaments, the vases, the rugs…
And as I said at the start all these meanderings started with just one picture hook. Like the pandemic started with one rogue animal in China. We think. All events, all actions, however trivial, have consequences.
I will leave you with this thought. I have to give everything a name. Hence the Big V . But, if I could rename this pandemic I would choose Peter. Peter Pan… demic. The only problem about that of course is that he was forever young and would never die. Not really what we are hoping for so maybe I will stick with The Big V.
Stay safe and if we are spared I will see you all tomorrow.
PS While I have been typing this, my wife has knocked in a new picture hook and the photo is now safely up in its new home on my office wall and looking very nice indeed. There’s yet another example of the consequence of an event. She decides to clean my office ( for which I am very grateful as it was extremely dusty ) and the consequence is that whilst I am working on the blog the picture goes up. Point well and truly made. Can’t wait for another hook to fall out and give me more material to fill a blog.