Dig

My ongoing blog post re-reading and labelling enterprise (or OBPRALE) continues. I'm up to June 2011.

This retrospective has proven to be quite eye-opening. By experiencing my entire back catalogue in a short space of time, I've gained a new appreciation of exactly what the HELL I think I'm doing here.

Sometimes you need to step outside (the car wash, for example) to gain a proper overview (customer morale, roof graffiti).

I can see patterns in my writing. What had originally seemed a random assortment of thoughts and proverbs has shown itself to be a massive work of incredible complexity, fidelity and almost crystalline beauty.

But this knowledge - this god's eye view, if you will - comes at a price. Knowing what I know, how can I write further blog posts? I'm too aware of the whole. The part will suffer. The crystal will collapse. It will all tumble like a house of card barrels going over Niagara Falls.

I can't think about it. I must put it to the back of my mind. Surely the blog can withstand some self-awareness. It is shaped by my words, as the land is shaped by the glacier. Slow, relentless, irresistible. A blip cannot change its course. The glacier, I mean. Or the... blog. I've lost track of this metaphor. But that's probably for the best. Maybe future generations will find its fossilised remains in a mountain or canyon, and will learn that SYMBOLISM ONCE WALKED THE EARTH.

***

I thought about gardening this morning. I had to think about something.

After I wake up, I must make a concerted effort not to dwell on my own fatigue. That way madness lies. I can spend many minutes bemoaning my situation and yearning for sleep.

So I have to take my mind off things. Each day is a new topic. This morning, I thought about gardening.

I didn't come up with much. We don't have a garden. I've never had much interest in it. I suspect that I might enjoy it one day. Middle-aged men like to garden. It must feel very rustic and manly. You get to use a massive fork. And a rake. And a spade. Real men use spades. And real women. And fictional men in books about shovelling.

When I'm older, I'll probably garden. It must be satisfying to help things grow. I prefer animals to plants, but I can see why people chose plants. They stay still. And you don't get investigated if you kill them all.

You can massacre an entire family of plants, and no-one will bat an eyelid. That's the best thing about gardening: it legitimises murder.

I can see why so many people do it. Also, flowers smell nice.

Another good thing about gardening is those gloves.

Not the dainty, pretty, lacy gloves of the cold-handed débutante. Nor the protective, sterile rubber gloves of the professional (or dedicated amateur) surgeon.

No, these are heavy and worn and brown. They protect the hands from thorns and thistles and nettles. You can wrench an entire tree out of the ground with those gloves. I'd like to wear some of them.

Yes, gardening does hold a certain amount of appeal. But so, equally, does not doing it.

That train of thought was just enough to take me up to my early-morning departure time, thus staving off suicide for another day.

What a lovely topic.

***

Anyway, Louie is still great. I just thought you should know. The below clip is part of a great three-part episode where Louie has the opportunity to host the Late Show. Features DAVID LYNCH:



There. Does that make any sense out of context? Does it make any sense out of context?

Never mind. At least there's some craft there. My blog posts occasionally lack craft. It has lots of other things, but it can be craftless on occasion.

Craft is underrated. I'm going to work on craft.