Homework

Fiction. It's all around us. There is fiction in our books and on our televisions. There is fiction in our speech and our thoughts. Why, even my own children are fictional. Where does it come from? What can we do about it?

Those questions are not for me to answer. I ask them merely to conclude my opening paragraph. Intentionality is an island to which there is no ferry.

Answering those questions about fiction can be your homework.

I don't remember doing much homework when I was a schoolchild. Perhaps I was so brilliant that I got everything done in class, or perhaps I just refused to do any work at home because we had no flat surfaces on which to write. It was all 'spherical this' and 'convex that' at our house. I'm sure we thought it was all very modern at the time, but it seems rather tacky in retrospect.

That's the good thing about (some) jobs, I suppose. No homework. You don't need to take any baggage with you. Your evenings and weekends are yours to play 2D side-scrolling shoot-em-ups and eat bagel after bagel after bagel.

At university, it was pretty much all homework. It had its benefits. One could sleep until noon and go to see films in the middle of the day. But the work pressure was always there. There were no designated relaxation periods, which meant constant worry and constant sloth.

I'm happy to no longer have homework. Though some may consider writing this blog to be homework. It's certainly an obligation, and is eating into my bagel time. Often I write these posts at work, so everyone's a winner (except for my employer - the Chevron Corporation). But it's Bank Holiday Monday today, so this is all on me.

I am at home, but can something this fun seriously be thought of as 'work'? I don't think so. It's such a pleasure. It glides out of my brain and into your eyes as smooth as you like.

No friction, only fiction.

Fiction. Ah yes, back to where we began. Let's make some fiction.

***

A dog that could fly was friends with a gnome that could swim. Together, they won the Olympics.

***

There. Fiction. It's as easy as that.

I'm a bit ill at the moment. That's why it was so short. You know me - on a normal day, that story would have gone on for ages. Too long, really.

It's a shame. But I really am ill.

Can you imagine the kinds of things I'd have put in the story, if I was 100%? Crazy, crazy stuff.

I would have named the dog and the gnome, and the names would have been ridiculous. Like, they would have been weird. Not conventionally weird, but genuinely like "wow, where did that come from?" kind-of weird.

They'd have families and would have some pretty amazing conversations. Imagine the field day I could have with a gnome and a dog talking to each other and going to the Olympics? Damn these germs.

But it wouldn't just have been loads of surreal stuff happening. I probably would have made it unexpectedly moving, and it would have a political element that would make you think. I reckon, if I didn't have this cold, I probably would have included a reference to Jesse Owens that would have been clever.

It's such a shame.

And the Olympics could have just been the beginning. Imagine a dog that could fly and a gnome that could swim being employed as secret agents, going on covert ops and rescuing kidnap victims or what have you. There would be quips and probably some dog puns - even gnome puns would be in the offing - if only it wasn't for this blasted runny nose.

And the cough. The cough is probably the main reason you've been robbed of the entertainment.

Never mind, though. I'll probably feel better tomorrow.

I won't come back to the dog and gnome thing, though. Never look back. Only look forward. My eye hurts a bit, but I don't know if that's because of the cold or an unrelated thing, such as when I poked a lash out of there.

I should be in bed. Even having written this much is heroic. I never complain usually - you know me. But I am suffering.

Let's put an amusing photograph here. It's your reward for getting through this. Like at the finish line of the Race For Life, where they hand out bags of moisturiser and hair-straighteners.

Here is your moisturiser:

I'm going to make myself a Lemsip.