Lazy

Over the years, one thing I’ve said many times is that in some ways I’m lazy. (And it’s true – plus I’m almost certainly lazy in many, many ways)  However, in some circumstances my laziness actually results in extra effort/work.

Technically and pedantically I know it’s not laziness per se, it’s more a “can’t be arsed to wait” aspect which probably also matches up to something else I’ll be writing this week.

Anyway, as an example of this, I say I’m lazy when I can’t be bothered to wait for a bus or a tram/train (particularly when I lived in Manchester) on short journeys, so I’d rather walk. I simply don’t get why people would wait for a tram from Piccadilly station down to Piccadilly Gardens (or indeed really any tram stop in Manchester) when you can walk it in the time it takes for the bus/tram to arrive.

When I go shopping, I can’t be arsed to wait for a parking space right next to the shops. I’ll park further away in the car park, walk in, get what I need, and leave. If it’s been a quick shop, I’m sometimes in and out while the same damn car waits for a space right next to the store.

Indeed in general I can’t be arsed with hunting for parking spaces right next to where I’m going. I’m just as happy parking further away where there’s plenty of spaces and just, you know, walking a bit further.

But then, I’m lazy like that.


Following the Crowd – Again

Following on from yesterday’s post about charity, Children in Need, and doing what everyone else does, another current grouse is around Movember. It’s a great cause – raising awareness of male cancers, and raising funds for fighting them – but it’s another group thing.

In my office, every other male member of staff is doing it. And when you ask their motivations? Yep, it’s either “Well, everyone else is doing it, so I thought I would”, or “it’s for charity”. Yet when I asked them what charity it was for, at least half had no bloody clue, and aren’t even doing it to raise money.

Movember started off as a fun idea – but this year it’s got huge sponsors (including Gilette – which is kind of obvious, in fairness – and Three) but I just kind of get twitchy when it comes to charitable stuff with large corporate sponsors.

So yeah, if you’re going to do something that’s based around charity – at least support that charity, or know what the frick you’re talking about, rather than just following the damn crowd.


Following the Crowd

For many, many reasons – none of which I can really be chuffed with going into right now – I’ve grown up to be horrifically independent, both in action, life, and thought. One facet of that is that I’m sensationally bad at group activities, at doing what ‘most people’ do.

Today’s a case in point. I know I’ve waffed on about it before, but it’s Children in Need day, which is one of my particular bugbears.

“But it’s for charity, isn’t it?” is the calling-card of the day, assuming that if you’re not taking part and dressing up (or whatever) then you’re A Bad Person, and Uncharitable to boot. “Why not dress up, everyone else is doing it”.

And that’s part of my problem with the entire thing – it’s that ‘everyone else’ is doing it. Like Groucho Marx said, I’m not interested in being part of any club that’ll have me as a member. In the same way, if everyone else is doing something, you can be pretty damn sure that I won’t be.

The other side, when it comes to these days of charity and fundraising, is that I don’t like being conspicuous about which charities I support – and I like even less being forced (or attempts to force) to support charities because of how their perceived. I don’t publicise what I do, or who with, or why – because it’s no-one’s fucking business but my own. Being pushed to take part in something popular, into some fund-raising activity or other because everyone else is doing it, that can fuck right off.

So today, I’ll be in my corner, “Bah Humbug” hat and all. If you don’t like it, sod off. Go on, everyone else is doing it.


Self Doubt

Over the last two years or so, one thing I’ve noticed more and more is that I doubt myself far more than I ever used to.

Ten years ago, back when I was living in Manchester, I’d make a decision and stick with it – and sometimes those decisions wouldn’t work out, or they’d be based on flawed assumptions (god knows I made a fair few of those over the years) But most of the time they worked out, things grew from there, and I didn’t regret any of it. Again, sometimes mistakes were made – but they were based on what felt to be the best thing at the time. I did some truly idiot shit along the way – the ill-fated six month period of daily commuting round-trips by train between either Manchester and London, or Bath and London would probably be the lowest point in that particular theme. But I still did it – I’d made the decision to do so, and continue to do so, I reaped what I’d sowed and decided upon, and that was fine. (I pretty much had a breakdown at the end of it, but well, them’s the breaks)

Over the last decade though, that self-confidence (or at least confidence in one’s decisions) has been rocked a few times, and in some cases to the point of pretty much capsizing the entire damn thing. (I know, I’m kind of mixing metaphors. Live with it)  And it’s had a lasting effect, which I’m not entirely pleased about. I’m still working on it, aiming to build back up on that, along with everything else.

I’m still OK on a lot of things – if I’ve said I’ll meet someone anywhere, I’ll do it. If it involves others, those decisions are solid, and it doesn’t matter what happens, I’ll do my damnedest to be where I said, when I said.

The real crux though is when it’s something involving just me. It doesn’t have to be travel, or an event, it can be anything really. (The Peter Gabriel gig this week being a case in point) Because it’s only me doing it, my brain can descend into a spiral of second-guessing itself, a whole range of “Do I want to go?” internal questions, a bundle of “What If”s, “Yeah But”s, and “Well…”s.  I hate it, it annoys me so much. I’ve decided to do something, I want to just go on and do it. It’s the run-up, the cue time, the delays that bring about the doubts. [NOTE : When I talk about internal conversations, I’m not meaning ‘voices in my head’ as such, or any other inclement sign of madness]

I don’t know what’ll fix it – or even if anything will.  I’m working on rebuilding it, on knowing that when I’ve decided to do something, it’s the right thing to do – even if it turns out, with hindsight, to have been fucking stupid.  But sometimes at the moment it’s easier to give in to the self-doubt, to let it win, to take the easier and quieter route – which is, for me, most definitely the road less travelled.

Sometimes I think I’ve fought for so long, battled everything about myself and my life for so long, maybe I’m just tired of fighting for a while.

[NOTE having read that last bit back, and realised alternative interpretations, this does not mean I’m giving in/up, or aiming to do anything stupid.]


Wavering

This afternoon/evening, I’m supposed to be going to see Peter Gabriel at the O2. I’ve booked the afternoon off work, I’ve paid for the parking at the O2. As an aside, I always feel that parking cost is an iniquitous extra, but such is life – while it might be feasible for me to get there by public transport, it’s completely unfeasible for the return journey.

I will go

But right now, my brain’s wavering and havering, thinking “Yeah, but…” on a number of reasons, a range of logical excuses to not go. Tired, distance, time, return time, work – it’s all in there, all making me doubt.

I will go. I want to go.

I just wish my brain would be more certain, and shut up a bit.


Solitary

This week I’ve seen two stories about the ‘Angola Three’, and in particular Herman Wallace, who has just been released after 41 years in solitary confinement, after a judge ruled he didn’t get a fair trial. In 1972.  (Bizarrely, the reason it wasn’t a fair trial is because women were excluded from the jury, in breach of the Fourteenth Amendment.) Oh yeah, and he’s only got weeks to live, as he’s got advanced liver cancer.

The first story was in Reuters, ‘Dying ‘Angola Three’ inmate freed after 41 years in solitary confinement‘. The BBC picked up the story too, and has also had a couple of supporting pieces, one about what solitary confinement does to a prisoner, and one asking how people survive solitary confinement at all.

It makes for interesting reading, as well as a pretty damning indictment of America’s methods of jailing and punishing people, some of which I still feel hails from that Puritan background of the original settlers.

Honestly though, you can’t really imagine being in that kind of situation, of hardly having any human contact for 41 years. It’s hard to conceive of a lifetime (near as dammit my lifetime, anyway) with minimal human contact and interaction, being confined to a 9′ x 6′ cell for at least 23 hours a day. Even more so when it’s for a crime that they say they didn’t commit (and for which there’s no evidence to say they did) But that’s what these men have lived through.  The final one of the three, Albert Woodfox, is still there, still in solitary confinement. He’s been there since 1972, and there’s no end in sight.

I’ve sometimes wondered how I would handle solitude and solitary life – in some ways I’m quite close to it anyway, not needing or wanting much in the way of physical interaction. But that’s on my own terms, and it’s my own choice. If I want to go out and interact, I can do. Most of my contact with friends is via t’internet, Twitter, Facebook, mobile phone and the like. It’s still interaction, just not on a physical level in general.

How would I handle it if that solitude were enforced? If it was in a cell with a locked door? Honestly, I don’t know. And I really wouldn’t fancy finding out.

[Updated : Herman Wallace died, less than a week after being released.]


Identity

At the moment I’m thinking a lot about identity – it’s primarily related to an idea I’ve got for a writing project, but it’s just a process that keeps bouncing round my head.  Are we really who we think we are? And if not, which is the true identity? The one we live, the one we think we live, or the one we dream of being?

As an example, I’m pretty sure of who I am, but other people see a different person to the one I see. They see personality traits – good and bad – in me that I don’t see in myself. So which is true? Or are both true?

There’s probably more to be written on this, I’m just bouncing things round in my head, seeing what shakes out in the long run.