clinging to the wreckage

  A drive from Cambridge to Boston on a beautifully sunny Massachusetts day, we head towards Nahant beach. The beauty is astounding. New England, in its classic ocean-side glory, is at its best here. The soft smooth sand caresses one’s feet as the ocean gently rolls up to kiss the beach. A line of houses to the far left and the far right provide a scenic masterpiece, but also a sense of privacy and peace within. There is space, but the people who are there all seem to be beautiful. It is clearly my state of mind; a state of happiness that makes everything bright and brilliant and beautiful. On the beach our conversation flows and feeds our thoughts. We speak of books and films and travel. There is desire, but it is forbidden. It is a wonderful moment in time.

  What caused you to reach out today? What is it that made you feel you wanted to connect with me on this day of all days? Was it a dream? Was it a photo? Was it a thought like ‘I need money and I think he has some’? Or is it merely a desire to be friendly and remain in touch? We once lived together. We made the decision to put our relationship into the hands of the government… something I could never fully come to terms with. Perhaps I’d read too much Thomas Hardy. It has just always seemed incredibly ridiculous to me that the government manages a relationship. If you want to end the relationship, you have to ask the government for permission to do so, and they decide who owes what (after you have paid them).                   It can be sad how we grow older and lose excitement or enthusiasm… or both. We lose a lot of hope. I used to dream of love, of holding the hand of someone I was passionate about from afar. I used to dream of sharing time and space with them, of travelling and ex

  The world is ending… so everyone has stopped drinking and has started having kids. I simply do not understand it. I take a short walk in my flip flops and go directly to the pool on the way back. In the pool I read a book and enjoy the blinding bright blue sky. Tomorrow morning, starting at 8am, I have three one-hour meetings back-to-back, so I decide against having a beer. Last night was a sleepless one, mostly, because my mind was painting the walls and ceiling black. I dozed off at 5am and had a dream about an ex. I awoke feeling desperate to message her… but I resisted the urge. In the pool I started to see things… a crocodile floating upon a crocodile… and prey, or babies, in the water. A stampede takes place on a balcony to my right and there are more babies, forever loud. The drone ant colonies file home from the office. They are told to return to the office, and they do. They are told the climate is changing and they ignore it. They ignore all science. But they love money. Th

Memories come and memories go… but I recall driving to Newbury where you had booked a hotel for us for one night. At the time of the booking, we were innocent. We were less innocent when the night arrived. Afterwards, we were bathed in sin. It was delicious and delightful. It was also when love was forged. I saw you looking into the mirror and, whenever you did, one of your eyes would lose focus and look towards your nose. It was one of the most adorable things I had ever seen. The next day, I saw you crying as you sat in your car behind mine. As I drove home my phone rang and it was your friend telling me that I was your dream man. I couldn’t understand it. You were not completely free. Hence the tears. We intended for that to be the last night… to walk away and get on with our lives, but it was not to be. We fell in love. We spent many days and nights together and there were times I couldn’t understand how. I began to wonder if the other was merely a phantom. An apparition to allow y

  You come to me in my dreams at night. It is frequent, and I don’t understand it. It was precisely 11 years ago that we met. It only took me two weeks to fall in love. 11 years have passed, and there has not been a day that I have not thought about you. I think it has been 7 years since we last met. In the dream last night, we sensed each other on a sports field, then we embraced. We were suddenly in an aquarium with others… we escaped to a secret room that started to drop like a faulty elevator. I was certain we would be crushed, like the scene in Star Wars where Luke, Leia, and Chewy are caught in the trash shoot with the closing walls. Crushed by walls and by desire. We kissed… it became heated and sexual. Then I awoke to a deep longing and a sense of despair. I sent a message to wish France well for their game in the Euros that day, but mostly to make contact. There was no reply.

Writing is a window to the mind. A true view of the full person behind the words. Face to face, when speaking, an individual can come across as calm and collected, they smile and use charm… they pretend to be what they want, and they wear a mask to disguise what lies inside. When they write, it pours out… their inner darkness and angry and emotional despair. For some, it also reveals their grammatical chaos… often caused by simple and pure blind fury. Writing is a powerful tool to use… it is also a powerful tool to be used against you if you are only a good person behind your mask.                   Communication in all walks of life is vitally important. In the professional realm, it is required to be seen as credible… it’s about timing as well as delivery and audience. As a leader, it is absolutely crucial. A leader firing off spouts of furious phrases that are poorly worded and contain grammatical errors in a constant flow simply has no credibility whatsoever. Many people are able t

  He lay alone in the darkened room. The blinds were closed to the maximum in order to block out any potential light breaking through from the dazzling Spanish sun. It was the day after his birthday. He had spent the previous day with his girlfriend. But that now seemed an eternity away. Lifetimes had passed since then. It was a Tuesday morning and he simply did not know if it would be possible to get out of bed and go to work. Life seemed empty. Everything was lost to him except the deep throbbing pain reminding him that he was alive. To be alive like this… in this space of black desolation and despair… was it even to be alive? He had found something, something worthwhile and meaningful… something that brought light and hope, but it was now lost. It was inevitable. It seemed as if it was surely, at the very least, the end of his Spanish adventure.