Arranged the usual place: the balcony. Coffee was served and the sun had been ordered, and was on it's way. Slowly adding a little colour to this long day that seemed to already be in existence. The first sip of this dark black liquid kicked in the first question of the day. "Where did it all start?" An odd question I thought to myself, not because of the actual question, but by it's simplicity. The over simplification of English has made the whole process awfully contextual. I knew that the question was regarding my existence, but in a strange way my mind wandered to the thoughts that the question could mean about everything. I mean, the big bang. Primordial soup, one-celled amoebae, the ice age, big reptiles, Tunguska, etc, etc and even Kentucky Fried Chicken secret recipes. But as the second sip was taken in, and more importantly kicked in, I dropped the analytical hat on the table and looked at the point at hand.
Four years the fifty will come along. A half century and nothing in comparison to the cretaceous period, but to myself, the ageing fool, quite a long stretch. Fifty years ago, people were dancing and singing to the flower power. The ideal of free thinking and a little liberty, to what seemed to be a strict and hash regime; called government. Nineteen Eighty Four had already been written and read, but actually converged with it's actual date-sake. I am convinced that my parents were not long-haired, grass blowing liberalists. One reason was that my current lack of hair can be genetically attributed to my father. Skinheads were some way off, and I never thought that the idea of a bald hippie would be a wild child affair. So I was born, to a typical family. Two popped out instead of one, but it seemed that is as far as the oddity occurred at the time.
The sun was now up, and the coffee tasted good. Even though instant. Noises started to permeate the air, from sweet bird song there came a transcendence to the annoyance of city life. Garbage trucks and coughing pedestrians, addicted to their cancer sticks. Trying to make it to work. Trying to get through the day. And so the conversation grew. It was a big leap from "Where did it all start", to "Where are you now", but I guess the coffee cup was limited and peering in over it's rim, it appeared to be half gone. So time was catching up on me. Where can I see myself. Trying best to be contextual again, rather than the abruptly obvious answer; which was the balcony. The thing I realised, as I surmised an answer in my mind, was the factual evidence was better an answer than the psychological tennis that was being played out in my mind.
Where was I? In a lot of shit! Happy being an artist? In a transgression between my past and my future? Well, as I said, the coffee was now getting cold, and the train of thought was beginning to leave it's station. I am here. I am drawing each day, being the person that some forty years ago, picked up a pencil and found some fascination in it. Found some reason to grasp on to it and hold it like a fear of death would prevail if I let it go. Sensing that through all this roller-coaster of life-long experience some sense of pride, arrogance, stupidity...call it what you will. Has got me to this stage. None the wiser, none the richer, but still the same enriched creative that one could be. Unable to explain in words the internal paradox that art is a joyous existence. That the world inside, is a daily trip into fantasy and delight, and the evil barrier that has denied this feeling to osmotically emerge into the world can only be called reality.
"Boy", I thought. I can see why people need a coffee first thing in the morning. So, time ticked by, as in any life. The monday morning feeling started to kick in, like the blue pills taking us to some perverse reality. For a moment there was a pregnant pause. As I gazed up from the coffee and reached into the sky to trap myself away from the reality and see swallows cutting the sky up into the patterns that nature wished them to design. Clang! The reality kicked back in, as did the coffee. Noisy rubbish men, never with concern to the sleeping souls around, made their presence known. Question three? Quick, before my imagination runs away with me, and I am left an empty shell. What could question three be? Was that a question in itself? Will this now be a long string of questions based on being an answer to the previous? No! There I stopped it before it begun. I seemed to desire music. The coffee had awoken my senses and I seemed to hear that there was more silence now than delightful noise. Not that mountain silence that I enjoy; swim in. But the 'waiting-for-the-the-next-noise' type silence. And it does come often than not. A crack, a bark, a bang. Nothing that makes city life worth living. But here we are, caged in concrete blocks, and tied down to the regulation that Nineteen Eighty Four seemed to have penned about all those years back. So, I guess the past and the present had been covered. The only fitting question would be the future..."Where would you like to be?"
One could only chuckle to this collection of words. Apart from having a myriad of fortune cookie type answers, that all seemed to deliver an answer heavier than the deepest fantasy one could imagine, one seemed to be lost. Lost even to not knowing were home is sitting on this freaking balcony, staring out to space (well at least the concrete block opposite) and, and, well what? Knowing where I'm going. Knowing what will happen. Hoping my dreams will self-assemble into something better than an IKEA pre-packed furniture combination, that could house a 48" plasma surround sound tv. Knowing that to some this is what the week's dream is. Some amount of something that will make the days seem worthwhile. That makes living bearable. That gives value to their pointless parade of daily grind. "Where would I like to be?" kept ringing in my mind. It started to form a dichotomy in my head. I'd like to be far away from all these troubles, but at the same time I want to be right here. So, as the last sip of coffee was taken in and the day and begun, I had to conclude the conversation by saying "Here!" I need to try, I need to fail or succeed. I need to laugh and cry. I need to foolish and at the same time responsible. I need to jump with excitement and at the same time be calm. I need to dream through reality. All these things are here. Maybe not on this balcony, nor even this place I call 'home'. Nor this street, this city, this country! But here, in me. I am the only thing that makes all the difference in my world. So am lived my life 'here', in this place and one day I will die in 'this' place. I look at each day, with either weary eyes or glowing dreams and know that 'this' place; whatever an atheist can call it, is the safe place to grow me.
copyright © Rob Snow | creative 2016
