Jax Burgoyne Writes

"Attempt to recall a bad date or a botched interview, or any one-on-one situation that went awry with awkwardness.  What stands out to you?"

Mr Tickle.  The tale of Mr Tickle is one I often tell.  And I'll say right at the beginning, that the thing that stands out to me is that for some reason I did what I did because I wanted to avoid an awkward situation by leaving, so instead, out of politeness, I did what follows....

Mr Tickle is a friend of a friend.  He seemed very nice.  (I'm sure he is very nice.)  Interesting, intellectual.  I went to his house for dinner and a film - a DATE!  

I started seeing a few warning signs as we had dinner - but those little signs of arrogance did not preview what occurred.

The thing is, people seem often to not know when I actually mean something, and especially not recognise when I'm very, very angry.  I think I must be the epitome of British politeness.  Or have been having botox for the last 24 years without noticing.

So, when we sat down to watch the film, and Mr Tickle started to tickle me...he didn't believe me when I said, 'Please don't tickle me, I hate being tickled,' and various other words to that effect.  I don't think I was laughing and saying it in an 'ooh, stop that, hee hee hee' way, and if I was, I certainly quickly st0pped.  The 'hint' was not got, though - even when I grabbed his thumbs and wrenched them into a thumb lock: he still continued trying to tickle me, until the imminent danger of losing two thumbs (and the pain) made him stay still.  Yup.  Weird.

But the weirder thing (if it's possible) is that I then sat and watched the rest of the film with his thumbs almost to the point of breaking, and then let him walk me home.  

Well, I didn't want to be rude.

"Go to the edge of a bookshelf, count seven books in, and take that one out.  Open it to page seven and count to the seventh sentence on that page.  Write a poem that starts with something from that sentence."

And hang, zig zag, on hedges,//Green as glass.
(Norman MacCaig, "Collected Poems.")

This has been sitting on Lizzie's computer stand on her desk at work for ages.  I forgot to do this at home (where the bookshelf is) so have just used this book.  I've never heard of Norman before, but that's quite a nice line.  So...more poetry....  This is one of those types of poems (most of my attempts are) where it's possible it's good, but probably I'm just apeing what I call 'pretentious wank'.

Once Sharp Sand

Glass - I collect it, sea-glass,
On every beach I come to now
For you.

Blue is the most exciting colour (rare),
But all of it shows that minutely pitted texture
Of blades become gentle.

I collect it, and I post it
(To you.)

"Describe a beloved toy from childhood."

Quilty.  

Whenever Nicola (my recent housemate - now sadly moved out) hears me talk about Quilty, she laughs because she has a friend called Quilty.  (NB I don't talk about Quilty that often.  Just if it comes up.  Like now :) )  The idea of a human called Quilty confuses me because it is clearly the affectionate (add a 'y') version of the word QUILT.  As in a blanket.  (Sorry to the human Quilty - I should not criticise/question your name.)

So, Quilty.  It is possible that Quilty still exists...somewhere in my room...(bed)....  Although, obviously, as an adult I am perfectly capable of existing without it.  (Quilty has no gender.)  I definitely don't hug it as I go to sleep.

Quilty was my blanket as as baby.  (I can hear many gasps of surprise right now.)  Yes, that is what Quilty was.  Which means it is, essentially, a rectangle.  Because of its extreme age (34 now!), and because of a PREVIOUS habit I had of chewing Quilty, it has had to have several new covers.  At one point there wasn't enough of the fabric I'd selected so MUM HAD TO CUT OFF A CORNER OF QUILTY!!!  (So I guess Quilty is technically a pentasomething.  Irregular pentagon?)    

That unfortunate (maiming) event started the black-fabric-with-flashes-of-colour-and-some-lovely-silk-thread-sewing-done-by-me-to-keep-Quilty-located-within-its-casing era, and because of the end of the chewing phase, Quilty lived in that case for I guess about 25 years, but has recently had to graduate to its current home.  This is a black, white, blue, purple and yellow bit of fabric given to me by my friend Sarah when she came back from Kenya.  As she has been me friend since primary school, she is probably aware of Quilty, and will hopefully approve of this use of (some of) her gift.

P.S. in case some of you are drunk/a tad...easily confused....  The above picture is NOT Quilty.

"Does reading the phrase 'the red wheelbarrow' immediately conjure up William Carlos Williams's poem of the same name?  Williams was one of the imagists, early modern poets who focused on an economy of language in free verse that spoke as much in image as in rhythm.  Try it for yourself in a short, visually focused poem."

This is a great thing for me to do.  With all of those visual skills I have :)

So, first, does that phrase conjure up that poem?

No.  Soz.

I feel I know it, or should know it, or have encountered it at some point.  I mean I studied American Literature.  And the term 'imagists' sounds familiar.  

A poem I do love, with incredible imagery, is this one:

Design, by Robert Frost

I found a dimpled spider, fat and white,
On a white heal-all, holding up a moth
Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth--
Assorted characters of death and blight
Mixed ready to begin the morning right,
Like the ingredients of a witches’ broth--
A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth,
And dead wings carried like a paper kite.
What had that flower to do with being white,
The wayside blue and innocent heal-all?
What brought the kindred spider to that height,
Then steered the white moth thither in the night?
What but design of darkness to appall?--
If design govern in a thing so small.

Take an image, and then load if with a religious crisis: love it.  Is 'God' good?  Is the idea of him being all-powerful and all-pervasive good, or actually a tad scary (Big Brother style)?  Love it.

Anyway, here is an attempt at a poem from an image that is burned into me:

The tube is in your mouth.
Your eyes and face are over-full
of water (pudgy, puffed),
Closed and bruised.
The nurse asks if I am ok.
I am not.

"If you could broadcast a thirty-second message to the entire world - over seven billion people - what would you say?"

There would have been a time when I would have voiced my concerns about over-population, and questioned whether having a child was a good thing for the child or the rest of the world, given the future that might await it (that I believe will await it).  But I've learned that there is no point, that the voice of rationality and numbers is not heard here.  (And it does have its potential, scary, drawbacks.)

BUT I think it's too late now - so there isn't really a whole lot of point.  Instead, well, here you go:
​
People of this world!  We are screwed.  We have only a certain amount of time left.  What, therefore, is the best way we can use these...decades?  I think we might have some decades left.  Maybe, if we are lucky, a hundred years!

So how should we spend them?

We should be kind.  We should be kind to everyone.  We should talk to our friends and our mothers and fathers.  We should smile at the people we walk past in the street and maybe even say hi - even smiling at the people in their cars who beep at us or the people who are shouting and angry.  And those people - the angry ones - we need to make them happy, or as happy as we can.  Talk to them - what is hurting them, and how can we help them to get rid of, or at the very least lessen, it?

Do not worry about MONEY. 

There is no point in earning and saving money for the future.  And, even if there was, wouldn't it be a far nicer thing to go round to your lonely old neighbour's house and have a cup of tea than pull an extra shift at work?  (Unless you happen to have an awesome job, like me :) )

And how would you rather spend your money?  Buying more shit you do not need?  Re-doing your kitchen one more time?  Buying an extra jumper because so far you don't have a lavender-coloured one, or, at least, not a lavender-coloured one that was made this year in that very special style that is now 'in'?  Or would you rather spend your pounds/dollars etc. helping make a home for a homeless person or a refugee?   (And then spend sometime helping that man or woman to be happy.  Give them your support, your time, your love.)

We don't have much of this life-gift left.  So let's try to make sure that life IS actually a gift for as many people as possible.  Not some shit present that they would rather be without.

P.S. The picture is from Thor: Ragnarok.  Apparently 'Ragnarok' = End of the World in I guess Norse mythology or something.

"Outline a compelling cliff-hanger, something that leaves a big dangling question for readers.  Be sure to build up tension to give your cliff-hanger dizzying height, for the reader to fall farther back into the story."

Oh plot.  I suck at plot.  (Yes, I know - this isn't the best weakness to have as a writer.)  Will have to think on this (and watch one of the great videos* Cata sent me).
*By 'video' I of course mean online filmy thing.

(SEVERAL WEEKS LATER, AND VIDEO STILL NOT YET WATCHED....)

Ok, I will take something out of one of the ridiculous 'soap operas' I continuously make up in my head:

USA, slavery era, around the time of William Wilberforce in the UK.  (I.e. people in the UK are campaigning to end the slave trade.)

2 men - 1 British, and one Southern USA, are standing, pistols at dawn.

Why?  Flashback.  The UK man is an anti-slavery campaigner.  He is travelling the USA with his band, which includes former ex-slaves.  They were performing in a pub when the USA man brought a gang to fight them.  The UK guy scornfully shot USA man's horse through the open doorway and told him to fuck the hell off.

Next day there comes a challenge (for insult and damage to property, in the ye olde aristocratic way) and the UK guy, who (for other reasons which I can't be bothered to go into, but include what would now be PTSD from being in the army) doesn't care if he lives or dies accepts.

Back to the present - UK guy waits and lets the USA guy shoot him - the shot grazes off his left shoulder, and blood starts to slowly seep through his jacket, darkening the grey fabric and then slowly running down.

The USA guy shouts at him, "Come on then, take your shot."

UK guy says one word to one of the black members of his band, in that man's native language.

Then he raises his gun, and pulls back the hammer.

What did he say?

"There is an unmarked manila envelope waiting for you in your mailbox.  What is in it?"

It is, of course, something I put there and forgot about.  I put it there, in the envelope, to remind myself to do it.  (Whatever 'it' is.)  And I put it in a manila envelope to give it a sense of excitement: I am far more likely to get excited about doing something if it comes with a gadget (like a stopwatch) or a lovely bit of stationery.

This is probably a folder full of rough flyer designs, poster designs, rough 'lesson plans' and clippings of LGBTQIA+ books, films, reviews etc (like the one I just tore out of The Big Issue): I must work more on my 2Headed Giraffe project! 

​What is this?  Well I'm collecting and sharing stories of the LGBTQIA+ experience - trying to raise awareness of the homophobia that still exists in the UK.  (I used to, naiively, think everything was fine here now, but talking to my gay, bi, trans and lesbian friends, I'm learning this is not the case. Obviously things are much better than in other places, but there still are a lot of problems.  Like an underlying homophobia - hidden, but when you scratch the surface....) 

One of the things I must do is share 2 errors of my own.  I won't share them here - that's for the other website, BUT what I want to note is that I'm gradually learning more, and realising where I have stupid prejudices (hopefully small ones, which I must correct!), where I don't understand, and where I combine these things, or am flippant, and think I am perfectly tolerant and accepting but actually sometimes I don't think before I speak and say something offensive.  (Thank you to my LGBTQIA+ friends who kindly let these things slide or, if necessary, kindly call me on these errors and are helping me to learn.)  I thought I was the perfect ally - the Queen of accepting who never put a foot wrong.  But I do.  I think not intentionally, but it is amazing, and somewhat demoralising, when you realise this is not actually the case.

So yes, I'm walking along and over the rainbow and seeing more and more (including my own reflection).

"Think of five different products from five different sections of the grocery store.  Now visualise them together at the checkout.  Who do you see standing there, buying this assortment of stuff?  Describe the person in any way you please."

Oh no.  Visualisation!  I will write the words, but you must realise that this is not happening for me: there might be pictures in my head, possibly, but the light is switched off: it's pitch black.  Nothing going on in there.  Well, nothing visual.

Ok: pineapple, cheese, tin foil, Bucks Fizz, tights.

This is a Spaced fan, preparing to do a Daisy-party.  If we build it, they will come.*

She's a creative type (like Daisy), and has grand plans to 'peel' the pineapple, then stick cocktail sticks with lumps o'cheddar on the end, and add some kind of foil striping to make the world's most-uber Dalek.

She will, of course, drink 2/3 of the Bucks Fizz in the process and have to go to the local to get some over priced something or other, which she will decide to pour into a bowl, adding the pineapple (the Dalek was a failure) to make some kind of incredible wineapple punch.  

Some or all of this was planned while walking round Tesco: hence the somewhat scattered/random shopping.  The tights are because tights always break.

Oh, I should be describing her.  Um.  She has short blonde (bleached) hair, tanned skin, green eyes.  She is wearing flares and a long-sleeved stripy shirt with a headscarf on her head.  (This appears to be becoming a description of a 70s pirate.  And also, other than that arbitrary physical description, it is basically me.  Oh well.)

*for those young beans who do not know what Spaced is, you should do.  Find it, and watch it. :)

"Anais Nin said: 'It is the function of art to renew our perception.  What we are familiar with we cease to see.  The writer shakes up the familiar scene, and, as if by magic, we see a new meaning in it."  How does this statement relate to your writing goals?"

I think for me, maybe, writing is a way of joining people in old ways - revealing truths we all already knew in our stomach, or our throats, when we cry.

It is already there, but we don't notice it if we aren't living it.  And if we are living it, this thing, because it is forgotten by most people, or maybe denied or secret, we feel alone.  That's what I want to stop - want to help with.

I hope what my writing does is goes under your bed or into the back of your cupboard - shines a very focused torch and says, "Look, see that dead woodlouse, or that old button that fell off your shirt?  I've got those too."  (I speak metaphorically, of course.)

And not just negative (although I am drawn more to that) - but the good too; the little gleams that make us all smile.  (I mean I love buttons.  Free buttons.  Win!!)

But yes, for me it is not shaking up and giving a new meaning particularly - it is more re-revealing the very, very old.  (Archaeology.)

"When did you last want to celebrate being right about something?  Or do you currently feel 'in the right' about some matter?  Write it out."

I find it very difficult to feel right about things.  My memory of facts is essentially non-existent.  When I pitch an idea the poor guys at work have to put up with me saying, "You know there's this thing with some stuff and something sort of happened I think, but I'm not sure what it was."  (Yes, always with the 'you know', or some sort of equivalent.)

And then I backtrack, rapidly.

My history teacher at school (one of them - Mrs Powlesland) called me Janus - the two-faced God.  But not as in two-faced (although I can be that too), but as in seeing both sides of...most things.  Even if my emotional side is being unbelievably biased there is usually some corner of my rational brain going, "Yeah, but, you know, what about...?"  (Hopefully.)

And do you know what?  It is very hard to win an argument with someone when you are like this - you say, "You're right, but I am too," and somehow they don't hear the second bit or can't be persuaded of the validity of MY argument, even though WE ARE BOTH RIGHT!  This doesn't feel fair - losing arguments because my opponent is either too thick or irrational to see sense.  :(

(Am I bitter?  Yes, I am.)