55:28

That's how long the call lasted, from around 6:25 this evening.
I've come out to my wife, as gay, though not as a boylover, and it went as badly as I could have anticipated.
The marriage is over, more or less, my wife started talking about dealing with the 'practicalities' within minutes. When I told her I was going to tell my daughter what had happened, she started talking about me being 'horrible' and 'disrespectful' towards her, even after I'd told her that the girl already knew. I spoke to her anyway, and again when I got back to 'domicile-ville' - she's OK, as far as I can tell over a phone line, but, then, she knew. Knows more than her mother, of course, because she knows about the boys.
My initial reaction was relief, that it was finally out in the open. Two hours and a half hours on, give or take, and I've reached the 'oooohhhh fuuuuuuck' stage.
End of the world news. Everything changes now, in what way remains to be seen.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Leaping out

Couldn't resist that one, sorry! I'm off on this bisextile day, so I'm going out shortly to see the world, or some small corner of it (West and maybe Central London, largely, in all probability), because if I didn't, there's little doubt I'd be sitting in front of this keyboard for most of the day, and given some of the dark places I've found myself of late, that isn't the healthiest of occupations just now.
I spent a couple of hours yesterday morning in one of those places, writing some more of my latest story. It isn't going to be a long one, and it's around half finished. How successful it will be, either as 'literature' or catharsis, remains to be seen.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Dark recesses

After yesterday, some of the shadowy places in my head have asserted themselves today. In particular, I've started writing a story which, if I get it finished and published, will definitely not appeal to the lovers of happy endings. The plot is all there in my head, it's just a matter of finding the words to flesh out the framework. If I can bring myself to do it, that is. The aim of this stuff, from my point of view, is catharsis, but each piece of the dark jigsaw I drag out into the world seems only to uncover two others, like some kind of Hydra, a bottomless pit of horrors to haunt and taunt me. And all the while, in spite of the turmoil within, I have to go out and face the world, to put on my mask of 'normality' and pretend I'm something other than my real self, day after day. Because if I don't keep up the charade, who knows what I'll lose - maybe everything. Dark is hardly a strong enough word to describe what's going on.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

I can't even remember what I was going to call this

But it's going to be a rant, mostly by me, about me. I apologise in advance if it's all too predictable and tedious.
The highpoint was high - at Waterloo station, just before midday, I saw the most spectacularly beautiful boy since I first saw DBJ in 2006, and he was very like my inamorato from Cornwall, too, but the high was brought crashing down by the fact that the boy concerned was more or less the same age as DBJ was that first time, around 8 or 9. As ever, he could never, indeed should never, be my boy, and I'm just left feeling filthy and worthless for having the thoughts I had about him. There's nothing more to say, really. The tipping point towards Plan B isn't too far away.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Two today!

My second blogaversary! It only seems like yesterday, and all that. I read the post I wrote a year ago today, which turned out to be a longish, borderline rambling effort about where I felt I was in my life. And, as I said in similar circumstances at New Year, when I compared my life position to the beginning of 2011, it doesn't seem that very much has changed, so I have no intention of going over the same ground again.

What I have been thinking about, though, is one element of my motivation for starting a blog in the first place, of how a blog might 'help', both me in dealing with the issues in my life, and others in being able to offer support and empathy based on my life experiences. It seems to me that the blog has largely failed in both of those linked aspects, to the extent that, as little as two days ago, I was seriously considering this anniversary post being my last, in the wake of what appeared to be a fairly bland, but supportive comment I'd left on a blog I'd recently come across having failed the 'moderation' stage. 24 hours later, it had appeared on the blog concerned, so I'm sorry for having jumped to the wrong conclusion, but it did set this 'helping' train of thought in motion. Over the course of my two years in Blogland, I've received two or three e-mails from people who have said my blog, or comments I've left, have helped them in some way. One and a half a year doesn't really strike me as being a very good average, even for someone who has no pretensions to being an 'agony uncle', or anything similar. And I haven't even helped myself to any appreciable extent - as I said, nothing much has changed in my life, I'm still closeted and conflicted about my sexuality, as though I've been able to lay out the 'bones' of my situation, but don't have the slightest idea about what to do next, how to apply what I've learned to make life flow more congenially. Maybe I'm just suffering from unreasonable expectations of what my blog, or any blog, is able to achieve. 

What I am thankful for, though, is the input of people who have tried, often, seemingly, in the face of my ingratitude and stubborn refusal to cooperate, to help me over the past two years. Even if I seem to be a hopeless case, I do genuinely appreciate the care and concern that has been offered. Thank you all.

Love & best wishes to all

Sammy B

Another good reason

Not to be a Christian, that is. Apparently, Rick Santorum doesn't think you can be both a 'liberal' and a Christian, that 'I don't believe there is such a thing (liberal Christianity)'. So, given that you can only be one or the other, in his view, how could anyone with a shred of compassion and consideration for others even countenance being a Christian? I've read elsewhere that even many in the higher echelons of the Republican Party are now terrified that Santorum might actually win the presidential nomination, and are doing all they can to prevent that eventuality, because they realise that his unremitting extremism makes him completely unelectable. I sincerely hope they're right.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Torture, again

Six or seven minutes of it, on the train back from work. It wasn't as bad, or as long-lasting, as my encounter with David last year, because the resemblance wasn't as strong or the journey as seemingly interminable, but I shared a carriage for the last segment of my trip with a boy who was more than a little reminiscent of DBJ this morning, and that was more than enough to sting my brittle emotions. I couldn't help looking, of course, and I'm pretty sure he noticed me looking. There's always something there to remind me, as the old song goes.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Second class citizens - if considered citizens at all

This story is disgusting enough as an example of the American religious right's intolerance and vindictiveness - '(Atheists) don't actually deserve rights', and the scandalous implication that atheist soldiers are cowards, from someone who's doubtless never been within several thousand miles of a front line - but could be thought to be one we in 'tolerant, multicultural' Britain might be able to look at and say 'that kind of thing doesn't happen here'. Except that we now have a government here that is quite willing, seemingly, to ride roughshod over the courts and retrospectively enact legislation which effectively makes atheists second class citizens whose beliefs and opinions count for nothing in the face of the supposed 'Christian majority'. When as little as 2% of the population of a major city like Manchester were found by a survey to meet a reasonable definition of actively practising Christianity, which majority are we talking about?

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Immortality

On the way to work last night, I got to the station at the same time as a boy of 13 or 14, evidently rushing to catch his train (not the same one as me, sadly). He wasn't the cutest I'd ever seen, but he was attractive enough, and as he passed me, running, on the station overbridge to get to his platform, his grace and natural athleticism brought this thought to my mind - why can't they stay 13 forever? I'll admit that being frozen in time wouldn't be a good option for the individual boy, but in my daydreams, I could wish, I thought. A few more moments of reflection, though, made me realise that, in a way, they are 13 forever - as one generation matures towards adulthood, their younger 'siblings', literal or figurative, take their place. Even specific, cherished individuals have their own version of immortality, in memory - my cousin, or DBJ, for instance, aren't the same as they were in the past, but, when I close my eyes, I can still envision them as they were, and will be able carry on doing so until death or mental deterioration intervene. The beautiful boy, ever present.

Love & best wishes to all

Sammy B

How to write off one day of your life

In the 24 hours up to 6:00 this morning, I've spent 14 hours at work, and another 3+ hours travelling to and from work. Yep, another of our double-shift Sundays has come and gone, an early shift and then back for nights last night. Fun, fun, fun. Or something.
At least I managed to be in the same room as my colleague's stepson for two hours or so yesterday morning without making a complete fool of myself - he wasn't quite as cute as I'd been led to believe, or led to imagine, anyway, although he certainly wasn't all that difficult to look at. Fortunately for me, I didn't get that many opportunities to look at him, given my work and the fact that I had my break while he was there, and spent some time eating cereal and playing another round of mindless games on my phone in the mess room. I did look at least once too often, though, and the boy himself noticed, but we'd sort of been introduced by that point, and he just smiled a little, amiable smile at me when he looked up from whatever he had been engrossed in on his own phone. A bit of a bullet dodged, all in all.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Another minefield, maybe

One of my colleagues approached the shift manager at work this morning, to ask if it would be possible for his stepson to come in with him tomorrow and stay at our workplace for a couple of hours before he goes to play in a junior football tournament locally. No objection was raised, so it could be that there will be a 12 year old boy, who, from what I've heard of him, sounds like the sort likely to appeal to my horrible tastes, in the room to help me out myself in front of everyone.
He may not appear - nothing had been finalised by the time the shift finished at lunchtime - but if he doesn't, I'll probably be even more disappointed than if he does. The moth actively wishing for the flame, it seems.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

No happy endings

I've got to find a way to embrace that most terrifying of words - 'never'. Because there are no circumstances, none at all, that I can envisage of having what I want and being able to live with myself afterwards. Even the wanting is almost more than I can deal with.
And they all lived happily ever after. Except one, the lost boy, who never did find his boy to love.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Torn

The issues that started to bubble up a few weeks ago, and led to me writing Perihelion have resurfaced today, and tipped me into a dark place. I wrote the story because I couldn't make myself say, even here, what was in my head, and I'm not finding it any easier now.
His brightness, the boy at the station when I was on my way back after work, that was what set off the avalanche in my head. Bright eyes, bright smile, as he played his balancing game on the platform, laughing as his mum tried to put him off and make him wobble. And just out of his eyeline, my darkness, desiring him.
Then ten minutes later, as I changed trains, another boy, enjoying his family time with his parents and sister. The proverbial final nail, really, because he was reminiscent of DBJ at the same age. The same darkness lapping towards him. My darkness.
Neither boy was more than 10.
There are no more evasions left. I'm just a paedophile.
I've said it, finally, but there's no catharsis. Just a morass of self-hatred and depression.
I don't know if the blog will continue.
I don't know f anything will continue.
I'm sorry. As I made one of my characters say, in another story, however much you pretend to the world. you can't fool yourself.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

All too familiar

On the train, heading back for another three weeks away from home. I can hardly restrain my enthusiasm. It's my daughter's 14th birthday today, too, although I'm sure she'll miss my company rather less than I'll miss hers today, because she's been out in 'town' with friends for much of the day, and has a couple of the girls staying for a sleepover tonight. We did go into the city centre together this morning, though, to sort out her main present, in the shape of a new mobile phone, as her old one has, basically, worn out. She's on the same network as me now, so we've got plenty of inclusive intra-network talk time minutes to use, should she find her boring old dad a suitable conversational partner.
After my daughter had met up with her partners in crime, my wife and I went on to do some grocery shopping, and while we were making our way around the supermarket, I spotted a very eye-catching boy, but one who I wouldn't normally have said would be to my taste, in that he was more than a little androgynous - in fact, it took a second glance, and maybe even a third, to confirm that he actually was a boy, rather than a boyish looking girl (the jeans and fleece top he was wearing wasn't conclusive evidence in itself - my daughter went out dressed pretty similarly this morning). Boy he was, though, and a very good-looking one at that, and, as ever, one who enhanced my 'shopping experience'.
Not the only cutie of the day, either - there was (briefly) one on my previous train, a rather baby-faced (but older than he looked, I suspect), mischievous looking lad, with the nicest hair, a delicious shade of blond, that I've seen for some time. I could quite happily have whisked him off to keep me company in 'domicile-ville' - but only in my daydreams, of course.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Chat, chocolate, chicken and chips, and chicos guapos

The first hour of today was occupied by the tail end of a conversation with my daughter which had begun the best part of three hours earlier, one of our periodic romps around 'life, the universe and everything'. For the first time, I saw quite a goodly chunk of my daughter's (recent) Facebook stuff, at her invitation, and while some of it was quite entertaining, it underlined my determination never to get involved in Facebook or its ilk myself - it just isn't my thing, quite apart from their requirement (not always complied with, of course) to post under your real name. It was an interesting evening, though, as ever when my daughter and I get our discursive heads on.
I wasn't as prepared as I usually am for Valentine's Day, because of not having ventured out much in the past 48 hours, given that I haven't been feeling all that special, but I redeemed myself sufficiently, I think, by coming up with a large box of fairly posh chocolates for my wife today. I even received a card myself, which isn't a given, by any means, so at least 'relationship stuff' is on a fairly even keel at the moment - not wishing to tempt fate, of course.
There was a family outing for lunch today, nothing to do with any commercialisation of romance, but because it's my daughter's birthday tomorrow, and we're not able to do anything on the actual day, because my daughter has made arrangements to go out with some of her friends during the day (including a lad who used to go to her weekend drama school who she's got some designs on), while I've got to travel back to Surrey tomorrow evening. We went to one of our regular (in so far as we go out anything like regularly these days) haunts, a pub-restaurant a few miles away, for what was a more than acceptable, if unadventurous' meal - lasagne for my wife, fish and chips for the soon-to-be-birthday girl, and the aforementioned chicken for me. All very congenial, and made nicer for me by the presence, being half term, of a few boys who were far from being hard to look at. The only 'downside' is that all of those I saw today were very much on the young side, which often has the tendency to dent my already fragile self-esteem. I keep saying I would never get involved with a 'little boy', and I still believe that, but when I see a cutie who is obviously still at primary school, and find myself thinking how attractive he is, even if only to look at, I find it hard to feel very good about myself.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Solace

A few seconds of life, where the whole world is subsumed in the reward circuits in the brain, where duration has no meaning, where involuntary muscle contractions and the nervous system's transmission of their effects transcend everything, where nothing exists outside of the feeling.
A instant of inviolable rapture all the troubles in the world can't tarnish.
To be treasured, always, because there might never be another.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Crashing

My health, my wife's job, the financial situation, all on the brink, it seems. The plates have been kept spinning for so long, but it's all going to crash down around us, I fear. All I can hope is that I break first, because then at least my wife and daughter won't lose everything. I'm worth far more dead than alive.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Hate

There are times when I do things, relatively trivial things, that make me hate myself so much, hate my stupidity, clumsiness, inability to do the simplest things without making a complete arsehole of myself.

I''m calming down a bit now. But I still find it hard to overcome my sense of utter worthlessness.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Opinions and twinges

I commented on a blog (with a different ID than the one I use here, keeping my real, virtual and secondary virtual personas separate, as I endeavour to do)  for the first time this morning. I've read it often enough, but this was my first comment. It didn't go especially well. I was, in my view, fairly rational, but not supportive of the content of the post. That, seemingly, was a mistake, because I got quite a bit of negativity coming back my way. I can take the criticism, I'm a big boy, but given the milieu (sceptical, atheist), I thought a bit more tolerance of views diverging from the 'party line' might have been forthcoming. I expressed an honest opinion, but because it wasn't, apparently, what some people wanted to hear, my integrity was called into question - I wasn't directly accused of being a 'troll', but the implication was there. The joys of cyberspace, I suppose.
From the disappointing, but less than earth-shattering, to the rather more worrying. My hiccuping heart has, since I've been on my medication, rarely been anything more than an inconvenience. Today, though, there has been an unwelcome development, and one I'm keeping close tabs on - I've had a series of uncomfortable, if less than outright painful, twinges in my chest. Any repetition tomorrow, and I'll be off to the doctor. It might not be anything significant, but I'd rather know than guess.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

It's not a commodity

Having read a reference to a freelance writer and consultant in the US facing potential bankruptcy because his young son came down with pneumonia, I was reminded of a conversation I overheard on the train yesterday morning, which made me wonder about the priorities of contemporary society. Sitting on the opposite side of the carriage from me were two 'suited and booted' managerial types, seemingly en route to a meeting of some kind, and discussing their stock in trade. There were a large number of 'management-ese' buzzwords in evidence, talking about 'business opportunities', 'costs', 'change management' and the like. All very conventional, it might be said - except that it was apparent that their line of business was healthcare provision. While I accept that healthcare has to be paid for, the 'commodification' of people's well-being, the evident assumption that there was little or no difference between health and the production of jam or shoelaces, I found extremely distasteful. The idea that the principal motivation of medicine is to make money rather than to make people better, even in a relatively 'socialised' system such as we have in the UK, is just disheartening.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Scratch a Tory, and you'll find a theocrat

'Christianity under attack'. So says the Daily Mail in their main headline today, before going on, in their typically restrained fashion, to claim that, amongst other things, the Coronation Oath would soon be outlawed. And what satanic forces are at large, one might ask? A judge ruling in favour of an atheist former town councillor in Devon, and stating that it is unlawful under a forty year old Act of Parliament for prayers to be included as part of official council business. Not that prayers couldn't be said, or that anyone shouldn't have freedom of religion, just that there shouldn't be a right for one group to be able to ram their beliefs down everyone else's throats in an officially constituted forum and expect to have that right unconditionally upheld. The Daily Mail is a sick joke, anyway, as far as I'm concerned, but it's not difficult to imagine the sort of headlines the rag would carry if a council in an area of the UK with a strong Muslim presence, say East London, voted to include Islamic prayers as a part of official council business.
Needless to say, all sorts of right-wing talking heads have emerged from under their stones to scream about how the UK is a 'Christian nation', how tradition and national heritage are being undermined, how disgusting it all is, and how the country is going to the dogs, but what concerns me more is some of the anti-democratic sentiments that have been expressed. If the atheist councillor didn't like the prayers, he should have stayed away was one quote from a former Tory MP - so, if you don't believe in the Christian God, you deserve to be disenfranchised, then? - while others are urging the government to right roughshod over the legal judgment by simply changing the law (and the government seem, worryingly, to be considering doing just that). Many other comments have been very reminiscent of the Cranston case in the US (although I haven't heard of any death threats yet), about the 'minority' dictating to the 'majority', disingenuously missing the point, as ever - human rights, if they are to be respected at all, should be extended to all equally, and that includes the freedom from religion being a concept equally as valid as freedom of religion, in my opinion. As I've said more than once, I'm quite happy for anyone to believe, privately, whatever they like, as long as they extend the same courtesy and don't try to force their beliefs on me or anyone else.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Where am I, and why am I here?

Another navel-gazing post, I'm afraid. This one has been brewing for a few days, but has probably been catalysed by an e-mail I received from someone, who has read my blog, and who is in a comparable position to me, and by a programme I've watched this evening portraying the darkest of imaginable dark sides arising from desires akin to mine, about the Moors Murders.
What I started to think about three or four days ago was what, specifically, I was attracted to in boys. What is different about a cute boy, in my perception, compared to a woman, a girl, or a man? Predictably, I suppose, no obvious answer presented itself. My first reaction was to think that if I could find a picture, or, better still, a video of DBJ, say, two years ago, that would be its own justification. Because he was so self-evidently irresistible that no other explanation would be required. But that is a circular argument. I love him because he's wonderful, so he's wonderful, because I love him. A snake swallowing its own tail, elucidating nothing. So, what is it then? Why do I find boys so attractive? And the conclusion I've reached is that I really, really don't know. I could talk about faces, bodies, personalities, grace of movement, joie de vivre, but the ultimate 'hook', the combination of all of those things, remains elusive to me.
And as cryptic as the 'what' is the 'why'. As I've said before in this blog, there's nothing I can think of in my childhood that could explain why I'm a boylover. I wasn't neglected or abused in any way, none of my siblings or close relatives have any comparable traits, as far as I'm aware, nothing traumatic befell me. Apart from my being much brighter than most of my milieu, there was nothing exceptional at all about my upbringing. Born this way? I can't prove or disprove that assertion, but I find it hard to believe that it's not the case.
So, what to do? Only, I guess, what I've been doing all along. Try not to hurt anyone, including myself, and especially to avoid any sort of outburst that could see a young person suffering in the way that the victims in the 1960's case suffered. Never, never, never hurt them, never.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Snow, snow, stay away!

I've finished work now for my long weekend, but I didn't get away in time to travel home this evening, so the plan is to get the first train down from 'domicile-ville' in the morning. However, the weather might have a say in whether that plan comes to fruition. It started snowing about two hours ago, and while we're not facing blizzard conditions by any stretch of the imagination, it's snowing fairly steadily, and with the air and ground being relatively cold, it's already settling. Given the propensity for the UK, especially the southern half of the country, to descend into chaos at the slightest sign of snow and ice, I'm reserving judgment as to whether I'll be able to travel as intended.
Earlier on, I had a day of the proverbial 'two parts'. This morning saw the birth pangs of a new story, one which, if it takes shape, might mark something rather different from my previous output - the very early paragraphs could form the basis of a surreal, sci-fi-ish, historical-ish, dreamworld-ish saga. I've got a few slightly off the wall ideas about how to nudge it forward, so we'll see how it goes.
Then I went to work, and, having swapped positions with on of my colleagues to avoid the 'assist' desk I so dislike, promptly got the job around my neck all afternoon and evening, especially the last two hours before I finished. Ironically, he ended up having to assist me for quite a bit of the shift, as the infrastructure fell to bits, so to speak, around us. And that was before the snow had arrived. Best of luck, night shift!

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

When America sneezes

The phrase 'When America sneezes, the world catches the cold' was originally an economic allusion, but after yesterday's series of primary victories for Rick Santorum, I can't help extending the meaning to a wider political context. I've said this before, but the idea of a theocratic US, headed by a person who professes to be inspired by God, and thus has a convenient 'imaginary friend' to pass responsibility for their actions to, is a prospect that frightens me greatly, the more so because of the recent American addiction to 'regime change'. Do as we 'advise' or face the consequences. The idea of the person with the greatest temporal power in the world abdicating responsibility to a non-existent deity, and following the precepts of a 2000-3000 year old book full of hatred and vengeance, makes me shudder.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Brrrrr....

It's bloody cold up here! At least virtually all of the remaining snow has vanished from 'domicile-ville' in my 36 hour or so absence, but it's still brass monkey weather, in spades. I need to emigrate to somewhere warmer - Cornwall would be good!

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

A stay of execution

Well, it looks like we're not going to be evicted - not yet, anyway. After our appointment this morning, the house is still ours - as long as we can find an extra £150 a month for the foreseeable future. It's a legally binding agreement, though, so we're under a kind of 'suspended sentence', which means, no doubt, more overtime and even less time at home for me. Short term pain for long term gain, hopefully. I'll be back off to Surrey in a couple of hours, albeit only for another two days or so - I should be back at home again by Friday lunchtime for my long weekend. Those long weekends are going to be the next sacrifice, though, the way things are looking - basically, while there's a chance of overtime, I simply can't afford to take 5 or 6 days off.
Earlier on, I saw two very different cuties on the round trip to take my daughter to school - on the way out, there was a boy, who my daughter knows from her school bus, who I thought looked around 14 or 15, but who, she told me, is actually in the sixth form, and thus definitely 'of legal age', but still very boyishly attractive, while the other, on the way back, was at the opposite end of the scale, from my perspective, around 11, in primary school uniform, but also a very sweet sight on a chilly morning. Not, of course, that either of them would have any interest in me, but I can daydream, at least.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Snow, a football cutie and an unwelcome journey

It had begun snowing, fine, 'frozen drizzle' kind of snow, before I got back to my accommodation on Saturday night, so I peeked through the curtains at the outside world with some degree of trepidation when I got up yesterday morning. And there had been substantially more snow, as well, two or three inches. The only saving grace was that I didn't have to be at work until 3:30, so I stayed in the warm until the last possible minute (having checked online how the trains were running, given the propensity of the network to stutter as soon as any amount of snow arrives - on this occasion, things went pretty well) before slipping and sliding my way to the station.
The trip to work was the highlight of the day, thanks to a young man en route to the Chelsea v Manchester United game with his dad (presumably), who got on the train about a third of the way into the journey. He was a definite cutie, 12/13, very kissable-looking, to my eye. Not only did I get to admire him across the carriage - at least until someone sat just in front of me, and spoiled the fun! - but I spent a couple of minutes almost close enough to him to breathe on the back of his neck, getting off the train and then walking up the station steps. Shivers, and no mistake, and nothing to do with the weather!
And now, this evening, I'm back at home for a flying visit, but not in congenial circumstances. After tomorrow, we could be looking at a really serious problem, in connection with our financial travails. Much as I like being at home, this is the sort of scenario I could well do without.

2115 edit - Another football cutie in evidence - I'm watching the Liverpool v Spurs game on Sky, and the Spurs pre-game 'mascot' was an absolute little darling. Very young, and strictly just to look at, but very nice to look at.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

The view from the pub

At least, it was going to be the view from the pub, but there was a human/technology interface issue. This would, had things gone to plan, have been my first post from my phone, but it refused to give me a 'virtual keyboard' to type the body of the text, after teasing me with a chance to key in the title. So I'm back at the accommodation now, performing on the trusty laptop.
I was in the pub, the same Wetherspoons place I found myself in on Monday, after having meandered around London for a while after I finished work at lunchtime today. And the view from the pub wasn't, in all honesty, all that encouraging. There was a sizable dose of 'why bother?' about my mindset three hours or so ago, after another more or less eye candy free afternoon, underlining the implausibility of my most cherished ambition. The futility of it all was most emphasised by the contrast between the only real cutie I did see today, and a couple of the patrons of the hostelry. I saw two young women, although one in particular was the apotheosis, twenty-ish, who had several males of a similar age buzzing around them as per the proverbial honeypot, towards whom my attitude was one of complete disinterest (academic, I realise, because neither of them would have had the remotest interest in a relic like me). The boy, though, was just on a completely different plane. He was 11/12, the youngest of a group of four, two boys and two girls, the others being around 13 or 14. He cavorted about, bouncing and skipping at the front of the group, doubtless trying to impress the 'ladies'. He was just so lovely, to my eyes, so desirable, leagues ahead of the girls that the 'real' men were chasing in the pub, but all he wanted was to be like the 'bees', attracted by the meretricious sweetness. Which, I suppose, is as it should be, for him, to fulfil his biological function, to propagate the species. What a waste, though.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

The randomness of existence

For no reason at all, someone from my past has found their way into my memory in the last half hour or so. A schoolfriend, not, by any stretch of the imagination, a close friend, but someone I used to chat to at break and lunchtimes. I don't know really how I came to pal up with him, he wasn't in my form, not even in my house, which made a difference, especially in the first three years at grammar school, because the vast majority of lessons in those years were taken with your own form, and forms were arranged by houses. When we got to the fourth year, though, what would be called Year 10 these days, and began our O-Level courses, the original forms were broken up, and there was far more mixing than in the younger age groups. But even then, Paul wasn't in my form, and I don't remember taking any subjects in the same classes as him. He might have been a friend of a friend, I really can't recall, but whatever the background, we clicked, and became friends. Then, one day just a few weeks before the summer holidays at the end of the fourth year, he was in a P.E. lesson, doing, as we did on dry days in the summer term, athletics on the top field. And he collapsed and died. Totally out of the blue. I don't remember exactly what he died of, but I think an unsuspected heart condition was involved. Paul was gone. At 15. Just like that. Literally, there one day, gone the next. I remember being pretty shocked when I heard about his death, but I don't recall grieving to any great extent. As I say, he wasn't an especially close friend, just someone who was good company.
And after the initial weeks, his memory faded, to the point that I have gone years at a stretch without thinking about him at all. Like ripples on a calm pond, the impact he had on my life soon ebbed away. How different might it have been if he'd lived? There's absolutely no way of knowing, of course. We could have drifted apart as randomly as we'd drifted together, or we could have become closer and been lifelong best friends. My life could have taken a completely different path, or have turned out similarly to where I am now. While I've been thinking about Paul, another memory, specifically about me, has come to mind. When I was 9 or 10, I came within inches of being knocked down by a car. I was out walking on my own, and needed to cross a busy road. I misjudged the approach of one particular car, and just made it onto the far side of the road in time, helped by the driver making an emergency stop. Obviously, that could have been the end of me, there and then. Or I could have been badly injured, to the point of disability. But I was unscathed, and my life continued on its way. By a margin of a few inches. Through the randomness of existence.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

Odd

Odd, that is, how much writing Perihelion had taken over my life, or, at least, the spare time part of it, over the past week and a half, something I didn't properly realise until it stopped after I pressed 'Publish Post' last night. Looking at my 'normal', non-Blogger browser history (I always access Blogger via an incognito window, so it doesn't show up) over that period - well, basically, there isn't one, apart from a few utilitarian things like paying some bills and looking at the football results. It's made me reflect on how much emotional capital I put into the story - it isn't autobiographical at all in a plot sense, there's never been a 'Ricky' in my life (more's the pity), but there is quite a lot of me in the protagonist, the emotional, passionate but often aloof 'Pete', who is ultimately a boy at heart, and who wants nothing more than another boy to love.
It would be nice if I could get that wrapped up in writing again, preferably with a lighter story, maybe in a different genre. I have got a couple of fragmentary things that might fit the bill, if I can keep the 'writing bug' going.
Real life has just intervened, in the shape of yet another 'difficult' phone conversation with my wife. I've said it before, and I'll doubtless say it again - I should've stuck to boys.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B

A jittery anniversary, of sorts, and completion

I didn't realise until around 9:30 this morning, but my shift at work today was the equivalent point on our 30 week roster to the shift where I made my big mistake last summer. That realisation made me more than a little nervous, because I had to deal with the same procedure I'd screwed up on the previous occasion, while I was almost as busy as I'd been on that day. Needless to say, I double and triple checked everything, and, to my considerable relief, it all went as it should have on this occasion, as did the rest of what was a hectic shift overall.
There was another sensation of achievement later in the day, too, as I finished the story I've been working on for the last week and a half. It certainly won't be to everyone's taste, and may not be to anyone's taste, but I think Perihelion is the best thing I've written since Lucent, more than eighteen months ago, and possibly the best thing I've ever written. It's up on Nephelokokkygia now. I'm pretty proud of it.

Love & best wishes to all
Sammy B