For Scots, and especially Edinburghers, the 13th
of November represents another important literary date: Robert Louis Stevenson
Day. My friends at the UNESCO City of Literature throw themselves into
this each year, with a mixture of events both intellectual and frolicsome. Two years
ago a “tache-mob” was organised, where literary types gathered sporting
the celebrated RLS moustache.
Another sort-of related theme that has taken over November is
where (mainly) men let the hair on their top lip grow out. I’ve nothing against
this, but I believe it has resulted in a resurgence of tache-fashion.
Not, I confess, something I view with much passion.
Let’s not be churlish: “Movember” raises not
only money, but awareness of an important issue. We are not as entrapped in the
taboo over cancer as we used to be, but I think there’s a vital factor which is
the way men deal with things mentally. The UK Movember website suggests numerous,
complex factors affecting men’s health:
- Lack of awareness and understanding of the health issues
men face
- Men not openly discussing their health and how they’re
feeling
- Reluctance to take action when men don’t feel physical
or mentally well
- Men engaging in risky activities that threaten their
health
- Stigmas surrounding mental health
It’s that last one that gets me. If men were
more minded to fix their minds, wouldn’t the former factors follow suit? Sadly,
many men hide behind a mask that prevents them from confronting their problems.
Ultimately, Movember is a fun way to address this. And so, my next Cautionary
Tale is just a bit of fun… but with a serious message.
from
Charlotte & The Charlatan
– and other
cautionary tales
Gesticulate
Gerry
Gerry
was fond of a drink or two, and although not a soul in his work-place would
think, when he got down the pub, that this mild-mannered man from finance
without but a hair out of place, with a beer down his throat, was all over the
place. And Why? Because Gerry seemed to lose the capacity to articulate his
mildly intelligent words without an absurd need to over-gesticulate.
In the office you’d hardly call
Gerry flamboyant, passionate, animated. There was nothing about him you loved
or hated; he was neither a winner nor loser. But down the boozer, his arms flew
around like a windmill; his fingers were nimble, his hands, never still; he’d
give vent to his words with elaborate gestures; a casual onlooker could
probably guess what his dramatised spraff meant – which Gerry performed without
hint of embarrassment.
In the mirror you’d see him perform
in full flow, with waving and gesture out-camping his colleagues with
exaggerated posture, as if so engaged with his story the floor was a stage for
each anecdote, adage, analogy, tale. Arms, fingers and sometimes legs would fly
out and around like semaphore flags – you could say his stories were quite
metaphorical, or in this case, downright semaphorical.
If he was eclipsed by another body,
you could still see Gerry’s limbs fly around like a fire-fly, like a demented
marionette with its strings all akimbo; behind that silhouetted torso, like a
daddy-long-legs in a lamp-shade – but more so. Gerry had arms too, and long
ones at that, which presented a danger; a cause of alarm for the casual
stranger. Keep an eye on your beer; hold on to your hat.
Yet Gerry, with all his gesticular
flair wasn’t only content with just groping the air. He thought nothing of
grappling with gentlemen’s bits, nor – for the pursuit of a narrative –
grabbing a handful of threepenny bits. You had to admit, he was entertaining,
though Gerry’s behaviour took some explaining back in the office, after the
weekend. If given the slightest interrogation, he’d pretend it was all gross
exaggeration.
You could never accuse him, for all
his exuberance, of outlandish or concupiscent deviance: Gerry had no time for
human touch, intimacy or lusty intention. His life was inert in that
department, he had no truck with whatever affairs of the heart meant. In the
morning he could barely recall how many body-parts his fingers had fumbled, or
how many glasses tumbled as he threw out his shapes, molesting tits and arses
for the sake of a quip: Gerry couldn’t give a flip.
Only, one day in his morning shower,
preparing himself for the 9-to-5 hour, he recalled the weekend’s escapades, his
indulgence of over-dramatic charades, he wished he’d tried a similar action upon
himself. He was caught in the single person’s accumulation of wealth that leads
a man to care little, or naught, for his health. For all Gerry’s secret
existence gesticular, he’d failed to feel for a far bigger issue testicular.
