Art is Ephemeral

In 2018, I decided to cease the frequency of entries on this blog, and also closed my diary after 26 years of journalling. I had my reasons, but the planet had other ideas and, in 2020, the so-called unprecedented events led me to re-open my diary, and to write several additional pieces that would re-open this turret window too. 

Amusingly the year began with my discovery of the Antony Gormley sculptures on the Water of Leith being replaced incorrectly reported in a local newsletter, the Broughton Spurtle. It was an example of the ephemeral nature of art, but also of how art galleries can get things very wrong. My sequence of photographs/poems was testament to the artist’s original intention, despite his subsequent change of mind – so the National Gallery of Scotland (I maintain) erroneously claims. 

When the pandemic kicked in, my next project was about the ephemeral presence of the abandoned shopping trolley. It has been interesting to see how many lockdown projects are now coming to fruition. Books, films, and other artforms that were either written during those strange days, or contain a flavour of the darkness many felt at the time. 

It seemed that post-COVID work being produced just as we emerged from the lockdowns had a “too soon” tag, as if it was a distasteful joke or because people hadn’t yet been able to process the trauma. 

Last year I exhibited 26 Trolleys twice, and people seemed more willing or ready to reflect on the collective experience which hit us all so differently. Perhaps it’s just reminiscence – we’re all prone to nostalgia, even over the difficult times, ironically. Maybe it’s about remembering, as each trolley picture is accompanied by a study reflecting on different aspects of the lockdown, much of which we may have forgotten. It’s not just art that’s ephemeral; the brain cells are pretty transient too. 

But art, with all its lies and misrepresentations and complexities, is meant to reflect the human condition, to help us contemplate our position in society, and create an understanding of how we co-exist among our fellow people. 

A couple of years ago I visited a friend in a row of streets local to me known as The Colonies. I won’t go into the social history or architecture of this interesting area, but for the last 20 years there has been a mini festival in which many of the artists and artisans who live in these curious rows of houses open their homes to the public, to show and sell their work. 

This friend, who I knew through music circles, lived in one of the upper colony flats, accessible via steep steps, but he also had some of his artwork – large, dreamy watercolours with folky themes and mellifluous floating patterns (much like his music) – displayed in the lower garden. 

Given the Colony of Artists festival is held in September, Edinburgh weather is unpredictable, so there was a sign telling visitors not to worry if it rained on these pictures: “Art is ephemeral” he declared. 

If art is a mirror to the soul; it therefore tells a greater truth of life’s brief spark. 

I have spoken before of the short-lived nature of friendship, so it seems natural that my project from nearly ten years ago that charted a new friendship has changed tack. 26 Doors between My House and Yours was a reflection on friendship, journeys, and the symbolism of doors. It remains a statement of truth, even though the original friendship took a different course, and many of the doors have been replaced, painted over, or removed altogether. 

A phone box kiosk in the original sequence which (ironically) lacked a door is now no more, and what

happened to the friendship that predicated this sequence of picture-poems I will leave to the imagination of the reader. Humans love anniversaries, appending to insignificant days the insignificance of one, or five, or ten years’ mind, as if the passage of time helps us makes sense. Last year I showed 26 Trolleys in a phone box as part of Art Walk Porty, who celebrate their tenth festival this year. 

Colony of Artists are celebrating their 20th anniversary, and I’m delighted therefore to be part of this weekend where I’ll have a ‘retrospective’ of Walking on the Water, 26 Doors 2016-2015, and my 2020 work which, five years on, feels a long time since. We keep a minute of silence every year to commemorate those who died in the war, then carry on fighting just as before. That is how my 26 Trolleys sequence ends, without apology. 

Too soon? I don’t think so.

Off his Trolley

Where do artists, writers, poets get their inspiration? 

From people or politics, religion or Real Things? I’ve been inspired by the 26 Collective to write several sets of ‘sestudes’ – 62-word studies based on 26 objects, pictures, or artefacts. I first became aware of this new literary form when the Museum of Scotland held an exhibition called 26 Treasures, based on selected objects from the Scottish section. 

I decided to compose my own sequence, which I wrote about on this blog throughout 2012 and as a guest blogger for the Museum’s website. I also made 13 hand-folded artbooks for Kalopsia Colective.

People who know me well won’t be surprised that I’ve written a 26 sequence on phone boxes. I’ve been mildly obsessed with this classic piece of British architecture (its cultural, social, and political significance) throughout my adult life, and incorporated it into much of my writing. 

The phone box sestudes have yet to find a home – although I’ve had my eye on a few obvious locations!

Also on this blog, widely exhibited and displayed, and published as a pack of cards, is my set of sestudes titled 26 Doors between My House and Yours, following a route of doors through Edinburgh. This was a reflection on the symbolism of doors, and a special friendship. 

Many of these doors have now changed, been painted over, or even removed forever! Such is the transience of Art… and sadly, sometimes, also of friendship.

At the beginning of 2020, I established a new, exciting friendship with someone who, having seen my 26 Doors exhibition and learning about the 26 Treasures too, suggested another 26 project: shopping trolleys! 

At first, I thought she was off hers, but when I began to spot trolleys around the place (and sent her pictures) I soon began to think of stories. 

When the pandemic kicked in, I realised I had something to get me through the lockdown – all thanks to Marta.

It’s hard to believe the ‘unprecedented’ events of the Pandemic occurred four years ago. Who can recall the unchartered times preceding lockdown, when even the buses changed colour!

Just a Number

I’m travelling on a Green 16

Don’t know where it’s going or where it’s been

Don’t want to panic or make a fuss

But Green is the colour of a Country bus

 

I’m hoping I’ll be home sometime soon

Even though City Buses are Maroon

The route we’re on seems as per usual

But the journeying is extremely casual

 

With very few passengers to pick up

We’re sitting for minutes at every stop

At least with such empty roads we’re able

To stick for once to the published timetable

 

Stay calm, keep your social distance

Is the Government’s solution and stance

Yet even with only five people on this bus

It’s one rule for them, another for us

 

That we’re on this bus in the first place

Is symbolic of the general disgrace

Of a Government, inept and unable

To offer advice either strong or stable

 

For I have to travel – albeit alone –

As the work I do can’t be done from home

And I won’t get paid if I don’t manage

To honour my contract of a minimum wage

 

I’m not some kind of working-class hero –

When my actual hours are reduced to zero

It’ll make no difference what colour bus

I’m travelling on – I’ll be as useless

 

To myself as to the ‘gig economy’

And as bankrupt as this poem’s allegory –

So now I’m alighting from a Green 16

Into times yet unheard of and as yet unseen

 

What about those pebbles the kids painted and left in lines along the prom, or footpaths, or outside closed-down schools? This poem, I confess, was written in the year before the pandemic…

 

Stepping Stone

Based on a painted pebble, found in Fife     

 

She gave him back his SMILE,
   though her heart was made of stone.
She offered him her LOVE,                       

   but he was not the only one.
She told him to be HAPPY...
   his ecstasy was temporary.
And yet, despite his loss,
   he was glad. Glad that she
had used his heart as a stone 

   to bear her foot across.

 

Like those painted pebbles, the Pandemic went on and on. Some feel it’s not over yet. But who can forget the ineptitude of the Government at the time, not to mention the corruption? Many, I suspect, have a hazy memory. This sort of social amnesia leads part of a population to vote for a government, politician, Prime Minister or (may God forbid) President despite abysmal form, behaviour, or record. 

In 26 Trolleys, I predicted (or prayed for) the downfall of a Government that wore a paper crown – and this was before we discovered they were all wearing party hats. I also suggested that a certain mendacious clown may not have been as plagued with COVID as his treatment required. Another poem might have worked better as spoken word, but that wasn’t an option at the time…

 

The Poet Compares Boris Johnson to Jesus

 

Jesus came (outwith God) from Humble Beginnings

Johnson came with God-given ready-made winnings

 

Jesus was born in a cowshed, yet was gifted with gold

Johnson was born with a silver spoon, entitled and bold

 

Jesus studied the scriptures, learned from the prophets

Johnson, at Eton, learned how to reap elitism’s profits

 

Jesus learned his Father’s trade as a show of humility

Johnson got elected on the basis of faked personality

 

Jesus said, suffer the little children to come to me

Johnson said, let them suffer – they don’t belong to me

 

Jesus respected all women, every Martha, every Mary

Johnson’s attitude to women was extremely contrary

 

Jesus gathered around him ‘followers’ from every walk

Johnson’s tokenistic Cabinet was bluster and all-talk

 

Jesus came to show the Way, the Truth, and the Life

Johnson, directionless, told lies sharper than a knife

 

Jesus fed five thousand families – with food to spare

Johnson induced greed and panic-buying everywhere

 

Jesus cared for the sick, the crippled, and the leprous

Johnson’s healthcare plans proved to be disastrous

 

Jesus instituted a High Feast in eternal memory of him

Johnson created food banks as a forever ‘us’ and ‘them’

 

Jesus was obedient, even unto death on a cross

Johnson ignoring his own instruction didn’t give a toss

 

Jesus continues to be celebrated in mythic resurrection

Johnson will need a miracle to survive the next Election

 

If you believe in unconditional love, then vote for Jesus

Or vote for Johnson, and spread another political virus

 

And who can believe both Easter and Christmas were cancelled that year! In a time when cancel-culture was rife, we also experienced the resurgence of ‘me too’ and ‘Black Lives Matter’ campaigns, accompanied by ignorant claims such as ‘not all men’ and ‘all lives matter.’ 

This was my short, simple take on the latter.

 

Subverting a Sentence

 

I tried to say ‘All lives Matter.’

Turned out I was a racist.

So a black person said to me,

“You need a change of emphasis.

 

“Try saying ‘No Lives Matter,’

and it will seem ridiculous.

Then say, ‘No Black Lives Matter’ –

you’ll see how you’re not one of us.”

 

On the absurd behaviour of that crackpot quack across the pond, I had little to offer in my 2020 opus. An older piece of work remains relevant to the current situation.

 

Trump is much worse now than he was eight years ago. It beggars belief that a convicted criminal, verified racist, unquestionably sexist and incoherent sociopath can run for office. Yet to say he shouldn’t be allowed would undermine democracy!

What a strange world we live in… but what a stranger world we inhabited in the Pandemic Lockdown. Many people felt quite inhibited at this time, and experienced immense creative lows – or perhaps, just a lack of muse.

 

Writer’s Block

 

Did lockdown break your spirit?

   It hardened mine –

at least in respect of a drinking habit.

 

Were you depressed at the thought

   of quarantine?

It surely cut our friendship short.

 

Of course you were reflected

   in every line

that, over time, became rejected.

 

Was increasing your social distance

   due to Covid-19

or a personal coincidence?

 

Although I was determined

   to find a rhyme

your demeanour left me winded.

 

And reading Essays in Pessimism

 – a sign of the time –

reflected your existential nihilism.

 

Even as we eased our isolation

   the dark red wine

fomented our sense of desolation.

 

Summer ended. But that pandemic

   seemed resigned

to make this metaphor endemic.

 

After months of endless nothingness

   for you, between

ourselves was friendship nonetheless?

 

No: whatever ‘future’ this virus

   could undermine

it destroyed what was between us.

 

Yet only after you’d departed

   I wondered why

my sadness turned to broken-hearted.

 

Perhaps it was because you left

   without goodbye

that I felt unfulfilled, bereft.

 

Would these lines ever be the same?

   This unforeseen

became an endless waiting game.

 

Personally, I found the experience extremely creative. Some of my lockdown opus has been recorded, posted, or published, though much of what I wrote remains on the shelf. Maybe people don’t want to ‘re-visit’ the misery of a lockdown. However, this year two exhibitions have proven, I guess, that my 26 Trolleys in Lockdown project retains relevance and interest despite its historical stance.

Having first exhibited my work (starting with my Gormley-inspired piece, Walking on the Water) in a shopping centre, I was delighted to find the first home for 26 Trolleys in Westside Plaza, Wester Hailes. 

This had double significance since Marta first noticed shopping trolleys when living there, and this fact prefaced our conversation when she gave me the inspiration!

Next, imagine my delight when I applied to be part of this year's Art Walk Porty (an art festival in Portobello) to be invited to display the work in Porty Light Box – a phone box converted into an exhibition space. 

It’s no exaggeration to say I’ve had my eye on this ‘gallery’ for as many years as it has been there! The only downside is that there are only 24 panels in a standard ‘K6’ box, and with three of these taken up with information slides, I had to choose only 21 of the set of sestudes.

The full set can be seen on my Instagram, along with a few other bits of my 2020 work.

Thus ends my reflection upon 2020, and another set of reflective studies known as ‘sestudes’ (I’m really hoping this neologism gets into the Dictionary!) The job of an artist is to reflect, and often this requires looking back. I started 2020 by vowing not to go back to where I’d been before. And I retain this stance, although ‘back’ remains ambiguous – as all poems should be.

 

Going Back

 

I will not go there, I said:

I’ve already visited it in my head.

 

The past will not unravel;

it is a land to which I need not travel.

 

At journey’s end, I am unwilling

to return to journey’s beginning.

 

The past is not a place I’d planned

to visit again like an unfamiliar land.

 

I’ve trodden this track before;

It only leads to another locked door.

 

And though my steps falter,

there’s nothing solid I can alter.

 

So why look back to nowhere.

It’s gone: I will not go there.

 

However, I won’t stop writing, using the past or current inspiration to fuel my art, my work, my passion. I’ll end this annual peek through my window with a final trolley poem; another reflection on friendship which, as I suggested, doesn’t always last.

Joni Mitchell, naturally, puts it rather well...

 

Anyone will tell you
Just how hard it is to make and keep a friend
Maybe they’ll short sell you
Or maybe it’s you
Judas, in the end
When you just can no longer pretend
That you’re getting what you need
Or you’re giving out anything for them to grow and feed on.

(from ‘Jericho’ – on Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter)

 

It’s true, some friends are fair-weather, others simply come and go; some are demanding or take advantage of our generosity, while others don’t appreciate us for who we really are. We’ve all been betrayed, and must learn how to walk away with dignity. 

But sometimes things just fall apart. At least I, like an abandoned or broken trolley, can turn this into art.

 

Closure

When shall I ever stop taking

pictures of trolleys for Marta,

park-benches for Melanie,

cows for Gaby, doors for Elena,

or telephone boxes for me?

 

In the days of film photography

expense dictated a prudent restriction:

only one photo per phone-box.

Gaby’s juvenile bovine-obsession

wore off in time, like innocence lost.

 

I permitted only 36 exposures

of doors from which to choose

26 to compose Elena’s sestudes.

Of Melanie’s benches I needed but one

to sit for an hour and write a poem upon.

 

But of trolleys, there was no closure.

When lockdown ended, Marta had gone,

and so the ubiquitous shopping trolleys

imbued me with increasing melancholy.

I made a rule, never to shoot

 

the same trolley twice

even if I saw one in a different place.

I broke it, of course: technology

encourages one to be far too snap-happy.

Cycling along a familiar route

 

I spotted a trolley I’d seen before

on a path that led to an esplanade

running alongside the water’s edge:

having been taken on a joy-ride,

left high and dry on a grassy knoll

 

looking out towards the bridges

that span the Firth of Forth

from Queensferry South to Queensferry North.

Was it the same one? I couldn’t be sure.

Nevertheless I took a second picture.

 

In 104 days of lockdown I shot

over one hundred and fifty

abandoned shopping trolleys:

who cares if one was a duplicate?

Was it that I wanted more, that

 

I travelled back to that same site

and, as the Queensferry Crossing lights

twinkled alluringly in the sunset

I, in a foolish attempt to forget

my friend and the distance between us,

was drawn towards the sea wall.

 

I looked over at the stony squares

scattered like stubborn sugar-cubes

and saw an image far less sweet.

Broken in two on the rocks, there

 

it lay, body separated from its legs.

Sometimes a situation begs

a final, honest photograph.

So I took it, wondering

if I should cry or laugh.

Re: Cycling (Part Three)

If there’s one thing that annoys me about my fellow humans, it’s the inability – or refusal – to recycle. Of course, there are lots of other annoying things about humans, but let’s start with this. When I see people dumping any old rubbish in the bins destined for landfill, I have an urge to pick out the bottles and card and plastic and paper. But I’m not a bin-raker.

Public bin with separate
sections - now removed...

(An aside: my Polish friend Marta once sent me a text, having seen rubbish bins in the city centre with ‘Any Old Rubbish in here’ printed on them. She asked, “why would I carry ‘old rubbish’ into town? All rubbish is new.” As a Londoner I found the expression ‘any old iron,’ far too hard to explain, and Marta remained bemused. Lost in translation.)

Living on a ground floor tenement flat I have the dubious pleasure of a selection of bins right outside my front window. In the past few years, the City of Edinburgh Council has removed the large bottle banks from most supermarket car parks, where people could dump their empties without annoying the neighbours nor announcing a drinking habit to all and sundry.

Now there are smaller metal bottle banks on residential streets. While I’m irritated by the sound of bottles being thrown into the wrong bins, I’m majorly disturbed by the noise of bottles clanking into these new bins – even more so when they’re emptied into lorries by equally noisy operatives – setting off car alarms as they do.

I know, there’s no pleasing some folk, right?

Recently I scored a little victory against the Council, regarding their street enforcement strategy. The same friend, Marta, recently moved from Morningside to my neighbourhood, but had left her bike behind, attached to the ‘Sheffield’ bike racks outside Waitrose. Being a sentimental sort, I’m rather fond of this bike, especially since I wrote a poem about it…

'Princess' in 2020 parked outside Henry's Cellar Bar (rip)

Identity 

She called her bicycle ‘Princess’  

even though, in her mother tongue,  

a bicycle is gendered male. 

 

Furthermore, the bicycle’s style  

was modelled for the ‘gentleman’ –  

a ‘lady’s’ bike has more finesse,  

presumably. But as we know,  

gender cannot be imposed  

upon a person or an object.  

 

It’s just a linguistic construct:  

we can be any gender we choose.  

Was Princess named, I wonder,  

in spite of her language’s gender? 

She might have said: “It’s my bike 

 – I’ll call him whatever I like.” 

 

Perhaps it was that he was precious  

to her that she called him Princess! 

That said, the model had a name  

printed on its (his) lower frame  

by the manufacturer: “Free Spirit.”  

Rather like her character and wit. 

 

Unfortunately, Marta is less sentimental. When I asked when was she going to pick up Princess, she just said, “He’s rusted,” then added with sad resignation: “The Council have probably taken him away.” True, her bicycle wasn’t in the best condition, and the gears were stuck in the hardest position – not ideal for a hilly city.

A few weeks later, visiting Morningside, I popped along to Waitrose. Sure enough, Princess was in a sorry state: his chain had come off, the tires were flat, and the gear cable was, indeed, rusted fast. Unsurprisingly, there was a notice attached to the frame announcing its imminent destruction.

It had already been there a week; time was nearly up – I needed to act quickly. So, I wrote to the Council’s Street Enforcement Team, begging a stay of execution for poor Princess. I included the poem, suggesting they could read it to see how important this unique bike was to me, and how much I held my friend in high esteem. Explaining that although Marta was a ‘free spirit’ she would not abandon this beautiful bicycle without lawful authority, I asked for some extra time, then I would fix and clean him up in time for Marta’s birthday in early July.

The Council excelled themselves with this reply…

FOR THE BICYCLE TO WHICH A NOTICE IS AFFIXED

In its current state,

never a second glance

 

A stay of execution,

wanted a second chance

 

Shock and dismay,

dishevelment and neglect

 

A plan of action,

need to repair and perfect

 

Cunning, timing, a chivalrous act

Proposed procedure we will re-tract

 

Re-unite Princess and Marta

Agreement from us is your starter.

 

Happy to comply with your request, please go ahead and remove the notice from ‘Princess’ and good luck in your endeavour to repair and re-unite with Marta.

 

Kind Regards

 

[Name]

Street Enforcement Officer

 

Luckily for me, the D-lock that fixed the bike to the rack gave sufficient mobility for me to oil and re-attach the chain and replace the gear cable and casings so that all five cogs of the rear cassette were fully functional. I cleaned the frame, pumped up the tires, and gave the chrome a bit of a shine. Question is, was I wasting my time? And how would Marta interpret this ‘chivalrous act’ – as the Council Officer described it?

I’m not gonna lie; as well as sending her a notice in the post from ‘The Bike Fairy’ (a real organisation, although based in Cornwall so it’s unlikely they secretly fix up bikes in Edinburgh) I also popped a copy of this story of unrequited love between two bicycles – which I read at the Edinburgh International Book Festival ten years ago – in the rack on the back, sealed in a plastic envelope.

'Princess' - polished, pampered, and pimped outside Waitrose!

Yet there is so much more to this tale than simply performing what I saw as a piece of non-reciprocal altruism – although many, perhaps even Marta, may reject that claim – or getting one over the Council and their over-zealous treatment of abandoned bikes. It goes back to my views on re-cycling, and it occupies a much broader question too.

The throwaway society we live in is a disgrace. 

The rate at which people throw out things that are unfashionable, faulty, or prematurely obsolete is shocking. The amount of packaging in shops (or delivery boxes if online is your purchasing preference) is alarming, whatever bin you put it in. We farm so intensely that fields are rarely left fallow to rejuvenate the soil, and yet society bins so much food because, even when covered in chemicals, it goes off before we can eat it.

Meanwhile, the Government introduces schemes it believes will alleviate climate change: who are they fooling? Charging for plastic bags in the supermarket is micro-consumerist bullshit. Getting shops to stop putting food in plastic pots, wrapping fruit in cellophane, encasing everything in superfluous wrapping is an impossible task; meaningless when pitched against food's carbon footprint.

A Local Shop

Dear Tesco/Tesco Metro:

why on earth do you sell

asparagus shipped from Peru?

 

I’m fully aware – and so are you –

this stuff grows perfectly well

in the fields of Kent.

 

If you went there

to purchase your produce

it would not only reduce

 

your carbon footprint

but also, by dint

of boosting the country’s economy –

 

which is better for you and better for me,

and benefits everyone globally –

would bring down the prices on every shelf.

 

And, as we both know, every little does help.

So why sell Peruvian peas and asparagus?

It’s better for them and better for us

 

and certainly more beneficial to you

to sell broccoli, sugar-snaps, and mange-tout

that comes from the Garden of England.

 

Or better still, grown here in Scotland.

And why not? Because people want their food here and now, uniform and regular, fertilised, sanitised, and artificially clean: as fake as their paid-for gym routine. 

Do they care about where their food comes from? Of course not. And are we going to save the planet? Probably not.

Encouraging farmers to use methane-reducing feed for cattle is all very well, but for starters, farting cows are not the biggest producer of methane. And second, better animal husbandry and organic practices will have a far greater effect than feeding cattle seaweed, Mootral Ruminant, Bovaer® or any other synthetically-produced food-source.

The same can be said for those who think planting clover or grassland swards will improve biodiversity. Sure, but only if you’re not fooling us that these gestures work only in pastures where sheep may safely graze. What about introducing agri-environmental practices first on unproductive fields and margins first?

Besides, what’s the point of attempting holistic or regenerative agriculture, or creating circular biological systems when farmers struggle to get organic feed for their farting cows, while others refuse to reduce nitrate fertilisation.

Back in the cities, they’re introducing Low Emission Zones (LEZ) to attempt to make our conurbations less polluted. This is fine if you’ve got the latest, up-to-datest car, or don’t need to drive. As a cyclist I should be happy with this sort of thing. But it’s flawed and unworkable. 

In Scotland, our five largest cities have had LEZ schemes introduced, and Glasgow is the first to see it enforced. A city with a motorway running right through the middle, right next to the boundary of it’s lovely, clean, exhaust-free corridors. 

What a joke.

Worse still, fining drivers of non-compliant vehicles seems like a cheek: a cash-cow for the Council right enough. Put another way, it’s a tax for those who cannot afford to buy a new car, or for those who have no choice but to work and drive in city-centres. Delivery drivers, those in the service industries, and people who cannot use public transport will be unfairly penalised. Then there are the taxi-drivers.

While I have little sympathy for their driving style, it must be said they’ve had a tough deal lately. The pandemic decimated the industry, many taxi drivers left the profession, and companies went bust. Then the Government told them they had to either retrofit or scrap their vehicles if they were from before some randomly selected date.

Taxi drivers have been given grants to destroy perfectly good vehicles! In the case of hansom cabs, Scottish cabbies often acquire their cars from Londoners as there are fewer restrictions up here, but when this scrappage incentive is offered in the expansion of London’s ULEZ who knows where Scottish cabs will come from? As for Glasgow, whose LEZ was the first to be introduced, since it was enforced in June, pollution has gone up, not down.

Whether the UK hits its net-zero target by 2050, or Scotland more optimistically by 2045, I doubt I’ll be alive to experience this utopian dream. I’ll try to do my bit to keep my emissions low (including methane farts) and separate my own, if not my neighbours, rubbish into the appropriate bins; I’ll continue cycling as long as I can, and refuse to dispose of anything perfectly functional just because it’s deemed old-fashioned, out-dated, or obsolete.

As for food waste, here are views on bagged salad...

Perhaps I should go one step further and systematically fix any bicycle that has a Council Scrappage notice on it, even if I can’t re-unite each bike with its owner. At least it would offer the chance to re-cycle a cycle instead of throwing it on the scrap heap. It would probably confuse my poetic friends in the Street Enforcement Team. Or maybe it’ll give them more time to chase up those naughty cars who can’t comply with the pointless LEZ scheme.

I’ll end on a less ranty note, with a piece I wrote several years ago. It was written as a long introduction to one of the Monday night acts at Henry’s Cellar Bar, a great guy who wrote a song about becoming a multi-millionaire. It was also a reaction to finding my way blocked on the way to this bar due to people gluing themselves to the road outside the Filmhouse.

While Henry’s Cellar and Filmhouse are no more, the Stop the Oil protesters continue to disrupt the roads, the tennis, the Proms, and more. Do they have a point? Maybe. Is this the right way to make their point? Who knows. Will they achieve anything. Again, probably not. But at least they’re not scrapping taxis, bicycles, throwing recyclables into any old bin, or feeding their cattle with MOOtral ruminant for the sake of a very poor pun.

A Helping Hand 

When Malcolm unexpectedly came into a vast amount of money, his concern was not that he would never need to work again, but that he might spend the rest of his days drinking or wanking himself to death. Either way, his fortune seemed likely to end up down the drain. 

Although his new-found solvency could have given him a degree of popularity, he palmed off – literally, on a daily basis – the idea of coupledom. He was happily single, filthily rich, and free from his formerly boring life in the Civil Service.  

Even the manner in which he came to inherit his great wad (of money) was humdrum. One of those emails offering to transfer a sum of money into one’s bank account. He nearly deleted it. Then he noticed: the name of this distant relative rang a bell. Literally: kerching! 

There was no chance that Malcolm’s funds would run dry. He lived in the same house – a one-bedroomed bungalow – and drove a perfectly reliable Ford Fiesta. He didn’t own a passport (on account of a fear of flying and a bad bout of mal-de-mere on a booze-run from Calais) and didn’t care for expensive food or wine. 

What, then, would he do with his pot of dough? He needed a project, a cause. Suddenly a line from a pop-song, about noble causes, came to him. Something like, ‘help the needy and the crippled, and put some time into ecology.’ 

Malcolm didn’t have the empathy to care for those in need, especially if they were children. He didn’t dislike kids; he accepted that they were the future, but not his future. The only option, then, was to care for the planet. He’d read on some wanky website that adults were responsible ‘for bequeathing the world to future generations.’  

If anyone had asked him if he was a Friend of the Earth, he’d reply: oh, just a friend of a friend. He’d never voted, or looked into the policies of the Green Party, and never got hot and bothered about climate change. So when he petitioned his neighbours about forming a scheme to have solar panels fitted on the roofs of every chalet-bungalow in the street, it was met with incredulity. 

This mild-mannered, middle-aged man from number 42, with a 1970’s moustache who dressed in cords and a lumberjack shirt suddenly wanted to save the planet! People admired his enthusiasm, especially those who were seeing this for the first time. Which was everybody. Sadly, only a few on the street actually had the money to chip into his scheme, which meant that Malcolm ended up footing the bill for ninety percent of the properties. 

He didn’t mind lending a hand. His money – unlike the ozone layer – was in no danger of depletion. He comforted himself that he was giving to both the needy and ecology, thus fulfilling that line from the pop-song. Apart from the bit about the crippled.  

His method of comforting himself quickly reverted to drinking and wanking.  

He needed another project. Malcolm had stumbled into a complicated world, some distance from his simple existence as a Civil Service pen-pusher. But he knew there was much more to do to make a difference.  

His eccentric aunt – for whom he had to thank for his fortune – tackled global activism on a truly local level. She made a stand against the dreadful, consumer-proof packaging that adorned supermarket food. At the till in Waitrose or M&S, she simply removed any extraneous packaging and left it right there on the counter. She ended up barred from every supermarket in town. 

This idea of civil disobedience, nevertheless, appealed to the New Malcolm, now so far from his erstwhile Civil Servitude. Malcolm knew little about the nitty-gritty of ecology. He left that stuff to scientists and Swedish schoolgirls. All the same, it seemed that saving the planet was about more than packaging, solar panels, and cycle-to-school incentives. 

It was about more than bequeathing the earth to future generations; the planet – or its inhabitants – was facing extinction. Action was needed, and rebellion – Malcolm learned at a local rally in a bar called Henry’s– was the only answer. He’d never been disobedient in his life – let alone in a civil way.  

He didn’t have to organise anything, or put up funds; he just had to go along and get stuck in. Literally. At the blockade, the police were in force. Perhaps it was the smell of the glue, or maybe the pint (or two) of Dutch Courage, but when it came to Malcolm’s turn to place his sticky palm on the pavement, he swayed and caught his balance with the help of a nearby phone box. Before he knew it, his hand was glued to the Perspex pane of the door. 

While the Special branch gently scraped the protesters off the pavement with their potions, and fish-slices Malcolm was left like a hapless bystander. Whatever chemicals worked with glue and tarmac, they didn’t work on BT’s plastic window. Instead of a police cell, Malcolm landed up in the Burns Unit of the local A&E. His right palm was permanently blistered. 

Being unidextrous, he retained the ability to lift a pint of bitter to his mouth, but his other leisurely pursuit, with his mangled right hand, was severely compromised. Luckily, thanks to the services of ‘Mandy’ at his local back-street sauna, he was lent a helping hand. With wealth enough to bring pleasure to others, he could barely bring pleasure to himself, let alone save the planet. Malcolm thought this a tad unfair.  

But he was still a multi, multi-millionaire.  

Acknowledgements:

All text and poetry © J. A. Sutherland; photos of ‘Princess’ by the author.

‘A Helping Hand’ was first published in The One O’Clock Gun, June 2022

Re: Cycling (Part One) can be found here; Re: Cycling (Part Two) is here.