I WISH I LIVED BY THE SEA

I Wish I Lived By The Sea

I wish I lived by the sea

Where the waves and the waters roll

I think it a good thing for me

To feel there, the wind in my soul

I'd willow my way on the beach

And crunch over pebbles and shells

And there in the ocean's reach

I'd listen for stories to tell

White horses and glistening sand

I'd kick off my shoes and I'd run

And there by the water I'd stand

And bury my face in the sun

I wish I lived by the sea

Where the waves and the waters roar

I'd think it a good thing to be

In a place on the edge of the shore

ASDAPHOBIA, OR INDOOR-VERTIGO

I went in Tesco, Wickes and The B&M Shop today. Three stores that make me feel queasy.

I don’t like places that are like warehouses. The roofs are so high and the air is so cavernous, it’s like being in a cave or a shuttle hangar, brightly lit by plasma lamps six miles overhead, above the tightly packed stepladder shelves. You shuffle round the dusty, narrow aisles while tinny music rattles in from inadequate speakers.

There are always those air conditioning tubes too - threading between the unfinished metal beams, along with electrical cables and heating pipes. Imagine if one of them snaked away and broke a cable-tie! Its dragon-like gaping mouth would roar with hot air as it swung wildly across the shop. Horrific.

It’s an odd phobia, for certain. Perhaps even less rational than the old fear-of-geese, the anatidaephobia, which has plagued me for years, and which I also go on about too much.

I was looking for: a padlock, one of those sink-stoppers (impossible to find), and an electrical timer for my bedside lamp. The three enormous shops produced only a padlock between them.

What’s the Greek for massive-budget-warehouses? The Internet says I have a form of megalophobia, but I don’t think that’s specific enough. Plus, I don’t mind large objects, I just don’t want to be inside a big store with a high roof and tall shelves - it’s like being claustrophobic and agoraphobic at the same time.

With respect to Walmart then, I’m calling it Asdaphobia. I am asdaphobic, like I suffer from a kind of indoor-vertigo. Asdas (UK Walmarts) are almost always like this, although clearly more stores are following them. I’m sure it’s cost-efficient and well-researched and pleasant enough for shoppers. Indeed, it might only be me who keeps wondering when they’re going to finish, and put in the suspended ceiling. I’m not holding my breath.

Well, I can’t anyway. There isn’t enough of it when you have indoor-vertigo.

BETWIXTMAS BEGINS

Betwixtmas Greetings!

Yep, now that the days with special names are over for the year, it’s time for that last great season - the five days when no-one has a clue what day it is or what’s actually happening.

I call it Betwixtmas. And for me, the great joy of the First Day of Betwixtmas (and so it is!) is being an introverted caterpillar, wrapped in a chrysalis/duvet of his own making, lazily rising for hot toast and butter, going for a heartwarming blustery walk, and chiefly, being mostly on my own.

Oh don’t get me wrong. I like people. But I am an introvert: a swirling ‘I’ to the left of Myers-Briggs; a ponderous ponderer, a thunderous thinker, an imperious imagineer, who loves a bit of time and space when the tinsel-party finishes and we all go home.

Except this year, for some inexplicable reason, I’ve gone shopping for a bin. A recycling bin, to be precise.

“I knew it was a mistake going shopping with two women,” said a tall man in the bin aisle. He was clutching an enormous box with a picture of the World’s Fanciest Bin on it. The two women in question, presumably his girlfriend and his Mum, were gathered around him, looking concerned.

“Well you do leave your recycling on the side,” said the younger woman. “This will stop you doing that!” The fancy bin was a dual compartment storage unit, judging from the picture.

“Yeah but all I wanted was a bin that goes on the inside of the kitchen cupboard!” he protested.

“Well if you don’t want it,” said his Mum, “You don’t have to get it.”

I looked up at the price on the shelf, while pretending to test the flap on a plastic pedal bin. The World’s Fanciest Bin was £49.99. I was suddenly on his side.

“Right!” he said, decisively. “Sorry mate, ‘scuse me.” I squeezed in while he passed.

“He’s always like this,” said one of the women. The other nodded in agreement.

I smiled, suddenly thankful for something I’m not often very thankful for.

But of course, The First Day of Betwixtmas doesn’t last forever. Soon I’ll be craving company again and I’ll be ready to be sociable. I shall emerge from the introverts’ chrysalis and be ready for the colourful world again.

Probably tomorrow, actually. For now though, I’m quite enjoying choosing my own bin.

THE TWO DAYS OF CHRISTMAS

It's raining out there. In here though, the light's low, there is a glass of crisp ginger wine glinting, and Herbie Hancock's tenor saxophonist is warbling out of a Spotify playlist like there's no tomorrow.

It's a lovely end to a Boxing Day, and I suppose, to the Two Days of Christmas.

The first day began at midnight, in a cold stone church, lit by candles. The vicar, dressed in white like a holy lab technician, instructed the villagers to 'share the peace' ... and so we all shook hands with as many people as possible with whom we felt comfortable saying 'peace be with you', which is of course, what you do.

I shook hands with a man in a bright red Christmas-pudding jumper. Then, rather uncomfortably, I turned and shook hands with a guy who stared at me with anything but peace. I tried my best to smile and say 'and also with you'.

The bubbly choir mistress appeared next to me. She was dressed in the bright blue robes of a Christmas chorister, much as the others were, mingling at the front.

"I know who you are," she beamed as we shook hands. I did my best not to look puzzled, but there was very little time to make it awkward. "When are you going to come and sing with us?" she asked, excitedly. I smiled and said 'Maybe one day'

I rather like that this midnight communion has become part of tradition for me now. At the end, when the carols were sung and the liturgy was complete, I shook hands with the lab technicians and the bescarfed curate, and I ambled back to the Intrepids' house for Christmas.

-

Over the years, I've worked out a bit of a scale to gage my Dad's response to a gift. If he says, "Oh that's excellent," then you've absolutely hit it and he will be 'chuffed' later, once he's finished playing with it, setting it up, or skim-reading the back. If he says, "Hmm... okay," then it really could go either way. However, if he says "Whatever is it?" as he has done on multiple occasions, then you are in trouble.

I watched him unlace the red ribbon and unfold the paper that I'd wrapped his surprise gift in. It was a portable anemometer, a wind-measuring device. I thought it would add a little extra interest to his weather conversations. I was banking on it being as popular as the gold-rimmed barometer that was an 'excellent' winner a few years ago, or the plastic rain-gage that still sits collecting water in the garden. He unflapped the cardboard of the box and pulled out the device.

"Whatever is it?" he said. I'm hoping it will come into its own once they're on their cruise.

-

I went for a walk in the afternoon. It was moody and windy. I loved it. The wind bent the branches, and roared magnificently through the leaves by the golf course. I shouted into it, knowing that no-one would ever hear me. That little moment of isolation has easily been one of my favourite moments this Christmas.

I got back and had some tea with the Intrepids. Then we played a couple of word-games. I learned that 'basorexia' is the urge to kiss and that 'bromatology' is the study of food. I reflected later, on the Christmas Dinner we'd cooked that had been so good I could have kissed it, and realised that those two facts were not inappropriate.

-

Boxing Day of course, is the day when the wider family get together in an ocean of wrapping paper, cups of tea, and bits of Lego. We did that. The Niblings were as excitable as imagined, though this year they were all trying to synchronise their tablets so that they could play some sort of battle game. That meant that I avoided being shot by nerf guns or poked by sonic screwdrivers for at least the first hour.

The gifts all went down well, I think. The conversation turned to Brexit, Trump, the colour of passports, and various conspiracy theories, as predictably as ever it could. It wasn't entirely predictable though...

"The trees tell me they don't like being decorated," said my oldest sister, glancing at the Christmas tree in the corner. There was a short silence. Then someone asked her what she meant.

"They tell me! They don't like being planted in rows either," she continued. So then, it emerges, my sister talks to trees, and they talk back. Although it's all done on feelings apparently.

"Are you sure you're not projecting your own emotions onto them?" I asked. She said that she didn't think so, because she herself, quite likes the look of a decorated tree. I wasn't in the mood to point out that that didn't exempt her from projecting an imagined feeling, even if she didn't share it herself. She seems to have developed a curious affinity for conspiracies. And all things leafy.

-

It's been relaxed then! And now, in the warm afterglow of all that, Herbie and his pals are riffing and the rain is pattering on the window. I think I said last year that I'd quite like the day when I'm sitting in front of a roaring fire on a cold winter's night, sipping something warm, while my grown-up nephews chat about life by the light of the flickering flames. They're not ready to know it yet, but peace will come.

I think at the heart of that is the idea that peace can be 'with you', wherever you take it, even if you miss the mark with a gift as I did, or you find out that your sister is erm... chatting to the forest... in her spare time. It doesn't really matter, as long as there's peace with us. And at this time of the year, it's my desire to be surrounded by people who live out the 'and also with you'.

And I think mostly, we do - which is rather a nice thought.

HOW TO HOLD A SOUP SPOON

I’ve just been studying the way I hold a soup spoon.

I cantilever it on the second finger of my right hand and push down on the end of the handle with my thumb.

My index finger seems to be acting as a kind of counterweight while the thumb controls the spoon from the end of the see-saw.

When did I learn to do this? I don’t remember it. Was there ever a time when I gripped it like a handlebar and shovelled soup into my mouth, like people do in the movies? Did I ever pinch the end of the spoon between thumb and forefinger and use the wrist for rotation? I hope not. I just tried that and it looked really weird.

The soup is a treat to celebrate the end of my Christmas Shopping Escapade 2017! Three days to go; I am done. This morning I squeezed round the shops, looking for animal fact books, biscuits, games, and surprise things for the Intrepids. I inevitably found myself in Whittards, looking at fancy teas, before escaping and searching for soup.

I had to stop and breathe at one point. I was having an anxiety attack in the middle of town.

Don’t panic - think of it like an asthma attack, but just affecting a different bit of the body. It’s no surprise really; tiredness has left me low and sad, and while I struggle to find the balance between being real and being strong, sometimes being anxiatic (I made that word up) just takes over and you’ve got no choice other than stopping.

I pushed it away. It pushed me to the edge of tears. I pushed it back. It swept through me like an electric shock, a throbbing wave of static sadness and fear, in every tightening muscle. I gritted my teeth, closed my eyes, whispered a prayer and kept walking, feeling weak under the weight of my coat, the bags, the heat and the noise.

Prayer’s good though. A few steps later and I was slumping down in front of a piano, right in the middle of a shopping centre, my fingers finding themselves a chord and my heart settling on a song. I didn’t care who was listening. Well, apart from One Person.

I suspect I evolved the soup-spoon-holding technique. It probably emerged as the most natural way to solve the problem, with a little help and instruction along the way. Perhaps by trial and error, perhaps with time, and many, many bowls of soup, I just subconsciously figured it out. It was never written in the sky for me.

I think it’s okay to keep going, whatever it is you’re trying to solve. I also think it’s okay for that solution to be a bit of a mix - partly you finding the best fit, partly with help, and partly by being given time and space to give it a go.

I sat down at that piano, realising that I do that in exactly the same way.

THE SHORTEST DAY

Last day before the holidays. The managers have been off on a jolly, which, judging from their expressions... was not particularly jolly.

Meanwhile, the office is slowly emptying and the amount of feasible work I can actually do is rolling to a festive zero. I need technical help from Patrick, who isn't here. I'm not sure anyone who actually is here really cares whether I'm here or not and it's all adding up to one decisive course of action for me.

It's kind of odd, this. It feels like Christmas is over already, not just beginning. The empty desks with their switched-off strings of fairy lights look more like they belong to January than to December. Ian and Pavel have gone, leaving their runway of illuminations behind them. Erica's tinsel bristles between the monitors, catching the light as the air conditioning tickles it. Some engineers are having a conversation about encryption. Bleak.

What happened to bring-your-toys-in day? That was always a thing - Buckaroo on the carpet, or, if you were lucky, the Millenium Falcon in a space battle with an X-wing, swooping over the classroom tables and pencil pots.

Then, a little older, that magic changed but it was still very real - the Christmas assembly. I was in the orchestra, with a short length of tinsel wrapped around the bottom of my clarinet, and "Hark the Harold" (Mr Roach had a weird sense of humour) in Bb, on a rickety music stand in front of me.

Mr Davies would read a Betjeman poem, the Headmaster would recite John chapter 1, they'd give out the Rosebowl prize to one of the Sixth Formers (just for being brilliant I seem to remember) and then we'd all walk home in the crisp blue afternoon, with O Come All Ye Faithful still ringing in our ears.

It's clouded over today. And I don't care much for email encryption. Oh, and would you believe it... Patrick is here. He's been hiding, I think.

You know what else I think?

I'm going home.

THE SYSTEM

Today’s challenge then: write an entire blog in a slow-moving queue.

So far so good, I’ve joined the back of it and I’m standing behind a couple playing with their phones.

The queue is in Stockholmhaven by the way. As am I.

One guy behind me now. We all shuffle forwards. A young Thomas is in trouble. That’s what boredom does to you, Thomas: makes you choose between refraining and being patient, or climbing the bars like a naughty chimp in a school uniform. Get used to it. A lot of life is like that.

The couple in front have reverted to sarcasm. “Oh I’m so thankful!” she says, rolling her eyes. He scratches his beard. “Oh really?” he says. Must be fun in their house.

Halfway there now I reckon. I hear a Scottish accent. Thomas is pestering for something sugary. I don’t like his chances.

It’s a myth that we like queuing in Britain, I think. My guess is that we hate it, but are too repressed to change the system or loudly complain about it. We just go along with it, one after the other. Except when we try to get on trains, when we passive-aggressively advance on the door, while politely letting the disembarking passengers off.

I have a tray now. Time to make some choices. I like the apple and strawberry smoothie. In a minute I’ll have to pretend I’m thinking about anything other than the meatballs. But the queue shuffles forward.

Dessert? Nope. Always too sweet. Must resist. Besides, Thomas is hopping about in front of the Daim cakes. I will be resolute.

I wonder why we all get hungry at the same time? Is it human synchronisation? Or just another learned system. We all get up in the morning, we all do something productive until lunchtime and then we float throughout the afternoon until hunger grips us, as the winter sun slips beneath the brittle horizon.

I’m there.

“Fifteen meatballs,” I say. I have all the usual Stockholmhaven thoughts. Why fifteen? What’s in the jam? How do they count them so quickly with just a spoon? Does it smell like this in actual Sweden?

“Peas?” says a lady, smiling under a blue hat.

“Please,” say I, realising that it rhymes. She rolls a spoonful of peas between the meatballs and the mashed potato and slides the plate toward me. I smile, impulsively.

Another queue. This time for the trays to slide past an elf by a till. He seems unimpressed with his role in the drama today.

I look back. The queue is half the length it was when I joined it. Typical, I think, finding a table.

But that of course, is the system.

THAT WEIRD OLD MAN

"So have you got your tree up?" asked my Dad.

"No," I said. It is true. I remembered last year, going through that whole thing about real versus plastic and how difficult it was to find a plastic tree that looks like a real one.

All that talk about class distincition and reverse snobbery. This year, I haven't even put mine up! My Dad seemed disappointed. My Mum made a face.

Part of the reason is time. The last few Saturdays have been recovery days. The one before last (ideal for Christmassy prep), I spent conserving all my energy by being asleep. This latest one followed a barn dance gig, and preceded a concert at which I'd been asked to do some recording. I was sleepy to say the least.

Hopefully this weekend, I'll get the chance to put on a Spotify playlist and let Frank croon in the corner while I wrestle the tree down from the loft. It feels late though.

Better late than never, I suppose; I definitely don't want to be that weird old man who's too miserable, or self-consumed, or busy, to celebrate Christmas.

Speaking of weird old men... In a bored moment between writing about encryption end points and certificate stores, I wrote a poem about one. Just goes to show how productive I am when everyone goes home early for Christmas...


That Weird Old Man

That weird old man
Just looked at me
He's back outside
The window. See
His steely eyes
His puzzled gaze
It looks like he's
Been there for days

Where does he go
That scruffy bloke?
And does he think
It fun to joke
By staring through
The window pane
So silently
At me again?

I once ran out
To ask his name
And whether he
Might yet refrain
Politely from his
odd campaign
And find a more
enthralling game...

But when I got
There, he was not!
He'd scarpered from
His favourite spot,
That weird old man
With weathered beard
Outrageously
Had disappeared.

Until today. And
There he stands
With frazzled ends
And ancient hands
He's back again.
And silently,
That weird old man
Reflects on me

INTERNALLY PROCESSING

No. My brain says I’ve got to talk, let it out, say at least... something. But my mouth won’t work. It won’t open, and even when it does, the words are lost. I squeak, then I um, then mumble, and then annoy myself. I haven’t got anything eloquent, poignant or apposite to say.

“I’m internally processing,” I say to others, like a true introvert. I instantly feel like a computer running close to 100% CPU. There’s barely enough RAM left to utter those three words. But it feels rude not to say anything at all.

Processing, churning, thinking, wondering. What is it that makes life worthwhile? What is the pulse, the tick, the engine, the thing, the motion, the bit that makes sense?

I hear the stock answers from the predictables. I don’t disagree! And yet, I lie awake in the dark, staring at the ceiling, feeling as though something incredibly important is missing.

But this computer can’t work out all the answers. I don’t think I can even calculate the questions properly. I can just lie here silently wondering, the hourglass spinning as the CPU whirs at maximum capacity.

No, says my brain. Ctrl+Alt+Delete, end task, and switch processes. Time for standby. At least until tomorrow.

GATHERING WINTER FUEL

I don’t know how to process anything at the moment. I appreciate that this is unusual, but this time, as hard as I try, I simply don’t have the words through which to filter my thoughts, feelings or heart.

So, failing that, I’m in Pret A Manger, and I am certainly ‘pret’ for ‘mange-ing’ a toasted ham and mustard sandwich. I’m also Christmas shopping. Halfway there, anyway.

I wonder what Christmas would be like without the present pressure. If we all stopped exchanging gifts, but kept everything else, what would happen? I’m asking because it’s the one thing about Christmas, I actually could do without.

I know, I talk about this every year, but it is still true, every year: I’m terrible at finding presents for people. And I don’t enjoy being so poor at it.

The tradition is though, wholly intertwined with Christmas itself. The Wise Men started it, Santa, like a little green imp, sprang out of it, and every capitalist institution on the planet has jumped on the back of it.

Exchanging presents as a demonstration of love and goodwill to our nearests and dearests is the fuel of the season, and without it, the whole thing would be no more than a cut-down Easter, a few days off for ultra-religious people in the bleak midwinter. Unfortunately.

And so for that reason, I’m in town, carrier bags digging into my fingers, rain splashing playfully from my hood in time with the soggy brass sound of the Salvation Army.

There’s too much mustard in this sandwich. It’s supposed to enhance the flavour of the ham, not replace it altogether.

You shouldn’t misunderstand me by the way. I love the people on my list, and I will push through the rain and the online clicks and the crowds in Boots and Debenhams and Waterstones. They will have gifts from me, and those gifts will be thoughtfully chosen. It will probably have taken a lot longer than they contemplated, but it will be done - and no, not just because of the tradition, the fuel, the pressure, but because I like them enough to make their day with a little smile and a sparkle of love on Christmas morning.

I like to think that without this tradition, we’d all do it anyway. As I realised, it’s a much better truth to realise that your family love you, rather than some chimney-stuffing old stranger. And in any case, the gold, the frankincense and the myrrh were symbols, tokens of a much greater truth, hidden behind their value.

And I like to think that those truths are what it’s really about, all this trek through queues and hot shops and awful music.

Maybe I can process a few thoughts then. Every shelf reminds me of the Niblings, the Intrepids, the Avengers (we’re doing secret-santa this year), Winners, Teebs, Paul and Heather, and the wonderful cavalcade of other lovely, beautiful people in my life.

That’s why I’m here. That’s why I’m gathering winter fuel in the deep and crisp and even footprints of the King.

BETWEEN THE REDWOOD TREES

Between The Redwood Trees

I walked between the Redwood trees

One solitary night

The starlit wood of memories

That whispered out of sight

Those mighty ones who held the sky

With roots of earth and stone

I heard them creak and softly sigh

Their song for me, alone

They sang of joy, they sang of light

To dark and ancient skies

Defying every weary night

With hope that sun shall rise

They sang of love and beauty’s dawn

Those wonders of the world!

And darkest hour before the morn

Into the light, unfurled

For me alone, yet not just me,

I heard the gentle breeze

And heard You whisper tenderly

Between the Redwood trees

THE PLACE I GO TO LISTEN

Starbucks seems to be a place I go to, specifically to listen to people who aren’t listening to each other.

I don’t know whether I can blame social media. It seems too obvious. But the millennial over here and her social worker, are talking about interview skills. The social worker is cleverly teasing out the subtle nuances of interaction, and encouraging the teenager to let her actions speak for themselves. The teenager is loudly explaining how she’ll keep referring to how good she is at her job.

Tweet it out, create your insta-brand, don’t let anyone tell you you’re anything other than the you you want to be. It’s all a good message isn’t it? But there is something truly magical about listening to the heartbeat of another. Twitter is noisy.

Meanwhile, the ‘couple on the verge’ are silently not-listening at all. And ironically, I don’t think either knows what to say. He holds her hand across the table but she doesn’t know how she feels about it. He’s confused by the micro-quiver of her muscles wanting to retract, but she’s not pulling the hand completely away from him.

Old friends talk about their medical problems. One of them runs a finger across her teeth while the other uses hand gestures to emphasise a thing that happened. Each of them is thinking about what set of symptoms, or prognoses they have, to talk about next.

I’m not saying I’ve got listening sorted. What I’m doing, after all, is sitting here, on my own with a Christmas cup, eavesdropping. Yet were there someone here to chat to, would I be any more attentive than anyone else? Or would I be plotting out the moves of the conversation as though I were playing chess?

The social worker’s doing okay though. To the teenager’s great astonishment, she’s just told her that she (the younger lady) appears to find humblebragging very natural despite trying to talk herself down. It’s kind of obvious from over here. I’m hoping the older lady will follow it up with a comment on how all the millennial’s sentences seem to end with an upward intonation as though expressing some sort of insecurity about herself.

“They still keep in contact with me? As though I made a good impression? But I was only there for two weeks?”

Anyway, I guess listening must be a big part of the social worker’s job. Perhaps that skill should be more important in all our jobs? I’d certainly like to get better at it.

But I already come here too often.

HOPE IN THE HAY

I don't want to overthink things - in fact, I want to learn how to keep it all very simple. When it comes to poetry and song-writing, I seem to subvert that a lot. You might have noticed that I go deep and cryptic often.

Nothing wrong with that! But today, I just felt like keeping it simple. Really,  Away-in-a-Manger type simple. This then, I might think about turning into a bit more of an ensemble piece - maybe for a small choir, maybe for woodwind, maybe for both, or maybe just for fun, capturing that warmth. Plus there's something so delightful about simplicity in a complicated world of darkness. It feels like what I need. And maybe I'm not alone.

I'll let you know when it has a tune, and maybe another verse...


Hope in the Hay

I wonder why the angels sing
So clearly through the night
I wonder why the farmhands keep
Their faces out of sight
I wonder why the wise men come
a-trailing from the East
The greatest and the highest
Always drawn towards the least

I wonder why the starlight falls
So sweetly through the wood
I wonder why this splintered world
Is blessed with heaven's good
I wonder why my heart is drawn
To Bethlehem today
I wonder why this love is born
As hope within the hay

O hope, where the darkness is
Cast out by light
O hope, where the world needs
This beautiful night
O hope, where the love sings
And fear melts away
And all of my wondering
is hope in the hay

A CHRISTMAS DO ON A TUESDAY

December, 2011. I found myself walking into town along an unlit canal path at 11:30pm. That was not sensible; there had been at least two murders along there. My breath expanded into the darkness and disappeared. As dangerous a thing as it was to do, I appreciated the silence. And I had reasoned with myself that however silly it seemed, it was a lot less silly than the thing I had left behind in the function room of the Hilton Hotel.

I've had an odd relationship with Office Christmas Parties since then. Presumably in an attempt to mollify the famous potential for excess and HR-interventions, the company I now work for take a more grown up view, by holding theirs on a Tuesday. Yes. A real, mid-week Tuesday, with three full days to go until the weekend.

Though, as far as I know, that never quite stops entirely all the silliness. Last year, a wife turned up and emptied a glass of something (the details were sketchy) over her husband and another colleague of mine. Fill in the blanks if you feel the need. Who knows what I'll discover tomorrow.

"Ah you made eye contact, that means you have to come to the Oakford!" said Nell, smiling at me. The restaurant was emptying slowly, as sales, marketing, engineering, support and various managers stumbled towards the coatrack. Erica and Junko had long gone (home, I think), and I was there almost alone. I sipped my tea and said I'd go to the pub for 'one'.

And this is what I mean by an 'odd' relationship. I can't be around the silliness; I want to have nothing to do with it, in as much as I believe that it, has nothing at all to do with Christmas. If I'm there at all, it's only ever for 'one'.

At that infamous party in 2011, two illicit liaisons happened simultaneously in the loos, a drunken manager attempted to mount a table and broke it, someone passed out in a pool (and yes, it was a pool) of sick, and a friend of mine, whom I had greatly respected as a quiet, classy, mild-mannered gent, said something so utterly outrageous to a girl standing next to me that... well, I later wondered how he hadn't left in an ambulance with a stiletto sticking out of his forehead. The dark and dangerous canal seemed like a world of peace, just a few moments later.

Back to the present. I did go to the Oakford for 'one' - one coke in a glass of ice. Mischa (yes, him of Non-Random Secret Santa fame) taught me a card game and I instantly forgot it. That annoyed him and amused me. Then Debbie tried to sign me up as a music teacher in one of her crazy new ventures, and another colleague wobbled into the conversation with a story which I think might actually make him a criminal. I drained my coke, waved goodbye to Nell, and walked down the road to Starbucks to meet Ruth and Rory.

That was more like it. We had a great catch-up. I laughed more, felt more at home, more loved and more joyful than I had in any of the previous few hours. I don't know if that makes me sound like an ungrateful square in the face of my workmates. The unspoken truth is though, that all my colleagues, quaffing their drinks in the Oakford, maybe even still now, would probably agree that they'd prefer to be with their real friends, any day of the week, even a Tuesday.

I reflected on it on the way home. It's another secret to joy, I think, this. It can't be bottled and sold from behind a bar. It can't be manufactured by hilarious horseplay in the Hilton hotel. It can't be taken in a stolen moment of abandon in a toilet, or dined out on with funny stories of 'great nights' that no-one quite remembers. Joy comes out of relationships - it bubbles between hearts and kindness, and it soars on the thermals created by lovely people who like each other. I think if I'm going to any kind of Christmas party, I'd like to go to one like that.

I got home alright. The stars twinkled happily in the cool, crisp night, just as they had done in 2011, and I twinkled back.

AN ENSEMBLE OF BASSOONS

There was a group of young bassoonists in Sainsbury’s tonight. They were playing carols and Christmas songs in rather nifty arrangements... and all in an ensemble of bassoons.

I’ve never seen that before. They were good, too. I always thought of the bassoon as a kind of equivalent to the tuba, or even the double bass, thumping and pomping away under the staves while the clarinets, oboes and flutes dance across it. It’s not the case. The bassoon’s much more the cello, with rich rounded wood-curving warmth and versatility that resonates through the octaves.

If I ever write a piece for woodwind instruments, I shall consider the bassoonist well, I hope.

That’s a lovely thought: devising a piece for a woodwind ensemble. I wandered around the aisles thinking about where to start and what I could do with a smooth melody.

And there it was again - that little inkling of a thought of arranging music. Choir last week, woodwind this: my heart must be telling me something. Or at least, something’s waking up in me. Now if only I had time to try it.

How, I wondered, did so many young bassoonists get together? It’s an unusual instrument to learn. If I were guessing, I’d have said the usual order is: flute, clarinet, then the kid who wants to be different and pick the oboe. I never met a bassoonist.

So, I need ideas. What will inspire a woodwind piece? What kind of thing would be simple enough to start, yet interesting enough to be a challenge? The wintry,l rasp of the oboe? The warm juicy fruit of the smooth clarinet? The dancing rays of sunlight that fall from the flute? Or the stately mellow joy of the oboe? How should these things fit? What shall I do?

It’s kind of exciting this, isn’t it? Well. If I get time to do it.

HALFWAY UP THE HILL

So. Still a bit ill.

I threw back the curtains in the darkness. The park was white. The shed roofs were dusted with snow and every branch was loaded. Silently, the flakes still tumbled out of the heavy grey sky.

I sneezed. Then I coughed. Then I stumbled to the bathroom.

I quickly realised that I was faced with a couple of choices. I didn't feel much like walking to church through the freezing blizzard; that seemed like a poor option. However, driving in the snow is always a bit of a risk - especially in the UK, where we don't seem to ever be prepared for the slippy roads or the frozen ice.

The third option was not going at all. In some ways that seemed like a brilliant idea; the duvet was warm, the air was cool and quiet, I was croaky and voiceless, and the logistics were simple. However, I knew that there would be a lot of people who would be stuck without me playing, and I didn't think I'd enjoy lying in bed, feeling guilty.

So I trudged out, leaving a trail of squelchy footsteps in the bright white snow. I scraped the car, jumped into the driving seat and blew warm air at my frozen fingers.

Ten minutes later I was stuck by the side of the road.

Halfway up the hill: I couldn't go up and I couldn't go down. The tyres rolled against the slippery snow and the car slid, almost out of control. Thankfully, in these situations, everyone else on the road is in the same sticky sitcom. Quite a few cars zipped past me, slowed down, slammed on the brake lights and slid backwards down the hill. It's times like this that 4x4s, jeeps and Chelsea tractors could be really useful!

"I'm stuck," I texted Gareth. It suddenly struck me that the choice I'd made had actually led me to the worst outcome of all. I wasn't at home keeping warm, I wasn't going to make it to church without walking after all, and my car, rather than being sensibly parked at home, was in the middle of nowhere.

In the end, Emmie rescued me in her truck. I left my car on the road.

The result of all of that was that I was late and a bit frozen, and still under the weather of course. I don't feel I was a lot of good to the team today, but I did my best under the circumstances.

-

I've been thinking about the way I make decisions. I reckon it seems more complicated than it really is, due to two interesting factors:

One is that I overthink everything. There I was, churning through the options, mentally calculating that it was better to take the risk and drive, than either: walk through the snow and make myself even sicker, or not go at all. I factored in all sorts of unspoken parameters into that calculation process: what time it was, what people think of me, how I felt about going out in the snow, guilt, being late, the weather itself, and the importance of the morning. I wonder if I could help subconsciously processing it all like some rapid algorithm, or whether I could be a bit more impulsive?

Two is that I never considered at all, the one option that would have saved me the bother - asking for help. Why didn't I just ring someone up and ask for a lift in the first place? I could see the snow was bad, a number of people I knew would be there have more sensible vehicles.... Why did that not occur to me? And if it did feature somewhere, how come it found a space so far down the preferable options list that it's taken me a retrospective analysis to find it?

Why do I find asking for help so difficult?

I don't propose an answer to that question; I just think it's an interesting observation. Somehow I'm wired up to be independent and self-reliant and, well let's just get it out there, proud. And I'll be honest - I don't like that thought very much.

It fits in with my ongoing thoughts about how conversations get out-of-phase. I think through the gaps, sometimes without really listening, and certainly without conceding any leverage. But this approach logically only ever leads to one thing, doesn't it? Loneliness. Well that, or being surrounded by sycophants, which, let's be honest is ultimately the same thing anyway.

We need each other, we need vulnerability to make our relationships work and we need that connection of hearts - where sometimes I have the answer to your question, but more often than not, I need to listen to you without worrying that you've thought of, or already knew the solution without me.

I need help.

But of course, so does everyone who gets stuck halfway up the hill and can't move forwards or backwards without slipping about all over the place.

ZERO ENERGY

I’m down to zero energy, I think. Maybe even minus numbers. I woke up in the middle of the night, streaming with cold and feeling like my insides had been sanded down while I slept.

I have a tricky balance to find: preserve my energy for tomorrow, or get moving and do some stuff today, risking the possibility that I will be useless tomorrow. It seems I won’t be able to do it all.

I hate sickness. It separates people. It ripples loneliness in all directions until you can’t see anyone, talk to anyone, or even ask how they are. It forces solitude. Imagine having something serious like the Plague or something, and writhing in agony without being able to see or be comforted by the ones you love.

I should point out: I haven’t got the Plague. I’ve got an energy-draining cold, and no, it’s not the same. I’m just pointing out that sickness always seems to separate people, no matter how serious it might be.

So I’m lying in bed, watching Star Wars trailers on YouTube as though I were sixteen, and writing down my wacky theory about why some conversations happen out-of-phase: I’ll come back to that but if you’ve ever tried talking to someone who appears to be listening, and then hasn’t been with you at all, you’ll know what I mean.

Zero energy. What a drama queen. I’m obviously typing and thinking. And thinking occupies a lot of my energy, most of the time.

I might get up in a bit and do some lunch. I’ve got a can of chilli somewhere, and some cheese that needs eating. I haven’t quite reached absolute zero yet.