BACK TO LIFE

I'm getting more predictable in my old age. In a move that annoyed me as soon it began, I started singing Soul II Soul’s classic hit, “Back to Life” this morning as I logged on to my work laptop. You know: ‘Back to life, back to reality…’

Hmm. It came out in 1989. I guess it just goes to show how good a hook that song has; if it’s stuck in your head now too, that probably proves it.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about, congratulations to you; you are officially young and you should be skipping with joy in your fresh-faced tikkytoks and snapcat videos.

Well anyway. It is ‘back to life’ today. Work returns: Sammy’s back teaching, and I’m back to being baffled at home. Only it is a little different, I suppose.

I looked up the lyrics:

“Back to life, back to the present time

Back from a fantasy, yes

Tell me now, take the initiative

I'll leave it in your hands, until you're ready”

Slightly passive aggressive to tell someone to take the initiative but also leave it up to them, isn’t it? Like saying, ‘in your own time’ while drumming your fingers and checking your watch. And what’s with the time travel?

It’s strange to think of this bit as ‘life’ and the last couple of weeks of honeymoon as ‘fantasy’ - in fact, I don’t think it’s very fair. Being baffled in front of my laptop ought to be the weird, out-of-body experience, and the reality, the life, the thing we’re born to do, should be the rest of it, shouldn’t it? Call me an old-fashioned romantic, but I can’t wait for my wife to get home today - it feels real being around her, and weird when she’s not here. Funny how quickly life changes so quickly; funny how the good old predictable makes way for the new, and it all seems so normal and real after just a short space of time. Maybe it’s okay to be unpredictable in my old age, after all.