Writing a stream of almost-consciousness.

This like a diary in a time of COVID, of Corona, of so-called “Lockdown” and vapid bulletins that even the most generous may see as disingenuous at best. This time of hot environmental soup on the fringes of quantum physics. 

Sitting indoors, surrounded by Netflix and jigsaws, planning dinners like long-ago foreign excursions. Recipe books as maps. Tonight, we’ll explore the Amalfi Coast in linguini. The sounds of people talking too loud, bonhomie ringing down the road in booming, beery voices. Don’t they know there’s a war on? Hiding and the wildlife is crashing about outside. My Australian prison warder neighbour playing classic rock through the walls. Ruining Purple Rain forever. Slurping Stella from a tin and you can check out but you can never leave. My god he likes a scrap. 

Glomming inspiration from multiple things. The TV series Devs reminds that most of us will never understand that the future exists in the present. It’s beautiful. A documentary about the writer Joan Didion says that the past was a mystery too. Scrolling through art galleries on a screen two inches by four. All the music is wistful, lonesome, driven by winds and the sea. For the past few weeks I had a project to complete. A novel, version five, no less. Set myself the task of ensuring it became a finished thing as we hunkered down. Worked on it daily, sometimes for hours and hours. And then it was done. Sent it to a couple of trusted people. Talked to my agent about it. He wants to see it and maybe he will, when it’s settled and stopped moving about like a cat on a blanket. So now the project’s finished. Begin another, there are already notes. Realise it can’t be written to order. So write this instead, just to write something. Just to write.