So in all this

"So in all this I remain, forever and a day, essentially unknowable."

I realised that I'm of a certain age and that, as it stands it is my sworn and solemn duty to remain alone and unknown in this life. The truth is I've never really been all that interested in other people, their lives or their ideas. I'm happy enough for them to be there, for them to be let be and for them to let me be. They can busy themselves with factories and farms and fighting pointless wars but as for me – I'll try to stay out of it. The goal being the vigorous anonymity of passing through.

Thinking about it, it's all down to friction, tone of voice and smell. Other people just make me uncomfortable, they produce those things and really I've no need to be overpowered or lambasted by their ideas, odours and their unconscious need to rub themselves against me. My space is vital to me and I would, if pushed possibly kill in order to maintain that space and restore a safe and some kind of untouchable distance.

So I'll remain in orbit around myself, self destructive but also self sustaining. Taking in those dim exterior shots like a lazy camera and occasionally, by slim gesture or a faint word broadcasting back into the void, that'll do for me. As I pass the tree a leaf may fall or a twig may snag. That will be the sum total effect of my presence in the world. I'll lend nature a little help, a whispered piece of aid as I drift pass like some ether ghost, here and there and nowhere. I'll suck up some oxygen and soak water and wine and bread but in the end the smoke and vapour will all be self consumed. The footprints I leave will not be mine even though I made them. I've bequeathed them to the desolation of the nation, the space and vacuum in the modern consciousness that I almost but not quite might occupy.

There is no proper answer in patience or humour either, I've tried these things, they get you nowhere. Sucking in a received word or idea and sparing the enemy the return death blow, holding back and waiting. Some clever retort that will only be misunderstood. Patience is like so many other pointless things a virtue, as far as the self styled virtuous are concerned. I tried that and I didn't enjoy the space and the trace or anticipation...it just made me nervous and as for humour. We laugh for a time, we laugh like rocking horse headed idiots. Great stadiums rolling in a perverse agony at the bidding of some comedian peddling irony and common experiences, rolling in the aisles. Then once back on the street the memory is erased, blinking in the street lights, sober again, like a blank pub conversation that was all about something but you've no idea what. Maybe a bland happy memory is enough, some dumb good experience but one that has no staying power. I marvel at the evaporation of thought and memory. I marvel but I refuse to participate.

So I remain religiously alone, my own defender and saviour; finding comfort in a rare book, an article or a vulgar screed on a website that somehow rises above the back lit screen and, as if written or printed on a quality paper actually has some meaning and substance. One thing's for sure, I've no intention of going out and really looking for any of that stuff...it can find me and I wont break sweat. I'm sure that's the essence of some universal truth. If there is truth, if it exists at all then it will find you, there is no need to seek it out.