'The Godfather - The Musical' & Polpette Alla Casalinga

The sound of rain beating down on my car roof used to drive me nuts. In a moment of frenzy I removed the roof with a metal cutter and replaced it with thatch. On the upside it makes the car interior cool, rainproof, and muffles the sound of rain. On the downside when the thatch is dry, it is flammable. On a few occasions I've driven to work with the car roof on fire. Once, on arrival at the office, I went straight to a meeting with my hat on fire. In a moment of panic I threw the burning hat at a colleague and his nose hair caught fire.

The episode wouldn't have been so catastrophic if the fire hadn't spread quickly to his beard and virgin wool underwear (Who knows what people wear to work underneath their clothes? For a while I wore a black PVC gothic corset with black satin trimming, purely for medical reasons, of course - an out-growing toenail.) My colleague worked part-time as a Forest Fire Lookout at the local national park. It didn't help matters that he ran straight out of the building, jumped on his bison, and made straight for the watch tower in the park.

Subsequently, the tower burnt down, and he was observed running from the scene by a passing Long tail Weasel with short eyesight. With smoke billowing from his clothes he appeared to rant, 'I can't find Himmler, my little meadow vole!' He was never seen again. It is believed Himmler met a broad rat called Adolf, and together they wrote a major treatise titled: The Economic Importance of Rodents.

*

My lineage has endowed me with a lack of muscularity befitting an interloper without the 'loper.' During the night my wife kicked four of my front teeth out. Was it deliberate? Who knows? It was the first time - to my knowledge - she has worn black German Army Para Boots and camouflage netting to bed. She usually prefers Soviet and Russian tactical and combat gear. As for me, I just wish she'd wear something from Harvey Nichols' - a Pierre Hardy Perforated leather handbag with a small strap, preferably around her neck.

All day I had to speak, smile, and eat while holding a hand in front of my mouth. It was a mistake to order Polpette Alla Casalinga at lunch. The meatballs were about 3 inches in diameter and the tomato and basil sauce ruined my clothes. A fellow diner thought I was learning Spanish. Another thought I was preparing to audition as Don Vito Corleone in 'The Godfather - The Musical.' I left the restaurant before there was an assassination attempt. I like my thighs and arms as they are: close to my hands.

*

Reflections: All this, of course, is insignificant when I recollect I was recently refused service at a restaurant in Belfast. I exclaimed to the owner, whose head resembled fossil remains (picture, if you will, the face of a 5 million year old turtle with three teeth belonging to a chimpanzee), 'I'll have you know I served with the French Foreign Legion. I was decorated several times and advertised as a 'spacious furnished apartment' for rental in Paris!'

Alas, my protestations were in vain. My feelings were indelibly hurt. Shooting the proprietor, however, give a semblance of redress. I had to complain. It is all I have left.

The Beginning of Survival

Last night, while driving home from work, I spoke on the phone to my girlfriend. 'Tell J.M. and Eavan we can make it over to their house on Friday night. It will be good to see them again. I should be home in about half an hour.' Following the short call I signaled before changing lanes then turned off the signal.

A green station wagon had been tailgating me for the last few minutes. I yielded to the right to let the vehicle past. The driver continued to tailgate and started to honk their horn. The antagonistic behaviour began to irritate. I was conscious how straightforward confrontations can lead to violent behaviour. I stayed calm and rational. I didn't want hassle.

A violent and loud thud suddenly projected my existence into illusory slow motion. For a split second I stared into the enraged gaze of my aggressor who pulled level with my car.  Haunting… crazed… the hothead tryed to force me off the road. Both vehicles became intertwined in a power struggle.

I began screaming in concert with the grinding of metal. I finally lost control of the vehicle and headed towards a weather-ravaged dark wooden fence. My final recollection was the rear of the station wagon as it sped of in a triumphant show of power. I slowly descended into unconsciousness.

'Are you all right? Can you hear me?' frantically enquired a young female voice. 'I saw what that guy in the vehicle did! He tried to kill you ... run you off the road. Are you all right?'

As her soft voice undulated I slowly came round. Disorientated and confused I tried to move each limb in turn to distinguish the extent of damage. While my vision was blurred - exacerbated by blood pouring from lacerations to my upper and lower face - I became gratefully aware of survival.

The girl continued to converse in a frenzied manner. 'Can you hear me? Are you able to speak? I've telephoned for an ambulance ... the police. They should be here soon. Just hold on ....'

The ambulance and police arrived at the scene in concert. The young girl was tearful, and persistently shook as she recounted the distressing event. I was lucky; I was still alive. Suddenly I acquired a new knowledge of reality, life, what it means to be mortal. Once more, I became part of the sun, the moon, the stars, this earth.

*

Reflections: A river runs by my house every morning at seven o'clock. I believe its a fitness fad, of sorts. This morning we strolled together and spoke of our childhoods. We have much in common.

The river dutifully executes its roles despite severe constraints, namely: lack of affinity with hard hearts, harsh words and voices, wanting to die but afraid of death. Constantly taking risks, being humorous, mostly ingratiating despite unwanted conflicts.

The river's tormented face sometimes bothers me, as does its toneless voice. It never complains, but despises its fate. It detests pity most of all.

A Thousand Pitfalls a Day

 

Today I received an 'old-fashioned' letter which I read several times at the Café Rousseau. The village is immaterial: the letter isn't. The message is beautiful and haunting. A letter accords a sense of the individual which an email, a text, a phone call, or a face to face meeting can ever hope to express. Tonight I shall sleep with the letter beneath my pillow as the moon lights up the rooftops in the village, and lazily watch my chest gently rise and fall as tranquility fills the room. 

I feel stronger than I did yesterday, and, indeed, the day before. Sometimes, thinking is worst than physical pain. I'm thankful, however, that bleak thoughts can be sweetened by satin words from a fresh-faced, beautiful - not necessarily, attractive - young woman. What do I fear? Perhaps drowning in my own thoughts, when frightening memories wash back and forth, and overwhelm my strength and spirit.

I recall watching a cow giving birth. And how the mother tenderly licked her calf. I was seven-years-old. The grass in the field graced my father's knees. His face, normally hard, was covered in a shiny coat of sweat. I could sense he was content, happy. For a moment he stood motionless, glanced at me, and smiled. I thought, 'It's so beautiful. The newly-born calf is so beautiful!' I had witnessed the birth of a new life.

*

'What do you want?!' a shrill voice exclaimed. A boorish waitress with a red face and pink arms stared down at me. 

'A coffee, please.'

'We don't have any!'

'Tea ...' I felt like a hunted animal.

'There's nothing to eat or drink! Don't you know there's a war on!' she said frostily.

The main shopping street was busy. Everything seemed normal. The coffee shop was full of people. I looked at them, one by one, through pale eyes. What were they thinking about? Some sat with their eyes closed, as if asleep.

'What war?' I enquired. The dazzling glare of the lights made me giddy. Everything that seemed simple a moment before now seemed complicated.  'What war are you talking about?'

The waitress came close to me. Her mustard breath tortured me. 'You must be a foreigner! What war?! Look around you! There has to be balance in nature between good and evil, love and hatred, murderers and bodies, or all hell breaks loose!'

To change the subject, I expressed interest in the coffee shop, and its customers.

'Don't they all look sad?' she asked, without waiting for an answer.

At such moments I wait for my thinking to produce words to lighten my heart and mind. It's strange how individuals and groups can cultivate fear. They trade in life and death, and can penetrate the strongest ceilings and walls. Their eyes shine in the darkness as their claws dig deeper and deeper into the bodies and souls of victims. The scent of death is never far from all things beautiful.

*

Reflections: It is not possible to identify yourself in someone else, dream their dreams, or to enter their soul. We are alone, finite, prisoners of our own egotism. Each one of us face 'a thousand pitfalls a day.'

Each second on this earth a person's mouth quivers with contempt and hatred of fellow human beings. They live in a restricted world of unceasing conflict. Such individuals may breathe copiously but they are already dead: they feel no sense of love, compassion, sadness, or loss. The one thing they cannot tolerate, above all other things, is life.

Everything's Coming Up Roses

Today my wife is infused with imagination, inspiration and a deep commitment to uncover why we've drifted apart. She gazes at me like a large-eyed, watchful donkey. After spiting on our wedding picture album she points a thick streaky sausage at me. Aided by her toothless mouth and undersized black patent pro-wrestling boots, she groans, 'You once seemed young. Now you're a bloody withered tree. You no longer live in or by time … Just books, and more bloody books!'

Differences divide her reality from mine. What's my wife looking at? The ghost of a man once celebrated for searching for "one great love" - the ideal woman? Maybe she observes an old beggar-man; half-crazed with a maze of half-healed scars on his swollen nose. Why do I bother staring back, it only makes a fuss?

Words only invoke memories of jealousy, hurt, a wrong turn in the road taken, innumerable ghosts. What she likes I detest, and vice-versa. Silly little things that grow into stupid big things. She drinks cocktails – usually, a "Singapore Sling" – while removing the wax from her ears with a large hair pin while singing “Everything's Coming Up Roses”: You'll be swell! You'll be great! Gonna have the whole world on the plate! Starting here, starting now, honey, everything's coming up roses! I sit traumatised by the deafening din and embrace the darkness only I can feel and see. The collected wax is utilised when she attempts hair highlights at home; always with disastrous consequences, for example, setting the dog on fire.

My wife makes sounds as well. One, in particular, starts of delicate, and ascends to a steady thud which rattles every window in our house, and dwellings beyond for all I know. Our poor dog's tail stiffens, his fur bristles, and he leaps about on the dining room table unable to bark. I think the dog hates me for saying nothing to my wife about her behavior. I'm never filled with enough confidence to confront her; the dog doesn't understand my predicament. Once the dog brought me a carving knife from the kitchen. As it wagged its stiffened tail, its sad, large eyes seemed to plead, ' Stab her to death, for me, please. Just this once!'

Outside the church bells chime. Why so far from the church? It must be 50 kilometers, at least, from our home to the little church, the graveyard, to the sound of rushing cars, and the black clad, hymn-singing congregation? The bells seem to be pacing up and down close to our living room window. How infuriating it must be to have to play the same melody each day, at the same time, and receive no gratitude? The chimes begin to fade. Perhaps the bells have deserted the church in order to be with other bells in a creative community? Or a tropical island in search of the simple life, if such a life exists?

I check my watch. Mr Cloud is due at 7.00 o'clock.

I hear his footsteps before he knocks on the front door. 'Beautiful weather,' he murmurs. Mr Cloud's appearance chills my blood, just like my wife's naked body on our wedding-night. He has no blood under his pale, translucent skin. He holds out a trembling hand. 'It belongs to my son, Ivar. I never leave home without it.' I gaze at the hand and say nothing.

We go into the living room. I pretend not to understand taxidermy. 'What type of bird is it?' he enquired.

'I'm not quite sure? Large, with ears like a rat. It flew in through the back door, circled the room a few times and hovered above my head. I was petrified. It was fearsome and confident. Lucky I was cleaning my shotgun. A single shot. I don't believe in death, but what else could I do?'

I was troubled by Cloud's cold stare. There was a long silence. He sighed deeply. 'Date and time of death?'

Lowering my eyes, I replied, 'Mid-afternoon ... today ...'

'Extent of injuries?'

'The nostrils are completely gone ...'

'The nostrils?!'

'I mean mouth! ... Beak! ... Whatever the hell you call it!'

I told him once again how it had happened. I also enquired if his services were expensive. When he asked if I wanted the mouth open or shut I thought either way unsightly; her mouth had morphed into a thin sharpened knife in search of hardened veal. I told Cloud I would accept his professional judgement.

Cloud and I went into the kitchen and opened the large chest freezer. We exchanged a knowing look and then everything went quickly. The large bird was well wrapped in polyethylene and frozen. We both grunted as we carried the heavy package to the back of Cloud's black van. He would contact me once she was stuffed.

Three days later Cloud was waiting for me at his premises. When he unveiled the mounted bird I was surprised how well she looked. Suddenly, I felt a lump in my throat.

'I know, I know, it's hard. But your wife would be proud. I'll deliver it tomorrow night when the world is silent.' In spite of everything Cloud and I began to laugh. 'What will you do now?'

'I'm not sure,' I replied. 'It will not, however, involve lifting heavy weights. I believe I shall paint my front door blue. Black can be such a sombre colour. Good day to you.'

I stepped out into the quiet street and stood still for a moment. My soul felt revitalised. My self-confidence had returned. I walked swiftly back to my home. It was dark but I was unaware of darkness. My anxieties turned into curiosity; curiosity and craving for my new life.

*

Reflections: Romantic love is ephemeral; therein lies its preciousness.

What did Vincent van Gogh eat for Breakfast?

The image one acquires of a genius is dependent on the selection. Whether the individual is a gifted painter, poet, philosopher, musician, inventor, or scientist, is, in fact, immaterial. Genius remains a matter of opinion and can't be measured. The genius, by accident of birth, possesses the special gift of originality, heightened perception and intuition, and embraces individualism in spite of (or because of) ridicule from contemporaries, in pursuit of their own vision and goal.

There remains a potent romantic image of the genius – probably, from Victorian times – as someone disturbed, on the verge of mental collapse, unable to keep their body and soul together. This is not the case with most geniuses. Jonathan Swift, David Hume, and Galileo Galilei, come to mind. There are others, of course.

The image of the artist Vincent van Gogh is a case in point. We know Van Gogh was a great artist: his works exist to to prove it. However, what is authentically known of Van Gogh's thinking, his inner tensions, the struggles his gifts bestowed upon him, his family and friends? A study of his life and work reveals a complex individual. This raises a further question: which human isn't complex?

Who decides whether a painting, a poem, a novel is, or, is not, a great work of art? In reality, it is a small coterie of academics, critics, merchandisers (so-called experts); an informal jury of sorts, who can make or break an artist's reputation and fortune.

Indeed, if we approach the works of geniuses without knowledge of a tragic backstory how would we view their works? It is impossible to know. The fact an artist may have died tragically at an early age draws some individuals to their works. This prior knowledge undoubtedly distorts one's view of the artist's output. How would such art be received if the artist were still alive? Would it be venerated to the same degree?

As with all individuals labeled geniuses, or not, excess of natural ability does not make for satisfaction and happiness, any more than excess of wealth.

Finally, what is normal? Each one of us is unique. We all have discreteness. We are all outstanding in our own way. Primarily, we are all moving in the same direction: seeking to live an authentic life out of the reach of false judges.

*

Reflections: For some people fame and fortune are a cross or a crown. They are recognised everywhere they go. As I live in anonymity, I am able to walk around my home unrecognised by my wife and children. Even our dog has stopped peeing on my leg, an affection which, oddly, I miss.

Rebekah Kerrigan interviewed in the Neonatal Unit, Ulster Hospital on 13 June 2010 - 'First Hours on Mother Earth'

I'm using Ronnie's blog to explain some things before people start talking about me and I won't be able to get a word in edgewise.

My name is Rebekah. I was born by caesarian today, 13 June 2010. I'm only five hours old. I hope you like the photograph. It's not my best side and the nappy nearly touches my nose. Smaller sizes, please! My first 'tantrum' and it feels good.

Anyhow, my dad, Ricky, is talking to a young nurse dressed in water blue scrubs. Not my dad, the nurse, silly! Such a beautiful colour. I shall always remember it. In fact, it may become my favourite colour. Ricky looks pale, tired and anxious. I can tell he is kind and clever. Believe me, I can see him. He smiles and waves at me. I'm snug in my little incubator in the neonatal unit.

There's another baby in the unit, too. I'm quite small: four pounds, four ounces. I'm surrounded by monitors and a tube carries milk to my stomach. My mum, Lindsay, is in a side ward recovering from the delivery. My mum looked exhausted as she cradled me so I did my best not to cry too loud. She has lovely, soft hands. Mum needs rest, just like dad. I arrived unexpectedly, but, in truth, I couldn't wait any longer to be born.

My favourite nurse has blonde center-parted hair and a dazzling warm smile. My instinct tells me I will be blessed with charm and beauty, too. I may even be a nurse. Now that the curtain has raised on my life I intend to be kind, courteous, form my life and destiny, and live in harmony with all living things. I will try to remember that the simple things in life are usually the most important.

I've noticed talking can be difficult. Talking sense, I mean. On top of everything else I have to learn how to be relaxed and amusing in conversation, and learn all the social gestures, looks and hidden meanings. I intend to never sulk or make a fool of myself, and spread joy wherever I go. Of course, I expect my parents to discipline me, when necessary, out of general concern and love for me.

I occasionally wonder why some individuals fail to realise I'm a unique individual. I'm a girl like no other girl who has ever lived. Yet some people gaze at me and foolishly say I've my mother's eyes, my brother's nose, my father's legs. I'm not a diva, just making a point. I'm not a carbon copy or a genetic copy of other people. I'm me. REBEKAH KERRIGAN! Guess that counts as a second tantrum.

Well, I have two sisters and a brother. I've acquired the main role and expect to be subject to extremes of sibling jealousy and devotion. When I get out of hospital I'll arouse interest everywhere I go. Meanwhile I'm being looked after by mum and dad and nurses in hospital and they keep me clean, spotless and fed.

I wonder what our house looks like and if it's in a quiet street? How many rooms does it have? Has it got little cupboards and hiding places? The furniture, pictures, the symphonies of smells will be new to me. A newborn world of sounds, colours, lights, odours.

In the weeks, months and years ahead, I'm looking forward to experiencing all kinds of things, like: Christmas and birthday presents, reading books about horses, watching cartoons and films, playing games with my sisters and brother, riding a bicycle, smelling flowers (especially roses), eating food (I wonder if I will like Mexican?), licking ice-cream and lollies, listening to music, dancing, laughing, being read 'bedtime' stories by my parents and grandparents,  bathing in warm, bubbly, scented water with lots of toys, throwing small stones into a lake of calm water, chasing butterflies, wearing jewelery, perfume, makeup, finding true friendship and unquestionable love in all its guises.

The nurse is coming to check my oxygen levels. I have to go and pretend I'm asleep. Bye for now.

*

Reflections:  I am five hours old and the 'baby' of the family. And guess what? I will always be the baby, even when I’m thirty, forty, or sixty! That sounds really old now. I might even be married with children of my own and still be the baby. How strange is that?