Stormbound

We sit in silence. Each passenger on the train has their own amusement. Work emails on the company laptop. Instagram scrolling. Daily Mail lite diatribes masquerading as free newspapers. Music bleeding from headphones. The standard commuter fayre. We feel lucky. We the survivors. Those who made it into the office when all trains were cancelled that morning. The ones who didn't pull a cheeky working from home manoeuvre. We don't go as far as hugging each other and exchanging reassurances that everything will be better tomorrow. If talking’s not on the agenda it’s unlikely that our physical boundaries will be troubled. We're aware of the farcical nature to this too. If we do risk conversation it's likely to be travel themed. The novelty of the bus ride in. Why can't the train companies get their act together. Is it so hard to tell us what's going on? Something neutral. Benign. Safe. Not even a placeholder to a real conversation. Especially considering the alternatives. The implications of a hard Brexit. The slaughter by random geographic misfortune in Indonesia. Is a rapist going to be elected to the supreme court in the US? Whether Boris Johnson's role is simply to grind Theresa May out of office to clear the path for Jacob Rees Mogg. Where is this bus going? The same could be asked of the country.

Dustbin

Part 1

A flame aflame

It was a dark and stormy night outside but inside the station was quiet. The drunk tank was empty save for old Steve whose drunken glory of earlier was now replaced with sober contemplation. The paperwork in front of him seemed fixed in place. Increasingly Jeffrey found himself looking out at the rain streaking across the windows. The random streams twisted in their courses with the wind but ultimately led downwards into the darkness below. The phone rang. It's shrill tones echoing through the office. Jeffrey lifted the receiver. “Homicide” he barked and then listened, sitting back in his chair. “How many?” He was starting to take notes. When the call ended he looked down at the sheet. Across the middle in capital letters was just one word. CARNAGE. Jeffrey buttoned his waistcoat and pulled out his revolver and badge from the top drawer of his battered desk. He sighed. This would be a long night.

---

“As a child the only thing I associated with Syria was hamsters.”, me, the other day.

---

“Can we go to the magic well?” asked Helen the Rabbit.

“Yes let's”, said Jeffrey the Badger.

“But can we take Steve the Squirrel too?”, he asked. “I think he would love to come and make a wish”

“That would be brilliant”, beamed Helen the Rabbit.

Steve the Squirrel lived in the wood by the stream. Jeffrey the Badger and Helen the Rabbit walked side by side in the sunshine as they crossed the meadow.

“What will you wish for?” asked Jeffrey the Badger

“A new toy” replied Helen the Rabbit, “something we can all play with”.

“I’d like that too” said Jeffrey the Badger.

They stood in front of Steve the Squirrel's tree at the edge of the wood. It was quiet. Steve didn't appear to be home.  With a rustle of leaves Steve suddenly fell in front of Jeffrey and Helen after climbing through a nearby bush.

Steve the Squirrel looked up at them. His eyes flashed with danger.

---

“Thermonuclear war may break out at any moment”, North Korea’s deputy UN ambassador, Kim In-ryong, 17 October 2017

---

Helen stared at her reflection in the mirror. The music from the bar was still loud but at least she could hear herself think. She snapped her unused compact shut. The makeup was fine. She was fine. She just wished she didn't need to keep telling herself.  

“I love your hair up. You should do it more often”.

Helen looked up through the mirror. “Ah but it's an effort and you know me. I'm a lazy bitch. That new dress really suits you by the way”.

At last, a compliment.  Helen had only joined the company a couple of months ago. She was new to everything. The industry.  The city. This resulted in her being enveloped by Paula's wing. They'd been out for a few drinks after work, a lunchtime pilates class and a theatre trip so some awful musical. Theirs was an infant intimacy based more on consumerism than say politics or the heart.

“Those cocktails aren't going to drink themselves”. Paula closed her handbag and turned towards the door.  As they re-entered the main room it felt inexplicably like even more people had come into the club. Helen and Paula headed back towards their table.

“No it was Callicrates that designed the Temple to Nike, you're thinking of the guy who scored the winner in the quarter final of the 1974 World” and before Steve could finish his sentence he’d more twisted than walked into Helen and spilled half the contents of his glass of beer down her.

Helen was furious but as she was about to unleash a blaze of obscenities he pressed a finger against her lips, shushed her and said “everything happens for a reason”.

---

“I like her style.  When I watch PMQs now or when I see her particularly abroad at international events, I have to say I feel quite proud that she is the prime minister of the United Kingdom.“ Kate Hoey, Labour MP for Vauxhall, a constituency that voted 78.5% in favour of remaining in the EU, the highest remain vote in the country, 6 February 2017.

---

“What do you want to wish for, Steve?”

All the animals turned to the scruffy squirrel with excitement.

“An exit”

---

“There were immigrants who came here in the bottom of slave ships, worked even longer, even harder, for less. But they too had a dream that one day their sons, daughters, grandsons, granddaughters, great-grandsons, great-granddaughters might pursue prosperity and happiness in this land.” Ben Carson, United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, 7 March 2017.

---

Sirens. All of them at once. Jeffrey sat in the back of a patrol car screaming its passage across the city. He remembered the first days in the job when he still thought he could make it back. To a home. A wife. A normal. Anything but this.

---

“The president used the word ‘wiretapped’ in quotes to mean broadly surveillance and other activities during that. It is interesting how many news outlets reported that this activity was taking place during the 2016 election cycle and now are wondering where the proof is. It is many of the same outlets in this room that talked about the activities that were going on back then.”, Sean Spicer discussing President Trump’s allegations that Barack Obama had ordered wiretaps of Trump when he was a candidate, 13 March 2017.

---

Helen burned with indignity. The hand drier had been surprisingly effective but she still stank of beer like some college freshman. She exited the washroom to find Steve stood a short distance away in the corridor looking apologetic.

“Do you have any other fucking clichés to share?”, her words spat out. Ire was rising.

“We've all had to make difficult decisions but through collectively approaching our problems together I believe in a better future.”

“That’s just fucking great.  I’ve always wondered what those dumb party drones did when they weren’t waving placards at political rallies  It turns out they stumble around throwing drinks over the electorate.”

---

“We didn’t lose. It was 1-1.”   Jose Mourinho, explaining his 2-1 loss to Hull City in EFL cup, 28 January 2017

---

The animals looked sad.  They looked at Steve the Squirrel.

“Why aren't you happy Steve?” asked Helen the Rabbit.

“The wood will be chopped down. The stream will dry up. Soon we won't know each other any more.

Everything burns.”

---

“OK I was a jackass”

“Worse than that”

“I wanted to reach out, to engage, to make a difference in your life”

“Here we go again”

“Sorry. Just sorry”

Helen smiled, almost despite herself. He looked really apologetic. Most of what he said was complete BS. It was almost like he was trapped making six o’clock news bulletin sound bites. There was the cuteness factor too though.

---

“Lock her up”, Michael Flynn referring to Hillary Clinton during the presidential election campaign.  As US national security adviser he lasted 24 days before resigning over attempting to cover up conversations with Russia about sanctions in the run up to Trump taking office, 18 July 2016.

---

The duty officer was talking, breaking down events but Jeffrey’s attention was beyond him, through the open door at the end of the corridor and the blood splattered wall now starkly displayed by the lighting rig the forensic crew had set up.

He walked forward to get a better look.  The duty officer fell into step.

“..some time between 18:00 and 07:00 the following day.  They think the blood is from one source. There’s one body.  Quite a mess.”

The forensic team were still processing the scene, working in pairs, all methodology, brightly coloured disposable boiler suits and evidence, slowly accumulating in labelled clear plastic bags.  Jeffrey stopped at the doorway, not wanting to disturb them.

“I thought you guys sang whilst you worked?”

“Again Detective. You’ve got dwarves mixed up with scientists.  We search for truths, not gold or lost princesses.”

“So what happened to this sweet prince?”

”I’ll skip the standard patter reminding you to wait from my report.  The detail’s going to be important on this one. This is something different.   Most murders are pure violence - a shot, a blow and stabbing. Fast. A point of no return in a heartbeat. This is the other type.  The ones no one gets.”

Jeffrey looked around the room.  In the middle was a counter. Kitchenware, bills, the detritus of life looking out of place with the scene beyond.  The wall was solid red further down towards the floor but the counter constricted his view. The lead forensic could see him craning his neck.

“Give us another hour or so and I'll take you for a personal tour through this wonderland. Let's do what we each do best. We’ll go about solving this and you can throw someone down some stairs in a temper. I'd recommend the super. A real charmer.”

---

“Personally I am against third-generation succession”, Kim Jong-nam, speaking in 2010 about his half-brother Kim Jong-un, leader of North Korea and rumoured instigator of his assassination by chemical sprays in Malaysia.

---

“Well I think you're just a big worrypot. The sky is blue. The grass at our feet us green and lush. Look up and feel the sun warm your face.”

Steve didn't know where to look. His eyes darted between the animal’s faces.

“I.. I just have questions. Ever since Paula the Gecko left.”

There was a brief quiet in the glade. Helen and Jeffrey looked at each other.

Water burbled in the nearby brook. It made Jeffrey think of the wood. It made him smile.

---

“Let’s be clear, no bagel should be treated so cruelly. And no one subjected to intimidating behaviour.” British Transport Police tweeting in response to incidents late on a saturday night in Hertfordshire involving bagels being placed on people’s heads and resulting in a brawl both in a train carriage and a station platform, 28 February 2017.

---

“Last chance. I get it that you're sorry. I hate beer. The taste, the smell.  You can imagine how pleased I was to have you throw the contents of whatever cheap crap you've been pouring down your neck all evening.”

“IPA”

“What?”

“Sorry that's not helping is it. But it was a really good drink I lost when you walked into me.”

It was his turn to smile, somewhat sheepishly, knowing he was pushing his luck.

“This is going to sound to you like another line and that's because it is. Of all the girls in all the bars I’m glad you were the one to clatter into me. I am genuinely sorry but after talking to you I'm wondering if you end up with people throwing drinks in your face most evenings and all I've really done is bucked the order of play”

He turned and walked away. Helen spied a nearby glass and contemplated throwing it at his head.

---

“Last summer, after the country voted to leave the European Union, Britain needed certainty, stability and strong leadership, and since I became prime minister the government has delivered precisely that.

At this moment of enormous national significance there should be unity here in Westminster, but instead there is division. The country is coming together, but Westminster is not.

And the decision facing the country will be all about leadership. It will be a choice between strong and stable leadership in the national interest, with me as your prime minister, or weak and unstable coalition government, led by Jeremy Corbyn, propped up by the Liberal Democrats, who want to reopen the divisions of the referendum, and Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP.” Theresa May, calling a snap general election, 18 April 2017.

“The prime minister said yesterday that she was calling a general election because parliament was blocking Brexit, but three-quarters of this parliament voted for article 50 and two-thirds of the Lords voted for article 50, so that’s not true, is it?  A month ago she told her official spokesman to rule out an election and that wasn’t true either, was it? She wants us to believe that she is a woman of her word but isn’t the truth that we cannot believe a single word she says?” Yvette Cooper speaking in the House of Commons the day after the UK parliament voted in support of the Prime Minister’s request for an early general election, two years after the last one and less than a year from the Brexit referendum

---

Paula was clear. “Forget about it and move on. Let’s get on that dance floor and get this evening back on track”.

“Yeah why not”

They moved through the crowds and headed to the music.

---

“We were invited here, then thrown away”, Tony Perry, postwar immigrant to the UK, invited to rebuild the county as part of a Windrush generation.

On 30 April 2018 Amber Rudd resigned from her post as Home Secretary for “inadvertently misleading" MPs over targets for removing illegal immigrants.

“The wrongs suffered by the Windrush generation shocked us all and since becoming home secretary I have made it my personal mission to rectify the injustices of the past” Sajid Javid, 19 July 2018

---

“She had to return to her own home. She found the wood very different to where she lived. She just liked different things. And that's ok. It was just better for her to go back. To be among animals just like her. That didn't have fur. That believed in the same things.”

Jeffrey still wasn't sure. He remembered Paula’s stories of fire, of shouting, of war.

Steve felt sad again. Pretending wasn't cutting it any more.

Part 2

Your mask keeps slipping, silly

“We need to evacuate”

---

“I’m not Steve Bannon, I’m not trying to suck my own cock”, Anthony Scaramucci, discussing the White House chief strategist. “Reince is a fucking paranoid schizophrenic, a paranoiac. What I want to do is I want to fucking kill all the leakers and I want to get the President’s agenda on track so we can succeed for the American people.”

Anthony Scaramucci, who was appointed White House communication director on 21 July 2017

“Anthony Scaramucci will be leaving his role as White House communications director,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders, “Mr Scaramucci felt it was best to give chief of staff John Kelly a clean slate and the ability to build his own team. We wish him all the best.” 31 July 2017.

---

“OK. Sorry. Concierge. Whatever. Who lives at 12b? And if you give me any more ‘you can't divulge private information without approval from management’ crap I'll have you in general holding on some fake child rape charge before you can think of a witty comeback.” Jeffrey was feeling the late hour. The back-to-back shifts. The grind.

The building supervisor looked again at his records, the file propped on his bloated belly as he idly thumbed his way through the papers.  “12b, 12b” he muttered to himself.

Jeffrey looked at his watch, feeling his gun holster press against his ribs.  “Yes 12b. The only one I’ve mentioned since coming through the door”

“Here we go.  Not a person. A company.  Ballantine and Ballantine Insurance.” He proffered Jeffrey a look at the contract as if he was bestowing a grand favour.  Jeffrey snapped the folder out of his hands, spun it around and read the limited information for himself.

---

“23 June last year will be remembered as a great day in history. It is comparable with Agincourt and Waterloo”, Jacob Rees-Mogg, speaking at an Article 50 debate in Parliament, 3 October 2017.

---

“Do you remember the time we visited the lake?”

“Yes yes!” squealed Helen, “we made new friends. Josie the Pike and Dustin the Duck.

“I remember the second time.  When it was colder. When everyone had gone.”

---

“The tunnel vision that the SNP has shown today is deeply regrettable. It sets Scotland on a course for more uncertainty and division”, Theresa May, accusing Nicola Sturgeon of playing politics with the future of the country over a new Scottish independence referendum. “Politics is not a game.” 13 March 2017

---

Daylight. The sun was low and bright in the sky.  He took another sip of the scaldingly hot coffee he’d bought out of mistaken loyalty from Tommy’s on 24th and 7th and wondered what civil codes coffee this bad could be breaking.  Today would be lost driving from interview to interview, morgue to station to wherever the trail went next. First stop was the insurers. His watch said just after eight. He looked at it again.  It was the only thing that had survived his first marriage. She looked him in the eyes, handed it to him and said “Happy Birthday. I love you.” He thought she’d meant it. He’d got a lot wrong on that one. The security guard in the lobby unbolted the doors and stood surveying his domain.  Jeffrey got out of his car and crossed the road, dodging the keener commuters on their way to cubicle hell.

“I’ve told you already, Mr Daniels isn’t in today and he handles all this stuff.”  Jeffrey could tell he was being taken seriously as two whole interns were helping him with his queries.

“Look, here’s my number”. He passed them one of his cards. “Track him down and get him to call me. Take this seriously.   I’ve got a dead body in one of your properties. If people help me with information then I stay calm and everyone has a nice life.  If I find out things anyway but also that you could have saved me a load of time I’ll be back with the drugs team and the dogs. Then I’ll ring my old lieutenant up at Fraud and get them to give your books a spin.”

“OK? OK”  He smacked open the lobby doors and headed out into the city, to the next set of half truths, broken promises and lies.

---

“I am surprised and disappointed that you have chosen to repeat the figure of £350 million per week, in connection with the amount that might be available for extra public spending when we leave the European Union.  It is a clear misuse of official statistics.” Sir David Norgrove, Chair of the UK Statistics Authority, 17 September 2017.

“I must say that I was surprised and disappointed by your letter of today, since it was based on what appeared to be a wilful distortion of the text of my article.  This is a complete misrepresentation of what I said and I would like you to withdraw it. I in fact said: ‘Once we have settled our accounts we will take back control of roughly £350m per week. It would be a fine thing, as many of us have pointed out, if a lot of that money went on the NHS’. That is very different from claiming that there would be an extra £350m available for public spending and I am amazed that you should impute such a statement to me.” Boris Johnson, 17 September 2017,

“We send the EU £50 million a day. Let’s fund our NHS instead”.  The caption on the side of a Vote Leave campaign bus during the referendum.

---

There was a strange calm in the wood.

Whether it was bees gathering nectar, creatures rusting through the undergrowth, birds singing in the trees there was normally sounds all around them.

This felt different.

Odd.

The animals stood in a circle in a glade and looked around them.

At first it was just a crackle. A hiss.  Hesitant trails of smoke. Later it would roar and storm from tree to tree.

Fire.

---

“The situation at our Southwest Border is unacceptable. Congress has failed to pass effective legislation that serves the national interest—that closes dangerous loopholes and fully funds a wall along our southern border. As a result, a crisis has erupted at our Southwest Border that necessitates an escalated effort to prosecute those who choose to illegally cross our border.  To those who wish to challenge the Trump Administration’s commitment to public safety, national security, and the rule of law, I warn you: illegally entering this country will not be rewarded, but will instead be met with the full prosecutorial powers of the Department of Justice.” Attorney General Jeff Sessions, instigating a zero tolerance policy on immigration leading to the separation of children from their families due to children not being allowed to be held in federal prisons. 6 April 2018

“I consider it to be a very important executive order. It’s about keeping families together while at the same time being sure that we have a very powerful, very strong border, and border security will be equal if not greater than previously.  I didn’t like the sight or the feeling of families being separated.” Donald Trump on cancelling the separation of children from families. 20 June 2018

In early August 2018 572 children were awaiting reunification with their families.  Of these, the parents of 34 had waived reunification, 57 parents raised a “red flag”, and the parents of 68 had been released in the US.

---

“Are we calling this our second date?”. He smiled then looked down at the glass before him.

Helen sighed and cast a reproachful expression.

“I have suffered many an indignity when dating, but I've never been reduced to calling minor assault a date”. Then she smiled.

He lifted his hands, palms out in supplication.

“That was an imported beer. Expensive. For the record. But if you want to #MeToo me and the beer tweet away.”

“Tell that to my top. It's never been the same since”

Why was she here? Helen at times confounded herself. Paula said she knew of a nearby taxi stand that the queues would be ok.  Helen had followed her a couple of blocks only to find it shut. They headed to a diner across the road to call a cab and wait it out over some much needed caffeine.  Steve was already in there, three booths along talking animatedly and waving his hands in the air.

“Spill any more drinks over people” she’d asked, “ or had you reached your tally for the night.”

“Hello again.  Wanna share a cab?”

They travelled across this city together and before halfway to dropping her off at her apartment had exchanged numbers.    

---

“I do not for one moment accept that a Labour government would represent any kind of threat, let alone an ‘existential threat’, to Jewish life in Britain”, Jeremy Corbyn, 3 August 2018

“The recently disclosed remarks by Jeremy Corbyn are the most offensive statement made by a senior British politician since Enoch Powell’s 1968 ‘rivers of blood’ speech”, Jonathan Sacks, former Chief Rabbi, 28 August 2018, referring to comments made by Jeremy Corbyn at a conference in 2013.

---

Everything was on fire. They watched as the treehouse collapse and fall through the branches, thudding into the ground and adding to the flames consuming the undergrowth.

“It's getting bigger. We need to move further away.”

The animals turned and one by one trooped away from the wood, their heads hanging low. Their backs slumped.

“We can never go back.”

“I don't want to.”

---

“I think Theresa May has scored own goal of the season. “ Gary Lineker

---

Part 3

Better this lie than any other

The phone rang. First silence. Then a click. Long distance. “You listening?” A male voice. Middle aged. Worn. Then came the info. The accusation. The story.

---

“The US has great strength and patience. If it is forced to defend ourselves or our allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea.”

Donald Trump in his first address to the UN general assembly, Tuesday 19 September 2017

“There is a saying that the marching goes on even when dogs bark. If he was thinking he could scare us with the sound of a dog barking, that’s really a dog dream” Ri Yong-ho, Foreign Minister, North Korea, 20 September 2017.  In Korean, a dog dream is one that makes little sense.

---

“It's so lovely to see you. Your cafe is quite charming.”

This was when Helen knew there wouldn't be a third date.

---

“We are deeply concerned by news reports about changes to the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) that are under consideration. These changes would not only negatively impact thousands of hardworking people across the United States, but will be a step backwards for our entire nation.” Microsoft press release, 31 August 2017

“President Trump's decision to end DACA is child abuse under the guise of public outcry under the guise of public policy - and it's a policy reversal that Republicans and Democrats alike don't even want” Stephen Goldstein, Executive Director of the Anne Frank Centre for Mutual Respect.  "In a Presidency already the most inhumane of modern times, this is President Trump's most inhumane decision yet. He is inflicting pain on children, wreaking havoc on families, and throwing a grenade at immigrants who are part of our nation's soul. The President has descended even further beneath contempt." 4 September 2017

---

“Do you still dream?” asked Steve the Squirrel.

Jeffery the Badger and Helen the Rabbit looked at each other, then at Steve the Squirrel and shrugged.

“Last night I was in the wood once more. The sunlight danced on our faces as the beams came through the branches. It's quite some time since our last walk in the glade. I fear the day when my memories of it become lost amongst all the meetings with clients, annoying internet video interstitial ads, the weekly slog round the supermarket...”

---

“If I ever got impeached, I think the market would crash. I think everybody would be very poor” Donald Trump, 23 August 2018

---

“People. Us. We’re inconsistent.  We want change, but elsewhere, not to us, to “them” those that need a kick up the backside, the helping hand taken away.  We don’t want soundbites, to be sold pat lies but we want reassurances, to be told the future will be better. We’ve abandoned gods and the proclamation of priests, sages and druids but hit refresh on our browsers to hear what our elected leaders think will happen tomorrow.  Climate change is real when there’s a sorrowful turtle on our TVs but not when it would interfere with the strip mining of rare elements, the container ships spanning the oceans or the vast robot production lines assembling that TV. We want low taxes. Small government. Until something big goes wrong.”    

“Me. I’m a party man.  Working my way up. A staffer. An aide. A policy grunt. Manning the phone lines. Reaching out to voters. Keeping to the party lines. The election cycle is two years away and it’s already an echo chamber of controlled messages, spin and social media wars with anyone in our way.  Through this pattern bombing of fake smiles, waves and photo opportunities you can’t even say to yourself that you want to make things better without it coming across as some underwhelming banality”

“Finally we get a glimpse of the real you...the inner truth.  Come back to my apartment, if you like. I’ll reward you with some deeply average wine and a chance to spill your guts.”

---

“He offered alternative facts.”  Kellyanne Conway, defending claims over record breaking attendances at President Trump’s inauguration in January 2017

---

“They were here for five years. Dormant for lots of it.  It made spotting the pattern really difficult. I still kick myself over the first couple of years. Missing the signs.  A taxi driver stabbed with a screwdriver. A teacher burned. A nursery assistant strangled. The dismembered farmer. The drowned stewardess.  No familial, social economic, gender or racial links. They all lived in the the city. Had never met each other, never crossed paths unless stuck in the same freeway queues.  I dug. I kept digging. It was the sales rep and the hammer that brought things together. The join. No one believed me. Still don’t. But it was there. Trust me in that. They’d killed them all. She's a genuine monster.”

---

“I am appalled that this kind of ugly and naked Islamophobia has been published in a national newspaper.” Naz Shah, Labour Shadow Equalities Minister in response to article written by former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson in which he managed to criticise Denmark's ban on burkas in public but also assert that Muslim women who wear them looked “absolutely ridiculous”, comparing them to letter boxes or bank robbers.

6 August 2018

“I have said it’s very clear that anybody who is talking about this needs to think very carefully about the language that they use and the impact that language has had on people, and it is clear that the language that Boris used has offended people.” Theresa May avoiding a fuller condemnation of the man tipped to oust her as Prime Minister, 7 August 2018

---

“Is this an heirloom to your lumberjack days?”

“It’s not a prop if that’s what you’re asking.”

The chainsaw was out of place with the sparse decor, Helen had to agree.

But so was the head in the refrigerator.

---

“It’s called a wrap-up smear. You make up something. Then you have the press write about it. And then you say, everybody is writing about this charge. It’s a tool of an authoritarian,” Nancy Pelosi, 5 March 2018

---

Helen was tired.  Bored even. Time to go maybe.  She listened to those signs.

He was asleep on the couch. For now.  

By the time he woke up they’d be across town.

She dragged him to the service elevator.

---

“She was in a position to do something. She could have stayed quiet - or even better, she could have resigned.  There was no need for her to be the spokesperson of the Burmese military. She could have said look, you know, I am prepared to be the nominal leader of the country but not under these conditions”, Zeid Ra'ad al Hussein, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights discussing Aung San Suu Kyi, 30 August 2018.

---

A name. Jeffrey rang from the bar. His first drink was a chunk of time ago and he had no good reason to stop. Uniform could see this one through.  The guy from the insurers had finally got back to him that morning. The apartment was supposed to be vacant. Dead end. The usual. Before he rang off Jeffrey asked why they had the apartment in the first place.  It was for relocated staff from across the country and had been empty for months. The next call was his long distant friend. Just the name. What he needed. The answer but nothing he wanted to hear. He passed it on and looked for tall glass of welcome oblivion.  Then another.

---

“On March 17, the Arctic sea ice cover peaked at 5.59 million square miles (14.48 million square kilometers), making it the second lowest maximum on record, at about 23,200 square miles (60,000 square kilometers) larger than the record low maximum reached on March 7, 2017.

More significantly from a scientific perspective, the last four years reached nearly equally low maximum extents and continued the decades-long trend of diminishing sea ice in the Arctic. This year’s maximum extent was 448,000 square miles (1.16 million square kilometers) — an area larger than Texas and California combined – below the 1981 to 2010 average maximum extent.” Nasa, 23 March 2018

---

Uniform chose to wait instead. To contain. Surround. Drag him to the end.

“Hi Jeffrey.  I guess we’ll have plenty of time to catch up.” Helen held her wrists up together in front.  One by one, Jeffrey slowly brought them behind her back and cuffed her.

“Playtime in the wood was a long time ago.  I’m way passed caring. You hate. You love. You love to hate. Whatever your reasons I’ve heard them too many times.”  

“Oh grant me at least some sense of originality in my mandate. The details. My account. You’re going to have to pay testament Detective Jeffrey.  My old friend. Jeffrey. Jeffrey the Pyro.”

---

“Does Brexit mean we won’t have any more trees?” Hayley, Love Island contestant, 8 June 2018

Dark in the sky

We stood on the southern tip of Attica looking North.  The sky ahead was clouding over, replacing the blue skies that had been with us for the week of our holiday. Temperatures had been steadily rising by a couple of degrees every day.  By Monday we were facing 40 plus in the shade. The air was thick with haze. I could almost see all of the available moisture being evaporated into the sky. The clouds were dirty. “That’s pollution from Athens” she ventured.  I wasn’t so sure. The discolouration was faint. I thought Athens was too far away and maybe it was a nearby fire. Something small.

We played the tourist game. Strolling around a 2500 year old world heritage site, looking at yachts passing by on blue seas, sitting at a cafe lamenting the existence of ready salted crisps, drifting through gift shops idly gazing at reproduction artefacts. We moved on, driving up the coast looking for a good spot for a late lunch, arriving at a seaside town filled with large hotels ringing a beach.  One side formed an isthmus. A hotel’s wall ran down the divide but it contained a window to advertise what you could pay to enter. Today was different. Beyond the wall was on the windward side and it was a completely contrasting scene from ours. The wind was very strong with waves crashing with repetitive fury. People were streaming out through the gate to get off the beach. Meanwhile our view from the restaurant verander was significantly calmer, with only a duckling chain of dinghy's tippling over further to suggest any strength in the wind out of the shelter of the shoreline.  As the evening approached we headed to the airport for our flight home. The wind continued to grow. Navigating through Athens’ suburbs, gusts moved the hire car across the lane. With each shudder I reapplied my grip ever more firmly on the wheel. Crossing east from the undulating topology next to the sea the landscape opened up as we approached the airport. A smoke cloud was streaming down the eastern coastline, filling the sky. Landing airplanes had to fly through it, their eddies making only the briefest of swathes on the churning smokestack . The decks of the airport compressed the wind, pushing metal benches down the walkways.  We dragged ourselves and our luggage against the wind and on entering the departure gate crossed into the artificial reality of airports, all delayed passengers, duty free shops and near infinite opportunities for queuing. Joining in the standard ceremonies we drank coffee, played cards and waiting for our late departing flight. Fires were burning across the hillsides as we took off that night. There were no other details, just the bright flames in the darkness.

We arrived home, slept and woke to learn that Greece has suffered its worst wildfires for a decade, with 85 people dying at one site alone.  So far so goulish observation. The hotel we’d checked out of on Monday was in Mati, the village at the heart of the fires on the east of Attica.  After leaving the hotel we driven up to Marathonas to do some more sightseeing. We’d driven through Mati again around 13:30 before heading south. The roads in the area had always been busy.  The main roads the steady concertina between junctions of any built up area. The side roads were very “Greek”, all double parking and negotiated weaving to get from one end to the other. Maps drawn up in the days that followed showed that our hotel had survived but the fire line was only metres away. A charred landscape ringed it. Further south on the coastal back road to Rafina lines of burned out cars filled our news screens. We’d driven that road to have dinner in the port at Rafina on Sunday night. The hotel we’d left had been standard holiday fayre, canned music, poolside sunbathing and a walkway out to the beach.  It’s hard to reconcile these memories with testaments of the survivors, some who had fled into the sea from the flames and the smoke, guilty at being unable to protect those that drowned.

We were fine.  Unscathed but struggling to reconcile that we’d been close by at best a couple of hours from being involved in something devastating.  Life is filled with the calamities that don’t happen. The blown tyre on the drive home. The faulty gas boiler. The drunk driver in the other car…..  These remain hypothetical. Monday was all too real….meaning nothing and everything. Greece, never universally affluent has endured years of financial hardship since its debt crisis.  Our travels across the country highlighted both its inherent beauty but also the poverty that has impacted on the population as a whole. Not that any county does but Greece didn’t deserve this. Not my Greece. A country of family, of kindness, of not worrying about locking your doors, of friendship.

Crops will be sown in the fields and grow again. Houses will be rebuilt. The people will mourn. They will remember. We carry on. πάθει μάθος.

Because I listened to Dua Lipa

Dua Lipa. These are the words that damn me. Invoking mockery and derision. Because I’ve listened to Dua Lipa. Because I’ve watched a Rita Ora & Charli XCX video on YouTube. Because I own a couple of Taylor Swift songs. Because I know who Raye is.

The user centric algorithm based search results of a music streaming service are but an echo of activity spliced with some marketing AI. It’s aims are simple, to keep you using the service, remain monetising. The agenda is transparent. But what of those around me? My “friends”. The sources of mockery. The intervention. The flurry of value judgements. “This isn’t your music”. “This is pop”. “I remember when you had taste”. “You introduced me to some of the music I love but now all I see is a broken man having a mid life crisis investing his energy into young lovelies in a vaguely concerning manner.”

Communication. Not my forte. People. Not my bag. At work it sort of is but it’s all focused on computer systems and there’s a base logic at the heart of each debate, a pattern, a model we can all support. I never have to look a colleague in the eyes and ask them how they’re feeling. Unless it’s a joke, or a device to unsettle them as my logic isn’t winning the day. What I’m doing leading a large team when I have the interpersonal skills of a faulty dot matrix printer is perhaps a ripe subject for another blog but let me acknowledge I at least pick and choose how and when I communicate with people.

Or do I? Can we ever stop communicating. How is my body poised in relation to the other person. Where are my feet pointing? Am I slumped? Upright? Am I looking into their eyes or anywhere else? Is this somewhere polite society tells me I shouldn’t be staring at. And smacking my lips exclaiming “oh boy!”. Do my responses chime with theirs, a forward narrative that shows we’re listening and responding to each other? Or am I on broadcast mode, simply conveying my message and discounting theirs?

And what about when it’s a group? What about when I don’t know them well and we have no common ground to back reference. Do I have small talk? Or do I think of it as a precursor to the Java programming language? What is small talk? The weather? Brexit? Donald Trump? Tax deadlines? I sit at dinner tables with friends of friends and flounder. No one talks about work - too gauche, bar to say we’re all awfully busy. No one does politics….although the right wing people like us tone rings strong. Religion - I don’t think so. The arts? No. Society? Too much like politics. Move on. Where are you going skiing this year? I’m left with nothing. Or at least nothing I care about. Whether blah blah blah’s house is or isn’t selling. How hard it is to find a decent gardner or cleaner. What house improvements we should contemplate next. Yeah, let’s replace some guttering but let’s never speak of it more than we have to and never, ever over starters.

Are we a caring society or are we wilfully looking the other way as people fall by the wayside. What does this manifestation mean to us as individuals and as a collective? What is brexit? A rejection of central european bankers or a return turn the a world of zero rights and the Victorian ruling class. Do we live in a democracy? Should we accept the status quo? Who is actually happy? And is this an unobtainable myth? Are we just animals, circling each other working out the next death strike? What does art say to us as people? Do we question ourselves? What does history tell us of today? Should we accept science’s only truism, that whatever we currently view as an accepted position will be challenged and improved in perpetuity?

This is too hard. We’re scared of each other. Let’s talk about the new models of BMWs instead. The latest crime series on tv. The new super food in the stores. Let’s smile and wave. Get through the day. Let’s skim. Let’s play Dua Lipa.