Shit pearl

Ah, I dunno. Today writing this feels gross. I feel gross. The world feels gross. I made the mistake of peeking out and saw the stupid world gone mad over the olympic opening ceremony. So much air time given to what ‘conservatives’ think. Suddenly I feel this urge to qualify how much I loved that fucken weird mad acid trip ceremony, in case I’ve been misunderstood, write another piece about in defence of the imagination of it, the looseness and beauty of it, the brilliant idea to set the whole thing along the Seine. But I’m only doing it to prove that I’m not that kind of person, that though I wrote that it ripped my face off, it didn’t mean I didn’t love it. This binary thing, where you have to declare constantly lest ye be judged. It’s gross. It’s all gross. I hate it and it’s making me not want to write this stupid thing, now I’m waking up anxious about it but it was supposed to be a small joy, a little n’importe quoi.

A friend I admire, a local music producer, came into the bookshop a few months back and in the space of buying a book, wrapping it and saying goodbye we had a brief conversation that has lingered with me. It was about how for him, as a white male, he has been quiet for the past years, allowing his (astonishingly beautiful and widely beloved) work leak out into the world in the smallest way possible, because that was what he thought his place should be, in the current times. It made me feel like crying because this man is so beautiful, so vast and deep, the idea of the world missing his voice right now was heartbreaking.

We need you so bad, I said, and I say this to Matt all the time. Please be louder. It’s not in their blood to try and drown out the lunacy with their beauty, to participate in this mindless world of chatter. Still, I can’t stand that they would make an effort to be even quieter.

Then I realised I’d been doing the same thing. And it is in my blood to talk too much. I like to write. I like to share. It’s natural to me, it’s fun. I had been swelling like violet beauregarde for ages trying so hard not to write.

I don’t know. Today I can’t be fucked. It’s a shame spiral, a desire to retreat to silence. I’ve made the half hour a day pact so I’ll publish this. Another pearl on the string, as Matt says. A shit pearl. But still a pearl.