Richard Pierce

Richard Pierce – author, poet, painter

Life, Music, Writing

Day 84

I have woken up this morning with a song in my head which I know neither title nor artist of. I don’t even know if the lyrics of it swirling round my head are the right ones. The tune is familiar and I really want to play the song, but… I’ve even tried to google what I think the song is, what the lyrics are, but have drawn a blank. And now I’m listening to Max Richter’s November while writing this so I can block out the madness that comes with having songs play to you in your head but not being able to decipher them.

A metaphor for life? I’m not sure.

I still don’t feel comfortable at my desk. Everything seems like it’s an inch or two out of place, and my keyboard straddles the crack here the extension leaf of the table starts. Only now, as I look at the desk have I realised I could sort this by turning the table round. Maybe I’ll do it next week when I’m on holiday, although the pain of having to disconnect  both computers, all the broadcasting equipment etc etc is putting me off. Silly really. Although I do have another idea for the reconfiguration of the study that involves cobbling together a standing desk for broadcasting using a load of Ikea storage boxes and a spare white table top that I think came with the house when we bought it.

Ramblings just to get words out. Consider it a warm-up.

I still haven’t glued the last three days of posts into my journal. It can be a problem, because it sort of stops me from writing long-hand poems into the thing, because I need to have everything in chronological order. I have always found it odd that someone whose mind thrives on chaos when it comes to putting words together is so OCD about the exact placement of his keyboard, about having his journal in exactly the correct chronological order, his books and vinyl in alphabetical order (not yet achieved for books because half of them are still in boxes in the shed).

We are just contradictions. That’s the beauty and irrationality of us.

One thing I hate, and I see it looking back up this post (although I won’t edit it out) is starting the sentences that begin paragraphs with I. It always seems a little self-centred, but I’ll give myself slack this morning. Perhaps I don’t think of myself enough, perhaps I don’t think enough of myself, perhaps I think too much of myself, too much about myself. Language does strange things with the positioning of words. I start therapy again in two weeks. I think I have come to the recognition that I probably need this weekly hour with someone outside the circle for the rest of my life.

And on the keyboard thing – if it’s not in the right place it makes the wrong sort of sounds and my fingers hit the wrong keys. And I’ve suddenly remembered the song. It’s playing now. Open Letter by The Beäfets. One of my 23 top songs of 2021.

We are fragmentaries. We hold fragments of lives. Our past. Our present. Our future.

 

 

AGGIE’S ART OF HAPPINESS – CHAPTER 41

 

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2 Comments

  1. Ren Powell

    25th March 2022 at 14:20

    I used to worry a lot about all my sentences beginning with I.
    The thing is, if if doesn’t and it is still my thought – the I is implied or I am making the assumption that I am speaking for other people as well. And that is just rude 😉
    So I stopped worrying about it much. Sometimes if I think it looks too repetitive visually – I just abbreviate the grammar – swallow all the I’s.
    You’re good. Balanced. Generous. No worries about your I’s.

    1. Richard Pierce

      25th March 2022 at 16:17

      If I’m balanced, so are you. Yes, I like abbreviating the grammar, too. Always have. Dead Men is full of staccato. Like the white space, it divides the audience which can never actually be a bad thing. They’re all thinking. Just like we are. And at the risk of making us writers sound vain and like megalomaniacs, we do speak for other people. That’s why we write. 🙂
      R

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