Sunday 30 September 2012
Saturday 29 September 2012
Thursday 20 September 2012
Wednesday 19 September 2012
Tuesday 18 September 2012
Basic Practices
Basic Practices
1. Walking the Shadow
If possible, take a walk in a quiet countryside environment or in a location where you will not be disturbed by too much human interference.
A sunny day is required [not too difficult in the Mediterranean yet more challenging in UK].
The practice is simply to walk in a direction that allows you to see your shadow on the road / path ahead of you. Set a specific time frame for the practice and walk with your entire focus on the shadow in front of you. Breathe into it totally, ignoring any attempt to interpret whatever comes [physical sensations / emotions / thoughts etc]. Just walk, watch and breathe.
At the completion of the exercise, thank your shadow for its participation and also the Sun for its provision of light.
2. Light on Water
This practice will require a sunny day and is most beneficial when there is a light breeze in the air. Locate a body of water [lake / pond / river / stream / sea / ocean / puddle etc] and find a place where you can sit undisturbed for a period of at least 20 minutes. You will need to be in a position where you can observe the reflection of the sunlight on the water.
Take some moments to breathe gently, yet with purpose, at the beginning of the practice. Then, allow the focus of your eyes to become very soft or even gently blurred.
Looking in this way, begin to gaze at the point on the water where the sunlight and ripples created by the soft breeze interact. Remember to breathe through the nostrils, directly from the stomach.
Allow yourself to become filled by the patterns created by the interplay of light and water. Breathe into whatever becomes visible.
At the conclusion, thank the sunlight, water and the location where you were sat.
3. Merging streams.
If possible, locate a place where two rivers or streams come together to form one larger river or stream.
Before beginning the practice, acknowledge the two individual streams and then the one that exists as a result of their merging.
Begin by taking some moments to breathe with awareness and feel yourself present in that location.
When ready, bring your attention to the point where the two streams merge to form the single larger stream.
Continue to breathe deeply as your gaze upon this point. Notice any changes in your visual awareness.
As you breathe ever more deeply, acknowledge that you are that midpoint, you are the fusion of the two separate streams into one flowing body of water.
After 15 minutes expand your field of vision to include all three streams. At this point, the encouragement is to let go totally and allow the presence of all three streams to be felt in the lower stomach area.
Upon completion , thank the rivers / streams for their support.
4. Gazing the Gaps
This practice can be done in any location. I find it most beneficial when supported by a natural environment, yet this is simply personal choice.
The whole emphasis of the practice is to bring the visual attention not onto the physical objects seen in your field of vision, but onto the gaps between them.
Begin by scanning your immediate environment, breathing gently as you do so. As you continue, acknowledge any areas that attract your attention. Select one of these as the focus of your attention.
Once the area is selected, acknowledge the physical shapes present in that location, then bring total awareness to the spaces or gaps between them. Breathe into the space for up to fifteen minutes. Every time your awareness wanders from the gap and focuses on the physical object / shape, simply take a deep breath and return to focus of the gap.
One situation where I find this practice to be particularly intense is when the gap gazing is focused on the space between the crowns of neighbouring trees. This is emphasised when the sky is devoid of cloud or during dusk and dawn.
5. Birds in flight
Following the flight of birds as they move through the air is a practice that can lead to direct observation of the dot-infused matrix that subtly permeates all aspects of the horizontal experience.
Gazing through softly-focused or gently blurred eyes can lead to visual confirmation of the presence of this matrix.
Select an area where birds are common. Gardens and parks in urban areas are just as supportive of this practice as are fields and woodlands in the countryside.
As you prepare for the practice, breathe deeply for several minutes to energise your system. Connect with the immediate physical environment, acknowledging the earth upon which your feet are placed. Feel yourself grounded as you breathe, becoming a representative of the landscape and offering yourself in service as a bridge between the earth and the air, the land and the sky.
Once you feel ready, scan the air for any birds. When one or more are seen in flight, simply follow their movement whilst continuing to breath deeply into the abdomen. Acknowledge any changes in the visual field that occur.
The most beneficial conditions for this practice are found early in the morning or during evening twilight. Coastal areas are particularly supportive as they provide opportunities for observing birds in flight for long periods of time.
Regular repetition of this practice may lead to a rewiring of the visual cortex and an increased potential for direct experience and observation of the matrix.
6. Wind and leaves
This is another practice that, in my experience, stimulates direct observation of the earth's magnetic energy grid or matrix.
The conditions most supportive of this practice are a sunny, windy day when the trees are in full leaf.
As with the previous practice, use deep breathing to connect with the local environment before beginning. Choose a location where you are able to observe the tree [s] from a distance of approximately 30 metres.
When you feel suitably tuned in to the landscape, allow the eyes to soften or gently blur. Whilst continuing to breathe deeply yet naturally, allow your attention to settle on the movement of the leaves of the tree[s] you have selected. It is most beneficial to look towards the crown of the tree[s], particularly the outer-most leaves who define the apparent limit of the tree's physical form.
It is there, right on the edge, where the movement of the leaves can stimulate an visual experience of the magnetic grid. It is possible to observe the tree and anything that exists in your field of vision as being constructed of million upon million of vibrating dots. It is also possible to see the physical form of the tree super-imposed upon a light-grey grid of varying geometric design.
Monday 17 September 2012
Raindrops
Raindrops
A single raindrop.
A single drop of rain
Wet falls in the calling
Of a swollen heart.
Between the beats
Where sleet can sometimes
Colder go and trembling turn
The air itself to snow,
A song sits still, sits silent
In the shining of its eyes.
"LOVE I AM" it starts to sing,
"LOVE only and the Heart of Man,
I breathe and breath
Knows death no more,
I Was, I Will, I AM."
Sunday 16 September 2012
Saturday 15 September 2012
Friday 14 September 2012
Wednesday 12 September 2012
Tuesday 11 September 2012
Jake's TV
Jake’s TV
Chapter One
Jake lived at number eighty 7. He thought it was heaven, on Earth. His nose was quite long and his snoring so strong that every night he woke the neighbours at number eighty 5. His dream was to scream through an empty ice-cream cone all the way from his house to the park gates, without drawing breath. It was a 15-minute walk with a following wind, 17 if it was blowing in his face. He always sharpened his pencils in an anti-clockwise direction and then wondered why every pencil sharpener he bought had a faulty blade. At the last count, he had one thousand four hundred and eighty 7 blunt pencils stored in an unused microwave under the stairs. His home, a bungalow, was called Bugaloo. Next to the front door, a piece of granite was set into the wall. It had the word ‘Bugaloo’ chiselled into it in an elvish typescript with [in brackets] the question: ‘How do you do?’
Jake could do 123 one armed press-ups. He was at his best using his left arm. His right arm had been removed just above the elbow when he was 6 years old. Ever since then, he’d referred to himself as the ‘One armed bandit’. The use of his remaining arm had been raised to such a level of unbelievable perfection and dexterity that it was worth three, four or perhaps even five fully-functioning and attached upper limbs, left or right. For example, he could peel an orange, tie his shoe laces or, most impressively of all, spread a slab of rock solid butter on a piece of his beloved wholemeal toast without breaking sweat.
Of the other assorted abilities and talents Jake had discovered during the course of his life so far, none were perhaps as celebrated by all who knew him as was the manner in which he employed his deeply flared nostrils during breathing. He seemed to possess a quite unique talent which enabled him to keep only one barrel open whilst breathing in, the other somehow being closed as tight as a farmer’s wallet.
He performed this logic-defying feat without any use whatsoever of his one hand that was attached to his one arm. Such was his delight in mischief making that he would regularly alternate which nostril he kept open when a breath was taken in and then immediately question any who were in his company if it was the same one he had used for the previous intake of air. Certain members of his intimate circle of friends, through strenuous effort and unrelenting practice, had somehow managed to learn and then perfect Jake’s bizarre breathing technique. They referred to themselves as the Nostrils.
Such simple pleasures were the cornerstone of his everyday and every night life.
Yet there was a very different and altogether more deceptive side to this remarkable specimen of a human being that remained hidden to all but the most sensitive and perceptively astute of his friends and varied acquaintances. Mystery was indeed his only true and trusted friend.
On the surface of things, to most people he met, Jake was considered to be what is generally called ‘normal’. Yes his physical appearance was slightly different to most people you might meet in the course of your everyday life, but in all other aspects, he didn’t really stand out from the crowd.
His choice of clothing never drew undue attention and his hair, although shaved very short to mask the onset of premature balding, was nothing out of the ordinary. Perhaps his determined approach and the impeccable way in which he dealt with his disability were the only things that lead to him being treated in an unquestionably favourable fashion by those who knew him. His ability to meet head-on every challenge that life had thrown at him meant neighbours, colleagues and the local community in general held him in the very highest esteem. The manner in which he had learned to not only cope with but actually make a mockery of the fact that he was one arm short of a full set endeared him most deeply to all who spent time in his company. To say he was admired would be an understatement of titanic and colossal proportions.
For several years running, Jake had won the regional stage of the One-Armed Citizen of the Year award and had twice made it to the national final, only to be beaten into second place on both occasions by a one-armed milkman from Preston, lovingly nicknamed ‘Stumpy’ by his customers.
Wherever he went in town, he was greeted with cheery ‘Hellos’ and one-handed high fives. He was bombarded with offers of marriage from beautiful women and strange looking men who wore green sandals. It was a rare occasion when he had to pay for food, drinks or any other such sustenance. But as I said, on the surface of things...
Chapter Two
Jake pulled the curtains in his lounge together and lay down on the carpet. Everything was ready. His preparations were perfect and planned in minute detail. Weeks of furious rehearsal had lead to this very point. This was it; the Moment. He reached out for the control console and then grumbled, realising he was groping in the darkness with a limb that ended just above the elbow. So much for planning he thought to himself. He rolled effortlessly onto his side and grabbed the sleek gadget with his left hand. His thumb slowly eased over the mass of sensor pads. It knew where it was going; practice makes perfect after all. When it reached its target, it hovered above it for a few final seconds. Small beads of sweat trickled down his forehead and into his eyes. His breath came in shallow shifts and his heart beat out a steady monotonous rhythm in the caverns of his chest. For a moment, his resolve wavered and his left arm was possessed by an urge to smash the controller into the floor. He pictured the broken pieces, the technological intestines spilled out onto the blood-red carpet. The veins in his hand bulged under the influence of undiluted rage and then deflated as the surge subsided.
As his thumb met the cold plastic membrane covering the sensor pad, a shiver of unknown delight rippled softly through his body. He had done it. He had really gone and done it. In a rush of drug-like pleasure, he seemed to melt into the warm threads of the carpet, lost in a personal world of pure contentment. He was recalled from the depths of his momentary trip into dream-like revelry by a clear and confident voice: “Next on BBC 1, the 10 O’clock News, with subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing.” A smile of smug satisfaction sat happily on his face. His eyes drank in the high-speed flicker of the screen and he watched with child-like fascination the shadows it cast on the white expanse of the ceiling.
Ignoring the sharply dressed man who filled the screen with his serious gaze, Jake reached carefully into the back of the television. His preparations during the previous weeks had included gently cutting a hole in the plastic casing of the unit. For Jake’s purpose, an older style TV was far superior to the flat screen models that had now been marketed into the forefront of people’s minds.
With a determined flick of his wrist, two previously unconnected cables were joined together, like man and wife, and the presenter in the sharp suit disappeared in a haze of pulsating static. For a moment, the screen lay still. Jake positioned himself in front of it and slowly closed his eyes.
Using a technique he had seen demonstrated by a man of Egyptian origin, who one Thursday evening just before Christmas, had given a lecture at the Town Hall on pre-Christian civilisations, he placed all his attention in the centre of his left earlobe. Using his breath to calm the furious workings of his rampant mind, Jake felt the ear lobe in question begin to burn. It felt as if every cell had ignited its own microscopic furnace. For a while, his breath came in gasps and he pictured his lungs as bellows, supplying precious oxygen to the hidden industries of his lower ear. When his breath returned to a more steady rhythm, Jake opened his eyes. He mumbled several words into the palm of his hand and then placed it flat on the screen.
This was the first time in over 12 years that he had attempted to use the TV in such a way. On the previous occasion, the screen had imploded as soon as he had placed his hand near it and it had taken him since then to create the necessary conditions for another attempt. This time there was no sound of shattering glass or the hiss and muffled screams of an electronic meltdown. No smoke poured genie-like from the bowels of the set. And none of Jake’s hopes and dreams lay scattered in broken pieces on the floor. What did happen is quite possibly beyond your boundaries of belief. It certainly was Jake’s. Nothing could have prepared him for the transformation that occurred as a result of his basic tinkering with the TV’s innards and the placement of his hand on the warm vibrating glass. It began as a glow in his face. His cheeks burned red hot and for a moment, he feared he had electrocuted himself. As the heat left his face, he felt it migrate south into his chest, where it took on the form of an angry volcano. After several attempts which left Jake on the verge of unconsciousness, the volcano finally erupted and sent him spiralling down into a black abyss of non-awareness.
When he came round, things were, well, different. Let’s just say there had been a change. From inside the screen, Jake could see his left hand magnetically locked to the outside, silhouetted by a crackle of grey static. He could see his body, his missing lower right arm and the room around his physical form. So far so good; Stage 1 complete. To reach this point had been his main intention. The position he found himself in correlated perfectly with the instructions that had appeared in a bluish-green text on the inside of the screen and this helped him deal with the low level panic he was beginning to experience. His dilemma was centred on the fact that he could see his body lay on the carpet, yet at the very same time, he was aware of his presence inside the TV. Added to this was the seemingly impossible evidence that the invisible ‘him’ could experience such emotions as fear and anxiety. Yet the instructions explained that these were common and necessary features of the first stage.
Having read and digested this information, Jake rapidly adjusted to his unfamiliar surroundings and even had to admit that as strange as it all seemed, things were not so new and different as they had at first appeared, just moments before. Lurking somewhere deep within him was the sense that somehow, all of this was a small part of a routine procedure, one that occurred on a regular basis but which didn’t normally register in his everyday awareness.
The instructions displayed on the screen now contained very clear advice regarding the nature of the second stage. In large glowing bold letters, they stated that the next manoeuvre could prove to be extremely challenging. What they actually said was this:
‘Please be aware that you may experience a rapid and dramatic alteration in your emotional field during this part of the procedure. This is perfectly normal and should not be the cause of undue alarm. However, in the unlikely event of an emergency, place your right hand on the inside of the screen and wait for three seconds. You will then be in a position to continue.’
Initially, Jake felt comforted by these words. He liked that fact that he could prepare himself in some way for what was possibly to come. He felt in complete control of his actions and was on the verge of commencing the preliminary tests for stage 2 when the efficient working of his rational mind ground to an abrupt halt. ‘Right hand?’ he thought to himself. ‘Did I just read right hand?’ He reread the words that seemed to glow from within with their own light. Yes, he had not been mistaken. It did clearly say right hand.
Having already discovered that the virtual instruction manual was controlled and operated by the employment of thoughts, Jake feverishly scanned the text for a solution to his dilemma. It was increasingly difficult to think straight, yet he persevered. In his non-body body, he was experiencing what could only be described as a dry mouth. Somehow, and he couldn’t for one minute explain how it happened, he reached a position of mental stability. With the apparent respite provided by this oasis of cerebral calm, he had begun to ponder these increasingly strange and paradoxical circumstances when the Hammer Blow hit home. It knocked the proverbial stuffing out him. His balloon was well and truly popped and all wind taken from his sails. You see, in the midst of his desperate text-trawling exercise it had dawned on him that even if he did have a right hand with which to touch the inside of the screen, he was currently in a most definitely body-less and non-physical situation. And, there was no help option anywhere to be found amongst the cold script, however frantically he mentally flicked through it. ‘It wouldn’t matter if I had a thousand hands to choose from’ he thought to himself, ‘because inside the screen, I cannot touch anything’.
The whole situation was beginning to enter the rotten realm of nightmare. Jake had never experienced such a sense of misery, of complete and utter obscurity. Through his unseen eyes, his prostrate body sprawled motionless on the carpet floor seemed no more than a piece of worthless meat. His invisible self inside the television set seemed no more than a ghoulish figment of a very disturbed and darkened imagination, an imagination that was not necessarily his own. If he screamed, no one could hear him. His meticulous preparations for the experiment had included booking a bogus holiday in Egypt.
He had cancelled his daily pint of milk and likewise the delivery of a daily paper. He’d even gone to the length of arranging for a specialist airport taxi company to collect him from his house at the precise moment when several of his neighbours would be leaving for work. Some of them had wished him a happy holiday and then under their breath muttered ‘It’s alright for some’. He had actually gone to the airport in the taxi and agreed a pick-up time with the driver for when he returned home from his trip to the Sinai Desert.
Never before had Jake knowingly experienced such depths of crushing confusion. It felt to him as if the carpet of his total existence had been pulled from under his very feet. He had fallen to an unknown floor, without form or feel. He had forgotten who, where and what he was. Perhaps he’d never known in the first place. Forgotten memories of frightening clarity exploded somewhere in his contorted field of awareness as he travelled through a storm of electric intensity.
How long Jake remained in this turbulent state is devoid of any relevance. It‘s like asking how long is a piece of string. The tick tock clock had come to a stop. Jake was dead. His corpse-like body still obliged with a heartbeat and slow regular rise and fall of the chest, but he was dead nonetheless. The Jake who Jake himself once thought he knew was no more. In the burning furnaces of stage 2, the chaotic crucible had reduced his bone and brittle boundaries to a mere dust, to ash and nothing more. And of course, there wasn’t anything wrong. The experiment hadn’t failed and neither had Jake. It didn’t matter about his missing right hand and the inside of the screen. And likewise the instructions; they were only instructions after all. They weren’t an order and every set always leaves room for manoeuvre. The fact of the matter was this: everything was correct in accordance with the authentic workings of the second stage.
This was suddenly and quite gloriously confirmed for Jake who again became Jake by the nudging of a voice that may possibly and riskily be described as being spiral in nature. Don’t ask me how a sound can have shape but it just did at that moment in time. And so it was in this mysterious manner that the hero of this strange tale experienced a kind of homecoming.
The voice said this: “Congratulations Mr Spud [his father had been a commentator – not that the voice said this of course]; second stage complete. You have successfully negotiated your way through The Gap. You are provisionally intact and have clearance to continue. Please proceed to boarding gate 13.” No explanation. No mention of the right-handed dilemma or possible emergency and definitely no room for questions or reassuring confirmation. In his innermost chamber, where council was kept with his closest advisers, Jake could conceive of only one course of action: to trust.
Chapter 3
The sight that greeted Jake’s not-there eyes hit him harder than did the fact that his awareness had returned to some form of what is generally termed normality. On what appeared to be a most distant horizon that fizzled with leaps of lavender coloured energy, he could just make out the inside of the screen and his physical body still lying on the carpet in his lounge. He struggled for a moment to recall what this scene represented and how it connected to him, yet he summoned the strength to succeed and was rewarded with an unusual sense of effortlessness. “I’m sat inside a stream” he thought to himself. In front of him [his awareness retained the understanding of front and back] stood a gigantic ice-cream cone, with the number 13 emblazoned across it, just below the wafer thin rim that normally holds the frozen goodies. Its apex was not fixed to point in one direction but moved in a circular motion through all the points of an invisible compass. Once it had completed a whole clockwise circuit, it instantly moved in reverse, travelling right to left in homage to all things anticlockwise. Its motion slowed and actually came to a brief standstill over each of what would be the four cardinal directions, before continuing on.
If Jake had been able to, he would have rubbed his eyes. However, his disbelief was at first balanced and then consumed by the sheer snake-like thread of ecstasy that felt as if it was slowly enclosing him in its coils. To his utter amazement, his physical body, still visible through the distant looking glass of the screen, was responding to this serpentine stimulus. It began to writhe in a most suggestive manner, the hips making small circular motions and the face screwed into an expression of beatific otherworldliness. Jake felt pleasantly sick and intoxicated by the inexpressible perfume of the whole experience. He sensed himself slipping into a quite different type of obscurity, yet felt compelled to stay where he was. God he was tempted to let go and fall into the stream but some inner hand stayed the rudder of his ship and he remained firmly positioned in front of the revolving cone.
In doing so, he seemed to have passed another unknown test. The effortlessness returned and he observed the cone increase its speed of movement. It began to spin so that the edges of its form blurred cosily with the mass of vibrant colours around it.
A climax of sorts was reached when its frantic motion created a whirlpool of molten white light, much the same as a Catherine Wheel does in the dark of a November Bonfire Night. Neither fear nor anxiety came to Jake, for he knew without knowing how, he had reached a place where they simply had no meaning. The cone itself was no longer visible. All Jake could see through his dream-dusted eyes was a large vibrating wheel. It positively hummed with impossible colours. Its centre was filled with what looked like a shimmering sheet of gossamer thin silk, yet Jake had nothing to adequately compare it with. The liquid-like substance rippled and billowed as if obeying the currents of some unseen breeze. Jake knew it was alive in a way that even his intuition didn’t understand and he marvelled at its translucent beauty. It drew his formless gaze closer and closer until some element of his unseen self actually touched the quivering membrane. His vacated body on the carpet twisted and turned with spasm after spasm of electrical energy. It was contorted into grotesque shapes and at times jolted clear of the floor.
Then came another voice; this time, one of heartbreaking softness. It came as a vision of dancing bubbles, resplendent in hues of gold and green, who wound their way gently round a tree of polished marble. Free of the clumsy deliverance so particular to words, Jake instantly understood the message. He more than understood it for he and the message were one, fused and welded together through the awe-full weight of their emptiness. Each mesmerising movement of the bubbles was a note in some cascading celestial harmony; a measureless paean to the sound of silence. Swept away by wave upon wave of crushing bliss, the message eventually solidified, rock-like, as a thought in his uncluttered mind: “Poetry. The Gaps are full of poetry.” And right there and then, a poem that was a seed was born in his heart.
The seed must find the soil
Must find the ground in which to grow,
In field or park or compost dark
The purpose is to sow.
About your business carefully,
Aware of twist and turn,
Each step a kiss of grateful bliss
For all there is to learn.
Remember all are welcome
In your house of many rooms,
From short to tall, embrace them all,
Their thorns and sweetest blooms.
Accept the stage you choose to tread
The weight of every scene,
Enjoy the play of night and day,
And twilight in between.
For time has come, oh yes it’s come
And the climate is so fair,
From the seeds you’ve sown, let’s see what’s grown,
What fruits you have to bear.
As the dance of the final line melted away, Jake saw that each word had become a leaf on the branches of the tree. They trembled in the thrill of their existence and drew Jake in, until he found his awareness sitting at the base of the trunk. He gazed up to the highest branches, splayed out like the ivory fingers of an ancient sage and then down into the roots through a floor that permitted such impossible vision.
The final image he could recall was of the trunk opening to reveal a spiral staircase of well-worn stone that lead down and down to some unfathomable depths. He could just make out what appeared to be a mass of dome-shaped constructions at the very bottom of the staircase when he felt the flame of his awareness first spit and splutter then burn out completely.
And Jake knew no more. For days and nights he drifted in a sea of unspeakable vastness, at one with the wind and the waves, tossed and turned and then slowly returned to the solid ground of his body that was curled in a ball on the carpet. Ten days it was in total he spent submerged in the depths. Neither food nor drink passed his lips in that time but his heart did not fail and his lungs obediently emptied and filled as if on automatic pilot. The only obvious physical change was a slight loss of weight and extra centimetre of grey hair that had sprouted in defiance of the razor to come.
He first realised he was back in his body when an earthquake-like tremor tore through the part of himself he had known as his belly. Full awareness at this time had not quite returned and for a moment, Jake lay in his cocoon of mental and physical darkness wondering what it was he was experiencing. Well, to be perfectly honest, his pondering was free of self-reflection, as he hadn’t yet arrived at the momentous point of realising that he actually existed at all. His precise location was a womb of non-awareness. He could experience but not reflect; he could feel but not think, nor put any labels upon even the most microscopic feature of his unknown situation.
And then, in a blaze of searing light, with trumpets sounding and the full acoustic fireworks of an orchestra exploding in the dark heart of his consciousness, he experienced the mind shattering sensation that comes with moments of pure and absolute clarity. The jigsaw was complete, all pieces of the fragmented whole having been returned to their rightful and original place. Bellow-like, his lungs drew in an almighty breath of air. His ribcage shuddered, heaved twice and then repeatedly jerked his chest and upper torso towards the ceiling. The wrinkled lids of his eyes rolled back like shutters beckoning in the dawn of a newborn day. Another tremor tore across the empty expanse of his shrunken stomach and in a final lunge his consciousness crossed the finishing line and lay panting of the track of his everyday awareness. His victory scream was the gold medal of all verbal outpourings.
It ricocheted several times round the room and then somehow forced its way through curtain and glass out into the business of the street and its early morning comings and goings. It caught the poor milkman so unawares as he bent down to place a pint on Jake’s doorstep that his creamy cargo was launched high into the air before coming to rest in an artistic heap on the crazy paving. The paper delivery girl was disturbed to the point of distraction as she inadvertently rode her BMX into the pond at number 36, whilst the postman, way down the far end of the street thought the noise was simply the usual abuse he got from the family who occupied number 81.
The revelation revealed in the thunder of Jake’s voice was simplicity in itself. It was also highly understandable, given the nature of the mysterious journey he had made, what with visions of ice cream cones and such like. For the words that dragged him back, alive and kicking into the affairs of the everyday world were these:
“I’m hungry!”
Chapter 4
Jake had to act fast or the final part of his plan would lie in tattered ruins. He could already hear the beginnings of a conversation between the milkman and one of his early-rising neighbours. “Get up Jake, get up” he urged himself, whilst still trying to come to terms with the whole bone-shaking experience. Somehow summoning the strength to comply with the unspoken guidance he got up off the carpet and spent but a few seconds collecting his thoughts before moving purposefully into action. Everything seemed to happen with precision and a minimal expenditure of energy. He pulled on his shoes, splashed a few drops of water on his gleaming face and grabbed the suitcase from the cupboard under the stairs. He pulled on his jacket and felt for his wallet in the inside right pocket. With everything in order, he let himself out of the back door, making use of the shadows to creep fox-like to the back gate. Rather than turn left or right into the alleyway, he scuttled straight ahead and disappeared into the tangled mass of shrubs, trees and brambles that populated the wasteland behind his house.
He knew exactly where to go, which path to take and how to avoid any early morning dog-walkers who may have thrown a spanner in his whole works. He reached the railings on the far side of the wasteland without even encountering a single bird, let alone another person. He squeezed through the gap where the iron uprights had been prised apart by some angry youths and snuck across the parallel lines of the train track. With weasel like stealth, he zipped into the large industrial estate and dodged in and out of the splodges of fading darkness that lay between the reach of each streetlamp. Jake was just about to step out into the orange light towards the bus shelter that sat opposite a large furniture warehouse when he saw two men approaching. His alarm increased when he realised he recognised one of them. He tried to make himself as small as possible and withdrew as much as he could into the bush behind him.
“Last day today. I can’t wait till three o’clock. Jane’s picking me up to save a bit of time. Straight home, a quick shower, make sure the kids have got everything and off to the airport.” Jake’s neighbour could hardly contain his excitement and relief at the prospect of escaping for a couple of weeks. “Yeah, we’ve got an apartment right near the beach. It’s still supposed to be warm this time of year, well, that’s what Jake said anyway.
I think he gets back this morning. Half the time, I just wonder what he’s been up to, going off on his own like that? I reckon there’s more to our friend than meets the eye.” His friend mumbled something about having to wait another six weeks before it was his turn, then proceeded to curse most of the people he worked with, particularly the management and directors.
So engrossed in the conversation were they that the two men passed by the partially hidden Jake without as much as an upward glance. He waited until they had turned the corner of the pavement and, scanning around with the eyes of a soon to roost owl, moved to the shelter. Within minutes, a bus pulled up. Jake immediately noticed the lack of passengers. He silently thanked his lucky stars and climbed confidently aboard. On the journey to the bus station, his sense that someone or something was pulling strings on his behalf intensified, as the driver whizzed past stop after stop, leaving queues of bemused and angry passengers to ponder his irrational antics.
As the bus approached the station, Jake’s heart moved up a gear and beat double time in his chest. Surely someone would see him, would recognise his face and the flapping form of his lower right arm. His body tensed and a nervous shiver echoed up and down his spine. He was hastily trying to figure out how he could avoid detection when to his utter amazement, the driver sailed past the station entrance and indicated to move out onto the busy ring road. Having safely done so, he coughed to get Jake’s attention. When he had it, his eyes grabbed Jake in the reflection of the mirror. For a brief moment, their vision locked together and Jake understood. “You’re not a bus driver are you? You don’t even know how to drive. I know what you really do. It’s obvious. You’re in the catering trade aren’t you?” The driver smiled but said nothing, for his smile said it all, as did Jake’s final words to the mysterious man: “You make ice cream cones.”
The bus, with perfect timing of course, arrived at the airport taxi rank in the same moment as the fare Jake had booked days before. He grabbed his suitcase and hopped off onto the tarmac, without even so much as a backward glance at the still grinning driver.
“Morning gov. Had a good trip? You ain’t got much of a tan have you? You been up to no good I bet. Ha, the one armed bandit strikes again.” The taxi driver whistled a happy tune as he placed Jake’s case into the boot. “Straight home is it? I bet you could do with a rest. I don’t know about you but holidays tire me out. I need to go again to get over the one I’ve just had. Still, shouldn’t complain.”
When the taxi pulled up outside his house, Jake wasn’t surprised to see a small crowd of neighbours gathered outside his front door. As he made his way up the path, they parted like the waves of the red sea and fell into a stunned silence. “Is everything alright?” Jake asked to no one in particular, feigning concern. “Well, we can’t make head nor tail of it” the milkman said. “I definitely heard something; a shout from inside. Made me drop your milk it did. I can’t swear on it but it sounded something like ‘I’m hungry’. It scared the life out of me. I can’t figure it out and neither can the rest of us.” The crowd all nodded and murmured in agreement. “Do you know what’s going on? We didn’t think you’d had anyone to stay when you’d been away.” Having said his bit the milkman turned to fully face Jake and pleaded with his eyes for some kind of explanation.
Jake suppressed the urge to laugh. An impish giggle was wanting to launch itself out into the world, via his belly and mouth. Having mastered his feelings, he addressed the crowd, who shuffled as a collective unit in anticipation of his words. “Well, firstly, let me thank you for your concerns. It just shows me what a fine set of neighbours I have. Secondly, I’ve had a fantastic holiday and will tell you about it in due course. Now, to try to explain; no, I haven’t had anyone to stay, but I did leave the TV on. I wanted to experiment with the recording function. I was hoping to record a series of cooking programmes. Some of them on one of the satellite channels were shown early in the morning. Perhaps that could explain the sound you heard. You know what they’re like some of the presenters nowadays, always trying to be larger than life and outdo each other with their attention seeking antics. I imagine they got a bit carried away or a bit high on the sugar as I think the one this morning was supposed to be about ice cream making.
It could also have been a couple of cables having an altercation in the back of the set. I reckon a mouse or something has chewed its way in there looking for a cosy place to hole up in over winter and exposed a few wires with its nibbling. I’ve been meaning to have a look inside there for ages. Never mind, everything in its right time. Anyway, I’m sure everything’s all in order. Well, anyone for a nice cup of tea? I’ve been gasping for one for days now. I couldn’t find a decent cuppa anywhere on my travels. Mind you, I suppose I did go to some places that were just a little bit off the beaten track. So, come in whoever wants to. I’ve got some delicious Egyptian biscuits you might want to try.”
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