The Lonely Road

And so it is here, two of my lives cross-over.

My literary life, and my culinary life.

And therefore, I shall do something I never normally do and publish the same piece twice, as I feel it is pertinent to both collections. Both The Lonely Road, which is concerned with literary rejection, and Cleaning Down, which is concerned with philosophical allegory

A/ There was a menu change today.

B/ Recently, I have been communicating with Alan Corkish.

Alan:

... I personally got my ‘education’ via the CP; they used to take over the LSE each summer and organise The Communist University; all free of course and London Comrades provided food and shelter. There I met Ralph Milliband, Tariq Ali, Maurice Klugman, Bertrand Russel, Arthur Scargill, Darcus Howe, Mick McGahey, Jimmy Reid, Valentina Tereshkova, Tony Benn, Dennis Skinner... and on and on (I could name-drop for the UK) ...and when I say ‘met’; they became friends, comrades, I introduced them to my family and met theirs. As for your kids; well I’d venture to suggest that with you around; they WILL get a proper education,

 We’d honestly love to publish some of your stuff; we work as a cooperative however and are just about to splash out...

which was an extract replying to an e-mail from me, beginning,

Craig:

I thought about a really funny reply, starting, "Go fuck yourself..." but then I thought all this overzealous profane hyperbole might be getting a bit old now. Still, it is funny isn't it, "Go fuck yourself" I think it's just such a great turn of phrase.

 I'll be honest with you Alan, some things in life outrage me, I mean really outrage me, but the fact that I am not a published author doesn't really rank up there with man's inhumanity to man. Nor man's self-sacrifice.

which was sent in reply to this e-mail:

Alan:

We’ll use some of your work in a future edition if it’s sent in the correct format and follows guidelines. I appreciate the frustration of an artist however all the submissions we get are treated equally. How could we do anything else? If we changed the rules for you we’d be letting the others down. And to be fair; no one has simpler guidelines than erbacce... no one. Did you know Ho Chi Min worked in kitchens as you do? Now there’s a role model.

which was sent in reply to this, the original e-mail,

Craig:

I'm still in Heswall Alan, but listen, why can't you champion my work for me, you guys went and published a whole load of shallow shite just because some guy had been in a band and had a hit (nick power) and you say the submission process is blind. Some of my stuff is shit Alan but some of it is brilliant, I have even made up my own word for Christ's sake - please google WYOCHUNG - I'm working in the busiest fucking kitchen on the Wirral for minimum fucking wage and I've got three kids and no fucking rich benefactors - I don't want money - all I want is a few pages in black and white and all I get told is submission guidelines, submission guidelines, well what if I'm not good with submission fucking guidelines, does that mean that my work has no place in print - for fuck's sake I've researched you man, that's why I came to you. Please Alan, get the panel to google wyochung, tell them who Keston is and how I just worked another 12-hour shift sweating my balls off to feed a bunch of overpaid civil servants, please Alan help me get something in black and white? You guys were meant to culture weeds, be radical, break the cycles, well I'm the biggest fucking weed around and all I'm getting is pseudo academic snobbery - do something Alan, help me, get them to google wyochung or something - tell them no-one else has their own fucking word except this little Scottish arsehole who's stuck in a kitchen... 

Oh, yes, there was a menu change today.

But I can safely say, I was on top of my game for it.

Then I got another e-mail,

Alan:

...When I was 14 I had my own flat; (I grew up quick) organised a party, beatniks, artists, street-fighters, poets, couple of Russians... a huge man known as ‘Dealer’ Corace stood on a chair and read this through his half ton beard with his mad Rasputin-eyes bulging. I changed that day. It was poem 14 and I was 14... seemed like an omen...

Poem XX1V by Stephen Spender

After they have tired of the brilliance of cities

And of striving for office where at last they may languish

Hung round with easy chains until

Death and Jerusalem glorify also the crossing-sweeper;

Then these streets the rich built and their easy love

Fade like old cloths, and it is death stalks through life

Grinning white through all faces

Clean and equal like the shine from snow.

In this time when grief pours freezing over us,

When the hard light of pain gleams at every street corner,

When those who were pillars of that day’s gold roof

Shrink in their clothes; surely from hunger

We may strike fire, like fire from flint?

And our strength is now the strength of our bones

Clean and equal like the shine from snow

And the strength of famine and of our enforced idleness,

And it is the strength of our love for each other.

Readers of this strange language,

We have come at last to a country

Where light equal, like the light from snow, strikes all faces,

Here you may wonder

How it was that works, money, interest, building, could ever hide

The palpable and obvious love of man for man.

Oh comrades, let not those who follow after

-The beautiful generation that shall spring from our sides-

Let them not wonder how after the failure of banks,

The failure of cathedrals and the declared insanity of our rulers,

We lacked the Spring-like resources of the tiger

Or of plants who strike out new roots to gushing waters,

But through torn-down portions of old fabric let their eyes

Watch the admiring dawn explode like a shell

Around us, dazing us with light like snow.

---

There was a menu changed today.

The Fruitless Fantasy of the Female Form

Well, as my time at the Boathouse draws to a close, I feel like there's so much I want to say, but my thoughts are so ill-ordered on the subject and my priorities hardly allow me time to think about it.

Misunderstand - Incorrectly understood or interpreted. Not appreciated or given sympathetic understanding. Attach a wrong meaning to.

In my last installment I may have spoken of instincts which illustrate the fact that we are all animals. Not just animals, but ANIMALS with instincts which can sometimes get "out of control".

This electronic collection of notes is sub-titled Step IV - Step four - Taking the fearless moral inventory.
Step Four in the Alcoholics Anonymous 12-Step programme,  is meant, of course, to illustrate when our instincts are out of equilibrium and to catalogue where our original problems might manifest into unreasonably strong desires.

So many instincts... to eat, to rest, to nest, to procreate, to be stimulated... and so on, which can all get out of control. We can be drug addicts, sex addicts, alcoholics, over-eaters, the list goes on.

Now of course, anyone than truly knows me, knows that I am a terrible drug addict, an alcoholic of many years standing and a pervert who cannot let any female, of any shape or size, pass me by without looking at their arse.
However, there is one arse I cannot and would never dream of looking at. And that is Jo's.
And I certainly can't sign off without speaking about Jo, my bestest boathouse buddy in the world.

I had a dream last night.
I dreamt that I had made a beautiful cake. I had baked the cake with love and so much due care and attention, but then iced it perfectly with rolled Royal Icing and it was flawless.

I showed this cake to Jo, in my dream, and said, "Look, look what I have made Jo, isn't it beautiful?"
She looked at me, then at the cake, and then silently dug her thumb deep, right into the middle of the icing.
What was more disturbing, was the silence which followed while she stared at me, emotionless, remorseless, while my jaw dropped open and I wept.

I told Jo about this dream and how much it upset me.
She listened and then threw a frozen pea at me derisively.
"You are a pathetic bum Craig, you're not complicated, you're a dick."

You see, I believe that my understanding with Jo is, well, that we share the same pain.
I know.
I know because I was there when it happened.
You see Jo know me, I know Jo.
We layers like onions.
No peel back to the sad. The sad we don't mention.
But Jo. Well Jo know me. The sad. The sad we don't mention.
Jo throw pea at me Jo cos we know what we don't mention. We know, no-one much else know. We kn...
...nd that's enough of that.

Of course, it has been my duty, as a writer, to attempt to engage the reader by painting an interesting picture in words of  the environment I discuss, and in doing so, I could quite rightly be accused of  portraying said working environment as some sort of glamorous place where fuckwittery is scarce and efficient adults combine their skills to achieve common goals.

I would like to dispel this myth now.

The fuckwittery I have experienced in this kitchen (as is the case every single other place I have been gainfully employed) is up there with the fuckwittery taking place in the current political cabinet.
Unfortunately, people are human.

Which brings me to the point when I originally started writing the first Cleaning Down notes - that I had the idea that I would not stoop to character-assassination for cheap laughs, but neither did I realise the risk I might run of developing some sort of subservient love-in within the realms of the large granite mutual-appreciation society building.

Yeah, well, whatever.

We know, Jo and I, about The Lost, the Hopeless and the Disparate.
That's what you find in the hospitality trade.

A fake smile.
A liar.
The Lost, the Hopeless, the Disparate and the Degenerate.
The almost good, almost bad and the almost ugly.

People who didn't decide quick enough or people who simply couldn't decide.
People who haven't reached their goal yet.
People who didn't work hard enough.
People who are "in-between".
Transients, drug addicts, degenerates, miscreants, alcoholics, the deluded, the Lost.
We are the best of them.
Jo and I.
Because we are professionals when it counts.
Just me and Jo - We Da Bes

Lost - unable to find one's way, gone astray, a lost child.
Hopeless - having no hope, bleak, despairing, having no possibility of solution.
Deviant - departing from the norm.
The Truth - that which is in accordance with fact or reality.

*******************

And the metaphor/moral/philosophy of this story - well, it's fuck off and work it out for yourself you lazy bastards, except Allan, who's my best friend, who I haven't spoken to for too long a time, who's on the left there, with the neckerchief... while that's me in the middle, with a fag, and all my best mates...

{NB: the answer to the metaphor is = PERSONAL FREEDOM}

the Crazy, the Lost and the Masochists adrift

Step four - "Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves."

"When I get mad, whenever I get angry, I have made a victim of myself," - Craig Guthrie, The Mushroom Papers.

I served up some food tonight in return for something akin to minimum wage.

And now it is the next day.

When one first attempts to descend into the fiery pit of a busy kitchen, one imagines the satisfaction one will gain from being an artistic pioneer of the senses. An artiste. Providing the public with unique culinary delights which will fire experience and delight the recipient.

Long after that baptism of fire, one experiences the true nature of  the satisfaction gained in being a chef in a busy kitchen.

What is the best thing about being a chef in that environment?

Guess for a second.

Is it the fact that you are providing your fellow man not only the sustenance by which he must live, but the sustenance dressed up so that it might provide a sensory pleasure, guilt-free which defines the very nature of a worthwhile existence?

No.

The best thing about being a chef in a busy kitchen is the fact that you know, you KNOW that perhaps only a thousandth of the population is either crazy enough or masochistic enough to last longer than three weeks. 

No-one but the hardy of will and body can do this job.

No-one but the lost, the crazy or the masochist.

I have decided that I am all of the above.

But then who is Connor. He fits none of the above.

The funny thing is, I have never taken, given myself, or had the time, to look at what Connor is serving up. But I don't have to.

The other thing about serving some length of time in what most sane people would call Hell is that you can tell more about the skill and endurance of someone in the kitchen by getting to know them as a person than you can by analysing their cooking methods and techniques.

Connor's not a cowboy, but neither does he seem to be lost, crazy or a masochist.

As I said, I am all of the above and I should gladly explain why.

You see this was me.
Used to be me.

And it still is me.

A part of me.

He above.

Him above.

I am he.

That black spot above my right eye is permanent marker - an extra freckle I added which was there for at least two years as far as I remember. I had a white patch around it at one point from my dearest mother scrubbing it with bleach.

I am smiling.

Everyone told me that I had a nice smile. That I smiled with my eyes. That you could not fake a smile like mine, that it was a genuine, it was a bone fide smile.

But the day that photograph was taken, my smile was not genuine...
...no it was not...

...because I found out that morning that the puppy I had always wanted... and that I had eventually got, had died during the night.

I was set adrift in this world.

What you see on the outside, is often not what is on the inside, I told Jams last night.

This was Ted.
Used to be Ted.

And still is Ted.

A part of Ted.

He above.

Him above.

He is he.

And now a part of me.

That day, he was separated from his mother and set adrift in this world.

What you see on the outside, is not necessarily what is on the inside.

Then there was this guy...

...my alter-ego? that part of me that said "no, I won't go along with this, it's absurd"?  some called him "Fish" I called him "Friend" sometimes "Bastard".

 Living by instincts seems like no dishonest path to take when you truly connect with someone -

"Only connect! That was the whole of her sermon. Only connect the prose and the passion, and both will be exalted, and human love will be seen at its height. Live in fragments no longer. Only connect, and the beast and the monk, robbed of the isolation that is life to either, will die."

-- Chapter 22, Howards End.

or perhaps that "making a beast of oneself takes away the pain of being a man" but I forget who said that, probably Thompson or someone he quoted.

Step four - "Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves."

"Creation gave us instincts for a purpose. Without them we wouldn't be complete human beings. If men and women didn't exert themselves to be secure in their persons, made no effort to harvest food or construct shelter, there would be no survival. If they didn't reproduce, the earth wouldn't be populated. If there were no social instinct, if men cared nothing for the society of one another, there would be no society. So these desires - for the sex relation, for material and emotional security, and for companionship - are perfectly necessary and right, and surely God-given.

 Yet these instincts, so necessary for our existence, often far exceed their proper functions. Powerfully, blindly, many times subtly, they drive us, dominate us, and insist upon ruling our lives. Our desires for sex, for material and emotional security, and for an important place in society often tyrannize us. When thus out of joint, man's natural desires cause him great trouble, practically all the trouble there is. No human being, however good, is exempt from these troubles. Nearly every serious emotional problem can be seen as case of misdirected instinct. When that happens, our great natural assets, the instincts, have turned into physical and mental liabilities.

Step four is our vigorous and painstaking effort to discover what these liabilities in each of us have been, and are." - The Big Book.

Step four - "Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves"

So who the fuck is Connor and who the fuck am I?

Well, we're both drinking my home-brew tonight,

Connor is alright,

Connor will be alright,

He is not phased by the ferocity of service, he is young, handsome and healthy in mind and body.

I am not.

I am old, ugly and unhealthy in mind and body.

I love you already Connor, but your puppy must die, like mine did, and we must take a photo of you on that day, smiling, for everyone to see.

Oh, that sounded a bit harsh and over-dramatic, do you know what, I would have loved to end on that black note but I take it back, I really hope your puppy doesn't die Connor and that you maintain what balanced life you have until God sees fit to take it away from you.

 Oh, that sounds really bad as well - but I must end on a black note - so let your black pudding be the blackest ever - for ever and always you handsome swine and I shall continue with my searching and fearless moral inventory of myself while my home brew kicks in and I think of how to tell Laura about the Rothschilds, the Napoleonic wars, and how the modern fiscal usury system they created keeps a hundred million people living in a river of shit and piss, while a footballer drives a car around with a personalized number plate which equates to the life of fifty thousand children living without a vaccine.

So do I digress?
What has all this to do with any searching and fearless moral inventory.
Well, it's the best I can do.
I am a swine, I am lost, crazy, a masochist for no other reason than I must make a beast of myself to take away some of the pain of being a man, battling instincts distorted by greed and addiction, sometimes winning, sometimes losing.
However, if I were to make a moral inventory and a fearless one at that, I should place above it a brass plaque, with the word "Create" scrawled in large letters.
Because this is where it all begins - genesis, the outlandish act of creation - where my purpose lies, has lain and is yet to repose comfortably - the reasons for which must only become apparent after the act itself.
In fact, lets stop the list there, with only the plaque, that will be enough of an inventory for me. Yes, that'll do pig, that will do.
Create first, deal with the consequences later.