No Different

I was reading Annemarie Schwarzenbach's short works that are autobiographical in nature, and I was so impressed and depressed that I decided to write something along those lines.

The first thing or rather object that had me thinking of slapstick and the circus was the door to the fire extinguisher storage in the corridor of a train. It was not locked and kept playing up for the duration of the time I had to stand there. I tried at first to close it firmly. But, it had a mind of its own and spun open with the gyrations of the train. I immediately thought of all the accidents and what might happen. Imagine you are there at the threshold and after letting passengers alighting turn round to take up your position leaning against the wall when suddenly (don't you just hate the use of suddenly for suspense) the damn door gets you in the small of the back and you stumble onto the platform. In the muddle of trying to stand upright the door closes. Meanwhile the fire extinguisher door flaps as if in raucous laughter! Why don't they lock it?

Now what happens next. You are standing in the corridor with someone who is transitioning. They have many feminine features, yet they have an obviously male voice. You take absolute delight in chatting with them, because you identify with the fact they are courageous and top of that you are both suffering from the damn fire extinguisher door. They want to charge their phone and the natural place is in the storage box, if only the door would not misbehave. It was a source of conversation and solidarity. A blessing in disguise.

What would have happened in Trumpania? In the red states. Oh my goodness. They can take their rabid bigotry and...the train whistles in a Hitchcockian moment.

The cost of identity is a terrible one.

I thought of AnneMarie and how her mother took it upon herself to burn the letters and diaries. How mean and dreadful.

I had a diary given by my late mother. It was a drinker's diary. A novelty one. I had entries for January 1977 and there it ended. I used it for a notebook and for shopping afterwards. Imagine however the value of such a diary two thousand years hence. They might know how much a tin of baked beans cost.

In short creative bursts, endeavours like this, one is mindful of language more. One wants to throw in a flashy word to show off. A stolen word from the TLS might do? Recrudescence. That was referring to the relapse of Nazism - as in Trump. It reminds me of someone writing to the Times who might be incandescent at the rise of immigrants. A Major Fosdyke-Browning. AnneMarie did a much better job of these snippets.

I saw a man clearly with issues looking at a row of CDs. He said to himself. "Not that one, not that one, not that one, not that one...that one!" He placed the CD in his bag and walked out. A clear case of theft. Yet! He was not the one I had in my thoughts. It was those in corporations that hire lawyers and accountants to fix the books. Creative accounting. Well the way he executed the theft reminded me of pure Absurd Theatre and Samuel Beckett.

Two women got out of their seats and generously signalled to me that there was a free seat! I briskly walked to the seat and sat down. I had a ticket but no reservation. I looked outside at the foggy landscape and read more of a review about a biography of AnneMarie. Since there were no letters or diaries, one had to lean on the written works. Carson McCullers (a fav writer) had an unrequited love for AnneMarie and indeed dedicated "Reflections in a Golden Eye" (novel) to her. There were love letters. No sooner than I had finished the review the following happened. A young woman wearing Islamic clothes asked to sit in the seat next to me. She had moved because the reservation ticket holder had got in. No sooner had she sat next to me I was in turn moved by a reservation ticket holder. I returned to stand near the fire extinguisher storage. I spoke again to the young trans. She was laughing with me at my predicament. That gave me a joy.

A friend of mine had been discussing the Congressional hearings about UFOs though now they are called something else. There was mention of antigravity machines and Edward Tesla. Also mentioned was a split in the curtain of the universe allowing craft to enter from another dimension. I thought of the Popular Mechanics magazines I had read online - they were from the 1930's. I could imagine AnneMarie reading one. Maybe...