The music got a little brighter, the sky a little richer, the lawn a little sweeter, the laughter a little more mine.
Think only of yourselves
The bar at a Hawkwind gig always sets the tone. At the tender ages of 45 and 46 we are, apart from a couple of Carnaby Street dandies, the youngest in the place by quite some way. And with our sensible hair and middle-aged man-from-M&S attire we are the straightest too. Queuing at the bar we’re surrounded by a sea of dreadlocks and pony tails, leather and denim, pierced noses eyebrows and lips, sequinned dresses and platform biker boots, male pattern baldness and blue rinses; all on people at least a decade older than us.
Individuality
Butterflies on shoulders, daisies on hips; every woman here sported the kind of tattoo that wouldn’t punish her in her fifties. The men weren’t much different; a bit of sleeve work here and there, proudly on show in the summer sun, but nothing that couldn’t be hidden by a clean white shirt on Monday morning.
On the beach
The smell of skunk mingled with wood smoke, sea salt and sun block.
Standards
By everyone else’s definition she loved him. Just not her own.
You ain’t seen nothing yet
The paper tore and suddenly I had a finger up my arse. Could the day get any better?
A mother’s comfort
The cloud had thickened, the sky taking on the colour and texture of every blanket Her Majesty had ever issued me.
Facing up
She had become the physical embodiment of my responsibility and I couldn’t help but resent her for it
Still got it
It was good to find things hadn’t changed. Including, it turned out, my baser instincts.
Minor victories
I have a little story. I tell it only because at the moment all stories seem to be so goddam fucking miserable, and this one is not. I mean, it’s not going to turn your life around or anything, but it does have a happy ending.
First, a little history.