22 & not a clue

A balmy day that started with torrential rain and built into something similar to Southern Spain. Ice creams dripped and dogs panted whilst kids dipped dinky toes into Diana's memorial fountains.

Hiding from the sun in Hyde Park, a novel idea struck upon by hundreds of Londoners every lazy Saturday afternoon since the dawn of Londinium itself. We weren't unique.

Bunches of buddies and pools of pals broke bread and sunk ciders, celebrating 48 hours of 'well deserved' freedom - for don't we all work 5 days to live for 2?

Luxuriating on scratchy pieces of green making a patchwork of blankets smothering the lawn, each group from one to the next, the old, the young and the beautiful sagging into make-shift seats or folding into deck chairs.

Today we were young and golden, tomorrow we're back in the office.

Ever wonder what your life looks like standing on the outside looking in? Have you ever put your life in a glass box and really looked at it - you may see things in that box that make you wonder how they got there. Perspective is priceless, hard to come by and even harder to keep hold of - most often we're gifted it by a sharp slap from reality.

My perspective came on the wings of bad news. My friend died. He was 23, just graduated, in the prime of his life, a unique eccentric individual. We may not have spoken in 3 years, but we were friends. And he just died. No rhyme or reason, a phone call from another friend I haven't spoken to in years and then another and before I knew it I was 15 again remembering ridiculous bygone times.

I spent my sunday in 2008 and my Monday morning in 2009. Together in my memories we drank too much, giggled and pushed the boundaries all over again. The way we were always supposed to.

Back in the office and I realised I had been working towards the wrong goals for a while. I'd gotten away from the bigger picture.

You need to figure out what your bigger picture looks like, start by filling in the blue bits around the corner. Don't focus so much on the tricky part in the middle, when you step back it won't look like the picture on the box anymore anyway. Life is the messy bits and the lost pieces.

Perspective comes at a price, I hadn't realised that until now. You realise something which once was precious shouldn't be anymore. Step back from the puzzle and fill in the blue sky.

She had the kind of beauty that doesn't need or ask for make up. Three small brown moles on her wrists which were slender with thin brown hair which caught the light - perhaps she had been in the sun recently. Her long legs were folded under her, she sat on the tube as if they were on a sofa. She leant against a thick browed man who appeared to be miles away.

Every few seconds her head would lift up and she would stare at him and say something with a smile on her lips. He would nod and continue to stare off. The smile would leave the corner of her mouth and thin lines appeared across her forehead. Digging around in her handbag she produced a note and laughed, showing it to him. He eventually turned and looked at the note, his eyes moved upwards and finally met hers which were dancing in a beguiling way.

A slow and uncertain smile made its way across his swarthy face, catching the shadows from his facial hair. His back softened and he seemed to lean in towards her smile. She leant her head again on his shoulder. He lifted one hairy paw and stroked a few brown strands across her face, tucking them behind her ear and then stroking her neck.

She smiled.

At the bottom of a hill in a small Irish town there lies a newsagents that boasts a funny smell. The owner looked his best 30 years ago and hasn't changed since. His cream cardigan is grubby, his finger nails orange, tinged from many a year spent rolling tobacco. The darting pink of his tongue running along the paper as it rolls together to make yet another 'bine'.

The kids outside bounce the ball against the wall for another time. He stirs from his stool, paper crushed by his side to be brandished.  The door bell chimes in a rush as he storms through to shout unintelligably. A mixture of uniforms, green with badges embroidered on and black with pockets hanging off. High school and Grammar kids mooch around in this no man's land.

Resting at the bottom of this hill the shop is a divide between the wealthier end of town and the estates backing onto it. From 15:30 - 16:00 the kids loiter, in this lost section of time when they aren't quite expected home yet and don't quite want to leave. The grammar girls mingle with the high school boys who make jokes and lean against the wall without a care, ignoring them. Hockey boys dart the spit balls thrown their way and the girls giggle on.

Stan has seen them all come and go, white tights with brown leather shoes, short skirts with high heels and black bras under white shirts. His darting tongue running across paper after paper as nimble dirty fingers fold and roll. The stubs of his finger tips become black from newspaper ink as he thumbs through the papers slowly, waiting for that golden half hour each day.

'A pound for a cuppa tea love, just a cuppa tea, I'm homeless and cold.'
'That's a good wardrobe for a homeless person'.
'Just a pound, it's a cold day and I've been outside all night.'
She strides on past, he lifts his cap and wipes his brow, swaying on into the path of the next on-comer on the street.
'Have you got a pound for a cuppa tea mate?'
'Sorry mate I 'aven't.'
Just a cup of tea, just something warm in his belly. He clutches the bagel and leans against the bakery window. Thank god for the Polish baker who gave it to him. The jeans are only washed because a woman gave him money to go to the laundrette. His jacket is only clean because it's inside out. But people see what they want to see.
It's not even 10am and there's a drizzle. There's a hole in either corner of his plastic bag, god knows what he carries with him.

The man with the Big Issue gives him a fag and a light and he puffs, staring towards the park and wondering if he'll have more luck with the pram pushers. The runners don't hear as they gallop past. He thinks of his kids and tries his luck again, lurching forward at another woman and asks;
'Pound for a cuppa tea love? Just a cuppa tea?'
She sniffs and strides on.

She stood up too quickly as the tube juddered to a halt coming into the station, bouquet in one hand and a kiss on the other blown to a somewhat bemused looking young man. She smiled and bounced off onto the platform. He put his head in his hands, rubbed his face and looked up smiling.

His hair looked unkempt and it appeared he wasn't much of a sleeper. She had had her hair in a pony tail, diamante earrings but a rain coat; the sensible but sweet type. They may have been on a date, his lingering smile told me as much. She seemed abashed, perhaps she knew that she had jumped up too soon and maybe she should have kissed his cheek rather than her hand. The air isn't as sensitive a receiver as skin.

He clutched his satchel, scuffed in a similar way to his shoes both of which he seemed too fond of to replace. His shirt was creased, but then so were her jeans - no one irons anymore. He sat for two more stops, his expression transfixed somewhere between the evening's events and the blurring black hole of a backdrop that lies outside the window of the carriage.

He rubbed his hands together feverishly, perhaps they had been clammy from holding hers all evening as they strolled along the Strand. A cliched date idea but it appeared this had been their first, and aren't we all allowed to indulge cliche when it's the first of anything? Finally he rubbed his hands along his jeans and stood up. Straightening his satchel, his shoulders dropped and his smile fell away as he followed single file out through the sliding doors.