22 & not a clue

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.

If you're a normal person then you probably remember everything you haven't done the moment you try to close your eyes and lie still. If you're like me then you type until the small hours and then give up thanks to exhaustion. Seriously though, what's with the lists and the buzzing thoughts, how do we control a monkey mind in a modern world where even the trains by my window make less noise than my thoughts.

The thing is, if I didn't have that half hour buzz before bed I wouldn't wake up and know exactly what needed doing the moment I stepped into the office. Tough break. Also since when did my life revolve around the office (she complains, yet really she loves it). So maybe the sleepless nights, endless deadlines and empty bank accounts have been worth it, maybe they're worth this rush I get when I'm working on 5 different things at once and thinking two steps ahead. Still making mistakes. Still learning. But getting somewhere.

When I'm not writing copy to pay the rent I'm trawling Etsy, collecting endless pieces of reclaimed vintage furniture and handmade home-wares to adorn the flat I don't have. I have bookshelves in wish lists for books I don't own, and artsy typography prints to be displayed on a wall to convey some kind of meaning. Suddenly I'm obsessed with all the trappings of a life that screams success. Not quite a Mulberry handbag and granite floors but my own version of what a career-driven 20 something's flat should look like.

I haven't written for myself since December and I've developed a bad case of 'Twitter fear'. It's amazing how our focus shifts, we re-prioritise our priorities. Six months ago I laughed at having 'stuff' - it traps you to one place and holds you back. Now I have digital shopping carts brimming with drift wood picture frames. The girl who only needed blu tac now dreams of ornate frames and mounted art work.

My backpack is starting to collect dust - but that rarely lasts long. How funny that we become the things we said we wouldn't and when we do, sometimes we are happier than we thought we would be. I think I've commenced nesting out a life I'm starting to see for myself, clearly one with too many arts and crafts and witty quotes on walls, but one I like the look of.

Here's a thought, if Eve hadn't tempted Adam with a delicious apple then man would never have come to exist. That pair would still be living it up up there and our blue dot of a planet wouldn't have happened.

I've been cheating on my beloved blog with copy writing because copy writing pays - What a word slut I am.