Channel Missing

My life isn't over, though I didn't know I was dead when I woke up.



You'd probably say I'm watching too much telly. I should be outside enjoying what I can before the sun goes down completely. You'd say my eyes will go square and my bum will flatten out like a pancake. You'd say I'm too young to be so obsessed with something as unimportant as a screen. But you're not here to tell me those things so you don't know what I'm doing. I'm looking for you.



It takes a while to figure out what's going on and to truly understand where you are and why. See Purgatory isn't just for those who are trying to make up for their sins to get into Heaven, it's also for those whose lives are still intertwined with the living. Something in your life is still going on like an investigation to try and find who took your life, perhaps your research partner is using your notes to try and figure out what you did before you passed, or maybe a doctor is using your body for science to learn more about a disease and isn't finished with it yet. Maybe you find out you're waiting for your sister to confess and reveal your secret to your dad that eventually lead to your life spinning so fast you didn't even get the chance to even blink before you died. Or maybe you're like me. I wound up in Purgatory because my death made my grandmother reopen the case of my missing parents.

Needless to say Purgatory is a pretty unusual place. When you wake up, you wake up in your home alone. There is an eerie feeling as though no one has ever been in the house before and you are very much on your own. All your furniture is here, the couches, the chairs, the TV but there are no photos hanging on the walls, no books on the shelves, no pens and no bits of strewn paper on the coffee table. It's as though someone has made a set, a place that should feel familiar to you but it isn't. Outside its your neighbourhood. Exactly as you remember it, but with no signs of life. The Ferguson's house across the street is still a pale green that's faded and flaking though they had been saying for years that they are going to paint over it. Next door on the left is the Pateek's house with the broken rope swing hanging off the branch of the tree in the front garden. From where I stand I can see the front steps and the various hand prints I made with paint once a year to measure my growth, the length of my life. I count 17 hand prints. There will never be 18. The whole place seems as though people have been here but you know there has been no one here at all.

The weather is that of a late afternoon sun in winter, blinking through the grey clouds after the rain has stopped. Looking towards the sun, you can tell that night is not far away, the sun will begin to set at any moment, but I didn't when I first arrived that that will only happen when my life is finished with the living and it is my time to move on. I live in a constant dim light.

A click springs me back into the present and I find myself staring at the television as it flashes my name. I sit in front of it and lean towards the screen as the flashing stops and my name melts away and I read everything I need to know.

"You are here to watch Channel Missing," the TV screen tells me, "You are to watch for the faces of your parents. Every person's face who is missing from around the world will appear on the screen for no more than 5 seconds and will not repeat itself. You may never see the face of one or both of your parents. This may be due to the volume of photos as more are added when someone goes missing or it may be because they have died or have been found. The channel updates without notice. Only when their case has been closed will you be allowed to move on."

With another click the words are gone and are replaced with a photo of a middle aged gang member with neck tattoos. I try to take in every detail of him, the different tones of blue in his eyes, where his hair starts, whether his ears are large or small. I try to note anything I can but I'm too slow and the photo switches to that of a young Asian boy. No, that man wasn't familiar, I didn't know him. Then again, I don't know what my own father looks like. Surely I'll know him when I see him, won't I? I won't need more than half a second to recognise you.


My world revolved around you. You, who would sooth me when I couldn't breathe through my tears. You, who would hug me so softly I thought I must be dreaming. You, who smelled of flowers and Summer so much that even in winter., our home was warm. You, who would get me to yell NEVER COME BACK! at all the monsters at night. Because of you I was ten feet tall. But you had one monster who did come back.

I remember almost nothing of him. I was too small when he was living with us to have any clear memories of him, but I get flashes every so often of that time.

I remember how the house would tremble underneath his feet as he'd pace the floor, as if the creaking noises was the house desperately trying to be quiet so he wouldn't get angry. Every once and a while a new hole or broken window would decorate the house, so I guess it didn't work.

I'd know his smell anywhere. Clean. Sharp. A musk that would hang in the air after he'd gone. It would linger like the smell of smoke before you realise there's a fire.

I remember his voice. A low rumble. Only a few words at a time and a pregnant silence that would drown the rooms when he wanted the conversations to stop. It wasn't a monotone because I can recall once or twice a moment when he got loud and took all the air away from you. Its like you were suffocating without him being anywhere near you. His voice would say things to me, things that adults are meant to say to children, asking questions about favourite colours and animals. Questions about what I did at kindergarten and what I wanted for dinner. Questions about what happened when I went to visit your mother. The voice lacked any kind of sincere interest and it never said "I love you".

The last thing I remember are his hands. Big, wide hands with long, slender fingers and pronounced knuckles. Perfectly kept nails and deep lines across his palms as if ravines had been carved into his skin. I would watch the way his hands moved slowly with grace and with ease in everything that he did. Clutching the handle of the refrigerator and forcing it open. Gripping letters and crushing them into balls with such intensity it was like he wanted to hear the paper twisting and crackling so whatever it said was too distorted and broken to upset him. I watched his hands take hold of another, a man's hand that was the opposite to his. A hand that was stubby, burnt, scarred and covered in tattoos that were poorly done. Pictures couldn't be deciphered the ink was so smudged. I found it odd even at that age that his handshake would be so welcoming and friendly when it was never like that towards us. Now I know it was because he needed that man and he didn't need us. We just got in the way. The last time I saw his hands, a chain of deep bruises spread across his knuckles. He said nothing when he saw me looking at them.

But his face. That is the one thing I can't remember.


A shrill BBBRRRRIIINNNNGGG pulls me back from my daydream and forces me to really look at the photos flashing in front of me. The noise forces me to focus as a few of the photos are seeming familiar though I can't name them. I never thought I would be happy to hear a phone ring. Wait, the phone is ringing?

I can't believe it when I watch the phone light up as it rings. I still can't believe it when I glance outside to see that everything is just the same as when I woke up. I still don't believe it when I answer and hear the loud and happy sigh of relief from an old man.

"Well blow me down! A new neighbour! Hello darling."
This has to be a joke. Running over to the window I try to peer into the windows of all the neighbouring houses but I see no one.
"Come on now, you must know where you are. You're going to have to say something eventually, you've got no one else to talk to."
He's getting impatient already and I can hear the drumming of a finger on a table. I mutter some nonsense sounds trying to think of something to say.
"You're going to have to work on your words girly, I'm afraid I don't know what ugh, durf and buh mean."
"Who is this?" I say quietly.
"My name is Martin."
"How are you ringing me?"
"My phone started blinking a 9 at me so I pressed it, it rang and here we are. That's how this works."
"How what works?"
"Purgatory dear. We all need someone to talk to so someone rings you and you have a friend until one of us is finally allowed to leave."
"Then the one who stays is left alone?"
"Oh no. Haven't you been listening? Your phone will flash a number for you to ring and talk to someone whose just arrived."
My head is spinning with questions and my heart is beating in my ears. It's all too much.
Martin waits a moment before he talks again. His voice is soft, "It's a lot isn't it."
"I don't know what to think."
"Believe it or not, you'll get used to it."
"How long have you been here?"
"The last year I remember was 2004."
"You've been here for 13 years!"
"Has it really been that long? Oh, that wife of mine. I'm not all that surprised though."
"You're okay with your wife being missing for 13 years? That's not cool!"
"Hmm? Oh, you must have Channel Missing. Not everyone is here for the same reason dear. I've got Channel Loss"
"What does that mean?"
"My wife you see, she still hasn't come to terms with my death and can't get past her grief."
"And what does the channel show you?"
"Similar to yours, it shows me all the people who are grieving and the happy times before someone's death."
"That's heart warming."
"Love runs deep my darling. It is both a blessing and a curse."
"Have you seen your pictures?"
"I have actually, a couple of times. It makes me happy in a way. Seeing her again."
"What was her name?"
"Dorothy. I called her Dotty."
"She sounds like she has a lot of cats,"
He laughs "You're not wrong there girly. Enough about me, how did you get here?"

I tell him everything I possibly can about myself and my life. I start with the very basics; name, birthday, hometown etc and I do my best to match up my memories with the information and go on from there. Martin is extremely patient and is the perfect listener (obviously we've both got a lot of time). He doesn't seem to mind when I get things wrong or stumble over my words because I have to say so much and have to start again. Even as I'm speaking I can tell that my memories are not in order or even whole. Bits are missing from most of them and they're starting to sound like they're splintered and smashed. Jigsaw pieces that have no conjoining parts. Have I made them up? Has someone told me things that happened and I believed them though I have no recollection of anything that's been said? It's overwhelming but I eventually make it to my final night with the Living.

Martin is quiet, I can only hear his breathing.
"Martin?"
"My dear," he whispers, "I'm so sorry."
"Shit happens."
He chuckles. "I'm glad I got to call you."
For the first time since I woke, I smile.
"It's your turn now Martin. Everything in 3, 2, 1."

And he does, he tells me everything. He tells me when he was born and how he met his wife when they were only 3. He tells me what it felt like to hear her say 'I do' and how she glowed with each of her pregnancies. He tells me about all the vegetables he hated as a child and how all of his kids hated the same ones! He tells me that listening to me reminds him of his only granddaughter ("Six grandsons! Even I think that's too many boys in one family"). He tells me how he wasn't sad to die, not really because he had a life that was lived and he got just as much love as he gave. "There is no other purpose in life my darling." I can't help but feel a weight on my chest grow heavier as I realise how much I've missed out on.

We're on the phone for hours while we watch our channels. He answers all my questions and explains that you know you're about to leave as night comes in and that you don't ever feel tired or need to eat so you don't miss anything on the TV. You can pause it for a break but only for an hour at a time then it starts up again on your own and you won't know if you missed your picture.

"Can I ask you one more thing Martin?"
"Of course."
"How come we get to talk to each other?"
"Purgatory is neither Heaven nor Hell. We still have our wits about us and need some help to keep our sanity. That's my theory anyway."
"I like that theory."
"I'm glad."
In that moment we find, for now at least, we have nothing more to say except goodbye.


Your smile, that was what changed when we moved house. A brand new house with no holes, no broken windows and no him. You gathered me up in the middle of the night and we went to Grandma's. I never saw him again and you wanted to keep it that way.

It was like you had a new face. I remember thinking your eyes were made of glitter cause they looked like they sparkled and your smile was bigger, wider and sincerely happy. You walked tall and gave me a home that we both needed. It was full of colour and light and music and laughter. You had friends that would come round with their children who became my friends almost immediately. You would come to my school productions early so you could get a seat with a good view of the stage for your camera. You built forts with me and danced around in your pyjamas on Sunday mornings. You got promoted a few times and to treat yourself you went to try out new classes you thought would be fun; pottery, flower pressing, baking. You brought of these into our home and I knew that the neighbourhood was envious of us.

One morning in particular sticks out to me. It had been a couple years since we moved out and you were signing and dating some very important looking forms. I have never seen a smile so big. It looked like you were trying to stop your feet from dancing as you were writing with great loops and swishes across the papers.

Putting the papers into a big envelope you turned to find me watching you.
"The people we chose to have in our lives is such an important decision. Be wiser than me my angel."
And you glided out the door to drop the envelope into the post box on the corner.

That morning sticks out to me because two days later I went to bed and woke up at Grandma's house, and you were gone.


Thank God for Martin. With every photo that passes I find myself truly believing in Martin's theory that we help keep each other sane. I spend long periods of time watch the TV that gets interrupted every so often with a call from Martin. We talk about everything. I tell him all the important events that occurred over the past 13 years (including when Daniel Albright told me he didn't really love me after all and I painted his bike pink) and he speaks to me about what life was like before I was born. All the music, all the wars. He even gives a entire rendition of 'Rebel Without A Cause' which he memorised line by line after he saw it as a teenager. He goes into incredible detail about all the different decades he lived through and how drastically he saw the world change. I listen as closely as I can trying to ignore the voice in the back of my that I don't know if either of them are dead, missing or have been found. I haven't seen either of their photos yet and there's only so long I can last before I lose it.


Grandma's house was nothing like ours. It never felt like home. She took care of me like you would've expected her to. She made me meals and helped with my homework and attended all school productions and sports games. She smiled and baked and gardened and took a genuine interest in what I did during the day while we ate dinner. She only let me have junk food on special occasions and cooked every single night. I can't remember a single time she ever ordered takeout. While living with her I was disgustingly healthy and breezed through my years at school. It was a picture perfect life with a gap where you had been erased. I always dreamed that tomorrow would be the day you would walk back into my life and I could draw you back into the picture. In some ways you did.

Every birthday and Christmas, a parcel would arrive for me. Only me. They were the ones I would hide away from Grandma, it was none of her business. This was between us. I'd take the box from the postman and run to curl up in my fort in the corner of my room. Tearing through the paper I would find a small, handmade pot with long loops and swishes around the side. Or sometimes it would be a pressed flower in a frame that had been sprayed in your perfume. I'd hide these in a chest with a lock under my bed so only I knew where to find you when everyone else had given up.

On one birthday afternoon, I wandered home from school to find a detective in the living room speaking with Grandma. They didn't know I was there so I waited and listened by the door.
"I'm sorry ma'am," she said "there are no more leads. We have to close it."
I heard Grandma's soft sobs and thought of the hidden treasures in my room that would prove otherwise, but I was stupidly biding my time until I could find you on my own. I shouldn't have waited.

I had convinced Grandma to go away with her friends for the weekend and used every trick in the book to get her to make her realise I was approaching my late teens and was perfectly capable of looking after myself so she had nothing to worry about. To my amazement it worked and I spent the whole Friday night planning what junk food I was going to buy on Saturday that would put me into a food coma and how I would get rid of the evidence on the Sunday before she returned. It was a plan that was fool proof and everything on Saturday went exactly as I had planned right down to when I would fall asleep on the couch watching Legally Blonde after I had ingested copious amounts of chocolate. It was perfect and I woke up in a dark room close to midnight to struggle my way up to bed but something felt wrong. Standing up I caught a whiff of something that made my hair stand up. It was something that clean, sharp and it lingered in my nose for a moment too long. My heart sped up and tried to calmly walk to my room. Making it to the hallway the smell had disappeared and I told myself I had made it up.

I made it to my bed and curled in for a very deep sleep. A peaceful one I wish but soon something was worming its way down my throat, closing up my airways and my body started screaming for air but I noticed it too late. Whatever it was had bled its way into my body and suffocated my insides so once I knew what was happening I couldn't move. In my mind I was clawing and scratching and screaming trying to wake myself up but I felt weak and heavy, like I was trying to swim in a metal suit. Little by little my body was losing oxygen and I felt myself fade. Down, down, down. And then I woke up in our living room.


Martin's on the phone telling me he's going. "My sun is starting to set my darling, I'm on my way out."
"I'm happy for you, really. She's finally let you go."
"Hah! If I know anything about my Dotty, I know she hasn't done that. I'm on my way to see her my dear."
"You sound happy Martin."
"You come and find me when you get there won't you. You'd love Dotty."
I can't think of what to say next, goodbye is too small.
"I'll miss you girly."
To my surprise my eyes well up and I suck in my breath to keep them from falling.
"Good." I say.
"Ha ha! You're one of a kind. Goodbye my dear."
There is nothing left now so I hang up the phone and let the tears fall freely.



My first day in Grandma's house I wandered into the kitchen just as Grandma was putting down the phone. Her eyes were red and her face was swollen.
"Where's Mummy Grandma?" I said.
"I don't know" she replied. I never asked her about you again.





It must be a couple of hours before my phone starts to blink. 7....7....7....7. I could push it, but I don't really feel like it right now. I leave it to blink and carry on watching Channel Missing.





To my angel,

There is so much I need to tell you but it will take more than one letter and I don't have a lot of time right now. I figured with this milestone birthday you're old enough to know a few things.

When I had you my whole world changed. I loved you intensely and still do, but the moment you were born I felt utter guilt bringing you into this world with this man who I knew would never love you. I could never make that up to you and I let that feeling hold me down while I raised you around him and the company he kept.

I know it was only a few years we were living with him but it was a few years too many and I will apologise for the rest of my days for letting you get to know a man like him.

I'll get straight to the important bit when I finally got the courage to leave.

It was a late night when I overheard him talking to one of his friends, one of his many tattooed friends, about what they had just done. I didn't catch all the reasons as to why they did what they did to someone else but I did hear all the details of what they did and how it felt. I won't tell you any more than that. I never want you to know what I heard that night, no one should. But as I was listening my heart dropped and I had no choice but to leave. To get us both away from him and safe somewhere else.

He heard me moving in the house and had me against the wall before I saw him. He demanded to know what I heard him saying so I told him and made the split second decision to offer him a deal. Let you and I go and I won't tell a soul what I knew. He would never see us again. That night he got what he wanted and I finally became the mother you needed. Soon we had the life I could only dream of and I never thought I would have it so good. I got so confident that I did something I shouldn't have. I filed for divorce and he came back.

Two nights later duct tape was slapped onto my mouth and he held me down in bed while he bound my arms and feet before picking me up and throwing me in his car. He didn't say anything as he drove me out of town away from you.

Years have passed I wonder how beautiful you must be now. I know Mum is taking good care of you and I hope you're being good for her. I have a new life now, a new name, a new hair cut and a new job but my husband is the same. He is better towards me now though he has chosen my life for me and knows everything. Two days ago he found out about my gifts to you and he went into a bigger rage than I had seen in years. I was shoved and locked in the bathroom while he left the house for over a day. He's back now and at work but will be home shortly so I'm going to warn you.

One of the things he does very well is make things look like accidents, especially fires. He is an expert at making them look like electrical faults so I need you to be aware! Please get Mum to put in security lights and cameras. Make sure you have ways out of the house on both floors and keep in mind that, if you're asleep, the heat of the fire won't wake you up because smoke inhalation and suffocation gets to people first and is the main cause of deaths in fires. I don't mean to scare you but the world is not filled with good people. You have to be weary.

I promise I will find a way out of this mess and I will find you.

I love you, never forget that.
Mum xx
P.S In fact, just move. That will give me peace of mind. I've also been able to set up a secret email account. It's written on the back so email me as soon as you get this! My angel, I think about you always.

Lazy Sunday Playlist

Dreams - Fleetwood Mac
Don't - Zoe Kravitz
River - Leon Bridges
Cold Little Heart - Micheal Kiwanuka
September Song - Agnes Obel
Straight From The Heart - Irma Thomas
Pocketful of Rainbows - Elvis
The Wonder Of You - Conor O'Brien
How's The World Treating You - Daniel Agee
Helpless - Neil Young
Nothing Arrived - The Villagers
Rippin Kittin - Golden Boy and Miss Kittin
When Love Breaks Down - Kate Walsh
The Chain - Ingrid Michealson
This Feeling - Alabama Shakes
Love Song - Adele
Cherry Wine - Hozier
Walls - Kings of Leon
Blue - Troye Sivan ft. Alex Hope
Love - Lana Del Rey
Rivers Flow In You - Yiruma
Ghosts That We Knew - Mumford and Sons
Let It Be - The Beatles
Song For Someone - U2
Without - Years and Years
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow - Amy Winehouse

Women Aren't That Great

For over several decades the feminist movement has been among us creating a wave of change for women and their roles in society. Very recently much talk has surrounded the issues of how women are portrayed to the masses and the gender pay gaps in almost every occupation. The main reason for the feminist movement is to be treated as equals to men and to stop being seen as merely sex objects. Men need to change their attitudes towards women, but the truth is we aren't doing all that well ourselves.

In my current job I have come to the conclusion that there is a certain type of woman who feels they have the right to be rude to the young women they are talking to. She tends to be middle aged or older, middle class and white. Over several occasions I have seen the attitude change almost immediately if someone else arrives to speak with them. There have been many times when I have told a woman something she doesn't want to hear such as "I'm sorry, we do not stock that product". It is something that can't be helped, either the company has it or it doesn't and some places are not able to order things in for whatever reason. However, this news coming from a 20-something can make the older woman become very irritable and impatient. She becomes rude and disrespectful and this seems to give her the right to talk down to the young lady as she is clearly incompetent. More than a handful of times I have gone to get another colleague who is an older man to come and say the exact same thing to the woman only to have her accept what he is saying without any kind of argument and be on her way. I have seen this happen among my other colleagues, even my manager who is a woman. You just need to look younger than these women it seems.

Perhaps young women have fault in these situations. I know that this certain type of woman, on a bad day, can crush the small amount of confidence that I have in an instant. I become flustered and embarrassed and can't speak properly and will end up saying something wrong to worsen the situation. I know that it happens to others too and you forget what you know you should say. Maybe its something you learn to grow out of as you get older. Watch this space.

On a primal level, there does seem to be evidence that it is logical for women (and everyone else for that matter) to follow the authoritative man. After all we are animals and commonly in the animal kingdom (among animals where the males stay in the group) it is the males who are bigger, who are head of the group and who fight other males for territory, food and the right to mate. Others in the group are taught not to try and take his role. Maybe this has something to do with women finding it easier to fight and argue with each other than it is with a man, especially if the one woman is viewed as below the other.

Of course this kind of treatment between women is not just between those who have a large difference in age, all women can be very unforgiving towards each other and you would know this only too well if you are, or have ever been, a teenage girl. In terms of bullying and bringing each other down, teenage girls are masters. I will admit I did not treat every girl the way that I should have at that time. But now, after getting through this stage of life and into make adult years I have discovered that it doesn't matter how old you get, some women don't outgrow these behaviours. There have been times that I also have repeated my teenage self as a grownup and I've felt terrible about it. I'm no angel, nowhere close, but is there anything around us could be encouraging such childish ways?

Prime examples of this are tabloid magazines and reality TV shows based around gossip. Mostly written and hosted by women and read and viewed by women. If you look closely at these you will find the same old bullets that these women are using to fire at those in the spotlight: she's put on weight, she's lost too much, she has a secret eating disorder, she's sleeping with this guy or all these men, she's fighting with this woman, she's still carrying baby weight after having her baby four months ago! Its ridiculous. The only thing that ever changes is the target. Why do these things have any kind of audience at all?

They also have extremely mixed messages about how women should treat themselves. Usually these things will say 'love yourself and your imperfections' then 'here's a workout to get that 'perfect' body', 'dress how you want to' to 'these are must haves!', 'eat healthy' with 'here's a great recipe for a cake'. I'm not aware of any male magazine doing this to men. If anything they build themselves up and don't make men feel guilty about it. Why don't we?

If we want to be seen as equal to men shouldn't we be starting with ourselves? I have no doubt that women can be great and could end up running the world so it won't be such 'a man's world' anymore. We can have equal rights and opportunities and girls everywhere will be able to receive an education but we won't be able to do it if we don't treat ourselves and each other properly. I have been told that how people treat others is a direct reflection of how they feel about themselves. If this is the case women must see themselves as deserving of being in the gutter.

I wish I knew the solution to turn these attitudes around but I don't. I'm at a loss. It all just feels like a David and Goliath battle with Goliath getting bigger and bigger the more women become obsessed with judging other women and going out of their way to hurt each other through new mediums like social media.

Can this ever stop? Am I the only one embarrassed?!

Manhattan

I find that writing in the middle of the night, like I am now, brings out old memories from a myriad of places. I suppose all memories are old as they are events and moments from the past, but I think old memories are the ones that you know will never fade. Like the ones I'm having at the moment.

I remember being in my local coffee shop in Manhattan. It was October and the leaves were falling, like me. The coffee shop where sometimes the drinks were decent but most of the time it was disgusting stuff. You remember don't you? 'Course you do, you worked there. I always came in only to see you. A cliche I know, but you did believe me for a long time when I said I worked from home and didn't want to walk too far to get some coffee, so I settled for clump of coffee you served. Stupid lie, you told me, but you smiled when you said it.

It was that day in October when I first got the courage to say more to you than just "Americana please". You let me embarrass myself for so long until you finally said "It's Americano." I blushed a deep red and you laughed. When I was about to leave you told me the coffee was on the house. "I love you, no I mean I love that!" I couldn't breathe. "That's a relief" you said, with that smile. I still couldn't breathe. From that moment I was ruined.

All of a sudden it felt like New York was ours. We shared it. You went wild for the crisp air and beautiful snow during winter while I stayed near a fire. I soaked up the sun and heat in summer when it was too hot for you to leave the air-conditioning. You loved the never ending noise of a city alive and I loved the never ending array of people who brought it to life. That was us, two halves who, together, had everything the city could give us. Until it wasn't.

Over the years it was like the winter snuck in through the cracks and tickled my feet before creeping up over my bones. Folding itself around me, over and over. It wouldn't have made a difference had I set a forest on fire and stood in the middle of it. It made me deaf and blind to you. Numb, actually, now that I think about it. And I couldn't stop it.

What was it like for you? Did the heat grow through you like anger? Did the summer boil your blood? Is that why you left so often, to go out and drown yourself in the constant roar of the city, so loud that it would conceal your own explosions?

You found me saying more to strangers in the street than I would to you. I always had to fight my way through crowds to find you. Eventually we both stopped looking.

So I left.

As I knew you would, you didn't search for me. I tip-toed out during the night you were away to spare you having to explain to your friends that you watched me leave. You came back to space that could be filled with someone new. That was that.

As atonement for my actions, I leave you Manhattan. You always needed it more than I did. The streets, the avenues, the falling leaves. I've gone west to settle on the beach. When it gets blustery I'm going to shout out my apologies into the wind, hoping they make it to you. Like how sorry I am that I didn't love you enough or that we ended up the way we did. I wish things had stayed the way they were at the beginning. But through the seasons and over the years, like everything else, we changed. I loved you back then, I do now, but after a while we weren't us anymore and I fell in love with an idea of us that I started to imagine. An ideal us that we could never come close to but that's where I stayed for so long. I shouldn't have.

Please have Manhattan, because I can't have you.

Girls and Beetles

My mother doesn't make sense. For starters she named me Wolf.
"Its short for Wolfgang. Its classical! Mozart had that name."
As if that explanation on its own would make up for the years of relentless teasing at school. It started with 'Doggy' in kindergarten and evolved from there over the years. Just one of the joys of having a name that is originally a noun. Had I had brothers they would have been called Van and Spike. Though it has been lonely being an only child, I am happy to have saved them from such torment. ("I never knew that having a child would be so expensive!" That was the same line I got from her every time I'd ask if there were a chance for me to have a sibling.)

I'd ask her what names she had picked out if I were a girl.
"A girl! None, I always knew I'd only have sons...well a son."
"But how did you know you'd never have a girl?"
"Because I wouldn't allow it. Now, off to school."
"I'm back from school."
"When do you go back again?"
"Tomorrow."
"Oh, well I suppose you can stay the night."
"I live here."
"Then you can start on dinner. And be quiet, I'll be in the next room contacting my aura so I need silence! I'll get that stubborn fucker to change from orange to blue if its the last thing I do."

I remember coming back from school, strutting down the street having just learnt in science that it's the man that decides the sex of a baby, not the woman. However, when I got home I found her crying because another boyfriend had left her. (It's not that she is incapable of having a long-term relationship, seven months is the longest so far, it's just that, after a while with her, most men realise its better for them to go back to their wives.) So I thought I should leave my new found fact for another time and let her ring her 'sorrow bells' (her wind chimes in which the nice, high sounds will eventually pick her mood up with them. They usually take a few days and piss the dog off to no end but its better than the alternative: friends with make-shift drums and no need for sleep are invited over for a kick off. It escalates very quickly from there.)

You might be thinking that I should like having such a unique name as Wolfgang, but I resemble nothing of a wolf or a strong man who could take on a wolf. Even the dog doesn't listen to me! I'm 14, 5'2, scrawny, very white, dark haired, asthmatic and I need huge glasses to see anything. I kind of look like Harry Potter if he were Gothic and afraid of the sun. Good thing is I don't need a costume for Halloween, even though I'm not allowed to take part in anything that's a part of Halloween as Mum doesn't want me to get sucked into 'Satan's Annual Orgy.' This coming from a woman who renamed herself Pixie-Loveboat because Delia seemed a little too close to the word devil. The only member of the family who doesn't have a weird name is the dog, who's called Dog. "Why would I call it anything other than what it is?" explains my mother. Like I said, she doesn't make sense.

Before I can get any dinner started, I need some pots and cutlery that go missing from the kitchen on a regular basis so I have to trudge to the other side of the house to interrupt Dad (Albertus) and his space experiments. He and mum were never together so I'm the result of a one night stand ("You could have said something before mum filled in my birth certificate!" "I'm afraid of your mother."). He still lives here because he can't get a proper job, usually due to his insistent need to show off his Klingon to prospective employers during interviews. I'm embarrassed to say I know how to count from one to five in that funny space-age language. I think I haven't forgotten cause it makes him happy and it once stopped a man from jumping off of a bridge. He was depressed as he couldn't find anyone like him until Dad started struck up a conversation. Unfortunately the man slipped on the side as he was turning around to get back over the railing and died in the water. Dad still considers it a victory.

I use the special knock that he needs to hear to open the door, otherwise I could be anyone: the CIA who have finally found him after all these years after he stole a dirty magazine when he was nine, or the Scientology people who have correctly identified him as the man who tried to throw an egg at a fellow Scientologist's house, missed and hit his cat instead (he would be a faithful member of Scientology if only Tom Cruise weren't part of it). The door cracks open slowly and I recite the line I learnt at age five, "I am no harm to those behind the door or any visitors from above who may be inside." I'm let in straight away and I find what I need in the structure of Dad's homemade Dalek. There's still a dent in the side after he and Mum got into an argument when mum said that they actually sound very worried and unsure rather than sinister and evil. Mum won and Dad's Dalek got the final blow.

"I'm going to need those back. I've nearly finished you know."
"You've been working on it for seven years."
"And to finish it, I need those back."
"Right"
"What's for dinner?"
"Lamb chops for me, non-gluten, no egg pasta and soy-mince for Mum and your usual mashed potato, raw kidney beans, five leaves of lettuce and a plate of peas on the side."
"And my drink of water?"
"With three ice cubes, no more, no less."
"Because odd numbers confuse the aliens."
"Yes, Dad. I know."

I close the door behind me and hear Mum yelling from her room when I get to the kitchen. "WHY ARE YOU RED NOW!?" While I prepare the separate dishes, I prepare in my head the conversation I need to have with Dad and Mum too but only because I know that there's no way I can speak to Dad without Mum around. In the event of an abduction, the aliens will go for the women first letting Dad have ample time to make it to his bunker (a three foot hole in the back garden that Dad promises he will finish but has been filled with rainwater in the meantime). So Dad won't leave his room unless he knows women are around.

My father is the last person I should really be asking for girl advice from but my choices are severely limited. There's the internet but the school and the local library have blocked any kind of inappropriate website that may be of use, (needless to say we don't have a computer at home) and the only other source for help is my one and only friend Tony. He's very tall and thin and his voice hasn't stopped cracking since we were twelve. I let him show me once how he picks up girls every weekend when we both know he's helping his mum at church or singing in the choir.

As I said I only needed to see it once to realise he's worse than my dad at talking to girls. He sauntered into a shop and said "Hello gorgeous, may I please have a boob BOTTLE! BOTTLE OF WATER PLEASE!'' He sprinted out of the store before anyone could say anything.

So that leaves my dad. He thinks that most women are cyborgs of some kind because he can't understand them, but he did get my mum to lie still long enough to create me so he obviously knows more than me and Tony put together.

See, there's this girl. She's new and I don't think she's worked out that who the cool kids are and who are the nerds that no one really knows. At this point I think I still have a chance to introduce myself and make an impression before the football guys do.

Her name is Annie and everyone wants to be her friend or her boyfriend. She oozes the essence of cool. No drama, always calm and will talk to anyone. ANYONE! She has amazing long blonde hair that smells of citrus, cool glasses and her skin is perfect. No makeup and no pimples anywhere, The complete opposite to all the other girls at school. Everyone knows who Annie is.

And that brings us up to date in my predicament and explains why I am going to ask a nervous, sci-fi recluse how to get Annie to go out with me.

I set all the meals on the table when Mum walks in looking drained and pale.  "No luck?" I ask. She just gives me a look that says 'if-I-wasn't-so-tired-you'd-be-dead-by-now'.  "I'll go get Dad." I mutter. "No, I'll go." Mum replies. After an unsuccessful aura session a good yell at Dad usually makes her feel a bit better. I wait to hear her let out her frustrations. "GET OUT HERE NOW!' No knock, just a yell.

I hear the door fling open and Dad comes shuffling into the kitchen wearing the head of his home-made Dalek. Mum quickly follows looking a bit more relaxed.  When they sit I realise I don't know how to start the conversation as Mum and Dad dig into their food.

Mum sees that I'm not eating. "Are you not feeling well? Did you do your emotional meditation today?"
"Mum, would you mind getting your Listening Beads?" I've never asked her to do this so she complies without any questions. When she returns she throws the necklace over at Dad which scatters his peas.
"So, what do you want to talk about?"
"Uh, I actually want to talk to Dad."

Slowly, very, very slowly I take the beads off Dad's plate (Dad is frozen with surprise) and hand them back over to Mum who's looking very confused.

"Dad....please don't freak out at all if you can help it. But I want some advice about a girl."
My mother clutches her necklace, straining the chord so hard her fingers are going red. I decide to carry on.
"There's a new girl who started a two weeks ago and I think she wouldn't laugh at me if I asked her out. I just need to know how. Do you think you could help me?"
"Well I don't know son. How's her Klingon?"
Mum makes a high pitched cry without opening her mouth. The vein in her temple is starting to show.
"No Dad, I mean she's normal. How do I talk to someone normal?"
Dad just looks at me as if he's never heard the word normal. Mum knocks the under side of the table with knee jolting Dad back into the conversation.
"Well I think...this is ah...hmm...ugh...who does..where...where is she from?"
"She's moved over from Cambridge. Her name is Annie."
"NO!" Mum screams slamming her beads onto the table. "I can't take it anymore. Beads or no beads I must speak. Wolfgang, you cannot bring this girl into our house, our lives."
"But Pix, we all have to learn how to initiate a conversation with all species of human being. If not I wouldn't have my Nimoy Appreciation Group to go to. Being a NAG is wonderful, even all the women joining love being a NAG."
"For the last time Eugene, my name is Pixie-Love not Pix! And the moment he said the name Annie I felt awash with anti-mother energy. She is not good news."
"But she's already the highest achiever in my class Mum. Even the teachers are starting to check with her that their facts are right."
Mum takes my face in her hands "My son. My beautiful, soulful son. The tender, succulent fruit of my loins you have to listen to mother! My skin crawled after you said her name and you know what that means don't you?"
"Yes Mum, your spirit levels are unstable."
"They are unstable! It has taken me weeks just to get them to sit next to each other now I have to massage my Mama points to calm them." She stomps off into her bedroom. Dad starts to sweat as he realises there are no women around him.
"She is still in the house Dad," I reassure him "the UFOs will still take her first." He seems to relax a little.
"So what should I say to Annie?"
"Who?"
"The new girl, Dad."
"Oh yes. How's her Klingon?"
"I don't think she knows any."
"Well then if she has big hands you could ask her to come round and finish the bunker."
"She doesn't have big hands. She doesn't know Klingon, anything about Dr. Who, our universe or the Marvel one. She's normal Dad, please try to understand."
"Well, my therapist told me to simply ask about them. Humans love to converse about themselves. Oh! Ask her if she gets that funny rash between her thighs like you do. That might be something you could have in common."
"You still go to that therapist?"
"Of course. He says I'm not crazy, I am just mentally athletic."
"Dad, please don't take this the wrong way. I'm asking you about this because...well you got Mum to be with you long enough to make me. How do I get a girl to stay with me while I'm talking."
"I'm going to be honest with you son. You know you're mother and I met at a Halloween party, she was Gaia and I was Spock. She liked me because she thought I was a good actor."
"You were acting like Spock?"
"No, I was just being me. Soon she wouldn't leave me alone and she pulled me into one of the bedrooms. Everything was a bit of a blur after that. She says that Venus was strong in the sky that night which is what made her particularly aggressive. To be honest I didn't have much say in the matter and before I knew it it was over and she was asleep. I did enjoy it."
At this point I've lost all hope for help from my father. I excuse myself and head off to my room.

Down the hallway I am clutched on the shoulder by my mother who shoves a jam jar filled with what looks like purple vomit into my hands. Its only covered by a layer of thin cling film and a rubber band.
"It's beetle husk son. Wipe it on her every time she's near enough. It will start to cleanse her spirits."
"No thanks Mum." I hand the jar back to her and make a bee line for my bed.

The next morning I'm up and out the door before either parent can say anything. I'd done some thinking on my way to school and thought that maybe Dad did have some good advice: just ask people about themselves. I decide that yes, this is what I will do.

I make my way over to the brick wall by the school entrance to wait for Tony. Leaning against the wall I hear a gentle clink from my bag. I lean back again and again. The clink is still there.  I pull my rucksack off to have a look inside. Before I reach in to take whatever it is out, I notice some familiar blonde hair in my peripheral vision. It's her. Oh God. There she is, two feet in front of me talking to some other girls. Her back is perfect. Can a back be perfect? She is perfect.

My brain manages to reconnect with my arm and I yank the mystery clinking item from my bag just as Tony arrives slapping me on the shoulder, jolting me forward throwing the contents of what I'm holding all down Annie's back.

It's the beetle husk. It had leaped through the thin cling film and was now dripping purple goo down her spine.

She's screaming. Her friends are screaming. People are laughing. People are pointing. I have to stay calm. 1, 2, 3...

"Wolf. Wolf!" Tony exclaims in my ear. "You're counting in Klingon out loud!"
I do the only thing every other person would do. I bolt. I sprint as fast as my little legs will take me down the street with Tony close behind.

"I'M NOT READY FOR GIRLS!" I yell at Tony.
"NO MAN EVER IS!" Tony shouts back.

I think maybe next time...ah, hell. There is never going to be a next time.

Unrequited Love: A Letter To You

Everyone has a story of an unrequited love at some point in their lives. That's what you are to me.

People are talking about how you're with someone new. That you're not using those 'boyfriend/girlfriend' terms yet but it'll get there eventually. I always knew that you would really like her. I knew it when I saw her and I'm usually pretty good with these things.

The rumours are flying around and most people say they don't believe something until they have seen it for themselves. But I don't want to. It will be too hard. I have been here before so I know from experience to get away from it all early before it goes further and I end up heartbroken over someone I never had and never will.

That's not to say that this doesn't hurt, this is brutal. But what's best is me leaving you alone completely. Not even looking at a profile picture. Its a very lonely place to be. You made me so happy and confident with myself in a way no one else has. I miss you, I hope that means something to you.

I thought that we would be good together. In fact I still do (maybe it's the idea of you, but I don't want to believe that). There is a lot in common between us and I have never gotten bored listening to you. You are one of the most interesting people I have ever come across. Intelligent. Thoughtful. Confident. Softly spoken. Funny. Creative. Tough. Considerate. Difficult. At times a real dick but I love that about you, so openly flawed that it made it so easy to fall in love with you. All of you. Not want to change anything. Not even how you could have your pick of any woman in the world.

For so long I have been looking at so many beautiful women comparing myself to them and hoping that you wouldn't fall for them, though I saw the way you would looked at them. Or maybe go back to one of your incredible ex-girlfriends, beautiful beyond compare, killing all my chances of being with you. Now you are with someone, someone I suspected from the start, and I have to turn around. I can't look for you anymore. Even if it's not true I should've done this earlier. But you changed me.

I'm better off having had you in my life. Stronger, braver, bolder. I'm going after things that, a year ago, I never even considered could be something I could do. I believe that nothing is impossible because you taught me that and I am forever grateful.

I just wish you were with me.

I hope in the future I will get to see you, talk to you and tell you all this. Or maybe all you will know is what is written here. In my wild imagination I hope that we both move on with our lives and they will eventually bring us together. But I don't want that if its at the cost of your happiness. You are so much more important than anything else.

I'm going to, but I don't want to move on. I have to to stop me from getting to involved when you know none of this and the only person who ends up crying is me. So here goes...

Be happy (with her or someone else).

I love you.

I miss you.

So much.

Goodbye.

Unacceptable

Self Acceptance.

There has been a lot of talk over the past few years in terms of body image and the concept of self acceptance. From a social stand point, it is based around the idea of dismantling the underlying messages that images in magazines and on the internet portray. Directed towards young girls and women, self acceptance seems to be about knowing that the way you look is okay despite the fact that you don't look anything like the model in the picture.

Why is it that 'perfect' looking women are so revered? It may be because she is the same sex as the audience that a campaign is mostly aimed at and therefore has more of an impact on those looking at her. If so, what is the underlying message that the picture is saying?

What is shown is a perfect body, face, skin, teeth, hair. A perfect everything. She is wearing the designer clothes, she is surrounded by other women who look the same as her, she is usually happy or oozing sex, she is surrounded by handsome men. She has money. She has men. She has friends. She has it all. It may be because her body is what is emphasised that girls and women take in these messages from the picture and associate her 'success' to the aesthetic of her body. She has value and she gets what you want. In many cases this translates over into the models personal life as many go on to date handsome, rich, famous men.

As a result, if you don't have what she has, it is because you don't look like her. Queue in fad diets, constructive clothing to give you the desired lines, the exercise regimes. I believe that a lot of people are actually aiming for this ideal rather than aiming for a fit and healthy body.

This certainly has a lot to answer for in terms of girls and women being unable to accept their bodies for what they are. However, I believe that the difficulty of accepting your body is also directly related to the difficulty of accepting who you are as a person. For me, this started as a child.

I have always struggled with myself. To like myself. To find myself interesting. I know exactly what I am and what I'm not, but still find it hard to go easy on myself. Usually when I have done something wrong or maybe over something I didn't do for example. I have always been this way, just like I have always been very sensitive.

As a child (and still as an adult) I took a long time to be at ease around new places and people. I am on the unusual side. My sense of humour is very specific, my imagination is always running (so at least I'm never bored), a lot of the time I can be a bit of a loner and I'm very quiet. No kid really wants to go and talk to the girl who's sitting on her own smiling to herself. So I've always found it hard to make friends and, at times, keep them. I went through a very long stage of loneliness as child and for a while considered my cat and dog my only friends. My peers weren't accepting me so it became very hard for me to do the same (especially when you have a sibling who has never really struggled in this area).

My mother has always said that you only need a handful of good friends to get you through life. I truly believe this to be accurate as I did eventually find a small group of friends as a teenager and then again in university. But during my childhood and early adolescence I did see the large group of kids as the group that I needed to be part of. Most kids like to talk, they like other kids who can make them laugh and they usually are very similar to each other. Subconsciously, on a couple of occasions, I tried to change and be like them. I tried to make jokes (usually didn't do too well with those), I tried to talk a lot and to make myself heard (a challenge when you're naturally softly spoken). Children are pretty harsh so if you're quiet you're usually left behind.

This didn't work while at primary school but it did for a time in my early teens. However, as time went on, I found myself becoming distant from the big group of friends I thought I had. Perhaps it's because talking for the sake of talking isn't really my thing and eventually I reverted back to being my quiet self.

As a teenager with your hormones on the loose running riot, you become very aware of your body as it changes and also noticing the changes in those around you. You become attracted to a certain kind of person and you become aware of the certain kind of person they are attracted to. This kind of attraction is like the way in which you meet people who you would like to be your friend. You end up comparing yourself to them and those around them. This is then influenced by the women you see in popular culture. The models, the actresses, the singers, the women who have it all.

It has carried on to a certain extent into my twenties. I am jealous of another woman at work who is the sort of person everyone wants to be their friend. She is fun, funny, happy, chatty, very smiley and happy and to top it all off, she has an amazing figure and sense of style. I'm am not going to try and be like her in any way but I can't help seeing how people are so drawn to her and praise her so highly, especially when she's not around. There have also been a lot of times when I have said something while she is having a conversation and she hasn't heard it.

It can be very blinding and overwhelming to be in a world where the skinny person is the 'ideal' and feeling as though, if you're not like her, you won't be as widely accepted as she is (this is slowly changing with more plus size models coming into mainstream consumption but it still has a long way to go) How we feel about our bodies is related to how we feel about who we are which can be related to how we were accepted as children before our different body types were thought to be important.

The women I know who accept not only their bodies but who they are as people, are in their fifties, don't really care what other people think of them and have found success in their own individual ways. They know that their bodies are what they are so why try and modify it to look like a twenty year old?

I feel that maybe if I was okay with being who I am then I would be okay with my body and walk around with more confidence. I would be fine with the fact that my thighs and many of my other bits are a bit big, my stomach is round and I have an extremely long neck (at odd angles it makes me head look very small). There are some days where I think I look pretty but the days where I feel pretty are very rare. I have never seen myself as beautiful. I think that has a lot more to do with my internal dialogue with myself rather than with what I see in the mirror.

Here's hoping we manage to accept ourselves and our bodies. I hope I'm not alone with these feelings.