Hardening arteries

Never is a lie

Sometimes pain can be a tool
that springs apart the boards
of all that makes sense.
Sometimes the truth
is no longer a window
but a solid door.
Sometimes love is ice
and hate soothes
and blackness is a flame.
All through this
Through this sane madness
Through a second guess
Lies the shifting sand
The sea and the shingle
The cold truth that is
Time.

Who are you?
Maybe a stranger
Yet familiar as daybreak?
Who were you?
A page torn roughly
From an old book?
Who am I?
The boy who became
A shadow of then?
I lose track
The thief is time
The mind is flawed
Truth is what
We say it is
Lies can't hurt
Time

D.H.

In the immortal words of Cornershop in their deep and meaningful song “Brimful of Asha” - they are indeed almost correct in their statement “everyone needs a bosom for a pillow”.
Everyone needs someone who has no issues or agendas apart from the friendship and loyalty they give willingly and without judgement. Everyone needs someone they can lean against and feel safe until they feel their strength return. It is also a two way street (well it is to me anyway) – I feel privileged that I can be in the position to offer such a service in return and feel that someone appreciates me just being there.

Time is basically a paintbrush for lies. It has the ability to invisibly cover over all the flaws and blemishes of the actual truth, or when used negatively, can turn the simple and beautiful into something quite grotesque. We cannot entirely trust our memories I believe!

The only true memory is NOT the one in the mind, because that picture is re-touched and flawed. It is the one in the pit of your stomach. The one inside the subconscious vault. The “original copy” that always overrides the rosy picture and insinuates at the truth without you quite ever being able to pin it down. It's like your spider sense I suppose. The trouble with “original copies” is their habit of ambushing you. They lie in wait hidden inside a seemingly innocent sound, sight or smell. They are the mocking assassins of our badly ordered, picture book minds. They shout out suddenly, right in our faces “I KNOW WHO YOU REALLY ARE” - these mental poltergeists really are delightful but frighteningly annoying!

Some things do not bear analysis as they are just what they are. A friendship being one of them. Once you try to clinically disect a friendship you find a million loose threads and scraps of coloured cloth that make up the fabric of something ethereal. Friendships can be formed in ice as well as fire!

I enjoy the day trips that a friendship throws up. The trips back into the past (whether accurate or flawed) are always either sad or happy. Here's to the journey! - it is to be toasted with a glass of the finest vintage our souls can muster.

Since the advent of electronic mail my life was unremarkable, but now I am reliably informed of many life enhancing improvements. To date I must have won at least the equivalent of the US national debt on various foreign lotteries. I have also been approached by hundreds of Russian brides who all see me as their perfect life partner. Even in my advancing years I needn't worry about my sexual performance with my new Iron Curtain lady as I am reliably informed that my manhood can be enlarged and it's rigidity guaranteed even if I die - in fact, the way they are talking, I will have to have a specially designed coffin to house my erection!

I have had letters informing me of security breaches in bank accounts with companies I don't HAVE accounts with, and just about every other jape and ruse imaginable. Added to all this I have people asking me to open attachments that have no other purpose than to cause damage to my PC.

A few questions. What do people gain by writing malicious bits of code that are bounced around from machine to machine that cause untold misery and wasted time. OK, I can see why keyloggers would plant bits of code on your machine. It's to steal your passwords and hence your money!

Maybe it is about time we stopped glamourising crime with exciting titles which would tend to make it less attractive to the street cool. Car theft and criminal damage sound way less cool than joy riding, and robbery with threat of violence sounds somewhat more scumbag than mugging. So let's dump the terms such as "hacking" and call it what it really is - criminal damage.

They say there is an up side to every down side, but the only up side I can see to this is that it keeps companies afloat that (thankfully) write anti virus programs.

Well apart from my youth (which is obvious) I miss other things. I miss choice being simpler. The TV had 3 channels. The choice of recorded media was vinyl or cassette. You watched films at the cinema or when they finally came out on TV. All this may make me sound like a Luddite but I don't intend to, it's just I grow tired of often pointless change. All my music was on vinyl, then cassettes came out so I bought some on cassette and transferred my vinyl onto blank cassettes. Then out came CD which royally bollocksed up all my music collection, so I slowly reassembled it (at a cost) on CD. Now bugger me if sodding vinyl isn't making a comeback! It's the same when I bought my first video recorder (luckily I chose VHS) I assembled a goodly amount of films, most of which I bought new on release. Then came DVD so yet again the costly replacement of a collection. Now they want to sell us all Blu Ray. May I make a suggestion?......Could you kindly PISS OFF.
My TV is HD so I upgraded my Sky box to just about every new development there is including HD and record facility. I wonder if I get 2 years out of it before it's all considered shite and we have holographic 3D mega pixel lazer guided TV or something?

As a young stripling of a lad the addictive pastime of fishing bit me deeply. I would read the Mr Crabtree books in bed and dream of being Peter sitting beside some lake or other with Mr Crabtree waiting for Tinca the Tench to grab my bait.

Amongst other heroes was the legendary Richard Walker who caught the record breaking carp Clarissa who weighed in at an impressive 44 lbs 8 ozs. Clarissa was transferred to London Zoo where she lived for a further 20 years.Mr Walker was an angling god to us kids. His record was intact from 1952 right through until 1980 when Chris Yates broke his record with a carp weighing in at 51 lbs. When I heard this news it was exciting, but at the same time I felt as if a great hero has fallen. Dickie Walker and the 44 pounder Clarissa were the stuff of legends. The record now stands at a staggering 67 lbs.

The reason for all this piscatorial prattle is to merely say that another legend has died. A carp by the name of Benson who oddly enough was female and weighed in at 64 lbs when she died. She was apparently caught over 60 times in her life. A very obliging carp and an international legend as anglers came from all over Europe to try their luck. Whatever your views on fishing I think most people would have to agree that the chance of such a fish surviving in a clean, well fed, non polluted lake would be very slim without the angling fraternity.