Bound for Glory (1984)

Gary sat huddled into his leather jacket on the train, his stomach turning somersaults, in time with the irregular rhythms of the train’s movement. He drew his scarf around his neck and pulled down the corduroy cap his Dad had given him, making the pretence that he was asleep more credible. The favourite cap which he thought made him look like maybe Bob Dylan or Woody Guthrie -someone like that, had been an unwanted gift to Dad from Gran. Her choosing of gifts had never been her strong point.

He was feeling rough, his worst hangover ever. Maybe he could get a coffee on the train later, that might help. Last night had been a heavy one, his twenty-first birthday bash, a pub crawl around the worst dives in the east end of Aberdeen. It had been a good night, but he and his work guys, all somewhat older, some even approaching fifty, had parted company inadvertently.

Gary had knocked back several nips of blended whisky, something he wasn’t at all used to, added to his usual tipple of lager. He staggered about trying to find his money in his jacket pocket, had fallen in George Street, lost his bearings and  had no idea where the rest of them were going, or had gone.

He staggered his erratic journey home after that, crashing in waking up his folks by banging the front door and causing the windchimes in the hall to clink off one another.

Next thing he knew, it was morning, his head ached, the room was freezing in the chill of an autumn day, and he was thankful that it was no longer spinning.

Excitement filled his mind. This was the day he was going to Glasgow, on his own, but a trip away, nonetheless.

He could act out his Jack Kerouac ‘Lonesome Traveller’ fantasies, speak to strangers and fictionalise it into a story later, describing scenarios whereby he would enter their lives and they his, even if it was just for a fleeting few minutes. He loved the books of Jack Kerouac, and was in awe of his long verbose sentences, which exuded enthusiasm and reminded him of when he was told off for ‘yapping’ and talking too much as a young teen.He loved the sentence in 'On The Road' about burning like fabulous yellow Roman candles, if only he could think up something like that.

 He wasn’t sure what ‘spontaneous bop prosody’ meant, but it read well to him, like a waterfall spilling out words like drips of water one minute, then an organised selection of words which read like a poem to him, or at least reminded him of poetry done at school and more recently borrowed from the library. He was discovering lots of music and books and learning what Life was like beyond the confines of his home town in North East of Scotland.

Since leaving school, he had been working at a civil service job, just like his Dad, and moreover just as his Mum had suggested the day his exam results came out.

He didn’t really care. He was enjoying a life of books and music now, the job was what financed that, he still lived at home with his folks, he had his whole life in front of him as they kept telling him.

He could do anything he put his mind to, as his Dad often said.

Maybe he would one day, maybe he already was.

Sometimes his job got him down, he was the lowest of the pecking order grade wise and was treated badly by those in charge, but what writer, or potential writer had a life which was a bed of roses?

Anyway, the last thing he wanted to end up as, was the mythical ‘typical civil servant’, a drudge who reported for duty every day at the same time, wore a suit, carried a briefcase, kept their head down working all day and left at the same time every day until they finally retired.

It was all grist to the mill, he thought to himself often, this was a quote from someone famous, he couldn’t recall who.

Since his epiphany of reading Jack Kerouac’s ‘On the Road’, Gary had developed a burning ambition to be an author or maybe a poet.

He was scribbling down notes and ideas at work all the times, much to the disdain of his superiors, but the teachers at school had told of his ‘flair for languages’, and they seemed to be right so far.

He had a notebook full of ideas that were driving him insane, and he was en route to Glasgow to buy some Books of the Beat Generation writers and albums of bands he had read about in ‘Sounds’ and ‘NME’. Glasgow seemed to be a great place for gigs also compared to Aberdeen, there was something decent on there most nights.

There would be a room in a cheap hotel where he could write and indulge his poetic fantasies, or maybe produce something concrete and lasting.

Get a cheap hotel, that’s what all his colleagues did on training courses in Glasgow, so they could blow their expenses on alcohol , that seemed to be the order of the day, but Gary wanted better than that ,in his mind , he would be living out in the Glasgow equivalent of the ‘Beat Hotel’ in Paris , where Kerouac had stayed back in the day.

This wasn’t a training course, though, it was a foray away from Aberdeen for Gary, a step into the world for him.

Gary felt he was on the cusp of something special, perhaps brilliance or magic, maybe this writing was something he could pursue as something a bit more than a hobby.

Maybe this would be his chance to shine, to prove himself, time would tell.

He would do whatever he put his mind to.