Candy

Let us take stock a moment, let us review, analyse, dissect and second-guess. Now is the time, the moment. Well I thought you were all good, did good things. Namely? Why don’t you tell me one thing that struck you about the performances that weren’t your own? I am in agreement. To be honest, I am going to find the physical aspect of proffering an opinion a bit troublesome, owing to the presence of a very heavy head-cold. I said I didn’t want to miss the performance, I am sorry, I came regardless. What do you think of me now? Well if I can overlay the importance of what I think about you over that which you think about me then I'm a winner. I shall not fear to be commanded by public opinion. Why don't you start by bowing down, you suddenly came out with. And this is precisely what I did, I don’t know why, I would not have bowed down had you not told me to, I did not want you to think such and such about me. You had not read the Hamlet, you must realise that I need my plaudits like you need them too. I didn’t realise it then, so clearly, and I believe you used it to your advantage.

Now is the time to take stock, the completion of the moment, the intercession, our allotted time. You put a heavy premium on thinking, here is your chance to shine. Where does the idea get conceived, gestate, where does it come to and come out of? Everything is a silent menace. Stay silent on the WhatsApp groups and the multiplicitous Teams chats. How bloodthirsty thought is, how it must be led away and censored. Scroll the memes on Facebook. Be silent on WhatsApp, inveterately so. They give you one fucking chance, off you go. And you bottled it. [GULP.] You have one chance to sparkle and shine. If only you could be oblivious. They think, whisper whisper whisper, poke poke poke, sharp as knives. Oh god let them think. Watch the opinions gather momentum in time. They are currently gathering. Soon you will be under review. The only forum is review, the only point of the frivolous exercise, something tangible, something more than words, a block of clay, or even a body. I respectfully submit that you are incorrect to think that. Can I tell you something? By all means. Preface it up with a nugget of flattery. The most important debts are not financial but those of failing to convey our sense of esteem for others, however falsely. Any mortgage can go unpaid for months, building up, building up. And up.

Can I ask you something then? Oh that’s better. You think I’m worthy. No I’m flattering you. No maybe I do, god strike me down for ever owning up to it. How much is your room? What’s that got to do with the price of eggs? (£1,000 give or take.) You should be paying her. Well you know that you don’t think I should be and I didn’t invite you to say it. Acknowledged. What in the end are we all trying to achieve? Esteem is it not. Not the debt itself. She expects more than the world can carry. Not an unenviable position, the position of a child. You can neither go it alone or lean completely on others for resolution. They are all always at their own silent breaking points. She posts only pictures of Foxgloves and the odd bee, not to convince us of course. In her little country cottage. Keep lurking on WhatsApp, keep keeping your shtumm. Keep thinking. You cannot trust people to be anywhere near as good as the last time, they will always fall short. You are in a court room. But the text says to an unseen person, no mention of a court. Eventually he will be in court, some sort of muttering of that ilk. The power of one’s own conceited belief in one’s own conceited thoughts. The tradition of age bearing in upon the younger. The tradition of youth kow-towing. The solid welt of public opinion. You did not even read the Hamlet, it is easy to tell how much time you gave it, it is often just a function of the time you devote to the text, to learning it, just giving yourself time to notice that you had not misread a word. And you showed off about the Stoppard, you couldn’t stop talking. You must have had something to prove. I see. It took me some time to cop it.