#1 Nothing Much to Do

I’ve been deliberating for some time about starting a blog altogether. Further rumination came regarding my first post, with a breakthrough arriving in the form of an oppurtunistic sifting session of old school books during a house move.

Finally, I settled on the idea of sharing one of my earliest pieces of writing. It seemed to amuse my teachers at the time, and I must say, was thoroughly amusing to write at the time, too.

The year is 1998; Monica Lewinsky had Bill Clinton in her mouth, with Tony Blair not too far behind her; Titanic won everything, including the dumbest death ever; Lauryn Hill completed music, whilst Robbie Williams ended it by leaving Take That; something pretty big happened in Ireland, with something else big brewing in the middle-east and the US not too far behind; Arsenal won the league by a point vs Beckham’s United, that same Number 7 not only lost the title but lost his head and got sent off at the World Cup in France, and all the while I was two days away from my 7th birthday in a classroom in Cheshunt crafting my literary legacy.

I must have been in good spirits, as a large portion of the content in this book, particularly the solely creative endeavours, often ended rather violently. This one, however, ended considerably lighter.

Early in the morning, dog and me
Looking out the window, nothing much to see
Day's getting older, sun's up high
Nothing much to do
But sit on the loo

Clearly a big dreamer as a kid. I just wanted to sit on the toilet with my doggo by my side. I can only assume I’ve returned to pen this poem in ink as I’d remembered it and wanted to increase it’s permanence due to anxiety, as if some Russian spy would infiltrate the attic and furiously rub out this masterpiece and it would be lost forever. And now I have gone a few steps further and increased its permanence to, well, forever.

Pencil, pen, eternity.

I would say the cultural significance of a clown has changed a little since then. Once heralded as a pioneer in youthful entertainment, a joyous gift of laughter, now reduced to being the butt of a joke in a tragedy, or a comedy for that matter, or conversely the petrifying villain in a horror flick.

Hollywood still seems to enjoy sticking them in the background of Judd Apatow and Marvel films, despite clown being such a prevalent insult, light-hearted or otherwise, certainly here in the UK and indeed the US; I’m not confident the clown sticker would be well received in today’s climate. I think it’s too often preceded by the f word, for instance, when someone cuts in front of you.

I will often go off on tangents, such as the cultural significance of clowns. Don’t be alarmed, I’m just a bit mad… but it does beg the question…

…what do you think of when you see a clown?

For me it’s the scene in the 1989 film Uncle Buck when John Candy’s character, the aforementioned Buck, punches a party hire clown for turning up to his nephew’s birthday drunk (Uncle Buck – Clown). Iconic. That, and cheeseburgers.

I would like to say the following works are of a higher quality, but I may well have peaked in 1998.