The book of dreams

I dare say, around the world, there may be imitations. But to this day I have yet to encounter a book as inspiring to the youthful mind as the Argos Catalogue.

For those who are did not grow up in the UK, let me paint a picture. Close your eyes, slow your breath, and imagine. Imagine yourself about seven or eight years old, sat on a carpet, or rug. I want this to be just you – for a moment, let anyone else in the household fade into the background. Whatever home was like for you, just for this moment, let everyone else go. Let any noise grow muffled and muted, let your breath flow in, and out, slowly, and gently. No one is bothering you right now, it is just you, sat on the carpet, looking down at a large, brightly coloured book. The carpet is warm beneath you as you let your gaze fall on the front of this book. The word “Argos” is written in red lettering across the cover, and all around it are bright photographs of items you might find at home. Perhaps a toaster floats in from the left, bright and clean. On the right, perhaps a toy, a remote control car, or a plastic fashion doll, new, undamaged, pristine. Fill out the rest of the cover now, with items from your own youth. Familiar items, items you wished for, items other families had, all perfect, gleaming and proud.

Now, before you open the book, I want you to take a moment to feel it. Place your left hand on the cover, and feel how smooth the paper is, glossed and firm under your fingers. Let your thumb run down the closed pages on the side of the book. It is a deep book, perhaps one thousand pages thick, the paper fine like supple ripples. Feel the tiny ridges of the leaves on the pad of your thumb. Breath out. Now, softly, use your thumb to lift the corner of the stack of pages and let them fall beneath your thumb as you slide it back up towards the cover. Listen to the steady flutter of the falling paper, one sheet on to another sheet, on to another sheet, in a soft cascade. Can you smell the shiny, newly printed paper as the tiny breeze made by its flowing tumble reaches you? Repeat this two or three times. How does it make you feel?

Stay there, on the carpet, a little longer, your hand on the book, that smooth, thick book smelling of newness, and start to imagine now something you, this you, eight years old, sat warm on the floor, safe for this moment from anyone interrupting, might want. Was it that car? A ball? A figure? A game? You don’t have to stop at one. In this book there is any thing you might want. Anything. Imagine someone gave you three wishes. Not enough? Take twenty wishes. Twenty five wishes. You can start with 100, narrow it down from there. Take this moment to remember all the things you wanted. The set your friend had? The one that did a little bit extra that you saw on TV? What about all the things you have yet to find out about? I want you to let that sense of yearning seep through your body. Where do you feel it the strongest? Perhaps in your stomach, or your chest, maybe somewhere else.

Or, did you like to imagine what life might be when you were bigger? What plates you might pick. Your very own set of towels, plump and fluffy in four sizes, any colour you want, just for you. Are you going to have a sofa, or just armchairs? Will older you ride a bike? You will need a big double bed, with bedside tables, and a duvet cover, and pillows, what type of pillows? Let yourself play with that curiosity. Eight year old you might grow to be anything at all, with a whole house to equip. Furniture for the garden?

I want you told hold that feeling now, curiosity, yearning…POSSIBILITY. Feel where it sits in your body, exciting, yes, but slightly uncomfortable too perhaps, slightly agitating. Now, you can make your first choice. Do you want to open the book at random, and choose the best thing on that page (could be Sylvanian Families, could be necklaces, could be lawnmowers), or do you go straight to the start of the toys and work through, a page at a time (you can fold over the corners of the best pages, you are allowed to do that)? Perhaps your birthday, or Christmas, is coming up. In that case I would go with option two if I were you. Perhaps your brother, or your sister, or your friend might join you now, if you like, and you can do option one together, compare and contrast, fantasise your futures to each other. There is time for both. It is just you, and the book, in a cocoon made from the stories you are making about yourself. Let your imagination spark.

The wonder of the Argos Catalogue, of course, is how close those fantasies are to reality. The format maintains the haziest gauze between wishing and becoming, like the smoke of the genie’s lamp. Browse, do, but just one picture, just a few words, and the rest must be imagined. And yet, it’s all right there, right now, for you to go and get. You just need to take that little pencil, write in the magic code on that paper spell slip and hand it to the wizard. Wait a moment while the magic is worked in some out of sight place beyond, watching the hopes of others manifest on the shelves behind the counter, and you shall be rewarded in your turn.

Needless to say, this childhood ceremony of materialist exaltation has its problems. Enough problems for a thesis on the perils of the Argos Catalogue. And I know that this book pales next to the seemingly infinite possession opportunities to be explored online. So much so that it has fallen out of publication. Never the less, I would argue that this book, the Argos Catalogue, has been a formative tome in generations of British minds, teaching us how to want, but not be ruled by wanting, how to experience longing, but still return to what must be done, and how to hope, and to know that hoping can be as sweet as having.