Conscious Streaming 001

Why is there a time limit to a stream of consciousness? Not the one Natalie Goldberg offers as an option, but the one that dams the stream the moment you think of it. It’s funny because while this little dam stops that flow dead in it tracks, it simultaneously diverts it into a brand new river-railway in-and-of-itself. There’s never two streams flowing at the same time, but theres always one. This one looks funniest when viewed from the water-pool below, which is above the water-pool below that. An old Indian railway chuga-chugs over the suspicious stone bridge. I was bought up on lemon-rice tea and the understanding that bridges were only trustworthy when together – alone bridges made ‘free agents’ look like puppets handcrafted out of shackles and sadness. “Suspicious” doesn’t make you “bad”- it could make you Captain C. Boy Mack, head peanut catcher at the saloon on West 56th and Proverbial Tumbleweed; intriguing, a male, or flat-out made-up. “Suspicious” is like MSG – to it we are addicted and it lingers in your local take-out. Chinese and fish ‘n’ chips is not fusion – it is confusion, and disgusting to boot. Did you ever think of eating (or even just having a nibble on) the front of your welly boot known as Shin’s Breathing Room? I didn’t until just now, and I only thought of that because an image of a gumboot as a croquet mallet flashed in my mind’s eye. The sound those boots make when you take them off is definitely one I feel the need to hear from in-between my teeth. How could I complain of food having a rubbery texture if I’ve never afforded rubber the opportunity for appraisal? Silly, short-sided me. Well, I think my sides are in proportion to my other sides, but come to think of it I’ve never asked. I meant to say short-sighted, but even that would be a lie because while I don’t know my exact prescription, I do know that I’m long-sighted. And astigmatic in my right eye, whatever that means. Something to do with some part of the eye being somewhat more oblong than spherical (as is the status quo), but my understanding ends there and is met with thoughts of rugby balls every time someone tries to explain me what is symptomatic of being astigmatic. A fascination with conical balls, perhaps?

I feel like rugby balls (and thus American footballs) are the Jaffa Cake of sporting equipment. Is a ball a sphere? Is a Jaffa Cake a cake? Or is it a biscuit? What are the parameters for ‘ball-hood’? It is my estimation that the war on such a question has reached stalemate and the soldiers are now not just eating but ENJOYING their baked beans. It has to be Heinz. He always was the best chef in Charge of the Light Brigade. He tended a village worth of crops in a past life, his sister-come-energy-healer told him in an afterlife, which is why he’s such a good cook now. He had been in charge of the horse-plough, bean fields, corn rowing and moon salutations. Despite being a competent shipman and a merman on a Blue Moon, he was never quite confident in this last task, because when the sky looks like the sea it is very hard to know which is the moon and who is her reflection. Only the North Star knows that, but she and Venus simultaneously said, “JINX!” when they were three and she’s maintained her vow of silence ever since. Stars, unlike bridges, are sturdy and reliable – the emblem of trust. Because if they can survive the death of Before and the birth of Big Bang and never leave where they are, then I think they qualify as top notch confidantes and A-star secret keepers. Just like trees, puddles and bakeries that smell best on early mornings and empty streets.

All these things fade and wither and never leave the collective subconscious.