Dear July, seven // from the cutting room floor

Because it's been a while, I thought I'd type out some recent 'noticings' from my writing-notebook. (I've written about keeping an observational notebook a few times before on this blog, but specifically: here. Basically, I am a bit nosy but use the excuse of ‘I’m a writer’ to legitimise writing down interesting things strangers are doing in a little notebook. 'For the novel. It's for the novel'):

One // as seen from the library window

Two bald business men in lilac shirts are eating fish and chips in the company car. They’ve opened the doors – wide. And rolled down the windows – all the way. They’ve flicked their ties and lanyards over their shoulders. The larger of the two men smooths a white napkin across the lap of his black suit trousers before tucking in. And so it goes: the rain coming down outside, and the two of them - the air con blowing goose-bumps up their arms - eating chips on a Wednesday afternoon. Life is good.

Update 10 minutes later: It looks as though the larger gentleman also has a packed lunch with him, because he’s just finished eating a banana and a yogurt – the carton of which he’s just crushed in his fist – and there are crusts (from a recently consumed sandwich, one can only assume) sitting in little right-angles in the Tupperware dish he’s just put up on the dashboard. I suspect he’s eating this second lunch to smother suspicion when he returns home because he is, after all, meant to be on that diet ('Did you eat your fruit, Arnold?'). That’s why the windows are open, why the AC is causing an autumnal gust inside. (‘We can get chips if you like, Graham. But Marjorie must never find out...’

♥

Two // trying to describe a man I keep seeing about town

He’s the kind of man who tuts to himself while going about life. Tutting at the laptop screen, rolling his eyes at emails, mentally shaking a fist at the heavens whenever the rain comes on. He’s the kind of man who wears a blazer with his blue plaid shirts (always those plaid shirts. ‘Every day the plaid shirts’). The blazer and the plaid shirt and the jeans, and that hair on top of head like Fezzik from the Princess Bride. 

♥

Three // on the baristas in a coffee shop one morning

I’m writing in a coffee shop today, sitting beside the door to the kitchen marked ‘private’. Staff members keep walking in and out with cups and mugs, so the dishwasher must be in there too. The girl with the messy ponytail who served me peppermint tea has just walked past with a tray full of dirty saucers. 

‘It’s a busy day,’ she’d said earlier, her eyes tired. ‘I'm feeling a bit stressed.’ 

As she got closer to the door – ‘Private’ in gold letters – her colleague – bearded, happy eyes – bounded up the stairs towards her, almost skipping. 

‘Hey!’ he said, coming towards her. 

‘Hi,’ she’d said, her voice quiet, shifting her arms under the tray to balance the weight. 

She leant against the door with her back to push it open and at the same moment he reached out to help her – his hand on the door so near her head that his arm was almost touching her cheek – following her round with the movement of it. She breathed in. As the door swung closed and I heard the clatter of the tray being put down, and I did wonder whether he was going to kiss her in there. She came back out about 10 seconds later, her fingers touching her lips...

♥

(Pictures from an evening walk along the canal last week with a nice friend...) 

Morning Fog

I found this today (by Brittney Lee, an artist for Disney) and loved it. Enjoy! (Her blog is: here). 

♥

I really am jealous of other people's talent sometimes...

I think that possibly maybe I'm falling for you

While I was waiting for my sister on Thursday (we were going to see a ballet), I had some dinner in the window seat of a fish and chip shop down the street from the theatre. What with the rain-soaked pavements, and the diner-type restaurant, and the fact I was alone with my book and my yellow mug of tea... it really would have been the ideal opportunity for a passerby to walk past the window and – a pause, an intake of breath, a meeting of eyes – fall in love with me. 

He would have walked past the window a few times, fighting with himself, with his natural shyness – hardly noticing how wet he was getting from the sudden deluge – until – ‘What have I got to lose?’ – he’d have run into the cafe – the bell on the door jingling – and walked over to my table – me looking up, wide eyed, surprised – and, in a half-whisper: ‘I don’t even know your name – but - it's just - I just had to say...’

Of course, this didn’t happen. And as far as I recall, the door didn’t even have a jingly bell on it, and it wasn’t really pouring with rain: just drizzling. And actually, if someone did decide to run up to me when I was by myself, I’d be absolutely terrified and incredibly suspicious and would probably shout for help.

But it was a nice thought. 

♥

(Post title from: this song)

falling light

I’ve recently fallen in love with this painting (‘The Accolade’ by Edmund Blair Leighton). The light, the solemnity, his down-looking eyes, her hair: beautiful.

 

I noticed it in my friend's house a few weeks ago. She had a copy of it hanging right as I walked in the front door.

I was pretty pleased with myself I have to admit because, without knowing anything about it, I was able to guess that it was a picture of Guinevere and Lancelot and that it looked vaguely pre-Raphaelite. Useful to know that – as well as being able to work out the metre of old poems, the difference between finite and non-finite verbs, and other such useful life skills – my English degree has equipped me with painting-recognition talents. Huzzah! Someone employ me, quick!

♥

Le Morte d'Dignité

♥

Tonight I noticed... a very large and gigantic beetle in my bedroom! (How long's it been there for? And does it have cousins? And aren't all insects supposed to be taking a holiday from frightening people at this time of year?? For goodness sake!) As much as I hate to think of myself as a damsel in distress, bugs make chivalrous acts not only desirable but, indeed, necessary. I was rescued from the fearsome beast by two kind gentlemen (father and brother).

Thank-ye kindly, sirs. Now excuse me while I go and search for my fallen dignity under that pile of books.

(picture from: here.)

♥

orders.

Lady with the happy wrinkles: "I’ll have a plain scone, honey. And an earl grey tea."

Man with the red tie: "I’ll have nearly the same. I’ll have a fruit scone. And -- I’ll just take some of your house tea."

~ In work the other week 

♥

'House tea.' I thought that was quite a cute thing to say.

(Picture from: Emma Block.)

Thinking of moustaches...

I saw a moustachioed man at the train station on Tuesday. He looked rather like a walrus. He was fat, with braces to keep his trousers up. And it was a large moustache - a big, looping white one that covered half his face... but in such a way that it wasn’t a beard. Quite clever, really.

It must be very itchy to have so much hair on your face, though. And his wife must find him tickly to kiss. If he has a wife, that is. (One shouldn’t assume.) Maybe he can’t find one because of the hair-up-the-nose issue. Or maybe he chose to have the moustache instead of the wife. He might of. I can imagine it was an active decision that he made after his pie-loving sweetheart – Marion Appleberry – told him she would ‘only ever marry a clean-shaven man’.

He might have stood in front of the mirror the day after she said it – face covered in shaving foam, hand clutching his razor – wondering: did he love her enough?

‘Can I sacrifice this hairy beauty to marry Marion? Marion – my soul mate, my one true love, the apple(berry) of my eye? Will I shave it all off to be with her – that fine figure of a women who shares my passion for marmite on scones, and finds my interest in small-rodent taxidermy endearing? Will I? Will I?’

A dilemma to be sure.

‘Marion or moustache? Marion or moustache? Marion or ---’

 

He threw the razor to the floor. He splashed his cheeks with water.

‘Damn her facial-hair preferences!’ He (maybe) cried. ‘The moustache will always be first in my heart!’

Now he spends his days drifting around train stations, a living monument of how staying true to yourself, no matter what the cost, is possible!

 

(He’ll never admit it, but sometimes, when he is picking scone crumbs out his whiskers, he does feel a little lonely.)

♥

Pictures from: marc johns (again).

just to say...

More writing, and less random phone photographs will come soon. From where I (metaphorically) stand just now, I can see the next two months; they are full of essays, studying and exams. So I suspect updates on here will become more sporadic. Maybe not though. We’ll wait and see. I like to surprise myself.

For now though, here are five recent noticings:

 

♥ Running in public is kind of a faux pas. Being a blend of commuter and last-minute-er, I tend to do a lot of it. Coat buttons popping open, eyes spilling, hair unravelling, legs aching. (I missed my bus today, even though I ran. So I then had to run for the train, which I caught. Phew.)

♥ Laughing --- so --- hard --- you can’t --- quite --- breathe --- is better than ice-cream: soul-cleansing, less milky. (I ended up laghing like this today with my friend, for the first time in ages.)

♥ I think it is funny how all the statues in George Square that were built to honour ‘great men’ (and woman) end up acting as rest-stops for seagulls. They leave the Great Men with heads stained white with --- well, you know. (Not very dignified. Maybe that’s why all of them look so stern.)

♥ When waiting for public transport, women – even the skinny ones – tend to cover up their stomachs (with bags, with books, with coats, with their hands). Men on the other hand - even the fatter ones - let their stomachs hang out (they leave their coats unzipped, they rest their arms on their knees, they rub their stomachs absentmindedly). Interesting!

♥ (So far,) John Keats’ letters are very beautiful. I found them today in the library, when I should have been writing about Alexander Pope.

(Anyway! After seeing the time, I absolutely must go to bed now. I’ve got a busy writing day tomorrow. Did not want to stay up this late!)

Pictures: Claire Owen.