Phantom Images

 

Here are a few images I’ve put together over the last couple of days. My initials, and my motto, is ATD (ART TILL DEATH), so I thought I better make the effort. I know its kinda crap compared to the stunning array of web-orientated digital graphic computer design out there, but it does qualify as art work and it keeps the cobwebs away. Plus, at the moment, without any graphics program, it’s the best I got. Not the most impressive, I’m nowhere near happy with it, but at least it’s something and at least I’m trying.

I’ve made two art portfolios in my life. My mum destroyed the first and I destroyed the second. Upon the matter of the first, you’d have to ask my mum why she put it in the bin. If you can understand that then you’re wiser than I’ll ever be. Upon the subject of the second, I thought it was getting ripped off. I sincerely regret both outcomes, but what’s done is done, its water under the bridge. The tears are spent.

With those two portfolios harnessed on graphics programs at university, I could have been a jobbing artist. No doubt about it. I was extraordinarily pleased with those pair. Now I’m struggling to stick a batch of cut-out doodles around somebody else’s phantom figures! In a way, I’m still happy though. As long as I keep trying, I’m sure I’ll surprise myself with some good results one day.

That’s that anyway. It’s payday today, so I won’t be working on no artwork. PARTY ALL THE WAY BABY! I think I’ll start on the Jim Beam. Oh could you imagine it!? Swigging straight from the bottle with a spliff in my other hand on big slug-patches of coca? What do you reckon? Should I roll back the years and get wild with it? Or keep sensible and sober?

There’s a wolf on each shoulder. Which one shall I feed? The ex-addict still lives in total shifting states of hellish and heavenly conflict. The only good listener upon this problem, at the moment (atm), I’m afraid, is you. Your good self. I can’t share at my therapy groups anymore. My content is too heavy for the general population. Here I’ll tell you anything apart from what is commonly accepted as too much information.

You are My White Void Person. Stephen King calls his readers Constant Readers. I call mine White Void People. So shut up, listen to my problems, then go away. I’m only joshing. I need you more than you probably think. Someone to bounce off, like, you know. I’m particularly jealous of bloggers who get lots of comments. That must feel really nice. I’ve had that feeling on FaceBook but never on my blog; I don’t suppose I ever will.

It was special on FaceBook when I said I’d started as assistant manager for a kiddy football team. Everyone was chuffed for me. Depressingly, the position didn’t last, but I still have that pleasing memory. Another pleasing fact of life today, a small thing to be grateful for, is the suggestions bar on YouTube when I sign in. Instead of straining to think of a song out of the blue, I have a familiar list of classic recommendations right there on the screen. Hey, I’m in a jolly mood. I just told you, its payday.

“Hello,” says Mr. Whiskey. “Hello,” says Mr. Lager.

I once saw J A Konrath, e-book extraordinaire, pissed up out of his mind on his own blog once, so don’t panic if I decide that resistance is futile. He was sat topless in his writing chair looking windswept with a bottle in his hand. All will be well in life. Our Higher Powers will look after us. Don’t worry, don’t fret, don’t panic. Mr. Donnie is here and he’s here to stay (unless imminent death puts a finale on this venture). Hope not.

On the contrary, with clinical depression, I once knew a tramp who prayed for death on a park bench. The next morning a well-to-do couple invited him back to their place where they gave him two baths (the first one black) and changed his life. He’s got one funny story. He was in a gospel-squad travelling party with two other friends of mine, visiting churches and preaching to the service. One of them, my ex-mentor, has passed. The other was a woman who I remember once woke up after chemo on the kitchen floor with the vegetables over-boiling on the stove. She wrote a book called LIFE AFTER BREASTS and played the harp. A beautiful figure, in a way. Her name was Lynette. I read her book and passed it to my ex-girlfriend. The way my ex-girlfriend pronounced the word vegetables is quite funny as well. She called them VEGGY-TABLES. As in school exam tables.

That’s it for now. See ya soon. And remember, give up jaywalking. It’s fraught with danger. A trick could rip you off or get her pimp to hurt you. Or his pimp. Christ.