Moving discoveries…
It’s always good to try and find the positives in stunningly boring tasks. I’m moving house on Friday and have been facing the mind-numbing work that is packing. As always, it leads to long periods looking at empty boxes and wishing Mary Poppins was on hand to help out filling them up.
But it also forces you to look through everything you’ve accumulated and bring it or sling it. I’ve found some great stuff… When I was plenty younger, I owned a couple of synthesisers and a drum machine and used to compose lyrics and (some) music. I found my old folder in a trunk. And you know what? Some of those lyrics aren’t bad. A little pompous seeing as I was in an Ultravox phase and dealing more often than not with terribly depressing subjects like loss and death but still, not bad for a spotty herbert.
Far more entertainingly though, I found my two first stabs at long-fiction. One written when I was 13, the other at about 16. The first, ‘Troja: Dawn’ is notable mainly because of the comment my English teacher, the splendid Stuart Widd, added to the end of it. He noted that he enjoyed the story but that the killing off of a major character half way through was rather a surprise. As readers of The Raven will know, something just stay with you, don’t they?
The second, ‘What price civilisation?’ is a terrifically awful piece of work notable for its derivative nature and its natty hand-drawn cover which I have a feeling is in fact a sketch of Elric’s soul-stealing blade. Mind you, it was the fore-runner of my first full length MSS, ‘The All-God’s Gift’ so it stil retains a place in my affections and will always be a source of cheer and comedy.
Found my old paintball gun too, a pump action Line SI Bushmaster… used to be top of the range when I was playing for The Turks back in the late 80s and very early 90s. Utterly obselete now but it brings back fine memories of the characters that were around the game at the time. I’d experiment to see if it worked if I could only remember how to screw the bloody thing together.
Thank heavens I’m a hoarder…
