Adventures in Hynagogia.
Leach and Roe. Newcastle tickets. Pat Harkins in Glasgow: shotgun diplomacy. Genotti in Jersey. 12 minutes of criminology in terse sentences. 1744 Newcastle to Morpeth. The softly spoken, insinuation of a Glaswegian brogue carries its audio wave over the double seat in front. “Representative” i.e. lawyer/functionary/facilitator of the crime demi monde. Alibis given and bail paid? The Cramlington lad is in rapt silence, only the cropped skull and Crombie are visible above the plastic mould of the train seating. The Glasgow spieler is visible in the curtain-of-night mirror of the carriage window. Greying boyish side shed and bovine eyes. Cheaply expensive mufti. St James’ Park hospitality stickers on a faux combat jacket by Paul Smith, or some such. The monologue continues. Saturday night tales of combat uttered from a tight gullet and the well fed bread basket of a spreading late-middle-aged gut. Familiar strangers on an unfamiliar journey. Self-penned histories carrying the scars of Rangers’ fans ill-thought revenge for centuries-dead religious and social lies and blood ties. Micro domains and the manors of machete-wielding Machiavellian 2 bob 2nd generation Irish chieftains of the bad old days of hazy nostalgia and ill-remembered re-casting of hoary old clichés. I’m dozing in a post-retail service overload of the senses. The emerging 6th sense foisted on me by mobile phone sales staff and online interstitials. The accompanying ersatz synaesthesia of confused responses to train vibration. Mobile phone setting or muscles tensing naturally after a day on one’s feet trying to punt AV equipment to unsure victims of the slow dazzle of LED or 3-D heaven firing 1080ps of ultra-brightness into already hypnotized orbs. Downloading myriad conversation from portions of the pre-frontal cortex or maybe even the medulla, as I quasi-sleep on this short ride in the capsule of choice. Doubts? I carry on listening in voyeur mode to the Glasgow functionary’s personal odyssey. I laugh inward, a dry rasp as I realize I’m never far from home. The magnetic pull of the city of my childhood attracts and repels in equal measure. The ambivalence is hard to nurture as I shut my eyes tightly in a despairing orison and banishing ritual. The wraiths alight at Cramlington and the paper-thin equilibrium I’ve been wishing for returns albeit for a mere 7 minutes.
