Blinking.

I feel like I'm blinking a lot at the moment. My eyes open and a snapshot of the world flares into existence, only for the lens to shut as the focus drifts true. Keeping up with the Blog posts as I wanted didn't happen - though I am stiring myself once again. 

Picking up the (metaphorical) pen once again I am reminded of the eternal struggle between form and content; assembling words into their various formats, inhaling breath to speak, only to hear the wisp of the tumble-weed as my absence of anything to say coughs up a mucus glued void - my literary hairball If you will. 

It's not as if there is a lack of subjects - after-all we live in a society that perhaps balances more precariously over the abyss than at any time in my lifetime; in a world more connected to, and alienated from itself than at any point. And if the personal is political (and the political is personal) - which it is, then my own experiments in creativity surely give food for thought - (and in many cases thought for food - and even food for food).

So there are subjects to talk about... but now instead of blinking I find myself stiffening the sinews and imitating the action of the goldfish - the eyes boggle, the mouth opens... and closes, and opens... and closes, and opens... and... well, you get the picture. I read about changing this and that, and acting on this - challenging this wrong, preventing this atrocity and I find myself stunned. I mean I vote, I rant, I sign petitions and I protest (though not as much as I should), but if I'm honest I stopped arguing properly a while ago because I found the arguments all accepted basic premises I didn't. 

We want to make things better - but we want to look to the past, we want our lives to hark back to our parent and grandparents days, but we don't want to question what it is we want from society. A university friend once asked me what life would ever be like after the revolution? I didn't know how to answer - I think I nicked something from Oscar Wilde - but brushed it off pretty quickly - after all... it was never going to happen - really? All we could hope for was to make the world we live in a little better. In other words we don't really know what we're after - is it simple: shelter? An income? The right to do the same thing day after day? Freedom to do what we want - when we want - whatever that means? I wanted to paint, to write - but that was never going heal people, generate a wage or in general make the world turn - was it?

My point is I want to fight, I want to argue - to know what to do with the anger I feel; but I don't know what we're looking for. And a lot of this feeling is my own fault - I need to read more and think more - it's not down to other people to inspire me, but that's not to say I wouldn't like to be inspired. The apparatus of Capitalism likes to regenerate itself like some deviant timelord, which makes it difficult to see outside of what we see and do on a regular basis. Maybe we can see the cracks - especially when people are shit on; but are we strong enough to prise them open? Too often we seek to paper over them - and given my ability at DIY I've always thought this is a bad idea.

I know I'm late to the party - but I get a sneaky suspicion that the future is now, so maybe it's time for me to paint a picture - of what it should look like. Alas, all I have right now are some rough drafts - I think I need some help.