Paths of Eden

Today it is sunny. The sky is laughing blue and the sounds of summer mingle upon the air. A bird sweeps past above my head maybe foraging for food? Or perhaps it is bringing a worm to its young? Or maybe it is in the grip of a fever? I love this sunlit day. The path; the glorious path is awash with mystery, inviting me down for a closer look. I'm outside the front of my house at the moment, but I know there are more choice cuts of path on offer around the corner outside the houses where old people live. I make my way across the hot road. The path just here is ugly, but I know it won't be long before I find what I'm looking for.
As I walk, a small white Opel Corsa from 1989 passes me slowly by, driven by a some wrinkles sitting under a curly white mass. I salute silently, wondering if she is looking forward to some biscuits sitting in the press at home. I'll call into her later to see how she's doing. After all, there is responsibility in being a citizen of this housing estate.
I spot a sandy coloured dog ahead of me on the grass which separates the path from the curb. It is busy sniffing out an old ice lolly wrapper.
'No lolly left!' I laugh and pass the hound by.
The path now is beginning to improve; the cement a beautiful grey with flecks of mysterious sparkling gem stones. Just a little further and I shall be entering Eden. Nobody else is around, they must be having their noon lunch. The sun feels so good; heating my shoulders and evaporating the sweat from my face.
An ice cream van jingles a merry tune off in the distance. Sounds like it might be in Riverside.
Just then, I stop. The path here is just right. I get down on my hands and knees and inspect it up close. Yes, this is what I've been waiting for. The path is completely dry and warmed by the sun. The colour is neither too light a grey or too dark and contains just the right amount of minute pebbles and gem stones. I've often contemplated picking these jewels out and making a handsome bracelet or brooch out of them but I know that wouldn't be fair to my neighbours - these paths are owned by all. Whatever people say about the state of the world right now I always take solace in the fact that no one has ever robbed these paths of their gems - everyone has a line I suppose. Soon I'm lying with my face against the path, cradled comfortably in the domestic bliss of my estate. It's not long before I'm asleep and I end up resting there for over an hour.

The Wakening

Kayleigh sat in her van and stared out at the junction in front of her. It was half eight on a gorgeous sunny morning in city centre Dublin and the streets were clogged with traffic. Kayleigh's van belonged to the business she delivered children for, a small company named Cloud Logistics; named after the boss's cat Cloud. Kayleigh had been working for this company just over ten years now, delivering children all over the city. The job was highly repetitive, following an identical route day after day. Nothing out of the ordinary ever happened, children were delivered, dockets signed and lunch took place in the same Superquinn car park every day at half one. Kayleigh never thought about how repetitive and monotonal her days were, she just drifted through them in a type of autopilot mode just below consciousness.
But this morning was different. This morning Kayleigh felt her head rise above the tide of disconscious drone. As she sat at the junction waiting for the light to turn green Kayleigh became aware that she was actively thinking. The experience was strange, normality was the ab for her. She tried to keep up with the thoughts as they passed through her mind, wondering at the level of their alien presence. Each one of her senses seemed to click on one by one. Her nose was suddenly inspecting the warm plastic of the van, the mild mould of the seats, the stale crunch of her clothes. Her eyes greedily peered at the sun lying across the road in between the tall buildings of O'Connell street. Her ears piqued at the the sounds of traffic drifting in through the half open window. Voices; human voices; all spun together in an indecipherable spool chattered in to her brain, charging it with a primitive excitement. She made a choice to move her head and actively look at something. Her eyes moved in on the car next to her, below the van's wing mirror. Through its window she could see friendly male hands gripping the steering wheel. She imagined the driver to look like Rob Lowe in Wayne's World. She could see the cuffs of a suit and pictured him smiling to himself in NLP-powered happiness. She tried to burrow into his thoughts as she gazed at the manly fingers clutching the firm leather wheel. He's probably anticipating how warm and rewarding work is going to be, perhaps considering the roll he's going to get in Centra on his lunch. I bet he gets olives and sun-dried tomatoes on a seed roll she thought. She imagined him imagining how happy his wife will be to see him later. Sitting on a poof in the sitting room all day, watching Sky Home and Leisure, leaving only to pee and look up men on dating sites. Kayleigh thought about how sad and lonely this wife was during the day; polishing the wooden DVD player cabinet religiously, at least twenty times each day, never able to make it fully smear-free. Oh how happy she'll be when Rob Lowe comes to her from his Docklands 'scraper, arms open and penis erect. Erect because he loves her, not because she's Loreal sexy hair tits and butt-ass-gee. Kayleigh looked at the hands on the steering wheel and curdled. Utterly curdled. A tear emerged from her lower eyelid as she realised that she was actually empathising with another being. That solitary tear was the first fruit of a spring which had been postponed for over thirty eight years. Kayleigh's consciousness trembled as she experienced a full and completely real emotion. Its immediacy was exhilarating. Her thoughts began to race.

What am I doing here?
What am I doing in this van?!
I want to live my life, not sonambulate it like some sort of sonambulator!
I want to experience this thing called 'a morning'!
I want what I've been denied my whole "life"!

Kayleigh opened the van door and stepped out into the crisp fresh air. It felt incredible. Freedom tasted like a sunny morning in Dublin city. Almost as soon as she had stepped out of the van and orchestra of beeps and barps erupted from behind it.
Oh I'm not going anywhere, she thought, smiling.
After striding four or five steps towards Eason's, Kayleigh jogged back to the van with embarrassment and drove on through the junction to continue her rounds.

Burt Bacharach is the Zenith

When Burt Bacharach first asked me to play the drums for him I was unable to answer for a few moments, being so shocked at the proposal. I stood in the phone box with the receiver resting against my cheek staring out at the field in disbelief.
'Eh, hello? Drums?' asked a small electronic copy of Bacharach's voice.
Still I couldn't respond. You have to understand what a long-awaited call this was, in order to deal with the situation my mind first had to go on a little journey. It wandered out into the field beyond the hedge. I could see myself lilting around the meadow to the sounds of Bacharach's most indelible tune - '(They Long to Be) Close to You'. I looked angelic, beautiful, larger than life. I picked up a snare and stick previously hidden by the tall grass and started to tap out a rhythm. As soon as the stick hit the snare skin a panorama of Alpine mountains erupted all around the field transforming it to the floor of an immense valley. Huge snow capped peaks now towered all around me as I lilted around the grass, tapping out the rhythm of Bacharach. The melody lurched and then burst into the blasting passion of 'Make it Easy on Yourself'. I could see myself screaming the lyrics up into the chilly mountain air, bliss surging through every nerve, capillary and vessel in my body. The notes thundered around the valley, calling animals from every direction. They raced down towards me and within moments I was surrounded by mountain cats, arctic foxes, hare, eagles, hedgehogs and many more hilly beings. The scene was ecstatic, ecstatic, ecstatic and I was utterly lost within it.
And then I heard the voice of God.
Calling from the rock itself.

'Will you play the drums or no?'

'Yes! Oh yes I will!' I screamed and felt myself rushing back into the reality of the phone box.
'That's great to hear,' replied Bacharach. 'We start rehearsing in May.'
'I'm already rehearsing!' I shouted into the wrong end of the phone.
'See you soon,' said God and hung up.
I held the receiver close to my bosom for about an hour, staring out at the meadow which had just been the stage for my most treasured dream. I left the phone box with the biggest smile one could possibly imagine. To find out later that day it had been a hoax conducted by some old school colleagues sent me into the deepest pit of despair out of which to this day I am attempting to escape.


Trains and bloats and planes are passing by
They mean a trip to Paris or Rome
For someone else but not for me
The trains and the boats and planes
Took you away, away from me

'How much?!' he asked, Heineken dribbling down his chin.
'One million euro and five hundred thousand euro. On completion of course,' replied Harry.
Smiths scratched his chin, his eyes gleaming at the thought of that amount of money.
'And what would I have to do?' he asked again.
Harry pointed over the table to the wall. A small white wooden trellis ran along the wall underneath the window sill, covering the radiators.
'Lie in there for a year.'
'You're lying,' sad Jog, his eyes sparkling.
'That's one thing I'm not doing,' replied Harry and took a merry swig from his glass of wine. 'I told you I wanted to spend my money in interesting ways and I find this to be a most interesting way.'
Smiths and Harry were sitting upstairs in the small cosy function-room of a bar in city centre Dublin. It was their friend Egan's 21st birthday party and they sat a little away from the main group of people, hatching their little plan. The room was small enough, with a dark wine and olive carpet. The furniture was old but in good shape and the lighting came from dim lamps dotted about the place. The trellis Smiths pointed to was definitely large enough to allow someone lie down inside it and stretched from wall to wall.
'So all I have to do is lie in there for a year? What about the owners of the bar?' asked Smiths.
'Already got that covered man,' replied Harry licking the stem of his wine glass.
'Money?'
'Yep.'
Smiths got up and walked over to inspect the trellis. It was immaculately clean - bright white with a lovely design, broken up into tiny squares. Harry joined him. 'Your friends will know you're here, but not people who rent out the function room. It's important that you don't let them know either, or you'll suffer a penalty.'
'Like what?'
'I haven't worked that stuff out yet. Something like putting a gone off yogurt in there with you or something, I don't know.'
They both gazed at the trellis.
Harry put his arm around Smiths's shoulders. 'I have it all figured out. The people who work in the bar usually get in around ten and they'll bring you your breakfast. We'll cut a little portion out there and put hinges on it so we can hand you in food and water. We'll turn that TV around up there so you can see it and give you a remote control. You won't be able to have your phone, but mates can come in and chat to you. We'll have to rig something up to take your pee and poo but I reckon maybe some piping in the floor should sort that out. What do you think?'
Smiths couldn't believe his luck. Granted, lying here for a year would be incredibly boring, but after it he would have one and a half million euro. He'd have to try at least.
'I'm sure I will have more questions, but I think I'm going to do it. Definitely, yeah!'
Both friends smiled.
'This is going to be insane!' said Harry excitedly.
'Madness!' said Smiths and they walked back over to the main group of people.


This story is ongoing and will feature different events which take place during the time of Smiths's stay in the trellis.

Porn Hits Bray

A new drug/sex shop opened up in Bray recently selling party pills and porn. The local press (ie.The Bray People) were outraged about this and printed a number of biased quotes from angry locals:

Disgusting! I have to take my kids past that shop every day on their way to piano. What am I supposed to tell them is sold in that shop? Chewing gum? The less I reveal, the more they ask. I can't very well say "Rebecca, they sell legal highs and porn", so I told her it's a hairdressers for blacks.

My eighty two year old mother walked into that shop the other day thinking it was a new butchers! And what did she see instead of carved up animals? Naked people on paper and all manner of bongs, pipes and growing lamps! No place for an eighty two year old mother at all!

If I caught my husband going into a place like that, I'd call my brother in and have him shot dead with rifles and dumped in the Wicklow hills around the Sally Gap area.

Public opinion was heated. But not everyone agreed that the shop was a bad idea. A small group of local perverts had organised themselves together to support the shop and fend off some of the mounting pressure. Their first move was to hand out fliers around the area (See Picture) followed by a fund raising gig in a pub. Needless to say the response was poor and not long after the flier campaign members of the group were beaten up when spotted chatting outside a chipper. One of the people working in the chipper at the time said they were talking all about intercourse.
Unconvinced by both side's arguments, I felt the only way to get an accurate idea of the merits of the shop was to go in and have a quick peek myself. I went in one Tuesday morning and to be honest I wasn’t really that shocked by the place. You had to ring a bell, which was promptly answered by a buzzing electrical lock opening. A normal looking lad sat behind the counter – about twenty, with short fair hair and a friendly face. For some reason I expected to see a Mexican with butter on his face and severed cocks hanging from his hair. I gave him a thumbs up and proceeded to have a look around the various items on sale. The first group of shelves displayed some rubber penises. Par for the course really – nothing too shocking about that, after all it’s not like it’s the thirteen hundreds! Next thing I saw was a glass cabinet housing all manner of ‘party pills’.
‘What the fuck are these?!’ I asked the sales assistant humorously. But he didn’t respond. Mustn’t have heard me.
‘Sorry! What the fuck are these?!’ I repeated, but again there was no response from the guy at the counter. I could see he was wearing headphones so I turned to walk closer to him, accidentally catching and knocking over a huge porcelain dildo. The subsequent shatter plucked him swiftly from his musical hypnosis. He looked at the shattered fragments on the ground and his face folded in horror.
‘That’s a priceless Ming dildo!’ He spluttered.
‘Oh shit, really?’ I asked starting to go red.
‘No, I’m only messing! I don’t know where that thing came from! I think it might have already been here when we moved in, don’t worry about it!’
‘Oh right.’ I replied with interest and continued on my search. Past the drugs there was another case, this one full of pipes and bongs, some even shaped in things like skulls or tractors! Right at the back of the shop were the DVDs and magazines. Again, nothing I hadn’t seen before and certainly nothing outrageous. I walked back towards the guy at the counter and was stopped suddenly by an odd sight. The guy who I had previously assumed was totally normal was masturbating readily over a magazine depicting some flower beds!
‘I suppose you gotta cater to every taste!’ I shouted to him smiling. He waved at me with his free hand. ‘Not a truer word spoken!’ he said breathlessly.
I walked out of the shop feeling a little more informed about the place. I think it would make sense for the people of Bray to actually go into the place and have a proper look, rather than simply imagining what sort of lurid things exist in there. It's also a discreet enough location in the pelvis of Bray, and anyway it’s not like they’re shoving shit smelling dildos down every old woman’s throat that walks past! But if you ask me – I’d say a few of them could do with it!!!!!!!