Smugson and son

I got my dad a job. And he smiled. For the first time in months. And I got to smile back like a smug son. I had done good for my pa. I had found him a job. Where I work. Hold on a minute- where I work? What the frak? What the dealio? I suddenly panicked about stupid superficial things like, what if he overhears people complaining about me? What if people don’t like him? Do I have to have lunch with him every single day? Will I still want to come home and visit my folks if I see my dad? Now we’re equals, will I think differently of him? Then I stopped... saw his smile and stopped being selfish. In an instant I had helped to heal a heartbroken man and nothing else mattered.

His first day was spent reading up on the organisation and familiarising himself with new people and new systems. He seemed to take to it, looking completely absorbed everytime I went to check on him and make sure he was coping. The commute is quite far and I was worried about his energy levels. Luckily, he was just happy to be not worrying about money for a bit. He was happy to be busy and to be working and to be immersed in something he clearly loved. People reacted as expected, a little weirded out but ultimately loving his affable smiley personality. They don’t know the backstory, they don’t know why I would ever consider getting my father a job in the place where I work. It doesn’t matter anymore- he’s part of the team and the background and I feel like a good son, I feel like I’ve helped my father who helped me all those years. A friend wondered whether this was going to be bad for me. It won't. I don't begrudge spending time with my dad. He doesn’t have the relationship I do with my dad. Kenya changed us, quickened our steps into synchronicity. I understood him and I appreciated his struggle and nothing I did for him and with him after that was born out of tedious family obligation, it was born out of pure love.

Last night, I willed my brain to work. I have an idea and I’m waiting for it to come to fruition. It’s a good idea and potentially the one that makes me, as most ideas seem to be at this stage of abstraction. My brain wasn’t complying with my silent frustrated squeals for ideas. They weren’t fermenting or bubbling, they weren’t coming. I fell asleep tortured and dreamt about streams of Twitter text falling down the page like lines of green Matrix code, a disturbed sleep with the dull hum of electronic noise pulsing in the background.

This morning, listening to Micachu and the Shapes’ amazingly electric album on my way to the post office, in the rain, my mind lost to images, those ideas came, streaming into my brain falling down my mind’s eye like lines of green Matrix code. Finally, we were cooking with fuel, fired up and with a mixed metaphor in my step, I set about rushing through the rest of my chores running the ideas through my brain repeatedly till I had a chance to write them down. I now have an ending. Funny how the brain sometimes works.