it begun with a young man raising his eyebrows and smiling at me – I’d never met him before, but I took a few seconds to make sure – damp from the rain outside, and somewhat comfortable with the cosy wet-dog-smell of the tram, I assumed the young man was simply impressed with my jog and dash - jumping on the tram at the very last moment – landing it beautifully, dressed in long hair and scarf like the madman – and rest, the head leaning against the window as my home town full of strange and strangers move about and my mind focuses on writing something a little less psychedelic, something more like the song I’m listening too – the young man gives up his seat for an older woman – older, but not old – I smile and raise my eyebrows – you know, I would’ve done the same, but I thought you were younger than me – I joke – I also thought you were a man, so I was way off!– I keep this part to myself and add another two years onto my life– the woman has a nice friendly face – she’ll make one of those adorable grandmothers that light-entertainment tv presenters will exploit for a heartfelt laugh – but then again there is something about this woman, looking very much like Maude from Harold & Maude, and the way she’s so eager to talk to me that makes me feel that she’s lived an independent and adventurous life, and that she’s never had children or wanted to – she’s talking to me like we’re new best friends, and I can hardly hear a word she is saying – something about her generation and dorian gray, so I laugh hoping she would too, giving me room to change the subject, or at the very least say something – but she didn’t laugh, so I said – sorry, ‘beg your pardon? – she assumed I was a musician, and no matter how much I denied that I was, she continued asking about my music – I’m more of a writer, if anything – and so it turns out she’s a screen-writer and when she gets angry with people she creates a character based on that person and kills them off – she’s a nice woman, but this is the sort of thing that turns me off writers –this snug, warm secretive power they think they have over the rest of the world – but I run with it – she asks what I do and say that I work in advertising (which is true, to an extent, and shameful) and enjoy keeping my art and work and life separate – she says she understands, but I know she doesn’t – I say things like – there’s no reason why a man can’t open a door for another man – until it’s her turn to talk again – it’s raining harder outside, and my stop isn’t far away – I know I’m going to have to interrupt her at any moment, telling her I have to leave now – yeah sorry, but this is me coming up – I point outside signalling my stop is next only to realise I’m pointing to a fat man eating a sandwich – oh that’s okay – she says – you meet some nice people on trams – and some arseholes as well – I reply – but I’m glad you put in me in the former category – I tell her I’ll see her again sometime, which is something I only seem to say to people I’m never going to see again in my life – it’s something I learnt off the Indonesians – like when someone asks you if you’ve been to Greenland, you say either yes, or not yet – never no – never know, she calls out as I push by the fat bellies standing between me and the doorway – oh, and don’t give up on the music! You could make it one day – make it one day, I think to myself – make it – we ask each other - hey, what are you up to? - like we’re finishing a book or something – but it’s no big deal – I step out into the rain and dodge a couple of asain school girls eating some strange pink plastic food through a straw, before a fat man in a tracksuit walks straight into me, refusing to move – obviously he’s had enough of this tough rainy day – I say – fuck you – and walk around his fat stomach, disgusted by the warmth I felt from it pushing against mine – I find a bottle shop and buy two beers – they’re icy cold, and I like that – there is a young man stacking the shelves at the fridge next to me, so I give him a smile and a nod – I take the beers to the counter and I’m surrounded by idiots - i pay for the beers and go to the cinemas to watch a movie
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