The Neverland Revelations - March 23rd

“It’s snowing.”

As first words to hear on any given morning, there’s something infinitely dreary about those two. If you happen to wake up in a strange bed, from a dream of running in a glorious warm spring sunlit day, they instantly collapse the sugar-cage of possibility you’ve built in your unconsciousness.

“Morning,” I said, across the enormous blank madeness of the bed. D was already up and on the computer, checking weather forecasts.

“Snowing?” I asked, making sure my one good ear wasn’t playing up. “But it’s March, for god’s sake.

“Isn’t it?” she agreed, grinning. “Confused?”

“More than somewhat,” I agreed, padding heavily over to the window.

“It’s snowing,” I said.

“Morning, honey,” she said, coming to kiss me on the forehead.

Ma was scheduled to go to Buckingham Palace this morning and stand, watching the Changing of the Guard, which she’s managed to get to her age without ever actually watching.

Over a vast hotel buffet, and while nibbling on toast and marmalade, she came to a decision.

“Bugger that for a game of bearskins,” she said. “I’ll see it next time. In Summer…”

“Good decision,” chorused d and I. “So whatcha gonna do?”

“Think I’ll have a wander up and down Edgware Road, looking for handbags,” said Ma. Handbags, for reasons that passeth all my understanding, are to Ma what kitchen equipment is to d, or comedy DVDs and pens are to me. Things in which there is inherent virtue from possession of excess, whether they are ever practically used or not.

“I’m gonna try my hand at bartering,” said Ma, clearly believing that the number of Arabic shopfronts along the Edgware Road meant she was actually in a souk. D and I locked eyes, as the idea of what Ma would be getting up to ran through both our brains. I vocalised it.

“Welsh Provocatrix Stabbed In Handbag Turf War…” I mused.

As it turned out, a brief excursion out onto Edgware Road convinced Ma that, after all, perhaps she wouldn’t do that on a day of driving frozen drizzle and a biting wind. She determined instead to come into Trafalgar Square with us, and “do touristy things”. Given the havoc of which she’d been at the centre the previous day when trying to do something as innocuous as buying a travelcard, I’d be lying if we were entirely easy in our minds as we went to see Dame Judi Dench and Ben Whishaw on stage, in the new play “Peter and Alice”.  The play extrapolates from a brief meeting of Peter Llewelyn-Davies, the namesake and part inspiration of Peter Pan and Alice Liddle Hargreaves, who in her gauche youth had been Alice in Wonderland. The play was brilliant and devastating, and should you have an opportunity to go and see it – do whatever you have to. It’s probably, I would say, in the top two plays I’ve ever seen, and its final line hits you like a train.

One of the best lines, from my perspective, in the piece was a very simple piece of life-wisdom.

“It’s your life – not Peter Pan’s, not Barrie’s. Live it.”

This, to me up in the demi-gods, was a revelation. An inspiration. An oxygen tent.

It won’t surprise any of you to learn that the last year or so has been a year of regrets, and excuses, and letting things get in the way of the Disappearing. I’ve already started giving the lie to all that, but this line, spoken by a great actress, hit me where I live on a lot of levels – not just as the Disappearing Man, but as a frustrated would-be writer too. One life is all we’re guaranteed. To me at least, it makes sense that that’s all we have. So if you want to do something, and you have the means to get that something at your disposal, and you still don’t get it, it’s nobody’s fault but your own – whether you dream of a more active, healthy life, or literary success, or some idea of personal happiness. Go for it – do what you need to do. Time is short – and may be shorter than you think (a truth underlined by the death of horror author James Herbert this week).

It’s worth mentioning I had a second tachycardic incident this morning, too. I was standing in the bathroom, mid-pee in fact, when the Catherine Wheel of pre-tachycardia began fizzing in my chest. It took me less than a minute of laying down with my legs up for the thing to sod off – and in retrospect, it may have been something to do with not being understood when asking for de-caff at breakfast – but nevertheless, it was an incident that helped underline the Neverland Revelation.

We made fun of Ma as the day went on – the Central Line, which was key to our travel plans…was entirely closed.

“They’ve heard you’re in town…” we muttered.

She ended up hiding from the snow and the bitter wind in the National Portrait Gallery, and only causing minor hassle by wandering into a ticketed zone without permission. Rumours of a multi-million pound art heist have been, we are assured, grossly exaggerated.

We went to our old haunting ground, the Golden Bird Chinese restaurant on the Mile End Road for our evening meal – but for one reason and another, we got there from Stratford, by bus…which involved travelling the first part of my usual, every morning Stratford walk, from Stratford Mall to Mile End Station. Stop by stop, it was impressed on me that a) that was quite a distance, and the fact that I went, routinely, all the way on to Aldgate East pretty much blew my mind, and b) it’s been quite a while since I did anything like that amount of walking. Tuesday, my 6 mile morning walks begin again earnest…That was revelation two of the day, really – and the resolution to action is part of revelation one. I want this again. I can’t really explain the difference this makes – I’ve known I’ve had to do it for some time. But actively wanting it is a whole other thing. It’s a plan, and a determination, and a fuck you to the condemnation of fate that would see me, twenty years from now, as a wheezing heart patient with no diabetic control. NO. I have a will – and when I focus, I have a will which must be reckoned. I am the author of my own destiny, dammit, and I will have my say.

Watch this space.