ON READING BOOKS
An introduction to the next season on Lager time
Greetings, bonjour, what’s happening.
Lager Lites of Lager Land Unite.
The day I’m writing this is December 12th, 2023. It’s raining outside and there’s a load of soggy cardboard waiting to be recycled; sounds a little bit like the current Man United squad. I’m pretty sure in the run-up too, and the then run-down of Christmas, this collapsed-cardboard exhibition sitting by my bins, is only going to increase; unless the bin-truck livens-up and relieves me of said cardboard before the January transfer window. Such trivialities pre-occupy my mind on a regular basis, nagging away, nagging away, but why? More on my attempts to wrestle with that in a bit…
So I’ve been pretty busy these last few weeks since I put the final episode out of Young Unprofessional. The drama and music project I co-run throughout the year, with Dream Arts, in London, is this Thursday doing our now annual end-of year Christmas sharing at Marylebone Theatre, where we show the first part of the next piece we’re developing; which is the third show now; so there’s been lots going on with that project.
I did a really fun gig at the Alley Pally a few weeks back (second time I’ve been performed there this year.) with two beatboxers: ABH and Native the Creative, who I know from Beatbox Aacadmey. It was in support of the final show on The Streets’ latest tour. We were only based in the food court there, but it was pretty rammed-out, and we were told at one point, we had more people watching us than the official support act on the main stage. I was on rap duties, and a smattering of percussion, while the other two handled the beats. Had a banging time, mate.
Aside from that, and a few other workshops, I’ve been in my little home studio getting my nut-down studying, in preparation for (hopefully) starting to take on some voice-over work. It’s been something I’ve been looking to do for the last couple of years and I’ve been slowly improving my recording-set up and learning a lot more about that side of things. It’s an investment, but I need something else to bring the reddies in, beyond what I’ve been doing, sometimes I still don’t know how I’ve managed to keep it all going this long. Doing Lager Time has been really helpful in that voice learning process, as I get to try things out here
Meditations on Meditaions
Something else I’ve been doing throughout this year is collecting quotes from the various books I’ve been reading. Which leads me nicely onto the next little season (if you like) of Lager Time, which will be me writing little response pieces, to various quotes from Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations; you can consider this an introduction of sorts.
I’ve been reading books, regularly since my late teens, mainly non-fiction but not always. I didn’t used to enjoy reading, I didn’t have the patience for it (and sometimes still don’t) and perhaps saw it as an overstretched tentacle, emanating from my school into my bedroom, prodding me to read some dry book, for which I was supposed to write some muggy essay about, and probably never did; then felt ashamed about not doing it; so swerved books. Maybe.
What I have always had, though, is a ferocious curiosity about all sorts of things. Fused with a frustration and often anger, that there’s all sorts of things that I don’t understand, it drove me to read books; but on my own terms.
Something my dad pointed out to me when I was about 14 (and averse to reading books) – was that I was consuming as much information as I could: on Millwall, football in general and then later, music. Be it teletext, magazines and newspapers, radio, TV shows, asking people questions all the time, etc. All of which, in a sense is reading. When I did eventually get going with reading books; I thought this is alright, mate, in fact, I loved it (but it’s been a fractious relationship, I can tell you that)
Over the years, I’ve built up a reading habit that’s almost become a ritual for me and I get anxious if I miss it. Sometimes I look forward to travelling on trains, buses, aeroplanes, just because it’s a good chance to read, and I find that something in the motion of travelling helps me get into it.
As mentioned, I do have a fractious relationship with reading, though, as I’m often in a state of what I can only describe as ‘fizziness,’ which makes reading challenging. It’s probably not that noticeable, unless you’re sat next to me and my leg is constantly shaking, or I’m beatboxing or tapping-out beats, but mentally, it’s like there’s a skip-load of that popping-candy in my head, packed full of e-numbers, popping-off all over the gaff. It makes concentrating very difficult at times, and I’m very easily distracted, by pretty-much anything, like the bin-trucks coming; which is probably why I didn’t get on with school. Sometimes, I might be calm and fairly focused but then I get excited by something I’m reading, which then sets everything off in my nut, like 3am in a 90’s nightclub; when a DJ pulls a banger out.
In case you’re wondering, I did earlier this year, after a very long process, get a diagnosis of ADHD, at 39 years old. Now I know these days, every prick has got some diagnosis or other, and I’m sceptical about exactly what ADHD is, and what seems like a whole industry around it, for something that’s very vague and hard to define; but it did make me examine my own behaviours. Incidentally, one of the other books I read this year, which was really helpful in all that, which I’ve taken loads of quotes from, is Gabor Matte’s The Myth of Normal. Maybe I’ll get into all that caper another time….
Reading books can sometimes take a long-time, especially if it’s a subject matter that requires a lot of thought. I get pissed-off when writers are overly verbose or use Latin and French phrases or figures of speech. My instantaneous reaction is straight to anger; cussing-out the writers for showing-off, or that they’ve deliberately written it in a way to makes it difficult for pricks like me, struggling with it. Or I just use a dictionary or Google or whatever, to look-up the meanings of the bits I don’t understand, then forget what I read about ten minutes later; which leads me nicely to the next bit on this little journey.
At some point last year, I realised that so much of what I was reading, just wasn’t going in, or it was, but only temporarily. I felt like I was missing out on wisdom or something. I started taking photos and keeping a file of bits that I liked, and I did that for a while until I got obsessed with it and realised, I wasn’t making use of any of those quotes, I was just wasting memory on my phone. So I started underlining stuff as I was going along, and then quickly got obsessed with doing that and began underlining almost everything, to the point where the On Liberty book I was reading, earlier this year, is just covered in biro, now rendering some of the pages unreadable.
So the next step, was to systemically go through and start typing up these quotes, and keeping a file for each book, which I eventually divided into chapters with reference numbers, filling-up pages in a Word doc just covered in quotes.
Typing up the quotes is a long process, and sometimes I get disheartened, wondering why on earth I’m doing this, but it does help me process the information and the rhythmic act of typing, can sometimes help to counter-act the fizziness with something a bit more calm and stable; like swapping the Red Bull and Haribo in your lunch-box, for an Evian and an apple. Not always though….
Currently, I’ve got three different books that I’ve ploughed through and collected quotes from and I’m going to start with Meditations; which is full of goodness, kinda wished I’d known about it when I was younger. I can’t even remember now, how is it I got into reading about Stoicism and Marcus Aurelius’, probably just another rabbit-hole I found myself down in a state of fizziness but realised there’s good some pretty good stuff in it all.
My plan at the moment, is to write one piece for each of the 12 books that make up Mediations, there’s a lot of quotes to choose from. I’ve written one so far, but I’d like to build up a few pieces before I start putting them out on here. No idea what I’ll do after that, maybe tackle On Liberty, which I’ve been thinking about. You can expect to hear from me probably in the new year, but who knows, maybe sooner, depends If I can get this vocal booth up that I’m meant to be building, with my less than basic building skills.
Thanks for sticking with it this year, and supporting what I do, even if you subscribed just because you know me, or some algorithm suggested it and you’ve no idea what the faaack this is; I don’t really know either; but I apricate the time it takes to listen or read.
Whatever it is you’re doing, I hope you’re safe in the world and moving forwards.
Have a banging Christmas and New Year
Keep it larger than life
Peas and taters
Paul
If you’re able to, these are ways you can support my work
THE SUBURBAN BOOK
My 1st book collection of stories and poems
Beats & Elements: A Hip Hop Theatre Trilogy
2 plays I co-wrote plus Denmarked by Conrad Murray
https://paulcree.co.uk/shop/beats-and-elements-a-hip-hop-theatre-trilogy
STREAM TOAST IN THE MACHINE EP
https://paulcree.hearnow.com/toast-in-the-machine
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On Reading Books