Pogonophilic Nonsense

Hello. Pogonophilic means 'beard-loving', which will be the theme of this post. Because it's my blog and I can do what I want with it, that's why. Incidentally, you may be interested to know that my browser's spell-checker doesn't recognise the word 'pogonophilic' and, when I right-clicked to see if I'd misspelt it, instead offered me the word 'necrophiliac'. This post will in no way be about that.
I have a beard and I love my beard because it's soft and comforting like a bunny made out of a half-forgotten childhood memory; and because today is the two-year anniversary of the last time I was clean-shaven  I thought I'd commemorate this important milestone by sharing with you a number of the thoughts I've had about the exciting world of beard-wearing in that time.
I suppose I should start off by admitting that mine is not the most spectacular beard in the world, and lends me less gravitas than those of other men and women (I do not ever knowingly discriminate on my blog). My maternal grandfather's beard, for example, made him look like Tsar Nicholas II; mine, by contrast, makes me look like a pokémon that might one day evolve into Brian Blessed. I acknowledge that this particular joke would work better if you could see me, but if you picture a pale creature with the contents of an unblocked bathroom sink's drain glued to its face you'll get a rather close approximation. If you want your image to be more accurate give it a gin-glazed expression and a puerile smirk. Oh, and damn sexy legs, those are an important part of the picture.
I originally grew the beard simply because I'm naturally a rather hairy man and it's a bugger to stay clean-shaven. In fact I'm hairy enough that I was once helping a six-year-old with its maths with my sleeves rolled up when it put down its pencil, stroked my arm and asked me if I was a cat. I'm not.
Despite the fact it's origin came out of practicality and laziness, over these two years my beard has grown on me. (Grown on me! Ha! Oh, what a shining wit I am!) Nowadays I wouldn't be without a beard. There is not a single moment in life when stroking one's beard is not an appropriate response; joy, anger or boredom there's always something it can offer - it's basically the Swiss-army knife of facial features; both because it has many uses and because a lot of the people who resisted Nazism had one. The moments when it is most useful are those in which I am upset or stressed because it's soft and comforting like a kitten made out of Kinder Buenos.
A beard's uses extend beyond being an emotional crutch (which is different from an 'emotional crotch' - my beard has never got drunk, put me in a headlock and shouted about how much it fucking loves me. This is fine, my beard and I have that deep sort of love that goes beyond words. It doesn't need to say anything, I know it loves me; I can tell.)
Like all relationships this one does have its ups and its downs, and its lefts and its rights, and occasionally a sort of spiral motion that makes me dizzy so I have to go have a bit of a sit down and a glass of ribeana (which the browser's spell-checker thinks is me attempting the word 'Caribbean'). The first downside is the fact that when I go drinking, as I am occasionally wont to do, my beard generates an unseemly fascination in some of those around me. I know it's a wonderful symbol of manliness, I know they're incredibly jealous, I know they see that it is soft and comforting like a puppy made out of a mother's love, but can these drunkards not at least ask my permission before they grope my chin? One time a particularly pissed bloke licked it. I felt violated.
But the chief downside is that I now get followed around by the staff whenever I enter a toy shop. I am in fact there because I'm killing time waiting for friends and want a look at the Lego and for all they know I could legitimately have a nephew or niece for whom I need to buy a gift, but no, they take one look at me and think I'm there for a bit of toddler snatch-and-grab! It's not my fault I'm a naturally sweaty man, my house doesn't have a cellar, any sweets I happen to have me are for my own use, and I don't even own a van! But they see the fact my Gillette doesn't get that much use these days and all these valid excuses start being ignored. They never say anything, but they don't have to; I can feel them judging me with their lifeless, glass eyes and mocking me with their neatly upholstered fur. ... I may have got toy shop workers mixed up with teddy bears there, but I think the point still stands.
But despite these minor annoyances I still love my beard because it's soft and comforting like a guinea pig made out of a joke that probably doesn't bear repeating a fourth time.
One hopes you're well,
Yrs,
ADWoodward (and beard)

A Message From Your Friends at the BNP

Hello. As much as anything else recently I've been endeavouring to catch up on the news, particularly political news - solemn duty of all citizens of democracies and all that. This made me remember that I'd written this piece. I thought I'd share it with you because I enjoy it; it's the closest thing to satire I've written. It goes thusly:

A Message From Your Friends at the BNP

I’m here from the BNP to make a party political broadcast. We here at the Belgian Geologists are Nasty party want to warn you about the grave threat Belgian geologists pose to Britain. Belgian geologists – all of them, not just a small minority of extremists – every single Belgian geologist is evil and out to destroy your way of life. Belgian geologists are a naturally backwards and jealous people, it’s ingrained into them at birth. Belgian Geologists - all of them, not just a small minority of extremists – even the little ones you see playing in the park, every single Belgian geologist bases their entire life on one holy book – the Manuel belge de géologie- which if you read it you’ll find is full of gross, outdated barbarisms. I’ve not read it- eugh books- I don’t need to read it, I know it’s evil, my mate Barry told me so.

The Belgian landscape is made up of mud, boredom and occasionally and an irate Colin Farrell, this leaves Belgian geologists very little to study. That means Belgian geologists – all of them, not just a small minority of extremists – even the nice ones at your work - every single Belgian geologist is part of a conspiracy to bring all other geologists down to their level. Now the English are fantastic geologists, as our language exhibits. English contains the word ‘homilite’ which is both an ‘association’ and a ‘borosilicate of iron and calcium’. Belgian geologists don’t have access to such a brilliant word for ‘borosilicate of iron and calcium’, if Belgian geologists want to discuss borosilicates of iron and calcium they can’t use homilite, they have to use another word, a Belgian word. I don’t know what that word is, obviously – I’ve not done any research to back this up. Who needs research when your opinions are informed by blind prejudice and things I’ve barely understood from internet chatrooms? And that’s just one example of the evil of Belgian geologists – which you would all know about if you weren’t blinded by the liberal media who are too cowed by Belgian-geological extremism to bring you the truth! That’s right Belgian geologists – all of them, not just a small minority of extremists - even the ones who are entirely integrated and don’t even know that much about geology - every single one of them believes that if they sneak onto British public transport and suddenly and violently explain the differences between igneous and metamorphic rocks then they will be rewarded with 72 samples of homilites. We can only hope that if it is true there’ll be some great cosmic joke: “I was promised 72 homilites!” Yes but did your holy book state whether they would be borosilicates of iron and calcium, or simply rather fancy synonyms for association?

One hopes you're well,
   Yrs,
      ADWoodward

Smiling Eyes

Hello. In keeping with my self-appointed task of updating this regularly I thought I'd share this with you. I wrote this almost a year and a half ago, but I thought you could enjoy it while I'm working on a few things that should be up here soon.

Smiling Eyes

Oh, shall I see her smile again at me?

She whose eyes sparkle like the starry sky?

Of all things on earth it is this I’d see,

Though offered sun-kissed views that eagles spy.

I’d gladly turn away the wealth of kings,

And eminence I would with scorn deride

If some god would grant my meagre words wings

And give me one more minute by her side.

By what magic might I complete my task,

And so attain this most glorious prize?

Would hiding my oddness with polished mask

Grant the precious gaze of her smiling eyes?

Eyes transfixed by thoughts of such blessed sights

Refuse to close and grant me sleep-filled nights.

But when I do succumb to sleep

I grin in wonder, overjoyed.

I see a vision floating there

With joyous face and smiling eyes.

All nourished by those shining orbs

Of sweet, translucent purity

This fitful sleep I sought so hard

Invigorates my weary limbs,

Electrifies my clouded mind

And sends me springing from my bed.

The energy within that sight,

I sought to keep upon a page

So when my spirit feels like lead

I might return and see her gaze,

And by the things I find therein

Rejuvenate my weighted soul,

And make the world seem good again.

One hopes you're well,
   Yrs,
      ADWoodward

Thunder and Silence

Hello. I have decided, as much to keep in the habit of putting things up here as anything, to share with you a short piece of fiction. If I ever get the time and the idea this might become the opening of something longer; as is I think it's rather good as a piece for its own sake. This started off when the opening sentence came to me in the pub and was written in two spurts of activity across the next few days. It goes thusly:

Thunder and Silence

Thunder crashed around the valley, its echoes shaking the misted glass of the old house. Well-maintained, despite its age, the red bricks of those stoic walls were the only sign of human artistry for a hundred miles around. No broad, flagstoned highways scarred the silent, sylvan, surrounds; indeed no paths at all save the winding, scarce-seen tracks along which wolves stalked the nervous deer. This was a primeval land. No booted foot had dared pick its way through the uninviting undergrowth for three hundred years; not since a grey-robed man had willed a house into existence at the bend of the stampeding river in that sly-shadowed valley.

                Watching the river through the stinging hail, from the warmer side of the lead-fixed panes was a man whose beard now matched the grey of his robe. Lines that had been formed by several lifetimes of studious scowling were being deepened as the man watched the raucous play of the storm-gods with irritated disdain.

                “Go blow yourselves out somewhere else,” he told them in the kind but firm tones of a harassed parent. “Some of us are trying to work.”

There was a pause while the bruise-coloured cloudbank digested this. The next crash, an unobserved observer could imagine, sounded angry and defiant, like a child refusing to accept it was bedtime. A blue-white streak of blistering light flung itself from the petulant sky towards the man and his window. The observer might have thought a lightning bolt would not have been able to look taken aback; they would have been wrong. This one, unused as it was to being stopped by an unseen barrier, managed it quite well.

“Stop that.”

 The words, though calmly said, filled the entire valley. The cloudbank flinched then rumbled sullenly.

“I mean it. Right now.”

The wind suddenly ceased, dropping its hastily-snatched cargo of forest-floor detritus. In the now-thunderless calm the tiny percussive sound of the last few hailstones completing their fall could be heard. The robed man drew breath for another reprimand. The clouds parted instantly and obsequiously, letting a shaft of warm sunlight fall onto the window and the man it framed. He suspiciously regarded the sky for one long moment, harrumphed and returned to the leather armchair and battered scroll he had abandoned.

                He was so engrossed in the arcane spider-scrawl in front of him as to be rendered almost-uninteresting, so the unseen witness might now take this opportunity to leave the wild-haired scholar to his reading and nose about the room, leafing through the draws in search of a spare cigarette. It was cluttered. Books and papers lay where they’d been discarded, half-obscuring the esoteric apparatus that occupied all of the many tables, desks and workbenches. One of the benches was conspicuously free from the academic snowdrifts. It held the studious man’s current project. On this bench, stood under the room’s large sky-light, sat a stone. In the light from the globe hovering a few inches from the ceiling it seemed to have sheen about it. First red, then green, then the blue of deep sunlit waters could be seen from its apparently perfect surface. About the size of a child’s skull, it was held by heavy, black iron vices that were themselves screwed to the work-surface. If stones could escape, someone had ensured this particular one would struggle to do so. If asked what it was, the man would, depending on his mood, answer either “None of your concern,” or “Something fascinatingly dangerous.” If he answered with the latter, he would then indicate the scorch marks along one wall.

                A gnat, bored with aimless flitting, settled itself on the stone. It burst into flame. The smell of a tiny life extinguished without care filled the room and failed to break the man’s concentration. With enough exposure and apathy, people can get used to anything. The light from the globe wasn’t the clearest ever seen, so an observer might have missed the stone’s adding of half a millimetre to its circumference.

                “Jumped-up, new-age rubbish!”

                A scroll, written a hundred years before the birth of the oldest person in the world outside this room, landed in the grate under the undusted mantelpiece where it crumpled despondently. The paper became even more dejected when the robed man felt the evening’s chill and ignited it with a small, precise gesture. The little ember was fed on thought and mild irritation directed down that gesture until a respectable blaze at in the grate, denying all association with the barely-warm little squirt that had recently occupied the space.

                The bewhiskered man turned his attention and his chair towards the workbench. The stone stood still. He frowned. The stone did nothing. He glowered. The stone, if anything, became slightly less animated.

                “Right, you. That’s enough of this brooding-in-the-corner-threatening-the-whole-of-existence business.”

                Two ancient consciousnesses reached decisions, gathered their insurmountable wills and focussed on their opponents. One took a couple of goes to roll up his voluminous sleeves; the other wished it had sleeves to roll up.

                The air in the room took on a dense and pressing aspect, thickening enough to delay the glow from the ceiling-globe and trap the heat from the fire. Sound could not move through that immobile mass. Time was held in place by the full force of millennia of mental mass meeting at high speed. It strained against the steel-clad thoughts blocking its path. The immense wills used the energies of supernovas to force their opponent one proton back.

                The old man felt like one for the first time in centuries; he could no longer spare the energy to maintain his physical strength. The thought that had been sent into the world to create the fire rushed along the psychic highways to defend its native home; the force that had created the house abandoned its colony of mortar to fight for the capital of flesh and bone; the bricks themselves melted to dust then to unbound force to rally the broad-cuffed commander. All reported for duty and promptly charged from synaptic gates to scream their battle cries at the massed opposing legions. An enemy rank fell. Then another. The whole barbarian horde was in full rout! The marshalled thought of three hundred years and more charged across the space and threw its weight at the red-streaked black of the hostile citadel.

                The stone cracked.

                Sleeves fell back to wrists. Now-white hair hung limply down.

                The ancient Sage of the River’s Bend fell backwards and dust settled on his barely rising chest.

                Thunder crashed around the valley and it started to rain.

                                                                                                                                                 

One hopes you're well,
   yrs,
      ADWoodward