Why did I not put shoes on? He said to himself as he inspected the bottom of his foot. I mean I walked past the shoes to get outside, I looked at them, ignored them and knew that it was a mistake, but still I didn’t stop.
He pulled the spike out of the flesh inspected it and threw it aside. The blood ooozed out. He was already calculating how much pain he was going to suffer over the next few days, how many pairs of socks he was going to waste because he didn’t put his shoes on. He started to sweat, heart beating quicker, it wasn’t the pain that made his sweat just the annoyance with himself, the worst kind of frustration, his forehead squeezed together and his eyes dimmed. He leant back against the pallet and breathed.
He stood on the stage staring out at the crowd, not really engaging them with his eyes. But not ignoring them. Their eyes, of course were fixed on him, which is kinda unbalanced, but come to think of it even in one on one conversations you hardly ever stare into each others eyes for a sustained period of time. It gets a bit intense if you do.
He fiddled with the mic stand, smiled to himself and called out to the bar through the mic.
‘Ligo neraki parakalo’
The bar man fished into the ice cooler and pulled out two bottles of water, handed them to a friend, who walked them to the stage.
The singer smiled, opened the bottle and started to drink, the cheap plastic collapsed in his grasp and the water started to escape down his chin. He ignored the stream, put his lips back to the mic and spoke again.
‘Water is life… Nero enai zoei’
He threw the half empty bottle into the crowd, turned to the band, bounced his head and went at it.
It wasn’t till later that I started to think about it, his gesture didn’t really scream anything in particular, in the moment I was more captured by the comfort he had on stage, but later I thought about water, about plants and food and us and our everyday need for water. Our constant question of what we need to survive, company, love, friendship, laughter, food. Maybe in the simplest form, if you boil it all down, what we need is water. Water is life.
‘I want to show you something’ Rachel said ‘follow me.’
Rachel led her sister down the steps to the bottom of the garden. There was no clear definition between the end of the garden and the field but after a few paces the semi manicured layout of nature became more random and wild.
‘Where are we going?’ Rachel’s sister complained.
‘Nowhere’ Rachel replied, knowing the quizzical nature of her response would annoy her sister.
‘For gods sake, I don’t really care what you are going to tell me, I don’t care for another lecture, I just want some internet.’
Rachel didn’t reply, she just kept on walking enjoying the process of navigating through the countryside.
After a while the pair arrived at the crest of the hill and peered down the valley. In front of them a mash of purple, yellow and beige lit up the landscape bringing a smile to Rachel’s face. ‘Now what do you think of that little sis?’
There was a pause as Rachel’s sister looked for her words. ‘Okay I like it, it’s nice, it’s pretty, but thats it, I don’t know why you have to walk me for half an hour across the countryside to see a bunch of fields. I can see them on the internet, if I had reception.’
‘But don’t you think it’s nice to see the colours with your eyes?’
hmmmm… Rachel’s sister sighed and sucked in some air through her teeth making a hissing sound, knowing what she was about to say was going to be controversial, ‘I don’t know… I think I am okay it’s nice but I’ve got better things to do, I don’t really care.’ She turned and looked at Rachel, nervous, fearing retaliation from her sister. But Rachel just shook her head, turned back to the view and let the colours in.
Life From the Dirt 