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Oktober
Sicilians are great liars. The best in the world. I'm Sicilian. My father was the world heavy-weight champion of Sicilian liars. From growing up with him I learned the pantomime. There are seventeen different things a guy can do when he lies to give himself away. A guys got seventeen pantomimes. A woman's got twenty, but a guy's got seventeen... but, if you know them, like you know your own face, they beat lie detectors all to hell. Now, what we got here is a little game of show and tell. You don't wanna show me nothin', but you're tellin me everything. I know you know where they are, so tell me before I do some damage you won't walk away from.
[SIZE="1"]Vincenzo Coccotti, True Romance[/SIZE]
On the face of it I was stepping out into a beautiful autumnal day. There again, faces don’t always tell the truth.
I watched sunbeams dance on barely stirring tree-tops as I rushed to haul on my shorts and vest, re-skinning my fingers with my Saucony gloves – just in case - after lacing on my offies. The pavement shuffle from house to downs was positively lovely; semi-warm sunlight, barely a whiff of breeze, just a hint of chill in the air.
Ten minutes later I stood at the first gate (the one that leads into the sheep-fields of Landsport Bottom), ashen faced, involuntary tears ripped from wind-seared eyes to be dragged unceremoniously across the bleached, heartless hillside. Goosebumps the size of Smarties blossomed on my pale, shivering skin as I stared, shell-shocked and in mortal envy, at the heavy, straggly-coated sheep. I sucked in a lungful of freezing air and plunged into the teeth of a bitterly cruel north-easterly. The sun shone it’s hardest in a risible attempt at warmth but it was all a bit like leaving the freezer door open to warm yourself on the puny internal light.
A hard-working eight kilometers later I stood quivering in my kitchen like a lard-laden turkey fresh from said freezer. My daughter looked on, appalled. Surely I should be hot after a run? I smiled, blue lips peeling back to reveal a ghostly, chattering grin, shrugged and made a dash for the hot, stinging kiss of the shower. I do like these outings, if for nothing else than this cherished moment of unbridled bliss, the caress of warm water bringing life to near-dead flesh. This is my True Romance, my secret love; the delicious embrace of the steaming cascade. I stood, head bowed, feeling every searing droplet sting my shoulders and back, watching the muddy water dance and swirl towards the plughole.
Any number of contenders for track du jour this morning as Alice Cooper delivered a steady stream of terrific tunes. Neil Young’s Like A Hurricane is a blistering track and a wonderful example of the mercurial songsmith’s distinctive style. Young’s guitar playing reminds me of that of Hugh Cornwell, the erstwhile Stranglers front man. Both could be said to be imperfect exponents of their art, ‘clumsy’ solos laced with clashing chords and ragged, jangling riffs. There’s no mistaking a Neil Young solo and Hurricane contains a cracking example. I was thrilled to hear the madly manic Doors number, Soul Kitchen, but settled on Bo Diddley’s classic Who Do You Love. This has been covered by any number of rock/ blues artists, perhaps most notably George Thorogood and the Destroyers; this wasn’t that version and the galling thing is I managed to miss Alice announce who it was. No matter; it was (mercifully) heart-warming to hear this wonderful voodoo-slide rhythm n blues thrashed out over bleak, windswept hills.
And on Halloween, too.
I walked forty-seven miles of barbed wire,
I got a cobra snake for a necktie
A brand new house on the road side and it's a-made out of rattlesnake hide
Got a brand new chimney put on top,
and it's a-made out of human skull
Come on take a little walk with me baby, and tell me who do you love?
The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph
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