This is some of the writing from my story ‘Follow the Light’
And we are off, bleary-eyed, into the Ayrshire morning. Emmy looks gorgeous, her short blonde hair and a smile that I would never tire of seeing.
My car sitting on the street coughs up a cloud of exhaust fumes as I turn the key. A few commuters on their way to the station do a double-take, but we breeze past them, leaving them choking in our wake.
We get a good run of lights as we hit the dual carriageway. I light up a smoke, and she flicks through the radio until she finds something she likes. The radio crackles to life with one of those old songs you know but can’t quite place.
For a moment, it’s like we aren’t ghosts at all.
We sing along to the chorus. She looks at me, and I look straight back. The engine opens up on the dual carriageway and we are cutting through the Ayrshire morning.
We’re analogue in a digital age; we’re radio in the streaming age.
We are the words written on the page.
And we don’t give a fuck if that’s good enough for you.
In this episode of the Whatever Tomorrow podcast I’ve got a new song ‘Shine’ as well as spoken word in ‘Bus Stop Boogie’ and ‘Let It All Be’
*IN THIS EPISODE:* —
00:00 – Intro Music & Welcome 00:54 – Creative Update: New recordings 03:15 – SPOKEN WORD: “Bus Stop Boogie” 05:05– MUSICAL PERFORMANCE: “Shine” (Original Song) 08:13– A thought on art and interpretation 09:00 – SPOKEN WORD: “Let It All Be” 10:05 – Sign-off & Outro
Bus Stop Boogie
Bus stop in the gentle rain, Waiting, Waiting.
Old couple arguing about something, nipping at each other.
Dressed like they are on a hill-walking expedition in monsoon season for the trip down to the bingo.
Sharing a packet of Wotsits.
The wet grass. Cars rolling by in the street, Turn up the volume, Ian Dury and the Blockheads Burst through my headphones.
And I’m traveling, Borneo, Bordeaux, Fantastique.
Feet tapping, Moving, Near ready to fly. Suddenly, shoulders start going, And the arms,
Like a dad dancing special at a wedding,
I’m moving.
The Missus is over the road walking a dog, Chuckles and gives me a wave. Saxophone solo hits, I give her a wave back.
And I’m moving like Jagger,
Moving smooth like an old soul band, Busting some moves like Sam and Dave, Found the 46-year-old version of the splits, I’m channelling James Brown.
The lights are on at the bus stop, Like a late-night club.
Me and her are dancing together, She always was a great dancer, Natural rhythm, Her perfume.
The dog’s the DJ, Spinning the songs, Looking at us like,
“You got this.”
The old couple are boogying together, They used to do salsa, They announce, “You young ones are missing out,”
They laugh.
As me and my lady dance closer, Slower, As the beat hits,
And we are dancing down The Champs-Élysées, Santa Fe, Troon Bay, Roses and fireworks.
We hear the bus, but it can wait.
At least a beat.
(c) Paul Andrew Sneddon
Let It All Be
I see an advert at the bus stop.
The open road of the USA, highway stretching through Monument Valley.
Nah, I’d rather be here.
On the bus, headphones alive, listening to something real —
like Traquair and the Tranquilizers, or Steve Adams singing, “Have you washed your hands?”
Heading to Irvine beach in the peelywally Scottish sun.
The kind of day you need sunscreen and a hoody, just in case.
The old town is alive with sun seekers, joggers, families and old ones.
Down those old roads, along the harbour.
Smiles at the Hac. I get the feeling that might be my kind of place.
Past the ghost of The Big Idea, drawbridge up.
I’m going to walk from Irvine to Barassie along the beach.
The water slowly rippling in, the sound of seagulls, and the further along you get, the people fade away,
and it almost feels like you are alone.
Arran in the distance, keeping a watchful eye.
Jumping over the streams and sandbanks, the occasional dog sprinting past, chasing his ball.
Sitting on the bench, a cool Wednesday morning. Tony could hear the traffic from there. Up and down Dundonald Road, all day long, the world going about its business.
Here he was, just like every other day.
The smell of flowers and cut grass drifted on the air.
Sandwiches wrapped in cling film beside him, next to his dominoes.
A bottle of Irn Bru by his feet.
The tombstones before him.
And one in particular.
Words like a prisoner, locked inside. But he was here this morning with his notebook, as always. He had pages and pages unwritten.
He had walked along the gravel path, seen dates born on, died on. Some stretched between centuries, some in weeks, days, hours.
He had gone down to the day centre again, but Wally wasn’t there. Just a crowd of unfamiliar faces watching the news. Wally’s seat empty. No one else liked playing dominoes.
The scores were still up on the wall.
Wally 123 — Tony 122.
Fuck’s sake. Cheeky git.
It didn’t feel right being there without him.
So he’d come back here.
In the silence it felt like he was closer to his friend. He reached a hand out in front of him, like it was reaching out across the great divide.
He breathed in deeply and closed his eyes.
He jumped as a school kid raced down the gravel track, disrupting the stones and shouting, “Ehoooooooooooo!”
And in a moment, he was gone.
Tony sighed.
He eyes drifted to the tombstone:
Wallace Douglas
02/03/1984 to 16/05/2024
Beloved son, brother, and husband.
He opened his notebook, held the pen in his hand.
He looked up at the sky as a great cloud rolled in front of the sun. He shivered a little.
He took a domino from the packet.
Just held it.
Or it held him.
He wasn’t sure.
Like an anchor.
A connection.
To a life lived. All those games. Defeats. Triumphs. But mostly,
The chat.
He held the domino in his hand.
They’d played in the pub till he had given up the sauce.
Then, when Wally got ill, the day centre. Then the hospital.
He sat on the bench, in the cemetery with the silence and the stone before him.
He smiled. He knew that there would always be a piece missing from this pack. It had gone with Wally. In his suit pocket. As he lay there in the open casket.
A parting gift from a friend.
He picked up his pen. He wrote:
‘Do the dead see us?
See us in our grief?
Like the other side of a glass partition?
Screaming at us,
“You’ve still got what I’ve lost.
Get up.
Get up.
Get living.
Now.
While you can.
Don’t waste this.”
Or do they place their hand against the glass,
Smile.
Or would it be
You again mate. C’mon to fuck, should you not be playing dominoes ‘
The notebook open, he picked up his bottle of juice, the gas had built up and as he opened the lid it poured out over the top.
He looked up to the sky.
He’d buy a new set of dominoes on the way home today.
Midnight. Midnight is gone. Deep into the heart of the night. Just speeding through the nighttime, past where the streetlights end. The road is quiet.
Got to get home.
Police cars burling past me down the dual carriageway. Lights flashing as I slow down a little.
Stop at the petrol station and fill up. The lady behind the screen is reading the paper, she looks tired but offers a smile. The air is cold and clean; the silence of the night is weighing down the world.
Smell of petrol.
Advertisement for a new radio station on the back of the paper.
I can’t go the radio these days, man. There are no gospel stations singing tired travellers home tonight. No local stations at all. It’s just a voice beamed in from the home of empire, reading out the latest catastrophes.
Or a 100-sound alike stations.
Same songs from Ayrshire to Aberdeen to London to Paris to Kansas fucking city. I can’t tell if that’s a real human voice anymore.
This is my resistance. While I’m still breathing. You can get yourself to fuck.
I can hear the ghosts of late-night Ayrshire.
I’ve got a coffee, got some kind of microwave food. Is it a burger? Is it a pie? It’s something in between. I can’t decide if it smells of death or heaven.
I’m back on the road. Sun coming up in the rearview mirror, calling my missus. I’m coming home.
They got me working late. Night shift, late shift, midnight ramble.
The world gives you nothing. It will strip away everything that matters if it can.
Paul Andrew Sneddon 