They keep on moving the goalposts and that’s why we never know if we’ve arrived or not. They keep on redefining our core identity too and so even if we did arrive then that would be no good because we wouldn’t know who it was that had arrived. It wouldn’t be us anyway because before we get from A to B our identity would have been switched, as neat as that, as neat as you please. That’s life anyway so I suppose there’s no point in complaining about it – not that I have any intention of stopping, of course. You’d think they’d allow us a little bit of consistency at least, wouldn’t you?
Life’s a tricky thing and I don’t care who hears me saying it! It sets you up and then it knocks you down; it gives you the thumbs up and then it bloody well pulls the plug on you. Life’s a tricky customer and I’m not afraid to be the one to say it. Someone has to be the one to say that after all. Someone has to be the one. I’m not afraid to tell it like it is, but the truth is that I don’t know how it is. That’s the fly in the ointment, I suppose you could say. That’s the dirty big bluebottle in the Nivea face cream now isn’t it? Just look at the ugly great bastard would you – when was the last time you saw a fly as big as that, for God’s sake? It’s the size of a golf ball and it’s still wriggling around. There’s no telling where it’s been – nowhere that you’d want to know about anyway, that’s for sure! It’s a right dirty bastard.
Life’s a lot like that isn’t it? It’s like a pot of Nivea face cream with a dirty grey bluebottle wallowing in it. You want to defy the visible signs of ageing but you’re afraid to put your fingers anywhere near that dirty old fly because you don’t know where it’s been. You’re afraid to dip your delicate fingers in that pot now, as badly as your face might need it. Life’s a lot like that isn’t it? It’s all so lovely and nice and then you spot the fly in the ointment and you don’t know where it’s been. And do you know what – you can’t get rid of that old fat fly no matter how hard you try. No sir you can’t. And even if you could get rid of it (which you can’t) would you ever be able to look at that pot of cream in the same way?
Go on, dip your finger in it and apply liberally to your cracked and moisture-hungry face. I dare you! God knows you need it, after all. Your face is crying out for it. They’ve change the goalposts again you see and you never spotted it right until right the last minute. All the stuff they told you at school was just a con; it was all just pure moonshine. You’re perplexed and confused. You’re at a loss. You don’t know whether you’re coming or going. You had all your ducks lined up neatly in a row and now have all flown away. They’ve flown away in search of sunnier climes. You can see them far off in the sky, heading south. Life’s a lot trickier than you might think you see. It’s not what they told you at school, that’s for sure. It’s not what they tell you on these online self-development courses either. It’s not what the lifestyle gurus tell us – there isn’t anyone honestly telling it telling us how it is, I’m afraid. Disinformation is the order of the day and it always has been.
You follow your dreams and what do you find? You find that they weren’t your dreams after all. You don’t know whose dreams they were but they certainly weren’t yours! You work hard on actualising your goals then you discover to your horror that they don’t mean anything to you anymore. They just don’t any make sense to you. None of it makes sense – your whole life fails to make sense but you’re trapped in it just the same. You started out as one person but that person is now nowhere to be found – they’ve jumped ship! You started out as one person and now you discover that that person never existed in the first place. They made their plans, they put the goals in place, but they never existed – despite all that damnable obsessiveness, despite all the effort and anxiety. You set the trap for yourself but it was never you in the first place, it wasn’t anybody. You’ve short-changed yourself but there’s no one to blame. You scored a world-class goal but then the next thing is that the crowd is booing you…
