SOMETIMES I wonder what happened to the life I was meant to lead. Perhaps someone else walked off with it?
This is not a complaint about my life. Mostly things are good, and certainly less rocky than a few months ago. I’ll spare you the details, but basically I now have a this-and-that portmanteau career-cum-means of survival comprising a part-time job, a spot of guest lecturing and some freelance writing
This is good but it does put my head in a swirl as one spinning plate is swapped for another. Sunday is a day off between the two jobs, and here I am doing what I do, which is sitting down at the laptop.
Post-redundancy that was my world, bashing out words on the Toshiba. Now I like that world and I like that version of me, the man who can sit at home making a living from writing. What a splendid version of me that is, Julian the Writer. Now this template is a true one, the truest one perhaps. Yet Julian the Writer is a broke sort of fellow, not penniless nor even poundless, but impecunious all the same.
Something must be done. I get in the car and go off to work, leaving Julian the Writer behind. He is usually there when I get home. Perhaps he has been there all day, staring at the screen, then tapping out sufficient wordage to be allowed time off for a coffee, a strum of the guitar or lunch with something subtitled on Walter Presents.
I think we all have different versions of ourselves, and the person we are follows one track while the person we thought we were going to be traces a route higher up the hill. This is me and here I am. Up there where the air is thin you will find the other me.
It is good to have various versions of yourself, so long as the different parties don’t fall out. That is my thought for this Sunday. Julian the Writer is still working on two novels someone might one day publish (optimism is sometimes in short supply but never runs out). And Julian the Blogger still sits down four or five times a week to reflect on life, have a rant or share a thought.
But Julian the Husband now must slough off his sweaty running clothes and have a shower before popping over to see the in-laws. Later, Julian the Baker had better set to kneading, for there is no bread in the house.
Now that’s a version of me that I like, someone who writes a bit and bakes a bit. That yeasty man does for me, although one sort of bread doesn’t translate to the other. Hence the need for Getting-Off-His-Arse-Julian to go out and do some proper paid work occasionally
