Giving up on giving up
Posted by Colin in March's Magazine
Thirty-eight years ago I gave up middle names. Actually it wasn’t really a conscious decision. At birth my mother spared me from the lifetime of the needless indulgence that is having three names instead of two. And every now and again I make a point of thanking her. Because having a middle name is like carrying around an extra hand solely for royal occasions and wrestling with forms.
In fact if a ‘Rupert’, ‘Ivan’ or, god forbid, ‘Ian’ had been sandwiched into my current couplet back in August ‘72, I suspect my parents would have quickly joined forces and defenestrated it forthwith. Probably spitting on its flailing syllables as it fell.
Why ‘defenestrated’? Well, after hearing that word the other day I promised myself I’d use it 459 times between now and April 23rd. Not because I’m a big fan of glassy death plunges. Or seventies rock star excess. The real reason is because it’s Lent. But instead of abstaining I want to indulge. Seriously indulge. Dirty Protest indulgence.
Diet heroin
Now before I go on, a caveat. The seemingly irreligious itinerary I’m about to articulate is in no way a sectarian salvo. Consider it instead to be an homage to the genius of Reginald Iolanthe Perrin as played by Leonard Rossiter in The Fall and Rise of Reggie Perrin. If you thought I was referring to the recent Clunes version, I urge you to do a more efficient John Stonehouse and free us from your appalling taste in sitcom remakes.
When Reggie liberated himself from conformity, his defiance manifested itself in an avalanche of absurdity and whimsy, the perfect two-pronged protest against the puritanical mores of bourgeois conservatism, and that’s what bothers me about Lent. It’s a celebration of smug righteousness, and not the revelatory asceticism it’s often portrayed as. Unless of course, giving up being a smug twat is your chosen form of abstention. In which case I’ll buy Lent a champagne flute of diet heroin.
Anyway, as an unhinged riposte to the orgy of self-denial I thought I’d give up giving up for Lent. By which I mean, for years I’ve been actively not doing stuff. Like actively not ram-raiding fruit shops. Or teaching dogs kung fu. Or making a hat-shaped cake every day. It’s been a lifetime of Lentishness. Now it’s payback time.
So. A warning. There’s a real chance I’ll be indulging in not not doing the following over the next few weeks. You may wish to stay indoors or avoid major landmarks.
1. I am giving up not sending hate mail to pigeons
Pigeons are an easy target I know, quite literally if you’re scooting along in a bus lane and get the angles right. But I can’t deny that, like countless others, I find their grey pecky idiocy to be a major sore point.
And have done for ohhh, all my life. So far, I’ve refrained from deluging their nests with dire warnings of retribution and menacing snaps of hawks, should they continue being pigeons. But now I shall.
2. I am giving up not laughing at accidental street stumbles
You scuff over a kerb and stagger like a drunken insect. Then there’s the perhaps even more mortifying compact knee-lift, drop and indignant turn around you may or may not know as ‘The Norman Wisdom’.
I refer to street stumbles. The convention is to stifle your laughter should you see one. But, just for Lent, I’m going to laugh out loud at them. Assuming of course they don’t result in head injuries.
3. I am giving up not advocating a ban on cod masculinity in pubs
Sometimes you just fancy a pint. Your tongue is punching your throat in frustration. So you hit a bar. Only to see the moment of refreshment spoiled by three tossers acting out the theatrical alpha male thuggery of a 70s Play for Today on BBC Scotland called Just Another Saturday. With anyone who isn’t head-butting doors instantly decried as a poof. It’s depressing. And I’m calling for a ban on it over Lent.
4. I am giving up not smiling suspiciously at people in lifts
Lifts are pish. There I’ve said it. Sorry if this is becoming relentlessly excoriating. But they regularly feature on my dartboard of doom*.
Instead of letting the buggers intimidate me with their claustrophobia-inducing verticality, I’m going to take to smiling oddly at anyone who shares a lift with me. This may result in arrest. But it’ll be worth it. The great unnerved shall become great unnerving. Going down…
That’s my starter for 11 (I’m giving up not saying that for Lent too). Should you wish to add to the pile of bile, I do take requests. Go on. What have you got to lose? Nothing. Me? My marbles, dignity, and self-respect…a small price to pay.
*I don’t actually have a dartboard of doom. It’s a metaphor. But I do have a snooker table of shite. Literally.