nothing good ever comes to the man that stands still

In the sixty three days that I have been absent, inspiration has come and gone and there is very little to fill time in this city. The streets and the buildings are wearing very much thin. And the majority of my days are spent nostalgically trying to recreate moment in which I felt...what one must only describe as hopeless, and drunk.

I pondered for a period of time if office work, as described by London Preppy, was mundane as he eluded, and in truth, it is. But I have come to appreciate the mundaneness of every day living. My life very much runs around my new professional routine. And in the corner shop, I am often mistaken for the opposite of which ever personality I am portraying; the drunk, the suit or the prep.

I lived life, not long ago, very much as a prostitute. Not whoring myself for money (which in hindsight may have been a better idea) but for attention, and the connection. But it is through this that I have realised myself, and have very much secured my position in the Clifton Elite, acquainted with businessmen, waiters and barmen. They say there is no such thing as a free lunch, but I beg to differ.

Had you have asked me sixty two days ago where I would be on the first of June 2012, and the answer would have been anywhere but here. In a way, it still is. However I have grown to realise that professional interests, can quickly overtake personal. And this, like many of us I assume, is something I already grow to regret. There was a time, four years ago, that I promised to leave this city, if only asked by a certain someone, but realistically, real life got in the way.

I have eight boxes on the living room floor, and no pictures on the walls.

On the balcony which hangs from the Georgian façade of my quarter-of-a-million Clifton crash pad I realise that, in the four years I have lived here, so has this bay tree. Each winter it is covered in a thick later of white. And around this time of year, it emerges, unscathed. On the work surface of my desk which now faces the office across the road (The blonde woman there, who sits on Facebook all day, enjoys watching me dress, drink and dance) is: a note with the lists of academic references, scrawled words I can no longer comprehend; a original copy of Newer Sarum 1949, and two books pending review. And I guess what I am trying to say is, Hey. Once this is over, I am all over this.

Do you remember when we drove along Kingsway A259, and we listened to Casey's Song, and the windows where covered in condensation, and the sat nav spoke French. And how we sat in your car for an hour or so, reading and rereading contracts. And the traffic lights on the highstreet by the furniture store, and something with the name Sun?